茶錄

Chálù 茶錄

Records of Tea by 蔡襄 (Cài Xiāng, 撰)

About the work

A one-juàn Northern-Sòng tea-treatise, the foundational text of the Sòng-period tea-cake (tuánchá 團茶) tradition and the principal Sòng work on Jiànān 建安 (Fújiàn) tea — the source of the imperial-tribute Beìyuàn tea. By Cài Xiāng 蔡襄 (1012–1067), the famous Northern-Sòng calligrapher, statesman, and tea-master of Pútián. Originally composed by Cài when he was Yòu zhèngyán 右正言 and xiū qǐjū zhù 修起居注 in the Huángyòu reign (1049–1054) and submitted to Rénzōng; later (Zhìpíng 1 / 1064) revised, with both an original and a later self-preface, and engraved on stone.

The work is in two piān (sections): the upper (shàngpiān 上篇) discusses tea (varieties, processing, tasting, judging); the lower (xiàpiān 下篇) discusses tea-utensils (the brewing-and-tasting equipment). Both are devoted to the technique of jiānshì 煎試 — Sòng-style tea-preparation through whisking powdered tea with hot water in a heated bowl. The Wénxiàn tōngkǎo lists the work as Shìchá lù 試茶錄, but Cài’s own two prefaces and the stone-engraved recension both give Chálù, so Shì is a later interpolation.

Tiyao

The combined tíyào covering this work is in KR3i0019. The relevant portion (translated): We submit that the Chálù is in one juàn by Cài Xiāng of the Sòng. Xiāng, zì Jūnmó, was a man of Pútián, holding office to Duānmíngdiàn xuéshì*, posthumous title* Zhōnghuì*; his career is fully recorded in his* Sòngshǐ biography. This work was presented during his Huángyòu period as Yòu zhèngyán and xiū qǐjū zhù*; before and after both have his self-preface. The earlier preface says: “Lù Yǔ’s* Chájīng does not rank the Jiànān varieties; Dīng Wèi’s Chátú discusses only the cultivation-and-processing fundamentals; as to brewing-and-tasting, there has never been a word. I have set out a few items, simple and easy-to-understand.” The later preface is from when, in Zhìpíng 1 (1064), he engraved it on stone. The work divides into upper-and-lower piān*: the upper discusses tea, the lower discusses tea-utensils — both concerning brewing-and-tasting methods. The* Tōngkǎo records the work as Shìchálù (Tea-Testing Records); but examining Cài’s two prefaces, both self-call it Chálù*, and the stone-recension also says* Chálù*; the character* Shì is therefore a mistaken addition. — Fèi Gǔn’s Liángxī mànzhì contains Chén Dōng’s postface to this book: “I heard from elder gentlemen that Jūnmó initially serving as Fújiàn transport-commissioner ordered the manufacture of secret-cloud small-cake tea as tribute. Fù Bìgōng heard this and sighed: ‘This is what servants-and-concubines do in loving their master — I never thought Jūnmó would do the same.’ I, when a child, also heard this and felt admiration-and-affection [for Fù Bì]; when I saw the stone-recension of the Chálù*, I regretted that Jūnmó had not turned his pen instead to writing a* Lǚáo piece to present.” Investigating: the Běiyuàn gòngchá lù records that under Tàipíngxīngguó a special lóngfèng (dragon-and-phoenix) mould was set for making cake-tea — so cake-tea was already a standard local tribute. The Tiáoxī yúyǐn cónghuà records that the Běiyuàn official-roasting-establishment paid annual tribute to the transport-office for upward submission — so tea-making was the Zhuǎnyùnshǐ*‘s duty, and Cài’s careful refinement was one form of carrying out his office. Chén Dōng’s recital of Fù Bì’s words was rather narrow. The* Qúnfāng pǔ (KR3i0044) also records this matter, attributing it to Ōuyáng Xiū; but Ōuyáng Xiū’s postface to the Lóngchálù itself describes Cài’s making of small-cake tea without any condemnation — showing that the saying is fabricated. How can we know that Fù Bì’s words are not equally fabricated? This is simply because of Sū Shì’s poem “First Dīng then Cài, to gratify the mouth-and-body” — and the attaching-of-stories to that. It is not the truth. Moreover, the tea-making was a Qìng-lì-period (1041–1048) affair; the Chálù submission was a Huáng-yòu-period (1049+) affair. Cài was originally a Fújiàn man — at most a literatus’s love of showing-off-the-local-product, an ingrained habit. To press it deeper would be to require that Qián Wéiyǎn’s tribute of Yáohuáng peonies — also mocked in a Sū Shì poem — and Ōuyáng Xiū’s Mǔdān pǔ (KR3i0029) similarly merit reproach. Chén Dōng’s words may be argued internally consistent but are not the verdict of a balanced observer.

