Ming official and scholar whose West Lake gazetteer and its supplement record Hangzhou street arts such as taozhen, ballads sung by blind performers to the pipa.
Mural guide
Mural of the cultural record “Daoqing and Yugu Fish-Drum Ballads”, which this person is tied to.
Tian Rucheng, courtesy name Shuhe, was a native of Qiantang, present-day Hangzhou. He passed the provincial examination in 1519 and the metropolitan examination in 1526, served in the Nanjing Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Rites and as an education official in Guangdong and Fujian, and retired on grounds of illness in 1541 to write. His works include the West Lake Gazetteer, its supplement the Xihu Youlan Zhiyu, and the Yanjiao Jiwen. The supplement describes blind men and women of Hangzhou singing old and new stories to the pipa, a form called taozhen, and scholars often cite it as an early record of the tanci ballad tradition.
Tian Rucheng Rises to Fujian Education Vice-Commissioner
From 1526
Tian Rucheng, styled Shuhe, a man of Qiantang, passed the jinshi in 1526 and was made secretary in the Nanjing Board of Justice, soon moved to the Board of Rites. He rose to director of sacrificial rites and Guangdong surveillance vice-commissioner, was demoted to magistrate of Chuzhou, then raised to Guizhou, made Guangxi right participating counselor guarding the Right River, and finally became Fujian education vice-commissioner.
Tian Rucheng Writes the Yanjiao Jiwen and Xihu Youlan Zhi
Jiajing reign, Ming
Tian Rucheng was learned, skilled in old-style prose and best at narrative. Having served in the southwest he knew the affairs of earlier reigns and wrote the Yanjiao Jiwen; lingering among lakes and hills and exploring the famous sights of western Zhejiang, he wrote the Xihu Youlan Zhi, and both were praised in his day.
Ming