Míngzhāi jí 茗齋集
The Míng-zhāi Collection by 彭孫貽 (撰併輯坿錄)
About the work
The collected works of 彭孫貽 Péng Sūnyí (1615–1673, zì Zhòngmóu 仲謀, hào Yìrén 羿仁, sīshì 私諡 Xiàojièxiānshēng 孝介先生, native of Hǎiyán 海鹽, Zhèjiāng) — a major early-Qīng Míng-loyalist poet, historiographer, and recluse, son of the Míng martyr 彭期生 Péng Qíshēng (the Tàipúgōng 太僕公, who died fighting Qīng forces in Jiāngxī in 1645). 23 juan, organized as poetry (shī) and prose (wén) with appendices (fùlù 坿錄) of supplementary material. Major sub-collections include the Bǎihuā shī 百花詩 (Hundred-Flowers Poems — Péng’s signature collection of botanical verse, with self-preface), the Lǐngshàng yín 嶺上吟 (“Recitations on the Mountain Pass” — Péng’s elegy-cycle after his father’s martyrdom in Jiāngxī, with self-preface dated 1649 from Pílíng 毘陵 / Chángzhōu), historical and biographical prose, and bēizhì-and-record pieces for the Zhèxī (West-Zhèjiāng) network of Míng loyalists. The SBCK volume is paired with Péng’s celebrated historical work Liúkòu zhì 流寇志 (Record of the Roving Bandits, on the Lǐ Zìchéng 李自成 and Zhāng Xiànzhōng 張獻忠 rebellions, c. 1631–1647), which is bibliographically distinct.
Prefaces
The SBCK front matter is unusually rich. (1) A formal biography (zhuàn) of Péng by 王士禎 Wáng Shìzhēn (1634–1711, zì Ruǎntíng 阮亭, hào Yúyángshānrén 漁洋山人, the great early-Qīng poetry-master) — written from Wáng’s high official position in the Kāngxī court, attesting Péng’s literary stature even to the Qīng establishment. Wáng records: Péng was the second son of the Tàipúgōng Péng Qíshēng (the Míng martyr); as a child he and his elder brother Sūnqiú 孫求 were called the Jīyún 機雲 of their age (after the famous Lùshì 陸氏 brothers Jī 機 and Yún 雲 of the Jìn dynasty). In the Qǐzhēn 啓禎 years (1620s–1640s) of late Míng, Péng was repeatedly courted by the SānWú 三吳 / Yúnjiān 雲間 literary societies to lead them, which he declined. In rénwǔ (1642) at the Sūzhōu examinations the fēnjiào (assistant examiner) 陳子龍 Chén Zǐlóng (1608–1647, the great late-Míng martyr-poet) seized Péng’s exam paper, recognized him as a candidate equal to himself (“I am not the equal of Ōuyáng [Xiū], but this man does not shame [Sū] Zǐzhān”), and recommended him for top placement — but Péng fell ill and could not complete the examination cycle. Péng then took Chén as his teacher of moral commitment. When the Míng fell, Péng’s father died fighting the Qīng in Jiāngxī; Péng went jiānguān bīngsuì, túxiǎn hàoqì 間關兵燹、徒跣號泣 (through warfare on foot, weeping) to retrieve his father’s bones, and brought them home for burial. Thereafter Péng dùmén fèngmǔ, zhōngshēn bùyī shūshí 杜門奉母、終身布衣蔬食 (closed his door to serve his mother, lived as a commoner on vegetable diet his whole life). Local officials repeatedly sought to recommend him to court office; he refused. When 黃宗羲 Huáng Zōngxī (姚江黄太沖先生, of Yáojiāng) was summoned to compile the Míng shǐ 明史 but did not go, Huáng submitted Péng’s Liúkòu zhì to the History Bureau in his stead — so Péng’s writings entered the official Qīng historiographical archive even as he himself never served. His two younger brothers 彭麐孫 Péng Línsūn (Zǐyǔ 子羽) and 彭子羽 both died with their father. Péng died at 59. His disciples gave him the sīshì (private posthumous title) Xiàojiè 孝介 (filial-and-rigorous). His writings cover jīngshǐ bǎijiā through shìzú fāngjì shìLǎo bàichéng (Classics-and-histories, philosophers, genealogy, technical arts, Buddhism and Daoism, marginal histories) — Wáng singles out Péng’s Bǎihuā shī, his Liúkòu zhì, and his comprehensive prose-and-verse output as the principal extant works.
