Shǎoyáng jí 少陽集
Shǎo-yáng (Lesser-Yáng) Collection by 陳東 (撰)
About the work
Shǎoyáng jí 少陽集 in 5 juǎn + 1-juǎn fùlù (Sìkù recension, condensed from the 10-juǎn Kāngxī edition) is the literary collection of Chén Dōng 陳東 (1086–1127), the most famous Tàixué memorialist of the late Northern Sòng. The structure: 3 juǎn of shàngshū (memorials submitted by Chén); 1 juǎn of letters and zàn (encomia); 1 juǎn of poetry and cí; 1 juǎn fùlù (the Sòng shǐ biography, xíngzhuàng, Qīnzōng’s edict to one jiāzǐ, and Gāozōng’s seven post-execution decrees). The earlier Yuán Dàdé (1297–1307) recension was titled Jìnzhōng lù 盡忠錄 in 8 juǎn; the Sìkù editors found the Kāngxī expansion too padded with non-Chén material and reduced the appendix to essentials.
Tiyao
Shǎoyáng jí 5 juǎn + fùlù 1 juǎn, by Sòng Tàixué shēng Chén Dōng. Dōng, zì Shǎoyáng, of Zhènjiāng Dānyáng. Career detailed in Sòng shǐ běnzhuàn. The collection cut at Yuán Dàdé (1297–1307) was titled Jìnzhōng lù — altogether 8 juǎn; the editorial-arrangement rather has the defect of cuòzá (mixed-and-disordered).
Cut-by the present-dynasty Kāngxī (1662–1722), titled Shǎoyáng wénjí — altogether 10 juǎn. The first 5 juǎn are all Dōng’s surviving prose; the back 5 juǎn are the běnzhuàn, xíngzhuàng, and other-books’ lùnzàn. Today preserve the surviving prose 5 juǎn + appended-shǐzhuàn one piece, xíngzhuàng one piece, plus Qīnzōng’s shěngchì one piece, Gāozōng’s yùzhǐ 7 pieces — for the 6th juǎn. Other [appendices] all tài (cut-down).
Dōng — as a zhūshēng (Imperial-Academy-student) fènqiè shíshì (vehement-in-current-affairs) — fúquè shàngshū (prostrating-at-palace-gate, submitting-memorial), correcting Cài Jīng, Tóng Guàn, and others — can be called zhí (upright). But, at-the-time, the state-pace was just-perilous, and shàndòng (agitating) over 100,000 persons; zhènjǐng tíngbì (shaking-and-startling the palace-and-court); to the point of huàiyuàngǔ (smashing the palace-gate’s drum), luán Zhōngjuàn (slicing-up the eunuch [Zhū Miǎn]) — jì lèi luànmín (acts resembling rebel-people) — also contrary-to the great-substance.
The Southern-Sòng end’s Tàixué héng (Academy unrestraint) — to-the-point of jìntuì dàchén, mòkě cáizhì (advancing-and-retiring the great-ministers; uncontrollable) — its pītāi (gestation) was really sown here. After, when responding-to-decree he again-came-out, finally with this composed-into trouble by Huáng Qiánshàn. Although the petty-man, yīnxiǎn gōng yú jǐpái (sinister, skilled-at squeezing-out), [it] also is that Dōng and others yǒu yǐ zhì zhī (had-something to bring-about-it).
But because his heart-was-in the state-and-family, words all kǎiqiè, further able-to pīzhāi quánchén, mào wànsǐ yǐ shēn gōngfèn (rip-into the powerful-minister; risking ten-thousand-deaths to express-the-public-vehemence). Hence Southern-Sòng-onward Confucians grant him with zhōngyì. And the surviving prose has up-to-now been transmitted-and-recited. Respectfully collated, Qiánlóng 42 (1777), 3rd month.
Abstract
The Shǎoyáng jí preserves the most consequential Tàixué memorialist corpus of the late Northern Sòng. Chén Dōng’s three principal shàngshū — the Liù zéi (Six Bandits) memorial of 1126, the Lǐ Gāng / Zhǒng Shīdào recommendation, and the Huáng Qiánshàn / Wāng Bóyàn execution-demand of 1127 — together constitute a documentary record of the Jīngkāng / Jiànyán transition seen from the academic-popular standpoint. The Sìkù editors’ balanced verdict — praising Chén’s integrity but criticizing the mass-action method as gestating later Tàixué héng — is one of the more politically self-aware passages in the collection-tíyào series.
The bibliographic history: Yuán Dàdé Jìnzhōng lù (8 juǎn) → Kāngxī Shǎoyáng wénjí (10 juǎn) → Sìkù edited recension (5 + 1 = 6 juǎn). The Sìkù editors’ decision to strip the Kāngxī appendices was on grounds of textual-discipline.
CBDB id 14765 confirms 1086–1127. Catalog meta has 1087–1128; CBDB / Sòng shǐ figure followed (one-year boundary).
Translations and research
- Sòng shǐ j. 455 Zhōng-yì zhuàn — Chén Dōng biography (preserved as appendix in WYG).
- Sòng yuán xué-àn — Chén’s Imperial Academy generation.
- No dedicated Western-language monograph located. Treated in surveys of the Jīng-kāng crisis.
Other points of interest
- Read together with KR4d0189 (the Ōuyáng Xiūzhuàn jí 歐陽修撰集 of Chén’s executed companion Ōuyáng Chè) for the full pair of Tàixué loyalist documentary corpora.
- The Liù zéi memorial is one of the most important political documents of the late-Northern-Sòng, identifying the six principal authors of the Xuānhé maladministration.