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Primary sourceBookc. 200-168 BCE

Mawangdui Silk Texts of the Laozi

Anonymous Han scribes · c. 200-168 BCE

Two complete early Han silk manuscripts of the Laozi, with the De section placed before the Dao section.

An early, complete silk copy of the text attributed to Laozi, showing its original structure.

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Photograph of a long, damaged strip of silk-like manuscript with rows of dark brown Chinese characters in vertical columns on a tan background, with numbered column labels below (15 上, 13 上, 11 上, 9 上, 7 上, 5 上, 3 上, 1 上). The strip is torn and fragmented, with a red seal mark near the lower right.
Mawangdui Silk Texts, Laozi manuscript B, before 168 BCE. Hunan Museum.

About this source

What it is

These two silk manuscripts, copied by anonymous Han scribes around 200-168 BCE, contain complete early versions of the text attributed to Laozi. They were found in a Han tomb and are now held at the Hunan Museum.

Why it matters

The Mawangdui texts show the Laozi in a form close to its earliest known state, including a different chapter order from the familiar version used today. Comparing them with the Guodian bamboo slips helps scholars trace how the book attributed to Laozi changed and grew over time.

Look closer

  • Why might the order of chapters in a text matter to how it is understood?
  • What can comparing two versions of the same text tell us about its history?
  • Why do you think this text was buried with the dead?

This book is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Laozi on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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Photograph of a long vertical manuscript fragment with brown, degraded edges, written in black ink in columns of seal-script-style Chinese characters separated by faint red ruling lines. Light patches and damage are visible across the surface.Book

Secondary source

Tao Te Ching

Laozi · c. 4th-3rd century BCE

Partial view of a museum display of thin bamboo slips standing upright in a row, each with vertical Chinese characters. Printed black text on white panels in front of the slips reads in columns.Artifact

Primary source

Bamboo Texts of Guodian

c. 300 BCE

Photograph of a handwritten classical Chinese manuscript page in vertical columns of brush-written characters on aged paper, with a title line at the top right reading as a chapter heading from the Zhuangzi.Book

Secondary source

Zhuangzi

Zhuang Zhou · c. 300 BCE

Faded fresco on a tan plastered wall showing several robed figures standing in a row, painted in green, grey and black tones, with a blue painted band at the top. Part of the fresco is worn and discolored.Painting

Secondary source

Confucius and Laozi fresco, Dongping tomb

Anonymous Chinese painter of the Western Han period · Western Han period, c. 2000 years old

An open old Chinese woodblock-printed book in a museum display case, with vertical columns of black characters on yellowed paper. A Chinese caption card below reads 呂氏春秋 (Lüshi Chunqiu).Book

Secondary source

Lüshi Chunqiu

Lü Buwei (compiler) · c. 239 BCE

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