Luòyáng qiélán jì 洛陽伽藍記
Records of the Buddhist Monasteries of Luòyáng by 楊衒之 (Yáng Xuànzhī, fl. 530s–540s) — zhuàn 撰
About the work
A 5-juan Northern Wèi monograph on the Buddhist monasteries (qié-lán 伽藍 / Skt. saṃghārāma) of the Northern Wèi capital Luòyáng — composed in Wǔ-dìng 5 (547) by Yáng Xuàn-zhī, a Northern Wèi Fǔ-jūn-sī-mǎ (Pacification-Army Marshal). Yáng visited the ruins of Luòyáng on official business in 547, ten years after the city had been devastated by the Yǒng-xī unrest and abandoned for the new capital at Yè 鄴. Moved by the contrast between the past flourishing and the present desolation, he compiled this monograph from older records and personal memory. The work is divided into 5 juan by gate-direction: Chéng-nèi (Inside the City), Chéng-dōng (East), Chéng-nán (South), Chéng-xī (West), Chéng-běi (North) — three gates on each face. Within each juan the monasteries are listed by the new and old names of their three gates as the framework. Praised by the Sìkù tíyào as “Yǔ Lì Dàoyuán Shuǐjīng-zhù jiān-suí” — “shoulder-to-shoulder with Lì Dàoyuán’s Shuǐjīng zhù” — for prose-style, range, and historical-ethnographic content. Originally contained interlinear self-commentary (zì-zhù) — now lost in all surviving editions.
Tiyao
We respectfully note: this is the work of Yáng Xuànzhī 楊衒之 of the HòuWèi (Northern Wèi). Liú Zhījī’s Shǐtōng writes “Yáng Xuànzhī” 羊衒之; Cháo Gōngwǔ’s Dúshū zhì also so. Yet the Suízhì also writes 楊 — agreeing with the present text. We suspect the Shǐtōng is in error. His native place is not in detail. From what is mentioned in the book, we know he once held the rank of Fǔjūn sīmǎ.
The Wèi from Tàihé 17 (493) made Luòyáng its capital. For a time it was deeply devoted to the Buddhist law; temples and monasteries were the foremost in the empire. By the disturbances of the Yǒngxī era (532–534), the city-walls became overgrown ruin. In Wǔdìng 5 (547), Xuànzhī, on official business at Luòyáng, was moved by the contrast of rise and fall, and gathered up older lore, retracing old traces, to compose this book.
He divides into five chapters by Chéngnèi (Inside the City) and the four gates outside. In the order of the narrative, he uses the three gates on the east, the three on the south, and the three on the north — each marking the new and old names — to lift the framework. The editorial form is utterly clear and analytic.
His prose is rich-and-elegant, gracefully-flowing — abundant but not tedious — fit to march shoulder-to-shoulder with Lì Dàoyuán’s Shuǐjīng zhù. His incidental narration of the rebellion of Ěrzhū Róng and similar matters is winding and detailed — much sufficient to verify standard histories. Other antiquarian sites and literary works, foreign-state customs and route-distances, are gathered abundantly — also sufficient to enlarge unusual hearings.
Liú Zhījī’s Shǐtōng says: “the Qín people did not die — verifying the deep slander of Fú Shēng; the Shǔ elders still survive — knowing of Gě Liàng’s many wrongs.” The Shǔ elders matter is in Wèishū Máo Xiūzhī zhuàn; the Qín people matter takes from this book’s Zhào Yì entry. Liú Zhījī cites evidence with strict care; we know that his account is not invention. Other matters — like explaining Wèiwén’s Miáocí stele, correcting Dài Yánzhī’s Xīzhēng jì — the textual investigation is also careful and refined. Only that he takes Gāoyángwáng Yǒng’s tower to be that of the Old Poems’ “northwest there is a tall tower; up to the floating clouds together” — this is unavoidable obstinacy in interpreting verse, becoming the flaw of this book. According to the Shǐtōng Bǔzhù chapter, which says “remove the redundant — the meaning is grudged; record in full — the wording is hindered. Therefore one fixes the underbrush, lining up as sub-commentary. Such as Xiāo Dàyuán’s Huáihǎi luànlí zhì, Yáng Xuànzhī’s Luòyáng qiélán jì are like this”: then Xuànzhī’s record indeed had a self-commentary. The currently circulated versions all do not have it; one does not know at what time it dropped out. Yet since the Sòng there is no one heard to have cited his commentary; the elimination has thus been long, and now cannot be re-investigated.
Abstract
The Luòyáng qiélán jì is one of the foundational monuments of medieval Chinese descriptive prose and the principal source for the Buddhist topography of Northern-Wèi Luòyáng — the most magnificent Buddhist capital of late-antique China. Its author Yáng Xuànzhī (the variant 羊衒之 in the Shǐtōng and Dúshū zhì is rejected by the Sìkù tíyào in favor of the Suíshū form 楊) was a Northern Wèi Fǔjūnsīmǎ (Pacification-Army Marshal); his native place is not preserved. The work was composed in Wǔdìng 5 (547) — ten years after the Yǒngxī unrest of 534–537 had devastated Luòyáng and the Northern Wèi court had moved to Yè under the régime of Gāo Huān 高歡.
The Sìkù tíyào endorses the work’s literary merit (“shoulder-to-shoulder with Lì Dàoyuán’s Shuǐjīng zhù”) and historical reliability (citing Liú Zhījī’s Shǐtōng corroboration of the Zhào Yì entry as evidence for the Western Regions’ Fú Shēng controversy), while noting one kǎojù error (Yáng’s identification of the Gāoyángwáng Yǒng tower with the Gǔshī “northwest tall tower”). The most consequential editorial loss is that of the original zìzhù (self-commentary), known to have existed from Liú Zhījī’s notice but absent in all surviving recensions. The principal modern critical edition (Fàn Xiángyōng 范祥雍, Luòyáng qiélán jì jiàozhù, Shànghǎi gǔjí, 1958/1978) reconstructs probable double-line interlinear annotation following the Liú Zhījī pattern.
The text is preserved in the Wényuāngé Sìkù quánshū (vol. 587.1) and in numerous SòngMíngQīng commercial impressions. Wilkinson §31 lists the work as a principal source for medieval Chinese urban history and Buddhist topography.
Translations and research
The standard English translation is Yi-tung Wang, A Record of Buddhist Monasteries in Lo-yang (Princeton, 1984), with extensive scholarly apparatus. See also W. J. F. Jenner, Memories of Loyang: Yang Hsüan-chih and the Lost Capital, 493–534 (Oxford, 1981) — the principal English-language monograph; James Hargett, “Yang Hsüan-chih,” in The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature, vol. 2 (1986); Mary Tieh, The Aesthetics of Buddhist Architecture in Sixth-Century Luoyang (forthcoming). Standard Chinese reference: Fàn Xiángyōng, Luòyáng qié-lán jì jiào-zhù (Shànghǎi gǔjí, 1958/rev. 1978); Yáng Yǒng 楊勇, Luòyáng qié-lán jì jiào-jiān 洛陽伽藍記校箋 (Zhōnghuá, 2006).
Other points of interest
The work is one of the great monuments of Chinese parallel prose and a literary touchstone in its own right; the Sìkù tíyào’s praise of the text as “shoulder-to-shoulder with Lì Dàoyuán’s Shuǐjīng zhù” places the two Northern Wèi monuments at the apex of medieval Chinese descriptive prose. The loss of Yáng Xuànzhī’s self-commentary is one of the most regrettable textual losses in Northern-Dynasties literary history.
Remarks
Duplicate of KR6r0127