Ma Duanlin

Biography

Family Background and Early Years Ma Duanlin was born in 1254, the second year of the Baoyou era, into an official family in Leping, Raozhou (present-day Leping, Jiangxi). His father, Ma Tingluan, served as Right Grand Councilor in the late Southern Song. Ma Tingluan had lost his father at an early age and “endured poverty and devoted himself to learning.” After passing the jinshi examination, he served in the palace scholarly institutions and at one point held the office of Vice Director of the Palace Library. Learned and widely read, he possessed a large private collection and was deeply experienced in the collection and organization of historical documents. Ma Tingluan also served as a compiler in the Southern Song Historiography Institute and as an examining official in the Veritable Records Institute, positions that gave him access to large quantities of official documents and archives. From childhood, Ma Duanlin was strongly influenced by his father and “continued the family profession.” His father's strict education and rich household library laid a firm foundation for his later scholarship. As a youth, he imitated the Northern and Southern Dynasties writer Yuan Jun and made a practice of copying fifty sheets of the Classics and histories every day, refusing to rest until the work was finished. This disciplined routine gave him a broad and deep scholarly foundation. In addition to family learning, Ma Duanlin studied under Cao Jing of Xiuning. Cao Jing was deeply versed in the learning of Master Zhu and was an important member of the later Zhu Xi tradition. Under Cao Jing, Ma Duanlin received systematic training in Zhu Xi learning, establishing the intellectual basis that made him part of that scholarly lineage. This teacher-disciple relationship strongly influenced his later historical thought. ### Youth and Entry into Office In 1273, the ninth year of the Xianchun era, twenty-year-old Ma Duanlin placed first in the transport examination and received the post of Gentleman for Service through hereditary privilege. By then the Southern Song political situation was already precarious, with the powerful minister Jia Sidao dominating government amid political corruption. In 1272, the eighth year of Xianchun, Ma Tingluan had submitted nine consecutive memorials requesting resignation in protest against the dominance of corrupt ministers, and was finally allowed to leave office and return home. Ma Duanlin returned with his father, cared for him, and under his guidance concentrated on organizing and studying historical documents. After Ma Tingluan retired, he upheld the family precept of the “Four Things to Leave in Reserve”: leave some unused skill to repay creation, some unexhausted emolument to repay the court, some remaining wealth to repay the people, and some remaining fortune to repay one's descendants. This precept had an important influence on Ma Duanlin's character. ### Withdrawal after the Fall of the Song In 1279, the second year of the Xiangxing era, Song forces were defeated at the Battle of Yashan. Lu Xiufu carried the young emperor Zhao Bing into the sea, and the Southern Song came to an end. Ma Duanlin was twenty-six. Faced with the collapse of the dynasty, he chose withdrawal from office as a form of passive resistance and refused to serve the Yuan. After the fall of the Song, Ma Duanlin maintained his sense of loyalty and repeatedly declined Yuan recruitment. Liu Mengyan, formerly a Song Grand Councilor and later Minister of Personnel under the Yuan, had served alongside Ma Tingluan in the Song government. He once offered to recommend Ma Duanlin for office in the capital, but Ma Duanlin tactfully declined on grounds such as the need to care for his ailing father. In 1289, the 26th year of the Zhiyuan era, Ma Tingluan died. Under pressure from the Yuan authorities, Ma Duanlin was compelled to serve as head of Cihu Academy and Keshan Academy. Zhai Heng, magistrate of Leping County, came personally to the Ma household twice, in 1274 (“11th year of the Yuan”) and 1283 (“20th year of the Yuan”), to invite Ma Duanlin to head the newly established Cihu Academy; Ma accepted on the second occasion. He later also headed Keshan Academy. In his later years he became an instructor at the Confucian school of Taizhou, but retired after only three months and returned home. ### Writing and Scholarship From early in life, Ma Duanlin had “the ambition to compile and arrange” and intended to write a major historical work, but he said that “a hundred worries consumed the mind and there was little leisure even in the three spare times,” and he did not immediately begin. He consistently emphasized the accumulation of learning and the collection and organization of materials, regarding these as an essential path of scholarship. Among earlier historians and their works, he especially admired Du You's Tongdian of the Tang and Zheng Qiao's Tongzhi of the Southern Song. By contrast, he criticized writers of dynastic histories such as Ban Gu, arguing that they had lost the method of tracing continuity and inherited change across periods. From an early stage he resolved to use the Tongdian as his model, “gathering material from many books” to compile a new specialized work on institutions throughout Chinese history. He began preparations in 1273, the ninth year of Xianchun, and started formal compilation in 1290, the 27th year of Zhiyuan. After more than twenty years of work, he completed the first draft of the Wenxian Tongkao in 1307, the 11th year of the Yuan Dade era. The work was finally completed in 1322, the second year of Zhizhi, and was published that same year. The Wenxian Tongkao comprises 348 juan. It begins with the Three Dynasties and ends with the close of Emperor Ningzong's Jiading era in the Southern Song (1224). It is divided into twenty-four major categories: land taxation, money, population registration, corvée obligations, monopolies and taxation, market grain purchases, tribute, state expenditure, selection of officials, schools, official posts, suburban sacrifices, ancestral temples, royal rites, music, military affairs, punishments, bibliography, imperial genealogy, enfeoffment, celestial phenomena, anomalies, geography, and foreign peoples. Of these, the categories on bibliography, imperial genealogy, enfeoffment, celestial phenomena, and anomalies were created by Ma himself. Each major category was further divided into subtopics, producing a more detailed and complete structure for institutional history. The Wenxian Tongkao also preserves historical comments by Ma Tingluan, introduced with the phrase “my late father said.”

