Jìn Shū 晉書 (Xiè Língyùn)
History of the Jin, by Xie Lingyun by 謝靈運
About the work
Jìn Shū 晉書 by 謝靈運 (385–433 CE) is a jíyìběn reconstruction of the Jin history compiled by the most celebrated landscape poet of the Six Dynasties period. Xiè Língyùn was appointed to compile a Jin history during the early Liú-Sòng period, and the work was recorded in 36 juǎn in the Suí Shū 隋書 bibliography. Only scattered fragments survive, recovered from Táng and Sòng sources.
Tiyao
No tiyao found in source. This is a jíyìběn reconstruction.
Abstract
Xiè Língyùn, Duke of Kānglè 康樂公 and scion of the great Xiè 謝 clan of Chén Prefecture 陳郡, was the preeminent poet of his age and a key figure in the development of Chinese landscape poetry. His service as a historian at the Liú-Sòng court produced this Jìn Shū, which was considered a literary as much as a historical work — the Suí Shū bibliographic treatise notes its elegant prose. The commission was a standard honor for a scholar of his standing, as the Liú-Sòng court sought to compile an official history of the preceding dynasty before the project was taken over by later scholars.
The surviving fragments are very few: the jíyìběn draws on citations in the Shìshuō Xīnyǔ 世說新語 commentary, the Tàipíng Yùlǎn 太平御覽, and the Wénxuǎn 文選 commentary. The content is too fragmentary to reconstruct the structure of the original work, but the preserved passages include biographical and administrative notices consistent with standard annalistic-biography format. Xiè Língyùn was executed in 433 CE, and his Jin history — like most of the early unofficial Jin histories — was eventually superseded by the official Táng compilation.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located.