Chapter 4 Section 3 The Expansion of Woodblock Printing in the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms

From 907 to 960 A.D., the Houliang, Houtang, Houjin, Houhan, and Houwu dynasties successively appeared in the Yellow River Basin; at the same time, 10 separatist regimes were established successively in various places in the south and Shanxi in the north. Ten Kingdoms". The Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms was a turbulent period in the history of our country, but woodblock printing was expanding day by day. Kaifeng, Chengdu, and Hangzhou are the most famous locations for engraving books. Kaifeng was the capital of the Liang, Jin, Han, and Zhou dynasties of the Five Dynasties. There was a Guozijian in the capital, and the famous "Jianben Nine Classics" was completed here.

In 932 AD, Feng Dao, Prime Minister of the Later Tang Dynasty, first advocated the engraving of Confucian classics.It is said that he saw the engraved books in Wu and Shu areas at that time. Although there were many types, most of them were calendars used by ordinary people, some popular books and Buddhist scriptures, but there were no Confucian classics.So he wrote to the emperor, asking for a printing plate to be printed according to the text of the stone scriptures.After obtaining the approval of the emperor, Tian Min, a great Confucian at that time, and others called together the "doctoral Confucian disciples" of Guozijian (the university at that time) to follow the scriptures of the best official model "Tang Shi Jing" at that time, and take one of the annotated versions of scriptures that have been in use since the Six Dynasties. Annotation, combined into a scripture with both scriptures and annotations, and then carefully read and proofread by more than six or seven experts and scholars, and then invited calligraphers to write it in regular script, and then organized craftsmen to engrave and print it.In this way, from 932 to 953 AD, it took 22 years to complete the construction.At the same time, two auxiliary works, "Five Classics" and "Nine Classics", were also engraved, totaling 130 volumes. This was the beginning of large-scale engraving of books by the government.Two years after the "Nine Classics" were engraved, that is, in 955 AD, Tian Min was ordered to engrave the book "Classic Interpretation" on explaining the pronunciation and meaning of the scriptures.The "Nine Classics" engraved this time, because they were printed by Guozijian, were later called "Five Dynasties Jianben Nine Classics". Since then, the term "Jianben" has appeared in edition studies. The advent of the "Jianben Nine Classics" made the ancient scriptures have a unified standard version, which was allowed to be sold publicly at that time, which made "the 'Nine Classics' spread widely", thus playing a certain positive role in the popularization of culture.However, the "Jianben" at that time and later in the Song Dynasty had different praises and praises.The modern scholar Wang Guowei (1877-1927 A.D.) gave a relatively fair evaluation of the "Jianben" in his book "The Test of the Five Dynasties". The text began to have a finalized version; since the Five Dynasties Supervisor’s Edition was published, the annotations began to have a finalized version. Although the text is not without errors, it is inherently better than the folk version. There is nothing wrong with it." It can be seen that the engraving of "Jianben Nine Classics" is a contribution to history.At the same time, since then, book engraving is no longer a matter of folk bookstores or monks and priests, but has become the publishing business of the governments of all dynasties, which has greatly promoted the development of the printing industry in later generations.

Due to the government's advocacy of the printing industry, privately engraved books by scholar-bureaucrats also increased.Private engraved books are known as "family engraved editions".Chengdu, the capital of the Shu Kingdom, was an advanced area for engraving books in the Tang Dynasty, and it was even more prosperous at this time.Because there has been no major war for more than 70 years from the end of Tang Dynasty to the beginning of Song Dynasty. Therefore, the economy is developed and the culture is prosperous. It provides favorable conditions for the development of the printing industry in this area.Wu Zhaoyi, the prime minister of Houshu at that time, was the pioneer of privately engraving a large number of books.According to historical records, when Wu Zhaoyi was young, he borrowed copies of the anthology of poetry and prose "Anthology" and the book "Beginners" from others, but they refused to lend him. Therefore, it is for the convenience of scholars all over the world." Later, he became the prime minister, so he had these two books and Bai Juyi's compilation "Bai Shi Liu Tie" printed, and his wish came true.He also paid his own money to set up a school, engraved the "Nine Classics", and engraved the Thirteen Classics of the "Houshu Stone Classic" (but not all of them were completed).Under his advocacy, the style of writing in Later Shu flourished.Wu Zhaoyi has indeed made great contributions to the development of culture and education in Shu.By the Song Dynasty, the books carved by Wu's family had been sold all over the country.Because of this, when Song Taizu destroyed Houshu, many people who were officials in Houshu were punished and their family properties were confiscated. Only the Wu family was lenient and ordered to return all the engraving plates to the Wu family.His descendants continued to engage in book engraving and became famous publishers in Chengdu successively.