Major Activities

Literary and Historical Contribution Ma Duanlin's representative work, the Wenxian Tongkao, is one of the largest works in Chinese history devoted to institutions across successive dynasties. It developed and supplemented Du You's Tongdian. For historical material before the Tang Tianbao era, it used the Tongdian as a basis and supplied omissions; for material in 1212 (“from after Tianbao through the fifth year of the Song Jiading era”), it continued the account. Its treatment of Song institutions is especially detailed, preserving much that is absent from the institutional treatises of the History of Song and frequently providing material that can correct or supplement them. The Tongkao drew on an exceptionally broad range of materials. Besides official dynastic histories, institutional compendia, the Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance, and other historical works, it used private histories, biographies, and other records relating to institutions. These documentary records constituted the “wen” in its title. Ma also quoted many memorials submitted by officials and discussions by scholars and prominent figures; these constituted the “xian.” The combination of “wen” and “xian” gave the work its title, Wenxian Tongkao. The Wenxian Tongkao received official attention already in the Yuan. Emperor Renzong of Yuan ordered an official woodblock edition so that it would circulate more widely. In the fifteenth century the work reached Korea, where the Dongguk Munheon Bigo (later revised and supplemented as the Jeungbo Munheon Bigo) was compiled largely on the structural model of the Wenxian Tongkao. Ma Duanlin also wrote the Collected Commentaries on the Great Learning, Duoshi Lu, and Yigen Shoumo, all of which are lost. ### Historical Thought The core of Ma Duanlin's historical thought was “comprehensive continuity.” He argued that “institutions and regulations in fact succeed and depend upon one another,” emphasizing the historical continuity and transformation of institutions and seeking to explain “the reasons for their changes, adaptations, tightening, and relaxation.” This approach drew on Confucius's statement that “the Yin followed the rites of the Xia; what was reduced or added can be known,” and especially on Zheng Qiao's idea of comprehensive historical connection. Ma extended this into an account of how institutions changed over time and how successive arrangements were historically related. Ma Duanlin attached great importance to socioeconomic issues and people-centered thought. In the Wenxian Tongkao, he raised economic subjects such as land taxation, money, population registration, and corvée obligations to the level of major categories and added substantial material on Tang and Song social and economic life. This reflected a Confucian concern for the welfare of the people. His views on land and military-service systems were regarded as going beyond those of his predecessors. Ma Duanlin rejected explanations based on portents and auspicious or ominous signs. He advocated an objective attitude toward historical events and figures and opposed praise and blame that departed from truthful records. In his view, the fundamental purpose of writing history was to examine the causes of the rise and decline of rulers across the dynasties, summarize historical lessons, and provide guidance for later generations. ### Method of Historical Study Ma Duanlin upheld a rigorous spirit of textual verification. In his preface he explained his method: “In narrating events, I base them on the Classics and histories, compare them with institutional compendia of successive dynasties and the biographies and records of the hundred schools, follow what is credible and supported by evidence, and do not record contradictory matters that should remain doubtful.” This commitment to verification and evidence helped open the path for later historical textual criticism and made him an important early figure in that tradition. His authorial comments ranged across past and present, weighing competing views and seeking cautious conclusions grounded in historical facts. In the history of historiography, Ma Duanlin helped begin a transition from the mere compilation of documents toward analytical historical research. ### Travels and Places of Activity Ma Duanlin's life was centered mainly on his home area of Leping in Raozhou. Before the fall of the Song he returned home with his father. During his years of withdrawal he taught at Cihu Academy and Keshan Academy. In his later years he became an instructor at the Confucian school of Taizhou, but retired after three months and returned home. In 1317, the fourth year of the Yanyou era, the Daoist Wang Shouyan, acting on imperial orders to seek out worthy men, came to the Raozhou circuit, copied the Wenxian Tongkao, and submitted it to the court, helping prompt the Yuan government to order an official edition. ### Relations with Contemporaries Ma Duanlin's principal scholarly and personal contacts included studying Zhu Xi learning under Cao Jing; maintaining an old connection with the former Song Grand Councilor Liu Mengyan while politely refusing his invitation to take office; interacting with Zhai Heng, magistrate of Leping County, and accepting his invitation to head Cihu Academy; and meeting the Daoist Wang Shouyan, who later submitted his work to the court.

