The kingdom of Linyi林邑國

The kingdom of Linyi was originally Xianglin county in the Rinan commandery of Han, the old borderland of Yuechang (越裳). Ma Yuan, General Who Quells the Waves, opened the southern frontier of Han and set up this county. Its land is about six hundred li across. The walled city is a hundred and twenty li from the sea and more than four hundred li from the border of Rinan, and on the north it adjoins the Jiude commandery. On its southern border, more than two hundred li by water and by land, there are Yi (夷) of Xiguo (西國) who also call themselves kings. It is there that Ma Yuan planted two bronze pillars to mark the boundary of Han. In that kingdom there is a gold mountain where the rocks are all red, and gold is born within them. At night the gold comes out and flies about, in shape like fireflies. There also come from it tortoiseshell, cowrie shells, jibei and chenmuxiang. Jibei (吉貝) is the name of a tree. When its flower is full it is like goose down; the threads are drawn out and spun to make cloth, as white as ramie cloth, and it is also dyed in five colors and woven into banbu (斑布). Chenmu (沉木) the people of that land cut down and pile up for years, until it has rotted away and only the heart and the knots are left. Put into water it sinks, and so it is named chenxiang. The next grade, which neither sinks nor floats, is called zanxiang (𥴈香).

In the great disorder at the end of Han, Ou Da (區達), a merit officer, killed the county magistrate and set himself up as king. It passed down several generations, and then a king had no heir, so his sister's son Fan Xiong was set up. Xiong died and his son Yi (逸) succeeded. In the third year of Xiankang under Emperor Cheng of Jin, Yi died and the slave Wen (文) usurped the throne. Wen was originally a household slave of Fan Zhi, chief of the Yi (夷) of Xijuan county in Rinan. He used to pasture cattle by a mountain stream, where he got two snakehead fish that changed into iron, and out of them he cast a sword. When the sword was finished, Wen faced a rock and made this vow: "If the rock is struck and splits, then Wen shall be king of this land." He raised the sword and struck the rock, and it cut as though he were cutting a bundle of straw. In his heart Wen alone thought it strange. Fan Zhi often sent him trading as far as Linyi, and there he taught the king of Linyi to make palaces and war chariots and engines, and the king favored him and gave him charge of affairs. Afterward he slandered the king's sons, and each of them fled to another kingdom. When the king died with no heir, Wen pretended to go and meet a prince from a neighboring kingdom, put poison in his drink and killed him, and then forced the people of the kingdom to set him up. He raised troops and attacked the small kingdoms around him and swallowed them all, and had a host of forty or fifty thousand. At that time Jiang Zhuang, inspector of Jiaozhou, made his intimates Han Ji and Xie Zhi overseers of the Rinan commandery one after the other, and both were greedy and cruel, so that the kingdoms suffered from them. In the third year of Yonghe under Emperor Mu, the court sent Xiahou Lan as grand administrator, and his exactions were worse still. Linyi had no farmland of its own and coveted the rich soil of Rinan, and had long wished to seize it. Now, riding on the people's resentment, it raised troops and fell upon Rinan, killed Lan, and sacrificed his corpse to Heaven. It stayed three years in Rinan and then went back to Linyi. Zhu Fan, inspector of Jiaozhou, afterward sent the protector Liu Xiong to garrison Rinan, and Wen slaughtered them again.

He went on to plunder the Jiude commandery, harming the clerks and the people. He sent an envoy to tell Fan that he wished to make Hengshan on the northern border of Rinan the boundary, but Fan would not allow it, and sent the protectors Tao Huan and Li Qu to punish him. Wen went back to Linyi, and before long camped in Rinan again. In the fifth year Wen died and his son Fo (佛) ascended the throne, still camped in Rinan. Huan Wen, General Who Campaigns Westward, sent the protector Teng Jun and Guan Sui, grand administrator of Jiuzhen, to lead the troops of Jiaozhou and Guangzhou against him, and Fo shut the walls and held fast. Sui ordered Jun to array his troops in force in front, while Sui himself led seven hundred stout soldiers over the rampart from behind and entered. Fo's host broke in terror and fled, and Sui pursued as far as Linyi, and then Fo asked to surrender. At the beginning of Shengping under Emperor Ai he raided again, and the inspector Wen Fangzhi struck and broke him. In the third year of Long'an under Emperor An, Fo's grandson Xuda raided Rinan again and seized the grand administrator Jiong Yuan, then went on to raid Jiude and seized the grand administrator Cao Bing. Du Yuan, grand administrator of Jiaozhi, sent the protector general Deng Yi and others, who struck and broke him, and Yuan was thereupon made inspector. In the third year of Yixi, Xuda raided Rinan again and killed the chief secretary, and Yuan sent Ruan Fei, protector of the sea patrol, who struck and broke him and beheaded and took captive a great many. In the ninth year Xuda raided Jiuzhen again, and Du Huiqi, acting in the commandery's affairs, fought him and beheaded his son Zhen Zhi, king of Jiaolong, and his general Fan Jian and others, and took alive Xuda's son Naneng together with more than a hundred prisoners. From the death of Yuan onward, not a year passed without Linyi raiding Rinan, Jiude and the other commanderies, and the killing and the sweeping away were so great that Jiaozhou grew weak and empty at last.

