Chapter Two

Chapter Two Wen’s Birth Year

A Most Abstruse Allusion to the Eunuchs

As we have seen in Chapter One, eunuchs had played an extremely important role in shaping the family’s fate ever since the beginning of Wen’s life. Throughout Wen’s life, eunuchs did remain an obstacle precluding him from attaining any political success. Although Wen often responded with animosity and anxiety to the eunuchs’ action of sabotage, we can never find the word “eunuch” in his works. If he needed to mention them, he did so using rarely used abstruse and misleading historical allusions or subtle metaphors. To clear the way for further research and avoid digressions, we shall first unravel one of his most difficult allusions and clarify why Wen had to refer to the eunuchs in such an ambiguous manner. However, before proceeding to this task, let us first examine a couplet in “Angling by the Pond of the Xue Family” (薛氏池垂釣, WFQ, j. 9), to see how he alludes to the eunuchs using “outspoken” terms.

Zhu Yu vainly stole the water of the Imperial Ditch, 朱 空偷御溝水,

“Brocade scales” with red tail belong to Yan Guang. 錦鱗紅尾屬嚴光.

Of all examples where Wen refers to the eunuchs this is the clearest. Zhu Yu is a eunuch of the Eastern Han (25-220), who, like the Late Tang eunuchs, amassed great wealth and even channeled water from the Imperial Ditch into his own pond, in defiance of the royal authority.¹ Yan Guang, a famous recluse, had been classmate and friend of Emperor Guangwu (r. 25-57). When the emperor asked him to serve in the court, he refused with the excuse that he preferred a life as a recluse. Here the poem seems to say that Wen was only commenting on the Han eunuch Zhu and the recluse Yan, with no evident interest in the affairs of his own time, although he is actually strongly condemning the eunuchs who forced him to into reclusion. Thus we see why and how Wen availed himself of historical allusions to refer to something he would not express in clear terms. He wanted to make indirect some of his most pointed castigations of the eunuchs. The allusion, often possessing more than one explanation, can just serve this purpose. This peculiar trope of Chinese classic versification, though in ordinary cases highly effective, did a disservice to some of Wen’s poems, when the allusions he used are too uncommon for ordinary readers to follow. That Wen’s most important autobiographical poems have remained, by and large, ignored or misunderstood by scholars illustrates his “failure” in this respect, since few readers possess both the knowledge and patience to make sense of them.

Now we turn to a very obscure allusion to the eunuchs, an allusion to Du Zhi (杜摯), in the following couplet from Wen’s “Hundred-Rhyme Poem”. It intends to say that (from the outset of his office-seeking life) Wen was faced with such a predicament:

52 In my loves and hates I took precautions against Du Zhi, 愛憎防杜摯,

In my laments and sighs I felt melancholy, as did Yang Zhu. 悲嘆似楊朱.

Even before we know to what the name alludes, we know that Du Zhi must refer to Wen’s enemies (most probably the eunuchs), even though it is an insinuating reference to them. We must determine what kind of a figure this Du Zhi is, since this will enable us to identify the precise connotation of Wen’s poems as well as some prose passages. Among all pre-Tang historical characters, we find only two men bearing this name, both mentioned in someone else’s biography and referred to very briefly.² In both cases, the Du Zhis must be excluded as a referent, as neither of them seems to have anything to do with the context. Thereupon two possibilities suggest themselves: some other Du Zhi (related to the eunuchs) alluded to by Wen was recorded in a historical text that is no longer extant; or there may be a textual corruption, and the name Du Zhi was originally something else. Further investigation verifies the latter possibility.

In Wen’s “Epistle Presented to Prime Minister Pei” (we will study all its texts), we find another mention of the same Du Zhi:

Later on, I spent many years at one or another Marquis’ before I traveled to the valley of the Huai River, where I presented myself by writing letters, and sought recognition while holding a calling card. But I had not expected that Du Zhi was to make a false charge and Zang Cang to harbor a bitter hatred against me.

In this context, Du Zhi is clearly the same kind of person as was Zang Cang, who, fortunately, is easier to identify. It alludes to a story of Duke Ping of Lu ³ (魯平公): The Duke was about to give audience to Mencius (孟子, 3 90-305, BC) when his favorite, Zang Can (臧倉) by name, stopped him from doing so by speaking evil of Mencius. Here Zang Cang was a favorite (嬖人) of the Duke, analogous to the eunuchs who were habitually regarded as playthings or house-slaves of the monarch. So, we come nearer to our expected conclusion: besides representing Wen’s enemy, the Du Zhi in question must be a figure similar to the eunuchs.

In “Hundred-Rhyme Poem”, the twenty-eighth rhyme provides decisive evidence for the identification of Du Zhi. Since Wen directs his castigation mainly at the eunuchs all through this poem, his manner of using historical and literary allusions should, very naturally, be consistent from beginning to end. Between the couplet cited above and the one we are going to discuss next there is just such conformity, as they both allude to the eunuchs by making use of the same historical episode. The difference is that the former alludes to the name Du Zhi, while the following one alludes to what the man Du Zhi did:

28 Letting drop my bow case, I was ashamed of finishing the cup, 垂橐羞盡爵, Raising the goblet, they insulted me for curving the bow. 揚觶辱彎弧.

Both lines in this couplet consist of two verb-object units, with a verb inserted in between. The couplet is unusual in that the four verb-object units designate men who act, instead of only an action, as would be more common.

