Xiǎomíng lù 小名錄
Register of Childhood Names
by 陸龜蒙 (Lù Guīméng, late Táng, 撰).
About the work
A short late-Táng prosopographical lèishū gathering the xiǎomíng 小名 (childhood / familiar / “milk” names) of historical figures from the Qín down to the Northern–Southern Dynasties. The compiler Lù Guīméng 陸龜-méng (d. 881) was the celebrated late-Táng eremite-poet of Pīlíng 毗陵 / Sōngjiāng 松江, whose biography appears in the Yǐnyì (Recluses) chapter of the Xīn Táng shū (196). The work was already partly damaged by the early Southern Sòng: Zhào Xībiàn’s 趙希弁 Jùnzhāi dúshū hòuzhì records it in 3 juan and notes that it contained “names of shénxiān yùnǚ 神仙玉女 and zì of fùrén zānghuò 婦人臧獲” (women and slaves), where the present recension in 2 juan contains only the latter group and goes only down to the Southern Dynasties, with no Suí material. The Sìkù editors conclude that the received text is a partial recension, possibly post-Táng patched, but suspend judgement: “doubts retained as doubts; preserve as one specimen of an old book”. Modern users find the work principally useful as a source for xiǎomíng attested in lost Six Dynasties prosopographical literature.
Tiyao
We respectfully submit that the Xiǎomíng lù in 2 juan was composed by Lù Guīméng 陸龜-méng of the Táng. His traces are in the Yǐnyì zhuàn of the Táng shū. The book records the xiǎomíng of past figures, beginning with the Qín, ending with the Northern–Southern Dynasties. Zhào Xībiàn’s Jùnzhāi dúshū hòuzhì records it in 3 juan; the present recension has only 2. Xībiàn says “the names of shénxiān yùnǚ and the zì of fùrén zānghuò — none was discarded”; this recension has the second but not the first; and Xībiàn says the work runs “from Qín to Suí”, but this recension contains no Suí material. So this is not the complete book.
The recorded entries are rather scattered. Qín èrshì Hú Hài 胡亥, Hàn Guāngwǔdì Xiù 秀, and the like — these are not xiǎomíng at all. Wáng Róng 王戎 called ĀRóng 阿戎, Wáng Sēngqiān 王僧謙 called ĀQiān 阿謙 — this is like Lǚ Méng 呂蒙 being called ĀMéng or Cuī Hóng 崔鴻 being called ĀHóng, or Wáng Píngzǐ 王平子 being called ĀPíng; like Mǐ Yuánzhāng 米元章 being called ĀZhāng — all simply prefixing the name or zì to express affectionate familiarity, and these too should not be on a xiǎomíng list. As for Kuāng Héng 匡衡’s xiǎomíng being “Dǐng 鼎”, that comes from the Xījīng zájì and was already firmly refuted in Yán Shīgǔ’s 顏師古 Hàn shū commentary — yet Guīméng follows it, without scrutiny. This book was made for recording xiǎomíng, but it goes on from xiǎomíng to draw in surrounding shìshí (events) — already wandering; and then Xiè Lǎng 謝朗, Wáng Gōng 王恭, Wáng Xiū 王修 etc. appear twice each, contrary to the tǐlì. Perhaps the original was scattered and someone later supplied missing material by guess and attributed the patched book to Guīméng? But Táng-period works are increasingly rare; even if we cannot fully credit this book, we cannot fully condemn it as forgery either. Yí yǐ chuán yí — preserve it as one specimen of an old book.
Respectfully revised and submitted, third month of the forty-fourth year of Qiánlóng [1779].
General Compilers: Jǐ Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. General Reviser: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.
Abstract
The Xiǎomíng lù is the principal — and indeed essentially the only — pre-Sòng compendium of historical xiǎomíng (childhood names, milk-names, familiar names) attested in catalog form. Compiled by Lù Guīméng (d. 881), one of the leading late-Táng eremite-poets of the Pīlíng / Sōngjiāng region (modern Sūzhōu), whose biography is in the Yǐnyì section of the Xīn Táng shū 196 and who is principally remembered for his agricultural-poetry and xiǎoshī with Pīrìxiū 皮日休 (the Pī Lù chànghé jí 皮陸唱和集). Compositional date is bracketed here to Lù’s productive late-life period (ca. 850–881); the Southern Sòng Zhào Xībiàn already saw a recension in 3 juan that included both shénxiānyùnǚ and fùrén zānghuò and extended to the Suí, whereas the present 2-juan recension lacks both the shénxiānyùnǚ category and the Suí material. The Sìkù editors flag the work as either partial or possibly partly forged.
As a textual repository the work preserves some attestations of xiǎomíng not found elsewhere (especially for late-Hàn through Six Dynasties figures), and Cén Zhòngmiǎn 岑仲勉, Yú Jiāxī 余嘉錫 and others have drawn on it for prosopographical scholarship. The text is one of two surviving prose works by Lù Guīméng (the other being the Lěisì jīng 耒耜經 on agricultural implements, KR3l0007); the bulk of his output is poetic. The work is also one of the few late-Táng lèishū organized typologically by personal-name category rather than by topic — making it a precursor of the later zìshū (Xìngshì shū, Páipǔ 排譜) genres.
Translations and research
- Cén Zhòng-miǎn 岑仲勉, Yuán-hé xìng-zuǎn fù sì-jiào jì (Zhōng-huá, 1994), draws on the Xiǎo-míng lù for cross-reference.
- Yú Jiā-xī 余嘉錫, Sì-kù tí-yào biàn-zhèng (Zhōng-huá, 1980, 4 vols.), entry on the Xiǎo-míng lù, contests several of the Sìkù editors’ specific criticisms.
- William H. Nienhauser Jr., “Lu Guimeng,” in his The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature vol. 1, 595–598; treats Lù’s prose works briefly.
No European-language translation.
Other points of interest
The Sìkù tíyào’s critique — that several entries describe simple affectionate name-prefixings (Ā-X) rather than genuine childhood-names — is a useful piece of Qīng evidential bibliography, separating two distinct sociolinguistic categories that the late-Táng compilers had run together.
Links
- Sìkù quánshū zǒngmù tíyào, Zǐbù · Lèishū lèi, Xiǎomíng lù entry.
- Wikidata: Q11074158.