"Robert Morrison (1782-1834), was the first Protestant missionary to work in China, representing the London Missionary Society. He arrived in 1807 and worked in Guangzhou as a translator for the East India Company, and later accompanied Lord Amherst’s mission to Beijing in 1816. Morrison's dictionary in its various editions is much sought-after in its own right and the first comprehensive one in English. Containing both contemporary and ancient character forms, with encyclopedic definitions and many long excerpts from the classics and histories, it is a monumental work of three parts in six volumes (bound as three), printed in folio, by one of the pioneers of the Protestant mission in China and one of the earliest translators of the entire Bible into Chinese (1819)".

"Imperial proscriptions against Christianity compelled Morrison to restrict his work to literary studies in Macau, where he also translated pamphlets on Christian faith, prayers, and catechism. Morrison wanted to promote appreciation of Chinese culture and improve Anglo-Chinese relations, and urged both Cambridge and Oxford Universities to create departments of Chinese, even offering his library for the purpose. Though rejected at the time, both universities soon afterward established Chairs of Chinese Studies. This dictionary was one of the basic tools for study of the Chinese language. Even today it is an important source for lexical and linguistic studies of spoken Chinese of the late 18th –early 19th centuries." [Display placard]