715Hung Sheng here gives a note saying that this line derives from a poem by Tu Mu 杜牧 [803 - 852].
716ox, sheep and pig.
717Ai-he 愛河, River of Love, Love River, being a Buddhist term, for the River of Desire, in which humans are drowned, love and sexual desires said to drown people, and “river” thus being used as a metaphor for them. Similar to the idiom “desire sea and love heaven” (yü-hai ch’ing-t’ien 慾海情天). Anon., Surangama sutra (Leng-yen ching 楞嚴經), says: “The River of Love’s dried and parched, and now you have been pulled free.”
Hsiao Yen 蕭衍 (468 - 549, Emperor Warrior of the Liang dynasty (Liang Wu-ti 梁武帝, Southern Dynasties Liang emperor, reigned 502 - 549), Essay on abandoning Taoism and converting to Buddhism (She-tao kui-Fo wen 捨道歸佛文), says: “Ascending high Lasting-joy Mountain (Ch’ang-le Chih Kao-shan 長樂之高山), and coming out from the River of Love’s depths.”
A similar-sounding term is Ai-shui 愛水:
i) ai-shui, “having a fondness for water/ rivers/streams”. Pai Chü-yi 白居易 (772 - 846), “Fond of streams, I often oared my boat, Cherishing flowers, I didn’t sweep the ground.”
ii) Buddist terms:
a) “Love Water”, being a liquid which flows from one’s body because of love desire. Surangama sutra says: “Influenced by the various kinds of love/ cherishing, one develops wild feelings, and the feelings increase ceaselessly, and can produce a Love River. That’s why, when all living bengs are reminded of food delicacies, liquid issues from their mouths. When they’re reminded of men of former times, they, sometimes out of sympathy, sometimes out of loathing, have tears brim their eyes. When they greed for wealth and jewels, their hearts issue cherishing’s saliva. And when their hearts are attached to promiscuity, the two roots of male and female spontaneously flow liquid.”
b) The vexations of love’s desire can further the practises of happiness, and bring on the causal results of the future, karma being likened to a farm-field, and love’s desires to a river, hence their being called the Love River. Anon., Garland sutra (Hua-yen ching 華嚴經), (Sanskrit Avatamsaka- sutra), translated in the T’ang dynasty, says: “Karma’s a farm-field, understanding’s seeds, lack of insight’s a dark covering, and the Love River’s moisture.” This signifies that when a person receives life, his practice of karma is like a farm-field, the Eight Understanding is like seeds, and love-desires are like a river/ water, which is able to moisten and irrigate and assist them to full growth.” Li Shih-min 李世民 (599 - 649, i.e. Emperor T’ai-tsung 太宗, reigned 627 - 649), Preface to Tripitaka’s sage teachings (San-tsang sheng-jiao hsü 三藏聖教序), says: “Clear love-river’s turbid waters, and gain the other bank.”. This “love-river” means the vexations of love desires.
718Shang-ch’ing 上清, Upper Purity:
i) Taoistic term. One of the Three Purities (San-ch’ing 三清). Numinous-treasure root-and-origin scripture (Ling-pao pen-yü an ching 靈寶本元經) says: “Beyond Four-persons Heaven is called the realm of the Three Purities, Jade Purity (Yü-ch’ing 玉清), Grand Purity (T’ai-ch’ing 太清) and Upper Purity, also named the Three Heavens (San-t’ien 三天).” Grand-truth scripture (T’ai-chen ching 太真經) says: “Between each of the Three Purities there’s a Main Position (Cheng-wei 正位), and Sages (sheng 聖) ascend to Jade Purity, Transcendentals (chen 真) ascend to Upper Purity, and Immortals (hsien 仙) ascend to Grand Purity.”
ii) Liu Ch’eng 柳珵 (fl. ca. AD 795), Account of Upper Purity (Shang-ch’ing chuan 上清傳), mentions how when Tou Ts’an 竇參 was ruined, she was assigned to Upper Purity as an imperial-palace maidservant, and was due to report to the emperor, and later duly entered the imperial palace. That was why the term Upper Purity came sometimes to mean “maidservant”.
iii) the name of an imperial palace. Hsueh Chü-cheng 薛居正 (912 - 981) and others, Old Five Dynasties history (Chiu Wu-tai shih 舊五代史), “Wang Yen chuan”, says: “In AD 967, the imperial Upper-purity Palace (Shang-ch’ing-kung) was erected.”
