Selections from the Annals: Pre-Qin to the Six Dynasties

Scope and method

Volume One of the Kangxi edition of the Lishui County Gazetteer, the 邑纪 or annalistic record, is a year-by-year chronicle. Its preface says that "the old gazetteer began its record in the Spring and Autumn period", and this selection runs from the opening of the volume to the end of the Chen, that is, to the whole of the period before Lishui County was founded in 591. On this site's timeline that span belongs to the "Pre-Qin and Six Dynasties" period.

As with the other selections in this series, the method is to list every entry first, including the two the gazetteer itself marks as "no record" for the Liang and the Chen, and then to reproduce six of them in full and register them as quotations, each followed by a note written here. Entries not registered as quotations are given only by year and subject; the text is in the gazetteer. Misprints, variant readings and the compilers' own textual notes are reproduced without alteration, and the square and round brackets are those of the gazetteer itself.

List of entries

Date	Subject
7th year of King Jing of Zhou	Chu attacks Wu and destroys Lai, which is Laisui; Lai is moved to Yan, and Wu moves its town to the foot of Lingping Mountain, renaming it Lingping
16th year of King Jing of Zhou	Chu sends Su Nai, defeats the Wu army and takes Lingping, renaming it Pingling
14th year of King Jing of Zhou	Wu sends Wu Yuan against Chu and burns Gucheng; the territory returns to Wu
3rd year of King Yuan of Zhou	Yue destroys Wu and takes the territory
37th year of King Xian of Zhou	Chu destroys Yue and takes the territory; it returns to Chu
26th year of the First Emperor of Qin	Jinling renamed Moling; Liyang County established, under Zhang Commandery
37th year of the First Emperor of Qin	The emperor tours the east and cuts through Jinling to suppress its royal aura; later generations call the cut the Qinhuai
5th year of the Yuanfeng era (Han)	Zhang Commandery abolished and Danyang Commandery established; Liyang remains under it, and the southern part of Liyang is detached as Yongping, soon abolished
6th year of the Jianwu era (Han)	The seat of Danyang Commandery moves to Wanling; Liyang under it (not in the old gazetteer; supplied here)
1st year of the Zhangwu era (Han)	Sun Quan detaches Yong'an from Liyang; later renamed Yongping, then restored
1st year of the Yong'an era (Wu)	Commandant Yan Mi ordered to open lake fields at Danyang
2nd year of the Taikang era (Jin)	Liyang under Danyang Commandery, whose seat returns to Jianye (not in the old gazetteer)
4th year of the Xianhe era (Jin)	Wang Yunzhi takes Su Yi at Liyang; tax remission ordered
5th year of the Xianhe era (Jin)	No grain or wheat; great famine
1st year of the Xiankang era (Jin)	Famine; envoys sent to relieve it
6th year of the Taihe era (Jin)	Great flood; the rice crop washed away (not in the old gazetteer)
6th year of the Taiyuan era (Jin)	Famine
14th year of the Taiyuan era (Jin)	Ice on the trees
5th year of the Yixi era (Jin)	Hail at Liyang
1st year of the Yongchu era (Liu Song)	Liyang remains under Danyang, held by Yangzhou (not in the old gazetteer)
8th year of the Yuanjia era (Liu Song)	Drought
9th year of the Yuanjia era (Liu Song)	Spring hail at Liyang injures people and livestock
12th year of the Yuanjia era (Liu Song)	Great flood (not in the old gazetteer)
24th year of the Yuanjia era (Liu Song)	Great flood; epidemic, envoys sent with medicine
7th year of the Daming era (Liu Song)	The emperor tours the south, questions prisoners of Liyang at his temporary court and reduces the land tax of the districts he passes
2nd year of the Taishi era (Liu Song)	Kong Jingxuan, magistrate of Yongshi, rebels; Liu Xiuwen, magistrate of Liyang, storms his outpost and beheads fifteen of his followers
3rd year of the Yongming era (Qi)	Prisoners held in Danyang's counties to be assembled in the capital for the emperor to judge in person
5th year of the Yongming era (Qi)	Arrears of land tax owed by Danyang's counties before the third year of Yongming to be cancelled for those not of middling means
Liang	No record
Chen	No record

The quotations and notes

7th year of King Jing of Zhou: Chu destroys Lai and moves it to Lingping

周景王七年癸亥，楚伐吴，灭赖，即濑。赖子舆榇从之，灵王以其臣椒举言，释焉。遂迁赖于鄢，迁许于赖。将城之，会水至，始罢。赖既灭，吴迁其邑于陵平山下，名曰陵平。

Translated: In the seventh year of King Jing of Zhou, gengzi, Chu attacked Wu and destroyed Lai, which is Laisui. The lord of Lai followed with a coffin, and King Ling, on the advice of his minister Jiao Ju, released him. Lai was then moved to Yan and Xu was moved to Lai. A walled town was to be built there, but the waters came and the work stopped. Lai having been destroyed, Wu moved its town to the foot of Lingping Mountain and called it Lingping.

