Dibao (ancient Chinese gazette)

Dibao (Chinese: 邸報; pinyin: dǐbào; Wade–Giles: ti³-pao⁴), literally "reports from the [official] residences", were a type of publications issued by central and local governments in imperial China. While closest in form and function to gazettes in the Western world, they have also been called "palace reports" or "imperial bulletins". Different sources place their first publication as early as the Han Dynasty (206 BC–220 AD) or as late as the Tang Dynasty (June 18, 618–June 4, 907). They contained official announcements and news, and were intended to be seen only by bureaucrats (and a given Dibao might only be intended for a certain subset of bureaucrats). Selected items from a gazette might then be conveyed to local citizenry by word of mouth and/or posted announcements. Frequency of publication varied widely over time and place. Before the invention of moveable type printing they were hand-written or printed with engraved wooden blocks. The introduction of European-style Chinese language newspapers, along with the growing intersection of Chinese and global affairs generally, applied pressure for the Dibao to adapt, and circulation of the Beijing Gazette was in the tens of thousands by the time publication ceased altogether with the fall of the Qing Dynasty in 1911. The gazettes from Beijing at this time were known as Jingbao (京報), literally "reports from the capital".

See also

• Kaiyuan Za Bao
• List of the earliest newspapers
• Neican

External links

• [1], Canadian Library Journal, 1992
• Mitchell Stephens, History of Newspapers For Collier's Encyclopedia