“Letting drop the bowcase” has its origin in the following classic text: “Wu Ju, knowing that they had taken precautions against him, asked to enter by letting drop his bow case”(伍舉知其有備也, 請垂橐而入) and Du Yu’s annotation to this is: “To let the bow case drop shows that he had no bow with him”(垂橐示無弓也). ⁴ As a term related to archery, a metaphor in common use for literary competition in Tang poetry, this reference is used here ironically for Wen himself, the subject of the line, to show that he had no ambition or energy to declare himself against the injustice he suffered upon being rejected as a Presented Scholar. “Finishing the cup” may refer to himself as one who drank a cup as a forfeit (because of failure), as expressed in our translation, or more preferably, to those successful Presented Scholar who drank their full. The first line thus gives a meaningful account of how he was too perplexed and ashamed to face those who had passed, despite his achieving an “Equivalent to Passing” (等第) in 839.

“Raising the goblet” alludes to the following story: ⁵ Viscount Zhi Dao (知悼子) died, and was not buried yet. Duke Ping of Jin (晉平公) had one of his drinking parties with his musician Shi Kuang (師曠) and favorite sycophant Li Diao (李調) attending, and enjoyed striking the bell. Now, the royal cook (膳宰) Du Kui (杜蕢) entered from outside. After some arguments, the cook succeeded in proving that both Shi and Li were to blame for their dereliction of duty; because, on a day when an important minister had just died, they failed to dissuade the Duke from drinking. In consequence, both were given a forfeit of wine. Then the cook proceeded to give himself a forfeit since he had overstepped his official responsibility by speaking out in this way. Upon hearing and seeing all this, the Duke said: “I, too, am to blame. Pour the wine and drink me the forfeit;” upon which, “Du Kui, after washing it, raised the goblet [to the Duke for a forfeit]”. Wen’s teacher Li Cheng once also used this allusion: “As to a case where The Rites failed to scorn what it should, I think about Du Kui’s raising up the goblet” (禮失所譏, 想杜蕢之揚觶). ⁶ Like his teacher, and unlike most orthodox commentators of the classics, ⁷ Wen took Du Kui as a negative figure, representing the usurping eunuchs of his time, because Du Kui’s post, royal cook, was always taken by eunuchs throughout the imperial times. It was not by sheer coincidence that on another occasion Wen used “royal cook” to speak of the eunuchs: in “Epistle Presented to the Academician-Drafter” (上學士舍人啟), Wen says: “I was downcast and haggard, at the bottommost of retainers; humiliated and distressed, in the presence of the royal cook” (委悴館人之末, 摧殘膳宰之前). Therefore, “raising the goblet” alludes to the royal cook Du Kui, a disguised appellation for the eunuchs.

“Curving the bow” also points to the doer (Wen himself) through an allusion to Guan Zhong (管仲, ? -645, BC). To annotate this line, the Qing annotator Gu Sili correctly quoted Ban Gu’s (32-92) “Rhapsody On Communion with the Mystical”(幽通賦): “Guan, curving his bow, was to shoot his foe, and the foe, after ascending the throne, became his own fulfillment” (管彎弧欲斃仇兮, 仇作后而成己). ⁸ Ban’s remark again contains an allusion.⁹ Before Guan Zhong served Duke Huan of Qi (齊桓公, ? -643 BC), he had been the Mentor of Prince Jiu, Duke Huan’s brother. When the two brothers were vying for the throne, Guan Zhong in a battle shot an arrow straight at Huan, and almost took his life. Later Prince Jiu was defeated and killed by Huan. At the recommendation of his bosom friend, Bao Shuya, Huan’s Mentor, Guan Zhong was spared and promoted as chief minister. Wen had reasons to use this allusion to Guan Zhong to mean himself, for, as a loyal attendant of Emperor Wenzong’s (r. 827-36) Heir Li Yong, he could have never suspected that it would be Emperor Wuzong (r. 840-846), one of Wenzong’s inconspicuous younger brothers, who would succeed to the throne, placed there with the ulterior support of the eunuchs. In his speeches or in the previous year’s (839) examination paper, he may have expressed his hostility towards the eunuchs’ monopolization of the imperial succession, a hostility that could easily have been interpreted by the eunuchs as blaspheming the succeeding monarch. At a time when the throne was shifting, the eunuchs used Wen’s devotion to the former emperor as a weapon to thwart his possible promotion in the new court. By alluding to “curving the bow”, Wen likened himself to Guan Zhong, declaring his allegiance to the new emperor as a means of justifying himself.

Now it is clear that the Du Zhi (杜摯) so baffling us should be Du Kui (杜蕢). It is likely that the Chinese ideograph kui (蕢) corrupted and was mistakenly discerned as zhi (摯), as Du Zhi (杜摯) is a better-known name. The corrupted form appeared as early as in the Song Dynasty encyclopedia Wenyuan Yinghua, which includes most of Wen’s extant epistles. In every instance, the name Du Zhi must refer to the eunuchs in the context.

Through this example we come to realize how, under the terrifying pressure of the eunuch rule, Wen made use of his erudition to impart the truth while avoiding adverse consequences. Because the way in which Wen composed his poetry and prose works is peculiarly logical, once we succeed in discovering the origin of his diction and allusions, the factual threads are laid bare, enabling us to unravel the enigmas of these works with more confidence. We determine Wen’s birth year in much a similar manner.

