SANDBOX3[edit]

Hello, this is my sandbox #3. My others can be found here:

Here are my article drafts:

Government (Not Bielenstein's Book)[edit]

Loewe's Book[edit]

Loewe, Michael. (2004). The Men Who Governed Han China: Companion to a Biographical Dictionary of the Qin, Former Han, and Xin Periods. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill. ISBN 9004138455.

Number of officials[edit]

Page 70 & 113: By using Han records from the Book of Han and others detailing the types and amounts of officials in each kingdom, commandery, county, nobility, salt agency, and iron agency in 5 BC, Loewe tallies them up to reach 99,214, and so estimates that the number of non-central government officials numbered about 100,000. For the combination of all non-central government officials (i.e. all those mentioned above) and all central government officials for 5 BC, the Book of Han states that there were 130,285. This leads Loewe to estimate that the number of central government officials in 5 BC amounted to about 30,000.

Privileges[edit]

Page 113: Officials were given distinction by wearing types of robes and riding in carriages that were appropriate to their rank. If an official was accused of a crime and found guilty, his punishment was less severe than that of a commoner. High officials in both Western and Eastern Han were afforded lavish tombs, while Eastern Han tombs built for officials were accompanied by a memorial stele.

Ebrey's Cambridge Illustrated[edit]

General stuff[edit]

Page 64: Picture caption reads "The bureaucratic government of Han times produced huge quantities of documents on wooden and bamboo strips, and great caches of such documents have been found among the ruins of the garrisons established along the northwestern frontier. The one shown here was excavated at Juyan in Gansu province: dated 95 AD, it is an inventory of the equipment of two infantry units."
Page 64: Due to the oppressive nature of the previous Qin regime, people in the Western Han Dynasty associated centralized government with tyranny. Because of this, people believed that the Han government should "parcel out domains as the early Zhou had," and this is exactly what Gaozu did in rewarding those who served him in his campaigns. Their semi-autonomous regions became vassals of the central Han authority. Yet this posed a threat to Han power and interregional stability. Han authorities wanted to find a way to combine "military strength (wu) with the morally centred civil arts (wen)."
Page 64: To counter the old aristocracy, Han prefects and magistrates directly governed the territories assigned to them, and won their positions through merit, not birth. They could be dismissed, transferred, and disciplined by the government. Their duties included judging lawsuits, collecting taxes, performing religious ceremonies sponsored by the state, commanding troops in battle and in peace, maintaining public works, being observant of the local economy and education, and looked to the local population to draft their staffs.
Page 64: Emperor Wu confiscated the domains of over half the princes and lords of the empire, and forced the rest to divide their lands among all their heirs, "thus guaranteeing that they would diminish in size with each passing generation."

Government (Bielenstein's Book)[edit]

Bielenstein, Hans. (1980). The Bureaucracy of Han Times. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521225108.

Ranks[edit]

Page 4: The 'bushel' rank-salary hierarchy had sixteen grades, which were
- 10000 shi
- Fully 2000 shi
- 2000 shi
- Equivalent to 1000 shi
- 600 shi
- Equivalent to 600 shi
- 400 shi
- Equivalent to 400 shi
- 300 shi
- Equivalent to 300 shi
- 200 shi
- Equivalent to 200 shi
- 100 shi
- Equivalent to 100 shi

Page 5: The rank of 10,000 bushel was not established until 8 BC, while four additional ranks existed in this list until 23 BC, those being 800 shi, Equivalent to 800 shi, 500 shi, and Equivalent to 500 shi.

