Eminent Chinese of the Ch'ing Period/Chang Hai-p'êng

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3633266Eminent Chinese of the Ch'ing Period, Volume 1 — Chang Hai-p'êngHiromu Momose

CHANG Hai-p'êng 張海鵬 (T. 若雲, H. 子瑜, 照曠主人), Mar. 28, 1755–1816, Aug. 3, bibliophile and editor, was a native of Ch'ang-shu, Kiangsu. His family is said to have been descended from a younger brother of Chang Chiu-ling 張九齡 (T. 子壽, 678–740), a learned scholar as well as an upright official of the T'ang dynasty. His father, Chang Jên-chi 張仁濟 (T. 敬堂, H. 訥齋, 1717–1791), owned the library named Chao-k'uang ko 照曠閣 which had numerous Sung and Yüan editions. Chang Hai-p'êng became a licentiate at twenty-one sui, but failing three times to pass the provincial examination, he abandoned the idea of obtaining an official position. Following the traditions of other famous bibliophiles of his native place, he devoted himself to collecting rare editions and manuscripts, which he collated and printed. Among his friends interested in the same undertaking was Ho Yüan-hsi 何元錫 (T. 夢華,敬祉, H. 蜨隱, 1766–1829), a native of Hangchow, who was famous as a collector of inscriptions from stones. To him Chang Hai-p'êng was indebted for transcriptions of rare items from the Wên-lan ko Library (see under Chi Yün).

Chang Hai-p'êng distinguished himself as the editor and printer of the following three collectanea: (1) 學津討原 Hsüeh-ching t'ao-yüan, printed during the years 1802–04 and issued in 20 installments with prefaces dated 1805 and 1806, is a collection of more than 170 rare works from the Han to the Ming periods inclusive. It reprints many titles from the Chin-tai pi-shu by Mao Chin [q. v.], with additions. (2) 墨海金壺 Mo-hai chin-hu is a collection of more than 100 items written after the T'ang period, and is classified according to the four divisions of the Ssŭ-k'u ch'üan-shu (see under Chi Yün). Chang printed this ts'ung-shu during the years 1808–14, but it was not issued until 1817. Only about 100 copies were struck off at this time, and some of these were destroyed while still in the printing house; hence the actual number in circulation is even less. Later the partially ruined printing-blocks came into the possession of Ch'ien Hsi-tso 錢熙祚 (T. 鍚之,雪枝, d. 1844 age 44 sui), a native of Chin-shan, Kiangsu, who owned the celebrated library named Shou-shan ko (守山閣). Ch'ien incorporated about two-thirds of the items of the Mo-hai chin-hu into his two collectanea known as Shou shan ko ts'ung-shu and 珠叢別錄 Chu-ts'ung pieh-lu, both published about the year 1844. In the summer of 1860, when the Taiping army overran Chin-shan, the printing-blocks of the three last-mentioned collectanea were completely destroyed. (3) 借月山房彙鈔 Chieh-yüeh shan-fang hui-ch'ao, printed during the years 1807–10, and issued in 16 installments (Chang's preface being dated 1812), is a collection of 135 rare works by Ming and Ch'ing scholars. Later the printing-blocks for this work came into the possession of Ch'ên Huang 陳璜 of Shanghai, who edited and printed (1823) about 110 items of it in 12 installments, under the title 澤古齋重鈔 Tsê-ku chai ch'ung-ch'ao. Still later the latter ts'ung-shu was revised and supplemented by Ch'ien Hsi-tso, and after his death by his two sons. The result was a new collectanea, entitled 指海 Chih-hai, in 20 series, published during the years 1839–46. After the Taiping Rebellion, copies in circulation of the three above-mentioned collectanea, compiled and published by Chang, became very rare, but recently reproductions and reprints of them have appeared. Chang Hai-p'êng compiled yet another collectanea, entitled 金帚編 Chin-chou pien, but he died before he was able to publish it, and the manuscript draft is lost.

Another contribution to scholarship by Chang Hai-p'êng was the reprinting of the 太平御覽 T'ai-p'ing yü-lan, 1,000 chüan, a voluminous and authoritative encyclopaedia, completed early in 984 by Li Fang 李昉 (T. 明遠, 925–996), and others. Chang began to reprint it on the basis of a manuscript copy of the Ming period, which he had found in the Hsiao lang-hsüan fu-ti 小嫏嬛福地 Library owned by a distant relative, Chang Hsieh 張燮 (T. 子和, 1753–1808). But later he obtained a more reliable manuscript text, made by Ho Yüan-hsi from two other manuscript copies and from printed fragments of a Northern Sung edition. Portions of the latter are preserved in the Seikadô Library, Tokio. Chang published his collated edition in 1809. Later its printing-blocks were lost, and copies in circulation of this edition are very rare. A similar manuscript draft of the T'ai-p'ing yü-lan was owned by Juan Yüan [q. v.]. A scholar of Shê-hsien, Anhwei, named Pao Ch'ung-ch'êng 鮑崇城 printed the encyclopaedia in 1818—partly on the basis of Yüan's draft—and this edition was reprinted in 1892.

Behind Chang Hai-p'êng's monumental printed works were many local scholars who assisted him in collating the texts, chief among them being Chang Chin-wu and Sun Yüan-hsiang [qq.v.]. The following scholars deserve also to be mentioned in this connection: Chou Hsing-fang 周杏芳 (T. 乾一, H. 靄林, 1734–1805); Shao Ên-to 邵恩多 (T. 朗仙); Ch'ên Hsiang-jung 陳向榮 (T. 春巖, b. 1760); Chang To 張鐸 (T. 椒卿, H. 春廬, 1774–1822); Shêng Ta-shih 盛大士 (T. 子履, H. 逸雲, 蘭移外史, chü-jên of 1800); and Huang T'ing-chien 黃廷鑑 (T. 琴六, H. 拙經叟, 拙經居士, b. 1762, lived to be about 90 sui). Shêng Ta-shih left a literary collection entitled 蘊愫閣集 Yün-su ko chi, 12 chüan, printed in 1801—revised and reprinted in 10 chüan, in 1807. He was a painter as well as a scholar. Huang T'ing-chien wrote prolifically, though owing to poverty he was able to publish only a part of his works. He compiled the 琴川三志補記 Ch'in-ch'uan san-chih pu-chi, 10 + 8 chüan, printed in 1831 and reprinted in 1898—being a supplement to an ancient gazetteer of his native district, entitled Ch'in-ch'uan chih, which had been written in 1196 and supplemented in 1363 and 1426-36. He also compiled the 琴川黃氏三集 Ch'in-ch'uan Huang-shih san-chi, printed in 1840-41—a collection of literary works by members of the Huang family in his district. It includes certain prose works by himself, entitled 第六絃溪文鈔 Ti-liu hsien-hsi wên-ch'ao, 4 chüan; and his verse, entitled Ti-liu hsien-hsi shih-ch'ao (詩鈔), 2 chüan. The former was later reprinted in the Hou Chih-pu-tsu chai ts'ung-shu (see under Pao T'ing-po).

[Ti-liu hsien-hsi wên-ch'ao, 2/23a, 4/8a, 11a, 25a; 常昭合志稿 Ch'ang-Chao ho-chih kao (1904), chüan 27, 29–32; Yeh Ch'ang-ch'ih, Ts'ang-shu chi-shih shih (see under P'an Tsu-yin) chüan 6; preface to Index to T'ai P'ing Yü Lan—Harvard yenching Institute Sinological Index Series, no. 23 (1935).]

Hiromu Momose