The Qin and Han Dynasties:the Growth of Feudal Society

Contents

The Qin,China’s First Feudal Dynasty
Peasant Uprisings in the Late Qin Dynasty
Establishment and Consolidation of the Western Han Dynasty
Golden Age of the Western Han Dynasty
Decline of the Western Han Dynasty; Uprisings of the Green Woodsmen and Red Eyebrows
The Establishment of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the Prolonged Turbulence, and the Yellow Turban Uprsing
The Development of Social Productive Forces
The Growth of Feudal Relations

The Qin,China’s First Feudal Dynasty

Feudal society reached maturity in the Qin and Han dynasties. The Qin Dynasty, the first feudal empire in China , unified the country on a scale unknown in China since the Shang and Zhou dynasties and estab-fished a form of government which had a lasting influence on Chinese feudalism. Among the accomplishments of the Qin Dynasty was the construction of the Great Wall. In power only 15 years (c. 221-207 B.C.) through the reigns of two emperors, the Qin Dynasty gave way to four years of ChuHan conflict before the Han Dynasty was established which lasted over 400 years.

Historians divide the Han Dynasty into Western Han (c. 202 B.C.-A.D. 5) which continued through 11 emperors and an empress regent belonging to ten generations and Eastern Han (c. 25-220) which was ruled by 14 emperors through eight generations. There was a short interval of 18 years between the Western and Eastern Han when Wang Mang, then Liu Xuan ruled. Starting in 196, as the Three Kingdoms Wei, Shu and Wu began to evolve, the Han Dynasty existed in name only.

The Qin in 221 B.C. conquered its six rival states (Han, Zhao, Wei, Chu , Yan and Qi) at the end of the Warring States Period, a period in which all seven states contributed to a trend of regional unifica-tion. In fact, the Qin was able to prevail not only through war but, more significantly, through this existing unity and its own developed productive forces and political organization. The Qin then further expanded along the lands of the middle and lower Huanghe and Changjiang rivers, as well as the Zhujiang River .

Given the scope of the Qin domain, King Ying Zheng of Qin decided to give himself a more distinguished title, the First Emperor (Shi Huang Di), and decreed that his successors be titled the Second Em-peror, the Third Emperor, and so on. He hoped that the Qin empire would be passed on in this way forever through his descendants. He also devised some exclusive terminology for the emperor’s use only in issuing edicts and in addressing himself.

The First Emperor (Qin Shi Huang, as he is generally known) set up a complete autocratic system of state administration extending from the central court to the local levels. In the imperial court, the cheng xiang (prime minister) assisted the emperor in governing the country, the tai wei (marshal) took charge of military affairs, and the yu shi (censor) supervised officials of all ranks. The whole empire was divided into 36 prefectures (later increased to more than 40), each of which comprised a number of counties. These prefectures and counti-es had officials who were counterparts of the prime minister, marshal and censor at the central level. Under the counties, township officials administered education, justice and taxation, and public security. And under the townships, households, consisting of individual families in which men farmed and women wo;ee at home, were organized in groups of five or ten.

This administrative set-up was like a pyramid. Perched on top, the imperial court extended its control right down to the grass-roots units of the household groups which supplied labour, grains and draftees. The First Emperor understood the basic importance of the indi-vidual families to the feudal empire. “Men are satisfied with farming their land and women are engaged at home” was a phrase he coined to describe the foundation of Qin rule.

Given the scope of the Qin domain, King Ying Zheng of Qin de-cided to give himself a more distinguished title, the First Emperor (Shi Huang Di), and decreed that his successors be titled the Second Em-peror, the Third Emperor, and so on. He hoped that the Qin empire would be passed on in this way forever through his descendants. He also devised some exclusive terminology for the emperor’s use only in issuing edicts and in addressing himself.

The First Emperor (Qin Shi Huang, as he is generally known) set up a complete autocratic system of state administration extending from the central court to the local levels. In the imperial court, the cheng xiang (prime minister) assisted the emperor in governing the country, the tai wei (marshal) took charge of military affairs, and the yu shi (censor) supervised officials of all ranks. The whole empire was divided into 36 prefectures (later increased to more than 40), each of which comprised a number of counties. These prefectures and counti-es had officials who were counterparts of the prime minister, marshal and censor at the central level. Under the counties, township officials administered education, justice and taxation, and public security. And under the townships, households, which men farmed and women consisting of individual families in wove at home, were organized in groups of five or ten.

This administrative set-up was like a pyramid. Perched on top, the imperial court extended its control right down to the grass-roots units of the household groups which supplied labour, grains and draft-ees. The First Emperor understood the basic importance of the individual families to the feudal empire. “Men are satisfied with farming their land and women are engaged at home” was a phrase he coined to describe the foundation of Qin rule.

The prefecture-county system instituted by the First Emperor had gradually evolved in the Spring and Autumn and Warring States peri-ods. This system was different from the feudal fiefdoms in the West-em Zhou Dynasty in that, in the first place, the throne and offices held by the nobles in the fiefdoms were hereditary while officials under the prefecture-county system were appointed and dismissed by the impe-rial court; secondly, the prefectures and counties had to accept orders from the central government which was not necessarily so with the hereditary fiefdoms. Devised to meet the requirements of feudal autocracy, the Qin system was to have a lasting influence on government in China ‘s feudal society. However, records give no details on the extent to which the prefecture-county system was actually carried out during the reign of the First Emperor. For instance, the state of Wei, born in the beginning of the Western Zhou period, disappeared as a state as late as 12 years after the introduction of the Qin government system. This indicates that the First Emperor’s new system could not have prevailed in the whole country within a short time.

To rule more effectively, the First Emperor ordered that the written language and weights and measures be standardized. The first step was aimed at simplifying communication in official documents, and the second at making easier the collection of grain, silk and other ma-terials as tax in kind and tribute, and metrological calculations for construction projects. These standards all proved helpful for cultural, production and trade development.

The First Emperor also ordered large-scale road and canal build-ing. Two broad highways with pines planted on both sides, called”imperial chariot roads”, were constructed with Xianyang, the capital, as centre, one stretching eastwards through present-day Hebei and Shandong provinces to the seacoast, and the other southwards to modern Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces. Roads were also built between Hunan , Jiangxi , Guangdong and Guangxi, and in the remote provinces of Yunnan and Guizhou . The First Emperor ordered his general, Meng Tian, to build another road leading from Xianyang through Yunyang (north of today’s Chunhua County in Shaanxi Province ) and Shangjun (in north Shaanxi ) to Jiuyuan (northwest of present-day Baotou in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region). Besides roads, the First Emperor also built the Lingqu Canal , dug in the northeast part of modern Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region to connect the Lijiang and Xiangjiang rivers and serve as a passage between the Changjiang and Zhujiang river systems. Although inspired by the military and political needs of the First Emperor, the opening up of land and water routes developed a transport network which fur-there’d communications throughout the country.

The first Emperor took various measures to suppress or forestall anti-Qin activities. He collected and destroyed weapons from the van-quished states. Fortifications that might be of military use, and even some city walls, were demolished. He had 120,000 rich families from all over the country moved to the imperial capital, weakening the old local powers and strengthening the court’s command over them. Primarily as a show of strength, he often toured the empire, mostly to the territories of the former states of Qi and Chu .

At a court banquet in 213 B.C., some scholars spoke in favour of the fief system. Li Si, the Prime Minister, held that any dissension over the emperor’s decrees could hurt the authority of the sovereign. So he proposed that all historical records in the imperial archives ex-cept those written by Qin historians be burned; that the Book of Odes, the Book of History and works by scholars of different schools be handed in to the local authorities for bttrning; that anyone discussing these two particular books be executed; that those using ancient examples to satirize contemporary politics be put to death and their fa-milies killed; and that those who had not burned the listed books within 30 days of the decree be sentenced to four years’ imprisonment. The First Emperor accepted all these proposals to exercise autocratic control over thinking and culture. But critics of the imperial regime were not silenced. In the second year of the burning of books, the First Emperor heard of people criticizing him. Regarding this as slander, he ordered an investigation and finally had more than 460 implicated scholars buried alive.

During the Warring States Period, a powerful nomadic people called the Xiongnu (the Huns) lived north of the states of Qin, Zhao and Yan. To keep out these nomads who often clashed with them, the three states built wall fortifications along their northem frontiers. The First Emperor had these defence works linked together to form the Great Wall extending from Lintao (present-day Minxian County, Gansu Province) in the west to the Liaodong Peninsula in the east. Although this engineering feat did not check the southward invasions of the Xiongnu, it stands as a monument to the knowledge and creative powers of the labouring people in ancient China .

