Qianlouzi 黔婁子

Qianlouzi 黔婁子 "Master Qianlou" is a Daoist treatise written by the Warring States period 戰國 (5th cent.-221 BCE) master Qianlou 黔婁 (meaning "black robe") from the state of Qi 齊. According to the imperial bibliography Yiwen zhi 藝文志 in the official dynastic history Hanshu 漢書 the Qianlouzi was 4 chapters long. The same entry and his biography in Huangfu Mi's 皇甫謐 Gaoshizhuan 高士傳 from the Jin period 晉 (265-420) say that Master Qianlou was a loyal subject but never accepted a state office, neither in Qi nor in Lu 魯. He lived during the reign of King Wei 齊威王 (r. 378-343). The book Qianlouzi was lost soon and could only be reconstructed partially by the Qing period 清 (1644-1911) scholar Ma Guohan 馬國翰 who collected fragments from Cao Tingdong's 曹廷棟 book Kongzi yiyu 孔子逸語. The compilers of the reprint series Xuxiu siku quanshu 續修四庫全書 doubted the authenticity of these fragments. It is therefore only included in Ma Guohan's collection Yuhan shanfang jiyi shu 玉函山房輯佚書.