Wu Mianxue, a famous square engraving artist
Pan Shiren
Zou Xuesheng/view/340742.htm
The Sibaofang engraving is from western Fujian It is a wonderful flower in the history of Fujian culture and even Fujian culture. It is also known as the four major woodblock printing bases in ancient China along with Beijing, Wuhan and Xuwan in Jiangxi.
The Sibaofang carvings began with Zou Xuesheng (also known as Qingquan, 1523-1598). In the eighth year of Wanli in the Ming Dynasty (1580), Zou Xuesheng resigned from his post as governor of Hangzhou, Zhejiang, and returned to Wuge. He brought back the woodblock printing technology from Suzhou and Hangzhou and started a bookshop "to engrave classics and history for the benefit of future generations." At the end of the Ming Dynasty, Zou Baochu, a kinsman of the Zou family, "traded in Xingning County, Guangdong, and made a lot of money. Then he married a wife and raised children. Because he lived there, he published scriptures and sold them. In Xinyou, the second year of Kangxi, he moved back to Benli, bought a house and farmland, and After raising his nephews, he still sold his business to make a living. The Minting Sibao Bookstore was founded by Shi Gong. "
After nearly a hundred years of creation and development from Wanli in the Ming Dynasty to Kangxi in the Qing Dynasty, it reached the Qian, Jiaqing and Dao periods. , Sibaofang Carving gradually reached its peak. According to the Genealogy of Fanyang Zou Family: "During the Qianjia and Qianjia Dynasties, the book industry in my hometown was very prosperous, and the richest people were tired of each other. After the Xian Dynasty, it was sluggish, and there were those who started to make money. Most of them accumulated success through frugality, but also Not as good as our predecessors." In the past 120 years of historical development, Sibaofang Carving has created brilliance in the history of my country's woodblock printing.
The rise and development of Sibaofang Carving has its special geographical and humanistic historical factors. Jujube wood, catalpa wood, pear wood and small leaf camphor are abundant around Sibao Fog Pavilion and Horse House. The paper and smoke ink required for engraving and printing can be obtained nearby. At the same time, Sibao is also a famous cultural hometown in history, with literati and talented people emerging in large numbers: in the Song Dynasty, Zou Yinglong, an official in Sibao, lived in Duanming Palace, where he knew the Privy Council and participated in political affairs; in the Ming Dynasty, Ma Xunguan served as the governor of the Duanming Palace; Zou Shengmai, a famous literati and calligrapher in the early Qing Dynasty, added "Kindergarten Stories from Qionglin", "Collection of Poems and Essays from Ji'ao Shanfang", "Tongzhen of Calligraphy and Painting", "Everyday Use of People", etc. In the Song Dynasty, there were 167 academies in Liancheng. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, private schools were almost found in every township and village. There were more than a dozen in large rural areas with a large population, and there were one or two in remote villages. Developed and enlightened education has cultivated a large number of talents. According to "Liancheng County Chronicles": From the establishment of Liancheng County to the Revolution of 1911, there were 29 Jinshi and 263 people who obtained honors through the imperial examination. These have provided a favorable cultural environment and technical preparation for the rise and development of Sibaofang Carving.
Sibaofang Carving, due to the lack of manpower, capital and technology, all started on a small scale. The "printing studio" engaged in printing is small in scale, and it is a typical family book carving and family operation. . From layout design, textual research, proofreading and verification, creation of blanks, engraving printing plates to paper cutting, ink mixing, printing, folding, paging, binding, pressing, cutting, sealing, packaging, bundling, etc. More than 20 processes, from the final shipment to the point of contact, are all handled by dedicated people. Family-style collaboration and management are adopted, and the rules of "refresh every year" and "ownership of hidden boards" are formed to standardize business behavior and avoid family members. Unnecessary competition within and between families. At that time, there were two major families engaged in carving and sealing: the Zou family and the Ma family. There are many bookshops in Sibao, and 123 Tangbo (printing studios) have been founded successively, including 32 of the Zou family in Fanyang, 42 of the Zou family in Longzu Township, Minting, and 38 of the Ma family in Sibaoli, Changting. There are 11 owners with surnames. Among them, there are more than thirty famous ones, such as Biqing Hall, Wenhai Tower, Wenxiang Tower, Hanbao Tower, Five Classics Hall, Linlan Hall and Yi Jing Hall, etc.
According to statistics from genealogy, account books and existing book tablets, there are 667 kinds of Sibao engraved books that have been seen in real objects or documented in documents. Except for various duplications, there are 489 kinds. Among them, "Siku" There are 105 kinds of Confucian classics such as "The Complete Book," "Collected Commentary on the Four Books"; 58 kinds of medicines such as "Qian Jin Yifang"; 65 kinds of daily practical ones such as "Daily Uses for People" and "Disciples' Regulations"; there are "Wen Xin Diao Long", There are 80 kinds of literature such as "Chu Ci"; 51 kinds of poems, Song lyrics, Yuan operas, novels, etc. by literati of the past dynasties; 42 kinds of geography, divination, astrology, etc.; 41 kinds of enlightenment reading materials, which can be said to be various and diverse. Naturally, its readers are also very diverse, such as literati, collectors, children, and people engaged in medicine, Feng Shui and other industries. This gives Sibao engraved books a large market and demand will not be interrupted.
In its heyday, Sibao's book engravings were "sold almost all over the world".
The Sibaofang engraving has good paper quality, elegant decoration, exquisite and generous; the fonts are mostly Song style, the strokes are neat, and the fonts are elegant: the proofreading is meticulous and there are very few errors. Moreover, the pages of the book are high at the top, making it easier for readers to annotate. Therefore, it has a high reputation and huge sales volume. It "monopolizes the south of the Yangtze River and is sold throughout the country." Many of the fine works in the history of printing were produced here, such as the boards collected by Zushutang and the "Baochi Compass Guide" supplemented by Wubentang, which were republished by Fujian People's Publishing House in 1992. "Taiwan Foreign Affairs: Five Tigers in Nanjing" also became the basis for Shanghai typesetting. At that time, merchants from Xuwan, Jiangxi Province, specially sent people to buy and transfer the four forts because of the exquisite calligraphy in the four forts. As a result, the legend of "Guandi Bali" is still spread among the four forts in Liancheng.
Sibao’s engraving book sales routes extended in all directions, covering more than 50 cities in the south of the Yangtze River at that time through three routes: the "Northern Line, the Southern Line and the Western Line". At that time, there were four bookstores (bookstores) in Sibao in all provinces south of Changting. Therefore, there was a heyday when Sibao's engraving of calligraphy "sold it and sold it for half the world".
After more than 120 years of glory, during the Xian and Dao periods, the Sibaofang carvings began to decline. In 1860, Shi Dakai's troops fought fierce battles with local Qing troops and landlord armed forces in Tingzhou and Liancheng, destroying a large number of printing houses in Sibao. The fatal blow came from the rapid development of modern publishing institutions. With the emergence of lithographic and lead printing technologies, modern publishing institutions such as Shanghai Dianshizhai, Guangxi Baishishanfang, and Guangdong Tongshu Publishing House began to rise. The quality and efficiency of book engraving produced by modern printing technology are beyond the reach of traditional engraving and printing technology. The market for Sibao carved books gradually shrank. The abolition of the imperial examination system in 1906 also left a large number of engravings on major aspects of the Four Fortresses, such as the Four Books and Five Classics, unattended. Sibaofang Carving never recovered and gradually declined, ending its glory as one of the four major woodblock printing bases.