Ancient writings, modern conceptions of authorship. Reflections on some historical processes that shaped the oldest extant mathematical sources from ancient China

International audienceThe oldest extant mathematical writing in Chinese handed down through the written tradition is the book The Nine Chapters on Mathematical Procedures, probably compiled in the 1st century A. D. Two facts about it are puzzling. First, there is no material evidence that the book existed as separate from later commentary, especially the one of Liu Hui, completed in 263, and the annotations compiled by Li Chunfeng, completed in 656. Second, the earliest testimony attributes its compilation to two authors who lived more than a century apart. The first part of this paper is an attempt to account at least partly for these facts. I show that the scriptural act that produced The Nine Chapters was not that of writing, but that of editing. I suggest that its early editors conceived of the text as a Canon, the text of which had been damaged through transmission. In their view, editing was the act appropriate to restore the scripture to its original state. The text of the medical Canon, the Internal Classic of the Yellow Emperor, provides a parallel. As a result, for the book The Nine Chapters as we have it today, it may be anachronistic to look for an author. In a second part, I argue that the 7th century commentary testifies to a shift in the conception of authorship and consequently in the way of handling writings of the past in the editorial work