山西 Shan-hsi) and served as an official of both the Eastern Jin and Liu-Song Dynasties. In the fifth century, almost a century after the Chen Shou’s death, the work was further annotated by Pei Songzhi (裴松之), who was born in present day Yuncheng, Shanxi (運城 Yùnchéng. The use of the term “lord” for the rulers of Shu also demonstrates Chen Shou’s loyalty to his native land. This was done to uphold the legitimacy of the court of Jin as inheritor of the Mandate of Heaven (天命, Tiānmìng) from Wei. The Book of Wei used the title “emperor” for the rulers of Wei, “lord” for the rulers of Shu, and personal names or the title “ruler of Wu” for the rulers of Wu. The book used the date of the fall of Han Dynasty (漢朝 Hàn Cháo 206 B.C.E.–220 C.E.) in 220 as the starting point for the state of Wei. Since the state of Shu lacked a written history of its own, he wrote it from his memory. Chen Shou began his work using two earlier histories of the states of Wei (曹魏 Cáo Wèi ) and Wu. After the fall of Eastern Wu (東吳 Dōng Wú) in 280, his work won the acclaim of senior minister and poet Zhang Hua (張華, 232-300, courtesy name Maoxian, 茂先). After the fall of Shu in 263, he became the Gentleman of Works, and was assigned to create a history of the Three Kingdoms. The original author was Chen Shou (陳壽), who was born in present day Nanchong (南充), Sichuan ( 四川), in Kingdom of Shu (蜀漢, Shǔ Hàn). The amount of space devoted to a biography is determined by the importance of the subject. Each volume is organized in the form of one or more biographies. The Book of Wei contains 30 volumes, the Book of Shu contains 15 volumes, and the Book of Wu contains 20 volumes. It contains 65 volumes and about 360,000 words which are broken into three books. Together with the Records of the Grand Historian (史記 Shǐjì), Book of Han (漢書 Hànshū), and Book of Later Han (後漢書 hòuhànshū), the book is part of the early four historiographies of the Twenty-Four Histories ( 二十四史) canon. It is included among the Four Great Novels of Chinese literature. Records of Three Kingdoms became the basis for a later historical novel, Romance of the Three Kingdoms ( 三國演義 Sānguó Yǎnyì), written in the fourteenth century by Luo Guanzhong, which incorporated material from oral legends, Tang poetry, and Yuan opera.
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