Zhōu Zhōngmǐn zòushū 周忠愍奏疏
Memorials of Zhōu Zhōng-mǐn by 周起元 (撰)
About the work
A 2-juàn compilation of memorials by Zhōu Qǐyuán 周起元 (1571–1626; Zhōngmǐn his posthumous title), the Dōnglín-faction Jiāngnán xúnfǔ who died under Wèi Zhōngxián’s torture. The two juàn are: Xītái zòushū 西臺奏疏 — 11 memorials from his Húguǎng dào yùshǐ xúncáo tenure (Censorial circuit-supervision of the Grand Canal); and Fǔ Wú zòushū 撫吳奏疏 — 19 memorials from his Jiāngnán xúnfǔ governorship.
Tiyao
Zhōu Zhōngmǐn zòushū, 2 juàn, by Zhōu Qǐyuán of the Míng. Qǐyuán, zì Zhòngxiān, hào Miánzhēn, from Hǎichéng, Wànlì xīnchǒu (1601) jìnshì, served to Yòu qiān dū yùshǐ xúnfǔ Jiāngnán; for offending the zhōngguān (eunuch) [Wèi Zhōngxián] he was killed; posthumously promoted Bīngbù shìláng with Zhōngmǐn posthumous title; re-conferred Zhōnghuì; his career in his Míng shǐ biography. — This carved edition contains: Xītái zòushū, 11 memorials in 1 juàn — submitted while Húguǎng dào yùshǐ xúncáo; Fǔ Wú zòushū, 19 memorials in 1 juàn — submitted while Xúnfǔ Jiāngnán. The first juàn of the original recension was Qǐyuán’s biography; juàn 4 was Lányán lù — eulogistic poems and prose by famous worthies of the time; juàn 5 was Chóngsì lù — official-shrine sacrifice papers and stele-inscriptions from places he had served — followed by various persons’ funeral-eulogy poems and prose, and 7 of Qǐyuán’s surviving poems. All gathered by his descendants at different times — added in piecemeal, no further sequence. — Qǐyuán’s bold remonstrance memorials concern the great affairs of the people’s livelihood and the nation’s planning — by no means the work of a shàng qìjié hǎo gōngjī zhě (one who values flair and likes attack); his person and his words are both fit for immortality, fit indeed to be specially recorded and transmitted. We here preserve his memorials in 2 juàn with 7 of his surviving poems appended. As for Qǐyuán’s name being already in the Shǐ cè (official histories), there is no need for biographies and inscriptions to transmit it; we have therefore deleted them all to avoid repetition. — Reverently presented in the tenth month of Qiánlóng 46 (1781). Chief Editors: Jì Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì. Chief Collator: Lù Fèichí.
Abstract
The Zhōu Zhōngmǐn zòushū is a documentary monument of the late-Wànlì and Tiānqǐ periods. The Xītái memorials (1611–c.1620) cover lower-Yangzi water-management and grain-shipment matters during a critical decade of Grand Canal infrastructure decline. The Fǔ Wú memorials (c.1622–1626) cover his governorship of Jiāngnán in the run-up to his arrest under Wèi Zhōngxián’s eunuch faction. The collection is closely linked to the famous Sūzhōu Wǔ rén 五人 case of 1626 — five Sūzhōu commoners executed for resisting Wèi’s arrest of the Dōnglín governor (Zhōu) — memorialized in Zhāng Pǔ’s 張溥 Wǔ rén mù bēi jì, one of the most famous late-Míng prose pieces. The Sìkù editors’ editorial decision to remove the biographical and eulogistic appendices (juàn 1, 4, 5 of the original) and retain only the memorials and 7 surviving poems exemplifies their consistent practice of letting zòuyì texts stand on their own without funereal frame-material.
Translations and research
- Charles O. Hucker, “The Tung-lin Movement of the Late Ming Period,” in Chinese Thought and Institutions (1957).
- Frederic Wakeman, The Great Enterprise: The Manchu Reconstruction of Imperial Order in Seventeenth-Century China (UCalP, 1985), part 1 — context for Zhōu and the Dōng-lín persecution.
- Wilkinson 2018 §65.3.7.
Other points of interest
The connection to the Sūzhōu Wǔ rén case of 1626 — Zhāng Pǔ’s Wǔ rén mù bēi jì, one of the most-anthologized late-Míng prose pieces — gives this memorial collection unusual cultural-historical resonance: the five Sūzhōu commoners died protesting the arrest of the senior governor whose memorials are preserved here.
Links
- Wikidata: Zhou Qiyuan
- Wilkinson 2018 §65.3.7.