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清異錄

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Text ID
KR3l0127
Date
955–970
Dynasty
宋

Qīngyì lù 清異錄

Records of the Pure and Anomalous by 陶穀 (撰)

About the work

A two-juàn miscellany of late-Táng and Five-Dynasties novel terms, neologisms, dish-names, plant-names, technical vocabulary, and curious expressions, compiled by 陶穀 Táo Gǔ 陶穀 (903–970), the four-dynasty office-holder who served the HòuJìn, HòuHàn, HòuZhōu, and Sòng courts as Hànlín. Organised topically into 37 sections (mén) — Tiānwén 天文, Dìlǐ 地理, Jūndào 君道, Guānzhì 官志, Rénshì 人事, Nǚxíng 女行, Jūnzǐ 君子, Yāomó 么麽, Shìzú 釋族, (KR0726)-zōng (Daoist clergy), Cǎomù 草木, Zhúmù 竹木, Bǎihuā 百花, Bǎiguǒ 百菓, Shūcài 蔬菜, Yàopǐn 藥品, Qínmíng 禽名, Shòumíng 獸名, Bǎichóng 百蟲, Yúmén 魚, and (in juàn xià) Zhītǐ 肢體, Zuòyòng 作用, Jūshì 居室, Yīfú 衣服, Zhuāngshì 裝飾, Chénshè 陳設, Qìjù 器具, Wényòng 文用, Wǔqì 武器, Jiǔjiāng 酒漿, Míngchuǎn 茗荈 (tea), Zhuànxiū 饌羞 (food), Xūnliáo 薫燎, Sàngzàng 喪塟, Guǐ 鬼, Shén 神, Yāo 妖. Each section contains between 1 and 54 entries; each entry presents a striking word, term, or expression, accompanied by a short narrative or citation explaining its origin. The total is approximately 648 entries.

The Qīngyì lù is an early and influential exemplar of the Northern Sòng biji (notebook) genre — Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §53, places its development in the immediate post-960 generation; the work is cited there (§31.3) explicitly for its preservation of Táng court-cuisine vocabulary including the Shāowěi shídān 燒尾食單. The Qīngyì lù is among the principal sources for the history of Chinese cuisine, plant-introduction, material culture, and lexical change across the 9th–10th centuries — a period for which Five-Dynasties documentation is otherwise extremely thin.

Tiyao

Your servants report: Qīngyì lù in 2 juàn. The Sòng Táo Gǔ, zhuàn. Gǔ’s zì was Xiùshí, a man of Bīnzhōu Xīnpíng. Originally a grandson of [the late-Táng] Táng Yànqiān; later, to avoid the tabu under the [Later] Jìn, he changed his surname to Táo. He served the Jìn as Zhīzhìgào, Cāngbù lángzhōng; served the Hàn as Jǐshìzhōng; served the Zhōu as Bīngbù shìláng, Hànlín chéngzhǐ. Entering the Sòng, he kept the same office and added Hùbù shàngshū. His deeds are in the Sòngshǐ biography. This book gathers and assembles the new and striking expressions of the Táng and Five Dynasties, dividing them into 37 sections, each with its title and with the matter of origin annotated below.

Chén Zhènsūn’s Shūlù jiětí held that [the language] did not resemble that of early-Sòng men; Hú Yīnglín’s Bǐcóng once disputed this. We now find that though Gǔ entered the Sòng, he was in fact a Five-Dynasties man — the literary register of the period was no more than this; Yīnglín’s view is correct. Yet Gǔ was originally a Northerner and made only one mission to the Southern Táng; the “Huā jiǔpǐn jiǔmìng” entry says “one Zhāng Yì, native of Chángān, came south because of the disorder; the Xiānzhǔ (Lǐ Biǎn) elevated him to the upper ranks” — this sounds like the words of a Jiāngnán man, and is somewhat hard to explain; could it be that miscellaneous old material was excerpted but the excision was incomplete?

The matters recorded are as if from a single hand — largely Gǔ’s own composition, in the manner of the Yúnxiān sànlù, only without forging an attributed book-title. Later men have therefore frequently cited it for literary diction. Lóu Yào’s Gōngkuì jí has the Báizuì xuān poem whose own preface cites this book — so by the Sòng age it was already used by men of name for established allusion. Long usage has made it indispensable.

Respectfully checked, Qiánlóng 43 (1778), 5th 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 Qīngyì lù is one of the foundational works of the Northern Sòng biji tradition and the most important single source for the lexical and material-culture history of the late-Táng to Five Dynasties. Its compilation is securely attributable to 陶穀 Táo Gǔ (903–970), CBDB id 25185, on the basis of internal evidence and the testimony of the Sòngshǐ biography (juàn 269) and Sòngshǐ Yìwénzhì; the work appears in the bibliography of KR3l0118 Tàipíng guǎngjì (978) sources and is cited by Lóu Yào (1137–1213) in the Gōngkuì jí — so it was unambiguously a Northern Sòng work of name by the late 12th century. The dating bracket adopted here (955–970) covers Táo Gǔ’s later career under the HòuZhōu and early Sòng, when the work was almost certainly compiled; the work’s stylistic frame and its treatment of late-Táng cuisine and material vocabulary suggests his Hànlín years (c. 955–965).

