hilde de weerdt466
© Brill, Leiden, 2006 T’oung Pao XCII
Also available online – www.brill.nl
WHAT DID SU CHE SEE IN THE NORTH?
PUBLISHING REGULATIONS, STATE SECURITY,
AND POLITICAL CULTURE IN SONG CHINA
by
HILDE DE WEERDT
University of Tennessee
Throughout its two-thousand-year existence the imperial Chinese
state and those who served in its bureaucracy harbored an ambivalent
attitude towards the circulation of written texts. The Legalist insistence
upon secrecy in political decision making first shaped the body politic
and political practice during the formation of the Qin Empire in the
third century BCE; it continued to inform political culture at court
in subsequent dynasties, including the Song, on which this article
focuses. According to Legalist logic, information about court politics
and the geopolitical and military situation of the empire constituted
strategic information that could be exploited both by external and
internal forces. Such information, along with other private texts
such as prognostications, astrological works, or histories, posed an
intrinsic threat to the rule of the reigning dynasty if it was allowed
to circulate freely.
By Song times, court policies towards the circulation of texts were
equally informed by a contrary logic of limited openness. This logic of
openness was based on a belief in the need for unbiased consultation
between the emperor and the upper echelons of the bureaucracy.
Both the literate elites of imperial times and modern scholars have
typically considered this belief, authoritatively articulated in the
Essentials of Government from the Zhenguan Reign (Zhenguan zhengyao
, 705), as central to Confucian political thought. For court
officials, unbiased consultation justified their access to and possession
of court documents and archival materials. Both logics operated
in sync, but their combined use in Song politics experienced stress
when the desire for access reached beyond the circles of court offi-
cials.
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what did su che see in the north? 467
The increase in the number of students preparing for the civil
service examinations between the eleventh and mid-thirteenth
century and the concomitant spread of commercial printing added
new urgency to the question of the circulation of materials that the
court defined as state secret. This article argues that the anxiety of
the Song court and officials about the smuggling of state documents
into the surrounding empires was, first, an expression of their concern
over the circulation of state documents among the literate elite in
Song territory. I reach this conclusion based on an investigation of
two kinds of publishing regulations: those governing the cross-border
smuggling of written texts, and those on texts related to border affairs
(section two). My discussion of cross-border smuggling focuses on
alleged smuggling “to the north,” that is, to the empires bordering on
the Song’s northern frontier. In order to substantiate the systematic
connections I am making among Song publishing regulations, official
and elite constructions of “the north” (section one), and elite political
culture, I contrast the regulations on the cross-border smuggling of
texts with those governing other prohibited goods (section three).1
The Ambivalent Meanings of “the North”
North and south have been widely deployed in twentieth-century
historiography as explanatory categories. In the case of middleperiod
Chinese history, twentieth-century historians have presented
the changing relationship between north and south (understood as
the territories north and south of the Yangzi River) as a determining
factor shaping the course of history from the Tang Dynasty onwards.
On this macrohistorical stage north and south appear as the main
protagonists whose differential environmental, demographic and
economic development provided the source material for Chinese
social, political, and cultural history.
Within this framework, the political field in late imperial Chinese
1 This article originated as a paper presented in the panel, “The Problem of North
and South in Middle and Late Imperial Chinese Politics,” the Annual Meeting of the
Association for Asian Studies, Chicago, IL, April 2, 2005. I am indebted to Han Seunghyun
for organizing the panel and Robert Hymes, who was the discussant, for his
questions and comments. I also thank the two anonymous reviewers for their stimulating
comments on the original draft.
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hilde de weerdt468
history is perceived as dominated by southern elites. By and large,
research addressing the tensions between north and south in late
imperial politics has centered on the representation of southerners
and northerners in the bureaucracy and on their performance in the
civil service examinations. Southern elites replaced the military and
aristocratic elites of the north as the dominant power in the Chinese
empires of the second millennium. In support of this paradigm,
historians of Song China, for example, have shown that top positions
at court as well as in the middle rungs of the bureaucracy were
increasingly filled by southern men.2 Likewise, the work of John
Chaffee has shown that the ascendancy of southerners was as much
evident in the civil service examinations.3
In Song times, officials considered the replacement of northerners
(or, in the Southern Song, northern immigrants) by southerners
to be a problem. Politicians called for equal opportunity policies
for northerners (beiren ) throughout the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries.4 Such calls did not halt the growing dominance of
southerners in imperial politics, however. In this article I propose
that we may be able to find reasons for these failed attempts, or at
least gain a broader understanding of the tensions between north and
south, by shifting our attention from the performance of northerners
in the bureaucracy to the representation of the north in Song
political discourse. The marked decline in the political fortunes of the
2 According to a recent study by Wu Songdi, southern politicians were already outnumbering
northerners in the first decades of the twelfth century. This trend continued
after the Song court was forced out of its northern territories in the 1120s. In the
course of the second half of the twelfth century the percentage of councilors and
vice-councilors of northern descent declined from 42.5 % to 15.4 %. This percentage
continued its downward trend in the thirteenth century. Similarly, the percentage of
northerners among circuit intendants for the Southern Song period as a whole was
30%. See Wu Songdi , Beifang yimin yu Nan Song shehui bianqian
(Taibei: Wenjin chubanshe, 1993), 164-165.
3 The percentage of degrees awarded at the capital to candidates from southern, especially
southeastern, circuits and prefectures began to outnumber that of their northern
counterparts by the late eleventh century. See John W. Chaffee, The Thorny Gates
of Learning in Sung China: A Social History of the Examinations (Albany: State University of
New York Press, 1995 [1985]), chapter 6.
4 Wu Qian (?-1262), for example, proposed changes in the examinations to
recruit more northerners from the routes bordering on Jin territory. See Huang Kuanchong
, “Cong hezhan dao nan bei ren” , in Shishi, wenxian yu
renwu: Song shi yanjiu lunwen ji , ed. Huang Kuanchong
(Taibei: Dongda tushu gongsi, 2003), 23.
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what did su che see in the north? 469
northerners was linked to a repertoire of stereotypical representations
of the north, a conglomerate of diverse elite perceptions that rendered
the north deeply ambivalent. The Song political elite’s ambivalent
perceptions of the north were closely intertwined with changes in
imperial Chinese political culture.
From the eleventh century onwards, the concept of the north
carried political overtones that can only be understood in the context
of Song relations with their northern neighbors. “The north” not only
referred to the northern parts of the Song Empire, its geographical
coverage also extended beyond Song boundaries into the territories
of the Song court’s most powerful neighbors, the Liao Empire in the
eleventh and early twelfth centuries and the Jin Empire thereafter.
We find evidence of this usage in embassy records and travel accounts
written by Song men sent as envoys to or held as captives in Liao
and Jin territory. Su Che (1039-1112) referred to his mission to
the Liao in 1090 as his “northern mission” (bei shi ). Hu Jiao’s
account of his stay with the Liao between 947 and 953, included
in Ouyang Xiu’s (1007-1072) New History of the Five Dynasties
(Xin Wudai shi ) was titled “Account of My Captivity in the
North” (“Xian bei ji” ). In extant records Song embassies to
the Jin were similarly termed “northern” missions. Lou Yue’s
(1137-1213) 1169 report was titled Diary of a Trip North (Bei xing rilu
); Zhou Hui’s (1127-?) 1177 report was known as Record
of a Northern Voyage (Bei yuan lu ).