In addition, Ren Zhixuan of the former Shu Dynasty saw the advantage of printing that "it does not bother to dye Han (dipping ink with a pen), and it can be used all over the world, so that everyone can recite it", so he paid for it himself from 909 to 913 AD. , hired workers in Chengdu to carve 30 volumes of "Tao Te Ching Guang Sheng Yi" written by Du Guangting, a famous Taoist priest and Taoist scholar, and carved more than 460 plates in five years, and printed them out to make them widely circulated.Also engraved in Chengdu is Tan Yu, a monk from the Kingdom of Shu.He collected 1,000 poems written by his master Chanyue master Guanxiu, and published them engraved and printed in 923 AD under the title "Zenyue Ji".These all reflect the development of Chengdu's printing industry during the Five Dynasties, thus laying the technical foundation for the prestigious "Shu Version" in the Song Dynasty.

Hangzhou, the capital of Wuyue Kingdom, also had a well-developed printing industry.King Qian Hongchu (Chu Chu) and monk Yanshou alone engraved a large number of Buddhist scriptures, Buddha statues, pagodas, and mantras. Among them, the number of printed volumes can be tested to more than 680,000 volumes, which is unprecedented.Moreover, the printing technology has reached a very high level. The printed paper is white, the ink color is uniform, the fonts are clear and pleasing to the eye, and the pictures are also very exquisite; there are also 20,000 pieces of Avalokitesvara printed on plain silk, which is also unprecedented. The prints printed on silk fabrics all reflect the high level of printing technology in Hangzhou.However, with such a large number of Buddhist printed materials, only a few scrolls and a small number of damaged Tatus are left today, and some of them have fallen into the United States, Britain, Sweden and other countries.In addition to one volume each in Zhejiang Library, Zhejiang Museum, and Changzhou Museum, there are also private collections.The volume of "Baoqiyin Dharani Sutra" collected in Changzhou is the best preserved. The front part of the scripture is engraved with the picture of "Feng Cai Yuan Shuo", and the back part is scriptures. There are 269 lines, each line has 10 characters, and a total of 2675 characters .The font is elegant, the ink color is clear, the pictures and texts are abundant, and the printing is excellent.This volume of precious cultural relics was donated in 1985 by Qu Fengqi, the fifth-generation descendant of Tieqin Tongjian Building, one of the four major libraries in the Qing Dynasty.

During the Five Dynasties, He Ning, a famous poet, was an official in various dynasties of the Five Dynasties, and has always achieved the high position of prime minister.He is fond of learning, quick-witted, good at short songs and erotic songs, and pays more attention to reputation. For this reason, he published 100 volumes of his anthology in his hometown of Shandong, and distributed them to friends. His works spread to Kaifeng and Luoyang.He Ning was the first writer to publish his own works, and since then the trend of printing private anthologies has become popular. In the later Jin Dynasty, Shi Jingtang ordered Taoist priest Zhang Jianming to engrave Laozi, which was the preface written by He Ning, and it was crowned at the beginning of the volume, so that it could be issued to the world.

