The transmission, preservation, and viewing of portraits of local worthies in the Song dynasty
宋代地方前贤画像的传存与观览

摘要

宋代地方人物画像中，一部分原为官员在任或秩满将去之际应当地士民之请而作的写真。人物离任以后，画像长期留存于寺观、官廨等处，遂由一时“留真”逐渐成为后来者所见的前贤旧像。画像的“传远”并不有赖原作始终完好无损；旧像损敝或亡佚以后，后人还可访求公私旧藏，据以补绘、重摹或迁藏，使前此所传之像得以接续。年代既久，宋人亦关注旧像能否得其“容貌之真”，访求旧本因而不仅为补其亡佚，也在使重新摹写有所依据。寺观为画像提供长期安置之所，官廨则常将历任守臣相次列陈，使异时之人得以同堂并见，历任旧像遂成为后来官员观法自警之资。画像记、写真赞及地方志等文字，还保存了画像绘制、迁藏、重摹以及瞻观、奠拜等情形，使大量今已亡佚的地方前贤画像仍可考见其传存与观览之迹。

Abstract

Among the portraits of local figures produced during the Song dynasty, some were originally painted from life at the request of local elites and residents when an official was still in office or was about to depart upon completing his term. After the sitter left office, such portraits were often preserved for long periods in Buddhist or Daoist temples, government offices, and other sites, gradually transforming from contemporary “preserved likenesses” into older portraits of former worthies viewed by later generations. The long-term transmission of these images did not depend on the survival of the original paintings in an intact state. When older portraits became damaged or were lost, later generations could search for earlier versions in public or private collections and use them as the basis for replacement paintings, new copies, or relocation, thereby sustaining the transmission of images inherited from the past. As the temporal distance from the sitter increased, Song observers also became concerned with whether an old portrait truly captured the sitter’s appearance. The search for earlier exemplars thus served not only to replace lost images but also to provide a reliable basis for subsequent copying. Buddhist and Daoist temples offered stable sites for the long-term preservation of portraits, while government offices often displayed portraits of successive local administrators in sequence, bringing figures from different periods together within the same hall. Such collections of portraits consequently served later officials as models for emulation and as means of self-admonition. Written sources—including records commemorating portraits, encomia on painted likenesses, and local gazetteers—also preserve information about the production, relocation, and recopying of portraits, as well as practices of viewing them and presenting offerings before them. These texts make it possible to reconstruct the histories of transmission, preservation, and viewing of numerous portraits of local worthies that are no longer extant.