Central Administration[edit]

Grand Tutor[edit]

Page 5: The Grand Tutor was the most senior official of the empire, ranked above the Three Excellencies, and ranked higher even than the 10,000 bushel rank (earning an unspecified salary). However, the office was not filled regularly; in fact, it had only been filled four times from 202 BC to 6 AD, the year Emperor Ping of Han died. Empress Dowager Lü had Wang Ling become the first Grand Tutor of the dynasty in 187 BC. He resigned at an unknown date and died in 181 BC. The Empress Dowager died on August 18, 180 BC, while Shen Yizhi became Grand Tutor shortly after. However, he was removed from office before Emperor Wen of Han took the throne on November 14, 180 BC. No one was appointed as Grand Tutor again until October 17, 1 BC, when Kong Guang was appointed the same day Emperor Ping took the throne. Kong Guang was promoted to Grand Master on April 10, 1 AD and was replaced by Wang Mang. Despite being Grand Tutor, Wang Mang still held the title of Commander-in-Chief, or regent. QUOTE: "Nothing is known about the subordinates of the Grand Tutor during Former Han."
Page 5: In name, the Grand Tutor was supposed to provide moral guidance for the emperor, but no records indicate this was ever the case. It served merely a political tool. For example, Wang Ling was a rival of Empress Lü, and so was "promoted" to Grand Tutor so that he wouldn't fill the office of Chancellor of the Right. In response to this cordial slight, he chose to resign. Shen Yizhi was beholden to the Lü faction and held office during the days of political infighting following the Empress Dowager's death. When the Lü clan was annihilated, he was removed from office. Kong Guang was a partisan belonging to Wang Mang's faction, so his appointment was given so that Emperor Ping would be even more influenced by Wang's political devices. Wang saw the wisdom in taking the position himself, and only dropped the title when Emperor Ping died. Emperor Guangwu of Han appointed a Grand Tutor once he assumed the throne, while his successors followed suit.
Page 6: As shown on the table on this page, every single emperor of the Eastern Han except for Emperor Huan of Han had a Grand Tutor established at the beginning of his reign. Like the Western Han, Grand Tutors were appointed at the beginning of the emperors' reigns, and after the Grand Tutor died his vacant seat was not filled again until a new emperor came to the throne. Emperors An, Shun, Zhi, and Xian actually inherited the Grand Tutors that had been established by their predecessors. There were two Grand Tutors installed during Emperor Ling of Han's reign, due to Chen Fan being killed by eunuchs in the crisis of 168 (Chen was replaced by He Guang). Elder and venerable statesmen were chosen as Grand Tutors, so that they could die off relatively soon after they were chosen. Seven of them died within a few years of obtaining this office, one was promoted and transferred as Grand Commandant, and two were killed in office (besides Chen Fan during Ling's reign, Yuan Wei who was killed during Xian's reign; Yuan was actually inherited from Shao's previous reign).

Three Excellencies before 8 BC[edit]

Page 7: The phrase "Three Excellencies" didn't even appear until the period between 126 and 124 BC, during Wu's reign, and during that time the office of the Grand Commandant was vacant. After 106 BC, the Chancellor and Grandee Secretary alone were the only "Excellencies" for the rest of the Western Han, although the tripartite structure would be revived during Eastern Han.
Page 7: The shi or bushel rank of the Excellencies before 8 BC is actually unknown! We only know from Ru Shun's (fl 189–265) later statements that the corresponding monthly salary of the Chancellor was 60,000 cash and the monthly salary of the Grandee Secretary was 40,000 cash. While the Grandee Secretary ranked below the Chancellor, the Grand Commandant must have ranked below the Grandee Secretary. Ru Shun's remark that the Commander-in-Chief earned 60,000 cash per month can only apply to the era after 87 BC, QUOTE: "i.e., after the regency had been introduced and the Commander-in-Chief was no longer a member of the cabinet."

The Chancellor[edit]

