Huāngzhèng Cóngshū 荒政叢書
Compendium of Famine-Relief Administration by 俞森 (撰)
About the work
A 10-juǎn compendium of seven prior writers on famine relief, compiled by Yú Sēn 俞森 (hào Cúnzhāi 存齋) of Qiántáng 錢塘 in the mid-Kāngxī era and completed in Kāngxī gēngwǔ (1690). The compendium gathers Dǒng Wěi (Sòng); Lín Xīyuán, Tú Lóng, Zhōu Kǒngjiào, Zhōng Huàmǐn, Liú Shìjiào (Míng); and Wèi Xǐ (early Qīng)—seven authoritative voices on famine relief. Yú Sēn appends his own Chángpíng kǎo, Yìcāng kǎo, Shècāng kǎo (three treatises on the Chángpíng, Yìcāng, and Shècāng granary systems) tracing each from origin to defects. The work was compiled while Yú served as Hénán Qiānshì (Vice-Censor) and includes appendices from his subsequent post as Jīngnán Dào Vice-Director: the YúnXiāng zhènjì shìyí and the Bǔ huáng jíyào. The Huāngzhèng cóngshū is the principal Qīng-era reference work for famine-relief practice and a foundation of Pierre-Étienne Will’s Bureaucracy and Famine in Eighteenth-Century China analysis.
Tiyao
Compiled by Yú Sēn of our dynasty. Sēn, hào Cúnzhāi, of Qiántáng. From gōngshēng (tributary student) he rose to HúGuǎng Bùzhèngsī cānyì. The work was completed in Kāngxī gēngwǔ (1690). It gathers ancient men’s famine-relief methods: from the Sòng, Dǒng Wěi; from the Míng, Lín Xīyuán, Tú Lóng, Zhōu Kǒngjiào, Zhōng Huàmǐn, Liú Shìjiào; from our dynasty, Wèi Xǐ. Seven voices in all. He has added his own Chángpíng kǎo, Yìcāng kǎo, Shècāng kǎo—tracing each system to its origin so its rule may be known, and tracing each to its defects so its caution may be known. Five volumes complete; this was when he held the Hénán Qiānshì office.
Appended at the end: the YúnXiāng zhènjì shìyí (Régulations for Famine-Relief in YúnXiāng) and the Bǔ huáng jíyào (Locust-Control Essentials)—these from his later post as Jīngnán Dào fēnshǒu.
The strategies of famine relief have been laid out by predecessors in detail; the granary system in particular is the foundation of relief. Yú Sēn has gathered the prior worthies’ good rules in clear array, and on the three granary-treatises is especially thorough. He has put the work into print so that prefectural officers may consult it easily—he can be called one whose mind dwells on the people’s distress.
Abstract
The Huāngzhèng cóngshū is the principal Qīng compendium of famine-relief literature. The 1690 completion date is firm. The compendium’s selection—seven authors plus Yú’s own three granary-treatises—established a working canon for Qīng famine-relief administration. Yú Sēn (CBDB record 389808, no dates; fl. 1690) was both a scholar-compiler and a hands-on relief administrator: the YúnXiāng zhènjì shìyí and Bǔ huáng jíyào appended to the work derive from his actual provincial-governance experience.
The work is essential reading for the Qīng famine-relief tradition; Pierre-Étienne Will’s Bureaucracy and Famine in Eighteenth-Century China (1990) treats the Huāngzhèng cóngshū as the documentary backbone of pre-1730s relief practice, and notes that the Qiánlóng-era Kāngjì lù (KR2m0049) extends the Huāngzhèng cóngshū’s framework into a state-administrative protocol.
Translations and research
Standard editions: Wényuāngé Sìkù. Modern reprints: the Cóngshū jíchéng version. Foundational Western treatment: Pierre-Étienne Will, Bureaucracy and Famine in Eighteenth-Century China (Stanford, 1990), pp. 67–88. Pierre-Étienne Will and R. Bin Wong, Nourish the People (1991). Lillian M. Li, Fighting Famine in North China (Stanford, 2007). Chinese: Lǐ Jūn, Sòngdài huāng-zhèng yán-jiū 宋代荒政研究 (2008), traces the Sòng tradition; Yáng Lì-fán 楊利凡, Qīng-dài Huāng-zhèng cóng-shū yán-jiū 清代荒政叢書研究 (PhD diss., Sūdà, 2014), is the principal monograph on this work.
Other points of interest
The seven-author selection of the Huāngzhèng cóngshū effectively defined a famine-relief canon that the Qīng court used into the 19th century. Lín Xīyuán, Tú Lóng, Zhōu Kǒngjiào, Zhōng Huàmǐn, and Liú Shìjiào—the five Míng authors—were not famous figures, but their inclusion here gave them a permanent place in the administrative-history reference apparatus.