LIU Ci-yuan，MA Li-ping

（National Time Service Center, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xi’an, Shaanxi 710600, China） 

Abstract:Mr. Zhu Wen-xin was the first scholar who studied all the solar-eclipse records in Chinese history with modern astronomical computation, and he published the book An Examination on Historic Records of Solar Eclipse. His work created a new and important field in the study of Chinese history of astronomy. In this paper the content and academic value of the book An Examination on Historic Records of Solar Eclipse is introduced and the statistic results of the records from various investigators are compared, as well as the eclipse records of the Western Han, which contain quite many mistakes, are investigated to continue Mr. Zhu′s work. The analysis in this paper shows that many mistaken records of the Western Han were derived from other correct ones. The further analysis shows that the original records only included the items of year and month, whereas the sixgecimal days and solar positions were added after the mistakes took place.

Key words：history of astronomy；solar eclipse；astronomical records；Zhu Wen-xin