Page 7: The title Chancellor (chengxiang) was used since the beginning of Western Han. It was changed to Chancellor of State (xiangguo) in 196 BC but was reverted back to the old title in 189 BC. From 189 BC to 178 BC there were two chancellors in office, the Chancellor of the Right and Chancellor of the Left (the Right being superior to the Left). In 178 BC a single chancellor was once again in place.
Page 8: Here he cites Wang Yü-ch'üan! The guy who wrote that great article in the late 40s. The Chancellor was in charge of the state budget, QUOTE: "for which purpose his ministry stored and evaluated the financial accounts, maps, and population and land registers of the local administration. These documents were annually presented in the capital on the first day of the New Year. The Chancellor kept a roster of officials, graded their performance each year, and recommended candidates for vacancies. He also directed the Court Conference (p. 144) whenever the emperor requested advice and did not participate himself."
Page 8: In 118 BC a Director of Uprightness was installed under the office of the Chancellor, earning Equivalent to 2000 shi, and was responsible for reporting to him the illegal acts committed by officials. Other offices included two Chief Clerks (1000 shi each), a Master of Records, a Consultant (Equivalent to 600 shi), and a Prefect of the Conscripts at the Gates (who obviously protected entrances to the ministry).
Page 8: The office staff under the Chancellor was divided into Bureaus (cao), each one overseen by a Division Head (yuanshi) who ranked only 400 shi, and whose subordinates earned even less (Junior Division Heads earned 300 shi, Associates earned 200 shi, and Foreman Clerks earned 100 shi). The Bureaus included the Bureau of the East, the Bureau of the West, the Bureau of Memorials, the Bureau of Gatherings (in charge of accounts), and the Bureau of Consultation (in charge of giving advice).
Page 8: QUOTE: "It is clear that the ministry grew in size in the course of Former Han. During the early years, the Bureau of the East and the Bureau of the West had only nine and six officials respectively, all of whom then ranked 600 shi. By 117 B.C., the lesser staff of the whole ministry had increased to 382."

The Grandee Secretary[edit]

Page 8-9: During this entire period, the title of Grandee Secretary (yushi dafu) remianed unchanged. Although the Grandee Secretary may have been subordinate to the Chancellor at first, his ministry gradually became independent, and had overlapping jurisdiction in many state affairs and duties. He was QUOTE: "responsible for judiciary supervision of all officials, whatever their ranks, and whether belonging to the imperial palace, the central government, or the local administration. His main duty was to prevent abuse of authority."
Page 9-10: The Grandee Secretary had a Master of Records (zhubu, unknown salary) as his subordinate, as well as two Assistants (cheng), both ranking 1000 shi, one being the Palace Assistant Secretary (yushi zhongcheng) who is well known to history, and the other which little is known about, although his jurisdiction most surely covered everything the Palace Assistant Secretary was not responsible for (i.e. this other Assistant would have inspected the central bureaucracy other than palace officials, while his staff consisted of thirty secretaries each earning 600 shi and most likely divided into bureaus).
Page 9: The shortened form of Palace Assistant Secretary was simply Palace Assistant (zhongcheng). His office was located at the Orchid Terrace (Lantai) within the palace walls. It was in charge of maintaining charts, registers, imperial books QUOTE: "passed on to the throne memorials from the Three Excellencies, the Nine Ministers, and the local administration, and transmitted imperial edicts addressed to the commanderies and kingdoms. He also inspected behaviour of palace officials and reported breaches of discipline."
Page 9: Bielenstein says that, although the Grandee Secretary existed since the beginning of the dynasty, the imperial secretariat was not established until Emperor Wu of Han. During Wu's reign, QUOTE: "Memorials to the throne were processed by the Masters of Writing. The texts do not explain the seeming duplication of their efforts by the Palace Assistant Secretary. The answer may be found in one entry (HS 19A:5b), according to which the Palace Assistant Secretary impeached improperly written memorials. It seems that regular memorials had to pass through two levels of processing. They were first scrutinized in the office of the Palace Assistant Secretary for possible infringements of the law, including improperly written characters (HS 30:25a), and then sent to the imperial secretariat for action or rejection by the throne."
Page 9: There were fifteen Attending Secretaries (shiyushi), ranked at 600 shi each, who comprised the staff of the Palace Assistant Secretary. These Attending Secretaries must have also been part of the Bureaus (cao) of the Secretariat. Each Bureau had Junior Division Heads, Associates, and Foreman Clerks. The Foreman Clerks had to pass a literacy test (with knowledge of 9,000 Chinese characters and major writing styles) administered by the Prefect Grand Astrologer, or Chief Astronomer. Bielenstein says the Palace Assistant Secretary must also have controlled librarians since he was in charge of imperial books.
Page 9-10: Attending Secretaries could be sent out to inspect the provinces and discover any wrong-doing. Such inspections led to a mass execution in 99 BC, when the Attending Secretaries (entitled Special Commissioners Clad in Embroidered Garments, or xiuyi zhizhi) were given the authority to execute any official up to the rank of 2000 shi.
Page 10: Gradually, the Palace Assistant Secretary became responsible for the inspection of all local administrations. QUOTE: "At the beginning of Former Han, Clerks (shih) of the Chancellor had occasionally been dispatched to inspect the various provinces. These Clerks may actually have been officials under the Grandee Secretary, but since he occupied a lesser position than the Chancellor, the latter was at least nominally in charge. It is probable that the Clerks were none other than the Attending Secretaries fo the Palace Assistant Secretary."
Page 10: The permanent installation of Inspectors (ci shi), ranked at 600 shi, was implemented in 106 BC. Bielenstein states that they were subordinates fo the Palace Assistant Secretary, and were entrusted as central government officials, not local administrators.
Page 10: Much like the Chancellery, the ministry of the Grandee Secretary increased in size over time, so that by the time of Emperor Wu the lesser officials of it numbered 341.

