Ban Gu (班) | 24 Histories

Overview

The translated histories identify Ban Gu as a historian, military officer, official, and poet. This record brings together 15 passages from 14 chapters across 7 histories, with names, dates, relationships, offices, and events preserved as source-backed claims.

Names

Type	English	Chinese	Pinyin
Personal	Ban Gu	班	Ban Gu
Surname	Ban	班	Bān
Surname	Ban	班	Ban
Surname	Ban	班
Personal	Ban Gu	班	Ban
Personal name	Ban Gu	班	Bān Gù
Personal name	Ban Gu	固
Personal name	Ban Gu	班固	Ban Gu
Personal	Ban Gu	班固	Ban Gu
Personal	Ban Gu	固	Gù
Personal	Ban Gu	班固	Bān Gù
Personal	Ban Gu	固
Personal	Ban Gu	班固
Personal name	Gu	固
Given name	Gu	固	Gu
Given		固	Gu
Alternate		班

Identity

Historicity: Historical
Identification: Named
Sex: Male

Sex: male
Strongly inferred · houhanshu:031:s0083, nanqishu:048:s0018, weishu:111:s0007, yuanshi:066:s0018
Sex: male
Explicit · houhanshu:089:s0190, houhanshu:125:s0010, liangshu:043:s0017, liaoshi:104:s0091, liaoshi:110:s0003, liaoshi:116:s0001
Value: male
Strongly inferred · hanshu:022:s0025

Roles

Historian
Military Officer
Official
Poet
Scholar
Writer

Life and dates

Attested activity

Source Date: Text: AD 32-92 · Western Interval: Start: AD 32 · End: AD 92
Explicit event contextual date · nanqishu:048:s0018
Source Date: Text: Ban Gu, author of the table · Western Interval: Start: AD 32 · End: AD 92
Strongly inferred · houhanshu:125:s0010
Source Date: Text: 元和中 · Western Interval: Start: AD 84 · End: AD 87
Explicit event contextual date · houhanshu:031:s0083
Source Date: Text: 建初中校书 · Western Interval: Start: AD 76 · End: AD 84
Explicit · houhanshu:089:s0190
Source Date: Text: 永元 Dou Xian staff · Western Year: AD 89
Explicit · houhanshu:089:s0195
Source Date: Text: 漢史記傳時代 · Western Year: AD 80
Strongly inferred · liaoshi:110:s0003
Source Date: Text: 班作古今人表 · Western Interval: Start: c. AD 60 · End: AD 92
Explicit event contextual date · hanshu:022:s0019, hanshu:022:s0025
Source Date: Text: 班史 · Western Year: AD 80
Explicit · weishu:111:s0007
Source Date: Text: 班固 · Western Interval: Start: AD 32 · End: AD 92
Strongly inferred · liaoshi:104:s0091
Source Date: Text: 班固之世 · Western Interval: Start: AD 32 · End: AD 92
Explicit · liangshu:043:s0095
Source Date: Text: 班固時代 · Western Year: AD 80
Strongly inferred · liaoshi:116:s0001
Source Date: Text: 班固有曰 · Western Year: c. AD 92
Explicit · yuanshi:191:s0002
Source Date: Text: 班固記溝洫 · Western Year: AD 80
Strongly inferred · yuanshi:066:s0018
Source Date: Text: 竇氏之難 · Western Year: AD 92
Explicit event contextual date · hanshu:022:s0025

Career and standing

Label: Central Protector / 中护军 · Action: held
Explicit · houhanshu:089:s0195

Works and attributed material

Work: Table of Prominent People Ancient and Modern / 古今人表 · Relation: author
Explicit · hanshu:022:s0019, hanshu:022:s0025
班史
Explicit · hanshu:020:s0020
Title: Rhapsody on Communicating with the Hidden / 幽通之賦
Explicit · hanshu:117:s0158
Work: Table of Officials and Nobles / 百官公卿表
Explicit · houhanshu:125:s0010
Work: Ban Gu's History / Hanshu / 班史 · Relation: author
Strongly inferred · weishu:111:s0007
Work: Ban's history (Hanshu) / 班史 · Relation: author
Explicit · hanshu:022:s0028
Work: biographies of flatterers and harsh officials / 佞幸、酷吏傳 · Relation: author
Explicit · liaoshi:110:s0003
Work: historical writings / 史 · Relation: author
Explicit · liaoshi:116:s0001
Work: statement on early Han governance · Relation: author
Explicit · yuanshi:191:s0002
Work: Table of Officials and Nobles / 百官公卿表 · Relation: author
Explicit · houhanshu:125:s0010
Work: treatise on irrigation ditches / 溝洫 · Relation: author
Explicit · yuanshi:066:s0018
Work: The Way of the Zither / 琴道 · Relation: editor
Explicit · houhanshu:031:s0083
Kind: historical-judgment · Role: author · Provenance: Mode: quotation · Speaker Person Id: Ban Gu (班)
Explicit · yuanshi:191:s0002, yuanshi:191:s0003
Kind: narrative · Role: author · Provenance: Mode: historian-judgment · Speaker Person Id: Ban Gu (班)
Explicit · hanshu:022:s0003, hanshu:022:s0004, hanshu:022:s0019

