Nányuè xiǎolù 南嶽小錄
A Short Record of the Southern Peak by 李沖昭 (述)
About the work
A short topographical-hagiographical gazetteer in one juàn devoted to Mt. Héng 衡山 (Nányuè 南嶽 in Hénán-modern-Húnán), composed by the Daoist priest Lǐ Chōngzhāo 李沖昭 and dated by the author’s own preface to the 壬戌 winter — i.e. tenth month of Tiānfù 2 (902), one of the last years of the Táng. It is the earliest surviving monograph on any of the Five Marchmounts, and the principal source on the Daoist topography of Nányuè before the Sòng. The work is bound jointly in the Zhènghé Dàozàng (DZ 453, fasc. 201) with the companion text KR5b0136 Nányuè jiǔ zhēnrén zhuàn, the two together forming the documentary nucleus of the Daoist Nányuè cult.
Prefaces
The author’s preface (1a–1b) explains the impetus: Lǐ had “perceived the Way in his early years,” then “served a teacher” on Mt. Héng, where he frequently visited the língjì 靈跡 (numinous traces) but found that the older records had been scattered “after the fires of war” — a reference to the disorders of the late Táng. He therefore “perused the old stelae and the Héngshān tújīng and the Xiāngzhōng shuō,” interrogated his teachers and the elders below the peak, gathered single anecdotes piecemeal, and compiled them into one juàn so that dàolǚ visiting the mountain would have a guide. The preface closes “in the rénxū year, winter, tenth month” — the rénxū of Tiānfù 2 = 902.
Abstract
The text is organised by topographical entries rather than as continuous prose. Lǐ first introduces the mountain through canonical citations (《周禮·職方氏》, the Wǔyuè zhēnxíng tú, the Fúchù zhì, the Wǔlíng jīng) and lists its five peaks (Zhùróngfēng 祝融峯, Zǐgàifēng 紫蓋峯, Yúnmìfēng 雲密峯, Tiānzhùfēng 天柱峯, Shílǐnfēng 石廪峯) and three streams (Língjiàn 靈澗, Shòujiàn 壽澗, Dòngzhēnjiàn 洞眞澗). He then describes in turn the principal cult sites and monasteries — Sītiān Huòwáng miào 司天霍王廟, Zhēnjūn miào 眞君廟, Héngyuèguàn 衡嶽觀, Zhāoxiānguàn 招仙觀, Jiǔzhēnguàn 九眞觀, Xīlíngguàn 西靈觀, Shèngshòuguàn 聖壽觀, Jiǔxiāngōng 九仙宮, Zhōnggōng 中宮, Yuányánggōng 元陽宮, Shàngqīnggōng 上清宮, Zǐxūgé 紫虛閣, Shíshì Yǐnzhēngōng 石室隱眞宮, and a number of tái, yuàn, and yán — together with the Daoist masters associated with each (司馬承禎 Sīmǎ Chéngzhēn, 蕭靈護 Xiāo Línghù, 薛季昌 Xuē Jìchāng, 王仙喬 Wáng Xiānqiáo, 廣成劉玄靜 Liú Xuánjìng, 田良逸 Tián Liángyì, et al.). The final third of the work consists of two registered lists: the Qiándài jiǔ zhēnrén 前代九眞人, giving the names, dwellings and ascension dates of the nine pre-Táng zhēnrén (the same nine elaborated in KR5b0136); and the Tángcháo dédào rén 唐朝得道人 (twenty-one Tang adepts), with dates of attainment ranging from Tiānbǎo (742–) to Dàzhōng (847–). A closing notice mentions a Zhēnjūn zhuàn attributed to “Hàn Zhōnglěijiàowèi Liú Xiàng” 漢中壘校尉劉向 — an obviously pseudepigraphic citation but useful evidence for the Daoist book-claims circulating on the mountain at the close of the Táng.
The text’s significance is fourfold: (i) it preserves a late-Táng inventory of the major Daoist establishments at Nányuè, many of which were destroyed in the Wǔdài and Sòng wars; (ii) it preserves anecdotes about Táng eminences (Sīmǎ Chéngzhēn, Lǐ Bì 李泌, the eunuch Gāo Lìshì 高力士) connecting the mountain to the imperial court; (iii) it offers the earliest extant text of the Nányuè jiǔ zhēnrén canon; (iv) it transmits otherwise lost portions of the Héngshān tújīng and Xú Língqī’s Héngshān jì by quotation. Robson (2009) demonstrates that the Xiǎolù is the indispensable source for the medieval Nányuè cult and the basis for later Sòng compilations such as Chén Tiánfū’s 陳田夫 Nányuè zǒngshèng jí 南嶽總勝集 (KR2k0083 in the SKQS recension).
Translations and research
- Schipper, Kristofer, and Franciscus Verellen, eds. The Taoist Canon: A Historical Companion to the Daozang. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. 2: 904 (DZ 453, entry by Hans-Hermann Schmidt).
- Robson, James. Power of Place: The Religious Landscape of the Southern Sacred Peak (Nanyue 南嶽) in Medieval China. Harvard East Asian Monographs 316. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2009. — chapters 3–4 draw extensively on the Xiǎolù.
- Verellen, Franciscus. “The Beyond Within: Grotto-Heavens (dòngtiān 洞天) in Taoist Ritual and Cosmology.” Cahiers d’Extrême-Asie 8 (1995): 265–290. — for the Zhūlíng 朱陵 grotto-heaven.
Other points of interest
The closing notice ascribing a Zhēnjūn zhuàn to Liú Xiàng 劉向 (77–6 BCE) is one of many such Han-attributions circulating in late-Táng Daoist literature; it should be read as a claim to scriptural antiquity rather than as evidence of an actual Han prototype.