The Year of Having the Way And Epistle Presented to Prime Minster Pei

The accepted birth year of Wen Tingyun, 812, was worked out by Xia Chengtao in his “Chronicle of Wen Feiqing” published in the 1930s and reaffirmed by Gu Xuejie’s “Revision and Supplement to ‘Biographies of Wen Tingyun’ in the two Tang Histories”¹⁰ published in 1940s. However, Xia meant it as no more than a guess¹¹ and it would have been overthrown long ago but for the fact that it is the earliest study of this difficult and seemingly unrewarding topic, and that thereafter not many adequate studies have been focused on it. However, establishing Wen’s true birth year is of crucial importance in gaining a correct starting point for research on his life and poetry. Without an accurate time reference we will be unable to understand many of Wen’s works, and it will become all the more difficult to reevaluate Wen properly.

Gu reached his conclusion mainly on account of the following couplet in “Fifty-Rhyme Poem”: “When Ji Shao was a lad with hair streaming down \ It was the year Shan Tao began his official service.” Taking this couplet at face value, we can be certain only that by the time Wen had audience with the so-called Chancellor Li (李仆射, referred to by the allusion to Shan Tao), he was a boy aged about eight years.¹² Wen’s birth year cannot be decided unless we can pinpoint who Li was, on which year Wen had his audience with him, and finally what age Wen had in mind by the year “when Ji Shao was a lad with tufts hanging down.”

Unfortunately, “Fifty-Rhyme Poem” with its archaic allusions, does not present an easy account for such identifications. One must first decode the poem’s difficult language and work out a picture of Li’s life. Then one must compare this with various biographies of men bearing the surname Li and having an official position of a chancellor and, being in charge of Huainan Circuit, in order to find the one that is identical with the picture. Such a task can be both unrewarding and fruitless, because there were more than one “Chancellor Li” roughly fitting in with the inexact definition of the “Ji Shao-Shan Tao” allusion. Each of these will elicit a different conclusion. Moreover, in ancient China only when a young man arrived at the age of twenty (弱冠) must he put his hair up. Either aged above or under ten, boys could always have “tufts hanging down”. Thus the phrase indicates no exact age, only that one is still a child. We have no reason to suppose the age it denotes is eight, even though it has to do with Ji Shao’s childhood. Thus, we cannot be sure that Wen had such a number in mind when he availed himself of the term. Simply put, all academic efforts, including Gu’s, to use this term to calculate Wen’s birth year, come to little fruition.¹³

In order to ascertain Wen’s birth year, Xia and most Chinese scholars touching on the topic strain at this same poetic hint. It is only natural that their conclusions vary considerably.¹⁴ With respect to this issue, we will finally arrive at the conclusion that the Li here referred to is Li Shen, that Wen saw him in 806, and that therefore Wen was born some time around the turn of the century. Since using only this poem to determine who Chancellor was will lead to unnecessary digressions and prove fruitless, we must turn to other extant sources to find more solid evidence on which to build our conclusion. By happy coincidence, we do have another important hint, “the Year of Having the Way”, in the following epistle.

Wen’s epistles, in a manner characteristic of the Late Tang parallel prose style, are dense and full of literary and historical allusions. Most of them are saturated with important information about the major events of his life which any study of Wen’s life and poetry cannot afford to ignore. Therefore, in dealing with this epistle, we have no choice but to decipher the whole text. The exposed information not only will contribute towards a clarification of his birth year and an understanding of Wen’s situation in 839, but also will provide an outline for further exploration of Wen’s life in the chapters to follow.

The Epistle Presented to Prime Minister Pei (上裴相公啟)

Your humble servant wishes to say: I hear that he who wants to offer a precious treasure must first go to Marquis Sui and Bian He, and he who hopes to cure his disease must ask instructions from Lord Cang and Doctor Bianque.¹⁵ Without an unusually powerful potion, it is hard to expect a miraculous cure. I have now come to the Year of Having the Way¹⁶, while still harboring the remorse of a wronged innocent. Hence even though I perish, I will become a miasmal cloud, to disturb your most impartial Excellency [by my indignation], and I will make the voice of a wronged man, to resound forever in the history of unjust verdicts. For such matters the princes, dukes and ministers have raised their righteous indignation, while men of rectitude and ambition can only sigh and shed tears (某啟: 聞效珍者先詣隋和, 蠲養者必求倉扁. 茍無懸解, 難語奇功. 至于有道之年, 猶抱無辜之恨.斯則沒為瘴氣, 來撓至平; 敷作冤聲, 將垂不極. 此亦王公大人之所慷慨, 義夫志士之所噓欷).

My nature, truly, is that of an idiot, and my personality one of stubbornness. With regard to succeeding to my ancestor’s undertakings, I am ashamed of comparing myself to Kong Lin, distant in the past; and in taking up the family tradition, I am not the equal of Zhang Dai nearer to the present.¹⁷ Since the days when my ancestors were bestowed imperial favor and conferred fiefs, our family had enjoyed everlasting glory, which was inscribed on the imperial tripod. Then I took my registered residence in Liaoxi, before I studied the classics in Jixia.¹⁸ Thereupon I looked up to and exhausted the lore my teacher handed down to me¹⁹, and engaged in the composition of poetry and prose. I was hoping to sew up the broken drapery of the Confucian house, and to restore the magnificence and grandeur of the Constant Norm (某性實顓蒙, 器惟頑固. 篡修祖業, 遠愧孔琳; 承襲門風, 近慚張岱.自頃爰田錫寵, 鏤鼎傳芳.占數遼西, 橫經稷下. 因得仰窮師法, 竊弄篇題.思欲紐儒門之絕帷, 恢常典之休烈).

