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Portrait of Nian Xiyao
His family, once glorious and beautiful.
He himself was versatile, leaving many scientific works, and was even praised by posterity as "Leonardo da Vinci of the Qing Dynasty", but all his scientific research is not even recorded in the main history.
He is Nian Xiyao.
01
Nian Xiyao was born in 1671 and belonged to the Yellow Banner of the Han Army.
His father had served as an inspector in the Kangxi Dynasty, so Nian Xiyao was also a high-ranking cadre.
As a flag man, he did not take the path of the imperial examination, but followed the path taken by many flag people, starting from the pen-and-post style (a lower-level official in the Qing Dynasty, responsible for Manchu Chinese translation, mainly a flag person).
Supposedly, he had the path of an old father, and his career should be very smooth, however, he worked as a writer from his early twenties to 36 years old before he mixed with a prefect.
After becoming the prefect, Nian Xiyao stumbled and climbed in the official arena for seventeen years, until the age of 52, when he was mixed with the official position of acting (acting) inspector of the envoy.
It can be seen that this grandfather is not good at mixing up the officialdom.
02
Why has the grand duke of Nian been mixing smoothly in the official arena? Is he not smart enough?
No, in fact, he is a person with a very high IQ and can be called a bully.
The reason why he has risen so slowly is mainly because most of his mind is spent elsewhere.
The first is painting.
His work "Crane And Heron Scroll Scroll" is currently in the collection of the Palace Museum, which can be seen that his painting skills have reached a fairly high level.
Nian Xiyao's "Crane and Heron Scroll Scroll" is now in the Palace Museum
The second is music.
Nian Xiyao likes to play the guqin, so he also has a lot of research on rhyme and notation, and is also a well-known guqin collector, who is very good at identifying the guqin.
One of his collections, Song Xuan and Guqin, sold for 18 million yuan at an auction in 2010.
The third is medicine.
Nian Xiyao has always been interested in traditional Chinese medicine, and when he was in Beijing, he often went to the Tai Hospital to have various discussions with the Tai Doctors, or looked up medical books and recorded various prescriptions.
In the forty-ninth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1710), his book "Collecting Good Prescriptions" was officially published, which included modern Chinese medicine internal, external, gynecological, children, facial features, bone injuries, tumors, skin, sores, dentistry, male and female sexually transmitted diseases, reproductive infertility, hemorrhoids, beauty, black hair, hair growth and other departments, recording more than 1,600 prescriptions from generation to generation, and treating more than 100 kinds of diseases.
"A Good Recipe"
The fourth is history.
Nian Xiyao compiled the chronicle of historiography of the Gangjian Jiazitu, which was later translated by Western missionaries and published in Europe under the title of "Chinese Historical Chronicle", which attracted widespread attention from the European academic community and made Nian Xiyao a celebrity in the European academic circles.
Nian Xiyao's compilation of the "Gangjian Jiazi Diagram"
The fifth is hermeneutics.
On the basis of the "Five Fang Vowels" written by Fan Tengfeng in the early Qing Dynasty, Nian Xiyao made some additions and deletions, and compiled it into the "Complete Book of Re-proofing and Supplementing the Five Fang Vowels", which was published in the forty-ninth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1711), which became the dictionary with the largest collection of Chinese characters at that time, and occupied a place in the history of Chinese exegesis.
However, Nian Xiyao's greatest interest was mathematics, especially the study of Western mathematics that had been introduced to China at that time.
He not only learned it himself, but also focused on disseminating and popularizing this mathematical knowledge.
The Biography of a Qing Dynasty scientist, the Biography of a Domain Man, calls it "an excerpt from Khenpo, a key figure measured by the Westerners."
During the Kangxi Dynasty, he personally wrote mathematical works such as the three volumes of the Measuring Dao Gui, the one volume of the "Surface Proportion Handbook", and the one volume of the "Logarithmic Guangyun", and the word "logarithm" was first proposed by him.
