錢大昕と『乾隆鄞縣志』

Abstract

Evidential studies 考證學, a philological approach to the historical record, was a discipline characteristic of the learning of the Qing Dynasty, but it should also be noted that the age was also a period when the compilation of local histories was extremely popular. Qian Daxin 錢大昕 has been recognized as the most prominent of those involved in evidential studies, but his Yuanshikao 元史稿 was never completed and his reputation as a historian is not as high as it might have been. Nevertheless, as he treated local history as historical narrative, by examining the local histories that he compiled, it is still possible to appreciate his acuity as a historian. In this article, I consider his role as a historian through an analysis of the Qianlong Yinxianzhi 乾隆鄞縣志, a local history, which he had compiled. Qian Daxin was involved in compiling three local histories in his lifetime, the Rehezhi 熱河志, the Yinxianzhi, and the Changxingxianzhi 長興縣志. Because his first effort, the Rehezhi, was from his early days as an official and scholar, it can be surmised that it was compiled in accordance with tradition. However, it was impetus for reading through numerous local histories and establishing his own style, and also for his building a collection of historical evidence. The Yinxianzhi was compiled after Qian had retired from the bureaucracy and become the director of the Academy 書院 in the fifty-third year of the Qianlong era on the request of his intimate friend Qian Weiqiao 錢維喬, the governor of Yinxian. This local history is characterized on one hand by Qian's thorough examination of the Kangxi Yinxianzhi 康熙鄞縣志, compiled one hundred years earlier by Wen Xingdao 聞性道, an examination in which Qian applied the philological techniques of evidential studies to each description, indicating original sources, and also adding descriptions of events which he assembled himself, while on the other hand he organized the whole structure following the classical form. While the narrative praises Qing policy in the preface to each section of the work, the main body of the work elucidates historical reality, pointing out social contradictions behind the present prosperity and the weakness of the foundations to arouse the attention of politic leaders. A change in Qian's intellectual position can be seen in the fact that he eliminated from the Changxingxianzhi the chapter on the Heavenly Phenomena 天章篇, which had appeared in his first two local histories. The efforts of Qian Daxin as practitioner of evidential studies are esteemed in certain circles within the academic world, but there is a tendency to see him as scholar without a sense of statecraft reality and as rigid and narrow-minded. However, his advocacy of statecraft is revealed through the narrative of his local histories.