Soon after, it happened that I was reduced to a grief-stricken traveling orphan, hardly able to manage my daily coarse food.²⁰ Like Chumo, having no comforter, I hopelessly sighed at night, and like Xiuling, running out of rice, with what was I to make my breakfast? ²¹ Later on, I spent many years at one or another Marquis’ before I traveled to the valley of the Huai River, where I presented myself [to them] by writing letters, and sought recognition while holding a calling card. But I had not expected that Du Zhi was to make a false charge and Zang Cang to harbor a bitter hatred against me. In consequence, the local magistrates became increasingly hostile towards me, regardless of their past friendship, and, in response, those in power at court added slanders to my distress, yielding to the “decree”. A forsaken orphan with an insecure life, I was crudely bullied and mistreated. My route of flying and galloping [political advance] was blocked, and my means for drinking and pecking [daily life] was impeded. It is an unjust charge that I ever shot [blaspheming] blood, and there is no way for me to call [the attention of] Heaven.²² Such being the case, the sagacious ministers have shown their commiseration for me, and many an official has heard of it. Nevertheless, all have vainly sighed over the case, and none could exonerate me of the wrong charge (俄屬羈孤牽軫, 藜藿難虞. 處默無衾, 徒然夜嘆; 修齡絕米, 安事晨炊! 既而羈齒侯門, 旅游淮上. 投書自達, 懷刺求知. 豈期杜摯相傾, 臧倉見嫉. 守土者以忘情積惡, 當權者以承意中傷. 直視孤危, 橫相陵阻. 絕飛馳之路, 塞飲啄之途. 射血有冤, 叫天無路. 此乃通人見憫, 多士具聞. 徒共興嗟, 靡能昭雪).

In my humble opinion, in the first years when Emperor Xuanzong ascended the heavenly throne, His Majesty’s royal heart immediately came to be filled with compassion for the people. Thereupon, he took to correcting drawbacks and mistakes and redressing the wronged when Prime Minister Liu helped bring forth the imperial edicts, and the Duke Xu Su added radiance to the royal plan.²³ In the five decades [of his reign], customs and mores among the people could not be more honest and pure. Nowadays, however, when neither the flying nor the swimming [various officials] could have their peaceful settlement, and both the rainfall and the sunlight cannot follow each other in harmony; every man and woman in the country heaves grievous sighs, and each community and each village is in melancholy dejection. To look forward to a prosperous time of restored order, all must depend upon a great statesman with statecraft like you (竊見玄宗皇帝初融景命, 遽惻宸襟. 收拭瑕疵, 申明枉結. 劉丞相導揚優詔, 蘇許公潤色昌謨. 五十年間, 風俗敦厚. 逮及翔泳未安其所, 雨陽不得其和. 匹夫匹婦之吁嗟, 一聚一鄉之幽郁. 欲期昭泰, 必仰洪鈞).

Now if I advance in my official career, I harbor fear for my life; if I retreat, I will have nothing to fall back upon. With my name secretly listed for arrest, I could hardly benefit from imperial favor. Together with the embers I am to be thrown away [like a burned zither], and compared with insects [that also have their share of imperial favor], I am more hopeless.²⁴ There are parallel highways and thoroughfares, but I am weeping at a dead end; there are the sun and the moon hanging high in the sky, and it is only I that am trapped in the darkness (某進抱疑危, 退無依據.暗處囚拘之列, 不沾渙汗之私. 與煨燼而俱捐, 比昆蟲而絕望. 則是康莊并軌, 偏哭于窮途; 日月懸空, 獨障于豐部).

I know your Excellency Prime Minister did meritorious service to Yao and set up valuable feats in assisting Yu. All people have benefited from your kindness, and none was forced to go against its nature. If you were to heave a compassionate sigh when meeting me on the road, you would then cast loose the horse yoked at the right; or should you have heard my song from tapping on my sword, you would move me away from the second class room.²⁵ I divine for myself by looking on the wind, and am convinced that you will follow the example of antiquity. Since this Way of Confucianism is not false, pure and bright governance will not be far away. I respectfully hold in my arms my prose, poetry and rhapsody works, each in one juan, all presented to Your Excellency. My scrolls and papers are in poor condition, and my calligraphy and handwriting are dense and in a mess, therewith I venture to beg your condescending attention, while my anxiety and yearning are beyond expression (伏以相公致堯業裕, 佐禹功高.百姓咸被其仁, 一物不違于性. 倘或在途興嘆, 解彼右驂; 彈劍有聞, 遷于代舍. 瞻風自卜, 與古為徒. 此道不誣, 貞明未遠. 謹以文賦詩各一卷率以抱獻. 縑緗儉陋, 造寫繁蕪. 干冒尊高, 無任惶灼).

This epistle offers a brief, if not clear, description of what had happened to Wen’s family and to himself up to the time he presented it to Pei. It concentrates on telling the story of how Wen found himself in a dilemma, to the degree that his name was secretly listed by the eunuchs for arrest and even execution, as a result of the role he had played in the political arena. After introducing the reasons why he, in his desperation, had come to Prime Minister Pei for help, Wen recapitulates what had happened to him by enumerating his experiences in the following order.

