Riding the wind of rebirth

The book box is engraved with the four characters "Benyuan Jicang" in seal script. The exterior is coated with lacquer to make it waterproof and moisture-proof, while the interior retains the original wood texture to allow camphor oil to evaporate and repel insects. This is the original book box, which shows how meticulous the Yan family was in preserving their books.

Besides books, there are also many calligraphy copybooks, letters, manuscripts, maps, and so on.

“These are some of our museum’s most prized possessions.” Liu Yijie carefully took several wooden boxes from the bookshelf and said, “They are also important contributions made by Professor Yan to our country’s collection.”

After receiving the gloves from the accompanying staff, Zhou Zhi took the wooden box and saw that it still had a cover on it, titled "Song Edition of Huainan Honglie Jie".

When the wooden box was opened, there were twelve books inside. When the books were taken out, the cover was prominently printed with the words "Huainanzi Essentials, Volume 21" in large clerical script.

Zhou Zhi was greatly surprised. He carefully took out the book, opened a scroll, and found the title on the second line: "Recorded by Xu Shen, Grand Commandant and Chief Minister."

I quickly flipped to the end of the scroll, only to find that the title read "Huainan Honglie's Explanation of the Twenty-First Scroll".

Upon seeing the three characters "Huainanzi" within the single fishtail font in the manuscript, Zhou Zhi's heart pounded wildly: "This... Huainan Honglie's... Northern Song Dynasty... small-character edition?"

"You're quite the expert. Tell me your reasoning." Liu Yijie noticed his exceptional talent just by looking at the few key points that Zhou Zhi had just checked, and immediately felt a desire to test him.

"Regarding the Northern Song Dynasty version of Huainanzi, the famous minister Su Song served as the compiler of books at the Jixian Academy from the fourth to the sixth year of the Jiayou reign of Emperor Renzong of Song. During this period, he collated and edited Huainanzi and wrote a preface entitled 'Preface to the Collation of Huainanzi'. The preface states: 'However, these seven versions all have Gao's commentary, but the titles of the volumes are still different. Some say 'Xu Shen recorded above' under the 'Explanation of the Classics'... The differences are uneven and no longer reflect the style of the past.'"

"The Northern Song edition also has Gao's commentary. Except for volumes 10 and 21, the beginning of each volume is titled 'Huainan Honglie Jie', and below each volume is the phrase 'Xu Shen's Record.' This version's characteristics are almost identical to Su Song's description, which proves that the appearance of the Northern Song edition is very close to the time when Su Song served in the Jixian Academy."

"After acquiring the Northern Song edition, Qing dynasty bibliophile Yang Shaohe recorded it in his book 'Ying Shu Yu Lu'. Volume 3 of the book describes in detail the main features of the Northern Song edition: First, the Northern Song edition of 'Huainanzi Honglie Jie' consists of 21 volumes, with each set of 12 books in a case. Each half-page of the book is divided into 12 lines, with 22 characters in a large line and 25 characters in a small line. Each book is titled with the words 'Huainanzi, annotated by Xu Shuzhong, Northern Song edition, volume number X'."

"Although the letter and title have been changed, the characteristics of the book itself have been preserved, and it is completely consistent with Su Song's description. In addition, there are many traces that indicate that this is a genuine small-character copy from the Northern Song Dynasty."

“Gu Tinglong’s ‘A Brief Description of Tang and Song Dynasty Shu Printed Editions’ states: ‘Generally, eleven or twelve lines cannot be compared with large-character editions of eight or nine lines, and can be called medium-character editions; thirteen or fourteen lines should be called small-character editions.’ If we follow this standard, shouldn’t this version be a medium-character edition?” Liu Yijie raised a difficult question.

"That's because this set of books was already very famous in the book collecting world before Gu Tinglong. In order to distinguish it from another precious set of large-character Southern Song editions, people called it the small-character edition. Here, it specifically refers to the Northern Song edition of Huainan Honglie. It should be understood in a way that is different from Gu Tinglong's definition."

"I see." Liu Yijie smiled and said, "But isn't it insufficient to draw a conclusion based solely on whether it matches the characteristics described by Su Song?"

