Jindai mishu 津逮秘書

Jindai mishu 津逮秘書 or Jindai bishu 津逮祕書 "Secret books to be obtained by crossing the ford", also written 津逮袐書 (old pronunciation Jindai bishu), also known as Jiguge congshu 汲古閣叢書, is a series of collectanea (congshu 叢書) compiled by the Ming-period 明 (1368-1644) scholar Mao Jin 毛晉 (1599－1659). It includes 139 (actually 137) books.

Mao Jin was a famous collector of books. For his vast library he had set up the Jigu Hall 汲古閣. Mao was very interested to reprint old texts to expand their circulation, and so became the most important private publisher and printer in Chinese history. He had also compiled important scholarly studies, like the Maoshi Lu shu guangyao 毛詩陸疏廣要, the Yinhu tiba 隱湖題跋, Jigugue shuba 汲古閣書跋, Sumi zhilin 蘇米志林, the Shici zazu 詩詞雜俎, and the important theatre play collection Liushi zhong qu 六十種曲.

Figure 1. Preface of the Jindai mishu 津逮秘書

Calligraphy of Mao Jin's preface (Jindai mishu xu 津逮秘書序).

The series Jindai mishu is divided into 15 collections (ji 集). Two books recorded in the list of contents are actually not included in the sereis, namely the books Jinshilu 金石錄 and Mochipian 墨池篇. Some bibliographies speak of 144 or even 148 texts included in the Jindai mishu. Part of the book is the result of cooperation between Mao Jin and Hu Zhenheng 胡震亨 (1569-1645), whose projected series Mice huihan 秘冊彙函 could not be completed because the draft had burnt in an accident. Hu tried to reconstruct his project in the shape of Mao Jin's Jindai mishu.

Reproductions of ancient Song-period 宋 (960-1279) prints were contributed by Hu Zhenheng, while Mao's contribution is marked with the name of the Jiguge 汲古閣. The name of the series is derived from a description in the "River Classic" Shuijingzhu 水經注 of a place where books were hidden in a cave in a cliff that could only be reached by crossing the river. Most books in the Jindai mishu date from the Song and Yuan 元 (1279-1368) periods and include stories and reports on petty matters, and are rarely to be found in older series like Baichuan xuehai 百川學海 or Baoyantang miji 寶顏堂秘笈.

The series was printed in the last decade of the Ming period, in 120 booklets. In 1922 the Bogu Studio 博古齋 in Shanghai published a facsimile of this original edition. The Qing-period 清 (1644-1911) scholar Zhang Haipeng 張海鵬 (1755-1816) used the Jindai mishu as a base for his own series Xuejin taoyuan 學津討原.