Content introduction
The geography of Hanshu, including the first and second volumes, is a masterpiece of ancient historical geography newly founded by Ban Gu. Time and space of history are inseparable, so we must remember geography when writing history. This chronicle first describes the geographical evolution before the Han Dynasty, focusing on Kyushu in Gong Yu and Kyushu in Zhouguan. Then it narrates the geography of the Western Han Dynasty, taking the county country as an article, and in this article, in the form of notes, it sequentially writes out the geographical overview of the county country and its subordinate counties, roads and Hou countries, such as the number of households and population of counties, the history of abandonment and renaming, various specialties, the management of county guards, iron officials, salt officials and industrial officials, mountains and rivers, important passes, historical sites and road traffic. And always remember the total number of counties, countries, counties, roads and Hou countries in the Western Han Dynasty, the size of the country, land area, cultivated land, uncultivated land, uncultivated land, total number of households, total population and so on. Then, referring to the contents of Biography of Historical Records of Huo Zhi about local customs, this paper summarizes the achievements of Liu Xiang's On its Geographical Distribution and Zhu Gan's Adjusting its Customs. Combining with Ban Gu's own understanding and research on history and geography, it divides regions according to the characteristics of economy and customs, and writes about the scope, history, geography, people's livelihood, customs and characteristics of each region, as well as Chinese and foreign transportation and exchanges. This greatly expanded the scope of historical research and had a far-reaching impact on later generations. This chronicle focuses on "customs", aiming at explaining the relationship between geography and politics, reminding politicians to pay attention to local customs and implementing policies from the geographical reality.
History of Han Geography consists of three parts. The first part contains two ancient geographical masterpieces of China, Gong Yu and Zhifen, which are a simple explanation of the evolution of the previous generation. At the end of the volume, there are Liu Xiang's domain division and Zhu Gan's customs as appendices. The middle is the main part, which is the creation of Ban Gu. This part mainly describes the organizational system of regional administrative regions and creates a new system of geographical works, namely regional geography. According to the organizational system of Emperor Han Ping in the second year of Yuan Dynasty (AD 2), the author described the establishment and evolution of 103 county, 1587 county, state, city and Hou state in turn. Below the county and the country, there are household registration figures. Adding up these figures, it can be concluded that the national population of Emperor Han Ping in the second year was 59,594,978. Although this figure can't be said to be very accurate, it is a summary of the number of registered households in counties and cities across the country at that time and has certain reference value. At the same time, it is also the first history book to provide national population figures. Under the county, road, city and houzhou, according to the regional characteristics, the relevant mountains, rivers, minerals, products, economic development, folk customs and so on are selected respectively. The writing of each county is consistent, which is easy to compare and find, and provides valuable historical materials for studying historical geography today. The book also records many precious geographical data since the Zhou and Qin Dynasties. For example, in Gaonu County, Shang Jun County, there is a record of water (wěi, Sound Committee, water name, in Henan Province), which is the earliest record of oil resources; In Hong Men County, Xihe County, there is a Tianfeng Huojing Temple, where fire comes out of the ground. The fire pit recorded here is natural gas; According to statistics, there are 36 salt officials and 48 iron officials, which reflects the distribution of salt and iron producing areas at that time; There are more than 300 waterways, lakes and ponds. It is recorded in the book, and the source and flow direction are explained under the county where the birthplace is located. The tributaries and mileage of larger rivers are also recorded, which provides a reliable basis for understanding the changes of ancient and modern waterways.
Historical influence
Ban Gu founded Geography, focusing on the isolated administrative regions in the Western Han Dynasty, and recorded its mountains, rivers and products. Geology records the minerals in this county and the places where the iron officials, bronze officials, gold officials and salt officials who manage minerals are located, and also records the main rivers, lakes and seas in detail. This book is of great significance for studying the development of mineral resources in the Western Han Dynasty.
The writing of Hanshu Geography appeared under the situation of centralization and unification, which was welcomed and needed by the rulers. From the perspective of the history of science, The History of Chinese Geography has had a great influence on the development of geography in China. On the one hand, it has opened up the field of evolutionary geography research, which is commendable. On the other hand, under its influence, the study of geography ignores the exploration of the landform and development law of mountains and rivers themselves. Later, geography was more related to the content of history, which also had a certain relationship with the system established for geographical works in Hanshu Geography.