Abstract

The work is the principal Northern-Sòng tea-treatise and the source of all subsequent Sòng-period tea-knowledge concerning the Beìyuàn official-imperial tea-roastery and the tuánchá (cake-tea) tradition. It is the immediate predecessor to the more famous Huīzōng-emperor Dàguān chálùn 大觀茶論 (1107) — Huīzōng’s own treatise on tea, which substantially follows Cài Xiāng’s framework.

The composition is dated by the prefaces: the Huángyòu original c. 1049–1054 (during Cài’s office as Yòu zhèngyán); the Zhìpíng revision in 1064 (the year before Cài’s death). The stone-engraving of 1064 ensured the work’s preservation in standard form.

The work is the principal contemporary description of the Beìyuàn tribute tea: the xiǎotuán 小團 (small dragon-cake), the mìyún xiǎotuán 密雲小團 (“Dense-Cloud Small-Cake” — a famous luxury variant), the báiyá 白芽 (white-bud, processed only from the bud-tip), and the variations of dragon-and-phoenix moulding. The tribute-tea industry that Cài documents was a major source of regional economic activity in early-Sòng Fújiàn.

The famous controversy with Fù Bì 富弼’s criticism — that Cài’s refinement of the tribute-tea was unbecoming of a senior literatus — is preserved by Fèi Gǔn’s Liángxī mànzhì, with Chén Dōng’s 陳東 attribution; the Sìkù editors dismiss this story as later moralistic embellishment, of a piece with similar fabrications about Qián Wéiyǎn and Ōuyáng Xiū. Cài’s tea-monograph was a serious scholarly-and-administrative product, not a vanity-project.

Translations and research

• Benn, James A. 2015. Tea in China: A Religious and Cultural History. Honolulu: U Hawaii Press. Treats Cài Xiāng extensively.
• Smith, Paul Jakov. 1991. Taxing Heaven’s Storehouse: Horses, Bureaucrats, and the Destruction of the Sichuan Tea Industry, 1074–1224. Cambridge MA: Harvard Council on East Asian Studies. Background on the Sòng tea-tribute system.
• Hé Língfēi 賀玲飛. 2009. Cài Xiāng Chá-lù yán-jiū 蔡襄茶錄研究. Sū-zhōu master’s thesis.
• Egan, Ronald. 2006. The Problem of Beauty: Aesthetic Thought and Pursuits in Northern Song Dynasty China. Cambridge MA: Harvard UP. Discusses Cài Xiāng’s tea-aesthetic.

Other points of interest

The tea-utensils section of the Chálù is the principal source for the Sòng tea-bowl tradition — including the famous jiànzhǎn 建盞 (Jiàn-ware tea-bowls, especially the tiānmù 天目 “hare’s-fur” and yóudī 油滴 “oil-drop” glazed varieties) that became central to the Sòng tea-aesthetic and were later canonized in the Japanese tea-ceremony. Cài specifies the dark-glazed jiànzhǎn as superior because it shows the white qìrǔ 乳花 (cream-foam) of properly-whisked tea to best advantage.

Links

• Chinese Text Project
• Wikipedia (Cai Xiang)
• Wikidata Q706472