The Grand Commandant/Commander-in-Chief[edit]

Page 10-11: The Grand Commandant (taiwei) was the head director of the military, but his post was irregularly filled (from 205–202 BC, from 196–195 BC, from 189–177 BC, from 154–150 BC, and in 140 BC). The title of this Excellency was changed in 119 BC to Commander-in-Chief (Da Sima) and was shared by two individuals, generals Wei Qing and Huo Qubing. Wei held the office until his death in 106 BC, while Huo held the office until his death in 117 BC, while they were the last in Western Han to obtain this office. Although the title was revided in 87 BC, QUOTE: "it had become politicized and was henceforth conferred on the regent. Although the regent continued to be identified as one of the Three Excellencies (cf. p. 159, note 12), he was not a member of the cabinet."
Page 11: Although little nuance is known about the Grand Commandant's subordinate officials, it is known that his ministry was organized somewhat along the lines of the other two Excellencies' ministries. He had Bureaus with Division Heads and Foreman Clerks, he had a Chief Clerk, a Master of Records, a Director of Uprightness, and a new Commissioner over the Army and Chief Commandant established in 119 BC.

Three Excellencies after 8 BC[edit]

Page 11: In May to June of 8 BC, the cabinet was reformed so that the Grandee Secretary was replaced by a Grand Minister of Works, whose salary (alongside the Commander-in-Chief, or regent) was raised to the same level as the Chancellor. It is also known that from 8 BC onwards, each of the Three Excellencies earned a salary of 10,000 shi.
Page 11: QUOTE: "The disappearance of the Grandee Secretary did not mean that the central government abandoned its chief censorial surveillance of the bureaucracy. The Later Han divided it among the Three Excellencies. A single entry in the sources reveals that the first three of the Nine Ministers (Grand Master of Ceremonies, Superintendant of the Imperial Household, Commmandant of the Guards) belonged to the division of the Grand Commandant, the next three (Grand Coachman, Commandant of Justice, Grand Herald) to the division of Minister Over the Masses (see p. 14), and the last three (Director of the Imperial Clan, Grand Minister of Agriculture, Privy Treasurer) to the division of the Minister of Works."
Page 11-12: Although the two-partite cabinet with the Chancellor as the most senior official was the mainstay of Western Han, the Eastern Han had a tripartite division of government with the Three Excellencies seen as co-equals. The censorial powers of the Three Excellencies overlapped each other in the inspection of local administrations, as well as the annual reports used to promote or demote officials. The Three Excellencies (and their subordinates) were expected to investigate the same exact officials of local government throughout the entire empire, so that their powers were not limited to tripartite zones of the empire.
Page 12: Each Excellency was now responsible for heading three of nine specialized ministries, were each responsible for censorial affairs, and were the emperor's advisers. They could make independent or joint policy proposals to the emperor.
Page 12: Although his rank and salary remained unchanged and equal to the other two Excellencies, the Grand Commandant gradually came to be seen as the de facto leader of the tripartite cabinet. The Chancellor never recovered from his loss of status to two equals.

