All seats were occupied, and many had to lean against handrails or find a space in corridors at a ceremony at Peking University honoring the 100th anniversary of Wang Zhongmin, a late professor's birthday.
Among them were old scholars in their eighties, middle-aged teachers and young students who admired Wang's academic achievement and came to share the celebrations for the teacher.
Wang, who was born in 1903 and died in 1975, had been well known both home and abroad for his deep research on philology and Dunhuang, an area of caves holding ancient wall paintings in northwest China's Gansu Province.
Devoting all his life to philological directory study, Dunhuangand index compilation, Wang was praised as a founder of the compilation science for the country's modern science documents, inaddition to his landmark contributions to Dunhuang study.
"Master Wang died, but his cause will remain with us," said a scholar attending the ceremony.
In 1956, Wang was elected the first dean of the university's library science department, which led the country's studies for the next half century.
"Wang made outstanding contributions to China's philology," Lin Jiuxiang, vice president of the university, said at his opening speech.
During his early years, Wang took great efforts to collect rareancient Chinese documents scattered in western libraries, which now helps the country's history studies.
The department was re-named the Department of Information Management in the 1990s and has since introduced digital-based courses. Under the leadership of incumbent dean Wang Yuguang, the department ranked first in national appraisal in 2001.
Under a generally economic-oriented shadow across China, philology and library science have been snubbed because they mainly engage in ancient Chinese culture studies.
But some major Beijing-based media still come to report and more than 100 experts from China, France, the United Kingdom and Japan assembled in the Chinese capital expressing their admirationfor Wang.
"China's library cause is far from good enough, it needs more efforts," said Yu Guangyuan, an 89-year-old professor from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and also Wang's colleague in the 1950s.
The ceremony will last for two days at the university, which iswidely reputed as China's best for liberal arts and sciences.
(Xinhua News Agency September 19, 2003)