The generic quality of “the north” expressed the ambivalent
attitude of the Song envoys and travelers and contrasted with more
specific references that conveyed political sovereignty, such as “Liao”
or “Jin,” or ethnic difference, such as “Khitans” and “Jurchens”
(the names of the ethnic groups that established the Liao and Jin
Dynasties, respectively). The ambivalence was borne out of two
conflicting tendencies in the Song political elite’s perception of the
north. On the one hand, the north stood for the territory, the people
and the cultural tradition of the Central Plains. The establishment
of non-Chinese empires covering parts of the Central Plains evoked
memories of loss. In the eleventh century the Song court acknowledged
the Liao occupation of the so-called “Sixteen Prefectures,” which
were administratively and culturally considered part of the Chinese
territory. In the 1140s it acknowledged the Jurchen occupation of all
territories north of the Huai River. In the imagination of travelers
to the Liao and Jin Empires, the lost territories were inhabited with
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hilde de weerdt470
memories of Chinese rule, especially with those of the Han and Tang
Empires, to whose grandeur and longevity the Song aspired.5
The northern territories were therefore not foreign. As Christian
Lamouroux has argued in an article on records of embassies to
the Liao Empire, Song representations of the northern territories
differed from earlier accounts on the peoples and political entities
located to the north of the Chinese territories in that they assumed
cultural and administrative similarity as well as difference. Song
authors described Liao and Jin territories like Song territories in
terms of their administrative organization. They still applied some
of the cultural stereotypes about northern peoples (for example, the
representation of non-Chinese peoples as animal and not entirely
human), but, overall, the description of northern societies was based
more on the cultural categories deployed in the regional descriptions
of Song territory (the tujing and fangzhi ) than on those
formerly used in ethnographic descriptions of non-Chinese peoples.6
The use of similar categories in the description of Song and nonChinese
territories conveyed a sense of cultural continuity that lay
reflected in the concept of “the north” as encompassing Liao or Jin
territory on the one hand and expressing Song attachment to the
same territory on the other.7
The north carried ambivalent meanings because it was the carrier
of historical memory, and because it was at the same time perceived as
a potential source of threat to the existence of the Song Empire. The
north was both desired and rejected. It was desired for its historical
relevance—the lost north represented to southerners what it meant to
be part of the Song Empire—but it was simultaneously rejected for its
5 Such memories pervade Zhou Hui’s Record of a Northern Voyage. See, for example,
his account of a temple dedicated to Emperor Guangwu, the founder of the Eastern
Han Dynasty, as translated by Chavannes: Édouard Chavannes, “Pei yuan lou. Récit
d’un voyage dans le Nord par Tcheou Chan,” T’oung Pao 5 (1904), 183. See also Herbert
Franke, “Sung Embassies: Some General Observations,” in China among Equals:
The Middle Kingdom and Its Neighbors, 10th-14th Centuries, ed. Morris Rossabi (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1983), 138.
6 Poo Mu-chou discusses the representation of foreigners as animals in Enemies of
Civilization: Attitudes toward Foreigners in Ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, and China (Albany:
State University of New York Press, 2005), 83-84.
7 Christian Lamouroux, “De l’étrangeté à la différence. Les récits des émissaires
Song en pays Liao (xie s.),” in Récits de voyages asiatiques: genres, mentalités, conception de
l’espace. Actes du colloque EFEO-EHESS de décembre 1994, ed. Claudine Salmon (Paris:
École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 1996), 109.
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what did su che see in the north? 471
tainted and uncertain loyalties. The literate elite desired information
about the north and the court’s policies towards the polities located
there. Their desire for information was typically motivated by the
aspiration to regain territories that formerly belonged to the Chinese
Empire. Court officials represented the north as the threat that
legitimated restrictions on the circulation of political and military
information. As we will see below, Song publishing regulations
expressed the ambivalent meanings of the north.
Song Publishing Regulations
The north was in several respects represented in the same fashion
across the Northern-Southern Song divide. Even though social
historians have considered it a major break in the history of imperial
China,8 as far as perceptions of the north and publishing regulations
are concerned the relocation of the Song court south of the Yangzi
River was not a watershed. From the early eleventh through the
early thirteenth century, the Song court consistently issued publishing
regulations that bore on its relationship with its northern neighbors—
the Liao, Xi Xia, Jin, and Kory[o Dynasties.
Regulations directly bearing on Song international relations were
of two types. Firstly, there were regulations dealing with cross-border
trade in books and documents; secondly, there were prohibitions on
materials touching upon border affairs.9 One of the earliest publishing
laws issued under the Song was the prohibition, promulgated in the
year 1000, on cross-border trade in any textual material other than
the nine classics.10 This prohibition was repeated in 1006, just two
years after the conclusion of the Song’s first peace treaty with the
Liao.11 The Song court occasionally presented foreign envoys with
the classics. Such gifts and the early exemption of the classical canon
from prohibitions on cross-border trade in written texts suggest that
8 For an authoritative articulation of this view, see Robert Hymes, Statesmen and
Gentlemen: The Elite of Fu-Chou, Chiang-Hsi, in Northern and Southern Sung (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1986).
9 They are detailed at the end of this article in Appendixes A and B, respectively.
10 Songshi (Academia Sinica ed.), 186:4562-3.
11 Li Tao , Xu Zizhi tongjian changbian (Academia Sinica ed.;
hereafter XZZTJCB), 289:7068.
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hilde de weerdt472
the Song consistently considered the classical texts of Antiquity—
as opposed to reports on current affairs—as the embodiment of
legitimate politics and constituting a shared political language for
both the literate elite in Song territory and foreign courts.
Subsequent regulations were more specific about the kinds of
materials that were targeted by the ban on cross-border trade. Acting
on a report submitted in 1027, the central administration ordered
that materials on border defense should not be traded abroad.12 The
report charged that printed editions of the literary collections of court
officials were circulating on the market in Xiongzhou Prefecture
(Hebei East Circuit). Xiongzhou bordered on the Liao Empire and
was officially recognized by both Song and Liao as a legitimate
place for the exchange of goods and diplomatic correspondence.
According to the 1027 report, collected writings included secret
information about border defense and should therefore be banned
from circulation.
A similar report reached the court in 1040.13 It stated that unemployed
men and booksellers in the capital of Kaifeng were collecting
and printing documents on border affairs and spreading them
abroad. In this case Kaifeng Prefecture was ordered to take action
and report back. In these occurrences, although the memorialists
alleged that materials on border affairs were traded abroad no titles
were mentioned and no instances of transactions were documented.
This was not necessarily in accordance with reporting practices
in the eleventh century, however: other reports on violations of
publishing laws do include the titles of confiscated materials. For
example, a report dating from 1042—about the same period as the
two prohibitions just cited—stated that the Commentary on the Laws
in the Legal Code (Xingtong lü shu ) had been printed in Hangzhou
under the title The Correct Meaning of the Golden Rules (Jinke
zhengyi ).14 In this case the court ordered the local Fiscal
Commission (zhuanyun si ) to apprehend those responsible for
violating the prohibition on the private marketing of legal materials
and to have the woodblocks destroyed.
Subsequent reports concerning the illegal sale of books and
12 XuSong , Song huiyao jigao (ca. 1809) (Academia Sinica ed.; hereafter
SHY), Xingfa (hereafter XF) 2:16.
13 SHY, XF 2:24.
14 SHY, XF 2:26.
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what did su che see in the north? 473
documents to the Song’s northern neighbors similarly targeted
materials on border affairs, but most did not list specific titles. Where
titles were mentioned (see the discussion of the 1122, 1202, and 1213
prohibitions below), the materials were confiscated domestically;
they were related to domestic political feuds and, typically, sales to
“northern guests” (bei ke ) or “non-Chinese” (huawai ren )
were not documented.15 Indeed, the reports concerning Song-Liao
relations contain clues suggesting that Song publishing regulations
may have been motivated by reasons other than the alleged security
threat from the north.
The two best-known reports on cross-border trade in books may
serve as examples. In 1055 Ouyang Xiu, then a Hanlin Academician,
submitted to the court a report entitled “Memorial on the Printing of
Documents” (“Lun diaoyin wenzi zhazi” ). Together
with Su Che’s 1090 set of five reports “On Issues Concerning the
Northern Border—Submitted Upon My Return from a Mission to
the North” (“Bei shi huan lun beibian shi zhazi”
), to be discussed later, Ouyang’s account has been frequently cited
as evidence not only of the increased use of print in the eleventh
century, but also of a sizable trade in printed materials between Song
and Liao. The brief report read as follows:
Recently I learned that someone printed a collection of texts in twenty chapters
in the capital. The collection was titled Song Texts (Song wen ). The
texts were mostly discussions of current administrative issues. The first piece
was Fu Bi’s (1004-1083) memorial on transferring office written years
ago. In it there are detailed descriptions of affairs relating to the caitiffs of the north.16
These words should not circulate. However, those who printed it do not know
the essence of these matters. I am afraid that [these materials] will circulate
increasingly widely and be transmitted to the northern caitiffs. This would be a
15 See XZZTJCB, 289:7068.
16 Fu Bi’s work is for the most part no longer extant, with the exception of a poetry
collection included in the Song series, Short Collections of Famous Worthies from the Two
Song Periods (Liang Song mingxian xiaoji ). He wrote a report of his 1042
mission to the Liao. See Fu Lehuan , Liaoshi congkao (Beijing: Zhonghua
shuju, 1984), 201. Several editions of this report and of Fu Bi’s collected works
(including memorials and official communications) are listed in the twelfth- and thirteenth-century
private catalogs of Chao Gongwu (ca. 1104-1183) and Chen
Zhensun (ca. 1186-ca. 1262). See Chao Gongwu, Sun Meng and Wang
Lixiang , Junzhai dushuzhi jiaozheng (Shanghai: Shanghai guji
chubanshe, 1990), 7:283, 19:984, supplement: 1130-1131; Chen Zhensun, Zhizhai
shulu jieti (ca. 1249) (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1987), 7:203,
17:493, 22:635.
