Zuo Zhuan is a pre-Qin historical prose that records detailed events and is good at describing diplomacy.
1. "Zuo Zhuan"
The old biography was written by Zuo Qiuming during the Spring and Autumn Period. Modern people believe that it was compiled by someone during the Warring States Period. It is the first chronicle with a complete narrative in ancient China. History books are also representatives of pre-Qin prose works. The original title of the work was "Zuo's Spring and Autumn Annals". In the Han Dynasty, it was renamed "Zuo's Biography of Chunqiu", "Chunqiu Inner Biography" and "Zuo's Biography". After the Han Dynasty, it was often called "Zuo's Biography".
"Zuo Zhuan" is essentially an independently written historical literary work. It begins in the first year of Lu Yin (722 BC) and ends in the 27th year of Lu Aigong (468 BC). year), based on the Spring and Autumn Annals, it explains the outline of the Spring and Autumn Annals by describing the specific historical facts of the Spring and Autumn Period.
It is one of the Confucian classics and a history book studied by Confucian students of all ages. Together with "Gongyang Zhuan" and "Gu Liang Zhuan", it is called the "Three Biography of the Spring and Autumn Period". Respected by future generations. It is published jointly with Spring and Autumn Annals and is regarded as one of the Thirteen Classics.
2. Content introduction
"Zuo Zhuan" is a voluminous volume with complex content, involving politics, economy, military, diplomacy, astronomy, geography, agriculture, medicine, customs, literature and art, etc. field, clearly showing the readers the social culture and life patterns of the Spring and Autumn Period and even older eras.
In the chronicle of the twelve generations of Lu Jun, it not only explains the "Spring and Autumn Writing Technique" used in the "Spring and Autumn" classics, but also records other than the Lu Kingdom such as Jin, Qi, Chu, Qin, The historical events of Zheng, Song, Zhou, Wei and even some small countries expanded the national and regional scope of "Spring and Autumn".
The narrative structure system of "Zuo Zhuan" is formed through the dialogues of historical figures, the transcription of documents and archives, some details relayed by historical witnesses, and the comments of sages on various events.
"Zuo Zhuan" also quotes the Confucian classics "The Book of Songs", "Shang Shu", "The Book of Changes" and lost Confucian books through the mouths of historical figures. While narrating history, it helps readers interpret the diction in these classics. , expounds the Confucian philosophy of governing the country, so "Zuo Zhuan" can be said to be both classics and history.
3. Sources of historical materials
The original sources of historical materials in "Zuo Zhuan" should be closely related to the "rumor" system of historians that existed in the Spring and Autumn Period, that is, those "historians" recorded on slips Personal or internal documents" became the source of "Zuo Zhuan".
4. Author and creation time
"Zuo Zhuan" is said to have been written by Zuo Qiuming, a historian in the late Spring and Autumn Period. Sima Qian, Ban Gu and others all believed that "Zuo Zhuan" was written by Zuo Qiuming. Liu Zhiji of the Tang Dynasty's "Shi Tong·Six Family" said: "The Zuo family descendants first came from Zuo Qiuming." Zhao Kuang of the Tang Dynasty first suspected that "Zuo Zhuan" was not written by Zuo Qiuming. Since then, many scholars have also become skeptical. Many people believe that the Zuo family who wrote "Zuo Zhuan" was not Zuo Qiuming.