A Study of the Unofficially Selected Poems in Pre-Qin Dynasty

According to Si Maqian,there were 3000 poems in Pre-Qin Dynasty,and nine of the tenth were deleted by Confucius.Based on historical records and unearthed literature,we can determin that the number of unofficially selected poems from the Western Zhou Dynasty to the Spring and Autumn Period were less than 30.Most of the 104 unofficially selected poems in Mu Gen Tie were not poems in the period of The Book of Songs.Most of the unofficially selected poems we have found today were not deleted from The Book of Songs,and the remark about Confucius deleted poems is not true.The are three reasons which lead to the appearance of the unofficially selected poems: firstly,a part of them are works from ancient times to Xia and Shang Dynasty,or works during the period of Warring States;secondly,some of them were written in the period of The Book of Songs,but they were never selected in it,that is to say,they are not poems deleted from The Book of Songs,but failed to be selected;thirdly,there were some poems actually being selected in The Book of Songs,but being deleted from it later for some reasons,and then become unofficially selected poems.