Jao Tsung I

Jao Tsung-I was a Hong Kong-based Chinese sinologist, calligrapher and painter. He was born in Xiangqiao, Chaoshan, China in 1917. He was home-schooled and self-taught, and wrote his first scholarly work at the age of 14. He taught at several universities and institutions in China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, France, and the United States. He was also an honorary professor at many prestigious Chinese universities. He was a versatile and prolific scholar, who contributed to many fields of humanities, such as history, archaeology, epigraphy, folklores, religion, art history, musicology, literature, and Near Eastern Studies. He published more than 100 books and about 1,000 academic articles over his career. He was especially renowned for his research on Dunhuang Studies and the history of Central Asia. He also translated the Akkadian creation myth into Chinese. He was considered one of China's greatest humanities academics by his contemporaries. He received many awards and honors, including the Grand Bauhinia Medal, the highest honour bestowed by the Hong Kong government. He died of natural causes in Hong Kong in 2018 at the age of 100.