Xiong Huizhen (; died 1936) was a Chinese

historical geographer Historical geography is the branch of geography that studies the ways in which geographic phenomena have changed over time. It is a synthesizing discipline which shares both topical and methodological similarities with history, anthropology, eco ...

and a disciple of the late-

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speak ...

scholar

Yang Shoujing Yang Shoujing (; 1839 – 9 January 1915) was a Chinese antiquarian, bibliophile, calligrapher, diplomat, geographer, and historian. He is best known for the historical atlas ''Lidai yudi tu'', commonly called the ''Yangtu'' ("Yang's atlas"), t ...

. He is known for completing the ''Shui jing zhu shu'', a monumental annotation of the 6th-century geographic classic ''

Shui jing zhu The ''Commentary on the Water Classic'' (), or ''Commentaries on the Water Classic'', commonly known as ''Shui Jing Zhu'', is a work on the Chinese geography in ancient times, describing the traditional understanding of its waterways and ancient ...

''.

Biography

Xiong Huizhen was born in Zhijiang County,

Hubei Hubei (; ; alternately Hupeh) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, and is part of the Central China region. The name of the province means "north of the lake", referring to its position north of Dongting Lake. The prov ...

during the

, and studied under the prominent historical geographer and bibliophile Yang Shoujing, who was also a native of Hubei. Yang spent most of his life annotating the 6th-century geographic work ''

''. Having completed 40 volumes of annotation, he died in 1915 without completing the work. Xiong carried on the project and wrote another 40 volumes. He also made the final editing of the entire work, painstakingly proofreading the annotations word by word. It took Xiong 22 years to complete the work, known as the ''Shui jing zhu shu''. He refused offers made by Japanese scholars to purchase the book. However, when he learned that the descendants of Yang Shoujing had secretly sold some manuscripts, he committed suicide by hanging himself in 1936. The

Second Sino-Japanese War The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) or War of Resistance (Chinese term) was a military conflict that was primarily waged between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. The war made up the Chinese theater of the wider Pacific Th ...

soon broke out in 1937. The Chinese government paid great attention to the protection of the manuscript as well as Yang Shoujing's precious book collection. Scholar

Fu Sinian Fu Ssu-nien (; 26 March 1896 – 20 December 1950), was a Chinese historian, linguist, and writer. He was one of the leaders of the May Fourth Movement in 1919. He was also one of the creators of the Academia Sinica, and was named director of t ...

negotiated on behalf of

Academia Sinica Academia Sinica (AS, la, 1=Academia Sinica, 3=Chinese Academy; ), headquartered in Nangang, Taipei, is the national academy of Taiwan. Founded in Nanking, the academy supports research activities in a wide variety of disciplines, ranging from ...

and the Ministry of Education to purchase the manuscript from Yang's heir Yang Mianzhi for 3,000 dollars, and brought it to Hong Kong for safekeeping. It was eventually published in Taiwan the early 1950s, and in mainland China in 1957. The influential historian

Gu Jiegang Gu Jiegang (8 May 189325 December 1980) was a Chinese historian best known for his seven-volume work '' Gushi Bian'' (, or ''Debates on Ancient History''). He was a co-founder and the leading force of the Doubting Antiquity School, and was hig ...

commented that the ''Shui jing zhu shu'' "brought to a point of culmination the textual research of ''The Classic of Waterways'' of the previous three centuries." He greatly admired Yang Shoujing and Xiong Huizhen for their "single-minded devotion" to the task, and Xiong's devotion to his master.

Biography

References

Further reading