Xuda died and his son Dizhen ascended the throne, and Dizhen's younger brother Dikai took their mother and fled. Dizhen came to regret bitterly that he had not been able to keep his mother and his brother with him, so he left the kingdom and went off to Tianzhu, yielding the throne to his sister's son; the chief minister Zangliao remonstrated firmly, but he would not listen. Once the nephew was set up he killed Zangliao, and Zangliao's son in turn attacked and killed him, and set up Wendi (文敵), the younger brother of Dikai by the same mother and a different father. Wendi was later killed by Danggenchun, a prince of Funan, and the great minister Fan Zhunong put down that disorder and set himself up as king. Zhunong died and his son Yangmai (陽邁) ascended the throne. In the second year of Yongchu under Song he sent an envoy with tribute, and Yangmai was made king of Linyi. Yangmai died and his son Duo (咄) ascended the throne, and in longing for his father he took the name Yangmai again.

The custom of that kingdom is to build their dwellings as raised halls, which they call yulan (于蘭), and all the doors face north. They write on tree leaves for paper. Men and women alike wrap a crosswise breadth of jibei below the waist, which they call ganman (干漫) and also duman (都縵). They pierce their ears and hang small rings in them. The noble wear leather sandals and the base go barefoot. From Linyi and Funan southward all the kingdoms are like this. Their king wears dharma robes and adds a necklace of gems, like the adornment of a Buddha image. When he goes out he rides an elephant, with conches blown and drums beaten, a jibei parasol held over him and banners made of jibei. The kingdom sets up no penal law; those who are guilty are trampled to death by elephants. Their great clans are called Brahmans. Marriages must be made in the eighth month, and the woman asks for the man first, because they hold men cheap and women dear. Those of the same surname still marry one another. A Brahman leads the bridegroom in to see the bride and joins their hands and gives them over to each other, praying "jili jili (吉利吉利)," and by this the rite is complete. The dead are burned in the open fields, which they call cremation. Their widows live alone with their hair loose until old age. The king of the kingdom serves the Nigan way (尼乾道), and casts human figures of gold and silver ten arm-spans around.

At the beginning of Yuanjia, Yangmai raided the commanderies of Rinan and Jiude. Du Hongwen, inspector of Jiaozhou, raised his standard and meant to punish him, but hearing that a replacement was coming he stopped. In the eighth year Yangmai plundered the Jiude commandery again and entered the Sihui estuary, and Ruan Mizhi, inspector of Jiaozhou, sent the company commander Xiang Daosheng at the head of troops to go and strike him; he attacked Qulicheng but could not take it, and drew back. After that he sent envoys with tribute year after year, and yet his raiding did not stop. In the twenty-third year, Tan Hezhi, inspector of Jiaozhou, and Zong Que, General Who Rouses Valor, were ordered to strike him. Hezhi made his marshal Xiao Jingxian the vanguard. Yangmai heard of it and was afraid, and wished to hand over ten thousand catties of gold and a hundred thousand catties of silver and to send back the households of Rinan that he had carried off; but his great minister Dusengda remonstrated and stopped him, so he sent the chief commander Fan Fulong to garrison Qulicheng on the northern border. Jingxian attacked the city and took it and beheaded Fulong, and the gold and silver and goods of every kind that he got were beyond counting. Riding on the victory he pressed straight on and took Linyi at once, and Yangmai and his son both got away with nothing but their bodies. The rare things he took were all treasures without a name. He also melted down their golden figure and got several hundred thousand catties of yellow gold. Hezhi afterward fell sick and died, and it was said that the Hu god (胡神) had brought the curse upon him.

In the Jianyuan and Daming years of Emperor Xiaowu, Fan Shencheng, king of Linyi, several times sent his chief secretary to present a memorial with tribute. In the first year of Taiyu under Emperor Ming he again sent an envoy with local products. In the Yongming years of Qi, Fan Wenzan several times sent envoys with tribute. In the ninth year of Tianjian, Tiankai, son of Wenzan, presented a white monkey, and an edict said: "Fan Tiankai, king of Linyi, set apart beyond the sea, is sincere in heart to the utmost, and from afar keeps up his tribute duties. This is truly to be commended. It is fitting that a rank and title be proclaimed for him and that he be covered with the grace of honor. Let him be holder of the tally, commander of all military affairs along the coast, General Who Overawes the South, and king of Linyi." In the tenth year and the thirteenth year Tiankai several times sent envoys with local products. Soon after he fell sick and died, and his son Bicuibamo ascended the throne and presented a memorial with tribute. In the seventh year of Putong, king Gaoshi Shengkai sent an envoy with local products, and by edict he was made holder of the tally, commander of all military affairs along the coast, General Who Pacifies the South, and king of Linyi. In the first year of Datong he sent an envoy with tribute again. In the second year of Zhongdatong, Gaoshi Lütuoluobamo, acting king of Linyi, sent an envoy with tribute, and by edict he was made holder of the tally, commander of all military affairs along the coast, General Who Pacifies the South, and king of Linyi. In the sixth year he again sent an envoy with local products.