There are always different opinions about the origin of local chronicles. There are two main viewpoints: First, local chronicles originated from history and developed from the records of ancient historians. For example, the "four directions of local chronicles" mentioned by Zhou Li may be the source of local chronicles; Second, local chronicles were born out of geography, and evolved from China's earliest geographical works, Shangshu Gong Yu and Shan Hai Jing. Shang Gong recorded the territory, products and tribute before the Warring States Period, while Shan Hai Jing recorded the mountains, rivers, situations and strange things in ancient times, which was regarded as the embryonic form of local chronicles. At the beginning of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Yuan Kang, a member of Huiji, wrote Yue Jue Ji, which recorded the history and geography of wuyue. This is a historical work with the nature of local chronicles, a pioneering work in the history of local chronicles compilation, and is regarded as the originator of China local chronicles by many scholars in later generations. The so-called "ambition of one side" began with Yue Jue. Fu Zhenlun, a modern scholar, believes that "Yue Jue Shu first records mountains and rivers, battlements and tombs; The second time and biography, only today, later generations of local chronicles are imitation. " It can be said that Yuejueshu is the earliest existing local chronicles in China. Equivalent to the Southern Song Dynasty to the present. Almost all local chronicles in this period are called local chronicles, which is the mature period of local chronicles. It was in the Song Dynasty that the style of China local chronicles was basically finalized and the content was complete. At this time, "remember". "Picturesque" and the like have been basically replaced by "local chronicles", and the focus of local chronicles has also begun to shift from the geographical situation to many aspects of society. "Man" and "art" occupy a more important position in local chronicles, forming the overall pattern of local chronicles in later generations. For example, Taiping Ji, Yuanfeng Jiu Yu Zhi, Dalulin, Spring Tour Forest and Xianchunlin, which are called "Three Records of Lin 'an", are all representative local chronicles at that time. In the seventh year of Dade in Yuan Dynasty (1303), the unified annals of Dayuan were compiled into 1300 volumes, which was the first large-scale unified annals in China history, providing an example and model for the compilation of unified annals of Dayuan in Ming and Qing Dynasties. There are about 1500 kinds of local chronicles in Ming dynasty, and there are more than 400 kinds. Qing Dynasty was the heyday of compiling local chronicles. During the years of Qianlong and Jiaqing, the compilation of local chronicles reached its climax. The government also clearly stipulates that all provinces, prefectures and counties compile local chronicles every 60 years, and there is a special local chronicler organization 1 1. Many scholars also compete to compile local chronicles, resulting in a large number of local chronicles and high-quality local chronicles.
After thousands of years of development, China local chronicles have gradually improved in style and content, and accumulated a large amount of information. Unfortunately, many local chronicles have been lost in the process of circulation, especially those before the Song Dynasty. At present, according to the statistics of China Local Records Joint Catalogue, there are more than 8,500 kinds of local records in China, which is almost equivalent to one tenth of all existing ancient books. Among them, Beijing Library has the largest number of books, about 6,000, followed by Shanghai Library, about 5,000, and Nanjing Library ranks third, about 4,000. There are also many books in university libraries, ranking first in Peking University, second in Nanjing University and third in Beijing Normal University. The collection of local chronicles of Ming Dynasty in Tianyi Pavilion in Ningbo is the most distinctive. Since 196 1, 107 kinds of selected journals of local masters of Tianyige in Ming Dynasty have been photocopied and published.
Many local chronicles in China are scattered abroad. Since 1869, Americans have been interested in collecting China's precious books, including more than 5,500 kinds of local chronicles, and Harvard University alone has hundreds of precious local chronicles of the Song and Ming Dynasties. Japan hides more than the United States. In addition, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden and other countries also have collections.