Because the geographical records of territorial administrative regions compiled in past dynasties are the most basic and important part of China's ancient geographical writings, with traditional characteristics. If this tradition can be called a system, then the formation of the ancient geographical system began with the History of Han Geography.
evaluate
In the official history, the special train "Geography" began with Ban Gu's "Geography of Hanshu" [3]. Ban Gu lived in the era when the Han Dynasty was founded for more than 200 years. The dynasty was unprecedentedly unified and powerful, with developed economy, vast territory and developed land and water transportation. The accumulation of geographical knowledge is far from being comparable in the times of Mountain Classic and Gong Yu, and the demand for geographical knowledge in social life and management is unprecedented. Geography writing is no longer based on confirmation, but on hearsay, but on the direct knowledge of local authorities held by the state, even quite accurate mapping and statistics. Although the emergence of geographical works that recorded a large number of actual geographical data was the requirement of that era, it was Ban Gu's great contribution to later generations to train geography in the official history. In the feudal era, general geographical works were difficult to spread today, while geographical records in the official history were easier to spread under the protection of later dynasties. Ban Gu's practice of training geography in official history was followed by most official history and a large number of local chronicles in later generations. In this way, we have preserved a wealth of geographical data today, providing important conditions for studying the ancient geographical history of China and the social and cultural history of feudal times. Ban Gu's contribution to official history geography can't be ignored.
Create geographical records of administrative areas
The structure and content of Ban Gu's Geography of Hanshu are divided into three parts: the first part (from Huangdi Neijing to Qin Han Yan in the Warring States) records two parts of Hezhi Fang, and makes textual changes according to the language of Han Dynasty; At the end of the volume (from "Ten Thousand People Believe in the Nature of the Five Permanents" to the end of the volume), Liu Xiang's Domain and Zhu Gan's Customs are sorted out according to Historical Records and Biography of Huo Zhi. The text (from "Jing Zhaoyin" to "Han Dynasty is extremely prosperous") mainly describes the administrative divisions of the Western Han Dynasty, with the county as the key link and the county as the goal, and describes the geographical overview of the Western Han Dynasty in detail. Based on the national territory and administrative divisions in the second year of Emperor Han Ping (AD 2), this part describes the establishment and evolution, household registration statistics, mountains and rivers of 1578 county (county 1356, equivalent to county road 29, Hou Guo 193). Based on the framework of territorial administrative regions, various natural and human geographical phenomena in the Western Han Dynasty are divided into relevant administrative regions, and the writing style of understanding the distribution and relationship of various geographical phenomena from the perspective of administrative regions can be called administrative geography. This style was created by Ban Gu, which showed his new geographical view centered on human geography.
Ban Gu's previous geographical works, such as Shan Hai Jing and Zhi Fang, generally focus on mountains and rivers, and classify geographical phenomena into the geographical area drawn up by the author, without paying attention to the actual situation of territorial administrative areas. Although Yugong has a regional concept, he divides Kyushu by the natural boundaries of mountains and rivers, and describes the geography of various places by states. But "Kyushu" is just an ideal system, which has not been realized. Therefore, Gong Yu is not a geographical work with territory and administrative regions as the main body and program.
The reason why Ban Gu formed a new geographical view centered on human geography is not only his own reasons, but also because he lived in the specific historical era of the Eastern Han Dynasty. China's administrative divisions began in the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, but there was no unified feudal country. Although the subsequent Qin dynasty unified the whole country, it lasted for a short time. The Eastern Han Dynasty has a long and stable history of more than 200 years from the establishment of the Han Dynasty to the life in Bangu. In the vast territory of feudal emperors, a set of county (kingdom)-county (city, road and Houguo) administrative divisions was established and perfected. The long-term implementation of the social system has contributed to the emergence of new geographical concepts. Ban Gu's new geographical view has been passed down for a long time with the strengthening of the concept of great unity and the consolidation of China's traditional cultural spirit of attaching importance to humanity and neglecting nature and emphasizing the unity of man and nature. Not only are all official geographical records based on the geographical records of Hanshu, but all national geographical records from Tang Dynasty to Yuanhe County also follow its style. Ban Gu's geographical view and the geographical model of Hanshu had a far-reaching impact on the development of ancient geography in China. On the one hand, it reserves a lot of valuable human geography data for our country, on the other hand, it hinders the development of the concept of physical geography. Until the publication of Xu Xiake's Travels in the late Ming Dynasty, there was a lack of monographs on scientific description and research of natural geographical phenomena in China. Most of them are works that record the distribution and simple description of natural geographical phenomena, and they are often based on human geographical data, such as Zhu. One of the important reasons for this situation is the influence of Ban Gu's view of geography and the model of Hanshu Geography.