There is also Jinling (now Nanjing), the capital of the Southern Tang Dynasty, which once engraved the monograph "Shi Tong" on historical theory written by Liu Zhiji, a famous historical critic of the Tang Dynasty;In addition, Dunhuang in the northwest and Fuzhou in the southeast also published books. Dunhuang is located in the remote Hexi area. Cao Yuanzhong, the Jiedu envoy of the Guiyi Army stationed in Dunhuang at that time, asked craftsmen to engrave and print various Bodhisattva statues and great sages in the leaflets in the 1040s and 50s. The statue of the Shamentian King (the guardian god in Buddhism, one of the four heavenly kings or commonly known as the Four Vajras) and books such as "Diamond Sutra", "Qie Yun" and "Tang Yun".Among them, the statue of King Bishamon has a compact structure, a prominent center, and the lines depicted are strong but not rigid, bold but not rough, simple but not vulgar, which fully demonstrates the level of woodblock printing technology in this period.In the inscription of the statue, there is engraved the wish of "Jiedu Envoy of Guiyi Army... Cao Yuanzhong asked craftsmen to carve this printing plate. "The Statue of the Great Merciful and Greatly Compassionate Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva" and "Diamond Sutra" are not only printed with Cao Yuanzhong's name, but also printed with the name of Lei Yanmei, the time worker at that time. This is the earliest recorded book engraver in the history of our country.These kinds of Buddha statues and Buddhist scriptures are the precious printed materials of the Five Dynasties period that have been handed down so far.It is a pity that most of these prints were later stolen by Stein and Pelliot, and they were hidden in the British Museum in London and the National Library of France respectively.At present, the only Dunhuang printed matter of the Five Dynasties period in China is the "Statue of the Great Sage Manjushri (meaning auspicious) Bodhisattva" (Figure 3), which is now in the Beijing Library.This single print depicts the story of Manjusri Bodhisattva riding a lion, riding a cloud, and saving all living beings.The Bodhisattva holds Ruyi in his hand, sits firmly on the back of a lion, with a kind face.The Buddha's light is lingering behind him.On both sides of the Buddha statue, there is an inscription on the left "The Great Sage Manjusri Bodhisattva", and on the right an inscription "Pursuing the Aspirations to Support and Support".Below the image is the inscription, and the above image is below. The structure is rigorous, the style is concise, and the knife technique is clear. It is a very simple printed matter.

Fuzhou is located on the southeast coast. Wang Shenzhi, the king of Fujian at that time, attached great importance to cultural education. His Minister Xu Yin's "Life Geometry Fu" was engraved and sold by booksellers, so he wrote "Clumsy Fu Partially" The poem "Wearing and Printing and Selling" shows that there were already bookstores making a living by engraving and selling books in Fuzhou at that time. With the development of the book engraving industry, it is easier to collect books than before, so private and national book collections have also increased.According to records: Zhao Kuangning, the Jiedu envoy of the Later Liang Dynasty, was "very good at learning, and has a collection of thousands of volumes".Later Tang Dynasty general Wangdu "Hao Nang Books" has a collection of 30,000 volumes in his home.In the later Zhou Dynasty, Zhang Zhao accumulated tens of thousands of volumes and built a library.Sun Guangxian, a scholar in Jingnan Kingdom, was studious and tireless. He was well versed in classics and history, and his family had thousands of volumes of books.The three monarchs of the Southern Tang Dynasty, Li Min (bianbian), Li Jing, and Li Yu, all bought books and set up education, "thousands of books in the palace".The sons and grandchildren of Qian Liu (Liu Liu), the ruler of the Wuyue Kingdom, believed in Confucianism and liked to collect books.Therefore, it is said in history that "the prosperity of the collection of books in the south of the Yangtze River is the highest in the world".During this period, thousands of volumes of books appeared, which was very rare in the period of turmoil. It reflects the development of the book engraving industry in the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms from one aspect.

In short, the book engraving business of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms occupies a position of linking the past and the future in the history of printing: First, the three major systems of woodblock printing—official engraving, family engraving, and workshop engraving—began to take shape.Second, the places where the books were engraved spread all over the country, especially those relatively stable areas at that time.Third, it is clarified that engraving and printing books are completed in two processes: writing and engraving, which greatly improves the quality of printed books. Therefore, it has been followed by public and private engraving and printing books in the future.Fourth, the technology and printing facilities of the old engraving workers in Shu and Wuyue laid the foundation for the development of the printing industry in Chengdu and Hangzhou during the Northern Song Dynasty.Therefore, although the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms was a period of frequent wars, the engraving and printing industry was in a position of carrying forward the past and ushering in the future.It is a pity that there are very few printed copies of the Five Dynasties handed down to this day, and the only few are fragments, and some have been lost abroad.

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Notes: , "Book of Books", "Zhou Li", "Yi Li", "Chunqiu Zuo Shi Zhuan", "Gongyang Biography", "Gu Liang Biography", "Xiao Jing", "Erya".