Bukūri Yongšon: The Manchu Foundation Myth

Greetings from the Manchu Studies Group! We have a special gift for you. 

Almost fourteen years ago, Dr. Loretta Kim, then a graduate student at Harvard, worked with students in her Manchu A class to read and translate the Manchu Origin Myth story at the beginning of Manzhou shilu. Not satisfied with only reading and translating the Manchu version into English, they went further to translate the story in many modern languages and recorded their voices out loud.

Fourteen years later, Dr. Kim and the class alumni, with the help of many others, have produced a fine illustrated e-book that features translations of the Bukūri Yongšon myth in Modern Mandarin, Modern Cantonese, Korean, and Turkish to complement the Manchu/literary Chinese versions, including illustrations intended to appeal for an audience of 0 to 99 years old. They have also kindly offered to share this book with the Manjuristics community at large, free of charge.

To hear more about the story and ideas behind this book, listen to a recording of a zoom conversation between Dr. Kim and Dr. He Bian:

To download and read this wonderful illustrated book, please use the following links (note that the book is designed to be read in E-Book format using the .mobi file – you can transfer the file to an E-Book reader like Kindle or use the free Kindle for PC app):

We hope that this book will bring smiles to many of you around the world. May the divine Saksaha show us the path forward at a moment of profound hope and uncertainty around the world!