Xiang Cheng, Volume 26: Blended Floral Fragrance (Li Zhu's Bedchamber Incense)
The ancients placed great emphasis on "harmonizing temperaments" when blending incense, rather than merely seeking intensity.
Volume 26 · Blended Floral Fragrance (Li Zhu's Bedchamber Incense)
Original Text (Compiled)
Li Zhu's Bedchamber Incense: one liang of agarwood, cut into pieces the size of an incense stick; ten goose pears, take their juice to soak the agarwood; steam until tender in a zeng steamer, grind and mix, add a little borneol. When burned, it has the moisture of pear juice without the fierceness of agarwood.
Vernacular Translation and Annotation
Volume 26 discusses "Blended Floral Fragrance"—infusing floral scents into incense products. The most famous is the "Bedchamber Incense" of Li Yu, the last ruler of the Southern Tang: chop agarwood into pieces like incense sticks, soak in the juice pressed from ten goose pears, steam until tender in a steamer, grind and mix, then add a little borneol. The fresh moisture of the goose pear tempers the intensity of the agarwood; burned in the bedchamber, it is sweet and moist without being dry—a model of literati "incorporating flowers into incense." This also shows that the ancients placed great emphasis on "harmonizing temperaments" when blending incense, rather than merely seeking intensity.
Annotations
- Li Zhu: Li Yu, the last ruler of the Southern Tang.
- Cuo: to chop into pieces.
- Zeng: an ancient earthenware vessel for steaming food; here it refers to steaming.
Collation Notes · Edition and Arrangement Notes
Basis for the Edition:The transmission of Xiang Cheng (The Compendium of Incense) traces its ancestral edition to the Ming Chongzhen-era printed edition; presently seen are the Wenyuange Siku Quanshu edition, the Siku Huiyao edition, and various Qing manuscript copies. This compilation uses the commonly circulated arranged edition as its base text, collated against the Siku edition.
Collation for This Volume:Records Li Houzhu's Zhangzhong Xiang (Goose-Pear Zhangzhong Incense) and various formulas for Ninghe Hua Xiang; this formula steeps agarwood in goose-pear juice, with the various incense manuals differing in detail, here comprehensively recorded.
Facsimile Comparison:The "original text" on this page is an arranged compilation (with modern punctuation and paragraphing), not a facsimile of the original book; for character-by-character collation, please consult authoritative public-domain editions:Wikisource full text of Xiang Cheng (The Compendium of Incense) from the Siku Quanshu edition (twenty-eight volumes)、Wikimedia Commons facsimile scans of Xiang Cheng (PDFs of the National Library of China holdings, etc.). This site does not fabricate ancient book layouts, and therefore substitutes external links to authoritative public-domain facsimiles.