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The manuscripts in this volume were first published in volumes 6 and 7 of the Tsinghua University Bamboo Manuscripts. [1] In light of the vast amount of scholarship engaging with these materials, the Research and Conservation Center for Unearthed Texts, Tsinghua University, decided to collate the various readings offered in Chinese language scholarship, and to publish updated editions and translations of the Tsinghua Manuscripts. [2] The translations in the present volume were prepared with consultation of the scholarship available up to July 2022, and I have been able to review a draft of the Collated Interpretations volume kindly shared with me by my colleague Wei Dong魏棟. [3]
Not all scholarship on the materials has made it into the footnotes.Chinese language scholarship on manuscripts moves fast, often taking place on online fora and websites hosted by centers of manuscript study.
[4]
These studies develop previous ideas and from them tend to emerge a consensus of what counts as a valid reading for a particular graph on the bamboo and what simply does not accord with standards of paleography, phonology, or language use for the Warring States period, as we understand them.As such, while I have consulted—as far as I am aware—the majority of scholarship on the materials, I have chosen to remain economical in my annotations and have not listed all opinions on the texts.For more complete—if slightly dated—overviews of the whole gamut of scholarship on the manuscripts and the texts they carry I highly recommend the reader to consult the master’s thesis of Zhu Zhongheng’s朱忠恒，
and of course the
Collated Interpretations
by Wei Dong.
The texts contained in this volume are conventionally studied side by side with the Zuo zhuan 左傳and the Guo yu 國語，if only because of the significant overlap in content.I have chosen not to make this my main approach—this line of inquiry, while highly valuable, is common enough in scholarship already.I have of course compared and contrasted the materials to these and other texts.Especially for the Zuo zhuan , the masterful translation by Durrant, Li, and Schaberg has been invaluable as a resource and I have quoted it whenever relevant. [5] But ultimately, the Zuo zhuan and the narratives discussed here are different texts altogether, and while fully aware of the cultural literacy that was certainly shared by the audience, I have tried to understand the texts as if they were relatively stand-alone narratives, if only to reveal their qualities as part of a recognizable form.
My focus in trying to understand these texts has therefore been the way they appear to us as narratives that tell a story about the past.As a result, my translations do (at least) two things that may not always sit well with readers accustomed to more rigid understandings of a particular function word or sentence structure.For one, I have chosen to translate rather literally many common appellations of Springs and Autumns characters that would normally be understood by convention.For example, in the * Zheng Wen Gong wen Tai Bo 鄭文公問太伯，Bian fu邊父is translated as Sir Bian to preserve the paternal and hierarchic overtones in the honorific suffix fu 父. [6]
For the same reasons, Jian shu蹇叔in the Zi Fan Zi Yu 子犯子餘is rendered Uncle Jian, in the general respectful avuncular sense without implying any actual familial relationship with Lord Mu of Qin.This use of the term is reinforced on slips 9 and 10 of the manuscript wherein shu 叔is used in and of its own as a means of address twice in the space of two slips.The use of bo 伯in Tai Bo “Grand Elder” reveals this same dynamic and while implying seniority does so discursively and not just within the context of the lineage.
I am of course aware that shu 叔generally functions as “birth sequence indicator”，in this case the seniority appellation “middleborn” within the lineage and that texts such as the Zuo zhuan make productive use of these distinctions. [7] My point here is that in the manuscript texts discussed in this volume, the baseline meaning of “middleborn” for shu 叔or “oldest” bo 伯is effectively wielded to evoke both the hierarchy and the closeness of the kin in the dialogue between ruler and advisor.Doing so enables a subtle restructuring of power relations.Not an advisor subservient to a lord but their proverbial “uncle” or “elder”.The use of zi 子in courtesy names such as Zi Fan子犯or Zi Yi子儀is rendered “Mr.”here because it functions similarly to the “courteous prefix” in English, [8] without the problematic connotations to philosophers carried by the full-form “master”. [9]
In general, the honorific gong 公following the temple name of the ruler is rendered as the title “Lord,”and jun 君，depending on the context and the mood as either “lord” without capitalization or “ruler.”Self-deprecatory modes of address by these same rulers are taken literally, as they often highlight a particular aspect of the character, for example in the use of “the orphaned one”孤to highlight the fact that the ruler’s father has just passed away and the lord is therefore in the need of assistance.The texts at hand make use of slight differentiations in the mode of address to convey a particular sense of the relationship between the characters of the narrative.
Especially when it comes to rhetorical questions, exclamations, and the frequent use of image-based language, I have tried to convey the drama inherent in the narratives as much as the grammatical form of the language.Where I have felt that I had to choose, while aware of the grammatical finesse in Chinese, I have prioritized conveying the story within the narrative.As noted by Chao Fulin晁福林，when the * Zheng Wu Furen gui ruzi 鄭武夫人規孺子has the widow of Lord Wu reminiscence about her late husband’s absence, for example, it makes sense to translate shi 室in the sense of his private “chambers” rather than his royal “house” as it conveys the sense of a wife missing her husband: [10]
吾君陷於大難之中，處於衛三年，不見其邦，亦不見其室。
My lord was trapped in great hardship, resided in Wei for three years and could not visit either his state or his chambers.