Mei Wending, the top mathematician of the Kangxi Dynasty, also had a close exchange with this up-and-coming man who was more than thirty years younger than him, and made a high evaluation of him: "Hand-made small armillary instruments measure various instruments, list a few cases, and are extremely fine, shining in the seat." Gong Came down to Jane, shu took care of many things, and also personally inherited Di, looking at the strange instruments and strange books he hid, which were unheard of every day. ”
In 1711, Lao Mei, who was nearly eighty years old, published his own mathematical work "Explanation of Degree Arithmetic", and specially invited Nian Xiyao to write a preface to this book.
To be able to get the favor of a mathematical big man of Lao Mei's level, Nian Xiyao's level can be seen.
Nian Xiyao's "Handbook of Facial Proportions"
The grand duke of Nian put so much time and energy into all kinds of academic research, do you think his officials can still do a good job?
But people don't care.
Anyway, the Nian family does not worry about eating and drinking, being a person, the most important thing is to be happy, right?
Fast forward to November of the 61st year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1722), when the Kangxi Emperor died and was succeeded by the fourth son of the Emperor, Yin Chan, as the Yongzheng Emperor.
The eldest duke never expected that from here, his life would take a major turn.
03
When Yin Chan was still the Prince of Yong, Nian Xiyao's sister Nian Shi was working as a maid in the palace, and was later taken in by Yin Chan and adopted her as a concubine of Fujin (concubine).
When Yin Chan became emperor, Nian Shi also rose with the tide and became a noble concubine.
In this way, Nian Xiyao and his younger brother Nian Qianyao became uncles of the country.
Soon, Nian Xiyao was given the title of Inspector of Guangdong and finally stepped into the ranks of feudal governors, while Nian Qianyao, who was both literate and martial, was awarded the title of "Fuyuan Grand General", commanding a large army to go to Qinghai to quell the rebellion of Luobuzang Danjin, becoming the first Han general in the history of the Qing Dynasty, and the Nian clan could be described as red and purple.
However, just as the so-called people have bad luck, the days of the Nian family's great prosperity did not pass two years later, and Nian Guifei died of illness.
As soon as Nian Guifei died, Yongzheng immediately turned his face to his brother-in-law Nian Qianyao, issued an edict convicting him of ninety-two major crimes, put him on death row, and finally let him commit suicide.
The glorious Nian family fell to the bottom in an instant!
When Nian Qianyao was given to commit suicide, Nian Xiyao was holding the official position of the right attendant of the Ministry of Works, and at that time he panicked a lot, because according to the customs of the feudal era, such a major crime as Nian Qianyao, the immediate family members would definitely be subjected to the strain, and if they did not do well, they would be cut off all over the door.
In "Yongzheng Dynasty", the middle-aged Tang Yao is given a shot of suicide
At the crucial moment, Yongzheng issued an edict saying: "The young and the young Are all loyal and peaceful people, and they are dismissed from their posts and exonerated." ”
In this way, Nian Xiyao lost his official position, but saved his life.
04
Why did Yongzheng open up to the Nian family father and son?
On the one hand, it is to look at the face of the young noble concubine who has just died, and on the other hand, it is because the father and son of the Nian family are indeed harmless to people and animals.
Needless to say, the old cadres who have retired for many years do not have any real power or influence.
What about Nian Xiyao?
His mind was not on being an official, and he spent all day tinkering with all kinds of learning and art, and his political achievements were really not very good, so that Yongzheng was eager to teach him how to be an official by hand.
However, even so, Nian Xiyao was still absent-minded, and the official was confused, calling Yongzheng angry and calling him "particularly incompetent" and saying that he was "the most easily coaxed" "big fool".
In such a person, what political ambitions do you say can be made? Let him go.
Yongzheng criticized Nian Xiyao's large sections of red, almost hand-in-hand to teach Nian Xiyao how to handle government affairs
05
Two months after Nian Xiyao was dismissed, Yongzheng's anger towards him gradually subsided, and at this time he remembered the deceased Concubine Nian.