Upper-purity Taoist-monastry (Shang-ch’ing-kuan 上清觀) was located up on Mount Lung-hu in present-dayKui-hsi county in Kiangsi province. The Han dynasty Taoist Chang Tao-ling’s 張道陵 (fl. ca. AD 70) descendants lived in it. In the T’ang dynasty, it was called Transcendentals-and-immortals Lodge (Chen-hsien-kuan 真仙館), but during the reign-period 1008-1016 the Sung dynasty the name was changed to Upper-purity Taoist-monastry, and during the reign-period 1111-1118 again changed to Upper-purity Main-one Palace, (Shang-ch’ing Cheng-yi Kung 上清正一宮), the Yȕan dynasty changing that to Main-one Ten-thousand-years-longevity Palace (Cheng-yi Wan-shou-kung 正一萬壽宮). The Ch’ing dynasty changed it to Grand Upper-purity Palace (T’ai Shang-ch’ing-kung 太上清宮).
There’s also the term Upper-purity Pearl (Shang-ch’ing-chu 上清珠). Su E 蘇鶚 (fl. ca. AD 890), Miscellaneous compilations about Tu-yang (Tu-yang tsa-pien 杜陽雜編), says: “The Upper-purity Pearl was presented to the emperor as tribute by the state of Chi 蘮 [“woolen floor-felt”]-pin at the beginning of the reign-period 713-741. the pearl was bright-shining and clear white, and could light up a whole house. If you looked at it, you saw the shaking image in it of immortals and Origin Cranes on crimson steps.”
719Hung Sheng here gives a note saying that this line derives from a poem by Han Ts’ung 韓琮 [fl. ca. AD 835].
720Hung Sheng here gives a note saying that this line derives from a poem by Li Shang-yin 李商隱 [813 - 858].
721Hung Sheng here gives a note saying that this line derives from a poem by Ssu-k’ung T’u 司空圖 [837 - 908].
722Hung Sheng here gives a note saying that this line derives from a poem by Fang Kan 方干 [fl. ca. AD 860].
723Shang-chiang-t’ai 上將臺, Superior-general Altar-platform, the name of an altar-platform built by emperors for the appointment of main generals, commanders-in-chief.
724chien-ya 建牙, to set up Tusk/Tooth, i.e. to set up a Tusk/Tooth Flag. In ancient times armies used to have what was known as a Tusk Flag (ya-ch’i 牙旗). Chang Heng 張衡 (78 - 139) has the lines: “Dagger-axes and lances are like a forest, and Tusk Flags mill in profusion.”. An early note to that explains: “In ancient times when the Son of Heaven went forth, he would set up a big Tusk Flag. The top of its pole was adorned with an elephant’s tusk, hence the term Tusk Flag.
Feng Yen 封演 (T’ang dynasty) says: “In Songs classic there’s the line ‘The marshal is the claws and tusks of the king.’ The marshal was in charge of military defence provision, being like a wild beast on guard with its tusks and claws, and that’s why a big flag was set up to the fore of the army, it being called the Tusk Flag, and when people in the army listened to commands they invariably had to go beneath the Tusk Flag to do so. Someone else says: ‘Outside the gate to the monarch’s government administration wood was carved into the shape of a tusk and set up to the side of the gate, symbolising the tusk of a wild animal, and when the army was about to set off, the tusk would be put on top of a pole, and a flag hung from the top of it.’ This means the same.”
The flag came to be set up then at the main gate to the army’s camp, this gate then being called “the Tusk Gate”. Ch’en Shou 陳壽 (233 - 297) says; “The Tusk Gate flag was too tall and big for others to carry, but Tien Wei 典韋 was able to set it up with one hand.”
