The Study On How "Shi Tong" Inheriting And Developing "Wen Xin Diao Long Shi Zhuan"

The ancient Chinese historical criticism is the production of traditional historiography.As an important part of historical theory, the ancient Chinese criticism is theself-evaluation when traditional historiography developed to a certain level. Thedevelopment of Chinese historiography provide a foundation for historical criticism. Inturn, historical criticism becomes one of the internal power to promote the Chinesehistoriography. Historical criticism is the reflection towards historical practice and theory,which is the investigation, reflection and survey of historical phenomenon, historians,history records, concepts, historical compilations as well as historical criticism. In theprocession of the development of Chinese historiography, Liu Xie’s, Southern LiangDynasty,“Wen Xin Diao Long Shi Zhuan” is the special description on historicalcriticism with epoch-making significance, which is the first time of systematization ofhistorical criticism with far-reaching impact of historical thoughts. On the basis of thesuccession of historical criticism, Liu Zhiji, Tang Dynasty, wrote “Shi Tong” whichsystematically expounded the basic category of historical criticism and developmentcourse of the history before Tang Dynasty, marking the formation of Chinese ancienthistoriography theory. This paper, on the basis of previous studies, is aimed to analysizetwo kinds of historical criticism, digging out the relation of these two ideas, learning theirhistorical value and academic status. The paper will mainly contain the following parts.Chapter one, going to the source, made a brief analysis of trajectory of Chineseancient historical criticism before the Wei,Jin Dynasty to reveal the relationship between“Wen Xin Diao Long Shi Zhuan”and“Shi Tong”.Chapter two, discussing the inheritance of “Shi Tong” about “Wen Xin Diao LongShi Zhuan”, made a concrete analysis of the overall compose form, historical origin,historical function, genre and style of history books, principles and attitudes of writinghistory as well as the methods of history compilation in six aspects. Chapter three, on the basis of chapter two, discusses the further development ofhistorical criticism promoted by“Shi Tong” based on “Wen Xin Diao Long Shi Zhuan”in five aspects: system of national archives,“six classifications and two styles”(six: theclassification of historical records, two: history styles),“truthfulness” and “distortion”,“three advantages of historians”(ability, knowledge and insight)and the statement ofhistory.