Cujupu 蹴踘譜

Cujupu 蹴踘譜, also written 蹴鞠譜, is a book on kick-ball written by Wang Yuncheng 汪雲程 (c. 1506-c. 1576).

Although the kick-ball game is said to have been invented by the Yellow Emperor (Huang Di 黃帝), it is first mentioned in the history book Zhanguoce 戰國策, which states that the people of the wealthy regional state of Qi 齊 used to play this game. During the Han period 漢 (206 BCE-220 CE), kick-ball was used as a non-war-time form of training and leisure activity for soldiers. The earliest texts on kick-ball are therefore listed among bibliographical entries on military treatises (Bingshu 兵書). The Han-period bibliographer Liu Xin 劉歆 (d. 23 CE), author of the book catalogue Bielu 別錄, also describes the appearance of a playing ground, with staircase and ramp for the imperial onlookers. When the emperor attended the game, teams were composed of members of the Yulin 羽林 palace guard. The poet Li You 李尤 (50-130 CE) wrote a poem (later inscribed) on kick-ball (Jucheng ming 鞠城銘), in which he mentions the many implements used during play or placed nearby. Another early text on kick-ball is He Yan's 何晏 (190-249 CE) rhapsody Jingfudian fu 景福殿賦.

Wang's text is based on earlier descriptions of the ball game, mainly the anonymous Yuan-period book Cuju tupu 蹴鞠圖譜.

Figure 1. Kickball ground and scene

The left drawing shows the kickball ground, with positions of the gate and the players. The right image shows a scene in which three persons train to keep a ball in the air.

The text is found in the series Shuofu 說郛 and Xuanlantang congshu 玄覽堂叢書.