The term Tusk Gate came to be transferred from military to civil places of command. Ch’ien Hsi-pai 錢希白 (Sung dynasty) says: “It’s become a custom of late to esteem military things, and governmental administration offices are commonly called Tusk Gates, and by an erroneous shift the term has become the homophonous ya-men 衙門”
The ya 衙, originally meaning “to walk”, “to go”, was used as the name for the foremost hall of the T’ang emperors’ palace, from the above etymology. Old T’ang history (Chiu T’ang history 舊唐書), compiled by Liu Hsü 劉昫 (887 - 946) and others, says: “In the first lunar month of the year AD 820, all the ministers fo
r the first time attended court in the Government-proclaiming Front Palace-hall.” By the early Sung dynasty, this ya became a general term for any government administration headquarters. The term ya-men 衙門, “front-hall gate”, is taken to mean the local administration headquarters/offices/court, the ya-men, being the administrative and judicial centre in the capital towns of prefectures, sub-prefectures and counties.
725Emperor Solemn-progenitor (Su-tsung 肅宗, reigned 756 - 762), Solemn-progenitor being the posthumous “ancestral-temple” title of that T’ang dynasty emperor. His name was Li Heng 李亨 (711 - 762), Heng his personal name. He was the third son and crown prince of Emperor Dark-progenitor (Hsȕan-tsung 玄宗, reigned 712 - 756). An Lu-shan 安祿山 rebelled, and Dark-progenitor fled to Shu (Szechwan). In AD 755, the first year of the Rebellion of An and Shih (An Shih Chih-luan 安史之亂), when Dark-progenitor reached Ma Wei’s Slope (Ma Wei P’o 馬嵬坡), local elders asked his permission for the crown prince to be kept back to attack the rebels, and Li Heng then returned to Ling-wu 靈武, where he succeeded to the imperial throne. In AD 757, he used the famous Great General Kuo Tzu-yi 郭子儀 to take back the two capitals, Ch’ang-an and Lo-yang, and quelled the An and Shih Rebellion. He employed a eunuch mandarin as Inspector of the Armies (kuan chȕn-jung shih 關軍戎使), and caused the powers of eunuch mandarins to expand considerably. In AD 762, the eunuch Mandarins Li Fu-kuo 李輔國 (704 - 762) and Ch’eng Yȕan-chen 程元振 (fl. ca. AD 750) killed Empress Chang (Chang-hou 張后) and others, and set up the crown prince as emperor (Emperor Replacement-progenitor, Tai-tsung 代宗, reigned 763 - 779). Solemn-progenitor died of shock and depression. He was on the throne for seven years.
726Sun Wu 孫武 (fl. ca. 500 BC), a man of the state of Ch’i 齊, and an expert in the methods of warfare. King He-lü (He-lü 闔閭, reigned 514 BC - 496 BC) of the state of Wu 吳 employed him as a general, and in the west he defeated the powerful state of Ch’u 楚, and in the north overawed the states of Ch’i 齊 and Tsin 晉, and thus made his ruler the hegemon over the states nominally subordinate to the Chou dynasty. He is credited with the authorship of the now world-famous book on the skills of warfare entitled Sir Sun (Sun-tzu 孫子), and Pan Ku’s 班固 (32 - 92) Han history (Han-shu 漢書), “Yi-wen chih”, mentions a Sir Sun’s methods of warfare (Sun-tzu ping-fa 孫子兵法).
727Wu Ch’i 吳起 (?BC - 381 BC), an outstanding military and political expert of the Warring States period. A man of Tso-shih 左氏 (of the state of Wei, Wei-kuo 衛國), north of present-day Ts’ao county in Shantung province, he was fond of military operations, first becoming a general of the state of Lu, as which he attacked and routed the state of Ch’i 齊. Hearing that Marquis Civility, ruler of Wei (Wei Wen-hou 魏文侯), was noble-minded, he went there and adhered to him, being made his general. He attacked the state of Ch’in, taking five citadels, and was appointed Governor of Hsi-he (Hsi-he-shou 西河守), in which capacity he resisted the states of Ch’in and Harn 韓.
When Marquis Civility died, Wu Ch’i served his son Marquis Warrior (Wu-hou 武侯). Later, the Wei prime minister Kung Shu 公叔 became jealous of him, and slandered him. Wu Ch’i fled to seek refuge in the state of Ch’u 楚. King Grief of Ch’u (Ch’u Tao-wang 楚悼王, reigned 401 BC - 381 BC) appointed him his prime minister, and to the south he quelled the Hundred Yȕeh (Pai Yȕeh 百越), to the north annexed the states of Ch’en and Ts’ai, and repulsed the Three Tsins (San Chin 三晉), and to the west campaigned against the state of Ch’in. The rulers of the various subordinate Chou dynasty states were all troubled by Ch’u’s might.
