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dankodesThis is the last book in Lessons from the States! After this, we get into some fairly different material:
Minor odes of the kingdom (about 7 weeks)
Greater odes of the kingdom (3 weeks)
Odes of the temple and the altar (4 weeks)
And then we'll be talking about what we want to do next. But seriously, working through all the Lessons from the States is itself a milestone: one building-block of your Classical Education achieved.
* I found the best option for the weekly reminder emails, via Gmail. The external service options are more involved than our purposes require. Does anyone know anything about how to arrange an Apps Script? Basically all it has to do is tell ten people, on Saturdays, to come and get their juice/poems.
Until someone knows what to do there, I'll send out manual messages weekly. If you'd like to receive these and are not getting them, please let me know.
* If you haven't read it yet, chapter one, on tetrasyllabic shi poetry, in How to Read Chinese Poetry is hugely useful for the Book of Odes, imo.
* IF YOU HAVE FRIENDS WHO MIGHT LIKE TO JOIN or have other ideas, please let me know on this post.
* Every week I search the poems' English results to see if I can find any scholarship or neat bits and pop the results in Resources. Here is this week's collection.
* In case you missed it and are interested, some people on the com are doing a Nirvana in Fire read-along here. Anyone with thoughts is welcome to chime in.
**NEXT BATCH MARCH 22.**
Minor odes of the kingdom (about 7 weeks)
Greater odes of the kingdom (3 weeks)
Odes of the temple and the altar (4 weeks)
And then we'll be talking about what we want to do next. But seriously, working through all the Lessons from the States is itself a milestone: one building-block of your Classical Education achieved.
* I found the best option for the weekly reminder emails, via Gmail. The external service options are more involved than our purposes require. Does anyone know anything about how to arrange an Apps Script? Basically all it has to do is tell ten people, on Saturdays, to come and get their juice/poems.
Until someone knows what to do there, I'll send out manual messages weekly. If you'd like to receive these and are not getting them, please let me know.
* If you haven't read it yet, chapter one, on tetrasyllabic shi poetry, in How to Read Chinese Poetry is hugely useful for the Book of Odes, imo.
* IF YOU HAVE FRIENDS WHO MIGHT LIKE TO JOIN or have other ideas, please let me know on this post.
* Every week I search the poems' English results to see if I can find any scholarship or neat bits and pop the results in Resources. Here is this week's collection.
* In case you missed it and are interested, some people on the com are doing a Nirvana in Fire read-along here. Anyone with thoughts is welcome to chime in.
**NEXT BATCH MARCH 22.**
154. 七月 - Qi Yue
一之日觱发、二之日栗烈。
无衣无褐、何以卒岁。
三之日于耜、四之日举趾。
同我妇子、饁彼南亩、田畯至喜。
In the seventh month, the Fire Star passes the meridian;
In the 9th month, clothes are given out.
In the days of [our] first month, the wind blows cold;
In the days of [our] second, the air is cold; -
Without the clothes and garments of hair,
How could we get to the end of the year?
In the days of [our] third month, they take their ploughs in hand;
In the days of [our] fourth, they take their way to the fields.
Along with my wife and children,
I carry food to them in those south-lying acres.
The surveyor of the fields comes, and is glad.
七月流火、九月授衣。
春日载阳、有鸣仓庚。
女执懿筐、遵彼微行、爰求柔桑。
春日迟迟、采蘩祁祁。
女心伤悲、殆及公子同归。
In the seventh month, the Fire Star passes the meridian;
In the ninth month, clothes are given out.
With the spring days the warmth begins,
And the oriole utters its song.
The young women take their deep baskets,
And go along the small paths,
Looking for the tender [leaves of the] mulberry trees.
As the spring days lengthen out,
They gather in crowds the white southernwood.
That young lady's heart is wounded with sadness,
For she will [soon] be going with one of our princes as his wife.
七月流火、八月萑苇。
蚕月条桑、取彼斧斨、以伐远扬、猗彼女桑。
七月鸣鵙、八月载绩。
载玄载黄、我朱孔阳、为公子裳。
In the seventh month, the Fire Star passes the meridian;
In the eighth month are the sedges and reeds.
In the silkworm month they strip the mulberry branches of their leaves,
And take their axes and hatchets,
To lop off those that are distant and high;
Only stripping the young trees of their leaves.
In the seventh month, the shrike is heard;
In the eighth month, they begin their spinning; -
They make dark fabrics and yellow.
Our red manufacture is very brilliant,
It is for the lower robes of our young princes.
四月秀葽、五月鸣蜩。
八月其获、十月陨蘀。
一之日于貉、取彼狐狸、为公子裘。
二之日其同、载缵武功、言私其豵、献豜于公。
In the fourth month, the Small grass is in seed.
In the fifth, the cicada gives out its note.
In the eighth, they reap.
In the tenth, the leaves fall.
In the days of [our] first month, they go after badgers,
And take foxes and wild cats,
To make furs for our young princes.
In the days of [our] second month, they have a general hunt,
And proceed to keep up the exercises of war.
