Guōdiàn Chǔmù Zhújiǎn Lǎozǐ Jiǎ Zǔ 郭店楚墓竹簡老子甲組
Guodian Chu Tomb Bamboo Slip Laozi, Bundle A
About the work
The bamboo-slip version of the Lǎozǐ 老子 (Bundle A, 甲組 Jiǎ Zǔ) from Guōdiàn 郭店 Tomb No. 1, Jīngmén 荊門, Húběi Province, excavated October 1993. The Guōdiàn bamboo slips are the oldest extant witnesses to any recension of the Lǎozǐ, predating the Mǎwángduī silk manuscripts (KR5c0387, KR5c0390) by roughly a century. The tomb was that of an elderly male scholar, possibly a teacher (shīfù 師傅) to a Chǔ royal prince; it has been dated to the latter half of the 4th century BCE (ca. 300 BCE). Three bundles of Lǎozǐ bamboo slips were found in the tomb (A, B, C); this file contains Bundle A, digitised in the Kanripo corpus as 19 consecutively numbered sections (第一章–第十九章). The original slips were written in Chǔ bamboo-slip script; this file transcribes the text in standard Chinese characters. Tu Wei-míng famously compared the Guōdiàn discovery to “the Dead Sea Scrolls.”
The file has no manuscript title; the opening notation 第一章 is a modern editorial addition.
Prefaces
No prefaces or paratexts. The bamboo slips open immediately with the text of the first section.
Abstract
Discovery. Guōdiàn Tomb No. 1 was excavated in October 1993 by the Jīngmén City Museum (荊門市博物館) in a Chǔ-period tomb complex near the village of Guōdiàn, nine kilometres north of Ying 郢, the ancient Chǔ capital. The tomb owner cannot be identified by name but was clearly a high-status scholar with access to a substantial library. The crown prince associated with the tomb has been identified as Prince Héng 橫, later King Qīngxiāng 頃襄王 of Chǔ (r. 298–263 BCE), dating the burial to ca. 300 BCE. The Lǎozǐ slips were among 804 bamboo slips (730 intact) bearing approximately 12,072 characters, covering 18 distinct works across philosophical traditions.
Physical description. The three Lǎozǐ bundles were written in three different hands on slip sets of different dimensions, suggesting they did not form a unified text. Bundle A (甲組) is the largest set, with approximately 39 slips bearing around 1,000 characters. Bundles B (乙組) and C (丙組) are shorter, with roughly 18 and 14 slips respectively. The slip texts were first published with photographs, transcription, and notes in Guōdiàn Chǔmù zhúshū 郭店楚墓竹書 (Jīngmén shì bówùguǎn 荊門市博物館, Wénwù chūbǎnshè 文物出版社, 1998).
Content of Bundle A. The 19 sections in this file correspond to the following chapters in the received Lǎozǐ (Wáng Bì edition, 81 chapters):
| KR5c0392 | Received ch. | Opening words (Guōdiàn version) |
|---|---|---|
| 第一章 | 19 | 絕聖棄辯，民利百倍 |
| 第二章 | 66 | 江海所以為百谷王 |
| 第三章 | 46 | 罪莫厚於甚欲 |
| 第四章 | 30 | 以道佐人主者 |
| 第五章 | 15 | 古之善為士者 |
| 第六章 | 64 (latter half) | 為之者敗之，執之者失之 |
| 第七章 | 37 | 道恒亡為也，侯王如能守之 |
| 第八章 | 63 | 為亡為，事亡事，味亡味 |
| 第九章 | 2 | 天下皆知美之為美也 |
| 第十章 | 32 | 道恒亡名，樸 |
| 第十一章 | 25 | 有狀混成，先天地生 |
| 第十二章 | 5 + 16 | 天地之間，其猶橐籥與 |
| 第十三章 | 64 (former half) | 其安也，易持也 |
| 第十四章 | 56 | 知之者弗言，言之者弗知 |
| 第十五章 | 57 | 以正之邦，以奇用兵 |
| 第十六章 | 55 | 含德之厚者，比於赤子 |
| 第十七章 | 44 | 名與身，孰親？ |
| 第十八章 | 40 | 返也者，道之動也 |
| 第十九章 | 9 | 持而浧之，不若其已 |
The order differs substantially from the received text; chapters 70–81 of the received text are entirely absent, suggesting they may not yet have been composed or were not part of the tradition known to the Guōdiàn tomb owner.