(1) He attended the Luoyang National University, coming from Liaoxi so-called.

(2) A misfortune befell his family, and he found himself reduced to a traveling orphan, no longer with the means to support his life, much less his studies.

On the occasion of presenting an epistle to a senior guardian, Wen made his point briefly to the point. It was inappropriate to give a full-length account of what had happened to him, and Prime Minister Pei was presumed to have known what was left unsaid. Suggestively, after mentioning his Luoyang University days, in “Hundred-Rhyme Poem”, Wen describes the situation that forced him to embark on a precarious office-seeking career, in the following couplet, which can be compared to the account above.

50 The noisy swallows were shrieking in the short eaves, 短檐喧語燕,

While a hungry squirrel fell from a tall tree. 高木落饑鼯.

Though the metaphor is intricate, its implication is easy to see: in addition to describing a scene, it indicates that Wen experienced a fall in his family’s social status. The shrieking swallows in the short eaves remind us of those who vied for wealth and fame on an unsteady and crowded stage, where our poet Wen had to begin his political career. The hungry squirrel is the natural counterpart for himself, because, he had “fallen” from a relatively high position to lead his precarious life. In any event, Wen was forced to give up his studies, presumably because of some fall in his family’s fortunes. Considering that his father died long before he quit the Luoyang National University, we can infer that at this time the remaining family prerogatives he still enjoyed were stripped away, although we cannot infer further.

(3) The result was that Wen Tingyun began a life of wandering all over the country, “spent many years at one or another Marquis’”. ²⁶ From the very beginning of his vagrant life, he had to be on guard against the tyranny of the eunuchs, Du Zhi so-called.

(4) Next he “traveled the valley of the Huai River.” ²⁷

Face decreed a face-to-face meeting between Wen and the eunuchs on a narrow path. The result was miserable suffering for the poet. This is the first time Wen was personally involved in some incident with the eunuchs, the cause of a series of subsequent setbacks and adversities.

(5) It was some time after this confrontation with the eunuchs that something more complex and serious put Wen into greater straits.²⁸ The injustice he suffered forced him to turn to the powerful and friendly Prime Minister Pei for support, to enable to survive his crisis and allow him to pass the year’s civil recruitment examination.²⁹

In this study we will follow the order of topics contained in this epistle. Now we will commence with a determination of Wen’s birth year.

Since Wen clearly says his age is forty-two by alluding to “Having the Way [Guo]”, the key to identifying his birth year is to date this epistle, and while doing so, we will also identify Prime Minister Pei. From Wen’s own accounts, we know it was while traveling in the Huai River valley that Wen encountered the eunuchs’ attack. What Wen refers to here is the Jianghuai Incident that occurred in the first year of Kaicheng (836). Therefore, it was a certain length of time after the Jianghuai Incident (836) that Wen presented this epistle to Prime Minister Pei.

Wen gained access to the Heir Apparent through the recommendation of his minister teacher Li Cheng, in the autumn of second year of Kaicheng (837), and served the Heir until the boy’s sudden death in the tenth month of the following year (838). This experience is also subtly implied in this epistle. It must have been after his attendance upon the Heir Apparent that Wen presented this epistle to Pei; otherwise, he would not have stated that “If I advance in my official career, I harbor fear for my life; if I retreat, I will have nothing to fall back upon.” To be offered the opportunity to attend the Heir, thus being within possible direct access of the emperor, was for Wen an unusual advance and unexpected imperial favor, even though it led to a tragedy. Moreover, in the face of such a highly confidential appointment, Wen’s sense of honor called forth his courage to “advance” without hesitation. After the Heir’s death, however, Wen could not escape from his political entanglements, but had to brave all the dangers the eunuchs presented to him. The situation he describes here is thus a reflection of the reality he faced after the Heir’s death in the tenth month of 838.

Although in this epistle Wen made no explicit mention of his attendance upon the Heir, this information is implied in the context. Prime Minister Pei, who was especially concerned with the issue of the imperial heir [as we will see immediately after we identify him], ³⁰ would understand this and not need a precise reference to it. Wen praised the governance of Emperor Xuanzong and attributed his own misfortune to the situation in which “neither the flying nor the swimming could have their peaceful settlement, and both the rainfall and the sunlight cannot follow each other in harmony.” This is a circuitous castigation of the eunuchs who had been in the ascendant ever since Xuanzong’s reign, and hence a mild criticism of Xuanzong himself.³¹ After that time the eunuchs usurped more and more power, until they seized control of the Divine Strategy Army (神策軍), during Emperor Dezong’s reign (785-805). Eunuch command of the imperial army finally precipitated the disaster of the Sweet Dew Incident of 835. Both the Heir Apparent’s death (838) and Wen’s sorry plight represented in this epistle were, in a sense, an aftermath of the Sweet Dew Incident.

Adding to our argument, at the end of this epistle, Wen says: “I respectfully hold in my arms my prose, poetry and rhapsody works, each in one juan, all presented to Your Excellency.” This is termed “warming the scroll” (溫卷), by means of which Late Tang literati sought to impress those who were politically powerful and influence them to speak on their behalf to the examination administrators. In fact, in the autumn of the fourth year of Kaicheng (839), for the first time in his life, Wen sat for the Examination held by the Metropolitan Prefecture and succeeded in obtaining an “Equivalent to Passing”. Unless this epistle had succeeded in enlisting the help of Prime Minister Pei, any gain in the examination would have been impossible for Wen. Therefore this epistle must have been presented to Pei no later than the tenth month of the fourth year of Kaicheng when the examination of the Metropolitan Prefecture was held.³² Thus we can date it to a time between the tenth month of 838 and the autumn of 839.

