德国波鸿鲁尔大学东亚学系《物料價值則例》數據庫

This is a revised and enlarged version of the Databases on the Qing dynasty compilation on Prices and Wages in Public Construction Wuliao jiazhi zeli
(物料價值則例 “Regulations and precedents on prices of materials”). It has been reworked at the Section for History of China of the Faculty of East Asian Studies at Ruhr-Universität Bochum.

The original project, “Staat, Handwerk und Gewerbe in Peking, 1700-1900” (DFG-Project VO 472/10-1), was conducted at the Seminar for Chinese and Korean Studies of Tübingen University in cooperation with the Institute for the History of Natural Sciences of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, and the Institute for the History of Science and Technology and Ancient Documents of Tsinghua University, Beijing.

The prices and wages in these statistics were used for settling the accounts for the building projects of provincial administrations with the Ministry for Public Works. They quote the rates which the provincial governments could request to be reimbursed by the central government. According to the prefatory edicts, they reflect market prices at medium market activity, but some are also indicated as extrapolations from earlier prices. Since the rediscovery of these statistics in the project, numerous studies have been based on this source. Researchers are referred to these studies for further explanations on the function and meaning of the Wuliao jiazhi zeli statistics.

The databases compiled so far cover the provinces Zhili, Gansu, Shanxi, Hunan, Yunnan, and Jiangsu.