The archives administration of China's northwestern Gansu Province recently collected 120 historical documents from private collectors, the oldest of which is nearly 300 years old.

All the documents dated back to the Qing Dynasty, which lasted from 1644 to 1911 and was the last imperial dynasty in China's history, said Wang Haizhou, an official with the provincial archives.

According to Wang, these records were largely legible and well preserved despite the passage of time.

"The oldest document was drafted in 1705, the 44th year under the rein of Emperor Kang Xi, the longest ruling emperor in Chinese history, and the most recent document dated back to 1911, or the third year under the rein of China's last emperor," Wang acknowledged.

A preliminary study shows the documents were all official records of the local government of Qinzhou, today's Tianshui city and Longnan area in the southern part of the province.

"Some papers were bills of indictments, and others were official statements of taxes, applications for land reclamation, grain prices and meteorological records," said Wang, whose organization is sorting out the documents and mounting them for better preservation.

Experts say that these records, which portray the social and political life in the northwestern province, will provide firsthand evidence for researchers to study the legal systems, economic development and folk culture of the Qing Dynasty.
 
(Xinhua News Agency May 26, 2004)