Text Typology
Layered Texts

A Layered text is a previous text, of any type, to which an additional portion (not simply an interpolation or two) is added after a time. Further additions may also occur, from time to time. Layered texts differ from Accretional texts (where the extension process is more or less continuous), from Accumulated texts (where the units of addition are more nearly independent), and also from Assembled texts (which are one-time collections of separate and differently named short texts).

Texts whose original portion and later layer or layers both lie within the Warring States period are rare. We have found only two probable examples, plus a possible third. Most seeming Chinese examples consist of a Warring States core and a Chin or Han addendum, and are better called Resumed texts. This "resumption" phenomenon probably reflects the continuing cogency of many Warring States names well into Imperial times, and helps to define the Han attitude toward antiquity in general, and to the previous formative Warring States period in particular.

• Dzwo Jwan. The original work seems to have been a brief ritual commentary on the Chun/Chyou, composed in Lu the early middle 04c. This was extended in the late middle 04c by the addition of much anecdotal and political theory material, and then by bridging episodes no longer coordinated with the CC entries but serving to link the previous material into a history of the period. To that composite work was then further added a certain amount of Chi advocacy material, supporting the hopes of Chi to become the successor to Jou as ruler of a unified empire. This last addition can only have been made in Chi, for presentation to the Chi court. These perhaps four layers are not formally distinguished in the DJ, and have to be discerned by analysis. DJ is one of the few Layered texts whose formation process seems to lie wholly within the Warring States. A Montréal Problem.
• Wu Chi. Recent analysis has shown that the "Wudz ywe" sections of some chapters are the original work, and that the segments in which Lord Wu of Ngwei serves as patron and interlocutor are a later layer, which extended the original four to six chapters. The Wu Chi is thus a second Warring States example of a Layered text. A small amount of framing material, consisting of biographical data about Wu Chi, was added still later, perhaps in Chin. The text underwent further extension in Han, producing a Resumed text). A Montréal Problem.
• Tai Yi Shvng Shwei. If the second part of this composite Gwodyen text (see under Juxtaposed) was written by the compiler, in order to extend the pre-existing first part, then the result should properly be called a Layered text. It would then constitute a third WS example of the type.

Classical Chinese Texts is Copyright © 1993- by E Bruce and A Taeko Brooks

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