'Shanhai Xuanji' AI model brings history to life

Experts gather at Peking University for the launch of "Shanhai Xuanji", a specialized AI model for history and cultural heritage research. [Photo/China Daily]

Peking University unveiled "Shanhai Xuanji", an artificial intelligence model designed for research in history and cultural heritage, at a symposium on Dec 26, 2025.

The model was developed by the Department of History of Peking University in partnership with Shanhai App, a digital cultural heritage platform created by Hunan Broadcasting System (HBS).

Under the leadership of Professor Zhang Fan, a research team comprising numerous experts and over 100 annotators processed and sorted core classical texts, including Records of the Grand Historian and Book of Han, alongside archaeological reports and academic papers. This project culminated in the establishment of a robust knowledge base containing 270 million high-quality Chinese characters from textual materials, as well as 1.08 million expert questions and answers pairs focused on the Qin  (221-206 BC) and Han dynasties (25-220).

The "Shanhai Xuanji" model supports a variety of applications. It assists researchers in performing cross-regional and cross-temporal historical data analysis, provides reliable historical references to museums, filmmakers and game developers, and acts as an interactive educator for the public.

By integrating historical with AI, "Shanhai Xuanji" paves a new path for the digital inheritance of traditional Chinese culture and the intelligent upgrading of historical research.

He Jin, dean of the Department of History at Peking University, said that AI should serve humanistic studies and carry forward intellectual thought.

"Developing a historical model aims not only to answer 'what', but also to inspire 'why' and 'how to understand', making technology a bridge for passing on Chinese civilization," he said.