荔枝譜

Lìzhī pǔ 荔枝譜

Treatise on the Lychee by 蔡襄 (Cài Xiāng, 撰)

About the work

The foundational Chinese monograph on the lychee (Litchi chinensis / Litchi sinensis / lìzhī 荔枝) — the famous southern tropical fruit which Tang Yáng Guìfēi 楊貴妃 had postal-relayed to Cháng’ān at imperial expense. A one-juàn Northern-Sòng work in seven piān by Cài Xiāng 蔡襄 (1012–1067), the great Northern-Sòng calligrapher-statesman and tea-master (already author of KR3i0020 Chálù), composed in 1059 during his second prefectship of Fúzhōu. The first systematic monograph on a fruit in Chinese literature, and a model for subsequent fruit-treatises (the Sòng Júlù of Hán Yànzhí, KR3i0039; the Yuán-Míng-Qing tropical-fruit treatises).

The seven piān: (1) Yuán běnshǐ 原本始 (Origins); (2) Biāo yóuyì 標尤異 (Marking the Especially-Strange Varieties); (3) Zhì gǔyù 誌賈鬻 (Recording the Trade); (4) Míng fúshí 明服食 (Clarifying Consumption); (5) Shèn hùyǎng 慎護養 (Care of the Trees); (6) Shí fǎzhì 時法製 (Seasonal Preservation Methods); (7) Bié zhǒnglèi 別種類 (Varieties — thirty-two named cultivars).

Tiyao

The combined tíyào covering this work and KR3i0039 is in this file. The portion concerning Lìzhī pǔ (translated): We submit that the Lìzhī pǔ is in one juàn by Cài Xiāng of the Sòng. Xiāng, zì Jūnmó, was a man of Xiānyóu in Xīnghuà, jìnshì of Tiānshèng 8 (1030), holding office up to Duānmíngdiàn xuéshì*, died with posthumous title* Zhōnghuì*; his career is fully recorded in his* Sòngshǐ biography. This compilation was made for the Mǐnzhōng (Fújiàn) lychees, in seven piān*: First, “Origins of the Beginning”; Second, “Marking the Especially-Strange [varieties]”; Third, “Recording the Trade”; Fourth, “Clarifying Consumption”; Fifth, “Caring for Cultivation”; Sixth, “Seasonal Method-of-Preserving”; Seventh, “Distinguishing the Varieties.” [Cài] once personally wrote-and-engraved it; today the inked-wood-blocks still circulate in the world. The book is also included in his* Duānmíng jí*. At the end is “Jiāyòu 4* jǐhài autumn 8th month 20th day, Púyáng Kuí so-and-so narrated” — nineteen characters — but the present text omits these. By those year-and-month-figures, this was when he had just moved from being prefect of Fúzhōu to becoming prefect of Quánzhōu.

The making of a treatise on lychees began with [Cài] Xiāng. Its narration is particularly detailed-and-pure, with literary strength; yet Wáng Shìzhēn’s Sìbù gǎo says that Bái Lètiān (Bái Jūyì) and Sū Zǐzhān (Sū Shì) wrote Lìzhī zhuàn (Lychee Biography) which give the fruit its true spirit, while [Cài] Jūnmó’s does not — utterly not a fair judgment.

Also: in Xiāng’s poems he repeatedly sings of lychees, many of which can be cross-checked with the treatise. As in his “Fourth Month at the Pool” poem, the line “lychees just like small green plums” — Liú Kèzhuāng says this is the Huǒshān (Volcano) variety in the treatise. The “Seventh Month 24th Day Eating Lychees” poem, the line “vermillion-robed immortal-children passing mid-Yuán” — this is the Zhōngyuán hóng (Mid-Yuán Red) variety in the treatise. The “Thanks to Sòng Píngshì” poem, the line “after the troops the gods became known” — this is the Sònggōng lìzhī (Mr Sòng’s Lychee) in the treatise. There is also a hand-letter to Zhāowén Prime-Minister mentioning “Chén Family Purple — called the first — presented to you”, which is not included in the collection but appears separately in Hóng Mài’s Róngzhāi suíbǐ; this may also serve as classical-anecdote for this treatise.

Abstract

The work is the first systematic Chinese monograph on a fruit and one of the most influential of the entire pǔlù tradition. Its seven-chapter structure — origins, exceptional varieties, trade, consumption, cultivation, preservation, varietal listing — is the template for subsequent Chinese fruit-monographs.

The varietal section documents thirty-two Fújiàn lychee cultivars: Chénshì zǐ 陳氏紫 (Chén Family Purple, ranked first), Jiāngjiā lǜ 江家綠 (Jiāng Family Green), Zhōngyuán hóng 中元紅 (Mid-Yuán Red, named for ripening at the Buddhist mid-July Ghost Festival), Sònggōng lìzhī 宋公荔枝 (Mr Sòng’s Lychee), Huǒshān 火山 (Volcano, the earliest-ripening variety), etc. These are the canonical Sòng lychee varieties; many remain in cultivation in modern Fújiàn.

The cultivation chapter (piān 5) is the principal Sòng source for tropical-fruit horticulture: grafting, watering, pest-control, harvest. The preservation chapter (piān 6) describes the famous hóngyán 紅鹽 (red-salt) method for preserving lychee through the winter — a process Cài himself developed at his Fújiàn estate. The trade chapter documents the substantial Fújiàn lychee export economy, with lychees shipped by sea to the Yangtze-delta cities and overland (with great difficulty) to the capital.

The work is dated by the Sìkù tíyào to Jiāyòu 4 jǐhài autumn 8th month 20th day (24 September 1059), when Cài Xiāng had just moved from the Fúzhōu prefectship to the Quánzhōu prefectship; the surviving recension lacks this colophon but the Duānmíng jí and the original engraved-block recensions preserve it. The work circulated widely in Cài’s own woodblock-printed recension — one of the very early Chinese examples of authorial self-publication by woodblock.

Translations and research

• Wú Yìláng 吳乙朗 et al. 1991. Zhōng-guó lì-zhī yán-jiū 中國荔枝研究. Beijing: Zhōng-guó Nóng-yè chū-bǎn-shè. Standard modern monograph on lychee cultivation history; treats Cài Xiāng’s Lì-zhī pǔ extensively.
• Goody, Jack. 1982. Cooking, Cuisine and Class. Cambridge UP. Treats Cài Xiāng’s Lì-zhī pǔ in the broader context of pre-modern food-culture treatises.
• Egan, Ronald. 2006. The Problem of Beauty: Aesthetic Thought and Pursuits in Northern Song Dynasty China. Cambridge MA: Harvard UP.

Other points of interest

The work is the foundational Chinese fruit-treatise and a major influence on Sòng-Yuán-Míng-Qing fruit-literature. Cài Xiāng’s claim of personal woodblock-engraving for distribution is one of the early Chinese examples of authorial self-publication in print, several decades before the wider Sòng print-revolution of the 11th and 12th centuries. The work’s influence extended to neighbouring cultures: the early Edo Japanese reception of Chinese fruit-knowledge passed through this work, as did the early Korean reception.

Links

• Chinese Text Project
• Wikipedia (Lychee)
• Wikidata Q13391