Shèzhōu yànpǔ 歙州硯譜
Treatise on the Ink-Stones of Shè-zhōu by 唐積 (Táng Jī, 撰)
About the work
A one-juàn monograph on the Shèshí 歙石 ink-stones — the second-most-prized variety of Sòng ink-stone, quarried at Lóngwěi shān 龍尾山 in Wùyuán 婺源 county of Shèzhōu 歙州. Composed in Zhìpíng 3 (1066) by Táng Jī 唐積, then Tàizǐ zhōngshè and magistrate of Wùyuán; the source is the most authoritative early Sòng treatment of the Shè-stone industry. The work is divided into ten chapters (mén 門): (1) cǎifā shíkēng 採發石坑 (opening of the stone-pits); (2) gōngqǔ 攻取 (extraction); (3) pǐnmù 品目 (varieties); (4) xiūzhuó 修斵 (cutting and polishing); (5) míngzhuàng 名狀 (names and shapes); (6) shíbìng 石病 (defects); (7) dàolù 道路 (transport-routes); (8) jiàngshǒu 匠手 (artisans); (9) gōngqì 攻器 (tools); plus a residual chapter. The original was a túpǔ 圖譜 — an illustrated treatise — but the illustrations were lost when Zuǒ Guī 左圭 printed it into the Bǎichuān xuéhǎi 百川學海 in the late Sòng.
Tiyao
We submit that the Shèzhōu yànpǔ originally did not give the compiler’s name; only at the end of the juàn there is inscribed: “ninth of the ninth month, bǐngwǔ year of the Great Sòng Zhìpíng (1066)” — ten characters. Investigating, Chén Zhènsūn’s 陳振孫 Shūlù jiětí records a Shè yàn túpǔ 歙硯圖譜 in one juàn, stating it is by Táng Jī, tàizǐ zhōngshè and magistrate of Wùyuán, in the Zhìpíng bǐngwǔ year — the year and date matching exactly, so this is Táng Jī’s work. The work is in ten sections, recording the methods of opening, cutting and finishing the stone in great detail. Shè-stone became prominent in the Southern Táng and Sòng people, finding its fāmò 發墨 (ink-developing capacity) excellent, came to use it. The local people lived by the trade and often made stones in elaborate shapes to seek sales. Mǐ Fú once criticized them for cultivating the Duān shape — using the píngzhí dǒuyàng 平直斗樣 (flat-and-straight dipper form) as the most valued — which retains too much ink; very regrettable. And yet the present text in its míngzhuàng 名狀 chapter does indeed list the Duān form first, which also allows us to see the fashion of the time. Shūlù jiětí records this as a túpǔ; Mǐ Fú also said “the present manufacture, see the Shèzhōu yàntú” — but this recension has the treatise without the illustrations: apparently when Zuǒ Guī cut it into the Bǎichuān xuéhǎi, some had already been deleted, and we now still follow that.
(Note: this tíyào is part of the same combined 提要 introducing KR3i0003–KR3i0007 in the WYG arrangement.)
Abstract
The Shèzhōu yànpǔ is the standard source for the early Sòng Shè-stone industry. Its precision and technical detail — the description of extraction at Lóngwěishān, the cuts made by the artisans, the routes of land-and-water transport to the urban markets — make it the prototype of detailed-craft-monographs (gōngyì zhuānzhì 工藝專志) in the pǔlù tradition. The work is mentioned by Mǐ Fú in the Yànshǐ (KR3i0003) — Mǐ uses Táng’s manufacturing classification as his point of reference for criticizing contemporary Shè-stone forms — which puts the terminus ante quem of Táng’s text at the date of Mǐ’s working life (active 1085–1107), but Táng’s own date (1066) places the work nearly a generation earlier.
The work was preserved through the Sòng Bǎichuān xuéhǎi compilation by Zuǒ Guī 左圭 (compiled c. 1273), but the illustrations were dropped. The Sìkù recension is the Bǎichuān xuéhǎi text, restored from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn.
Translations and research
- Léng Jiànlì 冷建立. 2010. Sòng-dài pǔ-lù wén-xiàn yán-jiū 宋代譜錄文獻研究. Běijīng: Rénmín wénxué chū-bǎn-shè. Chapter on the Shè-stone treatises.
- Wáng Jūn 王軍. 2015. Shè-yàn shǐ-huà 歙硯史話. Hé-féi: Huáng-shān shū-shè. Modern history of the Shè-stone industry.
- Tsien Tsuen-hsuin 錢存訓. 1985. Paper and Printing. Vol. V part 1 of Needham’s Science and Civilisation in China. Cambridge UP. Uses the Sòng ink-stone monographs extensively.
Other points of interest
The work’s detailed enumeration of artisan-names — twelve named jiàngshǒu 匠手 from Wùyuán — is one of the rare Sòng documents preserving the names of working craftsmen at the source of a luxury-good industry. The chapter on transport-routes is significant for Sòng economic geography: it describes the network linking the Wùyuán quarries to Hángzhōu and Yángzhōu by both the Xīn’ān River and overland routes.