Chapter 16 The second section "Kangxi Dictionary" - the finalization of ancient dictionaries
There is only one reference book named after "dictionary" in the entire Qing Dynasty. It is Xuanye [Ye Ye], the sage ancestor of the Qing Dynasty, who ordered Zhang Yushu and Chen Tingjing to compile it in the forty-ninth year of Kangxi (AD 1710). The "Kangxi Dictionary" completed in 1716 AD.
Features of "Kangxi Dictionary" "Kangxi Dictionary" has a total of 12 episodes from subsets to Haiji. Each episode is divided into upper, middle and lower volumes. Together with appendices, there are 42 volumes in total, containing 47,035 characters, which are listed under 214 radicals.At the beginning of the book are: "Letter Rhyme Essentials", "Guide to Equal Rhyme and Qieyin", "Checking Characters", "Distinguishing Similarities"; the appendices at the end of the book: "Addendum" and "Remarks".The radicals and the characters received in each department are arranged according to strokes, from less to more.Interpret the characters first with phonetic notation and then explain the meaning. The phonetic notation of each word is first listed, and then the ancient books are quoted first Annotate the original meaning, different sounds, different meanings, and ancient sounds layer by layer.There is a space between each sound and meaning item, and the word "you" is used to separate them.The ancient style is listed under the original characters; the heavy text, other styles, vulgar books, and false characters are added after the notes; the textual research is listed at the end of the notes, and the word "by" is added to show the difference.This style is basically modeled on "Zihui" and "Zhengzitong" with slight improvements.
Kangxi once criticized: ""Zihui" is too short and "Zihui" is too simplistic, and "Zhengzitong" is too overflowing." The complexity of "Zheng Zi Tong"" (see "Kangxi Dictionary Shangyu"). The form and content of "Kangxi Dictionary" are based on "Zihui" and "Zhengzitong" as blueprints.
First of all, the radicals of "Zihui" and "Zhengzitong" were mainly used, and the divisions of certain characters were adjusted, and the characters that were collected from different parts and found in the same part in the two books were merged, or the characters that originally belonged to a certain part were transferred into A more appropriate radical.
Secondly, simplify the repeated tedious sound training in "Zheng Zi Tong", and no longer annotate the sound and meaning of the words with the same sound and meaning, but only mark "Note to see a certain word"; , Differentiate the contract, and enrich the phonetic information.
Third, enrich and supplement the content that is briefly missing in the "Words".The explanation of the meaning of words is very detailed. In addition to citing the explanations of "Shuowen", "Yupian", "Guangyun" and other books, it also collects the explanations of other calligraphy books, as well as "Zi Jingshi Baizi, and Han, Jin and Tang Dynasties". Since the Song, Yuan and Ming Dynasties, poets and literati have stated that there are many evidences and evidences" ("Kangxi Dictionary · Imperial System Preface").At the same time, attention should also be paid to the collection of new meanings and loanwords.The documentary evidence listed is basically full of book titles and chapter titles, in chronological order, and the "Notes" and "Shu" quoted in the evidence and commentary are also the notes and Shu of the original book.Some words are also attached in the explanation to enrich the content of the explanation.
Fourth, "Kangxi Dictionary" contains 47,035 characters in the main text, which is 13,856 characters more than "Zihui". Together with "Addendum" and "Remarks", it has a total of 49,003 single characters, which is the dictionary with the most characters in ancient times.Most of the rare characters, odd characters, and characters that are not accepted in other ancient calligraphy books, rhyme books, and classics and history collections can be found there.
Fifth, correct the font errors and miscalculated strokes in the two books of "Zihui" and "Zhengzitong".
Sixth, the "Letter Qieyun Essentials" and "Equal Rhyme Qieyin Guide" listed at the beginning of the book are convenient for readers to understand Qieyin; , Identify strokes similar to sounds and meanings of other characters.The "Addendum" and "Remarks" are attached at the back of the book, which contain rare words whose sound and meaning are not found in the main collection, and uncommon words with sound but no meaning or no sound and meaning at all.
Seventh, since "Jade Pian" changed to regular script, ancient dictionaries no longer use seal script, and rarely append seal script. In the various versions of "Kangxi Dictionary" published later, all characters with small seal script are added with small seal script at the end of the book .
Deficiencies in "Kangxi Dictionary" Kangxi regarded "Kangxi Dictionary" as "a good and beautiful tool, which can be regarded as a classic but not easy", and named the book "Dictionary".In fact, "Kangxi Dictionary" has serious shortcomings and errors.Since the compilers of the "Dictionary" were not experts in philology, and because there were too many characters and a large space, it was too hasty to write the book in many hands, so there were countless mistakes in the book.The explanatory texts are either rigidly attached to ancient sayings, not precise enough, ignoring the current meaning, and do not mention the popular usage of later generations; or the explanations are too brief.Although there are many citations, there are many errors in the titles of the cited books and titles, or arbitrary changes, and neglect of research. There are many sentence breaks and typos in the quotations; book titles, personal names, and place names are misrepresented.It does not reflect the true level of linguistics and philology research in the Qing Dynasty.
"Kangxi Dictionary" is the emperor's "imperial order", and only praises are allowed, and criticism is not allowed.Especially in the 42nd year of Qianlong (AD 1777), Jiangxi Juren Wang Xihou compiled the book "Zi Guan", which corrected some mistakes in the "Kangxi Dictionary", and did not avoid the names of Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong. The whole family was copied and beheaded, and the governors of Liangjiang and Jiangxi were punished.After this bloody literary inquisition, scholars in the Qing Dynasty learned their lesson, and no one talked about "Kangxi Dictionary" any more.Until the eleventh year of Daoguang in the Qing Dynasty (AD 1831), Wang Yinzhi, a master of Confucian classics, was ordered by Daoguang to write 12 volumes of "Dictionary Research", and found 2588 mistakes in "Kangxi Dictionary". In fact, the mistakes in the book are far more than this.He wrote to Chen Huan and said: "In the current battle of proofreading and engraving the "Kangxi Dictionary", there are too many mistakes, which cannot be corrected, and can only be ignored by those who have gone too far." Volume 4) Later, Japanese Watanabe Wen wrote "Kangxi Dictionary Examination of Correctness and Mistakes", and found 4,700 errors.Mr. Wang Li corrected the wrong pronunciation of 5200 words in the book "Kangxi Dictionary Pronunciation Correction".So far, the "Kangxi Dictionary" has not been completely corrected, and the photocopied version is still the original one full of errors.
From what we see today, although the "Kangxi Dictionary" is full of errors, it contains many characters, and the characters are not found in general dictionaries, so it can be found out without losing its value.
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