Cháishì sìyǐn jí 柴氏四隱集
The Four Recluses of the Chái Clan, Collected by 柴望 and 柴復貞
About the work
A 3-juǎn family-anthology gathering the verse-and-prose of the Cháishì sìyǐn 柴氏四隱 — “Four Recluses of the Chái Clan” — a quartet of Sòng-loyalist brothers from Jiāngshān 江山, Qúzhōu (Zhèjiāng): Chái Wàng (柴望, 1212–1280, zì Zhòngshān, sobriquet Qiūtáng 秋堂), the eldest and the most-famous (Bǐngdīng guījiàn); his cousin Chái Suíhēng 柴隨亨 (zì Zhānqí 瞻屺, jìnshì of the Wén Tiānxiáng examination cohort, served as Prefect of Jiànchāng); Chái Yuánhéng 柴元亨 (zì Jífǔ 吉甫, same jìnshì class as Suíhēng, served as cháosǎn dàfū and JīngHú cānzhì); and Chái Yuánbīāo 柴元彪 (zì Bǐngzhōng 炳中, sobriquet Zéyào jūshì 澤曜居士, chátuī 察推). After the Sòng surrender of 1276 all four brothers withdrew into hermitage and refused Yuán recruitment. The eleventh-generation descendant Chái Fùzhēn (柴復貞) reassembled the surviving works in the Míng Wànlì period (c. 1589); Chái Yuánhéng’s writings had perished by then and could not be recovered, so the collection preserves only three of the four — Wàng, Suíhēng, and Yuánbīāo — yet retains the inherited title “Four Recluses” in honour of the quartet. The Qīng Qiántáng bibliophile Wú Yǔnjiā 吳允嘉 obtained a Wànlì print and circulated manuscript copies; the SKQS recension also adds 5 supplementary poems from the Jiāngshān zhì (Jiāngshān county gazetteer) and Wú’s own Shīyǒng. The verse is mid- to late-Sòng with WǎnTáng affect — without the cluttered manner of standard Sòng — though Suíhēng’s and Yuánbīāo’s work is somewhat inferior to Wàng’s.
Tiyao
Your servants respectfully submit: the Cháishì sìyǐn jí in 3 juǎn — the poetry and prose of the Sòng Chái Wàng and his cousins Suíhēng, Yuánhéng, and Yuánbīāo. Wàng has the Bǐngdīng guījiàn already on record (see KR4d0386). Suíhēng, zì Zhānqí, registered in Wén Tiānxiáng’s [Bǎoyòu 4 / 1256] jìnshì-class; passed through Magistrate (zhī) of Jiànchāng military-prefecture. Yuánhéng, zì Jífǔ, took the jìnshì with Suíhēng and rose through cháosǎn dàfū and JīngHú cānzhì. Yuánbīāo, zì Bǐngzhōng, sobriquet Zéyào jūshì, once served as chátuī. After the Sòng fell, the brothers all withdrew and refused office. At that time they were called the Cháishì sìyǐn.
Wàng wrote the Dàozhōu Táiyī jí, the Yǒngshǐ shī, and the Liángzhōu gǔchuī; Yuánbīāo wrote the Wàxiàn jí; Suíhēng and Yuánhéng’s writings have scattered and fallen, the titles of their collections all unascertainable. In the Míng Wànlì period the eleventh-generation descendant Fùzhēn et al. recovered the yígǎo (left-over manuscripts); Yuánhéng’s pieces no longer existed; therefore [Fùzhēn] combined Wàng with Suíhēng and Yuánbīāo into a single collection, retaining the name Sìyǐn — by the old appellation. The world had only the single Qiūtáng collection (i.e. Wàng’s), and not even a complete recension; the Qiántáng man Wú Yǔnjiā first obtained a printed text and circulated it in manuscript. He further drew on the Jiāngshān zhì and his own Shīyǒng to supplement five additional poems from outside the collection, making the book complete.
The verse-style is close to WǎnTáng — without the cluttered habit of Sòng-men. Suíhēng and Yuánbīāo’s pieces are inferior to their elder brother’s. Yet resolute integrity and high air are concentrated in this one family; even though the surviving compilation is scattered, the sorrowful-grieving feeling entrusted to gēyín (song-and-chant) is still here-and-there visible; preserving it is enough to encourage moral instruction — not merely for the sake of the literary value.
Reverently submitted, fifth month of Qiánlóng 43 (1778). Editor-in-Chief Jǐ Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì. General Collator Lù Fèichí.
Abstract
Date. The constituent poems-and-prose are Southern Sòng (mostly 1240s–1290s). The compilation as transmitted is a Wàn-lì-period (c. 1589) reassembly by Chái Fùzhēn, with a preface by Zhāng Dǒu 張斗 of Pèishàng. The notBefore of 1276 reflects the post-conquest hermitage; notAfter of c. 1600 reflects the final shape of the transmitted Wànlì recension.
Significance. (1) Sòng-loyalist family-anthology. The Cháishì sìyǐn jí is the principal documentary witness to a family-level pattern of Sòngyímín refusal of Yuán office — four brothers who individually held Sòng degrees and offices and individually withdrew. The collection’s preservation of letters and poems exchanged between the brothers (and with Xiè Fāngdé (謝枋得) — referenced in Jì Xiè Diéshān èr shī) makes it an unusual sociological witness.
(2) Late-Sòng / WǎnTáng poetic style. The verse style is consistent with the late-Southern-Sòng WǎnTáng revival typified by the Jiānghú school but more austere — closer in feeling to Xiè Áo (謝翺) than to Chén Qǐ’s commercial poets.
(3) Documentary loss. The disappearance of Chái Yuánhéng 柴元亨’s works altogether — leaving only his brothers’ verse in family-correspondence — is itself a striking record of the textual losses of the late-Yuán wars that the Wànlì recovery only partially mitigated.
Translations and research
- Jennifer W. Jay, A Change in Dynasties: Loyalism in Thirteenth-Century China (Bellingham, 1991) — Sòng yí-mín family-networks.
- 鄧小南 Dèng Xiǎo-nán et al. on Sòng family-elite continuity.
- 方勇 Fāng Yǒng, Nán-Sòng yí-mín shī-rén qún-tǐ yán-jiū — context.
Other points of interest
Zhāng Dǒu’s Wànlì preface explicitly cites Chái Wàng’s Jì Xiè Diéshān èr shī — addressed to 謝枋得 — and reads them as “the will of Lǔ Zhònglián’s refusal to make Qín emperor” (Lǔ Zhònglián was the classic Warring-States loyalist refuser). The preface is itself a fine example of late-Míng yímín historiography looking back to the Sòng pattern.
Links
- Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §31.4.
- ctext