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hilde de weerdt474
great inconvenience to the court. As for the other texts, later generations do
not need them. They are rather deficient as models for others. Included side by side in
this anthology, they will mislead students. I therefore ask now that a clear order be
issued to Kaifeng Prefecture asking that they confiscate and destroy all copies
and stop booksellers selling it. Hereafter, if there are those whose titles do not
pass official inspection and who print collections of texts illegally, they are not
to be allowed to sell them. Other booksellers and people of all standing are
permitted to report them and will be given a reward of two hundred strings
of cash. The amount is to be paid from the family property of the violator.
Both printers and sellers are to be judged severely.17
In this report, Ouyang Xiu presented the discussion of northern
affairs in one of the memorials included in the printed anthology in
question as his main reason for concern. He feared that in case this
anthology was traded across the northern border the Song court would
face a diplomatic crisis. The hypothetical case is noteworthy: Ouyang
Xiu had seen the anthology in Kaifeng, but there is no evidence—and
Ouyang, who served on a mission to the Khitan around this time,18
does not suggest—that it was aimed at a northern market. Rather,
Ouyang suggested that, as this type of anthology found more buyers
domestically, it might also reach the northerners in the end.
In my reading, the second part of the report expresses a greater
concern, namely, that anthologies featuring recent discussions of
contemporary court policy would mislead students within the Song
Empire. Ouyang’s advocacy of strict governmental supervision of
printed materials may come as a surprise to those familiar with
his defense of factional politics and a reformist political agenda.19
Nevertheless, his support for state censorship of commercially published
materials deemed unfit models for Song students represented
a consensus on this matter among Song court officials.
Su Che’s observations on cross-border trade in books illustrate this
17 See Ouyang Xiu , Ouyang Yongshu ji , 3 vols., Guoxue jiben congshu
ed. (Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1933), zouyi ji , 114-115 (italics added).
18 He was nominated towards the end of 1155 and returned to Kaifeng in early
1156. According to his chronological biography, Ouyang Xiu submitted a report of
the mission entitled Record of a Northern Mission (Beishi yulu ), but it is no longer
extant. See Fu Lehuan, Liaoshi congkao, 3, 207; Chen Ming , Ouyang Xiu zhuan
(Guangzhou: Guangdong gaodeng jiaoyu chubanshe, 1998), 125-128. See also
James T.C. Liu, Ou Yang-Hsiu: An Eleventh-Century Neo-Confucianist (Stanford: Stanford
University Press, 1967), 69.
19 For a discussion of Ouyang Xiu’s discourse on factionalism, see Ari Levine, “A
House in Darkness: The Politics of History and the Language of Politics in the Late
Northern Song, 1068-1104” (Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 2002), 334-354.
book.indb 474book.indb 474 14-11-2006 11:33:5714-11-2006 11:33:57
what did su che see in the north? 475
fact and suggest some answers for the rationale behind it. Su Che
submitted a set of five reports in 1090 after he returned from an
official mission to the Liao court. His observations on book smuggling
can be found in the first piece and were presented, along with his
observations on the export of copper coins, as “Matters I Observed
at the Northern Court Inconvenient to Our Court” (“Lun beichao
suojian yu chaoting bubian shi” ). This report
is frequently referred to as evidence that large amounts of books were
illegally smuggled into Liao territory. In Hok-lam Chan’s reading,
for example, Su Che “reported he saw a profusion of Song works
in the north,” “many of which contained information about court
affairs and border defense,” and “which he feared might seriously
endanger state security.”20
What did Su Che see in the north? Upon a close reading of his text
it turns out that he did not report to have seen any Song works on
his mission. The opening sentence of the report reveals its tenor:
As for the texts carved on blocks and circulated in print by the commoners
of our dynasty, we suspect (liao ) that there are none that are not available
on the northern side.21
Su Che recounted three anecdotes to support his sweeping inference.
He related that upon his arrival in the auxiliary capital
Yanjing , Vice-Regent Xing Xigu related through an
assistant that Su Shi’s collected works were available in Liao territory
and asked why Su Che had not had his own collected works printed
and exported as well. The report did not specify whether Meishan’s
[Su Shi’s] Collection (Meishan ji ), the edition mentioned by Xing
Xigu’s assistant, was a collection of Su Shi’s poetry and prose, or
his poetry only. It is also unclear whether it was a manuscript or a
printed edition.22
20 See Hok-lam Chan, Control of Publishing in China, Past and Present (Canberra:
Australian National University Press, 1983), 6, 14 (my italics). For a similar reading,
see Zhang Xiumin , Zhongguo yinshua shi (Shanghai: Renmin chubanshe,
1989), 197; Liu Pujiang , “Wenhua de bianjie—Liang Song yu Liao
Jin zhi jian de shujin ji shuji liutong” ——
, Chågoku shigaku 12 (2002), 1-2; Lin Ping , “Lun Bei Song jinshu” ,
Sichuan daxue xuebao (zhexue shehui kexue ban), 128 (2003), 132. My thanks to Ari Levine
for sending me the last article.
21 Su Che , Luancheng ji , ed. Zeng Zaozhuang and Ma Defu
(Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1987), 937 (italics added).
22 Wang Anshi wrote a series of five poems on the collection which suggest that it
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hilde de weerdt476
Later, upon Su Che’s arrival in the Central Capital (Zhongjing
, or Dading Prefecture, in present-day Inner Mongolia),
another high-ranking Liao official, Commissioner of Funds Zheng
Zhuan , revealed in Su Che’s view his familiarity with the work
of his father Su Xun. He expressed his admiration for Su Xun’s prose
during a banquet, and specifically mentioned Su Xun’s marvelous
ability to expose the twists and turns of historical events. Finally,
as he reached the imperial abode, Hostel Escort Commissioner23
Wang Shiru asked him for the recipe of Poria Cocos (fuling
), a fungus-like substance found on the roots of fir-trees and
used in Chinese medicine. Su Che interpreted Wang’s reference
to this commonly used ingredient as evidence that he was familiar
with a rhyme-prose poem he had written on the benefits of fuling
for nourishing long life, entitled “On Taking Fuling” (“Fu fuling fu”
).24
Taken together, the evidence presented in Su Che’s report suggests
that at the very most three Song textual sources of information
may have been circulating in Liao territory: 1) copies of Su Shi’s
collected works, under the title Meishan ji; 2) copies of some of Su
Che’s rhyme-prose poems; 3) copies of Su Xun’s expositions on
historical subjects. Whether the last two texts or collections of texts
may have been a collection of poetry. Zhu Shangshu argues that a printed edition
dating from the late Xining reign was exported to Liao territory, but does not provide
corroborating evidence for this conclusion. See Zhu Shangshu , Song ren bieji xu
lu (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1999), 1:402. The text of Su Che’s report
can be read as a request not for a printed edition of his own works, but for another
edition of those of Su Shi. Xing Xigu’s assistant asked for a printed edition of the
collected work “of the Hanlin Academician.” At first sight this seems to be a reference
to Su Che, who had become Hanlin Academician in the late 1080s. For this
reading, see also Ronald Egan, “Book Printing and Resistance to It in Song Dynasty
China,” paper presented at the workshop “The Early Development of Chinese Print
Culture” (Cambridge, MA: Fairbank Center for East Asian Research, April 29, 2005).
It could, however, also refer to Su Shi, who had been nominated to the same position
in 1068. In this case, the Liao request for a printed edition of Su’s work might be
read as a request for a printed edition of his prose. Alternatively, it might be read as
an indication that only manuscript copies of Su’s collected writings (including prose)
were circulating in Liao territory.
23 The Hostel Escort Commissioner received the Song envoys in the hostel for
foreign envoys in the capital and escorted them to the imperial audience hall. See
Franke, “Sung Embassies: Some General Observations,” 126.
24 This poem is included in Su Che’s collected works. Su Che, Su Che ji , in
San Su quanshu , ed. Zeng Zaozhuang and Shu Dagang (Beijing:
Yuwen chubanshe, 2001), 46-7.
