Yuefu

…in 125 bce of the Yuefu, or Music Bureau, which had been established at least a century earlier to collect songs and their musical scores. Besides temple and court compositions of ceremonial verse, this office succeeded in preserving a number of songs sung or chanted by the ordinary people, including…

… takes its name from the Yuefu (“Music Bureau”) created in 120 bc by Wudi of Han for the purpose of collecting songs and their musical scores for ceremonial occasions at court. The music for these songs was later lost, but the words remained, forming a collection of Han dynasty (206…