Li Si, the First Emperor’s trusted Prime Minister, came from Shangcai (in present-day Henan Province ) of the state of Chu . As a Legalist, he was responsible for many of the policies under the feudal dynasty of Qin.

Peasant Uprisings in the Late Qin Dynasty

The First Emperor played a progressive role in establishing the unified Qin Dynasty, promoting the growth of social productive forces and developing production. On the other hand, he became increasingly tyrannical. Peasants were forced to fight expeditionary wars, guard frontiers, transport provisions for the army and build the Great Wall The emperor ordered a string of palaces to be built. For the construc- tion of the Epang (Efang) Palace alone, some 700,000 peasants were conscripted, and the same number laboured to build the First Emperor’s mausoleum. Many peasants died working on these projects. Moreover, they never knew when they might be punished at any moment on any pretext under the harsh laws of the Qin Dynasty.

Though progressive in nature compared with slave society, feudal society is a prison for labouring people, especially when a despotic ruler is on the throne. Even though the First Emperor of the Qin was aware of the importance of the individual families to his feudal empire, he enslaved the common people. In his later years, people began to organize against the Qin Dynasty. They were like kindling, ready to be ignited to destory the imperial regime.

In 210 B.C., the First Emperor died in Shaqiu (northeast of modem Pingxiang County , Hebei Province) while on an inspection tour. The eunuch Zhao Gao and Prime Minister Li Si conspired to forge an imperial decree ordering their opponents, the Crown Prince Fu Su, and General Meng Tian, to commit suicide, and declaring as successor the emperor’s second son, Hu Hai, who was then placed on the throne as the Second Emperor. Zhao Gao encouraged the new emperor to indul, ge in debauchery and to deal harshly with those he disliked or suspected. All this sharpened the class contradictions in society and the contradictions within the ranks of the ruling class. Not to mention the labouring people, many members of the imperial house, many ministers and even some of the First Emperor’s sons and daughters were killed. In 209 B.C., when the Second Emperor had been barely 10 months on the throne, Chen Sheng and Wu Guang hoisted the antiQin standard at the head of an insurgent peasant army.

Chen Sheng, whose other name was Chen She, was a native of Yangcheng (southeast of modern Dengfeng County, Henan Province) while Wu Guang, also known as Wu Shu, came from Yangxia (mod-ern Taikang County, also in Henan). Chen and Wu were amgng the900 conscripted peasants assembled in Daze Township (part of today’s Suxian County in Anhui Province ). While heading for Yuyang (in modern Miyun County , Beijing ), they were delayed by heavy rain that made the roads impassable, which meant they could not arrive on time. The law required those failing to report on time to be executed. At this point, Chen Sheng and Wu Guang considered their options. According to the Han Dynasty historian, Sima Qian, in his Records of the Histo-rian, Wu argued: “Since we will have to die anyway, why not rise in revolt?” And Chen said, “the common people have suffered more than enough. So we have only to raise the standard of rebellion for them to answer like an echo.” They then thought up a plan to lay the foundation for an uprising.

Not long afterwards, one of the conscripts found in the belly of a fish he had bought a piece of silk with the vermilion characters, “Chen Sheng will be the king”. This amazed the other conscripts. Late that night, somebody saw a sort of will-o’-the-wisp in a temple in the nearby woods and then heard, amid a howl like a fox, a voice saying,”The great State of Chu has been restored. Chen Sheng has become its king.” The voice was so loud that it woke the peasant conscripts. When they saw Chen Sheng the next morning, they quietly exchanged remarks about him. And so he became the centre of attention.

Establishment and Consolidation of the Western Han Dynasty

Following the downfall of the Qin Dynasty, the struggle for pow-er began among the leaders of the victorious rebel armies. Although Liu Bang prevailed in 202 B.C. to become the first emperor of the Han Dynasty, the struggle to establish and consolidate the feudal dy-nasty of Han went on about 66 years (207-141 B.C.), beginning with Liu Bang’s entry into Xianyang and going through the reigns of Emperor Hui Di, Empress Lu, Emperor Wen Di and Emperor Jing Di. A characteristic of these early days of the Western Han Dynasty was that the emperor and most of his subordinate rulers were of humble origin, a marked change¡ªwhich proved Chen Sheng’s view that royalty was not a matter of birthright¡ªin China’s political life from the time of the Shang and Zhou dynasties. After he entere & Xianyang, Liu Bang declined with thanks all gifts presented by the people as a token of respect to his army and further won acclaim by assembling the local people to announce the repeal of the harsh laws of the Qin government. He wanted them to observe only this law: “Let those who kill be executed, and those who inflict injuries on or rob others be punished.” This announcement was of great political significance in that it re-flected the popular demand of the time for personal safety and the fight to survival.

Liu Bang’s first confrontation with Xiang Yu following the overthrow of the Qin Dynasty came when Xiang Yu reached the Han-gu Pass. Earlier, King Huai of Chu had promised the territory west of the pass to the first man who entered it. Having had the good fortune to be that man, Liu Bang made himself supreme in the region and ordered his men to guard against intrusions by other forces. When Xiang Yu reached there with an army of 400,000 claimed to be a million strong and found his way barred, he was furious and pre-pared to attack Liu Bang. Because Liu Bang had only 100,000 men, he was forced to sue for peace. This helped to stabilize the situation for the time being.

A few days later, Xiang Yu marched into Xianyang where he slaughtered people and burned houses. The fires raged for three months. He called himself the “Hegemonic King of Western Chu” and made Pengcheng (now Xuzhou , Jiangsu ) the capital of his dominion. He called King Huai “Righteous Emperor”, but later got rid of him while King Huai was being moved from Pengcheng to Chenxian (in present-day Hunan ). Altogether, Xiang Yu named 18 princes, some of whom, however, were given territories much smaller than their former domains. With regard to Liu Bang, he ignored the promise of King Huai and accorded him, instead, the title of “Prince of Han”, with a diminished fief covering Hanzhong, Ba and Shu. In making these allocations, Xiang Yu aggravated the contradiction between himself and Liu Bang, as well as the armed forces under others.

In 206 B.C., within less than six months after Xiang Yu had granted fiefdoms to the various princes, Liu Bang marched east from Hanzhong and took the Hangu Pass and the area west of it. The following year, he attacked Xiang Yu with the collaboration of other armies, with a combined force of 560,000 men. He entered Pengcheng but was thoroughly defeated when Xiang Yu counter-attacked. Liu Bang escaped with a few scores of his cavalrymen. This was followed up by fierce battles between the two sides, centring on Xingyang and Chenggao (the Hulaoguan Pass to the northwest of today’s Xingyang , Henan ). In 203 B.C., Liu Bang seized Chenggao and surrounded Xing- yang. By then, his army had gained superioity, thanks to ample provi-sions and increased morale, while Xiang’s army suffered from lack of supplies and decreased morale. Liu took this opportunity to make peace with his rival. An agreement was reached that Honggou (“Deep Chasm”) Canal (in modern Zhongmou, Henan) be made the demarcation line, with the territory on the east going to Chu and on the west to Han. When Xiang Yu led his men back eastwards, Liu Bang ordered a surprise attack on him in Guling (northwest of modern Huaiyang, Henan), only to be routed. Later, Liu Bang joined hands with Han Xin and Peng Yue and surrounded Xiang Yu in Gaixia (southeast of mod-em Lingbi , Anhui ). Xiang Yu’s army had decreased in number and was now running out of provisions. But he managed to collect 800 cavalrymen and fight his way to a ferry named Wujiang (modern Wu-jiangpu northeast of Hexian, Anhui ) where, in the year 202 B.C. at the age of 32, he committed suicide.

With his chief rival gone, Liu Bang proceeded to build his feudal dynasty, i.e., the feudal regime of the Western Han Dynasty. He as-cended the throne two months after Xiang Yu’s death, to become known posthumously as Emperor Gao Zu of the Han Dynasty. He first chose Luoyang as his capital but shortly afterwards moved it to Chang’an. Liu Bang had the valuable help of “the Three Heroes of the Early Han”: Xiao He, a native of Fengxian (in modern Jiangsu), who was made Prime Minister; Zhang Liang, the chief counsellor, who was a descendant of a noble family in the former state of Han; and Grand General Han Xin, who came from Huaiyin (also in modern Jiangsu).