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what did su che see in the north? 477
were circulating is questionable, since none of Su Che’s conversation
partners referred to specific titles of written texts or editions of Su
Xun’s or Su Che’s collected works. Moreover, Su Che’s mission did
not find any evidence that any of the materials his informants may
have had access to contained sensitive information. (Existing Song
law primarily defined sensitive information as materials related to
border affairs, maps, and current court policy discussions.) Su Xun’s
expositions on historical subjects and Su Che’s rhyme-prose did not
fall within this category; and Su Che could not ascertain whether
editions of Su Shi’s collected works circulating in Liao territory
contained such information—it is noteworthy that he did not claim
that such editions contained sensitive information.
Irrespective of the rather unimpressive evidence, Su Che drew
sweeping conclusions from what he had heard:
Therefore we think (liao) that copies of texts printed during our dynasty have
already reached the other side in great numbers. Among those texts there are
officials’ memorials and scholars’ examination expositions and policy response essays. These
texts, in no small number, discuss the gains and losses of our court, and the
strengths and weaknesses of our army and territory. In addition, petty folk
and stupid mean people only have regard for profit. They print irreverent
words and stop at nothing. If we allow everything to be distributed across the
northern border, then we will end up leaking state secrets on the one hand,
and expose ourselves to the ridicule of the northern barbarians on the other
hand. These things are all of great inconvenience.25
And so, even though Su Che had not seen nor heard of any
evidence of the circulation of Song printed materials in Liao territory,
he surmised that large numbers of printed texts were traded abroad.
He further opined that traders in printed materials could increase their
profits tenfold in the north. He demanded even stricter regulations
on the domestic commercial production of printed materials than
Ouyang Xiu. He proposed that all proofs of commercial editions
be forwarded to local inspectors before they were transferred onto
woodblocks and printed. Only those proofs that did not violate Song
publication laws were to pass inspection and to be returned to the
printers.
Su Che’s concern over the widespread circulation of memorials
by officials and examination essays by scholars in Song territory
suggests that there were reasons other than the alleged large-scale
export of Song texts to the Liao behind his proposal to change Song
25 Su Che, Luancheng ji, 937-8 (italics added).
book.indb 477book.indb 477 14-11-2006 11:33:5714-11-2006 11:33:57
hilde de weerdt478
publishing regulations. Lurking behind the accusation that Song
materials were exploited by external enemies was a concern over
the widespread discussion of current affairs in Song literati writings.
The heart of the Song’s security problem lay in the commercial
publication of materials pertaining to current state affairs for the
escalating number of students preparing for the examinations.
The larger significance of the alleged threat of the north becomes
clear when the reports of Ouyang Xiu and Su Che and the publication
regulations that resulted from them are put within the broader history
of Song publishing law. Starting in the eleventh century, regulations
on cross-border smuggling and prohibitions on the printing of
materials on border affairs largely overlapped with regulations on the
publication of Song official documents and materials on current state
affairs. Acting on the report of Su Che, the Ministry of Rites issued
an order in 1090 stipulating that documents touching upon current
state and military affairs could not be copied and distributed.26
This order also included a ban on the copying and printing of Song
archival materials such as the draft dynastic history (guoshi ), the
veritable records (shilu ), and the collected statutes (huiyao ).
Such orders increased in frequency in the twelfth century, and during
this period they were supplemented with repeated prohibitions on
the printing of examination essays on current affairs.27
The prohibitions on book smuggling and on the dissemination
of materials on border affairs listed in Appendixes A and B below
26 SHY, XF 2:38.
27 For a listing and discussion of regulations on the domestic circulation of court archival
and historical compilations and other official documents, see Hilde De Weerdt,
“Byways in the Imperial Chinese Information Order: The Dissemination and Commercial
Publication of State Documents,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies (forthcoming,
June 2006). For lists of prohibitions on the circulation of examination essays and
manuals, see Lucille Chia, Printing for Profit: the Commercial Publishers of Jianyang, Fujian
(11th-17th Centuries) (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2002), 121-
123; Liu Hsiang-kwang , “Yinshua yu kaoshi: Songdai kaoshi shiyong cankaoshu
chutan” —— , Song shi yanjiu ji 31 (2001), 151-
200, and “Printing and Examinations: The Circulation of Study Aids in Song China,”
paper presented at the workshop “The Early Development of Chinese Print Culture”
(Cambridge, MA: Fairbank Center for East Asian Research, April 29, 2005). For a discussion
of twelfth- and thirteenth-century regulations in the context of the competition
over the definition of examination standards, see Hilde De Weerdt, Competition over
Content: Negotiating Standards for the Civil Service Examinations in Imperial China (1127-1279),
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, forthcoming, esp. chapter 5.
book.indb 478book.indb 478 14-11-2006 11:33:5814-11-2006 11:33:58
what did su che see in the north? 479
further illustrate the continuing concern among court officials over the
domestic consumption of materials on current policy. This concern
helps explain, firstly, the lack of corroborating evidence in reports
on smuggling activities, and, secondly, the increased focus in decrees
issued after 1090 on such political news genres as memorials, court
gazettes, and examination policy essays, which were sold individually,
generally cost less to publish and were therefore seen as widely
circulating among the literate elite as a whole, including those who
did not hold office.
The orders issued in 1108 and 1175 prohibited the export of
collected writings and the smuggling of examination essays and
geographical sources, respectively.28 The 1108 order repeated the
suspicion, voiced earlier by both Ouyang Xiu and Su Che, that
collected writings were widely circulating in the north. Neither order
supplied evidence for the alleged smuggling operations, however.
Two decrees that cited specific titles, issued in 1122 and 1213
respectively, targeted the domestic commercial publication of private
works discussing Song military and foreign policy.29 The 1122 order
demanded that private diaries of court officials be banned from
commercial publication. It was based on a report that Wang Anshi’s
diary was circulating commercially. Allegedly, the diary, which was
at the time being used for the drafting of the official history of the
reign of Emperor Shenzong (1068-1085), contained information
on military decisions and other recent policy decisions. The report
argued that a ban was justified on the grounds that such material
ought not circulate outside of the court and that it would prevent
the leakage of information about the Song court to its neighbors.
In this case, dissemination beyond the court was explicitly equated
with leakage abroad.
Similarly, the 1213 decree reminding Song officials of the prohibition
on the sale of items touching on current policy and border
affairs cited potential export to the north as a principal reason for
the ban on two collections of memorials and policy proposals. The
collections, Gong Rizhang’s (fl. 1190s-1200s) Sincere Discussions
of the Northern Campaign (Beizheng dangyi ) and Hua Yue’s
(fl. 1200s-early 1220s) Remedies for Achieving Security (Zhi’an yaoshi
28 SHY, XF 2:47, 118.
29 SHY, XF 2:86, 138.
book.indb 479book.indb 479 14-11-2006 11:33:5814-11-2006 11:33:58
hilde de weerdt480
), contained military policy proposals and thus violated past
regulations banning such materials. It is very likely, however, that
these titles were singled out because of the authors’ criticism of Han
Tuozhou’s (?-1207) military campaign against the Jin Empire
in 1206 and of the court’s military policy more generally. Hua Yue
had been ousted for his criticism of Han Tuozhou and submitted his
collection to the emperor from his place of exile in Jianning , a
known center of commercial printing, around 1208. The request for
the destruction of all woodblocks carrying any work of both authors,
a punishment not warranted by prior legislation, further suggests
that there were political motivations behind the original report on
the circulation of these titles.30
The sole exception to the general lack of evidence concerning the
smuggling of sensitive materials across Song borders in reports and
publishing regulations is the decree issued on July 29, 1202.31 This
decree addressed local government officials across the Song Empire
and reminded them of their responsibility to screen all texts for
30 Hua Yue’s Remedies for Achieving Security was long deemed lost, but a Yuan manuscript
including this title was rediscovered in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth
century. This manuscript (now at Beijing Library), entitled Record of a Northern Mission
(Beizheng lu ), and another Yuan manuscript (now at Nanjing Library) were the
source texts for the punctuated edition included in a combined edition of Hua’s extant
works published in 1993 under the title Cuiwei nanzheng lu, beizheng lu heji
(Hefei: Huangshan shushe, 1993). This edition includes a short biography
of Hua Yue, a textual history of the two titles it incorporates, and transcriptions of
prefatory and other bibliographical materials. For further discussions of Hua Yue and
this work, see Li Chuanyin , “Lun Hua Yue” , Chizhou shizhuan xuebao
(1996:2), 63-69; and Wang Lianbin , “Songdai bingshu ji qi junshi lunli sixiang”
, Junshi lishi yanjiu (1996:2), 173-175. For a similar interpretation
of this decree, see Rao Gong , “Songchao duiyu shubao de guanzhi”
, Wenxian (1979:1), 276.
