The Grand Scribe's Records, Volume VII

The Memoirs of Pre-Han China

Ssu-ma Ch'ien, William H. Nienhauser, Jr.

• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Year: 2021
• eBook ISBN: 9780253049179
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Chinese History
• Index: History

This volume is part of the first complete translation (in nine volumes) of the Shih chi (The Grand Scribe's Records), one of the most important narratives in traditional China. Compiled by Ssu-ma Ch'ien (145-c. 86 B.C.), it draws upon most major early historical works and was the foremost model for style and genre in Chinese history and literature through the eleventh century A. D., and through the early twentieth century for some genres.

Volume 7, The Memoirs of Pre_Han China, translates twenty-eight Lieh-chuan or "memoirs" which depict more than a hundred men and women: sages and scholars, recluses and rhetoricians, persuaders and politicians, commandants and cutthroats of the Ch'in and earlier dynasties. Although the memoirs also begin with what is now often considered myth—an account of the renowned recluses Po Yi and Shu Ch'i—the emphasis in these texts is on the fate of various states and power centers as seen through the biographies of key individuals from the seventh to the third centuries B. C.

Table of contents

• Cover
• The Grand Scribe’s Records REVISED VOLUME VII The Memoirs of Pre-Han China
• Title
• Copyright
• CONTENTS
• Dedication
• Note on the Newly Revised Edition
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• On Using This Book
• A Note on Chronology
• Warring States Reign Periods
• Weights and Measures
• List of Abbreviations
• Po Yi, Memoir 1
• Kuan Chung and Yan Ying, Memoir 2
• Lao-tzu and Han Fei, Memoir 3
• Marshall Jang-chü, Memoir 4
• Sun-tzu and Wu-ch’i, Memoir 5
• Wu Tzu Hsü, Memoir 6
• Confucius’ Disciples, Memoir 7
• The Lord of Shang, Memoir 8
• Su Ch’in, Memoir, 9
• Chang Yi, Memoir 10
• Shu-lu Tzu and Kan Mao, Memoir 11
• The Marquis of Jang, Memoir 12
• Pai Ch’i and Wang Chien, Memoir 13
• Mencius and Excellency Hsün, Memoir 14
• The Lord of Meng-ch’ang, Memoir 15
• The Lord of P’ing-yüan and Excellency Yü, Memoir 16
• The Noble Scion of Wei, Memoir 17
• The Lord of Ch’un-shen, Memoir 18
• Fan Sui and Ts’ai Tse, Memoir 19
• Yüeh Yi, Memoir 20
• Lien P’o and Lin Hsiang-ju, Memoir 21
• T’ien Tan, Memoir 22
• Lu Chung Lien and Tsou Yang, Memoir 23
• Ch’ü Yüan and Scholar Chia, Memoir 24
• Lü Pu-wei, Memoir 25
• The Assassin-Retainers, Memoir 26
• Li Su, Memoir 27
• Meng T’ien, Memoir 28
• Bibliography
• Index