The only Prime Minister bearing the surname Pei under such specific condition was Pei Du (765-839) ³³. Pei Du was one of the most outstanding prime ministers in the Late Tang period, famous for his service to the Tang court since the time of Emperor Xianzong (r. 805-820), during which he led the victorious military campaign, which crushed the recalcitrant warlord Wu Yuanji (吳元濟, 783-817), and laid the groundwork for the Yuanhe Restoration.³⁴ In the succeeding reigns of Emperors Muzong (r. 821-24), Jingzong (r. 825-27) and Wenzong (r. 827-40), Pei distinguished himself by most effective local governance and fierce allegiance to the court. Wen’s remark in the epistle -”I know Your Excellency the Prime Minister did meritorious service to Yao and set up ample feats in assisting Yu”-is nearer to hard truth than to conventional flattery. As the most influential veteran court official at the time, Pei was the only man who had the power to assist Wen in some way, by offering “an unusually powerful potion.” ³⁵

According to his biographies, Pei was sent out to be Military Commissioner of Taiyuan in the fifth month of the second year of Kaicheng. “You just sleep there and guard well the north gate for me” (為朕臥鎮北門可矣), Emperor Wenzong bade him when Pei begged for retirement. In the twelfth month of the following year, Pei was called back to the capital to be Director of the Secretariat; and in the fourth year of Kaicheng, “In the first month, Du came [from Taiyuan] for a court audience” – in the third month of the same year, he died, three months after his last audience ³⁶ (the first month of that year, 839, was an intercalary month). If we reconsider Wen’s statement that “I now come to the year of Having the Way (42)”, we believe more firmly that it was in the first month of 839 that Wen took the occasion to present this epistle to Pei. According to the Chinese method of calculating age, therefore, Wen was born in the year 798. This conclusion is identical with the one inferred from the “Ji Shao-Shan Tao-Ji Kang” allusion and we have more evidence to support it. Taken separately, the individual statements may seem confusing and ambiguous, but considered together, they are instrumental in bringing to light the major events in Wen’s life. This determination is applicable in explaining any of Wen’s experiences and can thus withstand any challenge.

Other “Circumstantial Evidence”

“Biography of Pei Du” in JTS also relates that, in his late years, because of the literati-officials’ failure to curb the eunuchs’ power, “after dealing with his official routines, often he spent his time drinking with the poets Bai Juyi and Liu Yuxi, regardless of the worldly affairs; and most of the renowned men of letters of the time came to join him”(視事之 , 與詩人白居易劉禹錫酣醉終日, 高歌放言, 以詩酒琴書自樂. 當時名士, 皆從之游). For a time Wen was among Pei’s retainers, although we are uncertain whether this was effected through Liu Yuxi. We are able to derive a substantial message from the following poems:

Two Elegies for the Director of the Secretariat, Lord Pei³⁷

(中書令裴公挽歌詞二首, j. 3, WFQ)

You were a Wang Jian, a model of virtue and style, 王儉風華首, You were a Xiao He, a leading subject of the Empire. 蕭何社稷臣. As a cloth-robe commoner from Danyang, 丹陽布衣客, You spent your life in the Lotus-isle till white-haired. 蓮渚白頭人. ³⁸ Inscriptions engraved when Mount Yanran was in dusk, 銘勒燕山暮,

And a stele sunk into River Han in its spring tide. 碑沉漢水春.

From now on I vainly drink and eat my fill, 從今虛醉飽,

But will no longer defile your carriage-mat. 無復污車茵.

In identifying “the Director of the Secretariat” as Pei Du, we must emphasize the fact that in Wen’s time Du was the only man bearing the surname Pei and this official title that we can take into consideration.

In the first two couplets Wen compares Pei with famous Prime Ministers such as Wang Jian (452-489) of the Southern Qi, Xiao He of the Han (? -193, BC) and Tao Hongjing (陶弘景, 452-536) of the Liang dynasty, in order to praise his personality and political achievements. Then, Wen stresses Pei’s unquestionable role in crushing Wu Yuanji, the treasonous Military Commissioner by alluding to Dou Xian (? -92) and Du Yu: ³⁹ Dou, after defeating the Huns, inscribed his military merits on Mount Yanran, and Du made two steles to assure his reputation for posterity, one sunk in River Han, and the other set up on the summit of Mount Xian. Despite the fact that the “Monument for Quelling Huaixi” (平淮西碑) written by Han Yu had to be rewritten by Duan Wenchang ⁴⁰ (段文昌, 773-835) as a consequence of factional strife, Wen’s poetry asserts that Pei’s contribution in winning the war is indelible. In the last couplet, by mourning Pei’s death with deep grief, Wen obviously revealed himself to be a retainer under Pei’s patronage.⁴¹

Poem Two

With your arrow flying, the evil star fell, 箭下妖星落,

In the blast, the killing air turned back. 風前殺氣回.

