Mr. Wang's interest in the study of China's ancient history began in his high school days. At that time, he read the photocopied Historical Records under the guidance of Chinese teacher Cheng Jinzao, and read Liang Qichao's historical works under the influence of his uncle Wang Zilin. Because I don't agree with Liang's point of view, the time when Sima Qian wrote Historical Records became a textual research on the time when Sima Qian wrote Historical Records, which proved that it was three years after Yuanfeng. I'm sorry that the manuscript was scattered all over the place, but it was not included in the Collection of Ancient History. But I also saw Mr. Wang's academic characteristics of being good at finding problems, thinking independently and not blindly following everyone.

Mr. Wang's academic foundation was laid during the period of Peking University and The National SouthWest Associated University. At Peking University, he listened to Qian Mu's lecture on the ancient history of China, read through "Country and Left" and wrote several papers. Zhong Er was inspected at that time. After the end of War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, Peking University, Tsinghua University and Nankai University merged to form Kunming National Southwest Associated University. Mr. Wang went to Yunnan to learn from Mr. Feng Youlan, Mr. Wen Yiduo, Mr. Luo Changpei, Mr. Wei, Mr. Wang, Mr. Wang, Mr. Wang, Mr. Wang studied the History of China Philosophy, Mr. Zhuangzi, The Book of Songs, The Songs of Chu, the Annotations on Phonology and Ancient Chinese Characters. In the class of Zhuangzi, he wrote an article commenting on Who is the Author of the Theory of Homology of Things, denying Mr. Fu's statement that the author of the Theory of Homology of Things thinks it is a Shinto. This article was well received by Gu Jiegang, Feng Youlan and Wen Yiduo, but Mr. Fu was unhappy and said that Mr. Wang liked to write about his conviction. This turmoil actually affected Mr. Wang's application for postgraduate studies at Peking University College of Literature, and he was finally admitted only as a candidate. This academic review article was deeply hidden by Mr. Wang, and it was only seen for the first time in the Collection of Ancient History.

During his stay at Peking University College of Literature, Mr. Wang's tutor changed from Mr. Fu to Mr. Wang, and he made an in-depth study of ancient philology. Under the guidance of Mr. Tang, he completed the first and second volumes of the Song Dynasty manuscripts and completed his graduation thesis "Examination of Galaxies". Teacher Wang is good at the fields of historical geography and national history, and The Examination of Galaxies has really been published! This article was not published publicly, but it was published by Oracle Bone Inscriptions, namely Oracle Bone Inscriptions, Taiyuan in the Western Zhou Dynasty, Luoyang, Haojing, Fang Jing and Wang Di. Since then, many of Mr. Wang's papers have been based on "the investigation of galaxies". Not only "Ghost Fang Kao" (won the Academic Invention Award 1945) is the continuation of this article, but also the articles discussing the origin of Shang nationality, the origin of Zhou nationality, the hometown of Chu nationality and its migration route follow and develop the ideas and methods of this article.

After liberation, Mr. Wang accepted and studied the historical materialism, began to study the social history of Shang and Zhou Dynasties, and wrote a paper on the social nature of Shang Dynasty before Western Zhou Dynasty. During the period of 1978, Mr. Wang participated in the "Seminar on the Staging of the Ancient History of China" held by historical research and China social science front in Changchun, and read out the article "People's Identity in the Spring and Autumn Period of the Western Zhou Dynasty", proposing that the Western Zhou Dynasty was an early feudal society. This theory has had a great influence in academic circles.

Although Mr. Wang, born in 1980s, is over 70 years old, he is healthy and diligent in his studies, and he is unaware of the approaching age. He has made many achievements in the field of ancient national history and cultural history, and put forward his own views on many major historical events in the process of writing the book Historical Draft of Pre-Qin Dynasty. He also wrote several macro or theoretical articles based on years of academic experience, such as "Ethnic Issues in Ancient History of China", "On Rong Di in Pre-Qin Period and His Relationship with China" and "Historical Role of Western Zhou Countries". The 37 articles assembled in the Collection of Ancient History can basically reflect Mr. Wang's above-mentioned road of studying ancient history for more than 60 years. In addition, these articles also show readers his research methods and academic spirit.

