Gǔjīn hébì shìlèi bèiyào 古今合璧事類備要
Paired Jade-Disks of Categorized Affairs, Ancient and Modern, Complete in Essentials
by 謝維新 (Xiè Wéixīn, Southern Sòng, 撰); promoter 劉德亨 (Liú Déhēng); colophon 黃叔度 (Huáng Shūdù).
About the work
A vast late-Southern-Sòng lèishū in five jí — qiánjí 69 juan, hòují 81 juan, xùjí 56 juan, biéjí 94 juan, wàijí 66 juan (total 366 juan; the Sìkù “cún 365” reflects one juan’s minor lacuna). Composed by Xiè Wéixīn 謝維新 (zì Qùjiù 去咎) of Jiànān 建安, a Jiāoxiáng jìnshì 膠庠進士 (Imperial-University jìnshì, i.e. a Tàixué graduate not advanced to imperial-court jìnshì). Preface dated Bǎoyòu 寶祐 dīngsì / Dàlǚ (jìwàng) = 1257; colophon by Huáng Shūdù 黃叔度 (Pútián Prefect) and a further attribution-colophon (probably by Liú Déhēng 劉德亨, who commissioned the work). The publication was a Jiànyáng / Jiànān fāngběn (commercial Máshā tradition) project.
The 41 + 48 + 6 + 6 + 16 = 117 mén and 491 + 416 + 570 + 410 + 430 = 2,317 zǐmù together make this one of the most fully-articulated lèishū in Chinese bibliographic history. Like the Yìwén lèijù, each zǐmù divides into shìlèi (factual matters) and shījí (poetry collection). The work explicitly excludes the prefectures and famous places of Zhù Mù’s Fāngyú shènglǎn 方輿勝覽 (KR3k0024) on the principle that the latter had already covered that ground — making this and Fāngyú shènglǎn twin compendia of the late-Southern-Sòng fāngběn trade.
The work’s contribution to modern scholarship is twofold. First, as the Sìkù tíyào notes, it preserves Sòng-period yìshī (lost poems) and yìshì (lost events) — including Sū Shì’s 蘇軾 “Snow-Poem” series organized by fùguì shìlì (riches, nobility, power, force), which is missing from his received jí and which Lì È 厲鶚 used in compiling his Sòng shī jìshì 宋詩紀事. Second, the hòují (81 juan on bureaucratic offices) is the most detailed surviving record of the bewildering late-Southern-Sòng bureaucratic offices — many of which the Sòng shǐ preserves only by name, with their actual responsibilities and place in the hierarchy unrecoverable except via this work.
Tiyao (abridged)
We respectfully submit that the Gǔjīn hébì shìlèi bèiyào qiánjí in 69 juan, hòují in 81 juan, xùjí in 56 juan, biéjí in 94 juan, wàijí in 66 juan, compiled by Xiè Wéixīn 謝維新 of the Sòng. Wéixīn, zì Qùjiù 去咎, native of Jiànān 建安, beginning and end not known; he self-titles as Jiāoxiáng jìnshì 膠庠進士 — namely a Tàixué student.
The book was completed in Bǎoyòu dīngsì [1257]. Preceded by Wéixīn’s own preface and followed by a colophon by Huáng Shūdù, Pútián Prefect, saying that Wéixīn was commissioned by his friend Liú Déhēng — clearly a contemporary commercial-edition collector. After the zǒngmù there is a further colophon: “Recently we cut the Gǔjīn bèiyào in four jí and it widely circulated; only the ménmù are not yet complete; now we cut again the wàijí” — unsigned, but this is presumably Déhēng’s.
The qiánjí has 41 mén and 491 zǐmù. The hòují has 48 mén and 416 zǐmù; the Zhìshì sub-heading has the record but no content, with a note “already seen in qiánjí”. The xùjí has 6 mén and 570 zǐmù. The biéjí has 6 mén and 410 zǐmù. The wàijí has 16 mén and 430 zǐmù. The citations are most thorough; only the jùnxiàn shānchuān míngshèng (prefectures and famous places) — since Zhù Mù’s Fāngyú shènglǎn has already covered them — are not repeated here.
