明代天文知識的多重面貌：朝廷史志與日用類書

天文知識在中國歷史的發展過程中，一直扮演著至關重要的角色。對於黎民百姓而言，天文不僅是提供農作時程的藍本，更是日常作息的依歸；對於國家統治者而言，透過觀察星象，更可進一步體察天意、假天意之名發聲，進而穩固其統治根基。歷朝各代的君王多不喜百姓習得天文知識，向來嚴禁人民學習之，明代亦然，朱元璋曾下令禁止天下「私習天文」。儘管朝廷的基本政策如此，但這並不表示天文知識自此就消失於社會之中。但是明代的天文所指涉的範圍究竟為何？卻少有文本清楚界定。因此，本研究將爬梳由明人所編的《元史．天文志》，以釐清明代史書編纂者所謂的天文，究竟是一門怎樣的知識？此外，本研究亦發現明人對「天文」的認識，會因為其所處的社會階級差異而有不同的認知。正因如此，明廷雖不希望百姓知曉天文知識，但民間商業出版品如日用類書天文門的出現，無疑彰顯出天文知識具有一定程度的流動性。儘管標榜四民便覽的日用類書中有天文門的架構，但天文知識對於庶民百姓而言始終不是一門容易親近的知識類型。明代日用類書天文門中所述之天文知識究竟為何？和正史與其他經典之間的關係為何？同樣是本研究的焦點。

關鍵字

明代；天文知識；天文星占；正史；日用類書

並列摘要

The knowledge of astronomy (tianwen 天文) plays a key role in Chinese history. It not only provides daily routine guidelines for people, but also helps the emperors to govern their territories by observing the sky. Throughout the ages, Chinese emperors had prohibited ordinary people privately learning astronomy. The same case happens in Late Imperial China. During the Ming dynasty (1368-1644), Emperor Hongwu 洪武 (r. 1368-1398) enforces the law to ban people from learning astronomy. Despite this legal prohibition, however, astronomical knowledge never disappears in the later periods. It shows how people see astronomy is usually according to their social status. As there seems no historical text that clearly defines the meanings of astronomy during the Ming times, this thesis will therefore be an attempt to do so. On the one hand, it will discuss the official histories such as the ‘Record of Astronomy’ (tianwen zhi 天文志) in the Yuan History. On the other hand, this thesis will also explore the ‘Division of Astronomy’ (tianwen men 天文門) in the commercially published household encyclopedias. Since the astronomical knowledge is not always easy for people to access during the Ming Dynasty, this thesis will hence explore how the astronomical knowledge of the encyclopedias is represented based on other earlier works on astronomy.