Events and relationships

Kind: political · Role: victim · Action: caught-in-Dou-clan-calamity · Outcome: project left unfinished · Date Context: Source Date: Text: 竇氏之難 · Western Year: AD 92
Explicit · hanshu:022:s0025
Kind: scholarly · Role: author · Action: compiled-nine-rank-table · Outcome: arranged nine-grade sequence of ancient and later figures
Explicit · hanshu:022:s0019
Kind: calamity · Role: victim · Action: suffered calamity · Provenance: Mode: quotation · Speaker Person Id: Yelu Mengjian (耶律孟簡)
Explicit · liaoshi:104:s0091
Type: child-of · Person Id: Ban Biao (班彪)
Explicit · hanshu:117:s0158
Relation: colleague-of · Person Id: Fu Yi (傅毅)
Explicit · houhanshu:089:s0190, houhanshu:089:s0195

Assessments and attributes

Assessment: ranged alone across millennia surveying the masters; undertaking unfinished because of the Dou-clan disaster · Provenance: Mode: commentator-judgment · Speaker Person Id: Zhang Yan (張晏)
Explicit · hanshu:022:s0025
Assessment: somewhat orderly account focused on Emperor Wu's era and incomplete on office duties · Provenance: Mode: historian-judgment
Explicit · houhanshu:125:s0010, houhanshu:125:s0011

References in the histories

Open any source group to read the Chinese and English passage in context.

Book of Han, Chapter 20Table of Ancient and Modern Persons · 1 passage

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師古曰：「六家之論，輕重不同；百行所存，趣拾難壹。張氏輒申所見，掎摭班史，然其所論，又自差錯。且年代乆遠，墳典隟亡，學者舛駮，師論分異，是以表載古人名氏，或與諸書不同。今則特有發明，用暢厥旨。自女媧以下，帝鴻以前，諸子傳記，互有舛駮，敘說不同，無所取正，大要知其古帝之號而已。諸人士見於史傳，彰灼可知者，無待解釋，其間幽昧者，時復及焉。」 Yan Shigu said, "The six schools' doctrines differ in what they value; the conduct preserved across the hundred practices is hard to gather into one standard. Master Zhang then set forth his own views, picking at Ban Gu's history—yet his arguments are themselves mistaken. Moreover, the ages are distant, canonical texts have gaps and losses, scholars contradict one another, and teachers' explanations diverge; for this reason the names recorded in the table may differ from other books. Here I add explanations of my own to make the meaning clear. From Nüwa down to before Emperor Hong, the various masters' records conflict and their accounts differ, with no way to decide which is right; in general one need only know the designations of the ancient emperors. Persons who appear in historical records and are plainly identifiable need no commentary; where matters are obscure, I sometimes explain them."

Book of Han, Chapter 22Volume 20: Prominent People from the Past Until the Present · 1 passage

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張氏輒申所見，掎摭班史，然其所論，又自差錯。 Zhang simply advanced his own opinions and faulted Ban Gu's history, but his own arguments were themselves inconsistent.

Book of Han, Chapter 117Volume 100a: Afterword and Family History 1 · 1 passage

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有子曰固，弱冠而孤，作幽通之賦，以致命遂志。 His son Ban Gu, orphaned at twenty, wrote the Rhapsody on Communicating with the Hidden to set his life on record.

Book of Later Han, Chapter 31Volume 28a: Biographies of Huan Tan; Feng Yan · 1 passage

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《琴道》一篇未成，肅宗使班固續成之。 The essay The Way of the Zither was unfinished; Emperor Zhang told Ban Gu to complete it.

