Keitoku dentōroku 景德傳燈錄 [景徳伝灯録]

Archive Unit
  • This material is held at
  • Reference
      GB 59 ORB 30/159
  • Dates of Creation
      1358
  • Language of Material
      Japanese
  • Physical Description
      2 volumes Condition: Good, with only minimal worm damage (repaired) and some brown staining. Fore-edges of all folios in maki 29 and 30 repaired and missing ji supplied in manuscript ff. 11-13 of maki 18 wrongly bound at end of maki, following kanki. Impression: Mostly sharp and clear. Seals of ownership: Square black seal, Shara juen 沙羅樹園, and square red seal, Ran [?] bunko 蘭□文庫, on first page of most of the former satsu. Two small red seals, Bunshōdō in 文昌堂印 and Isomura-shi 磯邨氏, on first page of maki 29. Oval red seal, Keisō 桂窗, on final endpaper of maki 30, and red oblong library stamp, Seisō bunko 西荘文庫, on original front cover of maki 1 (both being zōshoin of Ozu Keisō 小津桂窓). Manuscript notes: The following shikigo by Kyōkaen 杏花園 (=Ōta Nanpo 大田南畝) appears on the final endpaper of maki 30: 景德傳燈錄貞和板三十巻 ／ 闕巻一二 ／ 常州金龍寺古蔵本也 ／ 文政元年戊寅冬日於尚友堂 ／ 收得使楽地堂修補裝訂 ／ 七十翁杏花園. Kinryūji 金龍寺 is an old temple of the Sōtō sect (Zen) in present-day Ibaraki-ken. There are strong grounds for believing that this shikigo does not belong with the present copy but with the copy at ORB.30/151. It was, no doubt, erroneously transferred to this copy and bound in with it when both copies were rebound in western style, or at some earlier date.

Scope and Content

Author/compiler: Daoyuan (宋) 道原, Chinese Chan monk. Imprint: N.p., [Kenninji 建仁寺, Tenjun'an 天潤菴] , Enbun 3, 1358. Kanki on fol. 23b of maki 18 reads: 延文三年丙申十一月吉日 謹疏 ／ 幹縁比丘宗任. Description: 30 kan, formerly in 15 satsu, now rebound in 2 vols. (western style). 25.5 x 17.6 cm. Fukurotoji. Blockprint, supplemented in manuscript. Printing frame (of those maki which are printed) variable between 21.8 and 22.5 (height) x 16 cm. (width). Single-line borders above and below text; double-line (one thick, one thin) borders at inner edge of each folded leaf. Vertical rules between columns. Fishtail design on hanshin. Kanbun text, with reading marks in red and some manuscript kaeriten and okurigana in black in vols. of the original Enbun 3 (1358) edition only. 13 lines to page, 22-25 characters to line. Original mid-blue cover of satsu 1 (maki 1 and 2) only, within a modern western style half-leather binding. No title slips or gedai. Title from naidai. Hashiragaki: Den dai 1 (2, etc.) 傳第一 (二, 等) + folio no. Edition: Gozan-ban, Enbun 3 (1358) edition, printed partly from surviving blocks of the Jōwa 4 (1348) edition and partly from newly cut blocks. This copy is a composite set containing later additions, printed and manuscript, and is not made up wholly of maki from the 1358 edition. It consists of the following elements: (1) maki 7, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 17, 18, 23, 24, 27, 28, 29 and 30 of the Gozan edition of Enbun 3, 1358; (2) maki 1, 2, 19 and 20 from an early-Edo blockprinted edition with printed kunten; (3) maki 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 15, 16, 21, 22, 25 and 26 supplied in manuscript, c. Kan'ei period (1624-44). The kanki and kango of the original Jōwa 4 edition are reprinted in this copy. Contents: A biographical work compiled by Daoyuan in 1004, tracing the lineage of Zen Buddhism to the seven Buddhas of the past and giving short biographies, or quoting the names, of 1,701 Chinese and Indian Zen masters. An important source for the history of Chan Buddhism in China.

Access Information

Not Public Record(s)

Unrestricted

Acquisition Information

Donated to the British Museum by (Sir) Ernest M. Satow 13 June 1885.

Other Finding Aids

Kenneth Gardner, Descriptive Catalogue of Japanese books in the British Library printed before 1700 (London and Tenri, 1993). B. Buddhist works 仏書 11. Zen sect 禅宗

Bibliography

Bussho kaisetsu daijiten 仏書解説大辞典, vol. 3, p. 114; Gozanban no kenkyū 五山版の研究, pp. 106-12, 370-1, pl. 102, 105, 107; Ishii Sekisuiken bunko zenpon shomoku 石井積翠軒文庫善本書目, pp. 91-2 and pl. 169-79 (describing a reprint, 覆刻版, of the Enbun 3 edition).