Han Renming

Author: Shanghai Shuxue Publishing House
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2001-06-01
Features: "Han Renming," full name "Han Renming, the Deceased Official Han Renming of Wenxi County." Established in the fourth year of the Xiping era (175 AD) during the Eastern Han Dynasty, in clerical script with eight lines, each containing eighteen characters. The title on the top is inscribed in seal script: "Han Renming, the Deceased Official Han Renming of Wenxi County," totaling ten characters. In the fifth year of the Dazheng era (1228 AD) during the Jin Dynasty, Li Fuzhi, the magistrate of Xingyang County, acquired it. During the Kangxi era of the Qing Dynasty, this stele was once lost but was later rediscovered and moved to the Xingyang County Magistrate's Office. In 1925, it was relocated to Xingyang No. 6 Middle School. The lower right corner of the stone is damaged, and the inscriptions commemorate achievements and praise virtue, documenting Han Ren's accomplishments. The stele features bold and vigorous brushwork, a well-balanced structure, and a sparse yet dense layout, harmonious yet dynamic. For those practicing Han clerical script, studying grand imperial works is easy to master brush technique but difficult to achieve expansive brushwork; studying cliffside inscriptions is easy to grasp unique calligraphic forms but hard to maintain strict brush control. This stele combines both, making it highly valued by scholars. Qing Dynasty scholar Yang Shoujing once remarked on this stele: "[It excels in sparseness and elegance, likely serving as the inspiration for Cai Youlin's style]." According to Wang Zhuanghong's research, old rubbings of this stele show that in early Qing Dynasty rubbings, the character "shao" in the fifth line's "shao zhao" was not damaged. In Qianlong Dynasty rubbings, the characters "wei Jing" in the seventh line were not damaged, and the first dot in the fourth line's "wei shen" was not worn away. The current printing uses the rubbing where "wei Jing" is intact to delight readers. In book reviews, the character above the asterisk is a "sun" () under a "child" ().