Explanation of terms of Qianjia School

The Qianjia School refers to an academic school in the Qing Dynasty, famous for its research on various aspects of ancient Chinese social history. Because the school reached its peak during the Qianlong and Jiaqing dynasties, it got its name. Generally speaking, among the Qianjia Schools, the "Wu School" headed by Huidong and the "Wan School" headed by Dai Zhen had the greatest influence. The style of study of the Wu School is to collect the scriptures and sayings of Han Confucianism and to clarify and prove them. Its characteristic is that it "believes only in the Han Dynasty", that is, it respects the classics of the Han Dynasty, follows the study of the classics of the Han Dynasty, and pays attention to the tradition of exegesis of famous objects and regulations and systems. Everything that belongs to Sinology will be adopted and explained in a clear way. The main scholars of the Wu School include Shen Tong, Jiang Sheng, Yu Xiaoke, Jiang Fan, Wang Mingsheng, etc. The Anhui School attaches great importance to the textual research of the system of names and objects in the Three Rites (i.e., "Zhou Rites", "Yili", and "Book of Rites"). The characteristic of this school is that it starts from phonology and primary school (i.e. philology), and judges and understands the content and meaning of ancient books through characters and phonology, that is, using language and philology as a way to treat classics. They made many contributions in writing, phonology and other aspects. In addition, the Anhui School also attached great importance to ideas and theories, as exemplified by Dai Zhen's "Explanation of the Meanings of Mencius' Characters". Dai Zhen had many students, among whom Duan Yucai and Wang Niansun and Wang Yinzhi were the most famous.