Commander-in-Chief/Grand Commandant[edit]

Page 12: During the reign of Wang Mang, he did not want to bow to any regent, so he divorced the title and duties of Commander-in-Chief from the regent's role, did not have a regent, and the Commander-in-Chief became one of the regular three members of the cabinet of Excellencies.
Page 12: The system of Wang Mang was kept throughout Eastern Han, i.e. the regent did not hold the titles of Commander-in-Chief or Grand Commandant. The title Commander-in-Chief (Da Sima) was used during the reign of Emperor Guangwu, although on June 8, 51 AD the title was reverted back to the old Grand Commandant (Taiwei). The first two Commanders-in-Chief were military generals; after 51 AD, the Grand Commandants were civiilian officials. Their ministry eventually expanded so that it dominated the other two members of the cabinet, Minister over the Masses and Minister of Works.
Page 12-13: Like in the old days, the staff of the Grand Commandant's ministry was still headed by a Chief Clerk (zhangshi), who earned 1,000 shi, although the Director of Uprightness and Master of Records were no longer in service. The Commissioner over the Army and Chief Commandant (huzhun duwei) had his salary-rank increased in 8 BC to Equivalent to 2,000 shi. His title was changed to Director Against Brigands (sikou) in 1 BC and then Commissioner Over the Army in 1 AD, although he was never mentioned as being revived in Eastern Han.
Page 13: The Grand Commandant's ministry had thirteen bureaus, but they are vaguely described. The two most significant ones were the Bureau of the East (Dong Cao) and the Bureau of the West (Xi Cao). The former was in charge of expenditures, while the latter was in charge of appointment, promotion, and demotion of officials up to the 2,000 shi rank. The Bureau of Households oversaw population registers, sacrifices, rituals, agriculture, and sericulture of China's commoners. The Bureau of Memorials naturally oversaw memorials and discussions. The Bureau of Statements oversaw litigations. The Bureau of laws oversaw postal stations and couriers. The Bureau of Command oversaw conscript soldiers, convict laborers, and transportation needs. The Bureau of Banditry coordinated efforts to suppress banditry. The Bureau of Decisions handled criminal law. The Bureau of Arms supervised military affairs. The Bureau of Metal oversaw currency, salt, and iron production (i.e. the state monopolies). The Bureau of Granaries naturally oversaw granaries, as well as collection of tax grain. The Bureau of the Yellow Door handled official records. A fourteenth bureau was set up at least by 40 AD (when it was first mentioned) called the Bureau of Consultation. As with previous bureaus, these were all placed under Division Heads (yuanshi), some of whom had Associates and Attendants in their staffs, but not all.
Page 13: From these bureaus functions, it is obvious that the Grand Commandant's ministry dealt with far more than military affairs, but the ancient sources give most of the existing details about the censorial and advisery duties which he shared with the other two Excellencies, not these other functions unfortunately.

Grand Minister Over the Masses/Minister Over the Masses[edit]

Page 14: The title Chancellor (chengxiang) was replaced on June 21, 1 BC with a new title called Grand Minister over the Masses (dasitu). This title continued in used during the usurpation of Wang Mang and the duration of Eastern Han. The prefix 'Grand' was dropped from the title on June 8, 51 AD, rendering the new title Minister over the Masses (situ).
Page 14: QUOTE: "Little is known about the particular duties of the Minister over the Masses in Later Han times. He presumably was still responsible for drawing up the annual budget, although the sources are silent on this point. He had the same censorial and advisory responsibilities as the other two Excellencies. It is not certain that he still presided over the Court Conference in the absence of the emperor, but the Great Conference was definitely held in his ministry."
Page 14: Although the bureaus of the earlier chancellor were kept (and were pretty much parallel to that of the new Grand Commandant), there were some changes to the staff under the Minister over the Masses. On June 22, 35 AD the Director of Uprightness was scrapped, and by about this time the Master of Records is no longer mentioned. Instead of two Chief Clerks there is only one, his salary-rank still at 1,000 shi.
Page 14-15: Also, like the new Grand Commandant, the Minister over the Masses had in his staff a Libationer (jijiu), and like the Grand Commandant, he also had agents dispatched to the provinces who were given the special title Messenger with a Pure Edict (qingzhao shi). These were just some of the parallels between the two Excellencies' staffs.

