Yangzhou Tujing

Author: Jiao Xun, Jiang Fan
Country: Mainland China
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 1998-12-01
Features: The Yangzhou Atlas (Yangzhou Tujing) is a local document compiled by Jiao Xun and Jiang Fan during the Qianlong era of the Qing Dynasty. It gathers various records about Yangzhou from numerous sources. The purpose was to use the region of Yangzhou as the latitude and time as the longitude, outlining everything that had occurred in Yangzhou over the millennia. The original manuscript was titled The Yangzhou Prefecture Atlas and is preserved in the Beijing Library. The Yangzhou Guangling Ancient Books Publishing House printed it and changed its name to the current one.
Jiao Xun, styled Litan and Lichang, was from Ganquan, Jiangsu (now Yangzhou). The Jiao family had long been known for its expertise in the Book of Changes (I Ching). From a young age, he was renowned for his profound understanding of the Book of Changes. In the sixth year of the Qianlong era, he passed the provincial examination and was equally famous with Ruan Yuan. When Ruan served as the provincial inspector of Shandong and Zhejiang, he invited Jiao to travel with him. Later, Jiao failed the imperial examination and withdrew from urban life for many years due to a supposed foot ailment, constructing a tower named Diao Gu Lou by the lake to study and write. He was knowledgeable and had studied extensively in fields such as classics, history, mathematics, phonology, and etymology. He opposed common misconceptions and valued local documents, authoring works like The Yangzhou Records and The Little Records of Beihu. He died in the twenty-fifth year of the Qianlong era at the age of fifty-eight.
Jiang Fan, styled Zisheng and styled Zhengtang, was also from Ganquan, Jiangsu (now Yangzhou), and was a Qing Dynasty Confucian scholar. He studied under Hu Dang and Jiang Sheng, mastering numerous classics and being well-versed in historical matters. He wrote extensively. When his hometown neighbor Ruan Yuan served as the provincial inspector of Guangdong, he invited Jiang to oversee the compilation of The Guangdong General Gazette. Jiang Fan died in the eleventh year of the Daoguang era at the age of seventy-one.
Ancient Yangzhou was a major metropolis in the Huainan region and was known as the "Southeastern Hidden Gem." The preface to the Yangzhou Prefecture Gazette of the fifteenth year of the Qianlong era states: "In terms of geography, it embraces the Huai and Si rivers, controls the Wu and Yue regions, and stands as a great town eastward from Jingxiang. The tribute boats sent to the capital each year must pass through here. Its strategic advantages bring great benefits to the state, and its revenue depends on it. As for its cultural prosperity, history is full of records." Since the Han and Tang dynasties, Yangzhou has gradually become the political, economic, and cultural center of the Jianghuai region. Local documents about Yangzhou's customs and culture have also been renowned throughout the ages. Excluding the records in The Tribute of Yu, in the Eastern Han Dynasty, Wang Yi wrote The Record of Guangling Prefecture Park. In the Sui Dynasty, there was The Jiangdu Atlas. In the Tang Dynasty, Cao Xian, a Wenxuan scholar, compiled The Yangzhou Gazette. In the Southern Song Dynasty, Zheng Xingyi edited and Cao Shaowei and Yao Yiqian compiled The Guangling Gazette. Although these books are now lost, their contents have been scattered in later works and have had a significant impact on posterity.
From the Ming and Qing dynasties onward, it was a golden age for the compilation of Yangzhou local documents, in addition to the revision and continuation of official gazettes. The number of private compilations was also substantial. Despite destruction by war, some notable works remain, such as Yao Wendi's The Little Records of Guangling, Cui Yan's The Yangzhou Military Gazette and Chen Shuzu's compilation, Wang Zhong's The General Gazette of Guangling, Li Dou's The Yangzhou Boat Record, Jiao Xun's The Yangzhou Records, as well as works like The Little Records of Xishan in Yangzhou, The Antiquities of Guangling, and The Little Records of Beihu.
The Yangzhou Atlas is one of the earlier private works. The materials it collects, in addition to official histories, include unofficial histories, notes, novels, annotations, and inscriptions on stone tablets. In terms of data, it can be said to be relatively rich and accurate. Its content covers politics, military affairs, economy, culture, natural disasters, geographical changes, and nearly everything else. Although the books it cites are mostly well-known, it gathers all the materials into one place, serving as research material for the ancient city of Yangzhou and saving researchers the effort of searching. This has certain value.
The collation of The Yangzhou Park Atlas used the woodblock print edition by the Yangzhou Guangling Ancient Books Publishing House as the working text and the Qianlong edition as the reference. It was annotated and proofread. Due to the manuscript nature of the original and the inadequacy of the printers' checks, errors and variations were occasionally found. In this collation, for any cited text in the book that could be cross-checked with the original source, the original source was used for verification. For example, in the first volume, under the entry "Jiaoxi King Seal," checking The Records of the Han Dynasty (Emperor Jing's reign), The Biography of Jing and Yan (Jing Yan Wu Chuan), and The Table of the Kings of the Princes (Shuhou Wang Biao), all referred to it as "Jiaoxi King Seal," so the character "seal" (yin) was corrected to "seal" (yin). Similarly, in the first volume, under the entry "Jin Left Vice Marshal Zong Wei,"