James Legge (1815-97) was a missionary and sinologist. He was the first Professor of Chinese at Oxford University, 1876-97. Details are given in the Dictionary of National Biography.

The collection consists of:

• Papers relating to his role as Professor of Chinese, including lectures delivered, notebooks, translations, drafts of a Chinese-English phrase book and dictionary
• Papers of Legge and his family, consisting of a copy of a 20th-century journal kept by Hannah Mary Johnston before her marriage to Legge, autobiographical notes by Legge, and miscellaneous Legge family papers.

The papers were given to the Library in 1983.

Entry to read in the Library is permitted only on presentation of a valid reader's card (for admissions procedures see http://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/services/admissions/).

A full description is available in the Library.

Chinese language | Dictionaries | English

Chinese literature | Translations into English

Legge | James | 1815-1897 | Missionary and Sinologist

University of Oxford

China | History