During its first 60 years, the Western Han rulers took two major steps to consolidate their feudal regime. The first step was taken in the economic field, aimed to alleviate class contradictions and ensure revenue for the imperial treasury so as to strengthen the foundation of the empire. The second step was to eliminate the menace which the fiefdoms presented to the imperial court.

Fifteen years of ruthless oppression and exploitation under the Qin Dynasty, followed by eight years of incessant wars, caused a heavy toll on the common people. Population in major cities dwindled by 70-80 per cent, and people could barely make both ends meet. Even the emperor couldn’t find four horses of the same colour to draw his carriage; the prime minister and generals had to travel in cars drawn by oxen. In this situation, the need for restoring and developing society’s productive forces was more than obvious.

The emperors, from Emperor Gao Zu down to Emperor Jing Di, all devoted themselves to this task. In half a century or more, popula-tion in some areas doubled or even showed a fivefold increase. Life in general became easier for the peasants. Landlords gained much more and could even get official ranks according to the amount of grain they voluntarily delivered to the frontier regions and grain-deficient areas. During the reign of Emperor Wen Di, two economists, Jia Yi and Chao Cuo, developed theories which were to become the basis of the economic thinking of landlord-class statesmen for centu-ries. Jia Yi (200-168 B.C.), a native of Luoyang who wrote New Poli-tical Views, advanced the idea that agriculture was the foundation of the nation, and that only when grain was in abundant supply could an offensive or defensive war be fought with success. Chao Cuo (? – 154 B.C.), a native of Yingchuan (modern Yuxian County , Henan ), pro-posed measures against commerce in favour of agriculture. He also maintained that the peasants should be attached to the land to enable the feudal state to win their support and thus consolidate its power. The ideas of Jia Yi and Chao Cuo were clearly an advance on the thinking of Shang Yang of the Warring States Period.

After the founding of the dynasty, the Western Han ruling clique was worried about the growth of the power of the various fiefdoms, particularly seven principalities under men who were not members of the imperial Liu family. The administrative system consisted of pre-fectures and counties as well as fiefdoms, including principalities and marquisates. In the principalities the officials, except for the prime minister, were all appointed by the princes. Each principality might embrace from 30 to more than 100 towns, and during the early days of the Western Han, the combined territory of the seven above- mentioned principalities was greater than the prefectures and counties directly under central authority. Among the princes were Han Xin, an outstanding strategist, and Peng Yue and Ying Bu, who were excellent generals. Each of them had made !mportant contributions to the founding of the dynasty. What worried the imperial court most was that they all had armed forces of their own. In 196 B.C., Han Xin was killed by the throne, as were Peng Yue and Ying Bu afterwards. Three other princes either escaped or were displaced so that by the time im-mediately before Liu Bang’s death in 195 B.C., principalities con-trolled by those not bearing the royal surnames had practically been wiped out. Only the principality of Changsha remained, but it come to an end in 157 B.C. when the prince died without issue.

Hoping to perpetuate the supremacy of the imperial court, Liu Bang installed nine princes of royal blood to head fiefdoms formerly under persons who were not members of the royal family. He regarded this as representing his ideal that “the whole empire is under one fam-ily”. He commanded, “Let anyone not of the Liu family who dares proclaim himself prince suffer universal attack.” But the territories of the Liu princes were also extensive and their power formidable. Their fiefdoms grew in economic strength with rises in productivity. So the principalities still posed a threat to the central government. In 177 B.C., Liu Xingju, Prince of Jibei, Prince of Huainan, also plotted a rebelled. In 174 B.C., Liu Zhang, rebellion. These events took place less than 20 years after the death of Liu Bang, during the reign of Em- peror Wen Di (180-157 B.C.).

The scholar Jia Yi recommended to the court that more princes be installed in each principality to divide its strength. In regard to the powerful fiefs, Jia Yi made an analogy to the body of a person who had swollen and could hardly move because both legs had become as thick as the waist and the fingers as big as the arms. He argued that by installing more princes the central authority could control all of the principalities in the same way as a person controls his limbs. Jia Yi’s proposal was accepted and put into practice, though no serious effort was ever made for its thorough implementation. During the reign of Emperor Jing Di (157-141 B.C.), Chao Cuo proposed reducing the territories of the various fiefdoms, and this was carried out. He pre-dicted that such a measure would invite resistance on the part of the kings, but argued: “There will be revolts, whether you cut their territories or not. Cutting their territories will quickly lead to revolts which might bring smaller calamities in their wake, while not cutting them will only delay revolts which, once they occur, may entail greater calamities.”

In 154 B.C. Liu Bi, Prince of Wu, in alliance with the kingdoms of Chu, Zhao, Jiaodong, Jiaoxi, Jinan and Zichuan, staged a revolt, which he had been plotting for a long time, in the name of getting rid of Chao Cuo. Emperor Jing Di responded by sending Marshal Zhou Yafu on a punitive expedition which was successful within less than three months. Taking advantage of this victory, the emperor took steps to relieve the princes of their administrative powers, reduce the num-ber of officials in the principalities and change the title of their prime ministers to minister. These steps drastically restricted the power of the princes while strengthening the imperial government.

Golden Age of the Western Han Dynasty

In 139 B.C., Emperor Wu Di succeeded to the throne to rule until his death in 87 B.C., a reign that became known as the golden age of the Western Han Dynasty. Socio-economic conditions had already taken a marked change for the better, thanks to the gradual rehabilitation of the social productive forces during the preceding 60 or so years. Historical records say that in those days most people were decently fed and clad, granaries were filled to overflowing, and the state budget showed a surplus. Countless strings of cash were stored in the imperial treasury, tied by cords mildewed with age.

Emperor Wu Di took further steps to weaken the local authorities and strengthen the hands of the central government, carrying out the recommendation made by Jia Yi in the time of Emperor Wen Di. He decreed that when a prince died, his eldest son by his first wife was to succeed him, and the territory of his principality was to be divided among all of his sons who would thus be coheirs of their father and, with the exception of the eldest son, each would be granted the status of a marquis. This meant that the power of the principalities was dispersed without their enfeoffed land being taken back by the imperial court. The emperor divided the whole country, including the prefectures and fiefdoms, into 13 regions. To tighten control over the localities, he appointed an itinerant inspector for each of these regions to keep a watchful eye on the powerful families as well as the prefects and the ministers of the various fiefdoms. At the imperial court a secretariat was set up to handle the memorials presented by court ministers. This reinforced the autocratic monarchy in that it stripped the prime minister of his power to handle such papers.

In economic matters, Emperor Wu Di enlisted the services of Sang Hongyang on whose suggestion a series of measures were adopted to increase state revenues and curtail the financial pressures put on the central government by local authorities. By law anyone could engage in minting coins, boiling salt and smelting iron without restrictions. In reality, however, these rights were monopolized by the rich, the princes and the influential ministers to victimize the peasants and disrupt social economy. Emperor Wu Di decreed a state monopoly on mintage all fivezhu coins were to be made by the central governmentand forbade minting by local authorities or individuals. Government offices were set up in specified places for state sales of iron and salt. Offices handling tribute from various districts were also established. They picked the goods which could easily be damaged and those involving a high cost of transportation, shipped them to needy areas, and sold them at high prices, the profit going to the state. Official departments in the capital were created to buy up certain surplus commodities when prices fell and to sell them at higher prices when there was a scarcity.

In 119 B.C., Emperor Wu Di imposed a heavier property tax on merchants and usurers. Handicraftsmen were required to pay one unit of tax (120 copper coins) on every 4,000 copper coins’ worth of possessions while the merchants had to pay two units of tax for the same amount. The common people paid one unit of tax for each horsedrawn cart they owned, as compared to two units for the merchants. Merchants were also ordered to send in an account on their property. Anyone giving a false report had his property confiscated and was sent to guard duty on the frontiers for two years. Huge quantities of property and large numbers of bondservants and houses belonging to merchants were expropriated.

The economic measures instituted by Emperor Wu Di helped to strengthen the autocratic monarchy. Meanwhile, he also broadened his dynasty’s relations with the ethnic minorities to an extent never seen before. The Xiongnu (Hun) nomads were very powerful in the initial period of the Western Han. In 200 B.C., Liu Bang was even hemmed in by them in Pingcheng (modern Datong City , Shanxi Province) for seven days and nights and broke through only after strenuous effort. Rebellious forces within the Western Han ruling clique also allied themselves with the Xiongnu to oppose the court.

