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山海經廣注

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Text ID
KR3l0091
Date
1667–1667
Dynasty
清

Shānhǎijīng guǎngzhù 山海經廣注

Expanded Commentary on the Classic of Mountains and Seas by 吳任臣 (注)

About the work

An eighteen-juàn expanded commentary on the Shānhǎijīng 山海經 (KR3l0090) by the early-Qīng polymath 吳任臣 Wú Rènchén 吳任臣 (1628?–1689?, zì Zhìyī 志伊), of Rénhé 仁和 (modern Hángzhōu). The work supplements Guō Pú’s 郭璞 (276–324) classical Shānhǎijīng zhù 山海經注 with citations drawn from a vast range of Hàn-through-Míng sources — over five hundred works are listed in the prefixed yǐnyòng shūmù — in order to verify or expand Guō Pú’s explanations of names, things, glosses, and geographical detail. Its preface is dated Kāngxī 6 (1667). The work is the principal Qīng-dynasty expansion of the GuōPú commentary tradition and stood as the standard scholarly reference until Hǎo Yìxíng’s 郝懿行 Shānhǎijīng jiānshū 山海經箋疏 (preface 1804) eventually displaced it.

Tiyao

Your servants report: Shānhǎijīng guǎngzhù in 18 juàn, by Wú Rènchén of our dynasty. Rènchén is the author of the Shíguó chūnqiū, already catalogued. The present book builds on Guō Pú’s Shānhǎijīng commentary and supplements it — hence the title “Expanded Commentary”. On míngwù (names of things), xùngǔ (glosses), mountains and rivers, distances on the road, all is set in order and corrected. Although his love of the curious and fondness for broad citation make the references somewhat verbose — as for instance the gold of Tángtíng shān and the mandarin-ducks of Qīngqiū shān, things that even the market-women and hired servants all know, yet he reaches into the classical books for proof, with no avoiding redundancy — still his gleanings are abundant and copious, mostly sufficient to serve as material for textual research. The thirty-four passages of yìwén (lost text) he lists: of these the eighteen passages from Yáng Shèn’s Dānqiān lù onward are all Míng-dynasty books; the actual originals nowhere to be seen — these are clearly hawker’s misrecordings, beyond doubt. As to the fourteen passages from Yīng Shào’s commentary on the Hànshū onward, these perhaps come from variant readings in old editions, and are quite enough to broaden one’s report. The old edition carried five juàn of illustrations, divided into five categories: Língqí (Numinous Spirits), Yìyù (Strange Lands), Shòuzú (Beasts), Yǔqín (Winged Fowl), Línjiè (Scaly Creatures); these are said to derive from Shū Yǎ’s 舒雅 old draft of the Sòng Xiánpíng era (998–1003), and Yǎ’s from Zhāng Sēngyáo 張僧繇 (early-Liáng painter). The transmission of this account is faint and obscure, not to be relied on; the illustrations themselves are made by the editor’s own conjecture. Apart from the question whether they really came down from Yǎ and Sēngyáo: even if the account were certain, by what means could those two have seen and drawn these? Therefore at present we record only the commentary; the illustrations are dropped. Further, the prefixed yǐnyòng shūmù (book-citation index) of over five hundred and thirty titles is mostly culled from lèishū (encyclopaedias), an empty arrangement of titles; we do not record it in detail either. Respectfully checked and submitted, Qiánlóng 46 (1781), 9th month. Chief Compilers: Jì Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. Chief Collator: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.

Abstract

The Shānhǎijīng guǎngzhù is the major Qīng expansion of the Guō Pú commentarial tradition on the Shānhǎijīng — China’s archaic compendium of mountains, rivers, and the strange creatures and peoples inhabiting them, compiled in layers between the Zhànguó and Hàn periods. Wú Rènchén’s preface is dated Kāngxī 6 (1667), placing composition firmly in the early years of the Kāngxī reign and before Wú’s bóxué hóngcí 博學鴻詞 召試 success of Kāngxī 18 (1679). The work belongs to Wú’s Kāngxī-period programme of broad-encyclopaedic scholarship, alongside the Shíguó chūnqiū 十國春秋 KR2i0021 and the Zìhuì bǔ 字彙補.

