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庾子山集

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Text ID
KR4b0018
Date
1689–1689
Dynasty
北周 (commentary 清)

Yǔ Zǐshān jí 庾子山集

Annotated Collected Works of Yǔ [Xìn] Zǐ-shān by 庾信 (撰), 倪璠 (纂註)

About the work

Yǔ Zǐshān jí (zhù) 庾子山集(註) in sixteen juǎn is the great Kāngxī-era zhù (annotated edition) of Yǔ Xìn 庾信 (513–581) by Ní Fán 倪璠 of Qiántáng 錢塘. Built on the foundation of Wú Zhàoyí’s earlier jiānzhù (KR4b0017) — and explicitly intended to remedy its omissions — Ní’s edition adds a detailed niánpǔ (chronological table) at the front and re-annotates every piece with broader source-citation. The Sìkù compilers, while flagging some of Ní’s interpretive over-reach (e.g., his theory that the opening of the Xiǎo yuán fù uses ancient rhyme; his confused reading of the Āi Jiāngnán fù on the Xǔyáng tíng 栩陽亭), still rate it more thorough than Wú’s text and especially praise Ní’s Āi Jiāngnán fù annotations and his identification of two pieces (Péngchéng gōng fūrén Ěrzhūshì mùzhì míng and Bómǔ Dōngpíng jùn fūrén Lǐshì mùzhì míng) as actually by Yáng Jiōng 楊炯 rather than Yǔ Xìn — a critical philological corrective. This is the standard edition of Yǔ Xìn for modern scholarship.

Tiyao

By Ní Fán 倪璠 of the present dynasty (Qīng). Fán, zì Lǔyù 魯玉, of Qiántáng 錢塘. Jǔrén of Kāngxī yǐyǒu 康熙乙酉 (= 1705); Nèigé zhōngshū shèrén 內閣中書舍人. This work takes Wú Zhàoyí’s annotated Yǔ Kāifǔ jí — which was a hands-of-many production — as its foundation, but considers it lacking in coverage. Therefore Ní carefully examined the various standard histories, made a niánpǔ (chronological table) to head the collection, and broadly searched and re-annotated. In his treatment, e.g., of Xiǎo yuán fù 小園賦: the opening section is straight prose, but Ní takes it to use ancient rhyme — too forced. The Hànshū yìwén zhì records Xǔyáng fù 栩陽賦 in five pieces by an author named Xǔyáng, but Yǔ’s Āi Jiāngnán fù says “the Xǔyáng pavilion has a fù of parting” — so Ní took Xǔyáng to be a place. The Táng Shān fūrén Ānshì fángzhōng gē 唐山夫人安世房中歌 guìhuā 桂華 are part of a piece title, and féngféng yìyì chéng tiān zhī zé 馮馮翼翼承天之則 are the opening of the next song; Yǔ’s Huángdì Yúnmén wǔgē 黃帝雲門舞歌 has qīng yě guì féng féng 清野桂馮馮 — clear errors. Ní hedged on these and did not refute or correct them — also forced.

But comparing source-and-history work, Ní’s text is in fact more thorough than Wú’s edition. The Āi Jiāngnán fù in particular, in adducing the events of the time, is exceptionally typical and exact. At the end of the collection, the Péngchéng gōng fūrén Ěrzhū shì mùzhì míng 彭城公夫人爾朱氏墓誌銘 and the Bómǔ Dōngpíng jùn fūrén Lǐ shì mùzhì míng 伯母東平郡夫人李氏墓誌銘 are both shown by examination of dates and cross-checking against the Wén yuàn yīng huá 文苑英華 to be works of Yáng Jiōng 楊炯, mistakenly entered into Yǔ’s collection. This evidentiary work is also quite precise; we do not hold a slight prolixity against it.

Reverently collated, sixth month of Qiánlóng 46 (1781). Chief compilers: Jì Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì. Chief collator: Lù Fèichí.

