Yǔ Jiānwú 庾肩吾
Style name Zǐshèn 子慎. Native of Xīnyě 新野 (Hénán). Born ca. 487; died ca. 551 (during the Hóu Jǐng rebellion). Father of the famous Liáng poet Yǔ Xìn 庾信.
A Liáng-period official and literary figure: served as Jìnānwángguó chángshì (Jìnān Princely State Constant Attendant); under Liáng Yuándì rose to Dùzhī shàngshū (Minister of Revenue). Biography in Liángshū Wénxué zhuàn. A leader of the Liáng-period Yǒngmíng tǐ poetic-and-aesthetic group together with Xú Líng 徐陵 and the Crown Prince Liáng Jiǎnwéndì 簡文帝.
His sole surviving Sìkù-preserved work is the Shūpǐn 書品 (KR3h0002) — the foundational Chinese calligraphy-criticism treatise (parallel to Xiè Hè’s KR3h0001 Gǔhuà pǐn for painting). The work grades 128 (or 123 — the figures vary across recensions) Hàn-through-Liáng calligraphers into 9 categories with topical critical-discussion for each category. The Liùyī jiǎo cháng polemic by Dòu Jì 竇臮’s Shùshū fù criticizes Yǔ Jiānwú as having “mostly literary-flourish but lacking heaven-given [calligraphic] nature” — but the Sìkù 提要 commends Yǔ Jiānwú’s substantive judgments and his preservation of the canonical HànWèi calligraphic tradition.