Historian Hsu Cho-yun dies at 94

Taipei, Aug. 4 (CNA) Historian Hsu Cho-yun (許倬雲), a correspondence research fellow at Academia Sinica's Institute of History and Philology, has died in the United States at 94, Taiwan's top research institution confirmed in a statement Monday.

Hsu's death Sunday (U.S. time) was also confirmed by the Tang Prize Foundation in Taipei, which in 2024 honored the historian as a laureate in Sinology.

They praised his "holistic approach to the study of ancient Chinese history, seamlessly integrating an exploration of cultural and intellectual exchanges between China and the world."

Born in the Chinese city of Xiamen on Sept. 2, 1930, Hsu attended National Taiwan University (NTU), where he got bachelor's and master's degrees in history, and he obtained his doctoral degree from the University of Chicago in 1962, according to Academia Sinica.

He returned to teach at NTU in 1962 and chaired the Department of History from 1964 to 1970, before moving to the U.S. and starting what turned into a three-decade career at the University of Pittsburgh.

Hsu was elected as an Academia Sinica academician in Taiwan in 1980 and appointed professor emeritus by the University of Pittsburgh in 1999.

The U.S. university praised him for his "wide-ranging and influential body of work on Chinese history and culture" after he was named the recipient of the Tang Prize in Sinology in June last year.

"Hsu advocated for 'network theory,' using transportation networks to tell the story of long-term social and economic trends, and he also performed comparative research comparing Chinese history to Europe, ancient Egyptian and Mesopotamian civilizations and other regions," the University of Pittsburgh said at the time.

Hsu published a range of works, among them "Ancient China in Transition: An Analysis of Social Mobility, 722-222 B.C," "Han Agriculture: The Formation of Early Chinese Agrarian Economy, 206 B.C.-A.D. 220," and "American Life: A Humanistic Perspective of a Chinese Historian," the Tang Prize Foundation noted on its website.

Hsu, who was born with limited mobility, had "lost the ability to use all but two of his fingers," but he still continued to do research "with the aid of assistive technology and a helper," the University of Pittsburgh said when he was awarded the Tang Prize last year.

Academia Sinica did not provide the cause of death in its statement, nor did the Tang Prize Foundation.