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鑑誡錄

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Text ID
KR3l0021
Date
938–950
Dynasty
後蜀

Jiànjiè lù 鑑誡錄

Record of Mirror and Warning by 何光遠 (撰)

About the work

A ten-juàn (or, in some recensions, three-juàn) collection of 66 entries on Tang and Five-Dynasties matter, with substantial emphasis on Shǔ (Sìchuān) affairs, compiled at the Later Shǔ court of Mèng Chǎng 孟昶 by 何光遠 Hé Guāngyuǎn 何光遠 (zì Huīfū 輝夫), serving as Pǔchuān jūnshì pànguān in Guǎngzhèng 1 (938). Each entry carries a three-character title; the matter is largely anecdotal-comedic (páixié 俳諧) but with a deliberate moralistic frame (the title proposes that the entries are “mirror-and-warning” for the age). The work is a major primary source for Former Shǔ and Later Shǔ literary culture and especially for the ShǔTáng poetic circles around the Huājiān 花間 anthology era.

Tiyao

Your servants report: Jiànjiè lù in 10 juàn, by the Shǔ Hé Guāngyuǎn. Guāngyuǎn zì Huīfū, native of Dōnghǎi; under Mèng Chǎng’s Guǎngzhèng he held Pǔchuān jūnshì pànguān. The book records mostly Táng and Five-Dynasties matter, with Shǔ affairs particularly numerous; the speech approaches páixié (comic). All entries carry three-graph titles, 66 in total. Zhào Xībiàn’s Dúshū hòuzhì takes it as gathering up the conduct of rulers and ministers from the Táng on, suitable for the world’s mirror — but he seems not to have seen the actual book and to be conjecturing from the title. The old text has a preface by Liú Xīdù 劉曦度, also seen in Zhào Xībiàn’s Zhì. The Sòng shǐ Yìwén zhì therefore divides the work into two, listing Liú Xīdù Jiànjiè lù in 3 juàn and Hé Guāngyuàn Jiànjiè lù in 3 juàn — a slip, since Liú only prefaced the book. Internal interlinear notes (e.g. on the Pàn mùjiā entry: “this yìngběn jiāshū originally was composed by Hú Zēng when Lù Yán was governing Shǔ, not for Gāo Pián; Hé Guāngyuǎn has misrecorded”; on the Sù wéiluàn chù entry: “the Chányuè shījí gives this poem as ‘Crying for Fúzhōu Zhāng shìláng’ — not Zhāng shíyí; Hé Guāngyuǎn has wrongly cited”; on the Sì gōng huì entry: “this passage was originally in the Běnshì shī, narrated in great detail; Hé Guāngyuǎn lifts the discussion and changes it”) — all correct Hé’s slips, though we cannot determine whose hand made them. The present text is divided into 10 juàn with a Zhū Yízūn 朱彝尊 colophon saying it was traced from a Sòng copy in the Xiàng Yúbiàn family — so this 10-juàn division is itself Sòng. Examining the contents: the Xú Hòu shì (matters of Empress Xú) entry contains records on Wáng Chéng [Former-Shǔ] court — substantially overlaps with the Shíguó chūnqiū.

Abstract

CBDB id 30310 records Hé Guāngyuǎn with c_fl_earliest_year 938. The work is the principal primary source for: (a) the Former Shǔ literary court (Wáng Yǎn era) and the Later Shǔ court of Mèng Chǎng; (b) Tang poetic anecdote as transmitted through Sìchuān; (c) the Chányuè (Buddhist monk-poet) tradition around Guànxiū 貫休 — Hé Guāngyuǎn knew the Chányuè shījí well. Several entries — Hú Zēng 胡曾’s parody-poems against Lù Yán 路巖, Empress Xú’s poems, the Wáng Yǎn court banquets — are unique to this work. The 66-entry three-character-titled format is itself a distinctive Five-Dynasties literary structure, reflecting the influence of Buddhist gōngàn indexing on lay literary collection.

Modern critical edition: Jiànjiè lù (BāShǔ shūshè, 2004, with collation against Sòng witnesses).

Translations and research

  • Bryant, Daniel. 1982. Lyric Poets of the Southern T’ang. UBC Press. Uses Jiàn-jiè lù for Former / Later Shǔ literary milieu.
  • Shí-guó chūn-qiū 十國春秋 of Wú Rèn-chén 吳任臣 — repeatedly draws on Jiàn-jiè lù.
  • No European-language translation has been located.

Other points of interest

The work is one of the few extant primary sources from inside the Later Shǔ regime — an unusual position given the political eclipse of Shǔ at the Sòng conquest (965) within a generation of composition.

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