Zànníng 贊寧 (919–1001)
A WúYuè / early-Northern-Sòng monk-historian and the most authoritative monastic figure of the early Sòng establishment. Native of Déqīng 德清 in WúYuè (modern Zhèjiāng), he was tonsured at Tiānzhúsì 天竺寺 in Hángzhōu under the patronage of the WúYuè court. After the Sòng absorption of WúYuè in 978 he was summoned to the capital Biànjīng 汴京 (modern Kāifēng), where Tàizōng 太宗 conferred on him the honorific Tōnghuì dàshī 通慧大師 and entrusted him with monastic-administrative responsibility, eventually appointing him zuǒjiē sēnglù 左街僧錄 (Chief Monastic Recorder of the Left).
His major works are the 《宋高僧傳》 Sòng gāosēng zhuàn (T2061, completed 988), the third of the great Lives of Eminent Monks compendia, covering Buddhist masters from the Táng through the early Sòng; and the encyclopedic 《大宋僧史略》 Dà Sòng sēngshǐ lüè (T2126), a compact administrative-historical handbook of Buddhist monasticism. He also produced numerous prefaces for individual works, of which his 太平興國 8 (983) preface to Chéngyù’s Zhù shíyí lùn KR6p0051 is one. He was unusually well-connected with the early Sòng literary establishment and corresponded with leading Confucian officials, which gives his writings a distinctively literati-friendly register.