31 SHY, XF 2:132-133. For an alternative version, see Li Xinchuan , Jianyan
yilai chaoye zaji (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2000), 149-150. This
reading is adopted in An Pingqiu and Zhang Peiheng , Zhongguo jinshu
daguan (Shanghai: Shanghai wenhua chubanshe), 47-48; Liu Pujiang,
“Wenhua de bianjie”, 9, 15 n. 68. For a discussion of these alternative versions, see
Zhu Chuanyu , Songdai xinwen shi (Taibei: Zhongguo xueshu zhuzuo
jiangzhu weiyuanhui, 1967), 235 n. 106. Ming-sun Poon reads the two versions as descriptions
of two separate events: see “Books and Printing in Sung China (960-1279)”
(Ph.D. dissertation, 1979), 61-62. For my part I read them as different but compatible
versions of the same events. I take the view that Li Xinchuan emended the text of the
report (with Dai Shiliu as the name of a merchant) to read “carrying sixteen
cartloads of books” (zai shiliu che ).
book.indb 480book.indb 480 14-11-2006 11:33:5814-11-2006 11:33:58
what did su che see in the north? 481
content discussing state affairs, border issues and military policy before
publication. Materials that violated earlier bans on the discussion of
such topics should not circulate in print and should be forwarded to
the Imperial College. The decree was issued in response to a report
that a certain merchant, Dai Shiliu , was caught with a copy of
Facts of Our Dynasty (Benchao shishi ) in Xuyi Prefecture.32
Situated near the convergence of the Huai and Bian Rivers, Xuyi
(Huainan East, now northeastern Anhui) was the location of the
principal government-supervised market for the exchange of goods
between Song and Jin merchants on Song territory.33 The report
stated that Dai Shiliu intended to cross the Huai River with this
book. Its content suggests that there may have been actually more
than one title involved,34 but it remains unclear how many copies
the merchant transported and whether he was carrying on a business
in books. In any case, it underscores the fact that books were among
the many items private merchants illegally carried across the northern
borders of the Song Empire, even though the trade in books is not as
well-documented as the trade in other items like tea, livestock, and
military supplies (see the next section). More importantly, the ensuing
decree equally suggests that the existence of this trade was exploited
by the Song court to control literati discourse domestically.
The latter interpretation gains further validity when read in the
context of a ban on private accounts of contemporary history issued
earlier in the same year. On March 23, 1202, Emperor Ningzong
(1195-1224) gave his approval to a memorial proposing a ban on
all unofficial accounts of Song history.35 The memorial cited four
works that were circulating in print, all of which were well-known
titles and became source texts for commercial encyclopedias as well
32 For a short description of this title, see Yves Hervouet, ed., A Sung Bibliography
(Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press, 1979), 178-179.
33 For Xuyi and other government-supervised markets, see Quan Hansheng
, “Song Jin de zousi maoyi” , Lishi yuyan yanjiusuo jikan 11 (1944),
425-447; Hok-lam Chan, “Tea Production and Tea Trade under the Jurchen-Chin
Dynasty,” in Studia Sino-Mongolica: Festschrift für Herbert Franke, ed. Wolfgang Bauer
(Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1979), 111-114, slightly revised in Chan, “Commerce
and Trade in Divided China: the Case of Jurchen-Jin Versus the Northern
and Southern Song,” Journal of Asian History 36:2 (2002), 158-167.
34 The fact that two other titles are mentioned in Li Xinchuan’s account also supports
such a reading.
35 SHY, XF 2:138.
book.indb 481book.indb 481 14-11-2006 11:33:5814-11-2006 11:33:58
hilde de weerdt482
as the draft dynastic history. The memorialist demanded that such
sources be scrutinized by the Institute of Historiography, which
should keep for its own use the titles that would serve in its work to
compile a fair history of the Song past. He emphasized that even
those histories that received the Institute’s approval should not be
allowed to circulate in print. This clampdown on private accounts
of the Song past and present has been read as another example of
the anxiety of an autocratic councilor over the representation of his
regime, or his effort to stamp out opposition. This ban on private
histories, issued under the rule of Han Tuozhou, is then read in
the same light as the ban issued by Qin Gui (1090-1155) in
1144.36 Regardless of whether the proposal is read as a sign of the
paranoia of one councilor, or as the expression of a more common
ambivalence towards the circulation of official documents and private
discussions of court policy, the reliance on a report on the potential
export of such materials to the north to reinforce the ban was not
incidental. In short, the 1202 ban is another illustration of how the
north could be construed to control literati discourse.
The concern among high officialdom over the expanding domestic
discussion of court policy, especially regarding the question
of war and peace with the dynasty’s northern neighbors, also fueled
the issuing of the second type of publishing regulations bearing on
Song international relations, those that prohibited the publication
of materials on border affairs. While the information targeted by
these decrees remained the same from the eleventh to the thirteenth
century, there was a marked change in the targeted media. The
reports and decrees issued in 1027, 1055, 1090 and 1108, discussed
above, demanded censorship of collected writings that included memorials
touching upon military and border affairs. Decrees issued
and policy proposals submitted in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries
specifically outlawed the printing and dissemination of individual
memorials (1140, 1193), commercial gazettes (1156, 1193), policy
essays (1175, 1182, ca. 1202), and official documents (1193, ca.
1202).37 As in the cases of the administrative encyclopedia carried
36 For this reading, see An Pingqiu and Zhang Peiheng, ibid. For the ban under Qin
Gui, see Charles Hartman, “The Making of a Villain: Ch’in Kuei and Tao-hsüeh,”
Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 58:1 (1998), 86-117.
37 See Li Xinchuan, Jianyan yilai xinian yaolu (ca. 1208) (Academia
Sinica ed.), 138:853; SHY, XF 2: 118, 121, 125; anon., Qingyuan tiaofa shilei
book.indb 482book.indb 482 14-11-2006 11:33:5814-11-2006 11:33:58
what did su che see in the north? 483
by merchant Dai Shiliu (in 1202) and of the collected policy proposals
compiled by Hua Yue and Gong Rizhang (in 1213), later decrees
also targeted the larger collections of official documents which were
increasingly circulating in commercially printed editions. More than
collected works or general anthologies, small collections of policy
essays, memorials, and other official documents appealed to students
preparing for the policy essay session, the third in the civil service
examinations and the one that determined the rank of the successful
candidates. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries this session required
familiarity with Song history and politics. Commercial and private
publishers capitalized on the appetite for current information among
the hundreds of thousands of students preparing for the examinations.
This trend was accompanied by a more general interest in current
affairs among Song literati, to which political commentaries in
“random jottings” (biji ), the shared reading of official court
gazettes, and the commercial publication of the gazette all testify.38
The regulations on cross-border trade in books and the publishing
regulations on sensitive materials were aimed to exorcize the specter
of a politically active and critical local elite—an elite that settled
down locally but meddled with current court politics.
(ca. 1202, hereafter QYTFSL), in Zhongguo zhenxi falü dianji xubian
, ed. Yang Yifan and Tian Tao (Haerbin: Heilongjiang
renmin chubanshe, 2002), 17:365, 366; Zhou Linzhi , Hailing ji (late 12th
century) (in Siku quanshu [hereafter SKQS]), 3:2b-3b. The latter proposal was written in
immediate response to an edict issued in 1156; see Bi Yuan , Xu zizhi tongjian
(Hanquan ed., 1801), 131:3470.
38 The most authoritative source on Song court gazettes and commercial gazettes
is still Zhu Chuanyu, Songdai xinwen shi, chapters 1 and 2. This work as well as several
more recent articles focus on government regulations and prohibitions of private
gazettes; the history of how gazettes were read remains largely unexplored. See, for
example, Rao Gong, “Songchao duiyu shubao de guanzhi.” For a preliminary inquiry
into the reception history of the gazettes, see De Weerdt, “‘Court Gazettes’ and ‘Short
Reports’: The Blurry Boundaries between Official News and Rumor,” in “Constituting
Social & Political Imaginaries—Three Analyses of News, Rumor & Hearsay in
Imperial China,” panel at the Annual Meeting of the Association for Asian Studies
(San Francisco, April 9, 2006).
book.indb 483book.indb 483 14-11-2006 11:33:5814-11-2006 11:33:58
hilde de weerdt484
Prohibited Goods and Private Trade
Based on the above review of Song reports and decrees, it becomes
clear that there was little or no evidence that sensitive materials
fell into the hands of Liao or Jin merchants. Such lack of evidence
is surprising. By the eleventh century the Song court had set up a
permanent spying network along its borders and even into enemy
territory.39 While the official reports of Song envoys to the Liao
and Jin courts provided little information on cross-border smuggling
(Su Che’s report being no exception in this regard), communications
from border posts kept the court regularly informed about military
developments as well as illegal smuggling along the borders.
