James Legge

James Legge (1815–1897) was born in Huntly, Aberdeenshire, and ordained a Congregationalist missionary before spending nearly three decades, from 1843, based in Hong Kong. There he undertook a translation of the Chinese classics far more systematic than any before it, publishing The Chinese Classics in five bilingual volumes (1861–72) with extensive notes and prolegomena, followed by further volumes of Confucian and Taoist texts, including the Tao Te Ching, for Max Müller's Sacred Books of the East series (1879–91). In 1876 he became Oxford's first professor of Chinese, a post he held until his death.