This poem is not found in Chen Shou's History of the Three Kingdoms, nor in Pei Songzhi's Notes on the History of the Three Kingdoms. The earliest record of this poem is Liu Yiqing's notebook novel Shi Shuo Xin Yu, a scholar in the Southern Song Dynasty. Its original text is:
"Emperor Wendi (Cao Pi) tried to get King Dong 'e (Cao Zhi) to write poems in seven steps, but failed to achieve Dafa, so he replied with poems: boiling beans and holding soup, simmering it as juice. Honey burns under the pot, and beans cry in the pot. This is the same root, and we are too eager to fry each other. The emperor was deeply ashamed. "
At that time, it was more than 200 years since Cao Zhi died.
More importantly, there are no seven-step poems in Cao Zhi's collection.
Cao Zhi compiled his own collection of works "The Seventy-eighth"; On one occasion, Cao Sou of Wei Mingdi wrote a letter to Cao Zhi, collecting "100 articles" on various subjects. These two collections were circulated in the Jin Dynasty, and they were well preserved until the Tang Dynasty, and their loss occurred in the troubled times of the handover of the Song Dynasty. According to the Book of Jin, Sima Yan, the emperor of Jin Dynasty, saw a certain work and suspected that it was written by Cao Zhi, so he asked his son Cao Zhi to ask. Cao Zhi's reply is "My late king has a catalogue of his works, please check it"-it can be seen that Cao Zhi left not only a collection of works, but also a complete catalogue of works. Cao Zhi later wrote back to Sima Yan, saying that this work was not written by Cao Zhi, but the real author was a grass.
Scholars in the Southern and Northern Dynasties and the Tang Dynasty who can see the 30 volumes of The Complete Works of Cao Zhi-ji generally only say that the seven-step poem is from Shi Shuo Xin Yu, but no one says that it is from Cao Zhi-ji (for example, Shan Li often quotes Cao Zhi-ji as the annotation of Selected Works, but the seven-step poem quotes Shi Yu, which shows that Cao Zhi-ji he read. As far as the existing historical materials are concerned, there is no story about "Seven-step Poetry" in the Jin Dynasty for more than 50 years. These facts are enough to show that Seven Steps Poetry is not in Cao Zhi's collection. It not only shows that there is no "seven-step poem" in Cao Zhi Ji, but also shows that there is no "seven-step poem" in unpublished works (if any) preserved by Cao Zhi's descendants-based on reasonable suspicion, Cao Cao's attempt to whitewash the image of his father Cao Pi may be detrimental to Cao Pi's works. However, there is still no "seven-step poem" story after entering Jin, which is very telling.
In a word, Shi Shuo Xin Yu is the only source of the seven-step poem so far.