Qiányántáng wénjí 潛研堂文集
Collected Prose from the Hall of Submerged Research by 錢大昕 (撰)
About the work
The collected prose of 錢大昕 Qián Dàxīn (1728–1804, zì Xiǎozhēng 曉徵 / Xīnmèi 辛楣, hào Zhútīng 竹汀, also Qiányánzhǔ 潛研主, native of Jiādìng 嘉定, Sūzhōu, Jiāngsū). One of the towering polymaths of the eighteenth century — historian, philologist, mathematician, astronomer, epigrapher, bibliographer — and the single most influential historiographer of the entire QiánJiā era. The 50 juan of the Wénjí are arranged in 14 thematic categories, Qián’s own classification: (1) fù, sòng, zòuzhé (rhapsodies, eulogies, memorials); (2) yìlùn (essays); (3) wèndá (catechistic essays — “questions and answers” on jīng and shǐ); (4) xù; (5) bá (colophons); (6) shū (letters); (7) bēi (stelae); (8) zhuàn (biographies); (9) mùzhìmíng (epitaphs); (10) jì (records); (11) yúwén (eulogies); (12) miscellanies. Qián’s prose is famously dense, citation-saturated, and conceptually rigorous; the Wénjí is a working archive of kǎozhèng methodology at its highest pitch. Companion volumes in the SBCK fascicle are the Qiányántáng wénjí xùjí 潛研堂文集續集 (supplementary prose) and the Qiányántáng shījí 潛研堂詩集 (poetry).
Prefaces
The Wénjí opens with a single preface by Qián’s intimate friend 段玉裁 Duàn Yùcái, dated Jiāqìng shíyī nián suìcì bǐngyín jiǔ yuè 嘉慶十一年歲次丙寅九月 (ninth month, 1806, Jiāqìng 11) — two years after Qián’s death in 1804. Duàn’s preface is one of the most concise summations of Qián’s intellectual range in any premodern source: he begins with a meditation on why so few biéjí survive across the centuries (the union of xué and wéngōng is rare), then identifies Qián as combining yányǔ 言語 (rhetorical persuasion) and wénxué 文學 (literary composition) — the two distinct Kǒngmén (Confucian-school) sub-divisions — in a single career. Duàn enumerates Qián’s competencies: jīng exegesis (resolving the jīngyì zhī jùsòng 經義之聚訟 — accumulated disputes of classical meaning); wénzì yīnyùn xùngǔ 文字音韻訓詁 (philology in all three dimensions); dìlǐ yángé 地理沿革 (historical geography); lìdài guānzhì zhī tǐlì 歷代官制之體例 (the system-and-precedent of dynastic bureaucracy); shìzú zhī liúpài 氏族之流派 (genealogical history); ancient personal names, zì, lǐjū (native places), guānjué (offices), shìshí (deeds), niánchǐ (lifedates) — qí jì sǎn yǐ shōu zhī wèntí (the messy disambiguation of antiquity); gǔjīn shíkè (ancient and modern epigraphy); gǔ jiǔzhāng suànshù 古九章算術 (the ancient Nine Chapters mathematics) — and Chinese-Western lìfǎ 曆法 (calendar systems). Duàn signs himself as Qián’s tóngzhì 同志 (fellow scholar) writing at the request of Qú Jìngtāo 瞿鏡濤. Duàn notes that Qián’s most intensive work was on the Yuán shǐ 元史 (Yuán dynastic history), much of which remained as drafts at his death.
The xùjí and shījí each carry their own short prefaces, also by close associates of Qián.
Abstract
Qián Dàxīn is the single most important historiographer-philologist of the entire Qīng dynasty. Jìnshì of Qiánlóng 19 (1754) ranking second in the èrjiǎ; Hànlín biānxiū, then a series of senior court appointments culminating as shàozhānshì 少詹事 (junior tutor to the heir apparent — hence Duàn’s address “shàozhānshì Xiǎozhēng xiānshēng”). In 1775 his father died and Qián withdrew to mourn; he never returned to office, instead leading from 1788 to his death in 1804 the Zǐyáng 紫陽 academy in Sūzhōu, which under his leadership became the principal center of QiánJiā kǎozhèng historiographical training.
