清宮對歐洲自然史圖像的再製：以乾隆朝《獸譜》為例

Reproducing Renaissance Naturalist Images and Knowledge at the Qianlong Court: A Study of the 'Album on Beasts'

本文以很少受到關注的乾隆朝《獸譜》為中心，透過檔案檢視其製作過程，證實其與《鳥譜》、《職貢圖》應為同一個大型計畫下的個別子計畫。這三個計畫同步開始於乾隆十五年，同步完成於乾隆二十六年，其編纂與製作時間，不但早於乾隆三十八年才開始的《四庫全書》，且費時十一年，超過《四庫全書》的九年。這是一個以圖像為主，深具野心，意圖在視覺上建構乾隆帝國治下所有人、禽、獸等各種「職方之產」之製作，以提供聖王「對時育物」之資所需要的所有知識與訊息。這個大型計畫最具創新的部份在於，三者皆有意識地與中國傳統相關製作對話，其批評中國傳統博物學「闕疑莫考」、「泥於古」、「無以證今」、「肖形未備」、「格致無徵」等，並強調其製作及內容與現實的緊密關係。本文的研究顯示，來自歐洲的自然史圖像與西洋擬真風格在其追求「徵實」的過程中扮演關鍵性角色。總之，《獸譜》的成立有一全球史的面向，其內涵比起傳統博物學寫作更強調對外的連結與視覺的轉向，然其高度擬真的圖像卻不是簡單地「反應」現實的紀實，而是虛實相參，以擬真實境回應中國傳統統治的種種命題，進而成就乾隆治下的理想「現實」。

This article focuses on a work from the Qing dynasty court entitled ”Album on Beasts” (Shoupu), which has been very little researched up to now. Its production was a subproject of a much larger plan involving two other, better-known projects, ”Album on Birds” (Niaopu) and ”Illustrations of Official Tribute” (Zhigong tu). All three projects were begun in 1750 and completed in 1761. They thus preceded the ”Complete Libraries of the Four Treasuries” (Siku quanshu) project, and while the latter focused on texts, the former was an ambitious attempt to visualize all beings under his majesty's rule, as well as indicating a sage-king bringing prosperity by nurturing things according to their seasons. The most innovative aspect of this major project lay in its deliberate dialog with traditional Chinese productions of a similar nature. By denouncing them as empirically deficient, the Qianlong project represented itself as unprecedentedly realistic, and assigned an important role to naturalist images and styles with three-dimensional rendering learned from Europe. This article concludes that ”Album on Beasts” reveals a new visual turn that attempted to deliver knowledge and connect with the outside world. The relatively high degree of ”realism” of the images actually represents a coherence of both fact and fiction, using a style of realism to endorse traditional Chinese governance as well as the Qianlong Emperor's ideal ”reality” of rule.