Think of the Daozang as a vast tapestry woven over centuries—each editor adding new colors, patterns and texts. The first—and arguably most influential—hand at this loom was Lu Xiujing (406–477). Under the Liang court, he organized hundreds of Taoist scriptures into the famous “Three Caverns” structure, laying down the spine of what would become the canonical Daoist library.

Fast-forward to the Northern Song dynasty, and Zhang Junfang (979–1038) emerges as a crucial curator. Tasked with revising and expanding Lu Xiujing’s work, Zhang sifted through local temple collections and private manuscripts, polishing the canon’s organization and ensuring more seamless access for practitioners. His Song-era Daozang added dozens of newly transcribed texts, reflecting a period when Taoism was reinventing itself to meet the needs of both imperial patrons and grassroots believers.

Then came the Ming dynasty’s grand reboot. Driven by imperial ambition—and under the sponsorship of Zhu Di, the Yongle Emperor—a massive editorial commission gathered around 1444. Led by noted Taoist scholars (including Zhang Sicheng and members of the Commission of Rites), this team ballooned the canon to over 1,400 works across nearly 5,000 juan. It wasn’t just bureaucratic box-ticking: these editors scoured monasteries from Nanjing to the remote temples of Sichuan, preserving rare ritual manuals and Taoist poetry that might otherwise have vanished.

More recently, digital humanities projects—like the Shanghai Library’s ongoing Daozang digitization initiative launched in 2020—are following in those footsteps, cataloging variants and restoring damaged scrolls with 21st-century tools. Just as Lu Xiujing built the original “three caverns” framework, and Song and Ming editors filled in its niches, today’s scholars are ensuring that this ancient treasury stays alive—and new threads keep getting woven into the ever-growing tapestry of Taoist tradition.