In 1406 the Yongle emperor commissioned a new edition of the Daoist canon and placed the forty-third Celestial Master, Zhang Yuchu, at the head of the work. The compilation outlasted both men: completed and printed under the Zhengtong emperor in 1445, the Zhengtong Daozang gathered some 5,300 scrolls, and because the woodblocks survived at the White Cloud Temple, this Ming canon, and no earlier one, is the Daozang the tradition still reads.
Tagged: Celestial Masters and Zhengyi Daoism
The Event
- Date
- 1406-1408 (exact)
- Also called
- Zhengtong Daozang
- Era
- The Ming Canons; Standard periodization of Daoist history
- Location
- Nanjing, the Ming capital; today Nanjing, Jiangsu, China
- Traditions
- Daoism
- Streams
- Celestial Masters and Zhengyi
- Key figures
- Emperor Yongle of Ming, Zhang Yuchu
- Key texts
- Zhengtong Daozang
Primary Sources
- The Yongle commission for the Daoist Canon.
Secondary Sources
- Kohn, Livia, ed. Daoism Handbook. Brill, 2000.
- Little, Stephen, and Shawn Eichman. Taoism and the Arts of China. Art Institute of Chicago, 2000.
Provenance: HIST-0813; confidence 0.95; accessed 2026-10-28.
Related on This Site
Art Tradition
Daoism and Confucianism
Temple imagery, ritual painting, ancestor tablets, and the syncretism of the three teachings.
History Event
Cultural Revolution suppression
1966-1976
History Event
Daozang catalogued
748
History Event
Laozi canonized as Tang imperial ancestor
666
History Event
Laozi deified
166 CE
History Event
Post-Mao revival
1980s
History Event
Wanli Daozang
1607
History Event
Zhang Daoling; Celestial Masters
142 CE