Yúdì bēijì mù 輿地碑記目
Catalogue of Stelae According to Geography
by 王象之 (Wáng Xiàngzhī, fl. ca. 1196–1227)
About the work
A 4-juan jīnshí register organised by Southern Sòng prefecture and county, extracted from Wáng Xiàngzhī’s monumental Yúdì jìshèng 輿地紀勝 (200-juan comprehensive gazetteer). The work catalogues stelae and inscriptions preserved in or attested for each region, with brief annotations giving year, principal calligrapher / compiler, and content. Coverage runs from Línān 臨安 in the east to Lóngzhōu 龍州 in the west — strictly the post-Shàoxīng peace (1141 onward) Southern Sòng territory; northern China is excluded from coverage, the principal limitation when compared with Chén Sī’s contemporary Bǎokè cóngbiān KR2n0024.
Tiyao
[Translated and condensed from the Sìkù tíyào]
Compiled by Wáng Xiàngzhī of the Sòng. Xiàngzhī was a Jīnhuá man and once magistrate of Jiāngníngxiàn. He composed the Yúdì jìshèng in 200 juan, of which no transmitted version is now seen; the present 4 juan are from within it.
The work organises stele-inscription gazetteer entries by prefecture, with brief annotations of year and compiler / calligrapher beneath each. The coverage runs from Línān to Lóngzhōu — all post-Shàoxīng peace boundaries.
The work has accurate evidential adjudications: e.g. for the Zhènjiāngfǔ Dāntú “Liáng Tàizǔ Wénhuángdì shéndào bēi” 梁太祖文皇神道碑, Wáng identifies it as the Liáng Wǔdì’s father stele; for the Chéngdūfǔ “Diànzhù jì” 殿柱記, Wáng dates to early HànXīngpíng (194 CE) and so identifies it as not Zhōng Huì 鍾會’s calligraphy; for the Jiādìngfǔ “Yíshuǐ jì” 移水記, Wáng notes the “Jiāzhōu” characters and so identifies it as not Guō Pú 郭璞’s; for the Táizhōu Línhǎi temples (Qìngēn, Dìngguāng, Míngzhì, Míngēn yuàn) and the Wùzhōu Yìwū Zhēnrúyuàn stelae and the Fúzhōu Wūshí Xuānwēigǎnyīngwángmiào stele, all of which write Huìtóng 會同, Wáng knows the WúYuè kingdom did indeed use the Khitan reign-name. All evidence-based.
The work has minor inconsistencies: the Shàngxiāofēng Xiàyǔ stone-cutting is recorded under both Nánkāngjūn and Jiāngzhōu; the Kǒngzǐ Yánlíng Shízì bēi 十字碑 is recorded under both Zhènjiāngfǔ and Jiāngyīnjūn and Chāngzhōu — duplications. Some entries are tangential: under Huīzhōu the work records the prefectural folded-silk dispute; under Lǐzhōu it records the persimmon-wood “Tàipíng” character — these have no bearing on inscriptions and are out of place. Under Sīzhōu the work singly records Xià Zǒnggàn’s grave inscription in large characters — making the format hybrid. But the inscriptions covered are different from those in other compilations and supply useful collation; the tújīng yújì (illustrated atlas) material is also more detailed than the dynastic histories. Even in fragmentary form, useful for evidential study.
Abstract
The Yúdì bēijì mù is one of the two principal Southern Sòng jīnshí-cum-geography compendia (the other being Bǎokè cóngbiān KR2n0024) and the only surviving extract from Wáng Xiàngzhī’s lost or fragmentary Yúdì jìshèng 200-juan gazetteer. The catalog meta gives “fl. 1221” for Wáng; based on the Yúdì jìshèng’s own internal dating, the work is set notBefore 1196 / notAfter 1227 here.
The work’s contributions:
- Geographical-prefectural format. Stelae organised by Southern Sòng administrative geography with explicit prefecture-and-county headings.
- Evidential adjudication. Wáng’s identifications of mis-attributed stelae (Liáng Wǔdì’s father; not Zhōng Huì; not Guō Pú; etc.) are highly cited in later Qing scholarship.
- SōngLiáo huìtóng 會同 reign-name evidence. The WúYuè / Mǐn / Liáng coast inscriptions using the Huìtóng reign-name are unique evidence that WúYuè actively used the Khitan calendar — a non-trivial point in tenth-century international-relations scholarship.
- Source for the lost Yúdì jìshèng. As a derivative work, the Bēijì mù indirectly preserves geographical-historical material from the parent Yúdì jìshèng’s now-lost portions.
The Sìkù WYG copy is partial; modern editions (especially in Sòngyuán fāngzhì cóngshū 宋元方志叢書) collate against later quotations.
CBDB 10689 records Wáng but supplies no precise dates; fl. 1195 is the standard placement.
Translations and research
No English translation. Studies:
- Hilde De Weerdt, Information, Territory, and Networks: The Crisis and Maintenance of Empire in Song China (Harvard Asia Center, 2016), with material on Wáng’s geographical compilations.
- Endymion Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, 6th ed., on Sòng geography and jīnshí.
- Robert E. Harrist Jr., The Landscape of Words (Washington UP, 2008), on Sòng inscription scholarship.
- Lǐ Yǒngxiān 李勇先 and Wáng Xiǎohóng 王小紅, modern collated edition of Yúdì jìshèng (Sìchuān University, 2003).
Other points of interest
The exclusion of northern Chinese stelae from the Yúdì bēijì mù is the structural limit of all Southern Sòng jīnshí geographical work — the inaccessibility of Hé-Huái-and-northern stelae after 1126 means that the comprehensive coverage achieved by Ōuyáng and Zhào in the Northern Sòng era was no longer available to Wáng or Chén. Modern scholarship reads this absence as a kind of cultural-political map of the Southern Sòng’s literary horizon.
Links
- Wikipedia (中文): https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/輿地紀勝
- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q15914170