Thinking about it, Nian Xiyao, the eldest brother-in-law, should still be assigned a position, and it is also worthy of his dead sister.
Or isn't he fond of studying?
Then let him be the head of the Ministry of the Interior.
Although the official rank is not high, it is a fat shortage of the first class of the Great Qing Dynasty.
Thus, from the fourth year of Yongzheng (1726), Nian Xiyao became the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
From 1726 to 1735, Nian Xiyao concurrently served as the governor of Jingdezhen as the governor of the Internal Affairs Office, and became the supreme leader of the Jingdezhen official kiln system.
As a result, he developed a keen interest in ceramic technology.
In the past nine years, he has personally experimented with various new technologies, invented dyes that can be used for enamel porcelain, solved the problem of importing enamel porcelain pigments in the Qing Dynasty, and also increased the number of colors in the Qing Dynasty on the basis of imported colors.
The porcelain fired under his supervision is very exquisite, known as the "Nian Kiln", and has become a representative of the Qing Yongzheng official kiln porcelain.
Qing Dynasty porcelain is based on the Yongzheng Dynasty, and the Nian kiln is the top product of the Yongzheng Dynasty
06
By chance, Nian Xiyao obtained a European book on perspective from the court painter Lang Shining, so The Grand Duke became interested in perspective again.
He spent several years delving into the knowledge of perspective himself, and published the book of perspective in the seventh year of Yongzheng (1729).
After publishing "Sight Studies", Nian Xiyao was still dissatisfied, and asked Lang Shining and his students to help draw a bunch of illustrations, and after supplementing and editing, a second edition was released in the thirteenth year of Yongzheng (1735).
So, what is the level of this "Vision Science"?
In the book Perspective published by the American scholar E.C. Allison in 1977, the author comprehensively reviews 52 historical figures who have made significant contributions to the field of perspective worldwide from the 15th to the 19th century, and Nian Xiyao is the only one of the Chinese.
You say cows are not cows?
Some of the illustrations and illustrations in Nian Xiyao's "Visual Studies"
However, with the publication of the second edition of "Vision Studies", Nian Xiyao's good days also came to an end.
In August of the thirteenth year of Yongzheng (1735), the Yongzheng Emperor died, and Hongli succeeded to the throne as the Qianlong Emperor, and the Grand Duke of Nian lost his brother-in-law as a patron.
Soon, he was impeached by Gao Qiqiu, the governor of Jiangsu, for "harboring evil and indulging in greed," and the young Qianlong was already very dissatisfied with this young prince who had done a vague job as an official, and immediately ordered him to be dismissed.
Nian Xiyao, who had returned home, had already tasted the heat and coldness of the world at this time, and three years later, he died in obscurity.
And the book "Vision" that he left behind also disappeared into the world.
Decades later, when the late Qianlong scholar Ruan Yuan compiled the biography of a scientist, The Biography of a Domain Man, the book was also vague: "Another kind of anonymous title, the handwriting book is extremely exquisite, without the author's surname, it is suspected that it is also from the Xiyao family." ”
Such a world-leading high-level mathematical work has fallen into a "nameless" treatment!
In fact, why is this not Nian Xiyao's treatment?
This "Leonardo da Vinci of the Qing Dynasty", although he was versatile, even though he had the world's leading scientific research results, still did not even have a biography in the "Draft History of the Qing Dynasty".
In the "Biography of the Qing Dynasty", his short biography is only appended to the back of his father's biography of his years, summarizing his career in just three hundred words, but there is no mention of his research results.
All the records of Nian Xiyao in the Biography of the Qing Dynasty
With such a social environment and cultural atmosphere, can Chinese science work?
The answer is self-explanatory.
References: "Biography of Qing Shi Lie", "Biography of Domain People", "Department of Chinese Mathematical History", "Compendium of Chinese Mathematical History", "Origin of The Chinese Perspective Method"