Grand Minister of Works/Minister of Works[edit]

Page 15: Although the Grandee Secretary's name was changed to Grand Minister of Works (da sikong) in 8 BC, Wang Yü-ch'üan says the title change did not have an affect on this Excellency's functions and duties. Bielenstein disagrees; he says that the censorial and advisory powers of the Grand Minister of Works were more limited than that of the Grandee Secretary, because he QUOTE: "shared them in a tripartite arrangement with the other two Excellencies." Furthermore, he had a new specialized role: to oversee public works, something that was not included in the duties of the Grandee Secretary's office. The Grand Minister of Works supervised the construction of QUOTE: "city walls, towns, canals, ditches, and dikes." He crafted an annual report for the throne each year detailing the achievements of local administrations in such construction projects; this report was another basis of rewards or punishments, promotion or demotion for local officials.
Page 15: In 7 BC, the Director of Retainers (sili), an officer who existed prior to 89 BC as an overseer of road and canal construction, was reestablished (earning Equivalent to 2,000 shi) but was placed under the command of the new Grand Minister of Works. Also, the Court Architect was now only responsible for imperial structures, while all other building projects were handled by the Minister of Works.
Page 16: To make things a bit confusing, the Grand Minister of Works was reverted back to the Grandee Secretary in 5 BC, then reverted back to the Grand Minister of Works in 1 BC.
Page 16: The Chief Clerk under the Minister of Works, changed to Chief Clerk Secretary by 1 BC, held some of the same responsibilites that the Palace Assistant Secretary had in regards to the palace, but lost his powes to inspect local administrations as a censor. As for the Palace Assistant Secretary, early in the Eastern Han he was transferred to the ministry of the Privy Treasurer. The Director of the Retainers was not kept.
Page 16: However, the Minister of Works had censorial powers and duties as well as an advisory role which were equal and parallel to the other two Excellencies.
Page 16: On June 8, 51 AD his title was changed to Minister of Works, dropping the "Grand" from the title.
Page 16-17: Like the Grand Commandant and Minister over the Masses, the Minister of Works had the regular bureaus with Division Heads, as well as a Chief Clerk ranked at 1,000 shi.

The Nine Ministers[edit]

Page 17: The Nine Ministers retained a Fully 2000 shi salary-rank throughout Western Han and Eastern Han. QUOTE: "They were not directly subordinated to the members of the cabinet, but subject to their censorial supervision. Each of the Nine Ministers headed an independent and, in some cases, large ministry."

The Grand Master of Ceremonies[edit]