The chief policy to prevent Xiongnu invasion in the early years of the Western Han Dynasty was to try to maintain peace by arranging marriages between the royal family and the Xiongnu chieftains or sending enormous quantities of gifts. But this had been unsuccessful and Emperor Wu Di tried a new tact. He repeatedly sent Generals Wei Qing and Huo Qubing on large-scale expeditions against the Xiongnu, forcing them to move to the far north so that it became impossible for them to reestablish their rule south of the Gobi . Of course, war could not resolve the differences between the Han Dynasty and the various groups. Nevertheless, these expeditions dealt a crushing blow to the intruders from the north and thus defended the agricultural regions in the Central Plains.

To conquer the Xiongnu, Emperor Wu Di planned to form an alliance with the Dayuezhi, which would make possible a converging attack on them from the east and west. Originally living in the Gansu Corridor, the Dayuezhi had been driven to Daxia ( Bactria ) in the north part of modern Afghanistan . In the beginning of his reign, Emperor Wu Di sent Zhang Qian as envoy to the land of the Dayuezhi, but he was captured en route by the Xiongnu. He was kept prisoner for more than 10 years before managing to escape to make his way to his destination where, however, he failed to achieve his mission. In 119 B.C., Zhang Qian was again chosen as the Han emissary, this time to the land of the Wusun who were settled in the Ili River valley. His aim was to form a common front with this people to cut the fight flank of the Xiongnu. Though Zhang Qian failed a second time, his visits promoted understanding between the Western Han Dynasty and the regions north and south of the Tianshan Mountains . The countries there began to send goodwill missions to the Han court, which on its part opened up military colonies for land reclamation along their frontiers. All this helped to spread the influence of the Han empire and to cement its links with adjoining regions.

The ethnic minorities in Sichuan , Yunnan and Guizhou provinces were then collectively known as the Southwestern Yi . Some of them–for instance, the Yelang people around modern Zunyi City in Guizhou and the Dian people near what is now Kunming City in Yunnan already had entered a slave society. During Emperor Wu Di’s reign, prefectural and county governments were set up in these regions, and the chieftain of the Dian was elevated to the status of king and given a royal seal. As a result, contacts increased further between southwest China and the interior.

The reign of Emperor Wu Di also saw new developments in China ‘s foreign relations. Zhang Qian’s journeys marked the beginning of contacts between China and some countries of Central and West Asia . He and his deputies reached the countries of Dayuan ( Ferghana, in the eastern part of the Uzbekistan ), Kangju (along the lower reaches of Syr Darya in Kazakhstan ), Daxia ( Bactria ), Anxi ( Parthia , or modern Iran ) and Yuandu (the modern Indian Subcontinent). From then on, the Han court every year sent from five to a dozen missions to the West, each including one to several hundred members. After Zhang Qian’s westward trips, many Han products, notably silks, were brought to the Western countries. And introduced to China were thoroughbreds, grape vines, pomegranates, glazed tiles, woollen carpets, etc. Sea routes were charted to link China with Korea and Japan . At the time, merchant ships sailed between China ‘s Xuwen County (in presentday Guangdong Province ) and Hepu County (in modem Guangxi) on the one hand, and India ‘s east coast and some Southeast Asian ports on the other.

Emperor Wu Di’s period witnessed significant academic and cultural achievements. It was in his time that Confucianism gained supremacy as the ideological weapon of the feudal dynasties.

Emperor Wu Di was keenly interested in literature. Among those attending to him were some famous men of letters, for example, Yan Zhu, Dongfang Shuo, Mei Gao and Sima Xiangru. Sima Xiangru(179-118 B.C.), a native of Chengdu in modern Sichuan Province , excelled in writing prose-poems which had developed out of the songs of the state of Chu . His representative prose-poems include Zi Xu Fu and Shang Lin Fu, both masterpieces in the Western Han time. During Emperor Wu Di’s reign, yuefu poems appeared. (Yuefu was an official department of music whose duty was to collect and process folk songs.) These poems were composed of sentences of varying lengths, common for folk songs of the Han time, and were intended to be set to music and song at the imperial court. However, more of the folk songs of the Han Dynasty consisted of five-character lines.

Sima Qian (c. 145-90 B.C.), from Longmen (modern Hancheng County in Shaanxi Province ), was a great historian in the time of Emperor Wu Di. His major work, Records of the Historian, is a 130juan general history of China which describes legends from the time of the mythical Emperor Huang Di (the Yellow Emperor), events in the Shang and Zhou dynasties, upheavals of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, the rise and fall of the Qin Dynasty and the birth and consolidation of the Han Dynasty. Records of the Historian is unique in its accounts on different historical stages and their characteristics, its portrayal and appraisal of historical figures and its description of social conditions. Sima Qian showed originality in editing historical data and working out a style for historical writings. Though he regarded emperors, kings, generals and ministers as the creators of history, he was progressive in recognizing the role played by the people, such as in the peasant uprisings, in the making of history. He also recognized the influence of social status in determining individual consciousness. His writings had a tremendous impact on later Chinese historiography.

Despite the burning of books in the Qin Dynasty, the teachings of the various schools that had emerged in the not too distant Warring States Period continued to spread in the early Han Dynasty. In 140 B.C. ！ that is, not long after Emperor Wu Di’s ascension Dong Zhongshu (c. 179-104 B.C.) proposed that task of the “grand unification” of the empire in political philosophy, and consequently the institution of an ideological system serving the autocratic feudal regime. Emperor Wu Di accepted his proposal, adopted Confucianism as official philosophy, and denied scholars of all other schools the opportunity to enter the civil service. Confucian classics gradually became the main reading of scholars, and Confucianism became predominant. Comparing social to natural phenomena formalistically, Dong Zhongshu theorized that the relationship between ruler and subject was something eternal, a natural order. He advanced the doctrine of the”Three Cardinal Guides”, which later Confucians summarized as “the sovereign guides the subject, the father guides the son, and the husband guides the wife”. The mainstay of Confucianism, these were a severe mental constraint on the masses of people in the long years of feudal society. Dong Zhongshu, a native of Guangchuan (to the southwest of modern Jingxian County in Hebei Province ), had a number of books to his credit, among them the Chun Qiu Fan Lu (Spring and Autumn Studies).

To suit the needs of building a feudal autocratic dynasty, Emperor Wu Di organized many battles and launched a series of big engineering projects. He made repeated inspection tours, gave generous gifts to his favourites and became more and more intolerable formulated harsh laws. Things for the common people until, in his late years, a number of uprisings broke out in Shandong Province . When Emperor Wu Di died in 87 B.C., he was succeeded by Emperor Zhao Di who was then only eight years old and had to be assisted by Grand General Huo Guang, Chancellor of Military Affairs.

In 74 B.C., Emperor Xuan Di ascended to the throne. He paid great attention to improving the local administration and, according to historical records, “officials were competent, and the people pursued their occupations peacefully” during his reign. This period was marked by sharpening differences within the Xiongnu tribe so that in 54 B.C., it split into two sections, the northern and the southern. Huhanye, Chieftain of the Southern Xiongnu , occupied the whole tribal territory after the Han had defeated the Northern Xiongnu . Since he had pledged allegiance to the Han court the next 40 years or more were a period of rapprochement between the Han empire and the Xiongnu.

Emperor Xuan Di carried on the cause of Emperor Wu Di, main taining the power and prosperity created by his predecessors. Though he greatly valued the services of the Confucians, he spoke his mind when he said, “The Han house knows how to rule the country, that is, by combining the hegemon’s way and the king’s way.” He was referring to government by the Legalist method, by force and political trickery, and to government by the Confucian method, by conquering the minds of the ruled. These dual tactics were to be employed by the rulers of the succeeding feudal regimes.

Decline of the Western Han Dynasty; Uprisings of the Green Woodsmen and Red Eyebrows

In 48 B.C., Emperor Yuan Di came to the throne. His reign, fol lowed by those of Emperors Cheng Di, Ai Di and Ping Di, marked the beginning of the decline of the Western Han until in 6 A.D., Wang Mang, a nephew of the wife of Emperor Yuan Di, usurped the throne and three years later founded the Xin Dynasty. Not long afterwards, peasant uprisings broke out throughout the country which led to Wang Mang’s downfall, the restoration of the Han regime in A.D. 25 and the period Chinese historians call the Eastern Han Dynasty.