Book of Later Han, Chapter 89Volume 80a: Biographies of Writers 1 · 2 passages

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建初中，肃宗博召文学之士，以毅为兰台令史，拜郎中，与班固、贾逵共典校书。 Midway through Jianchu, Emperor Zhang called literati widely—named Fu Yi to the Orchid Terrace, made him a gentleman, and paired him with Ban Gu and Jia Kui to collate the canon.

及宪迁大将军，复以毅为司马，班固为中护军。 When Dou rose to Grand General, Fu Yi returned as army major while Ban Gu guarded headquarters.

Book of Later Han, Chapter 125Volume 114: Officials Part One · 1 passage

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唯班固著《百官公卿表》，记汉承秦置官本末，讫于王莽，差有条贯； Only Ban Gu's Table of Officials and Nobles traced how Han took over Qin offices from start to finish, down to Wang Mang, with something like a clear thread;

Book of Liang, Chapter 43Volume 43: Wei Can; Jiang Ziyi; Jiang Zisi; Jiang Ziwu; Zhang Sheng; Shen Jun; Liu Jingli · 1 passage

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子一續《黃圖》及班固「九品」，並辭賦文筆數十篇，行於世。 Ziyi continued the Yellow Chart and Ban Gu's "Nine Ranks," and several tens of rhapsodies and prose pieces, which circulated in the world.

History of Liao, Chapter 104Volume 104 Biographies 34: Literature 2 · 1 passage

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故左氏、司馬遷、班固、范曄俱罹殃禍，可不慎歟！」 Therefore Zuo Qiuming, Sima Qian, Ban Gu, and Fan Ye all suffered calamity—is caution not required!"

History of Liao, Chapter 110Volume 110 Biographies 40: Treacherous Ministers 1 · 1 passage

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故遷、固傳佞幸、酷吏，歐陽修則並奸臣錄之，將俾為君者知所鑒，為臣者知所戒。 That is why Sima Qian and Ban Gu devoted biographies to flatterers and harsh officials, and why Ouyang Xiu added treacherous ministers as well—so that rulers would know what to heed and ministers what to fear.

History of Liao, Chapter 116Volume 116: Explanation of State Language · 1 passage

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史自遷、固，以迄晉、唐，其為書雄深浩博，讀者未能盡曉。 From Sima Qian and Ban Gu through the Jin and Tang dynasties, the histories they wrote are vast and profound — so much so that readers cannot fully grasp them on their own.

Book of Southern Qi, Chapter 48Volume 48 Biographies 29: Yuan Tuan, Kong Zhigui, Liu Hui · 1 passage

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今栖遁之士，排斥皇王，陵轢將相，此偏介之行，不可長風移俗，故遷書未傳，班史莫編。 The recluses of today reject the throne and trample on generals and ministers—such eccentric conduct cannot be held up to reshape custom, which is why Sima Qian's history did not pass their lives down and Ban Gu's did not compile them.

Book of Wei, Chapter 111Volume 105a Treatise 1: Celestial Phenomena 1 · 1 passage

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班史以日暈五星之屬列天文志，薄蝕彗孛之比入五行說。 Ban Gu's History put solar halos and the five planets in the Astronomical Treatise, but eclipses, comets, and similar phenomena in the discourse on the Five Phases.

History of Yuan, Chapter 66Volume 66 Treatises 19: Rivers and Canals 3 · 1 passage

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玄既為河平之碑，又自以為司馬遷、班固記河渠溝洫，僅載治水之道，不言其方，使後世任斯事者無所考則，乃從魯訪問方略，及詢過客，質吏牘，作《至正河防記》，欲使來世罹河患者按而求之。 After composing the pacification stele, Ouyang Xuan reflected that Sima Qian and Ban Gu, in their treatises on rivers and canals, recorded only general principles of water control, not the practical methods—leaving later engineers nothing concrete to follow. He therefore interviewed Jia Lu about his methods, questioned travelers who had witnessed the work, checked official records, and wrote the Record of Zhizheng River Control so that future generations facing river disasters might find actionable guidance within it.

History of Yuan, Chapter 191Volume 191 Biographies 78: Virtuous Officials 1 · 1 passage

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班固有曰：「漢興，與民休息，凡事簡易，禁罔疏闊，以寬厚清靜為天下先，故文、景以後，循吏輩出。」 Ban Gu once wrote: "At the founding of the Han, the dynasty let the people recover from war; government was kept simple, legal restraints were broad and sparse, and the realm was led by clemency and restraint. After Emperors Wen and Jing, capable and honest administrators appeared in succession."