Imperially Commissioned Records of the Eight Banners Set

Author: Jilin Literature and History Press
Publisher:
Publishing Date: December 1, 2002
Features: The Eight Banner system was the fundamental social system of the Qing Dynasty, unprecedented in previous dynasties and absent in later ones. The Qing Dynasty highly valued the Eight Banner system and compiled two editions of The Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners, distinguishing the former as The Preliminary Collection of the Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners and the latter as The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners. These two works are detailed, systematic, comprehensive, and complete, serving as indispensable precious materials for researching the Qing Dynasty's banners, politics, economy, military, culture, society, folklore, clans, institutions, education, and religion. They are also classic works for researchers. The former was published by Northeast Normal University Press in 1985, while the latter, a Qing Dynasty edition, has a limited print run, numerous volumes, lacks punctuation, and lacks an index, making it inconvenient for readers to borrow and difficult to search, causing significant frustration. Jilin Literature and History Press has recently published a collated edition of The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners, which has garnered attention from academia and praise from scholars.
The Eight Banner system was established by Nurhaci, the founder of the Qing Dynasty, in 1601 on the basis of the Jurchen hunting organizations. Initially, there were four banners; by 1605, they were divided into eight, establishing the military and political unified Eight Banner Manchu system. Later, the Eight Banner Mongol and Eight Banner Han Army systems were developed, forming a complete and important social system of the Qing Dynasty. The rise of the banners corresponded to the rise of the Qing Dynasty, and the decline of the banners corresponded to its decline. The Eight Banner system played an extremely important role in the history of the Qing Dynasty and the development of the Manchu nation. Without understanding the Eight Banner system, one cannot fully understand the history of the Qing Dynasty or Manchu studies. In-depth research on the Eight Banner system is a major topic in the study of Qing history and Manchu studies.
The Preliminary Collection of the Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners was compiled by imperial decree in 1727 and edited by O rteyl and others, published in 1739, comprising 254 volumes. Its records span from the rise of the Manchu to the 13th year of the Yongzheng reign. The Preliminary Collection organizes its content around the Eight Banner military system as the backbone, with the Eight Banner laws, officials, and figures as the threads, divided into four sections: prefaces, records, tables, and biographies. The records are divided into eight sections: banner divisions, land ownership, construction, military system, officials, schools, rituals, and literature. The tables are divided into eight sections: titles, hereditary positions, Eight Banner officials, the Imperial Clan Court, the Grand Council, ministerial officials, provincial officials, and elections. The biographies are divided into eight sections: imperial clan princes, famous officials, meritorious officials, loyal and righteous officials, honest officials, scholars, filial and righteous officials, and women of virtue. The records, tables, and biographies are interconnected yet distinct in style. The records link events to history, the tables link years to people, and the biographies link people to events, each with its own focus, complementing one another. However, there are shortcomings: some entries are inconsistent in content despite being the same in title, and some follow the same format but do not align with historical facts. The literature record includes imperial decrees and ministerial memorials but omits the works of banner people, deviating from traditional conventions and misrepresenting the reality. The Preliminary Collection was used to write the preface for The Complete Collection of the Four Treasuries, but the book itself was included in The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners. This is because when Ji Yun and others compiled The Suiyue of the Four Treasuries, the former book was already completed, while the latter was not. By the time the Complete Collection of the Four Treasuries was compiled, the latter was already finished and included, arranged on shelves according to the catalog, resulting in the phenomenon where the preface to The Suiyue appears before the book in the Complete Collection.
The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners was compiled by imperial decree in 1756 and edited by Ji Yun and others, completed during the Jiaqing era. This book is actually divided into 12 volumes of imperial poems and prose, 120 volumes of records, 149 volumes of biographies, 69 volumes of tables, 4 volumes of other materials, and 2 volumes of indices, totaling 356 volumes, "establishing the laws of one generation and passing them down as eternal regulations." Earlier, in 1792, an imperial decree ordered the compilation of The Complete Collection of the Four Treasuries, and the Preliminary Collection was revised. In 1756, Emperor Qianlong reviewed the revised Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners submitted by the Four Treasuries Office and found it had serious omissions: names of people, places, and officials in Manchu were recorded without Han characters, making it difficult for later generations to understand at a glance; the office staff made careless errors, and the revision was insufficient—"this is copying history, not editing it." Emperor Qianlong rejected the submission and instructed, "Let it be handed over to the Military Affairs Office to work together with the chief editors of the office to revise it." Thus, the Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners began to be revised, and by the end of the Qianlong era, it was largely completed. During this process, Emperor Qianlong repeatedly reviewed it, the office staff repeatedly checked and revised, continuously editing, replacing, supplementing, and transcribing until it was completed during the Jiaqing era and included in the Complete Collection of the Four Treasuries. The records span from the rise of the Manchu and the establishment of the Eight Banner system to the 60th year of the Qianlong reign. The relationship between the two books is that The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners was compiled based on The Preliminary Collection, sharing similarities yet differing in certain aspects. The similarities include the same upper time limit and similar compilation methods. The differences lie in the lower time limit, content structure, selection of materials, and scope. The latter book adds 102 volumes compared to the former, with an additional 2 million words, totaling over 6 million words. It particularly supplements the history of the Eight Banners during the 60th year of the Qianlong reign. However, the former book was compiled first and laid the foundation, while the latter continued the revision, compiling the most extensive collection of materials. Therefore, the latter is not a continuation of the former.
