Cai Wenji (蔡文姬), courtesy name Yan (名琰), was originally named Zhaoji (昭姬), and during the Jin Dynasty, he avoided Sima Zhaoji and changed the character to Wen Ji .jín ji (文姬). General Hanzhong Lang and daughter of Chen Liu Cai Yong. His surviving works include "Eighteen Beats of Hu Di" and two poems of "Poems of Sorrow and Indignation".
Her story was first found in Wei Shi Ding's "Cai Bo Cao Female Endowment" and Cao Pi's "Preface" written for this endowment. Later, Fan Ye recorded his events in the Book of the Later Han Dynasty. Since then, for thousands of years, Cai Wenji has been passed down as a talented woman.
Cai Wenji was a native of the late Han dynasty and early Wei Dynasty, at the same time as Cao Cao. However, we go through the entire Romance of the Three Kingdoms and can't find a single word about her. Such a major event as "Wen Ji's return to Han" is not recorded in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. It's really weird.
We know that In the choice of historical materials, Chen Shou's attitude is much more rigorous than Fan Ye's. For example, on the death of Xun Or, the Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms writes that "or illness to stay in Shouchun, to worry about it, when the age is fifty", while the Book of Later Han records that "or illness stays in Shouchun, feeding food, hair vision, is an empty vessel, so drink medicine and die." Fifty years old". The difference in their attitude toward history can be seen.
Chen Shou did not write Cai Wenji's story into the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and there are three reasons for analyzing:
1) He thinks that Cai Wenji's affairs are not important, so he does not remember. However, the evaluation of the matter of "Wen Ji's return to Han" in the past generations is very high, and I believe that Chen Shou is not such a person without vision. So this reason should not hold.
2) He thinks that cai Wenji's things are not true, so he does not remember. Chen Shou and Cai Wenji lived in only about fifty years apart, so his attitude choice was more authoritative. If this reason is true, then Cai Wenji and her story should not be true.
3) This reason is even more frightening: in the era when Chen Shou lived, there was no story of "Wen Ji Returning to Han" at all. It sounds a bit ridiculous, obviously before Chen Shou, Ding Shu and Cao Pi had already written a fu and preface for Cai Wenji, how could Chen Shou not have heard of this? And I think that's the most likely reason.
The people of the Six Dynasties like to imitate antiquity and falsification, which is the consensus of the historical circles. "Cai BoCao Female Endowment" and "Cai BoZai Female Endowment Sequence" are likely to be concocted by that group of good literati, borrowed the names of Ding Xi and Cao Pi, and then circulated. And Fan Ye did not know it, and included it in the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, so that posterity was deceived by it.
Cao Pi and Ding Were political enemies. Ding Xi was the most resolute "pro-plant faction", supporting Cao Zhi and Cao Pi in the "succession dispute". After Cao Pi took the throne, the first thing he did was to immediately cut off Ding Li's head.
According to the friendship between these two people, Cao Pi wrote the preface to Ding Xi's article, which is really confused by the "sunrise of the West".
In fact, in history, many scholars have expressed doubts about the authenticity of Cai Wenji and his person.
1) The Later Han Shu Biography of Dong Qi's Wife says that Cai Wenji was the daughter of Cai Yong, a scholar at the end of the Han Dynasty. However, looking through the "Biography of Cai Yong" in the same book, I can't see any record of Cai Wenji.
2) The Later Han Shu Dong Qi's Biography of His Wife says: "Cao Cao Su and Yong Shan, who suffered from their lack of heirs, sent emissaries to redeem them with gold bi." That is to say, Cai Wenji was cai yong's only daughter, and after Cai Yong's death, Cao Cao was afraid that Cai Yong's family would break the incense, so he spent a lot of money to redeem Wen Ji from the Xiongnu and married her to a small official under him, Dong Qi. However, in fact, in addition to Cai Wenji, Cai Yong also had at least one son and one daughter.
Another daughter of Cai Yong (whose name is unknown) was the wife of Taishou Yangdao of the Shangdang of the Wei Dynasty. The Yang family was a prominent clan in Taishan County, and Cai Yong fled to the Yang family for several years because of his outspokenness, until Dong Zhuo entered the capital and used him as a servant.
This person did not have any popularity in the history of the Three Kingdoms. However, one of his sons and a daughter were prominent figures in that period of history. His daughter Yang Huiyu was married to Sima Shi. The "Biography of the Later Concubines of the Book of Jin" records that "(Empress Jingxian) mother Chen Liu Cai, the daughter of Hanzhong Lang's general Yong". The son of Yang Dao, everyone will not be strangers. It is the outstanding military figure of the Wei and Jin dynasties, the general Yang Jue of the Southern Expedition. The "Book of Jin and The Biography of The Estimation of The Sheep" records: "Estimation, cai yong's grandson, empress Jingxian's brother-in-law".
Cai Yong must have at least one more son, and the name is no longer available. But his grandson's name was Cai Xian, which is recorded in the Book of Jin and the Biography of the Yang Dynasty. Cai Xuan was rewarded with the Marquis of Guannei for the merits of his cousin Yang Jue, with 300 households.
3) The Eighteen Beats of Hu Di, which has always been considered to be Cai Wenji's famous work, is not found in the Book of later Han and is not mentioned in the Book of Later Han and the Biography of Dong Qi's Wife. It is also not recorded in the omitted Anthology of Literature and the Jade New Wing. Later generations speculated that it was most likely a forgery of the Tang Dynasty. Those who hold this view include Su Dongpo, a great scholar of the Song Dynasty.
Let's take a look at some of the clips from "Eighteen Beats of Hu Di". "The beacon at the head of the city has not been extinguished, when will the battlefield conquest stop?" Murderous qi towards the rushing door, Hu wind blowing the moon at night." Even sancao at that time probably could not write such a neat seven-character poem, which was indeed no different from the Biansai poem of the Tang Dynasty.
Although so many doubts are listed, if you hastily deny the existence of Cai Wenji, it is lost in arbitrariness. The subject of her has been debated for more than a thousand years and will continue to be debated.
It's just that when we read history books, if we can bring a critical eye, we may get another kind of gain.