17 Facts About Zhang Chao

Zhang Chao was born in 1650 during the Qing dynasty.

Zhang Chao liked chess, calligraphy, and painting and was skilled as a poet of various genres.

Zhang Chao was interested in flowers, birds, fishes and insects.

Zhang Chao's works are rich in imagination and associated with the features of the Qing dynasty.

Zhang Chao wrote Huaying ci, Xinang cunjin, and Yin zhong baxian ling.

One year before he was born, his father Zhang Chao Xikong became a jinshi and went to work in Shandong as an educational inspector.

Zhang Chao grew up in a wealthy family and his education was very strict.

Under his father's influence, Zhang Chao studied diligently from his childhood.

Zhang Chao devoted himself to the imperial examination for some time and he started to write eight-legged essays when he was 13 years old.

Zhang Chao worked as a bureaucrat in the early Kangxi era, but his rank was low and he became disillusioned.

Zhang Chao made a lot of friends who were famous scholars or litterateurs at that time, such as Yu Huai, Kong Shangren, Mei Wending, and Shitao.

Zhang Chao was familiar with writer Dai Mingshi, and spoke highly of him.

Zhang Chao enjoyed collecting books from all over the empire and enjoyed editing and carving books very much.

Zhang Chao kept close contact with a number of famous textual criticism scholars of his day, such as Zhang Erqi and Yan Ruoqu.

Zhang Chao was one of the scholars who accepted western learning relatively early.

Zhang Chao was very interested in western people and language.

Zhang Chao held the view that western medicine, law, and astronomy should be introduced to China.