Wáng Guàn 王觀, Míng-period Hóngzhì (1488–1505) period editor; tenth-generation descendant of the Sòng Dàoxué figure Wáng Píng 王蘋 王蘋 (1082–1153). Compiler of the present 8-juǎn recension of his ancestor’s Wáng zhùzuò jí 王著作集 KR4d0185 from family-preserved papers, image-encomia, Sòng recommendation memorials, colophons, pupil notes, etc. The Sòng-period 4-juǎn recension cut by Wáng Píng’s great-grandson Wáng Sīwén in Bǎoyòu (with preface by Lú Yuè) had been substantially lost.
CBDB has no clearly-matching entry; multiple Wáng Guàn homonyms exist in CBDB without distinguishing dates.
name: 王觀 pinyinName: Wáng Guàn alternateNames: [達叟, Dásǒu] dynasty: 宋 birthDate: deathDate: flEarliest: 1068 flLatest: 1077 cbdbId: created: 2026-05-14 updated: 2026-05-14
Wáng Guàn 王觀 (Northern Sòng; zì Dásǒu)
Northern-Sòng official and pǔlù author, zì Dásǒu 達叟. Native of Rúgāo 如皋 in Yángzhōu (modern Jiāngsū). The Sìkù editors correct Wāng Shìxián’s 汪士賢 Shānjū zázhì recension, which calls him “Jiāngdū rén” — but the Jiājìng Wéiyáng zhì makes him a Rúgāo native. (Note: do not confuse with the Yuán-Fēng-era Sòng cí-poet Wáng Guàn 王觀, also of Rúgāo, zì Tōngsǒu 通叟 — the Bǔsuànzǐ author; the two are sometimes conflated but appear to be distinct persons, or possibly the same with two zì.)
During Xīníng (1068–1077) Wáng held the post of jiāngshì láng zhī Yángzhōu Jiāngdū xiàn — a Tàicháng cìshǐ (Grand Constancy Court junior) appointment in the Yángzhōu Jiāngdū magistracy. While in office he composed the Yángzhōu fù 揚州賦 and submitted it to the emperor; he received high imperial praise and was awarded a fēiyī yínzhāng (red-robe-and-silver-fish ceremonial honor). His career-record is in the Jiājìng Wéiyáng zhì.
His one surviving pǔlù work, the Yángzhōu sháoyào pǔ 揚州芍藥譜 (KR3i0030) — the first systematic treatise on the sháoyào (herbaceous peony, Paeonia lactiflora) — is the most authoritative Sòng monograph on the herbaceous peony tradition centered at Yángzhōu, complementing Ōuyáng Xiū’s KR3i0029 on the tree-peony of Luòyáng.