Yù dìng Yùnfǔ shíyí 御定韻府拾遺
Imperially Established Gleanings to the Treasury of Rhymes
by the 聖祖玄燁 Kāngxī emperor (御定); compiled by Wǔyīngdiàn cíchén under his direction, including 王掞 Wáng Yǎn and Wáng Xūlíng 王頊齡 as preface-writers and supervisors.
About the work
The 112-juǎn official supplement to the Pèiwén yùnfǔ (KR3k0059), compiled at imperial command after the 1711 completion of the parent work to capture phrases and citations that the original had missed. Commissioned in Kāngxī 55 / fourth month (1716), with editorial work running from 1716 to Kāngxī 59 / first month (1720); the preface by dàxuéshì Wáng Yǎn and Wáng Xūlíng is dated Kāngxī 59 / seventh month (1720). The Sìkù tíyào notes that the original was about one-twentieth the bulk of the Pèiwén yùnfǔ itself.
The supplement follows the parent work’s rhyme division exactly. Its supplementary material falls into four classes: (1) for characters already in the parent, additional pronunciations and yùnshū fan-qie glosses; (2) for characters not previously gathered, full pronunciation, meaning, and citations; (3) for phrases and allusions not previously gathered, classed as bǔzǎo 補藻; (4) for phrases in the parent whose annotation was incomplete, classed as bǔzhù 補注. As Wáng Yǎn’s preface explains: jǔ dà ér jí qí xì zé shíyí wèi yùnfǔ zhī zhī liú; fù shǎo yǐ chéng qí duō zé shíyí wèi yùnfǔ zhī quán bì — gathering the great and reaching to the fine, the shíyí is the side-branch of the Yùnfǔ; supplementing what is few and completing it into much, the shíyí is the Yùnfǔ’s full disk.
Tiyao
We submit the following: the Yù dìng Yùnfǔ shíyí in 112 juǎn was imperially determined by the Shèngzǔ Rénhuángdì (Kāngxī emperor) in Kāngxī 55 (1716) to gather what the Pèiwén yùnfǔ had missed. The Pèiwén yùnfǔ alone runs to more than 18,000 yè — the yìlín has long been overwhelmed and stared as at the boundless sea — and yet the ruìlǜ (imperial deliberation), thoroughgoing and detailed, was still concerned that the great sea might in receiving abundance yet leave some trickle uncollected. Hence the special command to sōu qí jué mì (search for the curious, prise out the hidden) and produce this further volume.
Rhyme division follows the prior compilation in every respect. The supplement falls into four classes:
(1) Where a character is already present in the parent work, only additional yùnshū zhī yīnqiè (rhyme-book fan-qie) are recorded — for instance under the dōng 東 rhyme of yī Dōng (first Dōng), the Táng yùn / Zhèng yùn gloss déhóng qiè, the Jí yùn / Yùn huì gloss dūlóng qiè are added.
(2) Where a character is not previously collected but is brought in from another rhyme, both pronunciation and meaning are appended — under the èr Dōng rhyme, the character □ is glossed Guǎng yùn chōuxiōng qiè / Jí yùn chīxiōng qiè bìng yīn zhōng (read together with 蹱); the meaning is yú tóng (together with 傭, jūn equal, also zhí straight); and the note zhào Guǎng yùn zēng rù (added in accordance with the Guǎng yùn).
(3) Phrases and diǎngù (allusions) not yet present in the parent are classed as bǔzǎo: under the character dōng one such addition is the Yǔgòng běidōng entry.
(4) Materials present in the parent but whose annotation was incomplete are classed as bǔzhù: under dōng, the entry Zhōu yì zhézhōng jíshuō jūdōng and like items.
The gathering is comprehensive and the tǐlì (rule of practice) clear. The Dàxuéshì Wáng Yǎn’s preface and Wáng Xūlíng’s preface together explain: “Jǔ dà ér jí qí xì (gathering the great and reaching to the fine), the shíyí is the yùnfǔ’s side-branch; fù shǎo yǐ chéng qí duō (supplementing the few to complete the abundance), the shíyí is the Yùnfǔ’s full disk.”
For the shèngrén zhìshì (sage’s ordering of affairs) seeks ever finer refinement, leaving no smallest qiànquē (lacuna) — and this is one such instance.
The original printing did not divide by juǎn, identical to the Pèiwén yùnfǔ. The present (Sìkù) re-pagination, taking one rhyme as one juǎn and where a rhyme is bulkier dividing into six sub-juǎn, totals 112 juǎn. Respectfully revised and submitted, ninth month of the forty-third year of Qiánlóng [1778].
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 Yùnfǔ shíyí is the official Kāngxī-court supplement to the Pèiwén yùnfǔ (KR3k0059), commissioned in 1716 — five years after the parent was finalized — to gather phrases, allusions, and citation refinements that the original had not captured. Compilation ran 1716–1720 in the Wǔyīngdiàn compilation bureau, with the Kāngxī emperor personally reviewing initial drafts. The preface by dàxuéshì 王掞 Wáng Yǎn and Wáng Xūlíng 王頊齡 (the latter himself a senior poet and Kāngxī compilation veteran) is dated Kāngxī 59 / seventh month (1720).
The supplement is structurally minor compared to the parent — at one-twentieth the bulk, about 18,000 / 20 ≈ 900 yè in the original printing — but methodologically significant: it represents the same imperial-editorial practice of yīxīn cáidìng (single-mind decision) that the Yùnfǔ shíyí’s own preface attributes to the Kāngxī emperor for the parent work. The Kāngxī emperor was actively reviewing drafts and personally marking lacunae as late as 1720, two years before his death.
The four-class structure of supplementation — additional pronunciation glosses, newly added characters, bǔzǎo (added phrases), bǔzhù (added annotations to existing phrases) — was designed for use alongside the parent work, not as a free-standing reference: a scholar consulting any rhyme would first look in the Pèiwén yùnfǔ and then check the Shíyí for additions. The two are accordingly bound together in the standard Tóngwén shūjú lithograph reprints and in the Shànghǎi gǔjí re-typeset.
The work is one of the last imperial-compilation projects to bear the Kāngxī emperor’s personal editorial direction; he died in December 1722, two years after the supplement was finalized.
Translations and research
- Endymion Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual (Harvard, 2018), §6.2.1.6 — treats the Shí-yí as the standard companion-volume to the Pèi-wén yùn-fǔ.
- Hú Dào-jìng 胡道靜, Zhōngguó gǔdài de lèishū (Zhōng-huá, 1982).
No European-language complete translation.
Links
- Sìkù quánshū zǒngmù tíyào, Zǐbù · Lèishū lèi, Yù dìng Yùnfǔ shíyí entry.
- Wilkinson §6.2.1.6.