Nínghǎi jiāngjūn gùshān bèizǐ gōngjī lù 寧海將軍固山貝子功績錄
Record of the Achievements of the Pacification-of-the-Sea General, Banner Bèizǐ edited by an unknown compiler (闕名)
About the work
A one-juàn anonymous record of the campaign of the Pacifier-of-the-Sea General (Nínghǎi jiāngjūn 寧海將軍) and Banner Bèizǐ Fùlātǎ 富喇塔 (Furata, posthumously titled Huìxiàn bèizǐ 惠獻貝子, son of Bèilè Piāngǔ 篇古; a Manchu Aisin Gioro imperial-clansman) against the rebel feudatory Gěng Jīngzhōng 耿精忠 in Fújiàn and Zhèjiāng during the Sānfān 三藩 (Three Feudatories) revolt. Gěng Jīngzhōng rebelled in Fújiàn in Kāngxī 13 (1674); the Shèngzǔ rénhuángdì (Kāngxī emperor) appointed Fùlātǎ as Nínghǎi jiāngjūn, serving under the Commander-in-Chief Prince Jiéshū 傑書 (Kāngqīnwáng 康親王) in the field. Fùlātǎ moved into Tāizhōu 台州 in Kāngxī 13, breaking the rebels successively at Huángruìshān 黃瑞山, Zǐyúnshān 紫雲山, and Jiǔzhòngsìshān 九重寺山; in Kāngxī 14 he routed Zēng Yǎngxìng 曾養性 at Huángtǔlǐng 黃土嶺, Zēng fled by night, and the loyalist forces retook Huángyán 黃巖 county and went on to take Wēnzhōu 溫州, pacifying eastern Zhèjiāng. The compiler, as the Sìkù editors note, is a local Tāizhōu observer who recorded each engagement from local report (“each takes its outline and records it under heads”). Three appendices are included: (i) a Jìlüè 紀略 separately recording the Tāizhōu and Wēnzhōu engagements; (ii) Fǔshèng shìshí 撫嵊事實 on Fùlātǎ’s pacification of bandits in Shèng 嵊縣 county; (iii) Jīn Yǒng’s 金泳 Píng Mǐn gōngjī wénjiàn lù 平閩功績聞見錄 on the Fújiàn phase of the campaign. The original copy contained at the foot of each entry a seven-syllable quatrain (96 in all, “shallow and rustic, of no help in verification”), which the Sìkù editors deleted.
Tiyao
Nínghǎi jiāngjūn gùshān bèizǐ gōngjī lù in one juàn, no compiler’s name. It records the affair of Huìxiàn bèizǐ Fùlātǎ in attacking the rebel feudatory Gěng Jīngzhōng, advancing through Tāizhōu. Fùlātǎ was the son of the posthumously enfeoffed Bèilè Piāngǔ 篇古. In Kāngxī 13, Gěng Jīngzhōng rebelled in Fújiàn; the Shèngzǔ rénhuángdì commanded Fùlātǎ to be Nínghǎi jiāngjūn and, together with the Commander-in-Chief Kāngqīnwáng Jiéshū, to lead troops in punishment. In that year he came to Tāizhōu and broke the rebels at Huángruìshān, then again at Zǐyúnshān and Jiǔzhòngsìshān. In Kāngxī 14 he defeated their host at Huángtǔlǐng; the rebel general Zēng Yǎngxìng fled by night, and the loyalists thereupon retook Huángyán county and went straight on to Wēnzhōu, settling eastern Zhèjiāng. The details are given in the Zōngshì wánggōng gōngjī biǎozhuàn and the Bāqí tōngzhì. This book was apparently compiled by a Tāizhōu local — from the fourth month of Kāngxī 13, when Gěng first rebelled, to the eighth month of Kāngxī 14, when the rebels fled back from Tāi to Wēn — recording, on the basis of his own and others’ eye- and ear-witness, an outline of each affair under topical heads. The Bèizǐ, kinsman to the imperial line, accepted the charge and gave his utmost in the field, suppressing the rebels and pacifying the good — his merits are duly conspicuous. The order of the engagements here is naturally not as clear and complete as the official-history account based on memorial reports; but on the matters of the Bèizǐ’s relief of soldiers and people, his settlement of the gentry and commoners, and his strategic deliberations, the local report is rather true to life, and supplements the official biography in detail and abridgement. The book is preceded by a Jìlüè separately recording the Tāizhōu and Wēnzhōu battles, and a Fǔshèng shìshí on the Bèizǐ’s putting down of local Shèng-county bandits; both anonymous. Also there is a Píng Mǐn gōngjī wénjiàn lù by Jīn Yǒng of Mǐn on the Bèizǐ’s advance from Zhè into Mǐn, also rather full. We have preserved each as it stood and appended them to the end for cross-reference. As to the seven-syllable quatrains under each entry of the original — 96 in all, of shallow and rustic intent and of no help in verification — we have removed them all in printing. Reverently presented in the third month of Qiánlóng 46 (1781). Chief Editors: Jì Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. Chief Collator: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.
Abstract
The text is a primary local-eyewitness record of the Tāizhōu and Wēnzhōu phase of the suppression of Gěng Jīngzhōng’s revolt — one of the Sānfān — in Kāngxī 13–14 (1674–1675). Fùlātǎ (Furata, d. 1676; full name in Manchu transcription is variously rendered) was an Aisin Gioro imperial-clansman serving as Nínghǎi jiāngjūn; he died in the campaign, posthumously elevated to Bèizǐ with title Huìxiàn. The compilation date must fall after the conclusion of the campaign in Kāngxī 14 (1675); since the work also includes Jīn Yǒng’s separate Píng Mǐn gōngjī wénjiàn lù covering the Fújiàn phase (concluded Kāngxī 17 = 1678), the consolidated date bracket is c. 1675–1700. The book is a useful documentary supplement to the Bāqí tōngzhì and the Zōngshì wánggōng gōngjī biǎozhuàn on a critical phase of the Sānfān war.
Translations and research
- On the Sān-fān revolt see Lynn A. Struve, Voices from the Ming-Qing Cataclysm (Yale UP, 1993); Tsao Kai-fu, “The Rebellion of the Three Feudatories Against the Manchu Throne in China, 1673–1681” (PhD diss., Chicago, 1965). The Sì-kù tíyào notice is in 史部·傳記類二·名人之屬.
Other points of interest
The Sìkù editors’ deletion of the 96 seven-syllable quatrains the original compiler had appended to each engagement-entry is a noteworthy editorial intervention. Such yǒngshǐ 詠史 quatrains were a common late-Míng / early-Qīng device for local-county chronicles of campaigns and pacifications, and deletion is unusual.
Links
- Wilkinson 2018, Chinese History: A New Manual §49.