Page 17: The Grand Master of Ceremonies (taichang) was established in 200 BC under Emperor Gaozu of Han, changed to the Upholder of Ceremonies by Emperor Hui of Han in 195 BC, then reverted back to Grand Master of Ceremonies in 144 BC, during the reign of Emperor Jing of Han.
Page 17: His job was to organize and carry out state rituals and ceremonies. He was also charged with inspecting imperial graves. Until about 43 or 40 BC, he was also in charge of maintaining the imperial tomb towns, but these were soon placed under the authority of the respective commanderies they were located in. QUOTE: "He was responsible for the observatory, divination, the recording of portents and auspicious omens, the selection of auspicious days, and the Academy."
Page 17-18: The Grand Master of Ceremonies once had been in charge of the emperor's health through his subordinate, the Prefect Grand Physician (taiyi ling), yet this duty belonged properly to the Privy Treasurer, who eventually had the Prefect Grand Physician transferred to his ministry sometime during Western Han.
Page 18: The various subordinates of the Grand Master of Ceremonies performed a collective multitude of functions. His ministry's Prefect Grand Supplicator (changed to Prefect Invocator in 144 BC and then Prefect Ancestral Temple Invocator in 104 BC) was the leader of prayers at national sacrifices. Other functions carried out by his subordinates included the reporting of illegal acts committed in ancestral temples, aiding the emperor at state rituals, preparing and arranging sacrificial foods, and arranging ritual music and dancing.
Page 18: The Western Han had an ancestral temple placed at every imperial tomb. Each of these was overseen by four different prefects, one in charge of the ancestral temple, one in charge of funerary chambers, one in charge of the funerary park, and one in charge of sacrificial offerings.
Page 18-19: Like the Privy Treasurer, Minister of Agriculture, and Chief Commandant of Waters and Parks, the Minister of Ceremonies had tax collecting subordinates known as the Chief Director of Waters and Chief of the Office of Adjustment. The former collected taxes from fisherman who used the waterways of the funerary parks, while the latter collected taxes from merchants who set up shop and stall near ancestral temples.
Page 19: See augur for info you just added.
Page 19: The Prefect Grand Astrologer, QUOTE: "The most versatile and technically trained official in the ministry and, for that matter, the entire central government was the Prefect Grand Astrologer (t'ai-shih ling). He ranked 600 shih. Aided by one Assistant (ch'eng), he was in charge of drawing up the annual calendar and of memorializing it shortly before each New Year's day. On the first of each month, he also informed the emperor about the calendar of that month. For state rituals, he identified days which were auspicious and days to be avoided. He kept a record of portents and auspicious omens...In addition, he supervised two tests which had to be passed by those aspiring to appointment as Masters of Documents, i.e. imperial secretaries under the Privy Treasurer, or as Foreman Clerks under the Palace Assistant Secretary in the ministry of the Grandee Secretary. The first requirement was knowing 9,000 characters, the second mastery of the Six Styles of Writing."
Page 19: The Imperial Academy (Taixue), QUOTE: "One of the most important functions of the Grand Master of Ceremonies was to oversee the Academy (T'ai-hsüeh) and its educational standards. This Academy had forerunners in earlier reigns, but only became a Confucian institution of learning in 136 B.C. ...It was headed by the Supervisor of the Erudits (po-shih p'u-yeh). Under him were the Erudits (po-shih), one each for the recognized schools of the Five Classics (i.e. the Book of Changes, the Book of Documents, the Book of Odes, the Book of Rites, and the Spring and Autumn Annals). Their rank was a lowly 400 shih until the reign of Emperor Hsüan (74–48 B.C.), when it was raised to Equivalent to 600 shih. Each time new Erudits were selected, the Grand Master of Ceremonies examined the candidates, and then reported their level of expertise to the emperor."
Page 19-20: Transition to Eastern Han, QUOTE: "During Later Han, there was no major change in this ministry's scope of authority, even though ten of its offices were abolished after the restoration...They were those of the five Commandants at the Five Sacred Places at Yung prefecture, the Prefect Grand Butcher in Yung, the Prefect Grand Supplicator in Yung, the Prefects of the Funerary Chambers at the imperial grave mounds, the Chief Director of Waters, and the Chief of the Office of Adjustment. The Five Sacred Places at Yung had become obsolete. The ancestral temples and funerary chambers at the imperial grave mounds of Former Han had been destroyed after the fall of that dynasty and were not rebuilt by Later Han. Except for the three child emperors Shang, Ch'ung, and Chih, and the mothers of Emperors An, Ho, and Shun (who posthumously were elevated to the rank of empress), only the founder of Later Han had a funerary chamber at his mound. All taxation was shifted to the local administration. In short, the ten offices were no longer needed."
