35 Facts About Xia Nai

Xia Nai was the second son of Xia Yuyi who was a wealthy farmer.

Xia was given the first name of Guodong but later requested to be named Nai and styled himself as Ming when he became an intellectual upon secondary education.

Xia Nai majored in Economic History at Tsinghua University in Beijing, winning a scholarship to study abroad.

Thanks to his contributions to Chinese and world archaeology, Xia Nai was one of the most honoured Chinese scholars in academe, receiving memberships from the British Academy, the German Archaeological Institute, the Swedish Royal Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities, the US Academy of Sciences, the Third World Academy of Sciences, The International Association for Mediterranean and Oriental Studies, etc.

Xia Nai attended sishu, primary school and secondary school in his hometown of Wenzhou and went to Shanghai in 1927 to attend high school.

Xia Nai attended Yenching University after his high school graduation in 1930 and transferred to Tsinghua University the following year.

Xia Nai studied economic history and was awarded the Bachelor of Arts in 1934 and earned a scholarship to study abroad.

Xia Nai left for his studies at University College London in June 1935 and arrived in the United Kingdom in September later that year.

Xia Nai pointed out how Yetts could not read Chinese when a student raised a question during a lecture and how he struggled to comprehend dynastic jargon when analyzing the authenticity of an original record by the Qing imperial court kept in the British Museum.

Xia Nai accumulated a handful of field experience in archaeology by participating in Wheeler's excavation at Maiden Castle in Dorset in July 1936 and returned to London in September later that year.

Xia Nai participated in the British's excavation project in Armant, Egypt and Tell Duweir, Palestine.

Xia Nai visited Petrie during his time in Palestine as the latter was recovering in a hospital in Jerusalem.

However, Xia Nai spent a year conducting Egyptology research at the Cairo Museum for almost a year and only arrived at Kunming, China in 1941.

Xia Nai's research discussed the material, typology, use, arrangement and pictorial representation of the beads in relation to the nine divisions of the Ancient Egyptian dynasties.

Xia Nai proposed a new method to categorize the beads thus coming up with the first-ever comprehensive bead corpus to have included ancient Egyptian beads from all periods dated before the Arab conquest of Egypt.

Xia Nai came up with a classification method that is based on the 'group of material' which subdivided into two groups of 'decorated' and 'undecorated'.

Xia Nai justified that his classification method was both scientific and systematic after evaluating the pros and cons of other pre-existing beads classification methods by Horace C Beck, George Reisner, Guy Brunton and Hermann Junker.

However, it should be pointed out that Xia Nai has always been devoted to Chinese archaeology and he originally intended to pursue archaeology instead of Egyptology.

Similarly, the tense political situation in China prevented Xia Nai from conducting Egyptological research.

Xia Nai joined the staff of the Central Museum upon his return to China.

Xia Nai joined the subsequently formed Department of Archeology of the Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica and became the director in 1948.

Xia Nai chose to stay in China when the institution moved to Taiwan in 1949, anticipating the defeat of the Kuomintang by the Chinese Communist Party in the Chinese Civil War.

Xia Nai briefly went back to his home province to teach at the Zhejiang University.

Xia Nai was keen on passing on his excavation skills and techniques to his students as he once taught them that the success of an archeologist is not determined by what he or she manages to discover but the method of how he or she recovers artifacts.

Xia Nai joined the CCP in 1959 and was elected as a deputy to the second to sixth National People's Congress.

Apart from actively heading archeological excavations, Xia Nai started publishing the first Chinese archeological journals, Kaogu and Kaogu Tongxun in 1966 and had taken up the position of editor in chief.

Hence, throughout the Cultural Revolution, Xia Nai was paraded with the others in public and had his belongings such as his diaries confiscated by the Red Guards.

Xia Nai was finally released in 1971 upon being deemed 'fit' by authorities and resumed his archaeological work.

Xia Nai edited numerous Chinese archaeological publications including the Report of the Excavation in the Hui District and the Report of the Excavation in Changsha before the Cultural Revolution.

Xia Nai later became the First President of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in 1982.

Xia Nai contributed greatly to the preservation of Chinese artifacts by advising the drafting of the Cultural Relics Protection Law, pointing out the section of 'Relics Trade' should be discarded as it directly contradicts the law's intention to protect relics.

The opening up of China in the 1970s allowed Xia Nai to reunite with his teachers and conduct exchanges with fellow foreign scholars.

Xia Nai brought back his knowledge in Egyptology and archaeology from his time studying in the United Kingdom to assist his archaeological work in China.

Xia Nai is considered to be the 'first wave' of Chinese Egyptological researchers whose importance lies in his ability to set himself as a pioneer of the Egyptological field.

Xia Nai serves as an inspiration for future generations and reminds them of the importance of the Chinese perspective in contribution to 'a new understanding' of ancient Egypt.