(Xianchun) Lin'an zhi (咸淳)臨安志

(Xianchun) Lin'an zhi (咸淳)臨安志 "Records about Lin'an from the Xianchun reign (1265-1274)" is a local chronicle of Lin'an (Hangzhou 杭州, Zhejiang), the capital of the Southern Song period 南宋 (1127-1279). It was written by Qian Yueyou/Shuoyou 潛說友 (1216-1277), courtesy name Jungao 君高, style Chibizi 赤壁子, from Jinyun 縉雲 in the prefecture of Chuzhou 處州 (today in Zhejiang).

Qian expanded the two older chronicles from the city, the (Qiandao) Lin'an zhi 乾道臨安志, and (Chunyou) Lin'an zhi 淳祐臨安志, and compiled a 100 -juan long updated version. Apart from these texts, Qian made use of quite a few other sources, like Yan Shu's 晏殊 (991-1055) geography book Yudizhi 輿地志, Fan Zizhang's 范之長 Huangchao junxian zhi 皇朝郡縣志 and Da-Song dengke ji 大宋登科記, a book on state examinations.

In the first 15 juan, Qian Yueyou describes the capital city and the seat of the imperial government. The rest of the book is dedicated to the surroundings of the city and the capital prefecture, the borders, geography, edicts and concerning the city, the officials, temples and monasteries, literary works written by scholars living in and near Lin'an, military aspects, customs and habits, local products, spots of touristic value, eminent persons who had lived in the city, and so on. The book is very detailed in each aspect and therefore of high importance for the study of the history of the city of Hangzhou and the government of the Southern Song dynasty.

The Xianchun Lin'an zhi is the qualitatively best of all local gazetteers (difangzhi 地方志) from the Song period.

Figures 1-4. Maps from the (Xianchun) Lin'an zhi (咸淳)臨安志

Map of the Southern Song capital Lin'an (Jingcheng tu 京城圖).	Map of the city wall of Lin'an (Huangcheng tu 皇城圖).
Map of Lin'an facing the Hangzhou Bay (Zhejiang tu 浙江圖).	Map of the West Lake (Xihu tu 西湖圖).

The original was lost soon and had to be reconstructed from a Song-period print of which only parts had survived during the Ming period 明 (1368-1644). The Qing-period 清 (1644-1911) scholar Zhu Yizun 朱彝尊 (1629-1709) was able to obtain 80 manuscript chapters from Master Hu from Haiyan 海鹽胡氏 and Master Mao from Changshu 常熟毛氏, to which he added a further 13 chapters from his own fragment collection. These taken together, 7 juan of the original text were thus missing. Another scholar, Bao Tingbo 鮑廷博 (1728-1814), contributed juan 65 and 66, which were not among the surviving parts of the Song print. 95 juan are thus preserved. In 1830 Master Wang from Qiantang 錢塘汪氏 (Zhenqitang Studio 振綺堂) published a print of this fragment collection.