Yetgeul › Gyewon Pilgyeongjip (A Plowing of the Brush in the Cassia Garden) › Book 1 — Memorials

A memorial of congratulation on the Prince of Jian being appointed military commissioner of Weibo賀建王除魏博表

Gyewon Pilgyeongjip (A Plowing of the Brush in the Cassia Garden) 桂苑筆耕集 · Choe Chiwon · 886 (Tang, 6th year of the Zhonghe era · Silla, 12th year of King Heongang) · 1 passages · 195 Chinese characters · reading time 0.8 min

Gyewon Pilgyeongjip (A Plowing of the Brush in the Cassia Garden) Book 1 — Memorials A collection Choe Chiwon made by choosing out of the writings of his four years in the headquarters of Gao Pian, military commissioner of Huainan under the Tang, binding them into twenty volumes and presenting them to King Heongang of Silla in 886. It holds 366 pieces — memorials and reports sent up to the emperor, the proclamation denouncing Huang Chao, letters to the several military commissioners, orders and dispatches issued to those under him, Daoist and Buddhist texts for services, funeral offerings, records written for the outer wall of Chengdu and for a painting of Annam, and the reports and poems he sent up to Gao Pian. Here is the first report, which begins "I am a man of Silla," and the proclamation against Huang Chao with its line, "Not only do all the men of the world think to kill you openly; the ghosts under the earth have already discussed cutting you down in secret." The last volume holds the poems he made on the voyage home to the country he had left at twelve. It is the oldest collection by a Korean that survives, and when Hong Seokju and Seo Yugu printed it with movable type in 1834 they called it "the root and the beginning of the writing of our Eastern Country." Their two prefaces are translated with it.

1A prince of the house is given a great command

臣某言：臣得進奏院狀報，二月二十二日恩除建王可開府儀同三司兼太保充魏博節度使者。維城茂德，列土殊勞，逮分閫外之憂，實表寰中之慶。臣某誠歡誠喜、頓首頓首。臣聞周歌麟趾，漢譬犬牙，固須地處親賢，方得天垂寵寄。伏以建王修善為樂，居高不危，好書而既擅多才，獻表而肯慚求試。今以鄴稱上鎮，魏有大名，將資磐石之宗，遂錫分圭之寵。豈獨漳濱之俗，遠荷恩威，永令海內之人，皆歌德業。臣限守藩鎮，不獲稱慶行在，無任踴躍屏營之至。謹奉表陳賀以聞，臣某誠欣誠躍、頓首頓首。謹言。

Your servant So-and-so speaks. Your servant has had a report from the court liaison office, saying that on the twenty second day of the second month it was graciously granted that the Prince of Jian be made grand officer with ceremonial equal to the three highest ministers, and Grand Guardian as well, and be charged with the office of military commissioner of Weibo. By the rich virtue of the guarding wall and the singular labor of one who takes a land apart, the cares that lie beyond the threshold are now shared out to him, and this truly shows forth a happy thing for all the round world. Your servant So-and-so is truly glad and truly joyful, bowing his head to the ground, bowing his head to the ground. Your servant has heard that Zhou sang of the hoofs of the unicorn, and that Han took its likeness from the teeth of a dog. It is truly needful that the land be in the hands of one close in blood and worthy, and only then does heaven send down its favor and lay a charge upon him. Your servant humbly considers that the Prince of Jian makes a joy of cultivating goodness, and stands high without being in peril, and loves books and has already made his many talents known, and sent up a memorial and was not ashamed to ask that he be put to the test. Now Ye is called the first of the garrisons and Wei has a great name, and as the throne will lean upon a kinsman firm as bedrock, it has at last bestowed the favor of the divided jade tablet. How should the ways of the people by the Zhang river alone receive this grace and this awe from afar? It will make the men within the seas sing of this virtue and this work forever. Your servant is bound to his frontier command and cannot offer his congratulation at your traveling palace, and he cannot bear the utmost of his leaping and his dread. He respectfully sends up this memorial to set forth his congratulation and make it heard. Your servant So-and-so truly rejoices and truly leaps up, bowing his head to the ground, bowing his head to the ground. Respectfully spoken.

Interlinear notes 1

Daming is the seat of the military commissioner of Weibo. The words may also be read as praise, that Wei has a great name. — translator

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