The work’s authenticity was already questioned by Chén Zhènsūn 陳振孫 (1183–1262) in the Zhízhāi shūlù jiětí, on grounds of the “later” register of the language — a position vigorously refuted by Hú Yīnglín 胡應麟 in the Shǎoshì shānfáng bǐcóng 少室山房筆叢, and definitively rejected by the Sìkù editors. The consensus in modern scholarship (Cherniack 1994 on Sòng biji; Idema 1973; West and Idema 2010) accepts Táo Gǔ’s authorship while allowing that some entries may have been excerpted from older or contemporary materials, with limited later editorial padding. The “Huā jiǔpǐn jiǔmìng” entry’s southern-tinged language (noted in the Sìkù tíyào) most likely reflects Táo’s reuse of older Jiāngnán materials gathered during his single embassy to the NánTáng.

The work is a principal source for: (a) Chinese cuisine — including the Shāowěi shídān 燒尾食單 (a Táng court banquet menu, the only place this text survives), the Bīngshān 冰山 banquet, and innumerable dish-names; (b) plant-and-flower nomenclature (the Huā jiǔpǐn jiǔmìng 花九品九命, a famous nine-grade ranking of garden flowers); (c) tea culture (the Míngchuǎn section, with the earliest record of named tea-cakes and tea-preparation utensils); (d) costume and dress vocabulary; (e) Buddhist and Daoist clergy slang; (f) Five-Dynasties court anecdote. Many of its entries provide the only documentation of a vocabulary item that would otherwise be lost; modern scholarship therefore uses the Qīngyì lù extensively as a documentary source, with the standard caveat that Táo Gǔ may sometimes have invented an etymology for rhetorical effect (the Sìkù’s phrase “jí Gǔ suǒ zào” — “perhaps Táo’s own creation”).

The work circulated in two principal editions: the WYG / Sìkù 2-juàn version (followed here, with 37 mén), and a longer Míng-printed version expanding to 4 juàn but adding little substantive material beyond editorial subdivision.

Translations and research

  • Cherniack, Susan. “Book Culture and Textual Transmission in Sung China,” HJAS 54.1 (1994): 5–125. Standard English treatment of the Sòng biji genre; references the Qīng-yì lù as a key early exemplar.
  • West, Stephen H. “Cilia, Scale and Bristle: The Consumption of Fish and Shellfish in the Eastern Capital of the Northern Song,” HJAS 47.2 (1987): 595–634. Major use of the Qīng-yì lù for Sòng food history.
  • Shǐ Liáng-zhāo 史良昭, ed. Qīng-yì lù 清異錄, in Quán-Sòng bǐ-jì 全宋筆記 series (Dà-xiàng chū-bǎn-shè, 2003–). Standard Chinese punctuated and collated edition; the most reliable modern text.
  • Lǐ Yì-mín 李益民, ed. Qīng-yì lù; Mò-é màn-lù 清異錄·墨娥漫錄 (Zhōngguó shāng-yè chū-bǎn-shè, 1985). The standard Chinese punctuated edition for the food-culture community, with focused annotation of culinary terms.
  • Sterckx, Roel, ed. Of Tripod and Palate: Food, Politics, and Religion in Traditional China (Palgrave, 2005) — substantial use of Qīng-yì lù material in several chapters.
  • Anderson, E. N. The Food of China (Yale, 1988) — frequent reference to the Qīng-yì lù for early-Sòng cuisine.
  • No full European-language translation has been located; selected entries are translated in Davis and Chey 2011 (food and humour material) and in Anderson 1988.

Other points of interest

The Qīngyì lù’s preservation of the Shāowěi shídān 燒尾食單 — Wéi Jùyuán 韋巨源’s 53-dish banquet menu from his jìnshì graduation feast, c. 709 — is the single most important documentary source for high-Táng court cuisine; without the Qīngyì lù this menu would be lost. Wilkinson §31.3 cites this passage as a benchmark of late-Táng culinary documentation.

The Huā jiǔpǐn jiǔmìng 花九品九命 entry ranks flowers into nine grades and “nine commands,” giving rise to a Sòng tradition of botanical pǐndì (ranking) literature that culminated in Ōuyáng Xiū’s KR2k0163 Luòyáng mǔdān jì. The yīpǐn (top) class names Lán 蘭, Mǔdān 牡丹, Lǎmèi 蠟梅, Zhūzhī 朱芝, Mínghuā 蓂華, Yáozhī 瑤芝, Jiāzhī 嘉芝, Jūnyú 君猷, and Yùróng 玉容 — a classic of early floral connoisseurship.

The Yúmén 魚 section’s 33 entries on fish — names, varieties, anomalous specimens — together with the Qínmíng (32 birds) and Shòumíng (20 mammals) sections constitute a substantial early Sòng zoological lexicon.

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