The Institute for Chinese Ancient Legal Documents of China University of Political Science and Law, was founded in November 1984.It is not only the first academic institution established in China, specializing in the collation and research of ancient legal documents, but also currently the only one in all the colleges and universities affiliated to the Ministry of Education.This institute is the direct contact unit of the National Commission for the Collation of Ancient Documents of Colleges and Universities of the Ministry of Education. The Institute aims to collect, collate and study ancient legal documents, to inherit the essence of Chinese legal culture, and to revitalize and boost the traditional learning.The institute’s first director was Prof. Gao Chao, second director was Prof. Ma Jianshi, third director was Prof. Xu Shihong, fourth director was Prof. Li Xuemei, and now the acting director is Prof. Zhao Jing. At present, the institute has 14 members in total, including 2 professors, 6 associate professors, 4 lecturers, 1 administrative secretary and 1 academic secretary; among them, 12 members have the doctors’ degree,five of whom have completed their researches  in post-doctoral mobile stations and 2 members have the masters’ degree; there are 2 doctoral supervisors and 8 master supervisors. Their professional knowledge background involves many first-class subjects，such as law, history, literature, and philosophy.

This institute has focused on the collation and research of ancient legal documents for a long time, and has formed characteristic research position on both the handed down and unearthed legal documents, thus has received attention and recognition from the academic community.The institute has undertaken nearly 100 various scientific research projects,and many collective works, as these projects’ achievements, including Chinese Ancient Law Dictionary, Annotations and Translations of Legal Treatises of Chinese Successive Dynasties,  Comprehensive Studies, Revisions and Annotations to Great Qing’s Statutes and Sub-statutes, Mengshuizhai-Cundu, Complete Works of Shen Jiaben(8 volumes), Introduction to Ancient Chinese Legal Documents, and the Institute’s annual publication Journal of Chinese Ancient Legal Literature Studies, as well as other works, have been highly praised. All the members of the institute have gained comparatively influential achievements in the research fields of legal codes of succesive dynasties, Bamboo Slips of Qin and Han Dynasties, inscriptions on metals and stones,for example, they won the third prize of the 6th and 8th Excellent Achievement Award in Science Research of Colleges and Universities (Humanities and Social Sciences), the first prize of the 4th Qian Duansheng Law Research Achievement Award, the first prize of the 14th Beijing Philosophy and Social Science Excellent Achievement Award, the second prize of the 7th Wu Yuzhang Humanities and Social Sciences Excellence Award, and the 10th Deng Guangming Academic Reward Fund and so on, the state has become a unique academic force in our university and even colleges and universities, and have a certain influence in our peers.

The institute maintains its development and innovation of education and discipline construction. Since 1980s,the Institute has recruited Candidates for master degree of legal history（the direction of legal Philology had been separately set up）.Since 2004,it has recruited Candidates for doctor degree in legal history.Since 2012,it has recruited Candidates for master degrees of three subjects, namely the Historical Philology, the Ancient Chinese History and the Specialized History, under the discipline of Chinese History, and has offered more than 40 various courses;For the past few years, the institute has presided over many disciplines and curriculums construction projects, including the first batch of national first-class undergraduate courses (offline courses) “Chinese Legal History Seminar”, university-level interdisciplinary “Legal Philology”, university-level key discipline “Chinese Historical Philology”,university-level ideological and political construction demonstration course “Legal Civilization in Cultural Relics” and the Seminar “Traditional Culture and State Governance”and postgraduate Course “Legal Philology” and “Ancient Stone Inscriptions”, and postgraduate interdisciplinary courses such as “Legal Cultural Relics and Image Research”.The institute has formed a tradition in terms of study on historical materials (the Seminar courses “Research on Basic Historical Materials of Chinese legal History”, “Research on Legal Document Carved on Stones” and “Research on Tang’s Code”  have been set up continuously.) and practical teaching, and its teaching characteristics and quality have seen a remarkable improvement.

The Institute attaches great importance to close links with domestic and oversea academic circles, and scholars from Japan, South Korea, France, Germany and other countries visited the institute and gave lectures; The institute has signed academic exchanges and cooperation agreements with the Historiographical Institute of Japan Kogakkan University, Institute of Human Sciences of Kyoto University, and Department of Sinology and East Asia Institute of University of Münster and other institutions.

The Institute positively promotes pro-bono academic projects, and is constructing the “Virtual Museum of Chinese legal civilization”, updates the “Legal Cultural Relics Calendar” on the official account every day, and carries forward the splendid traditional culture by means of holding significant academic conferences, seminars, and public academic exhibitions, so as to make great contribution to the society with its professional expertise.