What is a history book?

Ancient history books refer to books that record history in ancient books, that is, the history department in the classification of the four major databases.

At the end of the Western Zhou Dynasty, there were historical records in various vassal states in China, such as the success of the Jin State, the branch of Zheng, the Xiongnu of Chu, and the Spring and Autumn Period of Lu. In Mozi, it is said that Mo Zhai has seen hundreds of countries in the Spring and Autumn Period. Early history books all existed in the form of chronicles, and the chronicles of bamboo books unearthed in central Hebei during the Taikang period of Jin Dynasty were also chronicles. At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Xun Yue wrote "Han Ji", which created a chronicle. In the Northern Song Dynasty, Sima Guang wrote Zi Tong Zhi Jian, which lasted from the 23rd year of Zhou Weilie (403 BC) to the 6th year of Zhou Shizong's showing virtue in the Five Dynasties (959 BC). The advantage of chronological style is that it is convenient to inspect the specific time of historical events, understand the relationship between historical events, and avoid duplication of narrative. The success of Zi Tong Zhi Jian initiated the climax of chronicle writing. Chen Yinque once said: "China historiography flourished in the Song Dynasty." . Chronological style became popular, resulting in outline style and chronological style. Liang Qichao thought: "Gai Ji's biography is mainly about people, the chronicle is mainly about years, and the chronicle is mainly about events." The reason why my husband asked for monuments is that it is useful to learn ancient times, and it is important. "

When Ye Fan wrote the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, he made a comparison between biographical style and chronological style. He said: "The Spring and Autumn Annals is short because it is always short and pithy, and it has a good rapid formation. Today, people plan to write them. Ji Chuanti, the change of Shi Ban, also caught a generation, and it is appropriate to learn after learning. This is excellent, so I will do it. " Zhang Fu evaluated the author according to the number of words in Records of the Historian and Hanshu, saying that "move with work, promise with promise, and act with deeds", so he thought Records of the Historian was superior to Hanshu. Gan Bao's "Jin Ji", "Its book is concise, straightforward and graceful, and salty as a good history."

When talking about writing motivation, Justin said: "I was tired of reading the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, but I couldn't sleep and had a rest, so I compiled a collection called the Book of the Later Han Dynasty." Yuan Songshan wrote the Book of the Later Han Dynasty. He concluded: "There are five difficulties in the book: annoying and incomplete, difficult; Vulgar but not classical, two difficult also; If books are not recorded, it will be difficult; There are four difficulties in rewarding and punishing the lost; There are five difficulties in writing without quality. "

After Du You published General Canon, the canon system was added to the history books, and the essentials system was also derived.

Zhang Taiyan advocates writing history in five styles: table, canon, collection, textual research and other records. Liang Qichao advocated four writing methods in China: Chronology, Record, Record and Biography.

In the New History, Liang Qichao divided the historical records into ten kinds and twenty-three categories, namely, official history (official books, special history), chronology, chronicle background (complete book, special book), political book (complete book, special book, small book), miscellaneous history (comprehensive record, trivial notes, imperial edict memorial) and biography (complete book, special book II).

Historical Records was written by Song Qingyuan Huang and printed by Song Jingyiu, and there are several complete versions of the Song Dynasty. The seven histories of the Northern and Southern Dynasties were all written by Meishan and Sui Shu in Song Dynasty, while the History of the South and the History of the North were printed by Yuan Dade, and the Book of the Old Tang Dynasty was printed by Shaoxing in Song Dynasty and the Book of the New Tang Dynasty.

China's history books are numerous and varied, which can be roughly divided into the following categories:

Official history: A historical book that records the achievements of emperors, the history of dynasties, biographies of people, economy, military affairs, culture and geography by biographies and chronicles, which is called official history. Such as the so-called twenty-four histories. Except for a few personal writings (such as Historical Records by Sima Qian, History of the Later Han Dynasty by Ye Fan, History of the Three Kingdoms by Chen Shou and History of the New Five Dynasties by Ouyang Xiu), most official histories are compiled by officials.

Other history: it mainly refers to miscellaneous historical books that record historical facts of past dynasties or generations, such as Dong Guan Han Ji, A Brief History of Du Dong, Da Jin Guo Zhi and Tong Zhi. It can be seen that other history is actually an important supplementary part of the official history and still a branch of the official history. Therefore, there is a saying that there are many branches of official history in the catalogue of the History Department of Sikuquanshu. Created by famous scholars, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish it from miscellaneous history. Such as Hanshu Jin Chunqiu.

Miscellaneous History: A history book with anecdotes, which only records the whole story, temporary experiences or private records of the family. It is different from the official history with complete style, such as discipline, biography, expression and ambition, and it is also different from other histories that have been in power for a time. Not limited by style. Although miscellaneous and superficial, it can make up for the omissions and shortcomings of official history books, including family history, foreign history, mini-history, unofficial history, unofficial history, anecdotes and other categories.

Unofficial history: Historical books written by the people are different from the official history.

History of barnyard grass: usually refers to historical records that record customs, folk trivia and old news, such as Song Barnyard Grass Banknote written by Pan Yongyin in Qing Dynasty and Qing Barnyard Grass Banknote written by Tsui Hark in modern times. Sometimes it is also used to refer to "unofficial history".

