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春秋年表

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Text ID
KR1e0017
Date
1078–1085
Dynasty
宋

Chūnqiū nián biǎo 春秋年表

Chronological Table of the Spring and Autumn Annals

by 闕名 (撰) · 岳珂 (重編)

About the work

The Chūnqiū nián biǎo 春秋年表 in one juan is an anonymous Northern-Sòng chronological synchronisation table for the twenty states of the Chūnqiū and Zuǒzhuàn, surviving in the Yuè Kē 岳珂 Xiāngtāi 相臺 Nine-Classics print as a paratext to the Chūnqiū. The Sìkù base is the recutting prepared by Yuè Kē for the same print that contains the Chūnqiū mínghào guī yī tú (KR1e0016). The table covers Zhōu and nineteen subordinate or contemporary states: Lǔ, Cài, Cáo, Wèi, Téng, Jìn, Zhèng, Qí, Qín, Chǔ, Sòng, Jì 𣏌, Chén, Wú, Yuè, Zhū, Jǔ, Xuē, and Xiǎo Zhū 小邾.

Tiyao

The Sìkù tíyào (text from the Kyoto Zinbun digital Sìkù tíyào):

Author not registered. Chén Zhènsūn’s Shū lù jiětí says: “Chūnqiū èrshí guó nián biǎo, one juan, author unknown — Zhōu and below: Lǔ, Cài, Cáo, Wèi, Téng, Jìn, Zhèng, Qí, Qín, Chǔ, Sòng, Jì, Chén, Wú, Yuè, Zhū, Jǔ, Xuē, Xiǎo Zhū.” The Guǎngé shūmù 館閣書目 has a Nián biǎo in two juan, compiled by Yáng Yànlíng 楊彥齡 in the Yuánfēng 元豐 era (1078–1085); apart from Zhōu, thirteen states are listed. Dǒngshì Cáng shū zhì 藏書志 has a Nián biǎo of unknown authorship, ten states from Zhōu to WúYuè, with all conquests, audiences, and joint meetings recorded. The present text correctly has twenty states, matching what Chén Zhènsūn saw; this is therefore Chén’s exemplar.

The book originally circulated independently in the Sòng. Yuè Kē, when cutting his Nine Classics, appended it after the Chūnqiū. Yuè’s own note: “The Chūnqiū nián biǎo — the various exemplars sometimes lack the names of states, sometimes confuse year and month. We have collated against the jīng and zhuàn, and corrected the errors, recording each ruler’s death and accession. Only Lǔ was missing — added from the jīng and zhuàn. Liào’s exemplar lacked the Nián biǎo and the Mínghào guī yī tú; now that we are cutting the Gōngyáng and Gǔliáng, we add these two works to be appended after the jīng and zhuàn.” So this work was emended by Yuè Kē, cut together with the Mínghào guī yī tú of Féng Jìxiān 馮繼先. The Tōngzhìtáng jīng jiě 通志堂經解 [SòngYuán jīng digest] failed to register Yuè Kē’s note and ran the Nián biǎo together with the Mínghào guī yī tú as a single work, attributing both to Féng Jìxiān: a serious error.

Abstract

The Sìkù tíyào makes the principal points: that the work is an anonymous Northern-Sòng twenty-state chronological table for the Chūnqiū, distinct from the Yáng Yànlíng thirteen-state and the Dǒngshì ten-state tables also recorded in the period; that the present arrangement is the work of Yuè Kē for his Xiāngtāi Nine-Classics print; that subsequent compilations (the Tōngzhìtáng jīng jiě) erroneously attributed it together with the Mínghào guī yī tú to Féng Jìxiān.

The Nián biǎo’s practical value is the synchronisation: for any given year of the Chūnqiū, it allows immediate identification of which ruler held office in each of the twenty states, which is essential for understanding the entries’ political context. As a Sòng-period precursor to the Chūnqiū fēn jì of Chéng Gōngshuō KR1e0045, the Nián biǎo is the simpler, table-form synchronisation tool from which the elaborated annalistic histories descend.

The frontmatter dynasty: field is left blank in the catalog meta because the work is anonymous and only inferable from the Yuán-fēng-era recordings of similar works in Sòng catalogues; the assigned date-bracket of 1078–1085 (the Yuánfēng era) covers the most likely period of composition.

Translations and research

The Nián biǎo is consulted by every modern editor of the Zuǒzhuàn. Modern equivalents include:

  • Yáng Bójùn 楊伯峻, Chūnqiū Zuǒzhuàn zhù 春秋左傳注 (Zhōnghuá 1990), the chronological tables in Volume 4.
  • Cohen, The Annals of the Spring and Autumn Period (Cambridge MA: Council on East Asian Studies 1989).

Other points of interest

The Yuè Kē emendation note quoted in the Sìkù tíyào is one of the rare surviving witnesses to the Liào (Liào Yìngzhōng 廖瑩中) Sòng print of the Nine Classics — an important comparator for Yuè Kē’s print and probably the most authoritative thirteenth-century jīng edition before Yuè Kē’s. The Liào print is now lost.

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