Trade was permitted in a limited number of government-supervised
markets. From the tenth to the thirteenth century the Song
court agreed to open up sites for trade with Xi Xia, Liao, and Jin
merchants.40 In the mid-twelfth century, for example, Song-Jin trade
was permitted in nine markets in Song territory. Small merchants
were allowed to leave Song territory and trade in an equivalent
number of supervised markets on the Jin side of the border.41 The
instability of markets whose operations depended on amicable SongJin
relations, government control over the volume of trade, the
exactions imposed by government officials (the total levy for goods
exchanged in Song markets was set at 22.4 %),42 the demand for
goods that could not be raised or produced locally in satisfactory
quantity or quality (e.g. tea, metals, and rice in the north, or wheat
and horses in the south), as well as the vast size of the Song-Jin
border—all of this created the right climate for large-scale smug-
gling.
Military governors charged with the supervision of the borders
reported on repeated violations of the ban on unsupervised private
39 Klaus Flessel, “Die Anfange des staatlichen Geheimdienstes in China,” Nachrichten
der Gesellschaft für Natur- und Völkerkunde Ostasiens 125-126 (1979), 84-97; 40-67.
40 For agreements on the border trade with the Xi Xia Empire, see Herbert Franke
and Denis Crispin Twitchett, eds., The Cambridge History of China, Vol. 6, Alien Regimes
and Border States, 907-1368 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 122, 170;
for those with the Liao, see Tao Jing-shen, Two Sons of Heaven: Studies in Sung-Liao Relations
(Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1988), 16-17, 31-32.
41 Quan Hansheng, “Song Jin de zousi maoyi,” 425-426.
42 Based on the calculations in Hok-lam Chan, “Commerce and Trade in Divided
China,” 161.
book.indb 484book.indb 484 14-11-2006 11:33:5914-11-2006 11:33:59
what did su che see in the north? 485
trade. Their reports outline the main smuggling routes and the types,
quantities, and value of the goods exchanged. The main routes ran
across two border zones between the Song and Jin territories (along
the Huai River, and overland across the borders between the two
empires in the Sichuan-Shaanxi region) and between the coastal
regions of Shandong in the north and Zhejiang-Fujian in the south.
Song merchants exported foods (rice, tea leaves, and ginger), metals
(bronze, iron, gold, and silver), textiles (cotton, silk, hemp), cattle,
human beings, and specialty products such as fish skins and leather,
feathers, lacquer, and books. Song sources reported that Jin merchants
mainly exported cereals, salt and horses. The Song government was
particularly concerned about the trade in hard metals and some of
the specialty products because they could be used for the manufacture
of military equipment.
	 Reports covering the trade in these goods informed the court
about the size and value of confiscated stores or provided estimates of
the scale of smuggling operations. For example, a report from Xuyi
Prefecture submitted in 1165 stated that a merchant by the name of
Xue Tai 薛太 was arrested for attempting to sell two hundred and
twenty-five shark skins across the border.43 The trade in shark skins
was illegal because shagreen could be used for the manufacture of
horse saddles and scabbards, or to coat sword handles.44 An official
who had served in Anfeng 安豐, another of the border prefectures with
a government-supervised market, wrote in 1204 that he confiscated
annually over one thousand cattle horns and pieces of leather that
were destined for northern consumers.45 Cattle horns were used,
since Antiquity, in the manufacture of bows, the most widely used
weapon in warfare during Song times.46 Leather had multiple
military applications, including making harnesses and horse saddles.47
43  SHY, Shihuo 食貨 (hereafter SH), 38:41.
44  The use of shagreen in the manufacture of scabbards is documented in Xu Jing
徐兢 (1091-1153), Xuanhe feng shi Gaoli tujing 宣和奉使高麗圖經 (1124) (SKQS ed.),
29:3b, and Xu Bo 徐
Aanpassingen Chinese karakters
T’oung Pao 92, 4-5
Artikel 2: Sigwalt
p. 34, n. 6: 專題
p. 42, r. 35: unicode: U+24A06
p. 57, r. 21: idem (note that this character should replace the whole part (XXX)
p. 67, r. 62 (1): 郭武
p. 67, r. 62 (2): 道教教儀與現代社會國際學術研討會論文集
Artikel 3: Eskildsen
p. 82, n. 3 (1): 陳先生內丹訣
p. 82, n. 3 (2): 秘傳正陽真人靈寶畢法
p. 82, n. 3 (3): 大丹直指
p. 103, r. 28: 太玄寶典
p. 103, n. 59 (1): 周易參同契
p. 103, n. 59 (2): 陰符經
p. 112, r. 5: 黃泉
p. 112, r. 6: 地下
Artikel 4: Benn
p. 157, n. 129: 教
Artikel 5: De Weerdt
p. 192, n. 44: unicode: U+242B9
p. 195, R. 21: 化外人
(1570-1642), Xu shi bijing 徐氏筆精 (SKQS), 8:26b-27a. Mei
Yaochen 梅堯臣 (1002-1060) mentions the use of small pieces of shagreen in decoratiing
precious swords in Wanling ji 宛陵集 (SKQS ed.), 29:7b.
45  SHY, XF 2:134.
46  JosephNeedhamandRobinYates,eds.,Science and civilisation in China (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1994), vol. 5, part VI, 104, 109-110, 126, 134, 272.
47  Wang Zengyu 王曾瑜, Songchao bingzhi chutan 宋朝兵制初探 (Beijing: Zhonghua
shuju, 1983), 275-279. Also SHY, SH 52:9.
tp92-45_deweerdt-rev.indd 485 15-11-2006 12:25:09
hilde de weerdt486
In 1160 Wang Huai (1127-1189), then Policy Monitor to the
Right, submitted a report on the illegal sale of what he considered
to be the most problematic goods in the trade between the Song and
Jin along the Huai River.48 He had surveyed the border region in
Huainan East and Huainan West prior to this report,49 and argued
that the court was losing control over the trade in tea, cattle and coins.
He estimated that seventy to eighty thousands heads of cattle were
transacted in Zhengzhuang , a place in the west of Jiangzhou
(alternate name for Guangzhou , Huainan West, now in
Henan Province). Most of this trade was unsupervised. Zhengzhuang
had, according to the information Wang gathered on his fieldtrip,
become one of the central nodes in the illegal private trade network.
Private trade in coins was especially rampant as several dozens of
people reportedly crossed the Huai with cash every day, knowing
that one string was worth several in the north.
Comparable figures on the size of confiscated stocks and estimated
transactions or descriptions of the trafficking routes are lacking
in reports on the alleged smuggling of books. Neither are books
mentioned in the lists of various types of contraband. In an 1171
report enumerating several goods that could be put to military use,
for example, books are, contrary to claims of their strategic value to
Jin informants, not discussed.50 Still, despite the lack of detail on the
illegal book trade, Song prohibitions and other sources suggest that
books did cross the borders separating the Song, Xi Xia, Liao and Jin
Empires. Xi Xia, Liao and Jin envoys received on occasion books from
the Song court.51 Books written or printed in Liao and Jin territory
were, despite reciprocal prohibitions, smuggled into Song territory.52
None of the titles mentioned appear to have fallen in the category of
sensitive military or current policy materials, however. Song sources
report on the success of Jin spies in acquiring intelligence on Song
48 Li Xinchuan, Jianyan yilai xinian yao lu, 186:649.
49 SHY, SH 38:38.
50 SHY, XF 2:158.
51 ZhangXiumin,Zhongguo yinshua shi, 231, 256; Kwang-tsing Wu, “Chinese Printing
under Four Alien Dynasties (916-1369 A. D.),” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 13:
3-4 (1950), 452.
52 ZhangXiumin,op.cit.,267;LiuMingshu , “Songdai chubanfa ji dui Liao
Jin zhi shujin” , Zhongguo wenhua yanjiu huikan 5:1 (1946),
105.
book.indb 486book.indb 486 14-11-2006 11:33:5914-11-2006 11:33:59
what did su che see in the north? 487
military and political decisions,53 but this intelligence generally does
not appear to have come from printed books. In one famous and rare
instance, a Jin client reportedly offered a large sum for a privately
printed edition of a letter of remonstrance. In this letter, written in
1138, Hu Quan (1102-1180), who had been appointed to the
position of Compiler in the Bureau of Military Affairs the year before,
offered a sharp criticism of the politicies of Qin Gui, the architect of
the peace negotiations between the Song and Jin in the 1130s and
1140s.54 Whether the interested buyer obtained the letter remains
unclear from the account.55
In contrast to the lack of evidence on illegal foreign trade in
books, there is plenty of evidence that commercial anthologies of
official documents, memorials and examination essays were circulating
among Song scholars. Extant private catalogues contain examples
of transcripts and of commercial anthologies of the draft dynastic
histories, veritable records and collected statutes, as well as commercial
anthologies of memorials and examination essays, and Song legal
materials. Such materials are indicative of the interest in current
affairs among the Song scholarly elite.