As a general, Wu Ch’i wore the same kind of clothes and ate the same kind of food as the lowest of his soldiers. As prime minister, he clarified the laws and carefully examined the statutes, recruiting patient mandarins, dismissing distant aristocratic relatives of the duke, so as to nurture warrior knights, his efforts devoted to strengthening the military. When King Grief died, most of the king’s noble relatives and important ministers, having resented him, attacked him. He threw himself face-down onto the king’s corpse, and was shot dead.
History records that when his mother died, he didn’t go to her, and that he killed his wife to become a general of Lu. Li K’e 李克 adds that Wu Ch’i was covetous and was fond of women’s sexual beauty, but that in his use of military force, even the famous Minister of War Jang-chü (Ssu-ma Jang-chü 司馬穰苴, i.e. T’ien Jang-chü 田穰苴, fl. ca. 520 BC) couldn’t surpass him. See Ssu-ma Ch’ien 司馬遷 (ca. 147 BC - 90 BC), Historians’ records (Shih-chi 史記), “Wu Ch’i chuan”. He wrote a fourty-eight chapter Wu Ch’i 吳起, and a probably apocryphal six-chapter Sir Wu (Wu-tzu 吳子) is extant.
728He Ch’ien-nien 賀千年, the name of a non-Chinese rebel general during the T’ang dynasty.
729Yȕn-t’ai 雲臺, Cloud Terrace:
i) name of a building, a terrace, built during the Han dynasty (206 BC - AD 220), and said to have been of enormous height, “up to the very clouds”, hence its name. Liu An 劉安 (?BC - 122 BC), Sir Huai-south (Huai-nan Tzu 淮南子), “Ch’u-chen”, says: “Cloud Terrace was so high that if anyone fell from it, they broke their back-bone.”, [which doesn’t make it sound so very high, after all!]. It was situated in Southern Imperial-palace (Nan-kung 南宮) in Lo-yang 洛陽, present-day Lo-yang city in Henan province.
Emperor Shining (Ming-ti 明帝, reigned 58 - 75), thinking back longingly to the twenty-eight “meritorious ministers” (kung-ch’en 功臣) (generals mostly), who had helped restore the Han dynasty under Emperor Shining-warrior (Kuang-wu-ti 光武帝), and assisted his own advent to the throne, had a Cloud Terrace built in which, in AD 60, the portraits were painted of the twenty-eight generals, omitting the most notable general of all, Ma Yȕan 馬援 (14 BC - AD 49), whom the emperor left out for fear of being accused of personal bias for Ma. This portrait gallery echoed the famous imperial Unicorn Chamber (Ch’i-lin-ke 麒麟閣).
Fan Yeh范曄 (398 - 445), Biographies of the Twenty-eight Generals (Erh-shih-pa Chiang chuan二十八將傳), says: “The twenty-eight generals of the [Han dynasty’s] Restoration (Chung-hsing中興) in previous times were considered to correspond to the Twenty-eight Constellations (Erh-shih-pa Hsiu二十八宿) above, the details of this never having been provided. But they were all capable enough to influence and participate in mighty affairs of state, and vigorously exert their wisdom and courage, being acclaimed as Assisters of the Dynastic Mandate-of-Heaven (Tso-ming佐命), and were indeed each of them knights of noble ideals and much ability.”