Giving high official positions to family members of the em-presses was a tradition of the Han period. From the time of Liu Bang through the reigns of Empress Lti and Emperor Wu Di to those of Emperors Zhao Di and Xuan Di, the influence of the relatives of the court women increased continuously. When Emperor Yuan Di was on the throne, palace eunuchs Hong Gong and Shi Xian collaborated with the Shis and Xus, all relatives on the empress, side, in controlling the government. Family members of Empress Wang also began to inter-fere in state affairs until they became a dominant group in the time of Emperor Cheng Di. During the period of Emperor Ping Di, who was only 9 years old when placed on the throne, Empress Wang assumed the reins of government as one belonging to the generation of the reigning emperor’s grandmother. * As the old lady’s nephew Wang Mang was appointed Chancellor of Military Affairs who was also in charge of civil administration throughout the empire. Emperor Ping Di became a puppet of Wang, who poisoned the youth to death five years later. In A.D. 6, Wang was made imperial regent and took charge of the government as “Substitute Emperor”. He proclaimed himself em-peror proper in A.D. 9 and named his regime the Xin Dynasty.

Wang Mang was aided by a mystical theory of the time following Emperor Yuan Di’s rule which indicated some lack of confidence in the future of the Western Han Dynasty and which helped prepare pub-lic opinion for the usurping of power by a careerist. The theory held that no dynasty could exist forever because, by the mandate of Heaven, another one sooner or later would emerge to replace it. This led some people to comment that the Han house was nearing its end and that it was time to hand over power to others.

After the reign of Yuan Di, the difference between rich and poor in terms of property became even more glaring than before. Appro-priation of land by influential officials and nobles meant misery for the peasants who, moreover, had to shoulder many other burdens. In the first years of the rule of Emperor Yuan Di, 11 prefectures and fief-doms suffered floods in which the common people faced starvation. But the feudal nobles, the wealthy landlords and merchants, and cor-rupt officials continued to lead a life of luxury and debauchery. Class contradictions intensified in the time of Emperor Cheng Di which witnessed a number of uprisings by peasants in different regions and by prisoners doing hard labour. The social crisis grew even more serious during the reign of Emperor Ai Di. Feudal oppression threatened the personal freedom and even the lives of the common people, relegating the difference between rich and poor to a secondary place. Country-wide peasant uprisings could break out any moment.

The Western Han Dynasty achieved little in the academic field during the years following Emperor Yuan Di’s rule. But among the famous scholars of the time were Liu Xiang (79-8 B.C.), Liu Xin (?- A.D. 23) and Yang Xiong (53 B.C.-A.D. 18), all of whom had great achievements to their credit. When Emperor Cheng Di was on the throne, Liu Xiang, of imperial ancestry, was ordered to collate impor-tant books kept in the imperial library, such as the Confucian classics, works of the different schools of thought written in the pre-Qin period, collections of poems and prosepoems and military and medical writings. He wrote a report to the emperor about each book collated, listing its contents and giving a synopsis of it. During the period of Emperor Ai Di, Liu Xin, son of Liu Xiang, took over his father’s job. He classified all the books under seven headings and briefly described the contents of each, and the summaries were later incorporated into the Seven Categories of Writings. The painstaking efforts of the Lius contributed to the preservation, classification and dissemination of China ‘s ancient works. Though Liu Xiang and his son propagted the mystical theory on the nonpermanence of dynasties, they took differing political stands on it. The father used mysticism as a means of people to comment that the Han house was nearing its end and that it was time to hand over power to others.

After the reign of Yuan Di, the difference between rich and poor in terms of property became even more glaring than before. Appropriation of land by influential officials and nobles meant misery for the peasants who, moreover, had to shoulder many other burdens. In the first years of the rule of Emperor Yuan Di, 11 prefectures and fiefdoms suffered floods in which the common people faced starvation. But the feudal nobles, the wealthy landlords and merchants, and corrupt officials continued to lead a life of luxury and debauchery. Class contradictions intensified in the time of Emperor Cheng Di which witnessed a number of uprisings by peasants in different regions and by prisoners doing hard labour. The social crisis grew even more serious during the reign of Emperor Ai Di. Feudal oppression threatened the personal freedom and even the lives of the common people, relegating the difference between rich and poor to a secondary place. Countrywide peasant uprisings could break, out any moment.

The Western Han Dynasty achieved little in the academic field during the years following Emperor Yuan Di’s rule. But among the famous scholars of the time were Liu Xiang (79-8 B.C.), Liu Xin (?- A.D. 23) and Yang Xiong (53 B.C.-A.D. 18), all of whom had great achievements to their credit. When Emperor Cheng Di was on the throne, Liu Xiang, of imperial ancestry, was ordered to collate important books kept in the imperial library, such as the ConNcian classics, works of the different schools of thought written in the pre-Qin period, collections of poems and prose-poems and military and medical writings. He wrote a report to the emperor about each book collated, listing its contents and giving a synopsis of it. During the period of Emperor Ai Di, Liu Xin, son of Liu Xiang, took over his father’s job. He classified all the books under seven headings and briefly described the contents of each, and the summaries were later incorporated into the Seven Categories of Writings. The painstaking efforts of the Lius contributed to the preservation, classification and dissemination of China ‘s ancient works. Though Liu Xiang and his son propagted the mystical theory on the nonpermanence of dynasties, they took differing political stands on it. The father used mysticism as a means of remonstrating with Emperor Cheng Di on the need to guard against the ambitious family members of Empress Dowager Wang, while the son spread such views to help Wang Mang seize power from the Han house.

A native of Chengdu , Yang Xiong wrote Tai Xuan, a book on philosophy modelled after The Book of Changes, and Fa Yan, which was an exposition of Confucianism modelled after The Analects. Though his writings were not innovative, he did disagree with the theory that there was a “God” who controlled everything on earth. He was progressive in as much as he opposed the prevalent mysticism.

Having usurped the throne, Wang Mang carried out successive reforms of the officials system, currency, land tenures, taxation and state monopolies of commodities. Most of his new measures were impractical, and some were merely copied from books of antiquity. Because the reforms were too numerous and revised too frequently, general uncertainty was felt in society. This presented an opportunity for the officials to swindle and oppress the people who were liable to be declared guilty on trumpedup charges, which meant bankruptcy, imprisonment and even death. To flaunt his power and prestige, Wang Mang repeatedly organized provocative activities against the ethnic minorities in north and southwest China . Apart from worsening the friendly relations between China ‘s various ethnic groups, this increased the burdens on the people in the Central Plains who had to do conscripted labour more and more often. Many peasants went bankrupt as a consequence.

Peasant uprisings gathered momentum in A.D. 17 when Lu Mu of Haiqu (to the west of modem Rizhao County , Shandong Province) led the local peasants in taking up arms. In Xinshi (to the northwest of modem Jingshan County , Hubei Province), peasant insurgents under Wang Kuang and Wang Feng joined forces with those in the neighbouring areas. Making Ltilin (Green-Wooded) Hills (modem Dangyang County , Hubei Province) their operational base, they became one of the most wellknown insurgent groups in Chinese history and are referred to in history as the Greenwood Army. The following year, Fan Chong of Langya (modem Zhucheng County , Shandong Province), led an uprising at Ju (modem Juxian County , Shandong ). With its headquarters in Mt. Taishan , his contingent quickly grew to be several tens of thousands strong. Called the army of the Red Eyebrows because their brows were painted red as a mark of identification, this group, too, is wellknown in Chinese history. Meanwhile, scores of big and small insurgent groups rose on the great plain in presentday Hebei and Shandong provinces north of the Huanghe River . At Yuan(modem Nanyang City , Henan Province), 7,000-8,000 peasants led by Liu Xiu and his older brother Liu Yan hoisted the banner of reconstructing the Hart empire.

The armies of the Green Woodsmen and the Red Eyebrows were the largest among the peasant armed forces of the period. Later, Liu Xiu’s men and a number of Lti Mu’s men joined hands with the Green Woodsmen and the Red Eyebrows respectively. Among the Green Woodsmen there were some landlord elements, like Liu Xiu, a native of Caiyang County (modern Zaoyang County , Hubei ) and his brother who were both scions of the Han house. On the other hand, the Red Eyebrows were simple peasants who announced, “He who kills shall pay with his own life, and he who injured others shall be dealt with accordingly.” This is roughly the same law Liu Bang announced when he entered Chang’an: “Those who kill be executed, and those who inflict injuries on or rob others be punished.” That the Red Eyebrows did not mention robbery but stressed personal safety and the right to survival is a refleciton of the most pressing issue concerning the peasants at the time.

