Spring and Autumn Annals

Both the Book of Han and the Records of the Grand Historian provide detailed accounts of the origins of the three texts.

The Gongyang and Guliang commentaries were compiled during the 2nd-century BC, although modern scholars had suggested they probably incorporate earlier written and oral traditions of explanation from the period of Warring States.

[4] During the late Han dynasty, there was a saying that the Guoyu was an "Outer Commentary" to the Spring and Autumn Annals.

[7] The Annals' terse style was interpreted as Confucius' deliberate attempt to convey "lofty principles in subtle words" (微言大義; wēiyán dàyì).

[1] Not all scholars accepted this explanation: Tang dynasty historiographer Liu Zhiji believed the Commentary of Zuo was far superior to the Annals, and Song dynasty prime minister Wang Anshi famously dismissed the Annals as "a fragmentary court gazette" (斷爛朝報; duànlàn cháobào).

[1] Some Western scholars have given similar evaluations: the French sinologist Édouard Chavannes referred to the Annals as "an arid and dead chronicle".

19th-century replica of Du Yu 's 3rd-century CE annotated Annals
An excerpt from the Spring and Autumn Annals carved on a surviving slab of the "Zhengshi Stone Classics" (正始石經, also known as the "Santi Stone Classics" 三體石經), dated to the year 241, now located in the Luoyang Museum . The "Zhengshi Stone Classics" are almost completely lost, only except for a few remnants.
The beginning of the Spring and Autumn Annals from a later printed edition
Pages of the Spring and Autumn Annals from an early 17th century printed edition in Japan
Russian translation, 1876