Types of history books
There are many kinds of history books in China, which can be roughly divided into the following five 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 Sima Qian's Historical Records), most official histories are compiled by officials.
Miscellaneous History: A history book with anecdotes, which only records the whole story, temporary experiences or private records of the family.
Other history: mainly refers to the historical facts of past dynasties or generations except chronicle and biography. History books; Sometimes it is difficult to distinguish it from miscellaneous history.
Unofficial history: It's different from the official private history books.
White History: It usually refers to historical records that record the customs of alley, folk trivia and old news, such as Pan Yongyin's Warehouse Receipt of Song Dynasty in Qing Dynasty and Clearance Sheet in modern times. Sometimes it is also used to refer to "unofficial history".
The style of history books
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.
Chronological style: Chronological history books, such as Zuo Zhuan and Zi Tong Zhi Jian, all belong to this category.
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.
General history: Historical books that describe the historical facts of each era coherently are called general history, such as Historical Records written by Sima Qian in the Western Han Dynasty, which can also be called general history. 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. Except Historical Records, the twenty-four histories belong to dynastic history.
In addition, there are historical books that record the history of various specialized disciplines, such as economic history, ideological history and literary history.
Several genres of ancient history books
This chronicle is a brief history of emperors compiled in chronological order, which records the center of words and deeds of emperors, as well as political, economic, military, cultural, diplomatic and other major events at that time.
A table is a form composed of people and events.
A book is a special edition about various laws and regulations and some natural social phenomena.
Family is used to record the activities of governors and important people in history.
Biography, mainly biographies of people.
Brief introduction of five ancient history books
The earliest existing chronological history books. According to legend, Confucius edited it according to the Spring and Autumn Annals compiled by historian Lu.
Zuo Zhuan: China's first relatively complete chronicle work. Originally known as Zuo's Spring and Autumn Annals, it is said that it was written by Zuo Qiuming at the end of Spring and Autumn Annals to explain Confucius' Spring and Autumn Annals, referred to as Zuo Zhuan in Spring and Autumn Annals.
The background of China's largest general history chronicle. The history of 1.362 years was recorded from the 23rd year of King Weilie Zhou (403 BC) to the 6th year of Zhou Shizong's showing virtue in the Five Dynasties (959 AD), which was compiled by Sima Guang and others in the Northern Song Dynasty in 1.9.
General History of China's First Biography. It describes the history of about 3000 years from the legendary Yellow Emperor to the fourth year of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. * * * A total of 130 articles, including biographies 12, tables 10, 8 books, 30 famous families, 70 biographies, * * * about 520,000 words, written by Sima Qian in the Western Han Dynasty.
The earliest national history books in China. ***2 1 Volume includes Zhou Yu, Lu Yu, Chyi Yu, Yu Jin, Zheng Yu, Chu Yu, Wu Yu and Yu Yue. It is a national history book that records some important historical events in different countries. According to legend, the author is Zuo Qiuming.
Hanshu: The First Biographical Chronological History of China. It has a history of more than 200 years from the first year of Emperor Gaozu to the fourth year of Emperor Xin Mang. The book consists of 12 biographies, 8 tables, 10 chronicles and 70 biographies, including 100 articles written by Ban Gu in the Eastern Han Dynasty.