A magnum opus' death of a thousand cuts

A bare fragment of great canon remains after it was slowly dismembered over several centuries

To the same degree that the compilation over just five years of the 11,095 volumes of the Great Canon of the Yongle Era and their ensuing transcription was a stupendous feat of research and craftsmanship, the loss of the great bulk of that work over several centuries is a thumping indictment of some of man's worst excesses, including greed and theft.

As a result, what should be a glimmering jewel of culture reposing in a Chinese institution for all the world to wonder at was scattered to the four winds, one or two bits held here and another one or two bits there, but the vast bulk of it simply lost. Instead the world has been left to wonder what happened to it all.