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Just Described:

Manchu, Korean, & Chinese Books(& a Chinese Woodblock)

Feng Shui, Divination, Geomancy, & Astrology

1. BU, Zewei & LIU, Bingzhong. Chong juan guan ban dili tianji huiyuan zheng pian tiyong kuo yao [A Collection of Profound Secrets in Feng shui]. Editor: Zhimo Xu; compiler: NaideGu. Numerous woodcuts in the text. 35 parts in 16 vols. 8vo, orig. wrappers, new stitching.

[China]: Xue ku shan fang, 1890. $4500.00

Second edition (1st ed.: 1880) of the compiler Gu’s collection of writings by Zewei Bu andBingzhong Liu (both Tang dynasty, 618-907) on feng shui, divination, geomancy, and Chineseastrology. Both the 1880 edition and our edition are very rare. The texts, which first appearedin the 17th century, have remained very popular, and there is also a 1970 (quite wretched)reprint.

Our edition was edited by Zhimo Xu, who lived in the Ming dynasty (1368-1644). Thetexts include Bu’s Xue xin fu, which appears in the first volume. The first woodcut in thisvolume is a full-page depiction of Xu giving his disciples geomantic images. Other images inthe volumes include further Taoist images of bagua, a series of what appear to be case studiesof landscapes that require the use of feng shui, wuxing (the Five Phases: wood, fire, earth,metal, and water), the recommended shapes of moats surrounding castles, the pressure pointsof the palm of the hand, recommended shapes of burial mounds, how to put water in moatsand remove it, physiognomy, pressure points of the face, feng shui applied to the placementand construction of houses, where to locate gates (very extensive), etc., etc.

At the end of the final volume, there is an “Afterword” dated 1615.This is a very rare book; we locate only one set of the 1880 edition in North America and

no set of our edition. This set is in quite nice condition. There are a few tears and some minorworming, but on the whole, in very good state. Preserved in two chitsu.

2. CH I NESE W OODB LOCK. Woodblock (170 x 163 x 22 mm.), consistingof two pieces of wood, joined on each sidewith two nails, carved on obverse & reversesides. [China: 18th-19th cent.].

$1950.00

A fine example of a woodblockexecuted in China, with images on bothsides, of the Chinese god Guanyin orGuanshiyin, the Buddhist Bodhisattvaassociated with compassion, and Congshen, a Chinese mythological figure.

Minor wear to borders on one side, butin fine condition.

3. KOREAN TYPE SPECIMEN BOOK. Type specimen book, entitled in manuscriptin Japanese on upper cover “Chosen dokatsuji mihon yonshu” [“Korean Copper MoveableType Sample {Book} Four Kinds”]. Compiled by Yasushi Uematsu. Four folding leaves (finalleaf with one line of text or manuscript excised). Large 8vo (273 x 194 mm.), orig. wrappers (a

little dusty), stitched as issued. [Japan: June 1916]. $3250.00

This apparently unique type specimen book was prepared by Yasushi Uematsu (1885-1945), librarian at Tokyo University and a well-known scholar of printing history and Japaneseliterature. Issued during the early years of the annexation of Korea by Japan, it was createdfor an exhibition, “Kokatsujibon Tenrankai,” sponsored by the Japan Library Association inTokyo in 1916 (Uematsu later became vice-president of the association).

On the left side of the four openings are four different printed specimens of very old (atleast one is 15th century) Korean copper moveable types with manuscript commentary on thefollowing pages by Uematsu. The four Korean type faces are: “Eifujin ji,” “Sillokcha,” “Seiriji” (or, in Korean, “Chongnija”), and “Han Kuja.”

On the final page, the author writes in manuscript that the ancient types were lent by thegovernor-general of Korea for the exhibition and that Uematsu hand-printed this work.

Very rare, with no copy in WorldCat. Clearly, very few copies were made. This is the firstAsian type specimen book we have encountered.

Moveable Type or Woodblock?

4. LU, Zhi. Ojong Yuk chu yakson. Edited by King Chongjo. Ten columns per page, 18characters per column. 2, 37, 34, 1 (=74) folding leaves. Two parts in one vol. Small folio (350x 228 mm.), orig. wrappers (wrappers rather rubbed & somewhat soiled), later stitching. [Jeolla (or Jeolla) Province: the Governor’s Office], from the colophon: July 1797.

$4750.00

A most uncommon Korean woodblock (?, see below) book, which reproduces the finestof the Korean moveable metal typefaces, the kabinja. “Selections from the memorials of LuChih (754-805), the great statesman of the T’ang dynasty. The selections were edited by KingChongjo in 1794 and first printed in mid-1797 by the Royal Printing Office with type from thekabinja font of 1777. It was from a copy of the movable-type edition that this woodblockedition was made by the Governor’s Office of Chollado.”–Fang, The Asami Library, 18.37.

Zhi Lu was chancellor during the reign of Emperor Dezong, who greatly valued hisopinions. Lu left a large body of writings, mostly advice for the emperor on political mattersand how to run the country. While he had a tumultuous political career which ended in exile,Lu’s posthumous reputation was favorable.

Zhi Lu would have appealed to King Chongjo (1752-1800), one of the most intellectual andenlightened of the Korean monarchs. He was perhaps the Korea’s greatest bibliophile and,as royal patron, supported all aspects of the book: typographers, printers, authors, librarians,and lexicographers. He founded the Kyujanggak Library in 1776 which is now part of thelibrary of the Seoul National University.

