Record of the Ten Continents within the Seas海内十洲记

Also known as

Record of the Ten Continents, Record of the Ten Continents and Three Isles

Author / transmission

Traditionally attributed to Dongfang Shuo (pseudonymous)

Period

Six Dynasties · Formerly attributed to Dongfang Shuo of the Western Han, but in fact a work written under a borrowed name by a Six Dynasties Daoist priest (c. 4th–5th century); one juan.

Canon division

Dongxuan Section, Jizhuan Category

Collected in

Zhengtong Daozang, Dongxuan: Records and Biographies

Category

Immortal Biographies

Fascicles

One Fascicle (Juan)

Synopsis

The Record of the Ten Continents within the Seas is presented as Dongfang Shuo's reply to a question of Emperor Wu of the Han, and describes in turn the ten sea-borne immortal continents of Zuzhou, Yingzhou, Xuanzhou, Yanzhou, Changzhou, Yuanzhou, Liuzhou, Shengzhou, Fenglinzhou and Jukuzhou, together with the situation, products and numinous drugs of paradises such as Kunlun, Fangzhang, Fusang, the Peng Hill and the Canghai Islands — the deathless herb of Zuzhou, the jade unguent of Yingzhou, the soul-returning incense of Jukuzhou, the bowstring-mending glue of Fenglinzhou and the like. Short as it is, the work is grand in imagination; it continues, in a Daoist setting, the mythical geography of the Shanhaijing tradition, and is the classic statement of the Daoist paradise system of the "ten continents and three islands," which together with the later system of the Ten Great Grotto-Heavens, the Thirty-six Lesser Grotto-Heavens and the Seventy-two Blessed Lands makes up the sacred space of Daoism. The numinous drugs named in it furnished imaginative material for Six Dynasties ingestion practice, and allusions such as the soul-returning incense and the bowstring-mending glue are widely met with in Tang and Song poetry and prose.

Key Ideas

• The paradise system of the ten continents and three islands
• Mythical geography and the sacred realms of Daoism
• Numinous drugs such as the deathless herb and the soul-returning incense
• The Daoicization of the Shanhaijing tradition
• Complementary to the theory of Grotto-Heavens and Blessed Lands

Structure

One juan, recording in turn the ten continents and immortal mountains such as Kunlun.

Editions

• Zhengtong Daozang edition
• Han Wei congshu edition
• Shuofu edition

Translations

• Thomas E. Smith's research on the immortality lore of Emperor Wu of the Han (doctoral dissertation, Ritual and the Shaping of Narrative: The Legend of the Han Emperor Wu, University of Michigan, 1992; he also wrote the "Shizhou ji" entry in The Encyclopedia of Taoism); a partial translation is also found in the works of Campany

Full Text & Online Resources

• Wikisource: Hainei shizhou ji
• CTEXT: Record of the Ten Continents within the Seas

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