Chou Collection, Upper Volume
Radical: Enclosure (wéi)
Character: 園
Kangxi strokes: 13
Page 217, Entry 03
Pronounced yuan
Shuowen Jiezi (Explaining Single-component Characters and Analyzing Compound-component Characters): That in which fruit trees are planted.
Chuxueji (Records for Early Learning): A place with a fence is called a garden.
Book of Changes (Yijing), Ben Hexagram: Adorned in the hilly garden, with bundles of silk, small and fine.
Book of Odes (Shijing), Zheng Feng: O Zhongzi, do not climb over my garden. Commentary: A garden is the fence of a vegetable plot, within which trees may be planted.
Rites of Zhou (Zhouli), Earth Official, Zhaishi: Use threshing floors and vegetable plots to tax garden lands. Commentary: A vegetable plot is where fruits and gourds are planted. In the late autumn, a threshing floor is made within it. A fenced vegetable plot is called a garden; to tax it means to take a portion from this.
Also: For garden dwellings, the tax is one in twenty. Commentary: Dwellings produce no grain, and gardens provide little profit, hence the tax is only one in twenty.
Also: The mausoleums of successive emperors are called gardens. Under the Han dynasty system, garden mausoleums had magistrates; Emperor Wen's mausoleum was the Wen Garden.
Biography of Sima Xiangru: Served as the Magistrate of Wen Garden.
Book of Tang (Tangshu), Biography of Li Sheng: I have already purified the palace precincts and respectfully visited the burial gardens.
Also: Taoyuan, a place name.
Book of Han (Hanshu), Treatise on Geography: Quanjiu Village; its west is named Taoyuan, which is the ancient Taolin.
Pan Yue, Xizheng Fu (Rhapsody on the Western Expedition): Asking about the old forest where the oxen rested, feeling moved by the name at Taoyuan.
Also: Jiyuan (Jetavana). Buddhist scriptures: Elder Sudatta built a monastery and invited the Buddha to dwell there, totaling 1,200 sections, which were called the Jeta Grove and Garden.
Also: Dongyuangong (Master of the Eastern Garden), one of the Four Elders of Mount Shang. Note: The historical records have lost his name and surname; the Zihui (Collection of Characters) takes Yuangong as a surname, which is incorrect.
Also: Rhyming with yun, pronounced yun.
Su Shi, Eulogy for Han Qi: With broad intentions and sparse talent, I shall return to the hills and gardens. You governed this state, and even in death, you are fed by its people.
Textual Corrections:
Rites of Zhou (Zhouli), Earth Official, Chongren: Use threshing floors and vegetable plots to tax garden lands. According to the original text, Chongren should be corrected to Zhaishi.
Buddhist scriptures: Elder Sudatta built a monastery and invited the Buddha to dwell there, totaling 1,200 sections. According to the meaning of the text, ten should be corrected to thousand.