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唐闕史

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Text ID
KR3l0111
Date
940–950
Dynasty
唐-五代

Táng quē shǐ 唐闕史

Tang Lacunae to History by 高彥休 (撰)

About the work

A two-juǎn collection of fifty-one anecdotes about late-Táng affairs, framed in the preface as supplements to the standard histories — episodes “worth boasting of, suitable for table-talk, fit for moral admonition” (kě yǐ wéi kuā shàng zhě, zī tánxiào zhě, chuí xùnjiè zhě 可以為誇尚者資談笑者垂訓誡者) that the author had transcribed from elders’ conversations during his official career and refused to let perish. The book belongs to the late-Táng / early-Wǔdài bǔshǐ 補史 (“supplementing history”) strand of xiǎoshuō writing alongside Lǐ Zhào’s Táng guó shǐ bǔ and Liú Sù’s SuíTáng jiāhuà, and was already cited as a historical source by the Xīn Táng shū compilers.

Tiyao

Your servants report: Táng quē shǐ in 3 juǎn. The old text-line attributes it to the Táng Gāo Yànxiū 高彥休, zhuàn. Yànxiū’s beginnings and ends are unrecorded. In the book the entry “Zhèng shǎoyǐn dēngdì” 鄭少尹及第 includes the words “in Kāichéng 2 (837), my elder Jiāngxià great-uncle a second time held the literary balance” (愚江夏伯祖再司文柄). Checking the Jiù Táng shū biography of Gāo Kǎi 高鍇: in Tàihé 3 (829) he was Lìbù yuánwài láng and was charged by edict to re-examine the biétóu jìnshì and míngjīng; in Kāichéng yuánnián (836), as Zhōngshū shěrén, he provisionally held the Lǐbù gòngjǔ, then was appointed Lǐbù shìláng and held the examinations three years running, then went out as ÈYuè guānchá shǐ and died — ÈYuè lying precisely in Jiāngxià country. The official rank and career match in every particular, so Yànxiū must have been Kǎi’s grand-nephew. Only because the Jiù and Xīn Táng histories both omit Kǎi’s lǐjí (native registration) do we not know what district Yànxiū was from. Chén Zhènsūn’s Shūlù jiětí says Yànxiū styled himself Cānliáozǐ 參寥子; the Táng yìwén zhì note agrees. The Sòngshǐ Yìwén zhì lists a Quē shǐ in 1 juǎn with the note “by Cānliáozǐ” and separately lists “Gāo Yànxiū Quē shǐ 3 juǎn” — splitting one book into two and two persons; this is plainly an error. Huáng Bósī’s Dōngguān yúlùn has a colophon to this book saying that the preface speaks of “compiled in the jiǎchén year,” which would be Xiànzōng Zhōnghé 4 (884), but the text contains entries already using Xīzōng’s reign-title — possibly added by a later hand. We now find that the preface says “I was born in a Qiánfú jiǎzǐ year”; Qiánfú contained no jiǎzǐ year — this must be a mistake for jiǎwǔ (874); from there to Zhōnghé 4 (884) is only ten years, and he could not have been able to write so soon. Thereafter the only jiǎchén year is Jìn Kāiyùn 1 (944); reckoning back from Qiánfú yuánnián jiǎzǐ (864), his birth-year, this would make him 71 at composition, an age at which authorship is plausible. Yànxiū was thus a Wǔdài man (typographical slip: the catalog inherits “jiǎzǐ” against the preface’s “jiǎwǔ” — preserved here as in the source).

All catalogues list this book in 3 juǎn; the present text has only upper and lower juǎn, evidently re-extracted from other books’ quotations and not the original. Zhāng Cǎi’s Wǎnqiū jí mentions Jiǎ Chángqīng’s discussion of the Bái Jūyì mǔ zhuì jǐng (Bái Jūyì’s mother fell down a well) entry preserved in this book, but the present recension lacks it — another sign of incompleteness. However, the preface itself says the book has fifty-one pieces in two juǎn, which is not what one would expect of a lacunose text — perhaps a later hand also retouched the preface. Wáng Shìzhēn’s Jūyì lù criticizes the opening piece on the transfiguration of Dīng Yuē 丁約 (a follower of Lǐ Shīdào’s rebel faction who, on the eve of execution, becomes an immortal) as glorifying treason — a fair criticism. Yet many other entries — Zhōu Chí’s reply to Wénzōng, Cuī Kǔn’s reply to Xuānzōng, Zhèng Xūn’s verdict on the eunuch yīnzǐ privilege, Lú Xié’s discussion of Zhènzhōu policy — all serve to corroborate the histories; the Lǐ Kějí xìlùn sān jiào entry (the actor Lǐ Kějí parodied the Three Teachings, the author argued no performer should hold office) is particularly upright; and entries such as Huángfǔ Shí’s composition of the Fúxiānsì bēi, or Liú Tuì’s discrimination of the Qí Huángōng utensil with its single-character maker’s mark Chángmíng (not the surname Cháng as had been supposed) — these are usable for textual collation and are not pure absurd talk of the xiǎoshuō.