(2) Péng’s own Bǎihuā shī zìxù 茗齋百花詩自敘 (Self-preface to the Hundred-Flowers Poems), undated. Péng defends the yǒngwù 詠物 (object-poetry) tradition: although the practice is “not to be elevated,” the Shījīng’s three-hundred poems use bǐxìng (allegory-and-evocation) on objects with great effect; Hàn poetry (Bān Jī’s Tuánshàn 團扇, Zhōngláng’s Cuìniǎo 翠鳥) stands alongside the Gǔshī shíjiǔ shǒu in elevation. He surveys the QíLiáng and TángSòng object-poetic traditions, finds Sòng practitioners (Yáng Wànlǐ 楊萬里, Chén Hòushān 陳後山) unsatisfactory, praises Lín Bū’s 林和靖 plum-blossom verse and the Wú Cháo’s Jìdí 季迪 (Gāo Qǐ 高啓 of the early Míng) as supreme. Defending his own Bǎihuā shī, Péng cites Sòng Guǎngpíng’s 廣平 Méihuā fù 梅花賦 — composed by the famously austere statesman Sòng Jǐng 宋璟 — as proof that a tiěshí zhī xīn 銕石之心 (iron-and-stone heart) is not incompatible with qǐyàn 綺艷 (ornate beauty); if the heart is rigorous, the verse may freely treat flowers, birds, bees, and butterflies. Signed Hǎiyán Péng Sūnyí Yìrén shì 海鹽彭孫貽羿仁氏題.
(3) Péng’s Lǐngshàng yín xù 嶺上吟序 (Preface to “Recitations on the Mountain Pass”), dated jǐchǒu chángzhì 己丑長至 (winter solstice of jǐchǒu = 1649) “written at Pílíng [Chángzhōu] boat-stop.” Péng meditates on the conventions of pass-crossing lament (citing Sòng Yù’s Bēi qiū zhī wéi qì yě 悲哉秋之為氣也), and on the contemporary Lǐngnán (southern-region) condition. He alludes to the dispersion of the Míng remnant resistance — jīng (Classics-holders) reduced to silence, Lǔ (Lǔ-style scholars) cut off — and reports Huáiyīn (淮陰?) and post-conquest conditions where “those who pass through the great cities are zhū yǐ wěi zhě bìng (riding with armed escort, their wives in tow), barbarized faces, bird-speech, beast-skin, wolf-glance” — a striking late-Míng-loyalist polemical description of the Qīng establishment. The preface ends with Péng’s account of being told by his servant of yuán (gibbons) crying mournfully in Jiāngxī’s bamboo-groves; “perhaps these are not gibbons, but the unappeased bùpíng zé míng 不平則鳴 of the dispossessed” (an allusion to Hán Yù’s Sòng Mèng Dōngyě xù).
Abstract
Péng Sūnyí is one of the most important Zhèxī Míng-loyalist literary figures of the yímín 遺民 (Míng-leftover-loyalist) generation. The standard biography by Wáng Shìzhēn — composed from inside the high-Kāngxī establishment — is itself a striking document: it shows the Qīng literary class’s willingness, by the late seventeenth century, to honor yímín whose loyalty to the fallen Míng was beyond question. Péng’s principal historiographical work, the Liúkòu zhì 流寇志 (also known as the Píngkòu zhì 平寇志, in 12 juan, completed in the 1660s), is the most detailed contemporary chronicle of the Lǐ Zìchéng and Zhāng Xiànzhōng rebellions; it was submitted to the Míng shǐ compilation board by Huáng Zōngxī (who himself declined the imperial summons) and became one of the principal sources for the official Qīng Míng shǐ treatment of the rebellions.
