The Han River as the Central Axis and the Predominance of Water: Questioning the Claim of “No Chu-Related Traits” in the View of Terrestrial Space in the Rong Cheng Shi Manuscript (Fourth Century B.C.E) (2021)
Dorofeeva-Lichtmann, Vera V. (Author)
Early China: The Annual Journal of the Society for the Study of Early China
Volume: 44
Pages: 143-235
The description of the “Nine Provinces” (Jiu zhou 九州) found in the Rong Cheng shi 容成氏 (Mister Rong Cheng?, late fourth century b.c.e.) manuscript from the Shanghai Museum Bamboo Slips Collection (Shangbo cangjian 上博藏簡) is the only manuscript version of it known to date. Its discovery immediately raised the question of its relation to the cluster of descriptions on the “Nine Provinces” transmitted from the late Warring States to the early Western Han periods. There is general consensus that the manuscript description of the “Nine Provinces” has close affinity with the transmitted descriptions, as well as with a wide spectrum of transmitted early Chinese texts in general. It is distinguished by the eclectic combining of known spatial concepts, rather than manifesting any radically new or specifically Chu traits. In this study I reassess this impression with respect to the reference to the Han River in the manuscript, which up to now has been noted only in passing as an unsolved puzzle. I argue that the Han River is referred to here as the central axis that divides terrestrial space into southern and northern halves, something that implies a shifting of the mapped area to the South and thus conveys a Chu view of space. Together with philological analysis of the descriptions of terrestrial space, I apply an innovative method of investigation of these descriptions through landmarks, using as a visual aid traditional Chinese historical maps. In addition, I explore the predominance of waters as the distinguishing feature of the representation of terrestrial space in the Rong Cheng shi manuscript and demonstrate its difference from the structuring of terrestrial space proceeding from mountains to waterways to be seen in the majority of transmitted early Chinese texts. , 提要 上海博物館藏戰國楚竹書（簡稱上博藏簡）藏品中，《容成氏》（容成先生？西元前四世紀晚期）簡牘所載之「九州」為目前唯一已知的簡牘版本。此簡牘公布後，針對此簡牘與戰國晚期至西漢早期間九州記載的關聯性，隨即引起論戰。學者普遍認為，此簡牘所描述之「九州」，與一般廣泛流傳於中國古代文獻的描述有密切關係；其特點在於兼容已知的空間概念，而非呈現新的或特別具有楚特徵的空間觀。本研究重新討論漢水在簡牘中作為參照的既有論述。目前為止，此議題僅被視為是一個尚未解決之難題。我認為漢水在此簡牘中被視為空間軸心，且將地理空間分為南、北兩半。此意味著製圖區域轉向「南方」，從而傳達了楚的空間觀念。我結合對地理空間描述的語言學分析，採用一種新的研究方法探究簡牘中的地標，並將其視為傳統中國歷史地圖中的視覺輔助圖像。此外，作為《容成氏》地理空間呈現之顯著特徵，我探討水域的重要地位；並論證其不同於大多數流傳的中國古代文獻裡所述之從山脈至水路的地理空間結構。
...MoreSimilar Citations
Book
Ao Wang;
(2018)
Spatial Imaginaries in Mid-Tang China: Geography, Cartography, and Literature
(/isis/citation/CBB875745228/)
Book
Wang, Haicheng;
(2014)
Writing and the Ancient State: Early China in Comparative Perspective
(/isis/citation/CBB001422620/)
Book
Tianren Lin;
(2015)
Reading Antique Cartography: Historical Chinese Maps in the British Library
(/isis/citation/CBB221058459/)
Book
Edoardo Boria;
(2021)
The graphic representation of Political Space. How cartography shapes our world views and why Geopolitics should care about it
(/isis/citation/CBB533529848/)
Article
Schäfer, Wolf;
(2005)
Ptolemy's Revenge: A Critique of Historical Cartography
(/isis/citation/CBB000640014/)
Book
Short, John Rennie;
(2004)
Making Space: Revisioning the World, 1475-1600
(/isis/citation/CBB000470163/)
Book
Thomás A. S. Haddad;
(2019)
Maps of the Moon: Lunar Cartography from the Seventeenth Century to the Space Age
(/isis/citation/CBB368554973/)
Book
Klein, Bernard;
(2001)
Maps and the Writing of Space in Early Modern England and Ireland
(/isis/citation/CBB000102236/)
Chapter
Solomone, Stacey;
(2013)
Space for the People: China's Aerospace Industry and the Cultural Revolution
(/isis/citation/CBB001320723/)
Book
Monika Wegmann;
(2016)
Language in Space: The Cartographic Representation of Dialects
(/isis/citation/CBB780577388/)
Book
Angelo Cattaneo;
Francisco Contente Domingues;
(2018)
Shores of Vespucci: A Historical Research of Amerigo Vespucci's Life and Contexts
(/isis/citation/CBB640429234/)
Article
Dunlop, Catherine T.;
(2013)
Mapping a New Kind of European Boundary: The Language Border between Modern France and Germany
(/isis/citation/CBB001320353/)
Thesis
Ashley Elizabeth Bashaw;
(2015)
Mapping the Vagina: Nineteenth-Century Narratives of Scientific Specularity
(/isis/citation/CBB115536099/)
Article
Romero, Gustavo E.;
(2012)
Parmenides Reloaded
(/isis/citation/CBB001252709/)
Book
Frederik A. Bakker;
Delphine Bellis;
Carla Rita Palmerino;
(2019)
Space, Imagination and the Cosmos from Antiquity to the Early Modern Period
(/isis/citation/CBB272577420/)
Article
Miura, Hirofumi;
(2002)
The Concept of Time and Space in Indian Realism---On kāla, ākāśa and diś in Praśastapādabhaṣya
(/isis/citation/CBB000630950/)
Article
Reynolds, Joshua J.;
(2008)
How Is the Third Kind in Plato's Timaeus a Receptacle?
(/isis/citation/CBB001211434/)
Article
Sattler, Barbara;
(2012)
A Likely Account of Necessity: Plato's Receptacle as a Physical and Metaphysical Foundation for Space
(/isis/citation/CBB001210529/)
Book
De Risi, Vincenzo;
(2015)
Mathematizing Space: The Objects of Geometry from Antiquity to the Early Modern Age
(/isis/citation/CBB843280666/)
Article
Larson, Thomas R.;
(2003)
Aristotle's Understanding of Place
(/isis/citation/CBB000641076/)
Be the first to comment!