The method is guǎngbó (broad-citation): for each Shānhǎijīng entry Wú collates Guō Pú’s gloss with material drawn from a vast range of Hàn-through-Míng sources — HànTáng commentaries on the Hànshū (Yīng Shào, Yán Shīgǔ), encyclopaedic lèishū (the Tàipíng yùlǎn, Tàipíng huányǔ jì, Bówù zhì), TángSòngMíng geographical and pharmacological works, and bǐjì miscellanea down to Yáng Shèn’s Dānqiān lù and other Míng compilations. The prefixed yǐnyòng shūmù lists over five hundred titles, though the Sìkù compilers correctly note that many of these citations are second-hand from lèishū rather than direct readings. The Sìkù compilers also flag a recurring weakness — verbose citation for commonplace identifications — and a notable omission: Wú’s appended thirty-four yìwén (passages claimed lost from the Shānhǎijīng) include eighteen drawn from Yáng Shèn and other Míng bǐjì, all of dubious authenticity, suspected by the Sìkù compilers (correctly) of being Míng-era fabrications. The remaining fourteen, drawn from earlier HànTáng material, retain genuine value.

The original edition transmitted five juàn of illustrations divided into Língqí, Yìyù, Shòuzú, Yǔqín, and Línjiè categories; Wú attributed the iconographic tradition through Sòng Shū Yǎ 舒雅 (fl. 998–1003) back to the early-Liáng painter Zhāng Sēngyáo 張僧繇. The Sìkù editors rejected the attribution chain as undocumented and the images themselves as imaginative reconstructions, and accordingly dropped the illustrations from the Wényuàngé version, retaining only the textual commentary. The illustrations survive in pre-Sìkù printed editions.

The work was the standard Qīng-period commentary on the Shānhǎijīng through the eighteenth century, eventually displaced as a scholarly reference by Hǎo Yìxíng’s 郝懿行 Shānhǎijīng jiānshū 山海經箋疏 (preface 1804), which applies more rigorous kǎojù method but draws heavily on Wú’s collations. Modern Shānhǎijīng scholarship continues to cite Wú directly for the range and breadth of his citation-base, particularly his recovery of HànTáng commentarial fragments.

Translations and research

  • Strassberg, Richard E. A Chinese Bestiary: Strange Creatures from the Guideways through Mountains and Seas (UCP 2002). The standard English study and partial translation of the Shānhǎijīng bestiary; uses Wú Rènchén’s commentary throughout for identifications and prior-tradition citations, and reproduces the guǎngzhù illustration cycle.
  • Mathieu, Rémi. Étude sur la mythologie et l’ethnologie de la Chine ancienne (Collège de France, 1983). Two-volume French translation and study of the Shānhǎijīng; relies on the Guō Pú — Wú Rènchén — Hǎo Yì-xíng commentary stack, with extensive use of Wú.
  • Birrell, Anne. The Classic of Mountains and Seas (Penguin 1999). English translation; consults Wú in the standard commentary apparatus.
  • Yuán Kē 袁珂. Shānhǎijīng jiàoyì 山海經校譯 (Shànghǎi Gǔjí, 1985); Shānhǎijīng jiàozhù 山海經校注 (Shànghǎi Gǔjí, 1980; rev. 1993). The standard modern Chinese critical edition, integrating Guō Pú, Wú Rènchén, and Hǎo Yì-xíng commentaries.
  • No European-language translation of Wú’s commentary itself has been located; it is consulted as a source by all serious Shānhǎijīng scholarship.

Other points of interest

The Sìkù compilers’ decision to drop the five-juàn illustration cycle is a characteristic Qiánlóng kǎojù judgment: an iconographic tradition lacking documentary chain-of-transmission is dismissed as conjectural, even when long-established and culturally important. The illustrations — which Wú had attributed (probably wishfully) through Sòng Shū Yǎ to the early-Liáng master Zhāng Sēngyáo — survive in the pre-Sìkù printed transmission and constitute one of the most important visual sources for the post-classical reception of Shānhǎijīng iconography; they were reintroduced into modern reprints and underlie Strassberg’s Chinese Bestiary. The episode illustrates the tension between Sìkù editorial standards and the practical reality that the Shānhǎijīng tradition is, and always has been, a fundamentally illustrated tradition.

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