Wǔlín jiùshì 武林舊事
Old Affairs of Wǔlín (i.e. of Hángzhōu / Línān) by 周密 (Zhōu Mì, 1232–1298) — zhuàn 撰
About the work
A 10-juan late-Sòng / early-Yuán retrospective monograph on the urban culture of Línān 臨安 (Hángzhōu), composed by Zhōu Mì after the fall of the Southern Sòng (1276) and during his residence at the Guǐxīn street in Hángzhōu. The work is the third and most highly regarded of the Hángzhōu triad (KR2k0117 Dūchéng jìshèng, KR2k0118 Mèngliáng lù) and the most literary in style — explicitly conceived (per the autograph preface) “to be like Lǚ Yíngyáng’s Záji but more detailed; like Mèng Yuánlǎo’s Mènghuá but more refined.” The work treats the imperial court ceremonies of the Qiándào / Chúnxī “Three-Reigns Transmission” (Gāozōng’s abdication and his and Xiàozōng’s imperial-elder maintenance), the entertainments of the Bǎoyòu / Jǐngdìng (1253–1264) period of late-Sòng efflorescence (which Zhōu compares to the ZhèngXuān of Sòng Huīzōng), and the Hángzhōu festivals, markets, restaurants, theatres, and brothels with notable literary care. The work is one of the major monuments of SòngYuán transition literature, blending the bǐjì form with elegiac feeling for the lost dynasty.
Tiyao
We respectfully note: the Wǔlín jiùshì in ten juan was composed by Zhōu Mì of Sòng. Mì, zì Gōngjǐn 公謹, hào Cǎochuāng 草窗; his ancestors were of Jǐnán; his great-grandfather followed Gāozōng’s southern crossing and the family settled in Húzhōu. In Chúnyòu he served as Magistrate of Yìwū. After the Sòng fell he did not serve, and ended his days at home.
This work records the wards-and-affairs of the Southern-Sòng capital. Although Mì lived at Biànshān (Húzhōu), in fact he lodged on the Guǐxīn street in Hángzhōu, hence what he saw and heard is most accurate. On the Qiándào and Chúnxī “Three-Reigns transmission and the two palaces’ imperial-elder maintenance” he narrates with particular detail.
The autograph preface says he wished to be like Lǚ Róngyáng’s Záji but more detailed, like Mèng Yuánlǎo’s Mènghuá but more refined. Now examining: although the format imitates Mèng’s book, the literary diction is dignified-and-rich; lost works and stray verses of Southern-Sòng persons depend on it for survival. As to “near refined” — that is no falsehood. Lǚ Xīzhé’s Suìshí záji — though now no longer transmitted, Zhōu Bìdà’s Píngyuán jí still preserves its preface, which says that on the Shàngyuán festival alone it had over fifty entries, hardly meagre — but Mì still considered it not detailed; from this we know how thorough Mì’s work is.
The Míng prints often deleted material at will: some have only six juan, or even less; preserving only the categories of ancient palaces, Jiàofáng yuèbù, etc., losing the original purpose of the work. The present 10-juan recension is taken from the Máo Jígǔgé Yuán-block transcription, complete head and tail; the lost passages and scattered events therein can supply cānjì — and the lake-and-mountain song-and-dance in their lavish flourishing display, just as they show its prosperity, also show why it declined; the loyalists’ and old officials’ veiled grief over the rise-and-fall is in fact subtly conveyed beyond the words, this is not merely a customs-record or capital-register.
In juan 10 from “Xiàqí dàizhào” downward — by this work’s format — should belong to the end of juan 6; suspect that in transcription the original order was disrupted, but there is no way to verify, so we follow it. Respectfully proof-read in the twelfth month of Qiánlóng 46 (1781).
Director-General compilers (chén /) Jǐ Yún, (chén /) Lù Xīxióng, (chén /) Sūn Shìyì; Director-General proof-reader (chén /) Lù Fèichí.