Note. This is the first entry of the annals and the first appearance of Lai, the forerunner of the name Lishui, in the gazetteer's chronology. The gazetteer treats Lai and Laisui as one and the same place, and records that after the destruction of Lai, Wu moved the town to the foot of Lingping Mountain and renamed it Lingping — the first link in the sequence of local place names. The gazetteer adds that the Junji dates the event to the fifth year of King Jing and the Tukao to the fourth, and that it follows the old gazetteer; this selection reproduces that note. The Western year is the generally accepted conversion, not the gazetteer's own.

14th year of King Jing of Zhou: Wu Yuan burns Gucheng

敬王十四年乙未，吴以伍员伐楚，烧固城，其地复属吴。

Translated: In the fourteenth year of King Jing of Zhou, yiwei, Wu sent Wu Yuan against Chu and burned Gucheng; the territory returned to Wu.

Note. Gucheng was the walled town built at Laizhu Yi in the Spring and Autumn period. The gazetteer's Tukao says that "Gucheng was built by Wu" and that its site lies south of present-day Gaochun. This entry records the town changing hands with the wars between Wu and Chu. The gazetteer notes that the Junji dates the event to the twenty-third year of King Jing and that this is an error; it follows the old gazetteer.

26th year of the First Emperor of Qin: Liyang County established

秦始皇二十六年庚辰，改金陵为秣陵。始置溧阳县，属鄣郡。

Translated: In the twenty-sixth year of the First Emperor of Qin, gengchen, Jinling was renamed Moling. Liyang County was established, under Zhang Commandery.

Note. This is the earliest record of a county being established within the present boundaries of Lishui, and the name given is Liyang, not Lishui; it belonged to Zhang Commandery. The gazetteer places the founding in the year Qin unified the empire, which agrees with the Shiji account of the empire being divided into commanderies and counties. Liyang County is not the same county as the Lishui County later detached in the Sui; the relationship between the two is set out in "On How Lishui Got Its Name".

1st year of the Yong'an era (Wu): lake fields opened at Danyang

吴景帝孙休永安元年戊寅，使都尉严密开丹阳湖田。

Translated: In the first year of the Yong'an era of Sun Xiu, Emperor Jing of Wu, wuyin, Commandant Yan Mi was ordered to open lake fields at Danyang.

Note. This is the earliest piece of water conservancy and reclamation within the county recorded by the gazetteer, and it belongs to the Three Kingdoms period. Danyang Lake, with Shijiu Lake and Gucheng Lake, belongs to this group of lakes; the later dispute over "abolishing the three lakes to make polders" grew out of lake fields of this kind. See "Polders and the Guangtong Dam in Lishui" for the sequel.

4th year of the Xianhe era (Jin): Wang Yunzhi takes Su Yi

成帝咸和四年己丑，将军王允之战获苏逸于溧阳。时久被兵火，诏复租税。

Translated: In the fourth year of the Xianhe era of Emperor Cheng, jichou, the general Wang Yunzhi fought and took Su Yi at Liyang. The district had long suffered from war and fire, and an edict remitted its taxes.

Note. This entry records a battle in the early Eastern Jin and its aftermath. Beside the fighting the gazetteer adds that taxes were remitted, putting military affairs and tax relief under the same year — a habit of the annalistic volume: whatever touched the county, whether warfare, natural anomaly, taxation or imperial order, was entered under the year in which it happened.

2nd year of the Taishi era (Liu Song): the rebellion of Kong Jingxuan

明帝泰始二年丙午，永世令孔景宣叛，溧阳令刘休文攻景宣别砦，斩其党史览之等十五人。

Translated: In the second year of the Taishi era of Emperor Ming, bingwu, Kong Jingxuan, magistrate of Yongshi, rebelled; Liu Xiuwen, magistrate of Liyang, attacked Kong's detached outpost and beheaded fifteen of his followers, including Shi Lanzhi.

Note. This entry records a local rising in the Liu Song period and touches two counties, Yongshi and Liyang. Yongshi was a county detached in the Six Dynasties period and lay in the same neighbourhood as Liyang; on that ground the gazetteer enters the affairs of a neighbouring county in its own chronology. It adds that the entry is "not in the old gazetteer", which is how additions made in the Kangxi edition can be identified.

Choices and uncertainties

First, only six entries are registered as quotations; the thirty are not transcribed in full. The rest are listed above by date and subject, and a reader can turn back to the gazetteer by date.

Second, the conversion of the gazetteer's sexagenary dates into Western years follows the generally accepted reckoning and may not agree with the gazetteer's own cycle at every point. Where a Western year appears, it is marked as a later calculation.

Third, the gazetteer's notes that an entry is "not in the old gazetteer" or "abbreviated in the old gazetteer" show where the Kangxi edition added to its predecessors. These notes are important evidence for the relationship between the editions, and this selection reproduces them all rather than dropping them.

Fourth, the gazetteer writes plainly "no record" for the Liang and the Chen. That is the state of the evidence, and nothing is supplied here to fill the gap.