Ban Gu
From Free net encyclopedia
Ban Gu (班固, Wade-Giles Pan Ku; 32-92) was a 1st century CE Chinese historian. He was born into a scholarly family, and his father, Ban Biao, was a prominent historian. Ban Gu took over from his father responsibility for writing a history of the Former Han Dynasty, a book known in modern times as the Hanshu (漢書, or The Book of Han). However, Ban Gu's work on the Hanshu was interrupted by political problems - his association with the family of Empress Dowager Dou led to his imprisonment and death (either by execution or torture). His book, however, was completed by his sister, Ban Zhao, and became a model for many other works about later dynasties.
Ban also wrote in the main poetic genre of the Han, a kind of poetry interspersed with prose called rhapsody or fu (T: 賦 S: 赋). Some are anthologized by Xiao Tong in his Wen Xuan.
Ban's family:
See also
- Sima Qian, a Chinese historian of the 1st century BCETemplate:China-bio-stub