Challenging Official History In The Song And Yuan Dynasties: The Record Of The Three Kingdoms

Abstract

The historical works designated as the official histories of the Chinese state were printed for the first time in the early eleventh century. This chapter explores how scholarly and political circles in the Northern Song and Yuan used print to promote their interpretation of the True Succession at a time of war and foreign conquest. It discusses in turn the transition of Sanguozhi from manuscript to print in the Northern Song, the impact of print publication on intellectual debate, and its contribution to the formation of a new type of motivated historiography during the Southern Song and Yuan. The experiments of the revisionist historians led them in the direction of what could be called a 'creative historiography,' one considerably at odds with the usual conventions for the Chinese writing of history. Xiao and Hao devised an integral format for their. Keywords: historiography; Northern song dynasty; Sanguozhi ; yuan dynasty