羅香林出生日期考辨

羅香林先生為當代史學名家，其生平與學術，研究者甚多。惜其出生日期，眾說紛紜，而能留意及此者，極為少見。本文為此網羅學術文章、工具書，以及主要互聯網頁之種種說法，表列異同，以突顯其混亂。先生出生日期之所以分歧，未嘗不因先生而起。蓋因先生於不同階段，所用出生日期或歲數，並不相同。研究者不明究竟，徒執一說，歧異自生。本文作者博覽先生著述、證書、履歷、族譜及有關機構之檔案，考訂其訛誤，從而得悉目前最流行之1906年10月19日說，不過是先生1949年南來香港以後始用。至其出生日期，應為光緒三十年九月十一日（1904年10月19日）或光緒三十一年九月十一日（1905年10月9日）。

關鍵字

羅香林；出生日期；香港大學；興寧

並列摘要

Lo Hsiang-lin was an eminent contemporary historian. Ever since his lifetime, there have been hundreds of articles on his life and scholarship. However, there are many versions of the date of his birth and unfortunately only very few people have noticed those discrepancies. This article attempts to identify the most reliable version of Lo's birthday. In reviewing all available versions including those appeared in printed academic writings, research tools, and major websites, the present authors find that the chaotic phenomenon concerning Lo's date of birth to a large extent owes its origin from Lo himself. This is because Lo used different dates of birth or years of age at different stages of his life. Most researchers only pick conveniently one version from one particular source and fail to notice the existence of conflicting versions in other sources. In order to exhaust all the available versions of Lo's date of birth and to find out which version is the most reliable, the authors have gone through Lo's works, letters, certificates, curriculum vitae, as well as genealogical records of the Lo's clan and various archives of the institutes which Lo was affiliated. The authors find that the most prevailing version is October 19, 1906, but this date was actually only used by Lo subsequent to his exodus from China into Hong Kong after 1949. The most reliable date of birth of Lo is, however, the eleventh day of the ninth moon of either the thirtieth year or the thirty-first year of Emperor Kuang-hsu's reign, i.e., October 19, 1904 or October 9, 1905.