In spite of Fang’s statement quoted above, the title-page states that this is a moveable typeedition. And, indeed, the cataloguer of the Kyoto University copy can’t quite decide, aftersome considerable head-scratching, whether this is a moveable type or woodblock printing(though the cataloguer leans in the direction of the latter). The Kyoto University copy doesnot have the printed colophon on the final leaf (that section of the leaf is blank).

Very good copy. Minor soiling.

Printed in Manchu

5. MANCHU CALENDAR. Daicing Gurun I doro eldengge I Juwan nadaci aniyai erin forgonI ton I bithe [Calendar for the Seventeenth Year of the Daoguang Reign of the Great Qing Empire]. 93folding leaves. Small folio (340 x 212 mm.), orig. wrappers (upper wrapper much repaired but

with the printing very largely intact), new stitching. Beijing: Bureau of Astronomy (Qin tianjian), 1837. $10,000.00

Very rare; our calendar appears to be unique in the West. Books printed in Manchu rarelyappear on the market.

This government Manchu-language calendar was prepared and printed for distributionthroughout the Qing empire before the Chinese New Year in 1837. Calendars were preparedin both Manchu and Chinese. Because the rulers of the Qing dynasty were ethnicallyManchu, Manchu was the dynasty’s official language. Legal regulations required coregovernment documents and texts to be produced in both Manchu and Chinese. Manchuritual calendars are far rarer than Chinese calendars, as they were often prepared only formembers of the central government and for offices in border territories.

The annual preparation of the official calendar took months. The yearly presentation ofthe calendar to the emperor and the ceremonies marking the formal publication andpromulgations of the document and distribution to various members of the ImperialHousehold, the boards of Civil Appointments and War, and civil and military officialsthroughout China were elaborate solemn rituals, involving kowtowing and musicalprocessions.

“The history of calendars in China goes back to the origins of Chinese civilization itself. As is well known, every official dynastic history included a substantial section on the calendar,since one of the most important acts of any new regime was to fix the time (fshoushi or shiling)and to regulate the calendar (shili)…Calendrical science in the Qing period thus involvedmuch more than mathematics and technology. Although continual efforts were made by theBureau of Astronomy to predict celestial events as accurately as possible, and to calibrate theyear into various precise subdivisions, calendar-making was also based on complexcosmological calculations. These calculations — made with the assistance of official sourcessuch as the voluminous guide to astrology known as the Xieji bianfang shu provided specificand detailed guidance for all levels of Chinese society, and made possible attainment of theChinese ritual ideal: doing the right thing, at the right time, in the right place, facing the rightdirection…

“At the core of all state calendars…is a month-by-month, day-by-day breakdown of theentire year, obviously designed to coordinate and control all aspects of Chinese political, social,ritual, and economic life.”–Prof. Richard J. Smith, “A Note on Qing Dynasty Calendars” in LateImperial China, Vol. 9, No. 1 (June 1988), pp. 123-45–(a fine article with a strong bibliographicalslant).

These calendars guided everyone from the imperial family to government officials toordinary people in all matters ranging from when to make administrative or businessdecisions to auspicious days to marry to when to clean the house.

With thanks to Devin Fitzgerald and Soren Edgren, who guided us and held our handsthroughout the making of this description.

Apart from the upper wrapper repairs, in fine and fresh condition. A few natural paperflaws and light marginal dampstaining in upper margin of final third of the book. Contemporary note, dated 1837, at the lower edge of the first page of text.

É Kornicki, Languages, Scripts, and Chinese Texts in East Asia, p. 70–”Throughout the Qingdynasty, Manchu was used extensively in China for administrative purposes and was alsoused for translation up to the early part of the twentieth century, but the language and scriptshave since fallen largely into disuse.”

Printed with Copper Moveable Type

6. YI, Tok-hyong. Hanum sonsaeng mun’go purok. Ten columns per page; 20 characters

per line. 57; 62; 79 folding leaves. Four parts in three vols. Large 8vo (314 x 201 mm.), orig.patterned wrappers (slightly soiled & wormed), new stitching. [Korea]: Printed by Ui-ik Yi,1869. $7500.00

First edition of this commentary on and supplement to Hanum mun’go (1668), the collectedwritings of Tok-hyong Yi (1561-1631), Korean scholar who was appointed Director ofEducation for the country in 1591, one of the youngest men in Korean history to be sodistinguished. During the Japanese invasion, he served several times as liaison official at theheadquarters of the commander of Chinese troops that assisted Korea. Yi then served aspremier or as a deputy premier several times (1598-99, 1602-04, 1609-13), and went to Pekingin 1608 to plead for China’s approval of the succession of King Kwanghaegum to the throne. Because of his successful mission, he was rewarded by being ennobled.

The present work, printed with metal moveable type by Ui-ik Yi (b. 1788?), is asupplement to the Hanum mun’go. It consists of a chronological biography and otherbiographical materials and was compiled by Ki-yang Yi and others.

The copper moveable typeface used here is known as chonsaja, cast after 1858 andmodelled after the style of the characters in the Ch’ien-lung edition of the 24 dynastic historiesEr-shih-ssu shih.

Minor occasional marginal worming and staining, but a fine set, preserved in a chitsu.É The Asami Library: A Descriptive Catalogue 39.55.

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