"According to the records of Qing Dynasty scholars, the title slips of each volume at that time divided the Northern Song edition into twelve volumes in one case. This was done by book collectors after the fall of the Song Dynasty, rather than by the original edition. Qing Dynasty scholar Huang Pilie once recorded that the Northern Song edition had 'twelve lines per half-page, with the larger characters in each line being the main text and the smaller characters being the annotations. Because there were many lines per half-page,' 'the Song Dynasty printing of this book had small characters and small fonts, many broken characters, and blurred areas in the printed edition, making it difficult to collate. Therefore, scholars often call it the small-character edition.'"

"Wang Shizhong's *Catalogue of Song and Yuan Dynasty Books in Yiyun Shushe* also specifically notes 'small characters' under the entry for 'Huainanzi.' This shows that the Northern Song edition belongs to the small characters version, which has become a consensus among Qing Dynasty scholars." "Actually, there is another piece of evidence that can confirm whether the version is correct."

"Oh?"

"According to Huang's description, the Northern Song edition changed hands several times during its nearly thousand-year circulation and was damaged. In Huang's record, the author's name on the first page of the eighteenth volume of the small-character edition is slightly different from that of the other volumes. The character 'Shen' in 'Xu Shen' is missing a stroke, which is evidence that the page was repaired or replaced at that time."

“If we take out the eighteen volumes and look through them, we might be able to prove that this set of books is the same one that Mr. Huang had seen.”

Liu Yijie quickly asked the staff to take down another book and open it for inspection. The staff exclaimed in surprise, "It's true! On the first page of Volume 18, the character '慎' in '许慎' has a short vertical stroke on the top of the character '真', without the horizontal stroke extending beyond it. It's different from the one in Xiao Zhou's book!"

Liu Yijie grabbed Zhou Zhi's arm: "Where did you see this record you're talking about?"

“This…” Zhou Zhi thought for a moment and smiled wryly, “My knowledge is not good enough, so I really can’t remember. But this statement must have appeared in Huang Pilie’s works. Huang Pilie was a famous book collector in the Qing Dynasty, especially obsessed with Song Dynasty books. He named his library ‘Ning Song Lou’ and called himself ‘Song Chan Yi Weng’, which shows how deep his love for books was.”

"As for whether the record comes from his 'Qiuguju Song Book Catalogue,' 'Bai Song Yi Chan Book Catalogue,' or 'Bai Song Yi Chan Fu Commentary,' I really can't remember."

Apart from Mr. Gu and Mai Xiaomiao, everyone present was amazed by Zhou Zhi's extensive knowledge and prodigious memory. The staff even said with a wry smile, "If this is considered a lack of knowledge by Teacher Zhou, then we should all go and bang our heads against the wall."

Even the way they address each other has changed.

Another staff member suddenly remembered something, so he opened another book and asked, "Is this the 'Bai Song Yi Chan' you just mentioned?"

Zhou Zhi took the book and looked at it. On the title page was a seal with eight seal characters that read "Seal of Changwuzi of Baisong Yichan".

"It's him!" Zhou Zhi exclaimed. "Bai Song Yi Chan was the name of his study, and Chang Wu Zi was one of his many pseudonyms! This set of books is the Northern Song Dynasty small-character edition of Huainan Honglie that Huang Pilie once collected! Legend has it that it was lost to Tsarist Russia, but I never expected it to come back here after all this time!"

“We have been studying this set of books,” Liu Yijie said. “Based on some research materials, we have also determined that it is a Song Dynasty edition. However, as you said, the only extant Song Dynasty edition of Huainanzi is the newly printed edition by Tan Shuduan of Chaling in the Southern Song Dynasty, which is housed in the National Palace Museum in Taiwan, as well as three facsimile editions. As for the Northern Song Dynasty edition, no one has seen it except for the records. As a result, everyone regards the 21-volume edition of Tan Shuduan of Chaling in Yanyilou as the only Song Dynasty edition of Huainanzi.”

"Because this set of books is very similar to Su Song's arguments, and many of the taboo characters in it are characteristic of the Northern Song Dynasty, we have always suspected that it is a Northern Song edition. Now you have provided us with another important piece of evidence, which is wonderful!"

"I was quite shocked when I saw it just now." In fact, Zhou Zhi still finds it hard to believe: "If this set of books is indeed real, then it truly is a national treasure. The Northern Song Dynasty small-character edition of the *Huainanzi* is a unique copy in the world!" (End of Chapter)