In late A.D. 20, Wang Mang sent troops to attack the Red Eyebrows. Defeated after one year’s fight, he tried again by mustering more than 100,000 picked men. In the winter of A.D. 22, the two hostile armies fought it out in Chengchang (west of modern Dongping County , Shandong ) where Wang’s forces were routed. This changed the situation on the east China front, and Wang Mang had to shift to the defensive.

On the southern front, in A.D. 21 Wang Mang attacked the Green Woodsmen with 20,000 men, but lost several thousand soldiers and all his mat6riel. The Green Woodsmen steadily grew stronger. In A.D. 23, Wang Mang dispatched his generals Wang Yi and Wang Xun at the head of a crack unit of 420,000 in yet another offensive on the Green Woodsmen. Purported to be one million strong, his army made a show of force when it marched to the battlefield, with its colours and transport vehicles stretching as long as 1,000 li (500 kilometres). The Green Woodsmen defended their besieged city, Kunyang (modem Yexian County , Henan ), with about 90,000 men while Liu Xiu went enlisting reinforcements elsewhere. He mustered all the forces he could, organized a vanguard unit of 1,000 or more, and put it under his own command. The Green Woodsmen fought bravely, pitting one against a hundred and killing large numbers of enemy soldiers. Exploiting the successive victories, Liu Xiu led a “do-or-die” unit of3, 000 men to strike at Wang Mang’s main force, which was put to rout. General Wang Xun was killed. Then the Green Woodsmen defending Kunyang came out to join in a converging attack on Wang Mang’s men who ran over each other in a helter-skelter retreat. A rainstorm happened to have caused the river outside Kunyang to rise, and several tens of thousands of Wang Mang’s soldiers were drowned trying to cross it. Wang Yi and a few other generals escaped on horseback over the corpses of their men.

The Kunyang campaign is one of the well-known examples in the annals of war showing how a small army can overcome a big one. Dealing a crushing blow to Wang Mang both militarily and politically, it gave impetus to the anti-Wang up-risings across the country.

One month before the Kunyang campaign, the Green Woodsmen installed Liu Xuan, a member of the Han royal house, as emperor, using the reign title of Gengshi. They purposely adopted the name of the Han house for the new regime, and formally proclaimed their objective of restoring the Han Dynasty after their victory in Kunyang. This meant that some changes were taking place within the ranks of the rebellious army as well as in the character of the peasant uprisings. But in any case, the Kunyang battle added to the prestige of Liu Xiu.

The Green Woodsmen followed up their Kunyang success with attacks on the Wuguan Pass and the city of Luoyang . Aided by uprisings against Wang Mang within the city, the troops marching on the pass took it with comparative ease. Then they thrust towards Chang’an. Fishing in troubled waters, the armed forces of the landlords around Chang’an tried to enter the Han capital where people were also ready to rise in revolt. Wang Mang fled for life, but was killed en route from the capital by a merchant. His death, which marked the end of the Xin Dynasty, came only three months after the Kunyang campaign, that is, in the ninth month on the lunar calendar in the year A.D. 23. In the same month, a detachment of the Green Woodsmen took Luoyang .

Following the fall of the Xin Dynasty, the Gengshi regime made Luoyang its capital. It sent emissaries to pursuade the Red Eyebrows to surrender, asking Liu Xiu to go to Hebei with the task of enlisting the services of the rebellious armies operating there. But when Fan Chong came to Luoyang with a score of his generals, the Gengshi authorities failed to unite with them. Conflicts began to appear between Gengshi and the Red Eyebrows until they assumed serious proportions. In A.D. 25 the Gengshi government moved its capital to Chang’an, from which Liu Xuan had to flee when the Red Eyebrows captured it the next year. The downfall of his regime came shortly afterwards when he was killed by the Red Eyebrows.

Meanwhile, Liu Xiu was successful in his activities in Hebei . He gradually detached himself from Liu Xuan and extended his own influence, so that in A.D. 25 he proclaimed himself emperor in Haonan (modern Baixiang County, Hebei) and is known in history as Emperor Guang Wu. The next two years saw him defeating the Red Eyebrows and the remnant forces of the Green Woodsmen until they were basically wiped out. Thus Liu Xiu appropriated the fruits of the peasant struggle and finally restored the Han house, henceforth known as the Eastern Han Dynasty because the capital, Luoyang , was to the east of the Western Han capital of Chang’an.

The Establishment of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the Prolonged Turbulence, and the Yellow Turban Uprsing

The opening years of the Eastern Han.Dynasty (25-220) were a period of establishing relative stability through the 40 plus years between 25 and 88 when emperors Guang Wu (Liu Xiu), Ming Di and Zhang Di ruled. At the outset between A.D. 25 and A.D. 36, Liu Xiu put down the rival regimes in various localities and asserted his authority over the whole territory of the former Western Han Dynasty.

The dynasty established by Liu Xiu was even more autocratic than the Western Han. Although he gave titles and fiefs to his followers, he did not allow them to share in real power. He also took direct control of the department handling imperial documents, making it an office directed by the emperor which could decide on policy and issue orders to the whole country. The reputed three chancellors, i.e., the chancellor of civil administration, the chancellor of military affairs and the great censor, no longer had any real power, while the inspectors in the localities were empowered by Liu Xiu to watch over or impeach officials in the prefectures and counties and the lords of the fiefdoms by circumventing the chancellors and approaching the court directly. He also made use of the current Taoist practice of making prophecies, which was very popular among politicians, to add a mystical colour to his regime.

After long years of war, Liu Xiu had to pay attention to the problems of landholdings and agricultural labour which had an important bearing on state revenues. In A.D. 39, he ordered a countrywide checkup on land reclamation and census. But the local officials shielded the big landlords and cheated on figures so as to shift the tax burden onto the peasants. Liu Xiu had a dozen of the most notorious officials executed, but to no avail. Both the peasants and landlords put up a violent resistance to the order each group having its own ax to grind, the peasants whose interests were encroached upon and the big landlords who concealed the true amount of their land. The emperor, who could do nothing effective, had to let the matter ride. Later he issued a number of rescripts decreeing the improvement of the status of bondservants before the law and the emancipation of some of them. This was also designed to increase the labour force.

After Liu Xiu died in A.D. 57, the throne was occupied first by Emperor Ming Di and then by Emperor Zhang Di, both of whom carried on and contributed to the work of the founder of the Eastern Han Dynasty. They also set store by Taoist divination, and did much to spread the already theologized Confucianism, calling themselves “prophets” to deceive the masses. In A.D. 59 Emperor Ming Di personally lectured in the imperial academy and discussed Confucian classics with scholars. Nearly 100,000 people are said to have attended. In A.D. 79 Emperor Zhang Di brought together the famous Eastern Han scholars in the White Tiger Hall in Luoyang to discuss the different versions of the Five Classics. He himself made the conclusions, which were later incorporated into Bai Hu Tong Yi (Compre-hensive Discussions in the White Tiger Hall), a book serving to deify and consolidate imperial authority.

The Development of Social Productive Forces

The Qin-Han period witnessed advances in many fields including agriculture, science and handicraft industry, medicine, engineering, city planning and architecture. It was a period which saw the invention of paper. Farming methods were improved through new implements like hydraulic water lifting devices; the building of canals and dams promoted irrigation and water conservation; and advanced ironsmelting techniques led to the mass-production of cheap, high-grade steel. In the meantime, physicians mastered acupuncture and the pre- scribing of herbal medicines, astronomers worked out a new calendar based on the formula of 365 days to a Solar year and craftsmen produced exquisite wool, cotton and silk fabrics. And above all, per- haps, stands the engineering wonder of the Qin Dynasty, the Great Wall of China .

In agriculture, special treatises by Si Shengzhi reflected the level of development reached at the time by summarizing both technical and theoretical questions about farm production. To begin with, iron ploughs and ox farming were popularized and improved while a wide range of farm implements many of them innovations were in use. plough frames were equipped with the main parts of animal-drawn ploughs. Already in extensive use was a plough for turning up earth, crushing stones, building up ridges between furrows and regulating the depth of ploughing. During the latter period of Emperor Wu Di, Zhao Guo, an army provisions official, invented and popularized a plough of a new type which was drawn by two oxen and operated by three people, one guiding the animals, one manipulating the plough shafts and one steering the plough itself. As time went on, the plough was adapted to fit into a team first of two oxen and one man and later of one ox and one man to save manpower and facilitate deep ploughing.

