Wáng Yǎn 王琰
LiúSòng — Southern Qí Buddhist layman and compiler. Native of Tàiyuán 太原 (the ancestral seat of his clan); born in Jiāozhǐ 交趾 (modern northern Vietnam), where his father had been posted. Active during the Yuánjiā 元嘉 (424–453) through Yǒngmíng 永明 (483–493) reigns. He receives no entry in the standard histories (no lièzhuàn in either Sòng shū or Nán Qí shū); essentially all biographical information derives from the self-preface of his KR3l0132 Míngxiáng jì 冥祥記 preserved in the Fǎyuàn zhūlín 法苑珠林 juàn 17. The preface reports: in Jiāozhǐ as a child (some time in the Yuánjiā reign) he received a small gilt-bronze image of Guānshìyīn 觀世音 from a foreign monk Xián Gōng 賢公; the image accompanied him to Jiànkāng 建康 (LiúSòng capital), to Wūjùn 吳郡, and back to Jiāozhǐ. Throughout these decades he collected verified miracle-tales centred on Guānshìyīn devotion, sūtra-recitation, and míngjiè (underworld) episodes, ultimately compiling them under the Southern Qí (latest datable episode in his collection refers to Yǒngmíng 7, i.e. 489) into the Míngxiáng jì in 10 juàn.
Wáng Yǎn was a jūshì 居士 (Buddhist layman) rather than an ordained monk; he received introductions to the Wūjùn monk Sēngyìn 僧隱 and through him to the wider LiúSòng — Southern Qí monastic network in the Jiāngnán region. His work is the earliest extensively-preserved Chinese Buddhist yīngyàn miracle-tale compilation; for full discussion see KR3l0132 and Campany’s Signs from the Unseen Realm (2012).
The CBDB lists multiple entries for the name 王琰 but none with reliable LiúSòng — Southern Qí dating; no confident CBDB id match exists for this person. The DILA Buddhist Studies Person Authority should be consulted for a possible match.