Xiong Huizhen (; died 1936) was a Chinese

historical geographer Historical geography is the branch of geography that studies the ways in which geographic phenomena have changed over time. In its modern form, it is a synthesizing discipline which shares both topical and methodological similarities with histor ...

and a disciple of the late-

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

scholar Yang Shoujing. He is known for completing the ''Shui jing zhu shu'', a monumental annotation of the 6th-century geographic classic '' Shui jing zhu''.

Biography

Xiong Huizhen was born in Zhijiang County,

Hubei Hubei is a province of China, province in Central China. It has the List of Chinese provincial-level divisions by GDP, seventh-largest economy among Chinese provinces, the second-largest within Central China, and the third-largest among inland ...

during the

, and studied under the prominent historical geographer and bibliophile Yang Shoujing, who was also a native of Hubei. Yang spent most of his life annotating the 6th-century geographic work '' Shui jing zhu''. Having completed 40 volumes of annotation, he died in 1915 without completing the work. Xiong carried on the project and wrote another 40 volumes. He also made the final editing of the entire work, painstakingly proofreading the annotations word by word. It took Xiong 22 years to complete the work, known as the ''Shui jing zhu shu''. He refused offers made by Japanese scholars to purchase the book. However, when he learned that the descendants of Yang Shoujing had secretly sold some manuscripts, he committed suicide by hanging himself in 1936. The

Second Sino-Japanese War The Second Sino-Japanese War was fought between the Republic of China (1912–1949), Republic of China and the Empire of Japan between 1937 and 1945, following a period of war localized to Manchuria that started in 1931. It is considered part ...

soon broke out in 1937. The Chinese government paid great attention to the protection of the manuscript as well as Yang Shoujing's precious book collection. Scholar Fu Sinian negotiated on behalf of

Academia Sinica Academia Sinica (AS, ; zh, t=中央研究院) is the national academy of the Taiwan, Republic of China. It is headquartered in Nangang District, Taipei, Nangang, Taipei. Founded in Nanjing, the academy supports research activities in mathemat ...

and the Ministry of Education to purchase the manuscript from Yang's heir Yang Mianzhi for 3,000 dollars, and brought it to Hong Kong for safekeeping. It was eventually published in Taiwan the early 1950s, and in mainland China in 1957. The influential historian

Gu Jiegang , module = , workplaces = Peking University, Xiamen University, Sun Yat-sen University, Yenching University, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Gu Jiegang (8 May 1893 – 25 December 1980) was a Chinese historia ...

commented that the ''Shui jing zhu shu'' "brought to a point of culmination the textual research of ''The Classic of Waterways'' of the previous three centuries." He greatly admired Yang Shoujing and Xiong Huizhen for their "single-minded devotion" to the task, and Xiong's devotion to his master.

Biography

References

Further reading