Jihan wuzhi 季漢五志

Jihan wuzhi 季漢五志 "Five biographies of the minor successors of the Han" is short history on the empire of Shu 蜀漢 (221-263), one of the Three Empires 三國 (220~280 CE). The 12-juan long book was written by the Qing-period 清 (1644-1911) scholar Wang Fuli 王復禮 (c. 1700), courtesy name Xuren 需人, style Caotang 草堂, from Renhe 仁和, Sichuan province (or Qiantang 錢塘, Zhejiang). He was author of numerous short texts, the most important of which are Wuyi jiuqu zhi 武夷九曲志 (a geographical treatise), Wang Ziding lun 王子定論 and Jiali bianding 家禮辨定 (on Zhu Xi's 朱熹, 1130-1200, family rites).

The Jihan wuzhi was written because Wang felt that the biographies of Liu Bei 劉備 (161-222, ruled 221-222 as Emperor Zhaolie 漢昭烈帝) and his closest ministers in the official dynastic history Sanguozhi 三國志 were too brief, and other histories on that period, like Wang Yin's 王隱 Shuji 蜀記 (lost, but used in Pei Songzhi's 裴松之, 372-451, commentary on the Sanguozhi), often wrong. He therefore rewrote the biographies of Liu Bei (written as imperial annals-biography, Zhaolie benji 昭烈本紀), Zhuge Liang 諸葛亮 (181-234), Guan Yu 關羽 (d. 219), Zhang Fei 張飛 (d. 221) and Zhao Yun 趙雲 (168-229). His new biographies were based on a wide range of sources and therefore quite reliable. An appendix adds some information not found in the Sanguozhi.