Mr. Wang's research on ancient history mainly focuses on ancient national history, historical geography and social formation. His achievements in these fields have been valued and recognized by academic circles. When reading Collection of Ancient History, the author thinks that Mr. Wang Can agrees on many issues because he adopts scientific and correct research methods. I don't want to be superficial now, just give a brief introduction.

First of all, when Mr. Wang studies a certain problem, he must first accurately and comprehensively understand the materials, methods and final conclusions adopted by his predecessors. After analyzing the existing theories one by one, I put forward my own views. Learning is like accumulating wages, and then coming from behind. Mr. Wang explores where his predecessors stopped, so he can make every article in the Collection of Ancient History "innovative" (see Mr. Wang's postscript). When Mr. Wang talks about predecessors' theories in his articles, he often lists several treasures. I want to take an interesting article "Ming Yi in Ji Zi" and North Korea as examples. Mr. Wang pointed out that the "Ji Zi Yi Ming" in the Book of Changes is the story of King Wu sealing Ji Zi of North Korea. "Ming" is actually the "dynasty" of ancient Chinese characters in China. But since the Han dynasty, many scholars have not figured it out. Mr. Wang said that some people don't know Ji Zi. For example, Zhao Bin, a Han Chinese, thought Ji Zi was Xunzi, A Qing Huidong said Xunzi, and Jiao Xun understood it as his son. The word Ming Yi was also taken apart to explain. The word "Ming enters the ground" in the Warring States and the word "Ming is above, Ming is below" in Xiang and Shu in the Tang Dynasty made Mr. Gu Jiegang hesitate to explain this word. Only Mr. Wang realized that it was a word, but he didn't really define its meaning. Mr. Wang pointed out that Ming characters in Oracle Bone Inscriptions were simplified to Chao characters, and quoted materials from Ming Dow to make readers give up the old theory and understand the sentences in Yijing. If the great scholar Huang Zongxi is reincarnated, he will be renamed "Ming Yi to be visited"!

Secondly, when studying a certain problem, Mr. Wang Can demonstrated it from many aspects, which is good and completely convincing. For example, the article "The Origin of Shang Nationality" argues that Shang nationality originated in the East. In order to illustrate this problem, he cited five evidences: the totem belief of the Shang nationality, the ancestral home of the Shang nationality in the distant sea, the struggle between Wang Hai and You Yi, the prospect of the Shang and Bo, the spread of Bo place names and the migration of the Shang nationality, and proved the origin of the Shang nationality from the archaeological Dawenkou culture and Longshan culture. In this paper and many other papers, Mr. Wang not only used the materials and methods of ancient philology, phonology, archaeology and ethnology, but also showed a solid academic foundation and good academic accomplishment. This also shows that scholars who study ancient history should have multidisciplinary knowledge, or work together with multidisciplinary scholars from different aspects to promote the discussion of difficult problems in ancient history and further solve them.

Thirdly, when studying a problem, Mr. Wang paid special attention to the logic of history and the development of things, and made reasonable assumptions, which provided the key for the study of difficult problems. For example, Mr. Wang's article "Oracle Bone Inscriptions is a Legend of Ghosts and Ghosts" points out that Fang was a powerful country in Shang Dynasty, but there was no trace of Zhou Dynasty, which is very puzzling. It is likely that the name of this country changed in the Zhou Dynasty. However, as a powerful country in the south of Shanxi, the ancestors of armadillos are very unclear. It can be inferred that it is a square. After analyzing Oracle Bone Inscriptions, inscriptions and documents, Mr. Wang confirmed his idea. For another example, when explaining the word "Chao" in Oracle Bone Inscriptions and the Middle School, Mr. Wang quoted several Oracle Bone Inscriptions with months, pointing out that if the word is still interpreted as "spring", then June, September, November, December and March all become spring, which is unreasonable. Therefore, he reflected on the theory that most scholars did not doubt, and put forward the "tide" theory. Paying attention to logic and clear concepts are the characteristics of Mr. Wang's writing, which also enables other scholars and readers to review his research process, which is quite beneficial to peers and later scholars.

