i-ching
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䷝ The Clinging Fire
What public domain translations and commentaries are available?
The translation from Chinese into English by James Legge (1815 – 1897), The Yî King (1882) as published in Sacred Books of the East, vol. XVI. (2nd edition 1899) is in the public domain and available via archive.org. It appears to be the only significant English translation that is currently in the public domain. There is a parallel Chinese/English edition 《易經 - Yi Jing》 hosted at the Chinese Text Project using the Legge translation.
The German translation and commentary by Richard Wilhelm (1873 – 1930), I Ging Das Buch der Wandlungen (1924) is in the public domain and available via Projekt Gutenberg. Wilhelm’s translation from Chinese into German was translated into English as The I Ching or Book of Changes (1950) by Cary Baynes (1883 – 1977) and should enter the public domain in 2045 (95 years after publication or possibly earlier?)
Wilhelm’s translation has provided the basis for translation into several other European languages. Which, if any, of these are in the public domain?
The earliest complete published translation into a European language was the Latin translation by the French Jesuit missionary Jean-Baptiste Régis in the 1730s, referred to by James Legge in Notions of the Chinese concerning God and the Spirits (1852)
In French, par Paul-Louis-Félix Philastre (1837-1902) Les Cinq Livres canoniques ou Grands Kings. Première édition, Ernest LEROUX, Paris, 1885.
The French translations of Charles de Harlez (1832-1899) are compiled in Le Livre des mutations (1959) by Raymond de Becker. First published in French in Brussels in 1889 (with a revised edition in 1897) and translated into English by J.P. Val d'Eremao in 1896.
They appear in 'The Asiatic Quarterly Review'
- Vol. VII, No. 14 (April, 1894), pp 386–395
- Vol. VIII, No. 15 (July, 1894), pp 107–116.
- Vol. IX, No. 17 (January, 1895), pp 117–132 (hexagrams 1 to 11)
- Vol. X, No. 19 (July, 1895), pp 107–122 (hexagrams 12 to 30)
- Vol. II, No. 3 (July, 1896), pp 115–129 (hexagrams 53 to 64)
Le Yi King ou le livre des changements de la dynastie de Tséou trans. Tséou Yi was published 1885-1893.
The Dutch translation of Wilhelm by A. Hochberg-van Wallinga as I Tjing. Het Boek der Veranderingen (1e druk verscheen in 1953)
Zhouyi Yinde 周 易 引 得 (‘A Concordance to Yi Ching’), Harvard-Yenching Institute Sinological Index Series, Supplement No. 10, October 1935. Peiping (Beijing), China.