Shiming 釋名

Shiming 釋名 "Explaining terms" is a glossary dictionary compiled at the end of the Later Han period 後漢 (25-220) by Kong Xi 孔熙.

With the Confucian concept of retifying names and terms (zhengming 正名), Kong tried to write a dictionary providing the correct designation of all items humans deal with. His dictionary is therefore arranged in an encyclopedical manner, beginning with Heaven and geography, proceeding to human relationships and language, and ending with various objects of all spheres of human activity.

The 27 chapters are arranged in 8 juan. For each character entry the author does not only provide an explanation, but first a kind of memorizing help through a homophonous word which at the same times helps explaining the lexeme word. The whole dictionary is structured according to this concept. This method is called shengxun 聲訓 or yinxun 音訓 "explanation through sound".

Although this method today seems to be simply a memorizing help during the Han period, when cosmological speculations were a common philosophical field, the homophonous similarities were also of a semantic significance.

The Shiming is not only an important source for the treasury of words of Han-period everyday language, but also for the study of ancient Chinese phonology. It belongs to a series of early glossaries of synonyms based on the Classic Erya 爾雅, namely Xiao erya 小爾雅, Guangya 廣雅, and Piya 埤雅. These are called the "Five [books] of correct [expressions]" (wuya 五雅), while the book Shiya, deviating in its arrangements of lemmata, is also called the "remnant [book] of correct [expressions]" (Yiya 逸雅).

Figure 1. Beginning of the Shiming 釋名

Beginning of the Shiming, Sibu congkan 四部叢刊 edition, reproducing a Ming period (Jiajing reign-period) reprint of a Song period print; from the collection of the Jiangnan Library 江南圖書館 in Nanjing 南京, Jiangsu.

There is a surviving Ming-period 明 (1368-1644) reprint of an early edition of the Song period 宋 (960-1279) which contains a lot of errors. The Qing-period 清 (1644-1911) scholar Bi Yuan 畢沅 (1730-1797) wrote a critical commentary, Shiming shuzheng 釋名疏證, in which he rectifies these errors. An additional work was written by Wang Xianqian 王先謙 (1842-1918), Shiming shuzheng bu 釋名疏證補.

Bi Yuan also wrote to supplements, one called Xu shiming 續釋名, and one Shiming buyi 釋名補遺. Both are attached as appendixes to the commentary Shiming shuzheng bu. The former consists of additional lemmata concerning music and intontation (Shi lülü 釋律呂, Shi wusheng 釋五聲). The latter is a collection of 31 fragments.

Guang shiming 廣釋名

The Guang shiming 廣釋名 "Extended Shiming" is a glossary from the Qing period 清 (1644-1911) written by Zhang Jinwu 張金吾 (1787-1829), courtesy name Shenzhan 慎旃 or Yuexiao 月霄, as a supplement to the Han-period 漢 (206 BCE-220 CE) glossary Shiming 釋名.

The supplement of 2-juan length was completed in 1814. Zhang collected words and terms from the Han period not included in the Shiming and arranged them in the same way and constructed with the same method as the Shiming. The dictionary is divided into encyclopaedic fields of nature and human acitivites. For each character, a homophonous word is given which, in a unitary cosmological sense, serves as an explanation of the lexeme.

The Guang shiming is included in the series Zhibuzuzhai congshu 知不足齋叢書.