Conclusion: “The North” and Song Political Culture
Regulations on publishing became increasingly numerous and
systematic over the course of the Song Dynasty. This is readily apparent
from a comparison between the regulations on the dissemination of
confidential information and banned materials in the Tang Code of
737 (Tang lü , originally the Code and Subcommentary [Lü shu
])—which were largely reproduced in the early Song code, the
(Song) Xingtong ( ) of 963—and the Classified Laws of the Qingyuan
Period (Qingyuan tiaofa shilei ), dating to ca. 1202. The
Tang Code prohibited the private possession (and thus the private
publication) of astrological works, maps, military treatises, esoteric
materials, unofficial calendars, and some divination manuals. It also
53 Zhu Chuanyu, Songdai xinwen shi, 101-119.
54 Ibid., 158.
55 The original account in Hu Quan’s biography in The History of the Song Dynasty
states that a person from Jin “searched” (mu ) for it. Tuotuo , Songshi (Beijing:
Zhonghua shuju, 1977), 133:11583.
book.indb 487book.indb 487 14-11-2006 11:33:5914-11-2006 11:33:59
hilde de weerdt488
included a provision that the punishment for the dissemination of
information either confidential (defined as relating to military and
policing campaigns) or sensitive (defined as secret but not of major
importance to state security, such as observations of anomalies)
was increased one degree when the information was shared with
foreign envoys.56 The Tang Code thus forbade possession of types of
materials that had been considered detrimental to the preservation
of the sociopolitical order since the early imperial period.57 Official
documents and other literature relating to contemporary court policy
and foreign affairs were not specifically targeted. The dissemination
of such news abroad was a concern, but, as it was not disseminated
in print at the time, the concern focused on foreign envoys visiting
the court and the capital of Chang’an, where such information was
concentrated. The Code did not differentiate between the dissemination
of sensitive information orally, in manuscript, or in print.
In contrast to the limited discussion of publishing regulations under
the section on administrative rules in the Tang Code, the Classified
Laws of the Qingyuan Period added a subsection on the dissemination
of sensitive information (under “administrative rules”) and a separate
section on official documents. In the former section, the sharing of
secret information with all manner of foreigners (Huawai ren
)58 was outlawed. The section on official documents stipulated
the punishments for the printing of policy essays touching upon
foreign affairs and the printing of all official documents relating to
border affairs. This section also specifically prohibited the printing
56 Wallace Stephen Johnson, The T’ang Code (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1979-1997), 2:77-79. Cf. Niida Noboru , “Keigen jÙhÙ jirui to SÙdai
no shuppanhÙ” , in Chågoku hÙseishi kenkyå
(Tokyo: TÙkyÙ daigaku shuppankai, 1981 [1935]), 446-448.
57 Astrological and esoteric materials were outlawed in 267 under the Western Jin
Dynasty. More bans on these materials followed between the fourth and sixth centuries.
See An Pingqiu and Zhang Peiheng, Zhongguo jinshu daguan, 13-26. Hok-lam Chan
(Control of Publishing in China, Past and Present, 2) writes that the Tang Code also banned
the transcription and distribution of “government statutes” and “national histories”
but does not cite relevant evidence.
58 This was a legal term in use already in the Tang Code where it is glossed as “persons
of those barbarian countries who have their own rulers and leaders.” Johnson,
1:252. Whether or not “the northerns” (beiren) were systematically covered under those
rules requires further inquiry. There are instances in the legal and historical literature
where northerners are juxtaposed to and thus distinguished from the more general
category of foreigners. See, for example, XZZTJCB, 289:7068.
book.indb 488book.indb 488 14-11-2006 11:33:5914-11-2006 11:33:59
what did su che see in the north? 489
of documents on current affairs, imperial writings, legal codes, and
collected statutes, as well as the copying and dissemination of other
court archival compilations such as the draft dynastic histories and
the veritable records.59
The innovations of Song publishing law reflected the spread of
commercial printing in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. They
also resulted from changes in imperial political culture. Literati
discourse on the northern homeland provided both the impetus for
the systematization of Song publishing regulations and the reason
behind their limited effect. The court’s attempts to control and legally
curtail the dissemination of current information about the north and
destined to it were directed first of all at the appetite for news among
the growing number of Song literati and commercial efforts to satisfy
this demand. Literati discourse about the northern homeland fed the
appetite for news and was a key feature of the imperial identities of
the Song literate elite. By the late twelfth century a vociferous group
of literati called for the recovery of the northern territories and found
themselves at odds with the prevailing court policy of appeasement
with the Jin court. The twelfth-century expansion of print culture
amplified the dissonance between court policies and literati opinion
about the north, a dissonance that the court proved unable to contain
despite the systematization of publishing regulations.
Allusions to the threat of the north in Song publishing regulations
were motivated by tensions internal to Song political culture rather
than by the documented ability of the Song’s northern neighbors to
engage in a sizable illegal trade in information. During Song times,
the meaning of “the north” was contested and shaped by opposing
tendencies in Song political culture. It was shaped by the political
self-consciousness of the scholarly elite: elite political discourse was
characterized by the desire to include the north in Song perceptions
of itself. Politically aware scholars therefore took a special interest in
current information about the Liao and Jin Empires and the Song’s
relations with them.
In reaction to literati interest in the discussion of current state
affairs, an interest that was now prevalent among students and
scholars who were not part of officialdom, court officials took
political action to contain that self-consciousness. Action against the
59 QYTFSL, 8:145-148, 16-17: 333-379, esp. 146, 364-5.
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hilde de weerdt490
unofficial publication of official and scholarly materials was justified
by claims about the threat of the north. In their reports court officials
represented the north as a major security threat that warranted official
inspection of all materials commercially published across the Song
Empire. In this sense, “the north” stood for an expanded political
elite, increasingly dominated by southerners, who were intent on
participating in the discussion of court affairs.
The dual images of the north expose a paradox in Song political
culture—a paradox that characterized the lives of some of its
greatest politicians. Take for example Su Shi. Su Shi supported
the proposals his brother submitted in 1090. He followed up with
a proposal for restricting the dissemination of written materials to
Korea in early 1093. On the other hand, he took pride in the fact
that some of his recent writings were in demand all the way up
north.60 As Yu Yingshi has recently argued, Song scholar-officials
differed from their predecessors in that they made a claim and felt
a responsibility for shared governance between the emperor and
the court and bureaucracy.61 But even among those who exercised
this responsibility for shared governance, the participation in policy
discussions of students and scholars who were not part of officialdom
remained an issue of great concern—a threat as great or even greater
than the north itself.
Appendix A
Song Reports and Decrees Prohibiting the Cross-border
Smuggling of Books to Liao and Jin Territory
Date Content Source
1000 Decree banning the export of all books except the nine
classics
SS 186:4562
1006 Repeat of 1000 XZZTJCB
289:7068
60 Su Shi, Su Shi wenji , ed. Gu Zhichuan (Changsha: Yuelu shushe,
2000), 745-51. Zhu Chuanyu, Songdai xinwen shi, 190-2. For a discussion of Su
Shi’s three memorials expressing his opposition to the imperial gift of selected titles
to the Korean court, see Egan, “Book Printing and Resistance to It in Song Dynasty
China.”
61 Yu Yingshi , Zhu Xi de lishi shijie: Songdai shidafu zhengzhi wenhua de yanjiu
: , 2 vols. (Taibei: Yunchen, 2003).
book.indb 490book.indb 490 14-11-2006 11:34:0014-11-2006 11:34:00
what did su che see in the north? 491
Date Content Source
1027 Report on the sale of printed copies of literary collections
of court officials on the border market in Xiongzhou
SHY, XF 2:16
1040 Report stating that booksellers in the capital collect and
print materials on border affairs and spread them abroad.
Kaifeng Prefecture ordered to take action and report
back.
SHY, XF 2:24
1055 Ouyang Xiu’s “Memorial on the Printing of Documents”
warning against the potential spread to the north of
printed literary collections with sensitive materials
Ouyang Yongshu ji
114-115.