The sources of historical materials for both books, as observed by the collators, include the Veritable Records of the Six Dynasties, the Kangxi Imperial Examination Regulations, historical records of the Six Censors, imperial writings, the Comprehensive Records of Shengjing, the Imperial Decrees to the Eight Banners, banner registers, and the Imperial Examination Regulations. It also extracts a large amount of Eight Banner archives and local documents. The main sources for the records are original archives from the Imperial Clan Court, the Six Ministries, the Imperial Academy, and incoming documents from Eight Banner generals, commanders, and provincial and county offices, as well as imperial decrees, imperial edicts, memorials, and literary works. The main sources for the tables are genealogical records, title registers, imperial decrees, decrees for hereditary positions, and registers of local meritorious officials. The main sources for the biographies are historical biographies, veritable records, historical books, and registers from each banner, as well as registers of honored women. Most of these archives and documents are now lost, and their preservation in The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners makes their historical value even more precious.
It is evident that The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners is not only a history of the Eight Banners compiled by the Qing people but also a collection of historical materials about the Eight Banners. This makes it extremely valuable for researching the history of the Qing Dynasty, Manchu studies, and particularly the history of the Eight Banner system. The literary and academic value of the collated edition of The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners can be summarized in four points, with brief comments.
In 1986, the Taiwan Student Book Company published photocopied editions of The Preliminary Collection of the Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners and The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners. Northeast Normal University Press published a collated edition of The Preliminary Collection of the Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners in 1985. However, regarding The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners, upon investigation, it was found that the manuscript copy is incomplete, the palace edition is rare and valuable, and the Complete Collection of the Four Treasuries edition is difficult to obtain. Readers urgently desire a collated edition of The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners. The scarcity of research on the Eight Banners is closely related to the difficulty of accessing The Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners.
Recently, the country has begun compiling a large-scale History of the Qing Dynasty, and Manchu studies have become an international discipline, making Eight Banner research increasingly prominent. The publication of a collated edition of The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners after two hundred years is timely and meets the needs of the time. This academic work holds even greater significance. The main tasks of collating The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners include segmenting, punctuating, annotating, and indexing. Segmentation facilitates reading. Punctuation, while seemingly easy, is actually difficult. Punctuating ancient texts can be challenging to interpret. The Qing scholar Yao Nai once said, "The use of circles and dots in books can inspire understanding more than explanations." Collating ancient texts requires deep expertise and careful attitude; without them, errors in identification and arbitrary interpretations can mislead readers. As Lu Xun said, "Punctuation often makes famous scholars look foolish." The punctuation in this book is even more challenging due to the translation of Manchu, Mongolian, and Han names, places, titles, offices, and honorary titles. Therefore, the punctuation is done with great caution, striving to avoid breaking sentences incorrectly and demonstrating the collators' and editors' rigorous attitude.