Respectfully checked, Qiánlóng 41 (1776), 6th 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 Táng quē shǐ is a fifty-one-anecdote collection by Gāo Yànxiū 高彥休 (b. 854; hào Cānliáozǐ 參寥子). The compiler’s own preface dates the work to the jiǎchén year Qīnghé yuè (4th month) — a sexagenary cycle that the Sìkù compilers identify with Jìn Kāiyùn 1 (944), pushing Yànxiū’s authorship into the Wǔdài and making him 71 at the time of writing. This conflicts with Huáng Bósī’s earlier identification of the year as Xīzōng Zhōnghé 4 (884) on the basis of internal use of Xīzōng’s niánhào. The Sìkù reasoning — that the preface’s own “born in Qiánfú jiǎzǐ” (864 if read literally) is incompatible with composition only twenty years later — is the standard modern view, although the question is not entirely settled and some scholarship still treats Yànxiū as a man of the very late Táng. The date bracket adopted here (940–950) follows the Sìkù dating; readers should be aware of the alternative late-9th-century placement.

The book carries on the late-Táng tradition of bǔ shǐ / yě shǐ 野史 (unofficial history) anecdote-compilations. Substantively it ranges from court politics and examination chronicles (Zhèng Xūn pàn huànguān yīnzǐ on the eunuchs’ nepotism-privilege; Lú Xié yì Zhènzhōu on garrison policy; Lǐ Kějí’s Sānjiào lùn satire and the proposition that entertainers should not hold office) to the supernatural and zhìguài (Dīng Yuē’s transfiguration; the Liù Sānfù ghost-story). Many entries supplement the standard histories with circumstantial detail unrecorded there — the Xīn Táng shū itself adopts material from the Quē shǐ, e.g. the celebrated account of Wáng Jū 王琚’s role in the Princess Tàipíng plot, an account the Zīzhì tōngjiàn declined to follow but which the Xīn Táng shū preserved. The book also offers a number of philological notes — Liú Tuì’s discrimination of the Qí Huángōng vessel inscription “Chángmíng” 單長鳴 (the Sìkù reads Cháng as a fragment of the name, not a surname) and Huángfǔ Shí’s authorship of the Fúxiānsì bēi 福先寺碑 — that became authoritative for later Sòng compilers.

Bibliographically the work is recorded in the Xīn Táng shū Yìwén zhì and Chóngwén zǒngmù as 3 juǎn; the Sòngshǐ Yìwén zhì doubles up, listing both a 1-juǎn Quē shǐ by Cānliáozǐ and a 3-juǎn Quē shǐ by Gāo Yànxiū as if two different works — the standard scholarly correction (going back to the Sìkù tiyao) is that they are one book under author and pseudonym. The transmitted WYG recension survives only in 2 juǎn with 51 entries; Zhāng Cǎi (Míng) cites a Bái Jūyì mǔ zhuì jǐng anecdote not in the surviving text. The 1922 Sìbù cóngkān and the 1958 Zhōnghuá shūjú TángSòng shǐliào bǐjì edition (collated by Yáng Jiāluò 楊家駱) are the standard modern critical printings.

Translations and research

  • Reed, Carrie E. Chinese Chronicles of the Strange: The “Nuogao ji” of Duan Chengshi (Peter Lang, 2001). Comparative discussion of late-Táng xiǎo-shuō including Quē shǐ alongside its peers.
  • Dudbridge, Glen. Religious Experience and Lay Society in T’ang China: A Reading of Tai Fu’s “Kuang-i chi” (Cambridge 1995). Although focused on Dài Fú’s Guǎngyì jì, contains methodological observations relevant to the late-Táng anecdotal corpus including Táng quē shǐ.
  • Allen, Sarah M. Shifting Stories: History, Gossip, and Lore in Narratives from Tang Dynasty China (Harvard-Yenching 2014). Major study of the formation of the late-Táng xiǎo-shuō anecdote corpus, with explicit reference to the Quē shǐ as a witness of the bǔ-shǐ mode.
  • Yáng Jiā-luò 楊家駱, coll. Táng-Sòng shǐ-liào bǐ-jì cóng-kān: Táng quē shǐ 唐宋史料筆記叢刊‧唐闕史 (Zhōnghuá shūjú, 1958/1979). The standard modern critical edition.
  • Lǐ Jiàn-guó 李劍國. Táng Wǔdài zhì-guài chuán-qí xù-lù 唐五代志怪傳奇敘錄 (Nán-kāi 1993). Detailed source-critical entry on Quē shǐ.

Other points of interest

The Xīn Táng shū’s adoption of the Quē shǐ’s Wáng Jū narrative — over the Zīzhì tōngjiàn’s rejection — is one of the relatively few late-Táng cases where the official history demonstrably prefers a xiǎoshuō source over a more sober chronological reconstruction, and is a standard test-case in modern Sòng historiographical scholarship for the porosity of the boundary between zhèngshǐ and bǔshǐ materials. The Quē shǐ is also notable for preserving the contemporary identification of the actor Lǐ Kějí’s parodic Sānjiào lùn as a moment of public satire on Buddhism-Daoism-Confucianism syncretism.

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