The seed plough used at the time saved labour and improved the quality of sowing through the three-fold action of furrowing, sowing and covering the furrows with earth. Besides the hydraulic water lift-ing devices, winnowers and water-powered mills were introduced and raised efficiency by a wide margin. Iron farm tools came into much wider use in the midWestern Han period.

New methods of farming were also introduced, such as the “al-ternation method” by Zhao Guo and the “small plot method” by Si Shengzhi. In the “alternation method” the land was ploughed into furrows and the earth turned up to make ridges. Crop seeds were sown into the furrows. As the young plants grew, the earth of the ridges, together with weeds, was piled around their roots so that they grew up fast and sturdy. To maintain the fertility of the land, the ridges and furrows were alternated every year so that the ridges of this year be-came furrows of the next, and vice versa. This method raised the per- unit-area yield by one to two-thirds and was best suited to dry regions. In the “small plot method”, deep ploughing and close planting were applied on small plots, where water and manure were used effectively and in a concentrated way and field management was intensified to ensure high crop yields.

Water conservancy projects were undertaken for agriculture, animal husbandry and navigation. The Linqu Canal built during the time of the First Emperor of the Qin Dynasty was an engineering success. Many of the water conservancy works of the Western Han period were constructed during the reign of Emperor Wu Di. The Caoqu Canal, dug in 129 B.C. by tens of thousands of people under the supervision of the noted water conservancy expert Xu Bo, channelled the Weihe River water east from the metropolis of Chang’an to the Huanghe River . This shortened the route of water transport of grain to the capital and brought irrigation to large tracts of farmland. Many more canals were dug later in presentday Shaanxi which irrigated the fields and improved the soil. Irrigation was also well developed in presentday Inner Mongolia , Gansu , Shanxi and, in particular, the Ningxia Plain. In the Eastern Hail period, efforts were concentrated on repairing and rebuilding the old water conservancy works. In A.D. 69, hundreds of thousands of people were recruited to harness the Huanghe River under the supervision of the famous specialist Wang Jing. As a result, no major breaks in the dykes or change in the river course occurred through the following 800 years.

Salt-making, ironsmelting and cloth-weaving were the three principal handicraft trades. There were sea, lake and well salts. In the mid-Han period, natural gas was used to boil salt in presentday Qionglia County , Sichuan Province. Ironsmelting was well developed both in scale and technique during the Qin and Han dynasties, especially after the midWestern Han period. Grey cast iron, which is better than white iron, appeared around the mid-Western Han period. The invention of fettling and the improvement of the repeated tempering technique, two important indications of the progress of ironsmelting in the Qin-Han period, opened the way for the mass production of cheap, high-grade steel. By the Eastern Han Dynasty, iron and steel had replaced bronze in making the principal weapons.

Cloth-weaving, the main household sideoccupation in the Qin-Han period, covered silk, flax, kohemp and woollen fabrics. The silk fabrics used by aristocrats were of fine workmanship and exquisite design. The cotton cloth from the prefecture of Shu ( Sichuan ) and the silk from the prefecture of Qi ( Shandong ) were famous at the time. Chinese brocade, which was characteristic of the high standards of Chinese textiles, found a brisk market in Rome . The hand-operated spinning wheels, weaving looms and figured fabric weaving looms of the time had lasting influence over China ‘s textile industry.

There was an elaborate division of labour in the making of lacquerware during the Han Dynasty. Presentday Sichuan was known for its goldor silver-decorated lacquers. A kind of paper-like material was made for writing in the early days of the Western Han. But the type of paper we know today was not invented until the Eastern Han Dynasty, in A.D. 105, by Cai Lun who made it of rags, old fishing nets and tree bark. It was called Marquis Cai’s paper in honour of the inventor. The use of these materials greatly raised the quality and efficiency of paper-making, enlarged the source of raw materials, reduced cost, put an end to the use of bamboo and silk as writing materials and created a favourable condition for the spread of culture. As techniques improved, Chinese lacquerware was introduced into Asian and European countries where it was favourably received. Chinese papermaking spread to Japan from Korea in the 7th century, to Arabia in the8th and to Europe in the 12th, contributing greatly to the developmenl of world culture.

The Qin-Han period witnessed new achievements in civil engineering. Besides the Great Wall, engineers during the Qin Dynasty built imperial chariot roads, the Zhidao Highway across mountains and valleys, the Epang (Efang) Palace, imperial villas, temporary imperial residences, and the Qin Shi Huang Mausoleum. With a circumference of 25 kilometres, Chang’ an, the capital of Western Han, was a model of city planning. It had 160 neighbourhoods, 8 main streets where 12 carriages could run abreast, the Weiyang Palace that occupied one-fourth of the city area, and separate residential districts for dignitaries and commoners. The famous Zhandao plank road built along treacherous chiff faces during the Qin-Han period shortened the distance between Sichuan and Shaanxi . High terraces and multistoryed buildings were designed in such a way that their wooder structure formed an intergrated whole by itself. Special components were used for beams and beam supports, bricks and tiles were of varied shapes, and new bricklaying methods were introduced. All these laid the foundation for further development in Chinese architecture.

In shipbuilding, vessels from 3.6 to 8.4 metres in width were made. In the Western Han period, the water-borne army at its strongest had 350,000 men and its vessels had two to four decks. Tendeckers appeared later in the Eastern Han Dynasty. Han boats were equippec with rudders, sculls and cloth sails.

Development in production brought in its wake a corresponding development in astronomy, mathematics and medical science.

The “Chapter on Astronomers” in Records of the Historian by Sima Qian is a systematic account of the astronomical knowledge of ancient China . On orders from Emperor Wu Di in 194 B.C., Sima Qian, Gongsun Qing and Hu Sui, basing their work on surveys by instruments and calculations by Tang Du and Luo Xiahong, developed the new Taichu Calendar, that had far-reaching influence in the history of Chinese calendrical science. The number of days of a solar year was calculated by the formula 365 and that of a lunar month by the formula 29 43/81 The new calendar contained the 24 solar terms and reasonable arrangements of the intercalary month. The first lunar month became the beginning of the year, whereas it was the tenth in the calendar of Qin and early Han.

The Mathematical Classic on the Gnomon, written around late Western Han, is the earliest extant treatise of its .kind in China . The Mathematics in Nine Sections, completed in early Eastern Han after repeated revisions over a long period, systematically summarized the important achievements in this field since the Spring and Autumn and the Warring States periods. The book contained 246 applied mathe- matics problems and was divided into nine sections according to the methods of solution and the fields of application. Its appearance de-monstrated that mathematics in China had developed into a scientific system.

In the medical field, as early as the Warring States Period the noted physician Bian Que had mastered the methods of diagnosis of feeling the patient’s pulse, observing his symptoms and listening to his voice and the methods of treatment of acupuncture, medical po-tions and hot compression. To consolidate his rule, Emperor Qin Shi Huang of the Qin Dynasty ordered the burning of all the books except medical classics. Another indication of the level of medical science at the time is a section in Records of the Historian on Chunyu Yi, a noted physician of the period of the Western Han’s Emperor Wen Di. The chapter describes 25 of his cases in terms of pathology, examination of symptoms, methods of treatment, and prognosis. The Yellow Em-peror’s Classics of Internal Medicine, written in a question-and-answer form around the early Western Han period, explains the physi-ological signs and pathological changes of the human body, gives the earliest elucidation of its blood circulation and points out the impor- tance of pulsefeeling in diagnosis. Apart from suggesting the methods of treatment for 311 ailments and illnesses of 44 categories, it, empha-sizes disease prevention and getting at the root of a disease to seek a permanent cure. Emperor Shen Nong’s Materia Medica, a pharma-ceutical work of the Eastern Han, records 365 medicines 252 medi-cinal herbs, 67 animal drugs and 46 mineral drugs their functions their time and methods of collection, their mixed efficacy and their application. The two works are monuments to the beginnings of traditional c tional Chinese medical and pharmaceutical systems.

In the Qin-Han period agriculture with its wide areas of application continued to occupy the predominant position in the social econ-omy. The agricultural labour force at that time was formed by individual peasants who enjoyed personal freedom to a certain degree and showed tremendous interest in production under the private economy. This labour force had two characteristics. First, the peasants were dependent upon the land, which meant a guarantee of work hands for the landlords and the use or ownership of the land for the peasants. Second, the production unit was formed by the household and com-bined farming and weaving, a system which, though making it hard to get separate households organized, made it possible for them to achieve self-sufficiency in food and clothing. In this way, the peasants enjoyed better working conditions than the serfs, which meant a change in the character of the labour force. This new labour force combined with the developed production tools and technique to form a new social productive force that accelerated the development of feudal relations.