When the State’s Redolence, Director Xun, departs, 國香荀令去,

For the Tower’s moonlight, Lord Yu will never return. 樓月庾公來.⁴²

The jade seal will eventually be in no danger, 玉璽終無慮,

But your golden case will not be opened, forever. 金滕竟不開.

I vainly sigh over the avenue for recommending worthy men, 空嗟薦賢路,

As fragrant herbs are laying waste on the Yan Terrace. 芳草滿燕臺.

The second poem begins by restating the military feats Pei had performed for his country. Wen also recalls Pei’s elegant manners when he was with his subordinates and retainers. In Wen’s terms, by means of Pei’s efforts and influences, the royal jade seal, i. e., the imperial power, was kept from danger. But Pei died at a time when the Tang court needed him badly. The allusion “golden case” ⁴³ functions here as a metaphor for Pei’s stature which matched that of Duke Zhou. According to Pei’s Biographies, Emperor Wenzong in his last years increasingly appreciated Pei’s loyalty and consulted Pei about everything important. He even wrote a poem expressing his admiration for and confidence in Pei-an extraordinary honor-just before Pei’s death. As with the last couplet in Poem One, the last couplet in this poem, tells of Wen’s own relation to Pei. From it we can infer that Wen once had won Pei’s promise of recommendation, ⁴⁴ but now had grievously lost it.

In the two elegies, Wen does not limit himself to praising Pei’s contributions (especially the feat of crushing Wu Yuanji). He also expresses his sorrow at losing a good guardian who knew him well and would, but for an untimely death, probably have helped him advance in officialdom and contribute to the revival of the country.

Comparing the Epistle, in which Wen requested Pei to help him through his crisis, with the two poems, in which Wen admired and bemoaned the dead Pei, we conclude that “Prime Minister Pei” of the Epistle was certainly Pei Du. Since Wen managed to obtain an “Equivalent to Passing” in the autumn of that very year, we are all the more convinced that this must have been effected at Pei’s recommendation. Without such a recommendation, Wen would not even have had the chance to take the examination, and “the avenue for recommending worthy men” would have been totally blocked.

Clarifying the time when Wen was married can yield further evidence to confirm the birth year we have determined. In Wen’s extant works, we have three apparent statements regarding his marriage. The first one is in” Hundred-Rhyme Poem”:

82 Coming as guest, I drank the green-ants, 客來斟綠蟻,

Trying [to ransom] a wife, I trod the blue-beetles. 妻試踏青蚨.

Even before we deal with the exact connotation of this couplet, we can say with safety that it is telling about his marriage, which occurred before the fifth year of Kaicheng when he wrote the poem. Further evidence concerning Wen’s marriage is in the “Fifty-Rhyme Poem”, written in the second year of Huichang (842).

To seek an official post, I had no appointment as that of Mao Yi, 宦無毛義檄,

In dealing with marriage, I had no money like that of Ruan Xiu, 婚乏阮修錢.

Wen reveals here that he did not have the luck of Mao Yi in getting an official post. Nor did he have the fortune of Ruan Xiu in collecting donated money for his marriage.⁴⁵ Because of poverty Ruan Xiu did not marry until he was in his forties. Wen’s marriage, too, occurred very late, nearly as late as that of Ruan Xiu.

A third proof is found in his “Epistle Presented to Bureau Director Han of the Ministry of Personnel:” “Like Zhongxuan, I am a traveler constantly moving; and like Zhuge, I am afraid of taking a wife too early” (仲宣之為客不休, 諸葛之娶妻怕早). The comparisons of himself with Wang Can and Zhuge Liang⁴⁶ once more emphasize that his marriage took place rather late in life, when he was in his forties.

Now we turn to another important evidence found in “Fifty-Rhyme Poem.” The topic of the poem tells us that Chancellor Li ⁴⁷ was a former senior acquaintance and friend of Wen’s, and held the post of the Military Commissioner of the Huainan Circuit at the time Wen presented it to him. Since its poetic account of Chancellor Li’s life is in highly sophisticated language characteristic of the Late Tang literati’s virtuosity, we will not bother the reader by paraphrasing the whole poem. Rather, we will pick out and study a few key lines, testifying to the accuracy of our conclusion about Wen’s birth year.

First, in “Hundred-Rhyme Poem” (composed 840), after the eighteenth rhyme:

18 My answer could be “a rare playing of the lute”, 對雖希鼓瑟,

So my name was passed off among those who blew the flute. 名亦濫吹竽.

We find a footnote by Wen himself:

Last autumn I sat for the Metropolitan Prefecture Examination, and got my name recommended on the supplementary list (原注: 去秋試京兆, 薦名, 居其副).

The couplet means that because of his excellent performance in the examination, Wen gained a passing degree, the so-called “Equivalent to Passing”. ⁴⁸ The footnote shows that Wen took the examination one year prior to the composition of the poem, i. e., in the year 839. Thus it tallies completely with the following record in Tangzhiyan, under the title “Equivalent to Passing but Failed to Pass”: “In the fourth year of Kaicheng, Wen Qi (温岐). ⁴⁹”Fifty-Rhyme Poem”, when relating the same experience of being recommended by the Metropolitan Prefecture, employs the following remarks:

Not knowing where the carp should jump, 未知魚躍地,

I was vainly ashamed to hear Deer Singing played. 空愧鹿鳴篇.

Now again it’s approaching the Jixia date, 稷下期方至,

But my Zhang-Riverbank disease is not yet healed. 漳濱病未痊.

