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Abstract
This paper describes a very rare, hand-coloured, unusually large (over 13 m2) manuscript map of China about which, in addition to our own copy, only two more copies are known. The map shows the territory of the Ming Chinese empire (1368–1644) in the seventeenth century. It was prepared in 1691 by the famous Japanese Buddhist monk, Sōkaku (1639–1720). The paper highlights several historical and geographical details of the period and the most interesting history of the map.
Notes
1 Unno Kazutaka (2005). Tōyō-Chirigakushi Kenkyū (Monographs on the History and Geography in the East), pp. 488–505, Seibundō, Ōsaka.
2 The Shingon Esoteric Sect had considerable following in Japan since its introduction from China during the first years of the ninth century by Kūkai, 空海 (posthumously known as Kōbō-Daishi, 弘法大師, 774–835), with headquarters in Kōyasan, 高野山.
3 In addition to our map, two other manuscript versions are known: a. Ōsaka, Kushūon In Shozō, (大阪久修園院所蔵, Collection of the Ōsaka Kushūon Temple) and b. Kōbe Shiritsu Hakubutsukan, (神戸市立博物館, Kōbe City Museum). However, the Kōbe Museum copy does not have the manuscript text relating the map’s history shown in of our map. Since neither Professor Unno Kazutaka, nor other well-known specialists of Sino-Japanese cartography (Professor Li Xiaocong, Beijing, Professor Myoshi Tadayoshi, Kōbe) have been able to identify the name of the original Chinese map’s author or the exact time when it was made, the original map may no longer exist.
4 Fontana, Michela, 2010. Matteo Ricci, (1552–1610), (Salvator, Paris).
5 Ren Jincheng, map no. 146, entitled ‘Complete Map of Allotted Fields, Human Traces, and Travel Routes Within and Without the Nine Frontiers under Heaven, ‘天下九
分野人迹路程全圖’ in Cao Wanru, Zheng Xihuang, Huang Shengzhang et al., 1994., An Atlas of Ancient Maps of China, vol. II., Note on Plates, p. 36 (Cultural Relics Publishing House, Beijing).
6 The Shangshu, 尚書, ‘Documents of the elder’, also called Shujing, 書經 ‘Book of documents’, is one of the five ancient Confucian classics (wujing, 五經). It is a collection of speeches made by rulers and important politicians from mythical times to the mid of the Western Zhou period, 西周 (eleventh century–770 BC). The Shangshu consists of five parts. Especially noteworthy is the chapter Yugong which is a description of how the mythical emperor Yu the Great tamed the floods and divided China into provinces, giving each province a quality label for its soils, tributes and local products. This chapter must have been added later, at a point of time when China has obtained her traditional geographic extent, presumably during the late Warring States, 戰國 (403–221 BC) or even the early Han period, 漢 (206 BC–8 AD). Cai Shen 蔡沈, a disciple of the great Neo-Confucian scholar Zhu Xi, assembled all Sung period commentaries on the Shangshu and published them as Shujizhuan, 書集傳, in 6 juan. The Shangshu, or Shujing, as it was called from then on, had to be studied by all those wishing to pass the state examinations. During the Ming period, 明 (1368–1644), therefore, it was part of the book Wujing daquan, 五經大全, ‘All about the Five Classics’, which served as a kind of textbook for candidates of the state examinations (Wikipedia).
7 Du Fu, 杜甫, 712–770, one of China’s most famous Tang Dynasty poets.
8 Because of its location, the 1545-m high mountain is associated with the rising sun, signifying birth and renewal; it is regarded as the most sacred of the Five Holy Mountains.
9 The Grand Canal, 京杭大運河, connecting Hangzhou with Beijing, the world’s longest artificial waterway, ca 1700 km, was in large part a creation of the Sui Dynasty, 581–618, as a result of the migration of China’s core economic and agricultural region away from the Yellow River valley and toward what are now Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces. Its main role throughout its history was the transport of grain to the Northern capital. It was almost completely renovated between 1411 and 1415, during the early part of the Ming Dynasty.
10 Brook, Timothy, 1998. The Confusion of Pleasure: Commerce and Culture in Ming China (University of California Press, Berkeley).
11 Cao Wanru, Zheng Xihuang, Huang Shengzhang et al., 1994. An Atlas of Ancient Maps of China, Vol. II, note attached to plate no. 84 (Cultural Relics Publishing House, Beijing), ‘In Shandong’s central section, the water of the canal is mainly provided by the springs of the province. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, in order to keep up the water transport of grain to the capital and ensure water supply for the canal, large scale surveys of the sources of the springs from the mountainous regions of Shandong were conducted’.
12 Monnet, Nathalie, 2004. Chine, L’Empire du Trait, Exhibition Catalogue, pp. 12–13 (Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris).
13 Famous cartographer, 1694–1771 also known as Huang Zhengsun (黄証孫), native of Zhejiang Province. Wikipedia.
14 Cao Wanru, Zheng Xihuang, Huang Shengzhang et al., op. cit., note attached to plate no. 102; ‘In 1855, the river changed its course at Tongwaxiang, Henan and then flowing wantonly over the level ground along Dongming, Puzhou and the Fanxian County, it broke through the Grand Canal at Zhangfu County, forced upon the Dapinghe River and got to Lijin County where it emptied into the Bohai Sea’.
15 In a map, entitled ‘Flood-Prevention Work on the Yellow River’, Wan-li Period, 1573–1620, the course of the river is commented as follows: ‘The Yellow River, starting from its source, flowing through present-day Qinghai, Gansu, Ningxia, Inner Mongolia, Shaanxi, Shanxi and Henan, merging with the Grand Canal near Xuzhou (Jiangsu), breaking away from the Canal near Huai’an, takes over the Huai River before finally emptying into the sea’; see, China: In Ancient and Modern Maps, 1998, map no. 83, (London, Sotheby’s Publications).
16 Nara was Japan's capital city from 710 to 794, when the capital was transferred to Kyōto.
17 The text was very carefully studied, annotated and punctuated in red by a later owner of the map. He used the very strict annotating code characteristic of Japanese scholars, facilitating the reading and understanding of texts: a. name or function of persons: one bar in the centre of the text; b. place names: one bar on the right side; c. Japanese chronological period names: two bars on the left side; d. book or document names: two bars in the centre.
18 Tsuchiya Sagaminokami, 土屋相模守, (政直, according to Wikipedia, Tsuchiya Masanao) 1641–1722, Shoshi, 1685–1687; Rōjū, 老中, 1687–1718, one of the highest ranking government post during the Tokugawa regime.