At a glance
- Reading focus
- Guo Pu authorship is traditional and questioned in the old account.
Definition and details
Zang Shu discusses burial sites, landscape and vital qi within a traditional siting framework. It is neither a general construction manual nor modern geology. Understand its relations among arrival, stopping, departure, wind and water before separating observable landforms from auspicious meaning; familiar vocabulary does not automatically retain modern scientific definitions.
Structure and history
The traditional account examines biography and bibliographies before finding Guo Pu authorship insufficiently established. It also discusses reductions associated with Cai Yuanding and inner, outer and miscellaneous divisions associated with Wu Cheng. These criticisms show that an Eastern Jin attribution is traditional, and a heading must not override explicit doubts in the source.
A concrete example
The digital contents separate inner, outer and miscellaneous sections. Compare a statement about vital qi with the bibliographic criticism of later embellishment to see critical reading within the tradition. Locate any quotation in text, preface or account, avoiding the attribution of a later bibliographer’s comment to Guo Pu himself.
Context and limits
The work illuminates burial, kinship and landscape ideas without proving that a grave controls descendants’ lives. Its account criticizes delayed or repeated burial motivated by fortune fears, documenting historical dispute. Modern site choices depend on law and environment; textual study does not supply locations with health or wealth guarantees or turn qi into a measured physical entity.
References & further reading
Historical sources document ideas and rules of their time, not empirical proof of predictive accuracy. Source notes identify the nature and scope of each reference.
- 葬書 · 提要与目录Primary / tradition source
Traditional account questioning Guo Pu authorship and describing editorial work associated with Cai and Wu.