Although the eldest son, Sima Biao was disinherited by his father due to his love of leisure and sex, pushing him onto a scholarly career path.
[1] Appointed to minor sinecures, he began to work on literature and history, annotating the Zhuangzi[2]: 302 and the Huainanzi, and writing the Chronicles of the Nine States (九州春秋; Jiuzhou Chunqiu).
He also edited Qiao Zhou's Examination of Ancient History (古史考), altering over two hundred events so they would comply with the Bamboo Annals.
Like most traditional Chinese histories,[4] his book was arranged into annals and biographies, along with eight treatises, and ran to a total length of 80 fascicles.
Of these, all have been lost but the five volumes of treatises, on the topics of the calendar, ceremony, rituals, astronomy, the five phases, geography, bureaucracy, vehicles, and clothing.