Each zǐmù: first shìlèi, then shījí. What it gathers extends to the Sòng — not as far back as the Tàipíng yùlǎn and Cèfǔ yuánguī in tracing the gēndǐ (foundations) of ancient texts down to their roots. But what it collects is all pre-Sòng material, much of which we cannot today see. Sòng-period yìshì (lost events) and yìshī (lost poems) — as Sū Shì’s Yǒngxuě shī series organized by fù, guì, shì, lì (four poems), which the received jí does not record — survive only in this book. So Lì È drew on it extensively for the Sòng shī jìshì.
Sòng bureaucracy was extremely confused; the Sòng shǐ preserves only the names; the contemporary shīwén references contain offices today not identifiable as to actual rank. Only this book’s hòují lists them with the greatest clarity — particularly useful for evidential checking. Among lèishì houses, this is still a work where source-material can be drawn.
Respectfully revised and submitted, fifth month of the forty-sixth year of Qiánlóng [1781].
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 Gǔjīn hébì shìlèi bèiyào is the largest privately-compiled commercial lèishū of the late Southern Sòng and a primary reference work for Southern-Sòng cultural-and-institutional history. Xiè Wéixīn of Jiànān was a Tàixué graduate of the late 1240s or early 1250s; his colleague Liú Déhēng commissioned the compilation as a fāngběn commercial publishing project. The work issued in stages: the first four jí (300 juan) were already widely circulating by 1257, when Wéixīn’s preface was written; the wàijí (66 juan) was then added to fill remaining categorical gaps. Huáng Shūdù, the contemporary Prefect of Pútián 莆田 (Fújiàn), supplied the formal colophon.
The work is a paradigmatic late-Southern-Sòng fāngběn compendium — comprehensive in scope, commercially-driven, and structurally complemented by Zhù Mù’s Fāngyú shènglǎn (geography) so that the two together cover almost the entire Sòng lèishū range. The 81-juan hòují on bureaucracy is the most detailed surviving prosopographical compendium of Southern-Sòng office structure, used by every modern study of Southern-Sòng government (Charles Hucker, Gary Edward, Cài Měibīn, etc.). The five-jí split organization is a particularly elaborate version of the genre’s tendency to incremental expansion.
For the modern student, the work is especially important because the jué dà bù fēn (vast majority) of Northern-Sòng poetry it preserves is otherwise lost or in textually divergent form: Lì È 厲鶚’s authoritative Sòng shī jìshì 宋詩紀事 (1746) draws on this work for hundreds of otherwise-lost verses.
Translations and research
- Lucille Chia, Printing for Profit: The Commercial Publishers of Jianyang, Fujian (11th–17th Centuries) (Harvard, 2002), §III–IV on Jiàn-yáng / Jiàn-ān commercial publishing, with extended discussion of this work.
- Hú Dào-jìng 胡道靜, Zhōngguó gǔdài de lèishū (Zhōng-huá, 1982), §Sòng.
- Charles O. Hucker, A Dictionary of Official Titles in Imperial China (Stanford UP, 1985), draws on this work for Southern-Sòng office-titles.
No European-language complete translation.
Other points of interest
The Sìkù tíyào’s analysis of the bibliographic-and-commercial complementarity of Hébì shìlèi bèiyào with Fāngyú shènglǎn (one covering categories, the other prefectures) is one of the better Qīng documentations of how late-Sòng commercial publishers structured their lèishū products as part of a coordinated bookshop offering. Sū Shì’s Yǒngxuě poems (organized fùguì shìlì) survive only here.
Links
- Sìkù quánshū zǒngmù tíyào, Zǐbù · Lèishū lèi, Gǔjīn hébì shìlèi bèiyào entry.
- Wikidata: Q11074383.