Qián’s principal monograph is the Niànèrshǐ kǎoyì 廿二史攷異 — a 100-juan systematic textual-critical and historical-analytical commentary on the 22 standard histories from Shǐ jì through Yuán shǐ, the foundational work of Qīng historiographical kǎozhèng and arguably the single greatest premodern Chinese work of historical source-criticism. His subsidiary works on history include the Hòu Hàn shū bǔbiǎo 後漢書補表 (supplementing the Hòu Hàn shū with missing genealogical and chronological tables), the Yuánshǐ shìzú biǎo 元史氏族表 (a genealogical table for the Yuán dynasty), the Yuánshǐ yì wén zhì 元史藝文志 (a bibliographic treatise for the Yuán which the standard Yuánshǐ lacks), the Sān shǐ shí yí 三史拾遺, the Zhūshǐ shí yí 諸史拾遺 — and the unfinished Yuánshǐ běnjì drafts that Duàn’s preface laments. In philology Qián’s principal contribution is the Shíjiàzhāi yǎngxīn lù 十駕齋養新錄 (his great philological notebook, parallel in form to 顧炎武 Gù Yánwǔ’s Rì zhī lù KR3a0091), the Hèngyán lù 恆言錄 (a lexicon of vernacular and dialect terms), and the Shēnglèi 聲類 (phonological monograph). In mathematics-astronomy Qián was a leading figure of the QiánJiā revival of native Chinese mathematics; his Yīnyáng lìfǎ kǎo and other writings document the late-Qiánlóng integration of Western (Jesuit) and native traditions.
The Wénjí documents Qián’s working method: the wèndá 問答 essays (category 3) are short quaestio-format treatments of disputed points; the bēizhuàn and mùzhìmíng (categories 7–9) are the principal Qīng documentary biographies of the QiánJiā network (including 惠棟 Huì Dòng, 戴震 Dài Zhèn, 盧文弨 Lú Wénzhāo KR4f0058, 全祖望 Quán Zǔwàng KR4f0054, 王鳴盛 Wáng Míngshèng, and many others); the shū (correspondence) preserves the methodological debates with these figures.
Composition window: c. 1750 (Qián’s earliest writings, in his early twenties) through 1804. The 1806 imprint sponsored by Qú Jìngtāo with Duàn’s preface is the editio princeps of the Wénjí as a 50-juan organized work; the SBCK reproduces this recension along with the xùjí and shījí.
Translations and research
Benjamin A. Elman, From Philosophy to Philology (Harvard, 1984; 2nd ed. 2001) — extensive treatment of Qián within the Sū-zhōu kǎo-zhèng circle.
Lin Qingzhang 林慶彰, Qián Dà-xīn yán-jiū 錢大昕研究 (Taipei: Wenshizhe Chubanshe, 1990).
Chén Wén-hé 陳文和 ed., Qián Dà-xīn quán jí 嘉定錢大昕全集 (10 vols., Nanjing: Jiangsu Guji, 1997; rev. 2016) — the standard modern critical edition.
Du Weiyun 杜維運, Qīng-dài shǐ-xué yǔ shǐ-jiā 清代史學與史家 (Taipei, 1962; expanded 1984) — substantial chapter on Qián.
Wáng Jì-lóng 王記錄, Qián Dà-xīn de shǐ-xué sī-xiǎng 錢大昕的史學思想 (Beijing, 2004).
Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §66.4 and §51 (Qián as paradigmatic Qīng historiographer); refs throughout.
ECCP 152–155 (Tu Lien-che).
Other points of interest
Qián’s studio name Qiányántáng 潛研堂 (“Hall of Submerged Research”) gave its name to the Wénjí, the shījí, and the Shíjiàzhāi yǎngxīn lù’s sister volume the Qiányántáng dáwèn 潛研堂答問 — all three of which together constitute Qián’s working bibliography. The studio name encodes his methodological ideal: scholarship submerged in the source-material, attentive rather than performative.
Qián’s Yuán shǐ program — substantially unfinished at his death — was the principal documentary foundation for the modern Xīn Yuán shǐ 新元史 of 柯劭忞 Kē Shàomín (1850–1933), the 1922 revision of the Yuán dynastic history. The Wénjí contains the methodological prefaces and draft-fragments of this program; Duàn’s mention of the yuán shǐ shǒu gǎo wèi dìng (Yuán-history draft uncorrected) in his 1806 preface marks one of the most regretted manuscript losses of Qīng historiography.
Links
- Wikidata Q5961116 (Qian Daxin)
- ECCP 152–155
- Wilkinson 2018, §51, §66.4
- CBDB id 29876 (1728–1804)