Shòuqīn yǎnglǎo xīn shū 壽親養老新書
The New Book of Long-Life Reverence for Parents and Care for the Elderly by 陳直 (Chén Zhí, fl. Sòng Yuánfēng 元豐 reign, 1078–1085, 宋) — base author; 鄒鉉 (Zōu Xuàn, fl. Yuán Dàdé 大德 reign, 1297–1307, 元) — supplementer
About the work
The principal Chinese pre-modern treatise on elder-care medicine (老年養生 / yǎnglǎo), in four juan: the first is Chén Zhí’s Sòng-period Yǎnglǎo fèngqīn shū 養老奉親書 (15 篇 / 233 entries on dietary regulation, seasonal cultivation, and emergency-care prescriptions for the elderly); juan 2–4 are Zōu Xuàn’s Yuán-period continuation, comprising (a) seventy-two examples of “fine words and good deeds” of elderly worthies, (b) detailed practical guidance on bedding, clothing, vessels, porridges, and medicines suitable for the elderly, and (c) prescriptions for women and children appended for completeness — 256 entries in all. Chén’s section is the textual ancestor of the elder-care section of Gāo Lián 高濂’s late-Míng Zūn shēng bā jiān 尊生八牋 (1591), specifically the Sì shí tiáo shè jiān 四時調攝牋. Zōu’s continuation drifts somewhat into literary miscellany — birthday-poetry, xiánshì (leisured-life) reflections — anticipating the Míng qīngyán 清言 (refined miscellany) genre.
Tiyao
Shòuqīn yǎnglǎo xīn shū, four juan. The first juan is by Chén Zhí of the Sòng, originally titled Yǎnglǎo fèngqīn shū. The second juan onward is by Zōu Xuàn of Tàiníng, who in the Yuán Dàdé period continued and supplemented Chén’s book, joining them into one work and giving it the present title.
Chén Zhí during the Yuánfēng period served as Magistrate of Xīnghuà 興化 in Tàizhōu. The Wénxiàn tōngkǎo records a Fèngqīn yǎnglǎo shū 奉親養老書 in one juan by Chén; this present text however carries the title Yǎnglǎo fèngqīn shū — character order reversed. But the present text is the Yuán Zhì-zhèng-period (1341–1370) Zhèjiāng reprint, made from old blocks; the title would not be erroneously given. The Tōngkǎo in transmission has reversed the words.
Zōu Xuàn’s hào was Bīnghè, also Jìngzhí lǎorén. The book refers to his great-grandfather as “Nángǔ” and his great-uncle as “Pǔān”. From the Fújiàn tōngzhì one finds Nángǔ to be the Sòng Cānzhīzhèngshì Zōu Yìnglóng 應龍 and Pǔān to be the Sòng Jiāngxī Tíxíng Zōu Yìngbó 應博, both well-known in their time. Zhōu Yìngzǐ’s preface calls him Zǒngguǎn jūn 總管君 and refers to his time at Zhōngdū 中都 — so Zōu also held office. But the Tōngzhì does not preserve his career-record, and the details cannot be recovered.
Chén’s book ranges from “Dietary Regulation” (飲食調治) through “Concise Emergency Prescriptions for the Elderly” (簡妙老人備急方), in fifteen 篇 and two hundred thirty-three entries. Its method of seasonal regulation is well-developed. The Míng Gāo Lián’s Zūn shēng bā jiān — its Sì shí tiáo shè jiān — broadly draws its medicinal substances from this book.
Zōu’s continuation: the first additional juan contains seventy-two examples of “ancient and modern fine words and good deeds”; the latter two juan cover the fitting bedding, clothing, vessels, porridges, and medicines, in greater detail, supplemented by good prescriptions for women and children — two hundred fifty-six entries in all. Among them, the birthday-celebration poems run to many connected pieces, somewhat tedious in collection. The “leisured-life” passages are sometimes thin and small in language, drifting into pretty miscellany — the late-Míng qīngyán and xiǎopǐn genres in fact derive from this. Yet the citation of prescriptions is mostly rare and secret, useful for the cultivation of old age, and is something the filial son ought to attend to.
(Respectfully verified, 12th month of Qiánlóng 46 [1781]. Chief Compilers Jì Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì; Chief Collator Lù Fèichí.)
Abstract
Composition window: 1085 (terminus post quem of Chén Zhí’s tenure under Yuánfēng) to 1307 (terminus ante quem of Zōu’s Dàdé continuation). The catalog meta gives the dynasty as 元, reflecting Zōu’s continuation as the dating-anchor for the received recension; Chén Zhí’s portion is Sòng. The transmitted Zhì-zhèng-period Zhèjiāng reprint of 1341–1370 is the SKQS base.
The work’s significance: (a) the foundational systematic treatment of elder-care medicine in the Chinese tradition, predating most of the corresponding Mediterranean and South-Asian contributions and forming the basis for all later Chinese gerontological practice; (b) the integration of medical, dietary, and quotidian-life domains under a single elder-care framework — a holistic approach matched in Western medicine only much later; (c) the late-Míng qīngyán lineage — the SKQS tíyào’s observation that Zōu’s continuation anticipates the Míng qīngyán / xiǎopǐn miscellany genre is one of the more interesting cross-genre observations in the medical-literary record.
The Gāo Lián Zūn shēng bā jiān connection — flagged by the SKQS editors — confirms the work’s status as the principal SòngYuán reference for late-Míng gerontology and yǎngshēng; through Gāo Lián the work entered the late-Míng commercial-publishing market and circulated widely.
Translations and research
- Hsiung Ping-chen 熊秉真, A Tender Voyage: Children and Childhood in Late Imperial China, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005. Treats Zōu’s pediatric appendix.
- Despeux, Catherine. Préscriptions d’acuponcture valant mille onces d’or and her broader work on Chinese yǎng-shēng and gerontology.
- Mǎ Jìxīng 馬繼興, Zhōng-yī wénxiàn xué 中醫文獻學, Shànghǎi: Shànghǎi Kēxué Jìshù Chūbǎnshè, 1990 (entry on the Yǎng-lǎo fèng-qīn shū / Shòu-qīn yǎng-lǎo xīn shū).
- Ito Yoshikazu 伊藤良和, Yōrō hōshin sho: Chū rokugaku no rōnenigaku 養老奉親書: 中国古老年医学, Tōkyō: Sōzō Shobō, 1995. Standard Japanese translation and study.
- Liào Yùqún 廖育群, Yīxué yǔ chuántǒng wénhuà 醫學與傳統文化, Tianjin: Bǎihuā Wényì, 2002 (chapter on Chinese gerontology).
Other points of interest
The Yuán Zhì-zhèng-period (1341–1370) Zhèjiāng reprint preserves the work’s title as Yǎnglǎo fèngqīn shū (in the order Care-for-the-Elderly, Reverence-for-Parents) — a small but philologically interesting departure from the Wénxiàn tōngkǎo’s Fèngqīn yǎnglǎo. The SKQS editors’ philological argument for the Zhèjiāng print’s order is supported by the surviving Yuán print’s blockcutting evidence.
The connection between Chén Zhí’s Sòng-period elder-care manual and Zōu Xuàn’s Yuán continuation is one of relatively few cases in the Chinese medical tradition where a major specialist treatise was substantially expanded by a later editor without losing its original editorial identity. The result is a hybrid work whose Sòng and Yuán strata are each useful in different ways.