Duānxī yànpǔ 端溪硯譜
Treatise on the Ink-Stones of Duān-xī by an anonymous early-Southern-Sòng connoisseur (闕名, 撰)
About the work
A one-juàn anonymous Sòng monograph on the Duānxī yàn 端溪硯 — the supreme variety of Chinese ink-stone, quarried at Duānzhōu 端州 (modern Zhàoqìng 肇慶, Guǎngdōng). It was Yè Yuè 葉樾 of Jìnyún 縉雲 (zì Jiāoshū 交叔) who transmitted the manuscript; the Sìkù editors’ assessment that the author, who refers to Huīzōng (r. 1100–1125) by the posthumous title Tàishàng huáng 太上皇, must have lived in the very early Southern Sòng — c. 1130 — is the standard dating. Yè Yuè’s transmission was annotated by Róng Qí 榮芑 of Dōngpíng 東平 in the bá (colophon) of Chúnxī 10 (1183).
The work divides into four parts: a discussion of the source of the stone and its quality and “eyes” (shíyǎn 石眼); a discussion of price; a discussion of formal shapes; concluding with a discussion of defects (shíbìng 石病).
Tiyao
The combined tíyào covering this work is preserved in KR3i0003. The relevant portion (translated): We submit that the Duānxī yànpǔ originally did not give the compiler’s name. At the end of the volume is a postface by Róng Qí of Dōngpíng of Chúnxī 10 (1183) saying: “Yè Yuè of Jìnyún (zì Jiāoshū) transmits this treatise — slightly different from the common discussions — but I do not know who composed it; it calls Huīzōng Tàishàng huáng (Senior-Emperor), so it must be a man of the early Shàoxīng (1131+).” So already at that time, who composed it could not be determined. The book first discusses the source of the stone, the quality of the stone, and the stone-eyes; next discusses price; next discusses form; ending with stone-defects. Liǔ Gōngquán 柳公權 of the Táng, in his discussion of ink-stones, placed Qīngzhōu and Jiàngzhōu at the head and did not mention Duān-stone; Sū Yìjiǎn’s Wénfáng sìpǔ (KR3i0002) still ranked Qīngzhōu hóngsī yàn (red-silk ink-stone) first. From this point onwards, Duān ink-stone alone gained world-pre-eminence, and the techniques of discrimination became correspondingly more refined. What this treatise records concerning the relative merits of producing-localities and the rankings of stone-qualities is everywhere lucid-and-detailed, and can be reliably followed. As for the contemporary view valuing zǐshí (child-stones), this treatise alone identifies the falsehood — hence Róng Qí said it was “slightly different from the common discussions” — referring precisely to this kind of matter. From Mǐ Fú’s Yànshǐ (KR3i0003) onwards it was already said: “Having inquired in detail of the stone-workers — there has never been any zǐshí*.” When Mǐ Fú served as Hánguāngxiàn* wèi*, he personally went to Duānzhōu and got the details; his statement precisely agrees with this — sufficient to know the assertion is genuinely correct.*
Abstract
The dating is set by internal evidence: the reference to the Huīzōng emperor (r. 1100–1125) as Tàishàng huáng 太上皇 places the composition in the period when Huīzōng had abdicated to his son Qīnzōng (1126) but was still alive, or in the very early Southern Sòng — i.e., 1126–1135. Róng Qí’s colophon of Chúnxī 10 (1183) gives a firm terminus ante quem. The author is unknown; the Sìkù editors take it as an early-Southern-Sòng work, transmitted later through Yè Yuè to Róng Qí, then to the Bǎichuān xuéhǎi.
The work is the most authoritative early-Sòng source on Duān-stone — independent of the more famous Mǐ Fú Yànshǐ (KR3i0003) — and is particularly valued for its detailed analysis of the price gradients of finished Duān ink-stones (a remarkable economic-historical source) and for its independent refutation of the zǐshí fraud — itself first criticized by Mǐ Fú on the basis of personal inquiry at the Duānzhōu quarries. The agreement of two independent sources, Mǐ Fú and the Duānxī yànpǔ, on the spurious nature of zǐshí makes that judgement secure for modern scholarship.
The work was preserved through the Sòng Bǎichuān xuéhǎi and reaches the Sìkù through that channel.
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.
- Wáng Yùxiá 王玉霞. 2008. Zhōng-guó míng yàn jiàn-shǎng 中國名硯鑒賞. Tài-yuán: Shānxī rénmín chū-bǎn-shè.
Other points of interest
The book’s account of Duān-stone “eyes” (shíyǎn 石眼) — those characteristic circular markings (often interpreted in connoisseurship as bird’s-eyes, mynah-eyes, or rat-eyes) — is the standard early reference. The work establishes the four-fold gradation of shíyǎn (active, dead, half-active, half-dead) that subsequent SòngYuánMíngQīng treatises followed.