Lingtai miyuan 靈臺秘苑

Lingtai miyuan 靈臺秘苑 or Lingtai biyuan 靈臺祕苑 "Secret garden of the numinous terrace" is a book on divination written by Yu Jicai 庾季才 (516-603), courtesy name Shuyi 叔奕. He was received at the court of Emperor Yuan 梁元帝 (r. 552-554) of the Liang dynasty 梁 (502-557), with whom he discussed matters of astronomy and astrology. When the Liang dynasty fell, Yu was appointed grand astrologer (taishi 太史) of the Northern Zhou 北周 (557-581). Yu also wrote the divination book Chuixiangzhi 垂象志.

The original size of the Lingtai miyuan was 115 or 110 juan, but only 15 fascicles survived after the revision of the text which Wang Anli 王安禮 (1034-1095; the younger brother of Wang Anshi 王安石) carried out during the Northern Song period.

The beginning of the book presents the star map of the "Stepping the Heavens Song" (Butian ge 步天歌), while the rest expounds on astronomical regions (fenye 分野), omens of clouds and winds, and various forms of divination. For example, in the section on the constellation Dou 斗, it says: "If the star is bright, there will be peace and longevity; if it is dim, out of place, or shows signs of flickering, then the state will lose loyal ministers, the people will harbour resentment, and conflict will arise." This shows that much of the book consists of interpretative explanations based on divinatory signs. All works cited in this book are ancient texts from before the Sui period 隋 (581-618), which makes Wang’s text a valuable source on the origins of early divination techniques.

The text is included in the series Siku quanshu 四庫全書 and Hubei Xianzheng yishu 湖北先正遺書.