Start with the Chronicle of History
As we all know, the "Records of History" written by Sima Qian of the Western Han Dynasty is the first general history of Chinese history, which records a total of more than 3,000 years from the legendary Yellow Emperor in ancient times to the first four years of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. Sima Qian's writing went through hardships and endured humiliation and burdens, and it took 14 years before it was completed. Please note that the three words "Ji Chuan Style" refer to the style of history books, and this article will start from the "History of History" to talk about the style of various historical books in history.
Classification of related concepts and history books
History: A record of a series of events in the course of human development and human society.
Shi Guan: In ancient times, he was in charge of official books and was responsible for keeping notes and chronicles.
The role of history: to record the facts, to learn from the past, to persuade the good and correct the evil.
Zhengshi: The official revision of authentic and orthodox history books, such as the Twenty-Four Histories, plus the "Draft History of the Qing Dynasty" for the Twenty-five Histories.
Other histories: History books with freer styles, more diverse themes, and larger content scope outside the official history.
Wild history: Generally refers to notes, biographies, miscellaneous records, and interesting facts written by private individuals based on historical facts.
The history books are divided according to the style as follows: chronicle style, chronicle style, chronicle style, political system (canonical style), study case style, historical commentary, Fang Zhi, etc., and are described below.
Chronology
The style of historical events is described sequentially in chronological order, that is, time. Advantages: The occurrence and evolution of historical facts can clearly indicate their time position, giving people a clear sense of historical timing; the connection between various historical events at the same time is more clear. Disadvantages: The events related before and after are often spaced because of the staggered occurrence of other events, which is difficult to describe completely and appears chaotic. Such as: "Spring and Autumn", "Zizhi Tongjian".
Ji Chuan body
Taking people as the main body and center, around the personal narrative to reflect the style of historical events. The "Records of History", which was first created by Sima Qian, takes the "Ji" overview as the outline, describes the events in detail with the "biography", lists the system in the "table", and divides the "Zhi" into categories. Advantages: vivid description of characters, detailed historical facts, complete analysis data; disadvantages: character events will be repeated in different parts.
Chronicle ends
The historical book style with historical events as the outline was first created in the Northern Song Dynasty Yuan Shu's "General Chronicle at the End of the Chronicle". He gathered together the events of a system recorded in chronological order in the Zizhi Tongjian and elaborated on them from the beginning to the end. Pros: Coherent notes, logical and organized. Later historians have followed suit, and there have been corresponding chronicles in the past. For example: "The End of the Chronicle of the Song Dynasty", "The End of the Chronicle of the Yuan Dynasty", and the "End of the Chronicle of the Ming Dynasty" by Qinggu Yingtai. Until the Ming and Qing dynasties, most of the names were various "Ji Luo" and "Fang Strategies".
Political system (canonical style)
With the canonical system used in state management as the center, it is divided into historical books that describe the canonical system of successive dynasties and their origins, development and evolution. There are also corresponding chapters in the "Records of History" and "Book of Han", but the time and content described are relatively limited. The first influential canonical political book in Chinese historiography was the Tongdian (通典) by Du You of the Tang Dynasty, which included the canonical system from the Yellow Emperor to the Tang Dynasty.
Tang Duyou wrote the Tongdian (通典), Zheng Qiao (郑樵) of the Southern Song Dynasty (通志), and Ma Duanlin (马端麟) of the Yuan Dynasty (元端麟) wrote the "Literature Tongkao", collectively known as the Three Links.
Study case
Describe the origin, development and evolution of scholarship. Each type of study should explain the lineage, origin, subject and life of the school, academic thought, academic treatises, relevant comments, etc. This is a special category of academic intellectual history, which provides scholars with literature for the study of academic thought throughout the ages. For example: "Song Yuanxue Case", "Ming Confucianism Case", "Qing Confucianism Case" and so on.
Historical Review
Commenting on historical events or works of historical books. The Tang Dynasty Liu Zhiji's Shi Tong is the first systematic monograph on historical theory in China.
The scope of "Stone" is very broad, and it can basically be summarized into two categories: historical theory and historical criticism. Historical theory refers to the exposition of historical styles, compilation methods, and the system of historians; historical criticism includes commenting on historical events, discussing the gains and losses of historical books, and examining the differences between right and wrong in historical events.
The Qing Dynasty historian Zhao Yi's "Twenty-two Historical Notes" consists of thirty-six volumes of historical commentaries.
Fang Zhi class
Also known as local history, it is a historical book that records local conditions, which is characterized by detailed descriptions and is an important material for understanding local history. For example, the early "Shang Shu - Yu Gong" and "Classic of Mountains and Seas" have the characteristics of local history. Later generations have followed the evolution, and there are records of provinces, provinces, prefectures, and counties in various places.
Celebrity reading history
Mencius: "If you believe in the Book, it is better to have no Book." I am in "Wucheng", take two or three strategies. The benevolent man is invincible to the world, so that the benevolent is unkind, and what kind of blood is the pestle? It can be seen that reading history requires independent thinking and has its own view of history.
Mao Zedong: All his life, he loved to read history, was good at combining with reality, and analyzed gains and losses with history as a mirror. In particular, he loved to read the "Twenty-Four Histories", often commented on ancient and modern figures, and left many classic comments: "Do not sell the overlord of fame and learning", "Zhuge is only cautious in his life, Lü Duan is not confused about major matters", "Familiar with the Tang feudal theory, Mo Congzi hou returned to King Wen". Public publications include The Twenty-Four Histories of Mao Zedong's Commentaries.
British Bacon: Reading history makes people wise, reading poetry makes people smart, mathematics makes people thoughtful, and philosophy makes people profound.
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