The listing here includes over 40 minutes of music. The earliest melody listed is famous as the world's earliest written melody written down in sufficient detail to allow reconstruction, but there are also several later melodies with "lan" in the title as well as others connected to orchids but without the word in the title.
My copy of this work, Mao Shi Pinwu Tu Gai, is an edition published in Taiwan; the title is also translated as the Revised illustrations of Plants and Animals in the Mao [edition of the Book of] Poems. (Compare with 毛詩、草木鳥獸蟲魚疏 the Mao [Edition of the Book of] Songs, Commentary on flowers, trees, birds, animals, insects and fish.) It was apparently copied from a Japanese work, with the title pronounced "Mōshi himbutsu zukō". It was compiled by the Japanese Sinologist 岡元鳳 Genpō Oka (1737-1787) of 浪華 Naniwa (Osaka), with marks in the text being kana that give the pronunciation in Japanese syllables. There are three prefaces, signed,
東讚柴邦彥撰
浪花岡元鳳撰 (Genpō Oka)
Another book also purporting to illustrate animals as depicted in the Book of Songs is（清）徐鼎 Xu Ting (Qing dynasty), Commentary on Illustrations from Mao's Edition of the Shi Jing (毛詩名物圖說 Mao Shi Ming Wu Tu Shuo). This work, in three volumes, has been copied in ctext.org.
(Return)
3.
Various meanings of lan
Both the Zhongwen Dacidian and Hanyu Dacidian (I. and II. below) connect lan with compositae and magnolias as well as with orchidae.
I. 33297.0 蘭 lan:
B. 蘭科香草名有數種，一莖一花者為草蘭，一莖數花者為蕙蘭，心白者為素心蘭，福建產者為建蘭。 "The name of a fragrant plant of the orchidae family, of several types. One flower per stem are called cao lan (32629.349 cymbidium virens or cymbidium), several flowers per stem are called huilan (32677.44, a genus of lan), those with a white center are called suxinlan (27924.17 a genus of lan), those grown in Fujian are called jianlan (Fujian orchids, perhaps the same as Taiwan orchids)." The earliest reference it gives is 毛詩、草木鳥獸蟲魚疏 the Mao (Edition of the Classic of) Poetry, Commentary on flowers, trees, birds, animals, insects and fish.
C. 木蘭也，花如連、香如蘭。 "Mulan, (a deciduous magnolia) with flowers like a lotus and fragrance like an orchid." The earliest reference given is 文選 Wen Xuan.
II. 9/626 蘭 lan:
B. 蘭草 lan cao, defined as 澤蘭 ze lan, which in turn (6/167) are defined as 菊科 ju ke (i.e., compositae); the references for this include 易、繫辭上 the first section of the 繫辭 xici 4th c. CE commentary on the 易經 Yi Jing (by 韓[康]伯 Han [Kang]Bo, which says 同心之言，其臭如蘭 "two people speaking with one mind gives a fragrance like the lan"), 左傳、宣公三年 Third Year of Duke Xuan in the Zuo Zhuan (see Legge, pp.292-4: Duke Wan's concubine dreams that heaven sends her a lan, saying that as the most fragrant flower it should represent the state; after this Duke Wan gives her a lan when he lies with her, resulting in a son they call Lan), and 離騷 Li Sao (lines 11-12, twining autumn lan to make a garland).
C. 木蘭 mulan, defined as 一種香木 a type of fragrant wood; references include a commentary in which 朱熹 Zhu Xi says the lan in 楚辭九歌 Nine Songs from the Songs of Chu refers to mulan (see I.C. above).
More recently "A Student's Dictionary of Classical and Medieval Chinese", p.252, puts lán in the aster family and says, "for pre-Song texts, lán is invariably Eupatorium, not 'orchid'." For an example, see this translation by Knechtges.
In sum, it is open to question exactly what flower is intended by early references to lan: at times it could refer to plants that are not true orchids at all. And I am still looking for a description or illustration that clearly identifies any of the lan in the qin melody titles with the orchidae family.
(Return)
4.
Orchids: flagrant beauty or subtle fragrance?
The most important characteristic of lan in classical texts seems to be their fragrance. An example of this can be found in the annotated translation of the inscription on Orchids, a painting by 鄭燮 Zheng Xie (1693-1766), in Liu Yang and Edmund Capon, Fragrant Space, Chinese Flower and Bird Painting of the Ming and Qing Dynasties from the Guangdong Provincial Museum, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2000, pp.100-101. After comparing his painting with one by the Song loyalist painter Zheng Sixiao (1241-1318), who drew his orchids with roots pulled out to represent the effect of the Mongol conquest of China, Zheng Xie says he prefers painting the lan orchid to the hui orchid because "though it bears fewer blossoms, it effuses a more exquisite fragrance that lasts longer and spreads afar."
(Return)
5.
Orchids and gentlemen
Both the Confucius and the Qu Yuan story suggest a man who maintains his principles even though the world does not recognize his talents. Other flowers were also associated with gentlemen. A theme found in art is the 四君子 "four gentlemen", referring to 蘭、菊、梅、竹 orchids, chrysanthemums, plums and bamboo.
(Return)
6.
Orchids and love
This aspect is described in Wolfram Eberhard, A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols, London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1986, pp,219-220, as follows.
Old texts mention bathing in orchid blossom. But this may be a euphemism for bathing in filth which was supposed to be a cure for possession by spirits. In general, the flower stands for love and beauty. 'Golden-orchid Bond' (jin lan qi) is a close friendship between two men or women, which is not necessarily sexual. A man can say to his wife: 'Above (on earth) we have the (bond of the) golden orchid, below (the earth) we have the same grave.' The relationship between two homosexuals cn also be described as a 'Golden-orchid Bond'....
Orchids in a vase may mean 'concord', after the passage in the Yi-jing which says: "When two people are in concord, their sharpness is broken. Words of concord are fragrant as orchids." (Return)
Return to Performance Themes
or the Guqin ToC