The Diamond Sutra is the earliest complete dated Chinese woodblock-printed book, produced in 868 CE.
Its full title is the Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra, a Mahayana Buddhist text traditionally associated with the Buddha’s teaching to the monk Subhuti. The surviving Chinese copy is a scroll containing text and a frontispiece depicting the Buddha’s assembly.
The date appears in a colophon at the end of the scroll, which records that Wang Jie commissioned it on behalf of his parents. This makes it especially important: earlier printed fragments exist, but the Diamond Sutra is the oldest surviving complete printed book with an explicit date.
It was discovered among manuscripts at the Mogao Caves near Dunhuang and entered the British Library in 1900 after its acquisition from the Daoist priest Wang Yuanlu. It is often confused with the Heart Sutra, another influential Buddhist text, but the two are separate works.