Sānwǔ Lìjì 三五歷記
Record of the Three and Five by 徐整
About the work
Sānwǔ Lìjì 三五歷記 is a jíyìběn reconstruction of a lost Sān-Guó Wú 三國吳 dynasty cosmogonic text by Xú Zhěng 徐整. The title refers to the “Three Sovereigns” (Sān Huáng 三皇) and “Five Emperors” (Wǔ Dì 五帝), the legendary sage-kings of Chinese antiquity. The text is famous as the earliest surviving source for the Pángǔ 盤古 creation myth — the story of the primordial giant from whose body the features of the cosmos were formed.
Tiyao
No tiyao found in source. This is a jíyìběn reconstruction.
Abstract
Xú Zhěng was a scholar of the state of Eastern Wú 東吳 during the Three Kingdoms period. His Sānwǔ Lìjì is recorded in the Suí Shū 隋書 bibliography (along with a related work, the Wǔyùn Lìnián Jì 五運歷年紀). The text is historically important as the locus classicus for the Pángǔ 盤古 myth, widely cited in later Chinese cosmological and popular literature. The key fragment, preserved in the Yìwén Lèijù 藝文類聚 and the Tàipíng Yùlǎn 太平御覽, describes:
天地混沌如雞子，盤古生其中。萬八千歲，天地開闢，陽清為天，陰濁為地。盤古在其中，一日九變，神於天，聖於地。天日高一丈，地日厚一丈，盤古日長一丈。如此萬八千歲，天數極高，地數極深，盤古極長。
(“Heaven and Earth were a chaotic mass like a chicken egg, within which Pángǔ was born. After eighteen thousand years, Heaven and Earth separated: the clear and bright became Heaven, the murky and heavy became Earth. Pángǔ stood between them, transforming nine times a day, more divine than Heaven, more sage than Earth. Each day Heaven rose one zhàng, Earth thickened one zhàng, and Pángǔ grew one zhàng. After another eighteen thousand years, Heaven grew extremely high, Earth extremely deep, and Pángǔ extremely tall.“)
The surviving fragments also include brief notices on the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors themselves, though these are far less extensive than the Pángǔ material. The text was lost after the Táng; the fragments were reconstructed in the Qīng period.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located.
Other points of interest
The Sānwǔ Lìjì is the earliest textual witness to the Pángǔ creation myth, which became one of the most important cosmogonic narratives in Chinese popular culture. The question of whether Pángǔ was an indigenous Chinese myth or influenced by South or Southeast Asian creation narratives (transmitted via the Wú court’s maritime contact) remains a subject of scholarly debate.