Ban Gu not only created the model of administrative geography in Hanshu Geography, but also completed the first book of evolutionary geography. Although Hanshu is a dynastic history of the Western Han Dynasty, the content described in Hanshu Geography is outside the Western Han Dynasty. Because the trace of the former king is far away, the place name has been changed several times. On the basis of collecting old news, examining poetry and pushing mountains and rivers, it added Yugong, Zhou Guan and Chunqiu to the Warring States, Qin and Han Dynasties. It is a geographical work in the Western Han Dynasty, and also involves the national history of ancient counties and the evolution of administrative regions. For example, the frontispiece describes the evolution of territory before the Han Dynasty. Ban Gu not only recorded the harmony workshops completely, but also added the suffix from Huangdi to Dayu before, and added the suffix from Dayu to Zhouhe workshops between harmony workshops, which briefly combed the evolution from Zhouhe to Qin and Han Dynasties, thus maintaining the continuity of regional evolution before the Han Dynasty. For example, Liu Xiangyu and Zhugan Customs are compiled at the end of the volume, which respectively describe the general situation of Qin, Wei, Zhou, Han, Zheng, Chen, Zhao, Yan, Qi, Lu, Song, Wei, Chu, Wu and Yue (Yue), among which evolution is one of the important contents. For another example, Ban Gu put other kinds of geographical phenomena into the framework of administrative geography, divided them under the relevant counties and roads, and mainly described the establishment and evolution of counties and countries from Qin Dynasty to Wang Mang in the form of annotations. The county-level administrative region also designated Wang Mang to change his name. Ban Gu's practice of attaching importance to geographical evolution in Hanshu was followed by Official Geography, National Geography and a large number of local chronicles, which made later works on evolutionary geography become an important part of ancient geography in China.
Ban Gu's Hanshu is a dynastic history of the Western Han Dynasty in China, which records a large number of natural and human geographical materials at that time, especially in geographical records, ditch records and biographies of the western regions. For example, there are 480 rivers and 59 ditches in the text of Geography of Hanshu alone, which describes the source, flow direction, destination and length of more than 300 waterways in China. This is the richest hydrogeology book before the appearance of water mirror notes. The paper also records the location distribution of 153 important mountains and 139 industrial and mining products; There are records of land reclamation; Construction of water conservancy channels; There are 1 13 counties, Chang 'an, the capital, and a few important counties, which are the earliest population distribution records in China and the most complete population statistics in the world at that time. There are supernatural, ancestral temples and shrines in the book; There are records of historical sites such as ancient countries and ancient cities; There are important customs, traffic jams, pavilions, obstacles, and the contents of roads other than traffic jams. In a word, the physical geography, economic geography, population geography, cultural geography and military transportation geography recorded in Hanshu provide valuable information for studying the society of Han Dynasty today.
Ban Gu's Hanshu recorded a large number of frontier geographical data in Geography Biography of the Western Regions. The Western Han Dynasty is one of the most prosperous dynasties in the history of China, with a vast territory and developed transportation, culture and economy. After Zhang Qian's several missions to the Western Regions and several expeditions by the Han army during the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the Silk Road was opened. Zhang Qian and others, after learning from the southwest, had a certain understanding of the southwest at that time. In addition, the geography of the southeast coast, the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean was also known in the Western Han Dynasty. These are well recorded in Hanshu. For example, Geography of Hanshu first recorded a navigation route from Xu Wenxi to southern India and Sri Lanka, and recorded the geographical phenomena along the way. Another example is recorded in Zhuzhuan. King Huainan said that the situation in Fujian (that is, Fujian) is "to examine its mountain and river fortresses with maps, which are only a few inches apart, but hundreds of miles apart, so that dangerous forests can be prevented." If it is easy, it is difficult. "For another example, the biography of Han Xiongnu records that the Emperor of the Han Dynasty should write about Xiongnu" the mountains are shaded, the things are thousands of miles away, the vegetation is lush, and there are many animals ". He also said: "Pingbei has a flat terrain, less vegetation and more sandstorms. "These descriptions of the Mongolian plateau show that people in the Han Dynasty had a good understanding of frontier geography and left us with rich research materials today.
Ban Gu was a famous scholar in the Eastern Han Dynasty in China. According to the archives, he copied and sorted out the descriptions of geography in Hanshu, especially Geography, a collection of geographical works before the Western Han Dynasty. The purpose of writing a book is to "remember the merits", praise the Han Dynasty, make it "famous for future generations", and also serve the administrative management at that time. Therefore, the content of geography is mainly the evolution geography of administrative regions, followed by the content of physical geography. This geographical view, which focuses on human geography, is consistent with the spirit of China traditional culture. The geographical model of Hanshu is easily imitated by the official geography, national annals and local chronicles of later generations, thus having a great influence on the development of ancient geography in China. The historical model of Han geography initiated by Ban Gu promoted the vigorous development of evolutionary geography in later generations, but it also hindered the progress of physical geography. It records a large number of humanities and physical geography data, but it also hinders the development of theory, especially the development of physical geography theory. Judging from the contents of the History of Han Geography, it is the basis for studying the evolution of China's territorial administrative regions, a must-read book for studying China's territorial geography, and a must-read book for studying Han Dynasty's geography.
In a word, Ban Gu has made great achievements in the creation of evolutionary geography and the preservation of geographical data. He was an influential historical geographer in China feudal society.