Quanzhen at Zhongnan (Daoist temple) in 1200, Jin empire

The tomb-hermitage of Wang Zhe (Wang Chongyang), the founder of the Quanzhen order, who died at Daliang (Kaifeng) on 22 January 1170 on his way east.

His four disciples carried the coffin back to his old hut at Liujiang village on the Zhongnan hills (in Hu county), buried him there and stayed together three years; the place was revered as the Ancestral Hut (Zu'an) and is now Chongyang Palace (Wikipedia, Wang Chongyang). The order grew in Shandong and Hebei under the Seven Perfected; from memory (not in the English pages we read) their deaths fall in Sun Bu'er 1182, Ma Yu 1183, Tan Chuduan 1185, Liu Chuxuan 1203, Hao Datong 1212, Wang Chuyi 1217 and Qiu Chuji 1227, so all but the first three are alive in 1200. From memory Qiu Chuji lived at Panxi and Longmen in Shaanxi until he went east in 1191, and the court summoned Wang Chuyi and Qiu Chuji in 1187-1188.

The Jin court has issued edicts against the order (1190 and again in the middle 1190s: dates differ in accounts, not verified); enforcement has been weak. A Jin plaque name Lingxu guan for the hermitage is recalled from memory with low confidence.

Who holds it

Title: Superior of the Zhongnan hermitage (Chongyang Gong); name not known
Since: not pinned
Confidence: low

No source consulted dates the office-holder for the winter of 1199-1200.

Overlord

The Jin court, through the prefect and the Bureau of Rites; the house is registered and taxed like other Chinese religious houses

What it holds

The Chongyang tomb-hermitage at Liujiang
Hermitages on Zhongnan mountain

How it was acquired

Over many centuries; the dates of the present endowments are not known.

Allies and rivals

Patron: the Jin court and the local officials; no quarrel is known.

How things stand that morning

Standing and visited as the founder's grave. The court's edicts against the order are on the books; whether they bite in Shaanxi in 1200 is not pinned. Superior's name not known.

Wealth

Temple estates, tenants and alms in the usual pattern; no figures given by any source we could read.

Military

None; a religious house with no armed monks known.

Threats

A court ban enforced by local prefects; the order lives by gifts of land and halls.

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1203Liu Chuxuan, one of the Seven Perfected, dies (from memory).Depends on: natural death Stopped by: nothing short of a change in his circumstances

Places of note

Liujiang: Wang Zhe's tomb and hermitage in Hu county

Where the sources disagree

The regional brief gives "the Jin court's ban of 1195 or so". Our reading is that there were edicts in 1190 and again in the middle 1190s; we could not verify the dates or whether they held.

Evidence: Wang Zhe's death (22 January 1170 at Daliang), the burial at Liujiang and the three years of mourning are in the English Wikipedia page on Wang Chongyang. The Seven Perfected's death dates, the Jin summons and edicts and the plaque name are from memory and not verified; the Quanzhen School page we read gives none of them.

On the map: The drawing is approximate; no estate boundaries are known.

Primary sources for Jin empire

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

Annals of the Western Xia, Wu Guangcheng (吳廣成) (1825 to 1827, compiled from Song, Liao, Jin and Yuan sources). A Qing scholar's year-by-year reconstruction of Tangut history from the Chinese histories, since the Xia left no surviving annals of their own in Chinese. Read online
Continuation of the Comprehensive Mirror for Aid in Government, Bi Yuan (畢沅), completed by Feng Jiwu after his death (late eighteenth century, finished after 1801, from Song and Yuan sources). A Qing scholar's continuous month-by-month chronicle of the Song and Yuan centuries, compiled from the Song shi, the Liao, Jin and Yuan histories, Li Tao, Li Xinchuan and other Song sources. Read online
Essentials of the History of Goryeo, Kim Jong-seo (金宗瑞) and the Joseon history office (1452). The chronological companion to the Goryeosa, finished a year after it and drawing on the same lost records, sometimes with entries the Goryeosa omits. Read online
Outline and Details of Two Reigns (thirteenth century, after 1224). A Song outline-and-detail chronicle of exactly the two reigns around 1200, drawn from the court's daily records. Read online
Record of the Personal Campaigns of the Holy Warrior (Chinggis Khan) (presented to Khubilai in 1288, finished in Mongolian in 1290; the surviving Chinese version dates from 1369). A year-by-year Chinese account of Temujin's wars, drawn from the lost Altan Debter (the same source behind the Yuan shi's first chapter and Rashid al-Din). Read online
The Secret History of the Mongols (1228 or 1240 (the colophon's Year of the Rat is disputed), with later additions; the surviving Chinese transcription and gloss were made under the Ming in the 1380s). The only Mongol account of Temujin's rise, written within living memory. Read online
History of the Jin, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office, with Ouyang Xuan among the chief compilers (1343 to 1344, from the Jin veritable records and the Jin national history). The official history of the Jurchen empire that ruled north China and Manchuria in 1200. Read online
Record of the Great Jin State, Attributed to Yuwen Maozhao (宇文懋昭); the attribution is doubtful (preface dated 1234; probably assembled in the Southern Song from Song and Jin material, with later accretions). A Song-side history of the Jin, with annals for each emperor and chapters on institutions, customs, the capitals and the Jurchen way of life. Read online

14 more in the sources library for North China and Manchuria.

Sources and studies

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.