Personal Relations

• Father: Ma Tingluan, Right Chancellor of the Southern Song, a learned man with a large library, from whom Ma Duanlin received his scholarly foundations.
• Teacher and friend: Cao Jing, a specialist in the learning of Zhu Xi and an important figure among his successors.

Historical Assessment

Yuan / Contemporary Emperor Renzong of Yuan ordered an official woodblock edition of the Wenxian Tongkao so that the work would circulate more widely, demonstrating the high official regard for its scholarly value. Wang Shouyan, acting under imperial orders to search for worthy men, came to the Raozhou circuit, copied the Wenxian Tongkao, and submitted it to the court. His action helped bring about the official edition and shows that the work had already attracted serious attention at the time. ### Ming and Qing Periods The Qing scholar Pan Lei grouped Ma Duanlin with Zheng Qiao, Wang Yinglin, and others as scholars “whose learning extended through antiquity and the present and who understood the principles of government.” The Wenxian Tongkao, Tongdian, and Tongzhi were collectively known as the “Three Comprehensive Works.” Because the Wenxian Tongkao was the richest in content, covered the longest chronological span, and was considered especially rigorous in verification, later historians regarded it as foremost among the three. An edition printed by the Zhejiang Book Bureau during the Guangxu era of the Qing survives, showing that the work continued to circulate widely in the Qing period. ### Modern Period The Wenxian Tongkao is widely regarded as a fundamental source for the study of Song history. Its accounts of Song institutions are especially detailed and can in many places correct or supplement the institutional treatises of the History of Song. The Wenxian Tongkao and Sima Guang's Comprehensive Mirror in Aid of Governance have been described as complementary: to read the Mirror without the Tongkao is said to be like reading the “annals and biographies” without the “treatises and tables”—one may know the deeds of people in an age without understanding its institutions. Because of his outstanding historical scholarship, later generations called Ma Duanlin the “second Sima Qian.” Into the modern period, the Wenxian Tongkao remains an extremely important reference for the study of Song institutions and those of earlier periods and retains high scholarly value. Specific arguments in the work, such as his discussion of local service obligations, have also been studied in depth by scholars.