Ding Wei: Politician, Incense Scholar
Ding Wei (Northern Song), one of the key figures in the history of Chinese Incense Culture (香学).
Ding Wei · Northern Song
Identity:Politician, Incense Scholar
Representative Incense Works / Incense Deeds:Tianxiang Zhuan (Treatise on Heavenly Incense)
Ding Wei (966–1037) is the author of the earliest extant monograph dedicated to agarwood. In Tianxiang Zhuan, he established a grading system for Hainan agarwood through the "Four Names and Twelve Forms," proposed the evaluation standard of fragrance that is "clear and long-lasting," and set the literati aesthetic orientation of "clear and long-lasting" for agarwood. Later generations—Hong Chu, Chen Jing, and Zhou Jiazhou—all cited this text. From the "Four Names and Twelve Forms" to "flavor clear and long-lasting," Ding Wei contributed a complete agarwood appreciation system to Chinese Incense Culture (香学), with an influence lasting a thousand years.
and Chinese Incense Culture (香学)
Viewed through Ding Wei, Chinese Incense Culture (香学) is not an isolated craft, but a process in which generations of literati and craftsmen continually documented, systematized, and spiritualized olfactory experience. Only by understanding these sages can one understand the weight of that wisp of incense in your hand today.
Representative Incense Formulas · Incense Poems · Incense Discourses
Discourse on IncenseHeavenly Incense Chronicle
Ding WeiHeavenly Incense ChronicleChronicling agarwood, it pioneered specialized treatises on incense culture(香学): 'Incense must regard Hainan sinking grade as the best; the incense of Li villages, leaves like holly, forms into incense.' It established 'clear, distant, deep, and long-lasting' as the foremost quality of agarwood, setting the standard for later incense appreciation.
Incense Formula ·Duke Jin Ding's Pure and True Incense
Composition: agarwood, sandalwood, musk, borneol, frankincense, blended with refined white honey. From Chen's Incense Manual, it is a refined blended incense favored by Ding Wei (enfeoffed as Duke of Jin).