Romance of the Three Kingdoms

Author: Chen Shou (Western Jin Dynasty)
Publisher:
Publish Date: 1996-10-01
Features: This book is one of the series "The Treasure House of Time-Honored Chinese Classics." The author is Chen Shou of the Western Jin Dynasty. The entire work comprises 65 volumes, divided into the "History of Wei," "History of Shu," and "History of Wu." It belongs to the chronological and biographical style of the Three Kingdoms history. The first four volumes of the "History of Wei" are considered annals, while the "Histories of Shu and Wu" have biographies but no annals. The rulers of Wei are referred to as emperors and are narrated in the annals, whereas the rulers of Wu and Shu are referred to as kings, not emperors, and are narrated in the biographies. Histories of Wei and Wu already existed before Chen Shou's work, with official histories including Wang Shen's "History of Wei" and Wei Zhao's "History of Wu," and private histories including Yu Han's "Brief History of Wei," which served as the main basis for Chen Shou's "Histories of Wei and Wu." The "History of Shu" had no existing history, but Chen Shou was a native of Shu and a disciple of the historian Qiao Zhou. Even before the fall of Shu, he paid close attention to the history of Shu, making the "History of Shu" no inferior to the "Histories of Wei and Wu." The three histories were originally independent and were later combined into a single book. Due to its relatively concise narrative style, it was annotated by Pei Songzhi during the Southern Dynasties period of the Southern Qi Dynasty.