The Growth of Feudal Relations

The Qin-Han period was one in which feudal relations reached maturity in China. The feudal landownership and the corresponding structure of the landlord class, both characterized by a hierarchy, were basically established in the middle-lower Huanghe, middle-lower Changjiang and Zhujiang river valleys.

The hierarchy in landownership was, in the order of importance, composed of the following strata:

1. The emperor
2. The landed aristocrats with hereditary titles
3. The landowners of powerful families
4. The mercantile landowners

The emperor, the supreme landowner, embodied a unity of land-ownership and political power. After his conquest of the six states, Qin Shi Huang had a stele erected which contained the inscriptions: ” The land in all corners of the earth belongs to the emperor ” and ” Where there is human habitation, there is the rule of emperor. ” These inscriptions showed that no distinction was made between land ownership and political domination. Private ownership of land did exist, but it took the form of a hierarchy, with universal recognition of the emperor’s supreme ownership. While toasting his father at a grand banquet, Emperor Gao Zu of the Western Han, i.e. Liu Bang, said to the old man, “You used to say that I was a good-for-nothing, unlike Second Brother who knew how to build up family property. Who do you think has built up more property, I or Second Brother?” The courtiers attending the banquet greeted these remarks with deafening cheers of “wan sui!” ( “May the Emperor live ten thousand years!” ) Clearly, both the emperor and his subjects regarded the entire country as the monarch’s private property. This way of merging the private with the public and the imperial household with the state also found expression in the functions of the officials. The nine ministers in both the Qin and Han dynasties mainly took care of the daily needs and property of the emperor, being responsible separately for the ancestral temples of the ruling house, the imperial palaces, the security of the ruling house, the imperial stable, the welfare of the members of the royal house, and the imperial treasury and granary. Even the highest-ranking officials, the three chancellors, were in a way retainers of the royal house. No matter who were in power, eunuchs or royal relatives on the side of the court ladies, the changes in the political situations in the Qin-Han period always took the form of internal disputes within the ruling house. This supreme authority of the emperor far exceeded the kingly authority in the Shang and Zhou dynasties and the power of the princes in the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods.

Next to the emperor were the landed aristocrats with hereditary titles. Each of them had a fief embracing a great number of households. The powerful landlords had a deeprooted local influence, but enjoyed no political prestige. The mercantile landlords, otherwise called “rich people”, had much social influence but were discriminated against politically. As a short-lived dynasty, the Qin left few records about these ranks among the landlords, and the stratification was not so clear until the Western Han.

Among the landed aristocrats in the Qin and Han dynasties there were relatives of the royal house bearing the same surname as the emperor and those from families that had rendered outstanding service to the court. In the Han Dynasty the landed aristocracy was augmented by relatives of the emperor on the side of his mother or wife as well as some of the descendants of Confucius and well – known teachers of Confucianism. Although Qin Shi Huang granted no fiefs after his conquest of the six states, he did create a feudal aristocracy by providing descendants of the royal house with food, clothing and a regular income from land rent and tax. Also, meritorious officials could be granted the title of marquis and could request land. The Han Dynasty saw the rise of large numbers of princes, marquises, etc. among members of the ruling house and the meritorious. There were many influential families among the royal relatives on the side of the emperor’s mother or wife. Liang Ji of the Eastern Han, for one, was granted territories with a total of 30,000 households. His brothers and sons were granted fiefs each with 10,000 households. In all, seven members of the Liang family were made marquises.

According to History of the Han Dynasty, the number of households during the late Western Han Dynasty was 12,233,062 with a total population of 59,594,978, of which 23 principalities accounted for 1,343,390 house-holds with a total population of 6,382,205. The book contains no re-cords of the number of households in the 187 marquisates, but it was estimated at 1,51,000 with a total population exceeding 7,050,000. According to Sequel to the History of the Han Dynasty, the number of households during the middle period of the Eastern Han Dynasty was 9,698,630 with a total population of 49,150,220, of which 19 princi-palities accounted for 1,694,690 households with a total population of 10,314,523. The book makes no mention of the number of households in the 95 marquisates, but it was estimated at 930,000 with a total population of more than 4,700,000. The statistics of the two books show that the principalities and marquisates accounted for approxi-mately one-fourth of the country’s total number of households in the Western Han period and more than one-fourth in tile Eastern Han period. These figures, however, did not include the labourers forced to work on the land illegally incorporated into these principalities and marquisates.

The landlords of powerful families included the descendants of the nobilities of the six states and influential local families. Although the former had lost their noble status after the fall of the six states, they remained an influential social force during the Qin and early Han periods. They also participated in tile anti-Qin struggle of the late Qin peasant insurgents. Mindful of their prestige, both Qin and Han rulers moved many of these families from the east to the areas around the capitals so as to put them under control. It is hard to pinpoint the time at which these influential local families appeared in history. Around the time of the uprisings of the Red Eyebrows and Green Woodsmen, Ru Yinshi, with a clan of over 1,000 people and some protrgrs, and Gongsun Shu, with a clan of 10,000 people, ranked among the most powerful local landlords. Liu Xiu, founder of the Eastern Han Dynasty, was assisted by a number of generals from influential local families who later became aristocrats. During the Eastern Han period, although the powerful local families had steadily gained strength, they could not yet overshadow the feudal aristocrats. Some of the wealthy people in frontier regions were also counted among the powerful families. One of them was Ban Yi, an ancestor of the noted historian Ban Gu and a big herds-owner who possessed thousands of flocks of cattle and sheep.

The mercantile landlords generally got rich by branching out into commerce or handicraft industry. Around the Western Han period, people with wealth amounting to three million five-zhu coins were regarded as wealthy while those below that level were regarded as middle class. A small number of people had amassed wealth to the tune of fifty million or even a hundred million five-zhu coins. Some people, such as a descendant of the powerful Tian family in one of the six states, was a big landlord as well as a wealthy merchant. In the social economic conditions of the time, a rich person was invariably wedded to the land, however wealthy he might be. In the words of the famous historian Sima Qian, the practice was to “acquire fortune by attending to the non-essential and preserve it by attending to the es- sential.” In contemporary usage, the “non-essential” meant handicraft industry and commerce and the “essential” meant farming. It was generally believed that a landowner was in a more secure position than a man with money alone. The fact that the emperor co-existed with the three categories of landlords as well as numerous medium and small landholders reflected the existence of ranks in agrarian rela-tions. The emperor’s undisputed possession of the nation’s land was shared by the hereditary aristocrats, the powerful families enjoyed royal recognition of their landownership, while the mercantile land- lords acquired land mainly through illegal channels, as acquisition of land through one’s wealth was forbidden by law. In the stratified feu-dal landownership of the Qin-Han period, the hereditary aristocrats held a dominant position, second only to that of the emperor.

In addition to paying the agricultural tax in grain and different kinds of poll tax, peasants in the Qin-Han period had to perform cor-v6e and military service. These feudal burdens were in essence land rent paid by the direct producers to the landlords, partly in kind and mostly in corv6e, the poll tax being a form of the latter. State tax was identical with land rent there were no other forms of state tax. The exploitation of peasants by hereditary aristocrats mainly consisted of a share in the rent paid to the royal house. The exploitation of peasants by powerful landlords was heavier than that by the royal house in terms of rent in kind, but was probably lighter in terms of corv6e be-cause peasants in this category did not have to perform military service and excessive corv6e and the land rent they paid to landlords was not part of the state tax.

To ensure its sources of soldiers and food grain and to enforce its rule and exploitation, the feudal state organized the scattered peasants on a tithing basis. These peasants were called “registered people”.

Polarization between rich and poor constantly occurred among these “registered people”. Some became big or small landlords, but most of them were impoverished. Stratification of peasants took place not only through polarization but also through the practice of confer-ring titles of honour on them. There were twenty such titles in the Qin-Han period, each indicating a certain status of the titleholder. Peasants with certain titles were exempted from corv6e. The feudal hierarchy in the Qin-Han period was complicated; it often covered up the true fea- tures of classes.

The growth of feudal relations in this period brought closer in economic life people scattered over wide areas who spoke more or less the same language and enhanced their national consciousness. It was in these historical conditions that the Han ethnic group came into existence.