Abstract
The Wǔlín jiùshì is one of the foundational texts of Chinese urban-historical and cultural-historical writing and the most literary of the triad of Southern-Sòng monographs on Hángzhōu. It was composed by Zhōu Mì 周密 (1232–1298; zì Gōngjǐn 公謹, hào Cǎochuāng 草窗 and Píngzhōu 蘋洲; CBDB 10183) — one of the great Sòng-loyalist scholars of the SòngYuán transition, also author of the Guǐxīn záshí 癸辛雜識 KR3j0093, the Qídōng yěyǔ 齊東野語 KR3j0021, the Yúnyān guòyǎn lù 雲煙過眼錄, the Cǎochuāng jí 草窗集, and several Sòng-loyalist anthologies. The work was composed during Zhōu’s residence on Hángzhōu’s Guǐxīn jiē after the fall of the Southern Sòng in Déyòu 2 (1276), with the catalog meta dates of 1232–1308 corrected here to 1232–1298 per CBDB.
Catalog-vs-CBDB note: the catalog meta gives Zhōu Mì’s death year as 1308; CBDB 10183 and standard reference works give 1298, followed here.
The work is divided across ten juan and treats: the imperial jiāo sacrifice; ceremonial protocol of the “Three-Reigns Transmission” of the Qiándào / Chúnxī era (Gāozōng’s abdication of 1162 and his maintenance as tàishàng huángdì; Xiàozōng’s abdication of 1189); the imperial gardens; the jiàofáng yuèbù musical establishments; the Bǎoyòu and Jǐngdìng (1253–1264) urban prosperity (which Zhōu compares to Sòng Huīzōng’s ZhèngXuān, with implicit warning that decadence presages collapse); the great Hángzhōu festivals (Lantern Festival, Qīngmíng, Duānwǔ, Qīxī, Mid-Autumn, Year’s-end); the xíngzài markets and trades; the wǎshè variety theatres; the zájù dramatists, shuōhuà storytellers, and other performance arts; the gējì singing-girls; the lake-and-mountain pleasure culture; and the courtesan culture of West Lake. It is the most literary and elegiac of the three Hángzhōu monographs, written from the position of a Sòng loyalist who would not serve the Yuán.
The work is preserved in Wényuāngé Sìkù quánshū (vol. 590.3) on the basis of the Máo Jígǔgé 毛汲古閣 transcription of the original Yuán block-print. Míng-period imprints had truncated the work to six or fewer juan; the Máo recension restored the complete ten-juan original.
Translations and research
- Stephen H. West, “The Interpretation of a Dream: The Sources, Evaluation, and Influence of the Dongjing meng Hua lu,” T’oung Pao 71 (1985): 63–108. Discusses the Wǔlín jiùshì extensively as part of the Hángzhōu triad.
- Stephen H. West and Wilt L. Idema, The Records of the Restored Capital: Memory and the Persistence of Place (in progress).
- Jacques Gernet, Daily Life in China on the Eve of the Mongol Invasion, 1250–1276 (Stanford, 1962). The principal Western-language synthesis using the Hángzhōu triad.
- Etienne Balazs, Chinese Civilization and Bureaucracy (Yale, 1964), passim.
- Patricia Buckley Ebrey and Maggie Bickford, eds., Emperor Huizong and Late Northern Song China (Harvard, 2006), comparative.
- Critical Chinese editions: Zhōu Mì Wǔlín jiùshì annotated by Yáng Hǎi-míng 楊海明 et al. (Hángzhōu: Zhèjiāng rénmín, 1984); part of the Dōngjīng mèng-huá lù wài sì zhǒng (Beijing, 1962).
- Wilkinson §74.4.
Other points of interest
The work’s Cháoyě bāshí gējì lists of singing-girls and zájù performers are an essential primary source for Southern-Sòng performance history; the Zhāngbùsuìshí jì and Suìshíshèng sections form the most detailed Sòng-period festival calendar to survive. Zhōu’s allusion to the late-Sòng Bǎoyòu / Jǐngdìng prosperity as a forewarning analogue to Zhènghé / Xuānhé is among the most pointed Sòng-loyalist subtle-criticisms of the dynasty’s late-period complacency.
Links
- Wikidata
- West, T’oung Pao 71 (1985)
- Gernet, Daily Life in China on the Eve of the Mongol Invasion (Stanford, 1962)
- Wilkinson §74.4