The boars of one year are for themselves;
Those of three years are for our prince.
五月斯螽动股、六月莎鸡振羽。
七月在野、八月在宇、九月在户。
十月蟋蟀、入我牀下。
穹窒熏鼠。
塞向墐户。
嗟我妇子、曰为改岁、入此室处。
In the fifth month, the locust moves its legs;
In the sixth month, the spinner sounds its wings.
In the seventh month, in the fields;
In the eighth month, under the eaves;
In the ninth month, about the doors;
In the tenth month, the cricket
Enters under our beds.
Chinks are filled up, and rats are smoked out;
The windows that face [the north] are stopped up;
And the doors are plastered.
' Ah! our wives and children,
' Changing the year requires this :
Enter here and dwell. '
六月食郁及薁、七月亨葵及菽。
八月剥枣、十月获稻。
为此春酒、以介眉寿。
七月食瓜、八月断壶、九月叔苴、采荼薪樗。
食我农夫。
In the sixth month they eat the sparrow-plums and grapes;
In the seventh, they cook the Kui and pulse,
In the eighth, they knock down the dates;
In the tenth, they reap the rice;
And make the spirits for the spring,
For the benefit of the bushy eyebrows.
In the seventh month, they eat the melons;
In the eighth, they cut down the bottle-gourds;
In the ninth, they gather the hemp-seed;
They gather the sowthistle and make firewood of the Fetid tree;
To feed our husbandmen.
九月筑场圃、十月纳禾稼。
黍稷重穋、禾麻菽麦。
嗟我农夫、我稼既同、上入执宫功。
昼尔于茅、宵尔索綯。
亟其乘屋、其始播百谷。
In the ninth month, they prepare the vegetable gardens for their stacks,
And in the tenth they convey the sheaves to them;
The millets, both the early sown and the late,
With other grain, the hemp, the pulse, and the wheat.
' O my husbandmen,
Our harvest is all collected.
Let us go to the town, and be at work on our houses.
In the day time collect the grass,
And at night twist it into ropes;
Then get up quickly on our roofs; -
We shall have to recommence our sowing. '
二之日凿冰冲冲、三之日纳于凌阴。
四之日其蚤、献羔祭韭。
九月肃霜、十月涤场。
朋酒斯飨、曰杀羔羊。
跻彼公堂、称彼兕觥、万寿无疆。
In the days of [our] second month, they hew out the ice with harmonious blows;
And in those of [our] third month, they convey it to the ice-houses,
[Which they open] in those of the fourth, early in the morning,
Having offered in sacrifice a lamb with scallions.
In the ninth month, it is cold, with frost;
In the tenth month, they sweep clean their stack-sites.
The two bottles of spirits are enjoyed,
And they say, ' Let us kill our lambs and sheep,
And go to the hall of our prince,
There raise the cup of rhinoceros horn,
And wish him long life, - that he may live for ever. '
Re: 154. 七月 - Qi Yue
That young lady's heart is wounded with sadness,For she will [soon] be going with one of our princes as his wife. eesh
So this one feels like a ritual calendar song, to me: setting out right behaviour for the agricultural and spiritual year. It also feels like the manifesto/biography of a specific place.
The boars of one year are for themselves;Those of three years are for our prince. this is the type of annual taxation system discussed at length in the Talmud, for tithing and thus the support of priestly-clerical classes.
In the tenth, they reap the rice; so are we in the South?
For the benefit of the bushy eyebrows. huh?
Why is the chronology not straight forward?
rhinoceros horn, homie where did you GET that?
They already have ice houses?!
Re: 154. 七月 - Qi Yue
Odes of Bin -- Bin is an ancient city name in present day Shaanxi, Xunyi + Bin county region. (So to your later question, it's northwestern China. Shaanxi cuisine tends to noodles, but I think it's also a rice growing region? Just less?)
"bushy eyebrows": longevity; old people have luxurious eyebrows
"rhinocerous horn": the gloss is just that it's an ancient drinking vessel made of animal horn, so this may be Legge editorializing
Legge should keep the sound effects. "chong chong" for the sound of ice being chiseled!
Re: 154. 七月 - Qi Yue
"the Fire Star passes the meridian;" In the fifth month, at dusk, he fire star is in the south, in the center/middle + highest spot. In the sixth month, it moves west-ward and down, so this is called 'flow'
"southernwood": Asteraceae or Compositae, namely Herba Artimisiae Sieversianae. Used as a sacrifice to gods/ancestors. (And /maybe/ by women before marriage? I can't quite parse this sentence)
"The boars of one year" vs "three years": means small animals vs big ones.
"bushy eyebrows": longevity; old people have luxurious eyebrows
The lamb sacrifice in the last stanza is as required in the classic of rites for early spring.
When reading the months, keep in mind that the Zhou calendar starts in the 11th month of the modern lunar calendar, so the 7-10 months in the poem correspond to the 4-6 of modern lunar calendar (? Not sure why we lost a month in the transition lol)