The Twenty-eight Generals of Cloud Terrace (Yȕn-t’ai Erh-shih-pa Chiang雲臺二十八將) were as follows:
1.Teng Yü 鄧禹 (2 - 58),
2.Ma Ch’eng 馬成 (fl. ca. AD 30),
3. Wu Han 吳漢 (AD? - AD 44),
4.Wang Liang 王梁 (fl. ca. AD 20),
5.Chia Fu 賈復 (AD? - AD 54),
6.Ch’en Chȕn 陳俊 (fl. ca. AD 20),
7.Keng Ye 耿弇 (3 - 58),
8.Tu Mao 杜茂 (fl. ca. AD 20),
9K’ou Hsȕn 寇恂 (AD? - AD 36),
10. Fu Chȕn 傅俊 (fl. ca. AD 20),
11. Ts’en P’eng 參彭 (AD? - AD 35),
12. Chien T’an 堅鐔 (fl. ca. AD 30),
13. Feng Yi 馮異 (AD? - AD 34),
14.Wang Pa 王霸 (Han dynasty),
15.Chu Yu 朱祐 (AD? - AD 47),
16. Jen Kuan 任光 (fl. ca. AD 20),
17. Chai Tsun 祭遵 (AD? - AD 33),
18. Li Chung 李忠 (fl. ca. AD 20),
19. Ching Tan 景丹 (fl. ca. AD 15),
20.Wan Hsiu 萬脩 (fl. ca. AD 20),
21.Kai Ye 蓋延 (fl. ca. AD 20),
22. P’i T’ung 邳彤 (fl. ca. AD 15),
23.Yao Ch’ 銚期 (AD? - AD 34),
24.Liu Chih劉植 (fl. ca. AD 10),
25.Keng Ch’u 耿純 (AD? - AD 37),
26.Tsang Kung 臧宮 (fl. ca. AD 15),
27.Ma Wu 馬武 (AD? - AD 61),
28.Liu Lung 劉隆 (fl. ca. AD 5).
a) a mountain also called Mount Yü-lin (Yü-lin-shan 鬱林山), situated on present-day Yü Island north-east of Kuan-yȕn county in Kiangsu province. Secluded and remote, and sheer and steeply rising, it often has cloud round it. Another name for it is Green-peak Pinnacle (Ch’ing-feng-ting青峰頂). On its south face it has a Green-empyrean Cave (Ch’ing-hsiao-tung青宵洞), and to its north a Sun-gazing Peak (Wang-jih-feng望日峰). Cf. Yü-lin 鬱林.
b) a mountain south-east of present-day Ts’ang-hsi county in Szechwan province, adjacent to the border of Lang-chung county. It’s said that the famous Taoist adept Chang Tao-ling張道陵 (fl. ca. AD 70) pursued cosmic truths there.
Here in this play, the terrace is situated in the Yȕeh royal-palace complex, and is seemingly an invention of the playwright’s.
730Chiu-miao 九廟, Nine Ancestral-temples. Pan Ku 班固 (32 - 92), Han history (Han-shu 漢書), “Wang Mang chuan”, says: “He erected Nine Ancestral-temples.”:
a) Yellow Emperor/ Demi-god Grand-beginning Ancestral-emple (Huang-ti T’ai-ch’u Tsu-miao 黃帝太初祖廟),
b) Emperor Yü-ti First-ancestor Resplendent Ancestral-temple (Yü-ti Shih-tsu Chao-miao 虞帝始祖昭 廟),
c) Ch’en Barbarian-prince’s Ancestor-uniting Solemn Ancestral-temple (Ch’en Hu-wang T’ung-tsu Mu-miao 陳胡王統祖穆廟),
d) Prince Reverence of Ch’i’s First-ancestor Resplendent Ancestral-temple (Ch’i Ching-wang Shih-tsu Chao-miao 齊敬王世祖昭廟),
e) Pince Min of Chi-north’s Royal-ancestor Solemn Ancestral-temple (Chi-pei Min-wang Wang-tsu Mu-miao 濟北愍王王祖穆廟),
f) Earl-prince of Chi-south’s Father’s-ancestral-temple-honouring Resplendent Ancestral-temple (Chi-nan Po-wang Tsun-ni Chao-miao 濟南伯王尊禰昭廟),
g) Infant-prince of Yȕan-city’s Honoured-father’s ancestral-temple Solemn Ancestral-temple (Yȕan-ch’eng Ju-wang tsun-ni Mu-miao 元城孺尊禰穆廟),
h) Prince Ch’ing of Yang-p’ing’s Female-relative Father’s-ancestral-temple Resplendent-ancestral-temple (Yang-p’ing Ch’ing-wang Ch’i-ni Chao-miao 陽平頃王戚禰昭廟),
Appendices and Endnotes Page 40