Lǐjì yīnyì yǐn 禮記音義隱
Hidden Sounds and Meanings of the Lǐjì
by 射慈 (撰)
About the work
A single-juàn reconstruction of 射慈 Shè Cí’s lost Lǐjì yīnyì yǐn 禮記音義隱 — a phonological-and-explanatory commentary on the Lǐjì (KR1d0049) by the Wú-court ritualist. The title yīn-yì yǐn (hidden sounds-and-meanings) is a distinctive Wú-school formulation for a commentary that addresses unfamiliar phonological readings and obscure semantic glosses. CHANT lists two same-title works (CH2e1100 by 射慈, CH2e1101 by 謝徽); this entry follows the CHANT 射慈 attribution. The CHANT reconstruction is drawn from Dù Yòu 杜佑’s Tōngdiǎn and Lù Démíng 陸德明’s Jīngdiǎn shìwén citations.
Abstract
The opening preserved fragments cover diverse semantic-philological glosses:
(i) “Ancient sandal-tongue knots.” Gǔ-zhě jù-tóu bí qí shéng xiāng-lián jié zhī, jiāng shēng-táng jiě zhī yě 古者屨頭鼻綦繩相連結之，將升堂解之也 — anciently the sandal-tongues had nose-knot cord-connections, untied before ascending to the hall.
(ii) “Yìn gloss.” Yìn = fàn bì dàng kǒu yě 酳：飯畢蕩口也 — yìn means rinsing the mouth after meal.
(iii) “Eastern-sea Lè-làng container terminology.” Dōnghǎi Lè-làng rén hū róng shí-èr hú zhě wèi gǔ 東海樂浪人呼容十二斛者為鼓 — the people of Dōnghǎi and Lè-làng (the Hàn-period commanderies in the Korean peninsula) call a twelve-hú container a gǔ (drum).
This last gloss is one of the most-cited early-medieval Chinese references to Lè-làng commandery dialect-vocabulary, with significant historical-philological value for the cultural history of the Hàn-Wèi peninsula.
The substantive content covers:
(i) Phonological glosses with fǎn-qiè spellings for difficult readings.
(ii) Material-culture glosses on Lǐjì-mentioned vessels, garments, and architectural elements.
(iii) Dialect / regional glosses including the Lè-làng drum-terminology fragment.
The dating bracket (220–280) reflects Shè Cí’s documented Wú-court career.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located. Treated in surveys of Wú-school Lǐjì scholarship.
Other points of interest
The Lè-làng gǔ (Lè-làng drum-container) dialect gloss preserved in this fragment is one of the most historically-significant single ethnographic observations to survive from Wú-period Chinese-peninsular contact, with value for the Hàn-Wèi commandery-period cultural history of the Korean peninsula.
Links
- Chinese Text Project — Tōngdiǎn: https://ctext.org/tongdian
- Chinese Text Project — Jīngdiǎn shìwén: https://ctext.org/wiki.pl?if=en&res=608648