Finally, Mr. Wang's thorough argumentation on many issues is inseparable from the continuity and cohesion of his research on ancient history. For example, Mr. Wang is good at studying ancient national history and historical geography, which benefits from his in-depth study of ghosts. The problems involved in Armadillo, such as the scenery of Luoyang and Taiyuan in the Zhou Dynasty, made him very familiar with the geography of Shanxi and the activities of ancient tribes in the pre-Qin period. Later, I became familiar with the discussion on the origin of the clan in Shanxi Province. Another example is that Mr. Wang has made a special discussion on the hometown of Chu people and their migration routes. Therefore, when discussing the issue of Duke Zhou's going to Chu, he thought that Chu was still between Shandong and Jiangsu at this time, so he had to draw the conclusion that Chu was related to the Eastern Expedition. When Mr. Wang demonstrated the social form of Shang and Zhou Dynasties, his ideas were also in the same strain. For example, he thinks that the inheritance of Shang Dynasty is mainly younger brothers and sisters, which reflects the remnants of matriarchal social system in patriarchal society. With this view, when constructing the lineage of the pre-Zhou Dynasty, it is naturally associated with the situation that the ancestors of the Zhou Dynasty also had brothers. It can be said that Mr. Wang's concentration on several topics has profound academic support and set an example for later learning. Because Mr. Wang has scientific research methods, he pays special attention to the authenticity of historical research. He advocates taking history as a mirror, but emphasizes seeking truth. He said: "one of the minimum necessary conditions of historical science is to seek truth." Only the truth of history can be used as a reference. If historical facts are untrue, history will become meaningless. "Teacher Wang has this idea, so he has unique insights on many issues, and can correct his previous views with the discovery of new materials, neither blindly following others nor sticking to his own ideas. As mentioned above, Mr. Wang loved literature and history in middle school. He has demonstrated it according to historical materials, not blindly following everyone's spirit. In his later academic career, he did not agree with Mr. Fu Sinian's statement that Shen Dao was the author of The Theory of Everything. When I was a graduate student, I denied Mr. Wang Guowei's theory that Ghost Fang, Kun Yi and Armadillo were one family, living in the west or northeast respectively and including the west. Later, I discussed with Mr. Gu Jiegang and affirmed that the three supervisors in the early Zhou Dynasty were Guan, Cai and Huo, excluding Wu Geng. When Mr. Wang changed the word "Spring" interpreted by Yu Xiansheng to "Chao", he always adhered to this attitude. Although Mr. Fu, Mr. Wang, Mr. Gu and Mr. Yu are all great scholars that Mr. Wang has always respected and admired, he still takes the historical truth as an example and dares to put forward his own opinions without following the precedent of his predecessors. This spirit is a good example for future study. Like many accomplished scholars, Mr. Wang has the courage to correct his previous views. For example, in the article "Examining Ghosts", he once advocated that ghost culture is higher than ghost culture, and cited ghost culture as an example. After seeing 1980 the inscription "All have Ding" found in Chang 'an County, Shaanxi Province, I immediately corrected the previous statement and admitted the above mistakes. In the investigation of the ghost side, I quoted the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, saying that the emperor cut the ghost side and defeated it in three years, thinking that Wuding's national strength was strong and it would take three years to conquer the ghost side, which shows that the ghost side is strong. Later, Mr. Wang realized that there would not be a large-scale war that lasted for three years in the Yin and Shang Dynasties, so he pointed out in the article "A Supplementary Examination of Ghost Prescriptions" that the original view was very wrong, and three of the "three years of grams" should be regarded as a calendar year. "Ghost prescription" is a scientific research achievement that won the academic invention award. Mr. Wang has not forgotten to revise and supplement for decades, which is also a manifestation of cherishing his academic crystallization.

To sum up, The Collection of Ancient History is a masterpiece of Mr. Wang's research on academic essence for more than 60 years, which is not only convenient for scholars studying ancient history to browse for reference, but also provides many methods and attitudes worthy of reference for future research. In the postscript, Mr. Wang said that the publication of this book can make the academic circles criticize and verify his academic achievements again, which shows that he welcomes readers to discuss the issues discussed in the book again. In recent years, new historical materials of Shang and Zhou Dynasties have been unearthed. As a post-school student and reader, the author is willing to study these materials with Mr. Wang and further explore some problems in the history of Shang and Zhou Dynasties.