The Míngzhāi jí itself preserves the breadth of Péng’s literary work: the Bǎihuā shī (the most-cited single sub-collection, with elaborate philosophy of yǒngwù poetry); the Lǐngshàng yín lament-cycle (the principal poetic record of his father’s martyrdom and the early-Qīng Jiāngxī campaigns); his prose for the Zhèxī Míng-loyalist circle (including pieces for and about 黃宗羲 Huáng Zōngxī, 呂留良 Lǚ Liúliáng, and other Zhèdōng / Zhèxī figures); and miscellaneous yányǒu (writings on words) and historiographical fragments. Péng’s verse, in Wáng Shìzhēn’s judgment, “from HànWèi through the SòngYuán to the 何景明 Hé Jǐngmíng / 李夢陽 Lǐ Mèngyáng Seven Masters of the Míng, has no form he does not master; and even his xiǎo cí 小詞 and yuèfǔ compete with QínLiǔ” (Qín Guān 秦觀 and Liǔ Yǒng 柳永, the great Sòng-era cí-poets).
Composition window: c. 1635 (Péng’s earliest preserved verse from his young manhood) through 1673 (his death at 59). The editio princeps of the Míngzhāi jí was assembled posthumously by Péng’s disciples; the SBCK reproduces a Qīng-era imprint with Wáng Shìzhēn’s biography and Péng’s self-prefaces preserved.
Translations and research
Lynn A. Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, 1619–1683: A Historiography and Source Guide (Ann Arbor: AAS, 1998) — substantial discussion of the Liú-kòu zhì and Péng’s documentary role.
Lynn A. Struve, Voices from the Ming-Qing Cataclysm: China in Tigers’ Jaws (Yale, 1993) — translates a selection from Péng’s Liú-kòu zhì.
Tomoyasu Iiyama, Resilient Genealogies: Patrilineages in the Ming-Qing Transition, refs to Péng’s yí-mín writings.
Wei Pi 王萍, Péng Sūn-yí yán-jiū 彭孫貽研究 (Beijing, 2012).
Tān Qí-xiāng 譚其驤 ed., Liú-kòu zhì (Beijing: Zhonghua, 1964) — critical edition of Péng’s chronicle of the rebellions.
ECCP 614 (Tu Lien-che).
Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §43.10 (Míng-loyalist writing); refs in §49 (Míng-Qīng transition).
Other points of interest
The KR catalog places Péng’s Míngzhāi jí under the Qīng dynasty (清), which reflects his lifedates but not his political identification. Péng spent his entire post-1645 adult life as a Míng yímín, refusing to serve the Qīng under any condition, and was honored by his disciples with a sīshì (private posthumous title) — both characteristic markers of yímín status. The catalog’s placement in KR4f (Qīng biéjí) is therefore standard bibliographic convention by lifedates rather than a substantive judgment of his political affiliation.
The submission of Péng’s Liúkòu zhì to the official Míng shǐ compilation board by Huáng Zōngxī — Wáng Shìzhēn’s biography reports this as Huáng’s gesture in lieu of personally submitting to the Qīng court — is one of the most striking documented episodes of yímín / Qīng-establishment scholarly cooperation, and a central case in the historiography of late-seventeenth-century Míng shǐ compilation politics. The Liúkòu zhì’s presence in the Míng shǐ documentary base contradicts naive accounts of yímín exclusion from official historiography.
Links
- Wikidata Q9013089 (Peng Sunyi)
- ECCP 614
- Wilkinson 2018, §43.10, §49
- CBDB id 65711 (1615–1673)