Wǔdài Chūnqiū 五代春秋
Annals of the Five Dynasties by 尹洙
About the work
A two-juàn (upper/lower) annalistic history of the Five Dynasties period (907–960 CE) written in a concise style deliberately modeled on the classical Chūnqiū 春秋 annals, composed by 尹洙 Yǐn Zhū (1001–1047; CBDB id 7104), a Northern Song prose stylist and associate of Fan Zhongyan and Ouyang Xiu. The text proceeds year by year from the founding of the Later Liang by Zhū Wēn 朱溫 in 907 through the Song dynasty’s unification in 960, recording dynastic transitions, military events, and political developments in the spare, morally weighted language of Chūnqiū annalistic style.
Tiyao
No tiyao found in source.
Abstract
尹洙 Yǐn Zhū (1001–1047; CBDB id 7104) was a major Northern Song prose stylist and advocate of gǔwén 古文 (ancient-style prose), closely associated with Fàn Zhòngyān 范仲淹 (989–1052) and Ōuyáng Xiū 歐陽修 (1007–1072). He served in various official capacities and is known for his principled and sometimes obstinate political stances. Peter Bol (“This Culture of Ours”, Stanford UP, 1992, ch. 5–6) discusses Yin Zhu as part of the reformist literati circle that advocated for gǔwén and moral historiography.
The Wǔdài Chūnqiū applies the moral-historiographical principles of the classical Chūnqiū tradition to the Five Dynasties period: by choosing to record or omit events, and by the precise wording of entries, Yin Zhu encodes judgments about dynastic legitimacy. This approach is the complementary to Ouyang Xiu’s Xīn Wǔdài shǐ 新五代史 (comp. 1044–1053), which similarly applies Chūnqiū moral categories to the same period. Richard Davis’s translation of Ouyang Xiu’s work (Columbia UP, 2004) provides the essential scholarly context for reading Yin Zhu’s companion text.
Translations and research
- Davis, Richard. 2004. Historical Records of the Five Dynasties (translation of Ouyang Xiu’s Xīn Wǔdài shǐ). Columbia UP. Essential companion.
- Bol, Peter K. 1992. “This Culture of Ours”. Stanford UP, ch. 5–6.
Links
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