Li Lincan and Dongba Script Literature
This tribute traces the pioneering contributions of Li Lincan ("Mr. Moso") to Naxi Dongba-script studies across three areas: his 1939-1943 fieldwork collecting 1,231 Dongba scriptures around Lijiang and his 1957 Six Moso Classics, Translated and Annotated; his co-compilation (with He Cai and linguist Chang Kun) of the 2,120-character Moso Hieroglyphic Dictionary (1944) and his 1956 cataloguing of 3,038 Dongba volumes at the U.S. Library of Congress, where he corrected the prior count and pioneered colophon-dating research, finding a scripture dated to 1668; and his foundational theoretical work on the pictographic-to-writing transitional nature of Dongba script, its likely Tang-to-Ming-era origin based on borrowed Tibetan letters, its probable birthplace along the Wuliang River inferred from the script's density gradient, and religion as the primary driver of its origin and development.
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