Key textual variants. The Guōdiàn text consistently shows variants that depart from both the received tradition and the Mǎwángduī recensions. Notable examples: Ch. 1 has 絕聖棄辯 and 絕偽棄詐 where the received text reads 絕聖棄智 and 絕仁棄義; Ch. 11 has 有狀混成 where the received text has 有物混成. These variants have been central to debates about whether the Lǎozǐ was anti-Confucian from the beginning or became so in later redaction (the 絕仁棄義 variant being the most discussed: the Guōdiàn version’s 絕偽棄詐 lacks the direct attack on Confucian virtues).
Relationship to the other two bundles. Bundles B and C cover different portions of the received text (B: received chs. 59, 48, 20; C: chs. 17, 18, 35, 31, 64 part) and show overlapping passages with Bundle A, confirming that the three bundles are not three sequential instalments but distinct collections of passages, possibly assembled for different pedagogical purposes. Neither Bundle B nor Bundle C is digitised separately in the Kanripo corpus as of this writing.
Significance for Lǎozǐ studies. The Guōdiàn Lǎozǐ demonstrated that a substantial portion of the Lǎozǐ was in circulation by ca. 300 BCE, effectively ruling out Hàn-dynasty composition for the core text and firmly establishing a Warring States date. The non-continuous, bundle-based structure raised questions about whether the text was assembled from pre-existing chapters rather than composed as a unified whole. Together with the Mǎwángduī manuscripts, the Guōdiàn find revolutionised Lǎozǐ scholarship; see Wilkinson §29.4.2.1 for a concise survey.
Dating. The bamboo slips were deposited ca. 300 BCE; the composition of the passages may be earlier (4th–5th century BCE for core material). The bracket notBefore: -400, notAfter: -300 reflects the range from plausible composition of the earliest layers to the tomb’s sealing.
Translations and research
- Henricks, Robert G. 2000. Lao Tzu’s Tao Te Ching: A Translation of the Startling New Documents Found at Guodian. Columbia UP. (Bilingual English-Chinese; the first complete English translation of the Guōdiàn Lǎozǐ.)
- Cook, Scott. 2012. The Bamboo Texts of Guodian: A Study and Complete Translation. 2 vols. Cornell East Asia Series. University of Hawai’i Press. (Definitive study-and-translation; vol. 1 covers the Lǎozǐ bundles extensively.)
- Allan, Sarah, and Crispin Williams, eds. 2000. The Guodian Laozi: Proceedings of the International Conference, Dartmouth College, May 1998. Society for the Study of Early China / IEAS, Birdtrack Press. (Review: Scott Cook in CRI 9.1 [2002]: 54–64.)
- Peng Hào 彭浩. 2000. Guōdiàn Chǔjiǎn Lǎozǐ jiào dú 郭店楚簡老子校讀. Húběi rénmín.
- Cui Rényi 崔仁义. 1998. Jīngmén Guōdiàn Chǔjiǎn Lǎozǐ yánjiū 荆门郭店楚简老子研究. Kēxué.
- Shaughnessy, Edward. 2005. “The Guodian Manuscripts and Their Place in the Twentieth-Century Historiography on the Laozi.” HJAS 65.2: 417–57.
- Chan, Shirley, ed. 2019. Dao Companion to the Excavated Guodian Bamboo Manuscripts. Springer.
- Mathieu, Rémi. 2008. Lao tseu, Le Daode jing. Médicis-Entrelacs. (Three complete versions: Wáng Bì, Mǎwángduī, Guōdiàn.)
- Jīngménshì Bówùguǎn 荊門市博物館. 1998. Guōdiàn Chǔmù zhúshū 郭店楚墓竹書. Wénwù chūbǎnshè. (Primary publication.)
Other points of interest
The absence of the final eleven chapters (received chs. 70–81) from the Guōdiàn corpus has led some scholars to propose that these chapters were composed or added to the Lǎozǐ corpus after ca. 300 BCE, possibly as part of the Hàn-period editorial process that produced the 81-chapter canonical form. This hypothesis remains debated: others argue that chapters 70–81 simply were not deposited with this particular tomb owner.