Lìshì zhēnxiān tǐdào tōngjiàn hòují 歷世真仙體道通鑑後集
Continuation of the Comprehensive Mirror of Immortals Who Embodied the Tao through the Ages
by 趙道一 (撰, fl. 1294, dàoshì of the Fúyún shān Shèngshòu wànnián gōng 浮雲山聖壽萬年宮)
About the work
A six-juan companion to [[KR5a0308|DZ 296 Lìshì zhēnxiān tǐdào tōngjiàn]] devoted exclusively to female immortals (nǚ xiān 女仙) from antiquity to the end of the Sòng. Preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0298 / CT 298 = TC 298), 洞真部 記傳類. The compiler Zhào Dàoyī 趙道一 — dàoshì of the Fúyún shān Shèngshòu wànnián gōng in Fèngxīn (Jiāngxī) — closes his great triple-undertaking (parent + male-immortals supplement + female-immortals supplement) with this volume.
Prefaces
No preface in the source. The work opens directly with the table of contents (mùlù 目錄): “Compiled and edited by Fúyún shān Shèngshòu wànnián gōng dàoshì Zhào Dàoyī.” Juan 1 opens the series with Wúshàng yuánjūn 無上元君 and Tàiyī yuánjūn 太一元君; juan 2 contains Jiǔtiān xuánnǚ 九天玄女 (the Yellow-Dynasty consort), Cánnǚ 蠶女 (the silkworm goddess), Yúnhuá fūrén 雲華夫人 (Xià period), Cháng’é 嫦娥 (Xià), Zhīnǚ 織女 (the weaving girl), Chāngróng 昌容 (Shāng), Nǚyǔ 女偊, Lǐ Zhēnduō 李真多 (Zhōu); juan 3 onward proceeds chronologically through Yíngnǚ 嬴女 (Zhōu), Tàiyángnǚ 太陽女, Tàiyīnnǚ 太陰女 (Zhōu), Máonǚ 毛女 (Qín), Méigū 梅姑 (Qín), Nǚjǐ 女几, Sūnshì 孫氏 (Hàn), Zhāng Wénjī 張文姬 (Hàn), Zhāng Wénguāng 張文光 (Hàn), Zhāng Xián 張賢 (Hàn), and so on.
Abstract
Jean Levi, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 2:894 (§3.A.6, Sacred History and Geography), describes the Hòují as supplementing [[KR5a0308|DZ 296 Lìshì zhēnxiān tǐdào tōngjiàn]] by gathering the lives of female immortals from antiquity to the end of the Sòng. Most of the material is drawn from the Yōngchéng jíxiān lù 墉城集仙錄 (DZ 783) by Dù Guāngtíng 杜光庭 (850–933), the standard Táng anthology of female immortals, supplemented by Sòng-era materials. The decision to issue a separate volume on female immortals is consistent with the parent work’s editorial strategy: the Lièxiān zhuàn’s female biographies are excluded from juan 3 of DZ 296 precisely so that they can be reincorporated here. Zhào Dàoyī’s working date of 1294 is the same as that of the parent work; the Hòují presents itself as part of the same simultaneous compilation. The frontmatter accordingly fixes composition to 1294.
Translations and research
No full translation. Standard scholarly entry: Jean Levi, “Lishi zhenxian tidao tongjian houji,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.6, 894. On Daoist female-immortal hagiography: Suzanne E. Cahill, Divine Traces of the Daoist Sisterhood: ‘Records of the Assembled Transcendents of the Fortified Walled City’ by Du Guangting (850–933) (Magdalena, NM: Three Pines Press, 2006); Catherine Despeux and Livia Kohn, Women in Daoism (Cambridge, MA: Three Pines Press, 2003).
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0310
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.6, 894.