For those who are interested in viewing the world's earliest excavated Sun Tzu Art of War book, you may visit the Ancient Han book and Tomb Museum at Linyi Mt. Yinque in Shandong province (山东临沂银雀山汉墓竹简博物馆).

In 1972, the earliest Sun Tzu's Art of War (Sunzi Bingfa) and Sun Bin's Art of War (Sunbin Bingfa) were excavated in a Han dynasty tomb. The achaeological discovery resolved the mystery over who was the author of Sun Tzu's Art of War (it was previously thought that Sun Bin was the author of Sun Tzu's Art of War)

Here are some of the pictures at the Museum

Museum of Han Tomb and Excavation



Earliest Sun Tzu's Art of War (Sunzi Bingfa 孙子兵法) from Han period (notice they are in fragmented bamboo pieces)




Sun Bin Art of War (Sunbin Bingfa 孙膑兵法)


I might want to visit this museum some day.

is that text 隸書? or is that something else?

Yes..it's more likely to be Li Shu 隸書 (Clerical Script) of the Han dynasty.

WICKED COOL!

Thats incredible! That must be at least 1800 years old! Very impressive. That would indeed be a very interesting trip.

Hi GZ,
When at Suzhou for the Sunzi BinFa meeting I met an archaeologist who excavated this 'Art of War' and the curator of the museum that houses the collection. My wife spoke with them a lot, and a group from Shangdong, but I was only able to speak briefly (and talked about weapons instead). I was told later that the museum houses reproductions and while this isn't made clear the originals are stored underground and out of site. This is quite common with lacquerware and perishable objects and rather a problem in Chinese museums where it is not made clear.
Some museums label objects 'reproduction' but others do not. The quality of the copies of bronzes I have seen can vary from perfect to poor quality. It was one source of annoyance to me at one point where I saw a jian with the name 'Ganjiang' on it which was clearly a copy, but there was no info where the original was. Unfortunately some museums do not seem to bother explaining which objects are real and which are not.
Check, contact the museum, before making a trip. There is a better collection to see in Shangdong I was told about...but you need to make an apointment.
Here is a pic. My wife would know all their names. The Sunzi Binfa archaeologist is the woman on the far right. I am in there. Spot the laowai. There is a Singaporean-Malaysian businessman/author, a Kungfu and Taichi master (brothers, plus a wife) both brothers named 'Sun' (as in Sunzi) Stephen Selby (traditional archery and Chinese script expert) as well as a couple of PLA folk. The guy in red was an airforce man (PLAAF), but his personal name was 'Navy' so they joked with him about that. There were rather a lot of military folk there, several Chinese generals as well as active and retired oficers from other nations.