Second, meticulous collation and printing, with extreme care and attention to detail. The annotations in this book reflect the collators' expertise. The collation is based on the Jiaqing era Wuying Palace edition as the base text and the Wenyuan Pavilion edition of the Complete Collection of the Four Treasuries as the reference. It cross-references the Veritable Records of the Qing Dynasty, the Imperial Examination Regulations of the Qing Dynasty, the Preliminary Collection of the Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners, as well as other documents and archives, while also incorporating previous research findings. The collators established the principle of "three diligence—diligent thinking, diligent checking, and diligent inquiry"—and "careful revision—corrections, errors, repetitions, and omissions identified must be verified and documented in annotations." This collation work ensures that missing lines, sections, inverted word orders, and errors, repetitions, and omissions are supplemented, corrected, and documented, with annotations added below the collated sections, lines, and words, numbered sequentially, and notes placed at the end of each volume. For variant characters such as (FDA2), such as (FDA3), such asB050 (), and such as (B15F), the original characters are retained without changes. As for characters with multiple meanings in the simplified character list, such asCACA (, pronounced Di), (pronounced Zhu), and (pronounced Xie), they are "separated and restored in the reference text." According to my statistics, The Preliminary Collection has only 164 annotations. The collation of The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners is more extensive, finer, broader, and more precise. My statistics show that the book includes 401 annotations in total, with 25 annotations in volume 285, 24 in volume 283, and 22 in volume 284. Examples of corrections include: "Hui people's camp" mistakenly written as "Hui people's labor," "injustice" mistakenly written as "injustice," "Mandahai" mistakenly written as "Haidahai," "attendant" mistakenly written as "attendant," "imperial decree" mistakenly written as "E222 said," and "Qianlong" mistakenly written as "Qianqian," as well as "General Zilu of the Ming Dynasty surrendered Jinzhou" with "Jinzhou" mistakenly written as "Jiangzhou," all of which have been corrected and annotated.
The collated edition of The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners is beautifully printed and bound, thick and elegant.
Third, records and biographies with indexes, benefiting scholars. In The Preliminary Collection, there are 122 volumes of biographies, including 3,977 Manchu, Mongol, and Han Banner people and 3,308 women of virtue, totaling 7,285 people. In The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners, there are 149 volumes of biographies, including 3,409 Manchu, Mongol, and Han Banner people and 15,997 women of virtue, totaling 19,406 people. The two books together include 7,386 Manchu, Mongol, and Han Banner people and 19,305 women of virtue, totaling 26,691 people. The scope and number of people included in The Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners surpass those in The Historical Biographies of the Qing Dynasty, The Draft History of the Qing Dynasty, The National History of the Qing Dynasty, The Collection of Inscriptions and Biographies, and The Compilation of Renowned Figures of the Current Dynasty. In a sense, The Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners is also a biographical collection of the Eight Banner people. However, the biographies in the records or tables are scattered across volumes, making it very difficult to trace and retrieve. Even the Index of Thirty-Three Comprehensive Biographies of the Qing Dynasty does not include the biographies of The Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners. This book compiles and indexes the 7,386 people (excluding women of virtue) from the main and supplementary biographies of The Preliminary Collection and The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners. It is divided into two parts: the first part is Index of Biographies in The Preliminary Collection of the Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners, and the second part is Index of Biographies in The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners. Each part includes a character stroke index and a Pinyin index. Below each biography, the name, surname, banner division are listed, along with the volume and page numbers of the collated edition and the volume and leaf numbers of the original base text. Notes are added for ambiguities. It is very convenient to use. This alone is a monumental achievement.
Fourth, selecting versions and repeatedly checking. To rescue national classics and meet the needs of academia, the Institute of Ancient Texts at Northeast Normal University organized efforts to collate and edit The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners. Selecting the correct version is crucial for collating ancient texts. The photocopied edition of The Preliminary Collection published by the Taiwan Student Book Company is based on microfilm from the University of Washington, but due to missing film strips, blank pages appear. The collated edition of The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners uses the Jiaqing era Wuying Palace edition as the base text and the Complete Collection of the Four Treasuries edition as the reference, making the selection of versions even more appropriate. If The Preliminary Collection is a compendium of materials on the Eight Banner system, then The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners is a specialized history and record of the Eight Banner system, as well as a more credible collection of Eight Banner materials, with high literary and academic value. The collation work of this book was led by Mr. Li Xun and Mr. Zhao Degui, with over 50 people involved. They maintained a rigorous attitude and serious academic standards: "not to shame the ancestors and not to harm future generations." The collation work began in 1986. The work was divided into two phases: the first phase lasted five years to complete the collation; the second phase was five years of traditional vertical printing in traditional characters; the third phase involved six years of twists and turns; and the final phase was re-collation, finalization, and publication. During this period, the research team members and publishing house editors proofread the clear copies separately, with a total of 12 rounds (including proofreading the red copy). Only the two main collators compared the base text and reference text for three volumes. The collated edition of The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners has gone through many hardships and has finally been published. The collation and publication of The Imperially Prescribed Comprehensive Records of the Eight Banners spanned 17 years, with a sincere spirit that deeply moved people. Meticulously collated, annotated, printed, and bound, it stands out in the literary world and benefits scholars.