The texts are filled with such subtleties of meaning and I am afraid I have not given due justice to all of them, despite all the help I received in the preparation of this volume.
I have been fortunate to receive the help of a fantastic team of scholars brought together by Ed Shaughnessy for this project.Chris Foster, Yegor Grebnev, Ethan Harkness, David Lebovitz, Vincent Leung, Jens Østergaard Petersen, Maddalena Poli, Adam Schwartz, Ed Shaughnessy, Ondřej Škrabal, Newell Ann Van Auken, Zhang Hanmo, and Zhou Boqun have saved my readings from many mistakes and improved it in ways too numerous to elaborate.Meeting online on a weekly basis (with some hesitance we took a break for Christmas and such), I have learned a tremendous amount from the group’s careful readings and spirited discussions.
I want to thank Zhang Bofan, Yang Qiyu, and Zhang Xinyu for their untiring assistance to the project, my colleagues at the Research and Conservation Center for Unearthed Texts, Tsinghua University for their help and support, Liang Fei, Li Yiqing, and the other editors at Tsinghua University Press for their invaluable assistance, and Paul Nicholas Vogt for the pleasant and instructive collaboration on the Shanghai Museum narratives that helped me form some of the ideas underlying the current study.I want to thank the two reviewers who provided kind and supportive feedback, helping me make sure I put my understanding of these materials in clear terms.Additionally, I received valuable comments on the Zi Fan Zi Yu and the * Jin Wen Gong ru yu Jin from Antje Richter and the anonymous referees at JAOS in the preparation of a study on the manuscripts’use of punctuation. [11] Any errors and idiosyncrasies remaining are of course my own.
Last but certainly not least, I thank my family for bearing with my work, which in toddler speak apparently mostly consists of a lot of “blah blah blah.”
The writing of this volume has received generous support from the “Western Dissemination and Research of Chinese Unearthed Texts”中國出土文獻的西方傳播與研究 (G1817) project funded by the “Paleography and Chinese Civilization Inheritance and Development Program”古文字與中華文明傳承發展工程，and a grant from the Beijing Municipal Foreign High Level Talent Support Plan北京市外籍高層次人才資助計劃 (J202132).
[1] Li Xueqin李學勤ed.-in-chief, Qinghua daxue Chutu wenxian yanjiu yu baohu zhongxin清華大學出土文獻研究與保護中心ed., Qinghua daxue cang Zhanguo zhujian (liu, qi) 清華大學藏戰國竹簡（陸、柒）(Shanghai: Zhong-Xi shuju, 2016, 2017).
[2] Huang Dekuan黄德寬ed.-in-chief, Qinghua daxue cang Zhanguo zhujian jiaoshi 清華大學藏戰國竹簡校釋 (Beijing: Shangwu yinshuguan, forthcoming ).
[3] Wei Dong魏棟，Qinghua daxue cang Zhanguo zhujian jiaoshi di liu ji 《清華大學藏戰國竹簡》校釋第六輯 (Beijing: Shangwu yinshuguan, forthcoming ).
[4] Especially the Jianbo luntan 簡帛論壇forum, http://www.bsm.org.cn/forum/and the websites of the centers of manuscript study at Fudan, Wuhan, and Tsinghua University, Fudan daxue chutu wenxian yu guwenzi yanjiu zhongxin wangzhan 復旦大學出土文獻與古文字研究中心網站，http://www.fdgwz.org.cn/; Wuhan daxue jianbo yanjiu zhongxin wangzhan 武漢大學簡帛研究中心網站，http://www.bsm.org.cn/; Qinghua daxue chutu wenxian yanjiu yu baohu zhongxin wangzhan 清華大學出土文獻研究與保護中心網站，https://www.ctwx.tsinghua.edu.cn/.
[5] Stephen Durrant, Li Wai-Yee, and David Schaberg (tr.), Zuo Tradition/Zuo zhuan 左傳 : Commentary on the “Spring and Autumn Annals,” 3 vols.(Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2016), hereafter referred to as Zuo Tradition .
[6] Axel Schuessler, ABC Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2006), 243.
[7] See Zuo Tradition , XXXIII–XXXV, for instance.
[8] Oxford English Dictionary , s.v.“Mr, n., sense 1.a”，published September 2023, https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/9220885546.
[9] I thank reviewer two for pointing me to Wolfgang Bauer, Der chinesische Personenname (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1959), 116–147, who notes the use of zi in courtesy names as a means of increasing their visibility as names.
[10] Chao Fulin notes that the “chambers” here probably refer (metonymically) to Zheng Wu’s wife; see Chao Fulin晁福林，“Tan Qinghua jian Zheng Wu Furen gui ruzi de shiliao jiazhi”談清華簡《鄭武夫人規孺子》的史料價值， Qinghua daxue xuebao (zhexue shehui kexue ban) 清華大學學報（哲學社會科學版），2017.3:128–129.
[11] Rens Krijgsman,“Punctuation and Text Division in Two Early Narratives: The Tsinghua University * Jin Wen Gong ru yu Jin 晋文公入於晋and Zi Fan Zi Yu 子犯子餘manuscripts,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 143.1 (2023): 109–124.