Abstract

Ní Fán (1672–1722, zì Lǔyù 魯玉, native of Qiántáng / modern Hángzhōu, jǔrén of 1705) completed his Yǔ Zǐshān jí zhù in 1689 (Kāngxī 28). The dating bracket adopted in the frontmatter (1689) is the year of Ní’s preface and substantive editorial work. The edition is built directly on Wú Zhàoyí’s earlier Yǔ Kāifǔ jí jiānzhù (KR4b0017) but corrects its lacunae and adds (a) a year-by-year niánpǔ (chronological table) of Yǔ Xìn’s life — the first systematic such table — set at the head of the collection; (b) wider source-citation in the annotations, especially for the Āi Jiāngnán fù; (c) the identification of two stele-inscription compositions (the Péngchéng gōng fūrén Ěrzhū shì mùzhì míng and the Bómǔ Dōngpíng jùn fūrén Lǐ shì mùzhì míng) as misattributions by cross-checking against the Wén yuàn yīng huá, which assigns them to Yáng Jiōng 楊炯.

The Sìkù compilers credit Ní’s Āi Jiāngnán fù annotation as the centerpiece of the edition — exegetically the most demanding piece in Yǔ’s corpus, and the one in which Ní’s careful cross-referencing against Zhōushū, Liáng shū, Nán shǐ, Běi shǐ, and Sòng shū is most useful. They also note (and sustain) certain over-reaches: Ní’s mistaken theory that Xiǎo yuán fù’s opening prose uses ancient rhyme (gǔ yùn 古韻); his misreading of the Xǔyáng fù-author as the Xǔyáng tíng place-name in Āi Jiāngnán fù; his garbling of the Táng Shān fūrén Ānshì fángzhōng gē citation in Huángdì Yúnmén wǔgē. These are flagged but not removed.

This edition is the standard text used in modern scholarship: the Zhōnghuá 1980 Yǔ Zǐshān jí zhù (with collation and apparatus by Xǔ Yìmín 許逸民) reproduces Ní’s 1689 text with full critical apparatus. The signature works treated in this edition are: Āi Jiāngnán fù 哀江南賦 (the great post-554 elegy for the lost Liáng); Xiǎo yuán fù 小園賦 (the fù on the small garden); Kū shù fù 枯樹賦 (on the withered tree); Tǔ luó zhē fù 兔絲花賦; Hèn fù 恨賦 (the fù on regret) and Bēi guì fù 悲桂賦; the Wǔ shī 武詩 cycles for Northern-Zhōu princes; the substantial corpus of zhìbēi (memorial-stele) compositions for Yǔwén Hù 宇文護, Yǔwén Tài 宇文泰, and other Northern-Zhōu figures; the late yuèfǔ and gēshī; the well-known letters to Wáng Bāo 王褒 and Yáng Jiǎn 楊堅. Yǔ’s late corpus is the foundation of all subsequent Táng sìliù tradition.

Translations and research

  • William T. Graham. 1980. “The Lament for the South”: Yu Hsin’s “Ai Chiang-nan fu.” Cambridge UP. The standard English translation and study of the Āi Jiāng-nán fù; uses Ní’s text as the textual base.
  • Xǔ Yì-mín 許逸民, ed. 1980. Yǔ Zǐshān jí zhù 庾子山集註 (3 vols.). Zhōnghuá. The principal modern critical edition, reproducing and apparatus-supplementing Ní Fán.
  • Tāng Yǒngtóng 湯用彤. 1962. “Hēi-ān shídài de wén-xué yǔ zōng-jiào — Yǔ Xìn de Āi Jiāng-nán fù.” In Tāng Yǒngtóng xué shù lùn wén jí. Religious-cultural framing of Āi Jiāng-nán fù.
  • David R. Knechtges, tr. 1996. Wen xuan, or Selections of Refined Literature, vol. 3. Princeton UP — translates Yǔ’s Wén xuǎn-included pieces.
  • Cynthia L. Chennault. 2003. “Yu Xin (513–581).” Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature, vol. 2.
  • Lǔ Tóng-qún 魯同群. 2010. Yǔ Xìn zhuàn lùn 庾信傳論. Tiānjīn rénmín.
  • Stephen Owen. 1981. The Great Age of Chinese Poetry: The High T’ang. YUP — discusses Yǔ Xìn’s centrality for the Táng poetic synthesis.

Other points of interest

Ní Fán’s niánpǔ (chronological table) at the head of the volume is one of the great early-modern niánpǔ compilations, and a model of how Kāngxī-era kǎozhèng practice constructed a niánpǔ by collating standard histories, the subject’s own collection, and surviving stelae. The two-stele attribution correction (transferring the Ěrzhūshì and Lǐshì mùzhì from Yǔ Xìn to Yáng Jiōng on the strength of Wén yuàn yīng huá evidence) is a classic case of philological transfer-of-authorship that the Sìkù compilers happily endorsed.

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