A major exhibition of ancient documents and historical materials discovered during the early 20th century opened at the National Library of China in Beijing on Wednesday.

The exhibition covers an area of nearly 3,000 square meters, and gathers together 382 precious cultural relics and ancient documents divided into 249 categories.

Oracle bone inscriptions from the Yin-Shang culture dating back 3,000 years, bamboo slips from the Han Dynasty (202 B.C.-220 A.D.) unearthed in a fortress, manuscripts and records in multiple languages from the 4th to the 11th centuries discovered at the Mogao Grottoes in 1900, and cultural relics stored in the royal cabinet libraries of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) are all on display at the exhibition, which covers some of the greatest discoveries of ancient documents and historical materials in China.

Among the oracle bone inscriptions showcased at the exhibition is an exquisitely carved rabbit figure on a section of turtle plastron, the largest piece of oracle bone work in the collection at the national library measuring 43.5 cm long by 24 cm wide and bearing a total of 218 characters.

Since oracle bone inscriptions vividly illustrate the origins of Chinese characters, including the pictographic and pictophonetic characters and associative compounds, the exhibition also has many interactive audiovisual installations to offer visitors an immersive cultural experience.

In another part of the exhibition, bamboo slips unearthed from the Juyan Fortress in northwest China's Gansu Province record how the soldiers garrisoned along the northern border of the Han Dynasty studied calendars and mathematics. Mistakes in the additions and wrongly written characters suggest that these slips were examples of homework, archeologists speculated. 

Also from Gansu Province, manuscripts and other volumes discovered at the Mogao Grottoes include rare translated Buddhist scriptures and popular novels, demonstrating the diversity of Dunhuang culture that incorporated elements from both East and West.

In an exhibition hall themed around the royal archives of the Ming and Qing dynasties, a dazzling array of government documents, ancient maps and historical books are on display, including a golden box that held the emperor's instructions and orders, and a copy of the list of top imperial examination winners during the Qing Dynasty.

The collection is the largest and most complete archive of ancient dynasties in Chinese history, recording the social development and history of the two dynasties from multiple perspectives.