A Study Of Ancient Agricultural Book In Ming Dynasty

Ming China is a dynamic and diverse time.It means that the development of economy and the diversity of cultural at that time.The expansion of agricultural production,as the economic base in the traditional society,support the social adjustment and transformation in Ming Dynasty.At the same time,the quantities of ancient agricultural books begin to increase,and the special system of agricultural knowledge begin to form.Therefore,it is necessary that the study of the ancient agricultural book in Ming Dynasty.On the one hand,the agricultural knowledge of ancient agricultural book recording reflect the level of the science and technology.On the other hand,that ancient agricultural book has immersed in the society network in that time.Of course,predecessor scholars have some discusses in that topic.However,their studies are paying more attention to the textural criticism,and on this basis to introduce related agricultural science and technology.Besides,there are some scholars regard the ancient agricultural book as historical materials,so they use that agricultural books to study the social and economic conditions in Ming Dynasty.Thus it can be seen,senior scholars'study of ancient agricultural book do not discuss the book itself.Especially lacking the angle of knowledge history to explore some interesting topics.First of all,from the angle of text and knowledge researches,the concept of ancient agricultural book in Ming Dynasty should be solved.With the help of some corpus of that time and several classical bibliographies and many ancient agricultural books,the concept of agricultural book in people's idea word can be described very pluralistic,and even base on the degree of participation,developing various concepts of ancient agricultural book.For the sake of convenience of researches,this plural idea of ancient agricultural book can be summed up as follows,the ancient agricultural book in Ming Dynasty is farming book and agronomic book and agricultural policies.After the definition of this category,combing the existing and lost literature,the number of agricultural books in Ming Dynasty are 502 books probably.However,behind the huge numbers,at that time,the ancient agricultural books have already existed the phenomenon of plagiarism and reprinting.Consequently,from the single view of agricultural knowledge,there are merely less than 300 agricultural books have practical value.In addition,no matter how much ancient agricultural books in Ming Dynasty,the textual research on those documents is still essential.Especially some mistakes of these agricultural books' author and edition and age of birth in predecessors'bibliographies of ancient agricultural book,and there are some unknown books by scholars,and some lost books could be collected again,all of these problems are worth studying.As everyone knows,text research focuses on ancient agricultural book itself,but the perspective of knowledge history lays particular stress on the interaction between ancient agricultural book and space-time.From time angle,the comparison between ancient agricultural book in Ming Dynasty and Song Dynasty,could reveal the changing of agricultural knowledge at various times.Mainly through contrast of content and author and space-time distribution,the difference and continuity of ancient agricultural book in Song and Ming Dynasty very obvious.Simply speaking,comparing to the Song Dynasty,in the Ming Dynasty,the ancient agricultural book pay more attention to the synthesis,the agricultural knowledge in these books further downward to the lower class,in addition,creation and publication of ancient agricultural book more restricted to the market rather than political power.Moreover,in the space of view,through the research of Huapu(a kind of florilegium),the ancient agricultural book seems to have taken on a certain degree of social communication function.And that means,ancient agricultural book participates the construction of the scholars' social network in Ming Dynasty.Furthermore,in addition to the macroscopical investigation,the research perspective of the knowledge history pay more attention to a kind of knowledge or book's production and spread and read and social influence.For example,the ancient agricultural book Shuyipian and Runanpushi have a connection.This indicates that the production process of agricultural book very long and flexible.From script to print,changing of those ancient agricultural book can be summed up as systematization of agricultural knowledge.After the birth of the agricultural book,they start to communication activities.In this process,the government has played a significant role.So the research of the official publication,could reveal some questions of the dissemination of ancient agricultural book.Of course,the dissemination is a way from author or publisher.The agricultural knowledge is accept or not,needing to examine the reader side.Facing this problem,Jiuhuangbencao and Yecaipu are a good research material.Basing on the study of content and preface and postscript and comment,a kind of multiple reading could be revealed in Ming Dynasty.Such as the two books mentioned above,they are very different from early reading thinking and late reading thinking.This is mainly because late Ming scholars always understand a agricultural book in a different perspectives.Last but not least,owing to the local agricultural book's shortage,their relationship with local society lack of relevant research.However,Bozhoumudanshi can fill this gap.On the one hand,this book introduces the peony knowledge from Bozhou.On the other hand,Bozhou,Bozhoumudanshi also a record of blooming season in Bozhou.Through this text,the Bozhou society become more fresh,and this text itself also can't separate from this society.Especially,Bozhoumudanshi is imply a kind of sensitive from class changing.In summary,the research of ancient agricultural book in Ming Dynasty is not only the collation of historical documents,but also analysis and discussion.Previous studies more focus on basic introduction,ignoring some discussions from knowledge history angle.A discussion of the above problems could be a key to the agronomy in that time.