Jia Sixie: Farming and the Qimin Yaoshu

Publicado por Anthony
el noviembre 11, 2026

Learn how Jia Sixie compiled the Qimin Yaoshu and what its advice on soil, seed, livestock, and food reveals about farming in northern China.

Quick Answer: Who Was Jia Sixie?

Jia Sixie (贾思勰, Jiǎ Sīxié) was a farmer, estate owner and former official of the Northern Wei (北魏, Běi Wèi). He compiled the Qimin Yaoshu (齐民要术, Qímín Yàoshù), a sixth-century account of agriculture and household production.^[1]

Period: Historian Francesca Bray dates its completion to somewhere between 533 and 544.^[1]
Contents: It covers crops, fruit trees, livestock, fish and food processing.^[5]
Method: Jia says he used earlier writings and consulted experienced people.^[2]

The book is one of the main sources for northern farming in early Chinese agricultural history.^[6]

Four stations trace the Qimin Yaoshu from field observation and soil care to household food processing.

A grower reading Jia’s manual might have to decide whether to plow after rain or wait for the ground to dry. Later in the book, the decisions move indoors to storage and food preparation. The chapters follow work that continued long after the crop came in.

How Jia Sixie Collected Farming Knowledge

The title line transmitted with the book names Jia as administrator of Gaoyang (高阳, Gāoyáng). It identifies a post he held, while the exact dates of his life are uncertain.^[3]

In his preface Jia describes gathering material from written sources and songs, questioning experienced people, and checking procedures against practice.^[2]

Some earlier farming works survive only in extracts, including Fan Shengzhi’s Book (氾胜之书, Fán Shèngzhī Shū) from the Han dynasty. Jia incorporated such earlier knowledge and recorded practices that developed later in northern dryland farming.^[6]

What the Qimin Yaoshu Teaches About Soil and Seed

The plowing chapter tells the reader to pay attention to how wet or dry the ground is. It warns that plowing wet ground can leave hard clods. Large clods would leave a poor bed for seedlings. The next chapter treats the collection of seed as a task in its own right, before the book turns to sowing grain.^[3]

For several grains, Jia recommended selecting good ears of uniform color, hanging them up, and sowing that seed separately in spring. The resulting crop would be harvested and stored apart to provide seed for the following year. Keeping it separate helped reduce mixing with other varieties.^[8]

His millet descriptions also distinguish varieties by how they perform. Some ripen early and tolerate dry conditions. Others withstand wind or are better suited to wet ground.^[8]

The book also records green manuring. It ranks mung beans first and also names small red beans and sesame. Instead of harvesting these plants, the grower plows them under in the seventh or eighth month to prepare the field for spring grain.^[3][4]

Why an Agricultural Book Includes the Kitchen

The volumes on animals cover sheep, pigs, chickens, ducks and fish. The chapter on sheep also includes dairy products. Later chapters turn to vinegar, vegetable preserves and douchi (豆豉, dòuchǐ), a fermented soybean seasoning used in Chinese cooking.^[5]

These subjects make the book a source for daily life in early China. The dairy and seasoning chapters sit in the same work as plowing and seed selection. For Jia, preparing and keeping food belonged alongside growing it.