Page:Eminent Chinese Of The Ch’ing Period - Hummel - 1943 - Vol. 1.pdf/45

Rh CHANG Chin-wu 張金吾, Sept. 18, 1787–1829, bibliophile and scholar, was a native of Ch'ang-shu, Kiangsu, home of many celebrated bibliophiles since the late Ming period. His father, Chang Kuang-chi 張光基, elder brother of , was a scholar of some note. Chang Chin-wu lost his parents in his youth and grew up under the protection of his uncle, Chang Hai-p'êng. He became a licentiate at the age of twenty-two sui, but failing in the provincial examination for the chü-jên degree, he abandoned hope of becoming an official and devoted himself to collecting books, especially rare editions of Confucian and literary import. His studio, Ai-jih-ching-lu 愛日精廬, contained some 80,000 chüan, including numerous Sung and Yüan editions which, late in his life (about 1826), were dispersed among his creditors. An annotated catalogue of 764 items in his library, entitled Ai-jih-ching-lu ts'ang-shu chih (藏書志), 36 + 4 chüan, was printed in 1826 and published with a preface by, dated 1827. It is one of the authoritative works on bibliography published in the Ch'ing period.

Chang Chin-wu was the editor of a collection of short works in prose of the Chin dynasty (1115–1234), entitled 金文最 Chin-wên tsui, 120 chüan, and of a ts'ung-shu containing about 90 commentaries and essays on the Confucian classics dating back to the Sung and Yüan periods, entitled 詒經堂續經解 I-ching t'ang Hsü ching-chieh, 1,436 chüan. He worked on the Chin-wên tsui during the years 1810–22, but was unable to get it published. Later, however, the manuscript came into the possession of the Hong merchant, Howqua (see under ), and after the latter's death was printed, according to his wishes, in 1882. After being condensed to 60 chüan, it was reprinted in 1896 by the government printing office of Kiangsu (江蘇書局), omitting that part of the collection known as 金文雅 Chin-wên ya (16 + 1 chüan) which was compiled by Chuang Chung-fang 莊仲方 and printed separately in 1891. The Chin-wên ya bears a preface dated 1841 and was first printed about that time. Chang Chin-wu compiled the I-ching t'ang Hsü ching-chieh for the purpose of supplementing an earlier work known as the T'ung-chih t'ang ching-chieh (see under ). The I-ching t'ang Hsü ching-chieh was never printed, though once, a fellow-townsman of Chang, attempted to publish it. Recent catalogues of collectanea state that the manuscript is (or was) in the possession of the Commercial Press, Shanghai.

Another of the contributions of Chang Chin-wu was the printing of the 續資治通鑑長編 Hsü Tzŭ-chih t'ung-chien ch'ang-pien, a chronological history of the Northern Sung period (960–1127) completed by Li Tao 李燾 in the year 1174. This work was lost, except for extracts in other sources, but fortunately was in large part recovered by the editors of the Ssŭ-k'u ch'üan-shu (see under ) from the encyclopaedia, Yung-lo ta-tien (see under ). These editors divided the material into 520 chüan but found that the text for the years 1064–70, 1093–97, and 1101–26 was missing. The transcription utilized by Chang was one made by Ho Yüan-hsi (see under ) from the edition of the Ssŭ-k'u ch'üan-shu deposited in the Wên-lan ko at Hangchow. The printing of the Hsü Tzŭ-chih t'ung-chien ch'ang-pien, with movable type, was completed in 1820. But as this edition became rare, and was marred by printers' errors, the governor of Chekiang, T'an Chung-lin (see under ), had it recollated and reprinted (1881) with additional notes, by the Chekiang printing office (浙江書局). Under the same auspices a supplement, entitled Hsü Tzŭ-chih t'ung-chien ch'ang-pien shih-pu (拾補), 60 chüan, was prepared to fill in the missing parts of the original edition. This was published in 1883, with a preface by T'an Chung-lin dated 1881, and another by Ch'in Hsiang-yeh (see under ), one of the editors, dated 1882.

In the field of classical studies Chang Chin-wu published several works, among them two entitled 兩漢五經博士考 Liang Han wu-ching po-shih k'ao, 3 chüan; and 廣釋名 Kuang Shih-ming, 2 chüan. The former, a study of the so-called "Doctors of the Five Classics" in the Han period, was published in 1835; the latter, an expansion of the ancient lexicon known as Shih-ming (see under ), was first printed in 1816, and was revised and reprinted in the Hou Chih-pu-tsu chai ts'ung-shu (see under ). Chang also wrote his own nien-p'u, 言舊錄 Yen-chiu lu, which was printed in the Chia-yeh t'ang ts'ung-shu (see under ).

Among the friends of Chang Chin-wu may be mentioned Ch'ên K'uei 陳揆, a fellow-townsman, who like Chang was a bibliophile. His library, Chi-jui lou 稽瑞樓, was rich in local histories, but it was dispersed soon after his death. A catalogue of it, Chi-jui 33