To Establish Peace: being the Chronicle of the Later Han dynasty for the years 189 to 200 AD as recorded in Chapters 59 to 63 of the Zizhi tongjian of Sima Guang.

Abstract

Foreword: Since the hard-copy of To Establish Peace is now out of print, and is easily available only through specialist libraries, it seems appropriate to offer the text in electronic form to those who may be interested in the history of the Three Kingdoms, perhaps the most tumultuous and romantic of all Chinese history.

In the presentation below, the original English-language of the 1996 edition has been preserved, with a few minor corrections, but the requirements of the internet have compelled a number of changes in format. Firstly, no characters are included. There are, however, detailed references to Chinese works, and those who wish to do further research and checking should have no difficulty in identifying the relevant texts. Given the convenience of searching electronic documents, moreover, I have not included an index. Second, rather than running heads to show the chapter or year on each page, at intervals and throughout the notes I indicate in the margin the year which is under consideration: thus Ja 6: 201 means that the text is rendering the chronicle for the first year of Jian'an, roughly equivalent to 201 AD. Third, annotations are not provided as footnotes, but appear as additions to the text, in a smaller font, at the end of each annual chronicle. Reference points are indicated by full-size numbers in the body of the main text. Other technical details from the hard-back edition are explained in the introductory material to Volume 1. Subject to these alterations and a few amendments, the present document gives the original text of the 1996 translation of the chronicle from 201 to early 220 AD. Rafe de Crespigny Canberra October 2003