I Ching PDF: the Legge translation, free

What is in this PDF

This is the core text of the Book of Changes as James Legge translated it for The Sacred Books of the East (volume 16, Oxford, 1882). For each of the 64 hexagrams you get the figure, its trigrams, the judgment and the six line texts, plus the two extra texts for hexagrams 1 and 2 that apply when all six lines change: 450 texts in all (64 judgments, 384 line texts and those two extra texts). It opens with a short guide to casting with three coins and a table to find any hexagram from its two trigrams.

Legge's long footnotes and the appendices known as the Ten Wings are not included, and his page numbers are removed; his words are otherwise unchanged. Because the PDF uses standard fonts, a few accented letters in his spellings (such as the breve in "Wăn") appear without the accent.

Is the Legge translation public domain?

Yes. Legge died in 1897 and his translation was published in 1882, so it is out of copyright in the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union. You can print, share and quote it freely. Richard Wilhelm's German translation (1924) is now out of copyright too, but its well-known English rendering by Cary F. Baynes (1950) is still protected in many countries, so it is not reproduced here.

Legge's English, and a plain reading

Legge translated closely and filled gaps with words in brackets, which makes the text accurate but hard going. Every hexagram on this site pairs his judgment and lines with a plain-language reading we wrote, a note on love and work, and the hexagrams it turns into when a line changes. To consult the oracle online, use the I Ching reading tool; to understand the book itself, read what the I Ching is and how to read changing lines.

Questions

The 64 hexagrams online

The same text, one page per hexagram, with plain readings:

The 64 hexagrams