Classification by style:

Biography: Biographical history books were first seen in Historical Records of Sima Qian in the Western Han Dynasty. They give priority to biographies and describe the emperor with biographies. Use "aristocratic family" to describe princes and special people; Use "table" to unify the age, lineage and figures; Record laws and regulations with "books" or "records"; Record people, nationalities and foreign countries with biographies. All previous dynasties used this as a model for compiling history. Another example is Hanshu. Some official histories have no books or records, such as The History of the Three Kingdoms.

Chronological style: Chronological history books take the year and month as the order, the year and month as the longitude, and the facts as the latitude, which easily reflects the relationship between various historical events in the same period. The method of chronicle recording history originated in China. For example, Zuo Zhuan and Zi Tong Zhi Jian both belong to this category. Chunqiu is the earliest chronological history book in China.

Chronicle: Yuan Shu's Zi Zhi Tong Jian was founded in the Southern Song Dynasty. This genre is characterized by taking historical events as the key link and listing important historical events separately. Each article is written in the order of year, month and day. There are nine ancient books in the chronicle.

Country style: Country style history books are written in Mandarin. Country history books are historical essays written by some countries. It contains the history of many countries. For example, The Warring States Policy falls into this category.

Classification by time and space:

General history: Historical books that describe the historical facts of various times coherently are called general history, such as Historical Records written by Sima Qian in the Western Han Dynasty. Because he recorded the historical facts that lasted more than 3,000 years from the legendary Yellow Emperor to the era of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty.

Chronicle: A historical book that records the history of a generation is called the Chronological History, which was founded in Han Shu in the Eastern Han Dynasty by Ban Gu. The twenty-four histories belong to dynastic history except Historical Records.

State style: historical books recorded separately by country. For example, the warring States policy.

In addition, there are historical books that record the history of various specialized disciplines, such as economic history, ideological history, literary history, historiography history and so on.

Types of biographical history books:

1. Chronicle: A brief history of emperors compiled in chronological order, which records the center of emperors' words and deeds, and also describes major political, economic, military, cultural and diplomatic events at that time.

Form: it is to write people and things in the form of a form.

3. Book: It is a special edition about various laws and regulations and some natural social phenomena.

Family: used to record the activities of princes and important people in history.

Biography: mainly biography.

Records: Records of geography, music, etc. In the official history, records are very important and profound. Liang Chao and Jiang Yan said: "Without ambition, it is difficult to edit history." Preface to the Chronicle of Song Dynasty is a good article that must be read. This paper summarizes the origin of chronicle and the chronicle of Song Shu, and also talks about the difficulties of chronicle.

Record: It was originally used to refer to the history of deposed emperors, but later it was used to refer to the historical records of those who established their own names and were condemned as tyrants.

History books may not be able to record history truthfully, but collect local events and then compile an integrated book. The authenticity of the history of China dynasty was questioned and accused as a tool for rulers to govern the country. Liu Zhiji called it: "Since the Warring States period, the resigners have been literary, and they all pretend to be guests and pretend to answer them." Many of them are unreasonable or described by ghosts and gods. For example, the emperor was surrounded by dragons before he was born. At that time, when compiling books, the emperor would certainly control historians, increase flattering remarks and delete negative events, such as the memorial of Emperor Taizong. Later emperors would tamper with the history of the former dynasty to ensure the legitimacy of the country, while the history of the Qing Dynasty was accused of praising Manchu's contribution to China. Even in modern times, no matter how developed the information is, news is often blocked, so scholars can only think that history books have many fictional elements.

Twenty-four histories are the general name of twenty-four official histories in ancient China. Namely: Historical Records (Sima Qian, Han Dynasty), Han Shu (Ban Gu, Han Dynasty), Han Shu (Ye Fan, Southern Song Dynasty), Three Kingdoms (Chen Jinshou), Jin Shu (Ling Xuan, Tang Fang) and so on. ), Song Shu (South of Shen Yue, Song Liang), etc. Zhou Shu (Tang Linghu Defen et al. ), (etc. ), southern history (life extension), northern history (life extension), old Tang book (later Shao), etc. ), the book of the New Tang Dynasty (Song Ouyang Xiu, Song Qi's "Official History" first appeared in the "Annals of Sui Shu Classics": "There are writings in the world, all of which are intended to be official history." Emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty approved the Twenty-four Histories, and the word "official history" specifically refers to the Twenty-four Histories. According to the provisions of Sikuquanshu, the official history class "anyone who has not been judged by Chen knows that it is not chaotic." To respect, righteousness, and cover the official history, do not hang government decrees, and dare not increase privately ",that is, without the approval of the emperor, it may not be included in the official history.

1920, ke shaowen wrote the new yuan history. In the tenth year of the Republic of China (192 1), President Xu Shichang took the New Yuan History as the "official history", and together with the Twenty-four History, it was called the "Twenty-five History". However, some people do not include the history of the New Yuan Dynasty, but list the draft history of the Qing Dynasty as one of the twenty-five histories. In other words, if both books are included in the official history, the "twenty-six histories" will be formed.