1071 Decree prohibiting the transfer of maps to foreign
emissaries in postal stations and along their route
SHY, ZG 22:9
1078 Repeat of 1000 XZZTJCB
289:7068
1090 Su Che’s “Matters I Observed at the Northern Court
Inconvenient to Our Court” alleging the large-scale
smuggling to the north of printed materials with secret
information
Luancheng ji 937-
938
1093 Su Shi’s memorials asking for a denial of a Korean
request for Song books on the grounds that granting
the request would make the ban on the sale of books to
the Liao Empire ineffective. Koreans were suspected of
transferring Song materials to Liao agents.
Su Shi wenji, 745-
751
1108 Decree ordering that violators of the ban on carrying
books across the border be punished according to the
regulations on carrying copper coins across the border.
The decree stated that many literary collections and
books printed in Song territory had been found in the
north. (For the regulations on carrying copper coins
current in the late twelfth century, see QYTFSL, 29:410-
415.)
SHY, XF 2:47
1122 Memorial asking that court diaries (rilu) be banned
from circulation domestically and abroad because they
contained security information
SHY, XF 2:86
1126 Memorial asking that official communications dealing
with border affairs not be made public to prevent
information from being leaked to the enemy
BMHB 52:394
1175 Decree prohibiting the smuggling of examination essays
and geographical sources
SHY, XF 2:118
1182 Decree to be forwarded to all prefectures ordering that
the ban on the printing and sale of examination policy
essays be strictly implemented. The decree quoted from
an official opinion stating that even though laws on the
smuggling of books were strict, they were frequently
violated by those intent on making a profit. It was
therefore safer not to have policy essays on current
policies circulate.
SHY, XF 2:121
ca.
1202
Law prohibiting the sharing of official documents and
information on border defense with foreigners
QYTFSL 8:146
1202 Decree prohibiting the unauthorized printing of materials
on border affairs. A special appeal was made to border
regions in response to a report on the capture of privately
printed works on Song history in the possession of a
private merchant in Xuyi Prefecture
SHY, XF 2:132-133
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hilde de weerdt492
1213 Endorsement of an official request for a prohibition on
the sale of items touching on current policy and border
affairs. This decree was issued in response to a report on
the confiscation of two commercially printed collections
of memorials touching upon military policy. The
memorialist argued that much harm would ensue if these
materials were leaked to the north.
SHY, XF 2:138
Appendix B
Song Reports and Decrees Prohibiting
the Circulation of Materials on Border Affairs
Date Content Source
1027 Report on the sale of printed copies of literary collections
of court officials on the border market in Xiongzhou.
The report stated that such collections contained secret
information about border defense.
SHY, XF 2:16
1039 Decree stating that border affairs can be thoroughly
discussed, but news about them cannot be spread
Song ji sanchao
zhengyao 2:27b
1040 Report stating that booksellers in the capital collect and
print materials on border affairs and spread them abroad.
Kaifeng Prefecture ordered to take action and report
back.
SHY, XF 2:24
1041 Decree warning examination candidates not to discuss
border affairs and important state affairs as a tool for
career advancement
SHY, XF 2:25,
also SHY, YZ 7:22
1042 Decree prohibiting petitions on border affairs from people
of all walks of life. According to the report, most such
petitions were based on materials sold by booksellers
who culled them from authors’ writings. Petitioners were
accused of currying favor.
SHY, YZ 7:22
1043 Memorial referring to a recent decree prohibiting officials
working in the Document Transmission Office to leak
reports on the Jiang-Huai armies
Ouyang Yongshu ji,
Zouyi ji 19
1071 Approval of a memorial asking for a prohibition on the
reporting of news on border affairs and on the excerpting
of related memorials in court gazettes
SHY, ZG 2:46
1078 Edict prohibiting the inhabitants of Hangzhou from
selling books touching on border affairs to Koreans
XZZTJCB
303:7379
1078 Edict prohibiting the printing of the work of Imperial
College student Zhong Shimei because some of it touched
upon border affairs
XZZTJCB
294:7166
1081 Edict prohibiting the discussion of border affairs in
private correspondence of border officials
XZZTJCB
306:7637
1090 Approval of a proposal prohibiting the copying and
distribution of texts on borders affairs
SHY, XF 2:38
1122 Decree prohibiting the discussion of border affairs in
private correspondence of border officials
SHY, XF 2:86
1125 Edict punishing the discussion of border affairs with exile BMHB 20:147
1126 Memorial asking that official communications dealing
with border affairs not be made public in order to prevent
information from being leaked to the enemy
BMHB 52:394
book.indb 492book.indb 492 14-11-2006 11:34:0014-11-2006 11:34:00
what did su che see in the north? 493
Date Content Source
1133 Approval of a memorial asking for a prohibition on the
excerpting of memorials discussing border affairs in court
gazettes (cf. 1071)
SHY, ZG 2:48
1134 Decree stipulating that leaking information on border
affairs will be treated according to martial law
SHY, XF 2:148
1140 Decree stipulating that memorials that have not yet been
implemented and that touch upon border affairs cannot
be printed
Yaolu 138:853
1156 Imperial edict lashing out against the spread of false
rumors and the discussion of border affairs among
officials
Yaolu 172:418;
XZZTJ 131:3470
1156 Examination graduate Liang Xun exiled for discussing
Song-Jin military affairs in a petition
Yaolu 172:418
(different version
in BMHB
128:1638)
1167 Approval of a proposal not to send the court gazette to
border prefectures
SHY, ZG 2:51
1182 Decree to be forwarded to all prefectures ordering that
the ban on the printing and sale of examination policy
response essays be strictly implemented. The decree
quoted from an official opinion stating that even though
laws on the smuggling of books were strict, they were
frequently violated by those intent on making a profit. It
was therefore safer not to have policy response essays on
current policy circulate.
SHY, XF 2:121
1193 Approval of a proposal banning the circulation of
commercial gazettes. The memorialist argued that
gazettes touching on state and border affairs could cause
great damage if circulated.
SHY, XF 2:125
1193 Proposal demanding a prohibition on the unchecked
printing of courts officials’ memorials, censors’ reports,
sealed memorials, scholars’ examination essays that touch
upon state secrets (border and military affairs are not
specifically mentioned, but implied)
SHY, XF 2:125
ca.
1202
Law prohibiting the printing of materials on border issues QYTFSL 17:364
ca.
1202
Law punishing the printing of examination essays with
the penalty of eighty blows, and issuing the higher penalty
of exile at three thousand li for policy essays discussing
information about the enemy
QYTFSL 17:365
ca.
1202
Law prohibiting the sharing of official documents and
information on border defense with foreigners
QYTFSL 8:146
1202 Decree prohibiting the unauthorized printing of materials
on border affairs. A special appeal was made to border
regions in response to a report on the confiscation of
privately printed works on Song history in the possession
of a private merchant in Xuyi Prefecture
SHY, XF 2:132-
133
1213 Endorsement of an official request for a prohibition on
the sale of items touching on current policy and border
affairs. This decree was issued in response to a report on
the capture of two commercially printed collections of
memorials touching upon military policy. The memorialist
argued that much harm would ensue if these materials
were leaked to the north.
SHY, XF 2:138
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hilde de weerdt494
Appendix Sources:
BMHB: Xu Mengxin , Sanchao beimeng huibian (SKQS ed.).
QYTFSL: Anon., Qingyuan tiaofa shilei , in Zhongguo zhenxi falü dianji
xubian , ed. Yang Yifan and Tian Tao (Haerbin:
Heilongjiang renmin chubanshe, 2002).
SHY: Xu Song , Song huiyao jigao (Academia Sinica ed.). XF: Xingfa
; ZG: Zhiguan ; YZ: Yizhi .
SS: Tuotuo , Songshi (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1977).
XZZTJ: Bi Yuan , Xu zizhi tongjian (Hanquan ed.).
XZZTJCB: Li Tao , Xu zizhi tongjian changbian (Academia
Sinica ed.).
Yaolu: Li Xinchuan , Jianyan yilai xinian yaolu (Academia
Sinica ed.).
Anon., Songji sanchao zhengyao (SKQS ed.).
Ouyang Xiu , Ouyang Yongshu ji , 3 vols., Guoxue jiben congshu
(Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1933).
Su Che , Luancheng ji , ed. Zeng Zaozhuang and Ma Defu
(Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1987).
Su Shi, Su Shi wenji , ed. Gu Zhichuan (Changsha: Yuelu shushe,
2000).
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