Between the two couplets, Wen inserts a footnote: “I was once recommended by the Metropolitan Prefecture, and had my name on the supplementary list” (余嘗忝京兆薦, 名居其副). Then, at the end of the second couplet, Wen puts down another footnote: “For two years I have contracted a disease, hence did not respond to the local recommendation, to be examined by the office concerned” (二年抱疾, 不赴鄉薦試有司).

Here the first couplet means that Wen vainly became an “Equivalent to Passing”, having no chance to be really passed as a Presented Scholar. “Not knowing where the carp should jump [over the Dragon Gate]” ⁵⁰ is a metaphor for Wen himself being unable to become a Presented Scholar. “Deer Singing” is the title of a poem in the Book of Songs, which was sung when “feasting the court officials as distinguished guests.” ⁵¹ In the civil service recruitment system of the Tang, the music was used in the ceremony for accepting new Presented Scholars. ⁵² The so-called Jixia date should be understood as the examination date, because, every year, the universities of the state as well as of the prefectures sent their graduates as candidates for the upcoming state-managed examination. “Zhang Riverbank disease” alludes to the following lines:

I contracted a disease chronic and incurable, 余嬰沈痼疾,

And fled to the bank of the clear Zhang River. 竄身清漳濱. ⁵³

If Liu were only physically ill, he would not have to flee to the bank of the Zhang River. The couplet thus shows Liu’s, and hence Wen’s, disease was a political one. Therefore, the second couplet says that as the date of the year’s examination again approached, certain political reason still barred Wen from participating in it.

Establishing such context makes possible a precise understanding of the two footnotes. The first footnote merely recalls Wen’s experience of being recommended in the fourth year of Kaicheng (839). The second footnote reveals that, because Wen had to flee to the south in the winter of the fifth year of Kaicheng (840), the year 840 was the first year in which he “did not respond to the local recommendation, to be examined by the office concerned.” The following year, the first year of Huichang (841) is then the second year. Although the focus in each case is different, both “Hundred-Rhyme Poem” and “Fifty-Rhyme Poem” mention Wen’s experience of being recommended by the Metropolitan Prefecture, while his political “disease” remained unchanged. Therefore, the “two years” must be 840 and 841, when Wen remained unable to “respond to the local recommendation.” Fifty-rhyme Poem” also states:

In my vagrant life, I meet again the end of spring, 旅食逢春盡,

When something forces me to travel without end. 羈游為事牽.

The so-called “end of spring” could not be that of the first year of Huichang, for, at that time, he “did not to respond to the local recommendation” only in the previous winter. Instead, it should be the spring of the second year of Huichang (842).

Additionally, in “Fifty-Rhyme Poem”, among many laudatory descriptions of the Chancellor Li’s personal experiences, there are two couplets, referring to Li’s official prospects, which deserve our special attention:

After having raised your wings made for soaring on high, 既矯排虛翅,

You are to hold the power of Heaven’s creation. 將持造化權.

The myriad beings will look forward to your molding, 萬靈思鼓鑄,

And various talents will be subject to your cultivation. 群品待陶甄.

We can infer that Chancellor Li of Huainan was about to assume the post of Prime Minister. Li Deyu did become Prime Minister, after he left the post of Military Commissioner of Huainan Circuit with the title of the Honorary Right Chancellor (檢校右仆射), but it happened in the ninth month of the fifth year of Kaicheng, when Wen had not yet composed “Fifty-Rhyme Poem.” Another Military Commissioner of Huainan, Li Shen, who replaced Li Deyu, was also a Chancellor. According to Kong Wenye’s “Edict for Appointing Li Shen Prime Minister” (李紳拜相制), ⁵⁴ Li was appointed Prime Minister on the twelfth day of the second month, the second year of Huichang. Therefore it was just before Li Shen was appointed Prime Minister that Wen presented “Fifty-Rhyme Poem” to him in Huainan, in the hope that Li would be able to assist him to resolve his political impasse.

As we have seen from the Ji Shao-Shan Tao-Ji Kang allusion, the study of Li Shen’s relationship with Wen definitely serves to strengthen our conclusion concerning Wen’s birth year, especially since Li’s identity as the subject of the poem is corroborated.

Finally, evidence is found in Wen’s “Epistle Presented to Secretary Du” (上杜舍人啟): “I used to have great ambition in my juvenile years, but I suffered many calamities in my middle age” (某弱齡有志, 中歲多虞). This epistle was composed toward the end of the Dazhong era (847-860) and pre­sented to Du Shenquan (杜審權, fl. 830-60). Even without taking into consideration when it was composed and to whom it was addressed, we can easily determine what Wen’s “middle age” refers to. Wen was seriously injured and insulted by the eunuchs and was involved in a scandal because of his marriage with a singer-prostitute. After he gained access to the Heir Apparent, he also became the target of the eunuchs’ persecution, and had to change his name to take the examination held by the Metropolitan Prefecture, even though he was rejected once his name change was divulged. All these disastrous incidents occurred in the Kaicheng era when Wen was in his forties: “Middle age” can only logically refer to the years of the “forties”. Wen’s experiences in the Kaicheng era should be highlighted because no other period in his life was filled with so many misfortunes.

In conclusion, it is possible to ascertain Wen Tingyun’s birth year, because Wen left behind some particular works bearing concrete information. Following the clues Wen arranged in them, we are able to work out a reliable date, which provides a correct starting point for the study of his life.