Ancient China · Scholar

Ji Ci 季次

Jì Cì

Attested BC 500

Passages: 3
Chapters: 1
Histories: 1

Overview

Ji Ci was a scholar.

Life and dates

Attested activity

BC 500 死而已四百餘年
Dated from the passage context · Records of the Grand Historian 124, passages 4, 6

Career and standing

bare rooms and wattle doors 空室蓬戶
Poverty
Directly stated · Records of the Grand Historian 124, passage 5

Assessments and attributes

Assessment solitary gentleman; laughed at by his age · Mode historian-judgment Speaker Sima Qian (司馬遷)
Directly stated · Records of the Grand Historian 124, passage 4

References in the histories

Records of the Grand Historian, Chapter 124Biographies of Knight-errants · 3 passages

及若季次、原憲，閭巷人也，讀書懷獨行君子之德，義不茍合當世，當世亦笑之。 Then there were men like Ji Ci and Yuan Xian — common folk of the lanes and alleys who cherished their books and upheld the solitary virtues of the true gentleman. They refused on principle to bend to the age, and the age laughed at them in return.

故季次、原憲終身空室蓬戶，褐衣疏食不厭。 So Ji Ci and Yuan Xian lived out their days in bare rooms behind wattle doors, clad in rough cloth and eating thin gruel, yet never once complained.

誠使鄉曲之俠，予季次、原憲比權量力，效功於當世，不同日而論矣。 If one were to weigh the local knights against Ji Ci and Yuan Xian in terms of power and achievement, measuring their service to the age — they simply cannot be spoken of in the same breath.