Page 20: QUOTE: The office of the former Prefect Ancestral Temple Invocator was divided. One of the two new offices was placed under a Prefect Grand Supplicator, the other under a Prefect Invocator, both ranking 600 shih. This means that the two earlier titles of the Prefect Ancestral Temple Invocator were revived but now applied to different officials. The Prefect Invocator was put in charge of minor sacrifices within the palace compounds and transferred to the ministry of the Privy Treasurer (see p. 62). The Prefect Grand Supplicator (t'ai-chu ling) remained with the Master of Ceremonies, continued to be the national prayer-master, and had one Assistant (ch'eng) during at least part of the dynasty.
Page 21: Like the Ministry of Ceremonies in Western Han, the Eastern Han Ministry of Ceremonies retained a prefect for music and a prefect butcher for sacrificial food.
Page 21: The Prefect of the Temple Eminent Founder and Prefect of the Temple of the Epochal Founder, QUOTE: "Since the Later Han abandoned the practice of building ancestral temples at the imperial graves, it only appointed one Prefect of the Temple Eminent Founder (Kao miao ling) and one Prefect of the Temple of the Epochal Founder (Shih-tsu miao ling), each ranking 600 shih, and neither having an assistant. The two shrines were located within the walled city of Lo-yang. These Prefects were in charge of guarding, inspecting, and cleaning the temples."
Page 21: QUOTE: "For each of its imperial tombs, the Later Han appointed one Prefect of the Funerary Park (yüan ling), ranking 600 shih. It kept the Assistant (ch'eng), did away with the position of Chief, and appointed instead one Chief of a Regiment (hsiao chang) at 200 shih. The Prefect was responsible for inspecting and cleaning the mound and park, while his Chief of Regiment guarded against grave robbers. The size of the security force is not stated. Secondly, there was appionted for each tomb one Prefect of the Office of Offerings (ssu-kuan ling) ranking 600 shih...Here was well, the position of Chief was abolished."
Page 21-22: QUOTE: "It also was the custom after the death of an emperor to attach childless harem ladies to his tomb. They acted as general attendants, marked the time by beating drums, arranged covers and pillows, prepared bath water, and set out toilet articles, as though the emperor were still alive."
Page 22: QUOTE: "The Prefect Grand Astrologer (t'ai-shih ling) ranked 600 shih and had one general Assistant (ch'eng)...The sphere of his authority was increased by absorbing into his office that of the former Prefect Grand Augur."
Page 23: QUOTE: "The title of the head of the Academy (T'ai-hsüeh) was changed from Supervisor of the Erudits to Libationer of the Erudits (po-shih chi-chiu), ranking 600 shih...He performed the ritual of sacrificing wine to Earth...The Erudits (po-shih) continued to be appointed one for each recognized school of the Five Classics and to the rank of 600 shih. By the middle of the second century A.D., the student body had reached a size of more than 30,000."
Page 23: Inspector of the Imperial Library, QUOTE: "During Former Han, imperial books had been under the jurisdiction of the Palace Assistant Secretary in the ministry of the Grandee Secretary (see p. 9). When that ministry was dismantled from 8 B.C. onward, the Palace Assistant Secretary was transferred to the ministry of the Privy Treasurer (see pp. 16 and 58). Presumably his duties continued to include upkeep of the imperial library until A.D. 159. That year, the office of Inspector of the Imperial Library (pi-shu chien) at the rank of 600 shih was created for the first time and placed in the ministry of the Grand Master of Ceremonies...He was in charge of charts and books, of standardizing ancient and current temples and compound characters, and of reconciling textual variants...i.e., he became the chief librarian of the various imperial book collections in the Southern and Northern Palaces of Lo-yang."

The Superintendant of the Imperial Household[edit]

Page 23: QUOTE: "The original title of this minister was Prefect of the Gentleman-of-the-Palace (lang-chung ling), but in 104 B.C. it was changed to Superintendant of the Imperial Household (kuang-lu hsün). He was responsible for security within the public parks of the palace compounds and for protecting the emperor on his excursions from the palace. The military contingents at the entrances and walls of the palace compounds were controlled by the Commandant of the Guards, while in his private apartments the emperor was protected by the eunuchs...This division of duties was undoubtedly designed to prevent a single official from gaining complete physical control over the emperor's person. The Superintendant of the Imperial Household was furthermore in charge of certain officials who served the emperor with advice and criticism, and of the imperial Internuncios. In these endeavours, the Superintendant of the Imperial Household was aided by one Assistant (ch'eng) ranking 1000 shih."
Page 24: During Western Han, there were five units of security for the public areas of the palace. Three of these were maintained by the General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household for All Purposes, the General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household of the Left, General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household of the Right, each ranking Equivalent to 2000 shi. QUOTE: "These three units enrolled certain categories of candidates for office who underwent a probationary period in the capital. The majority of the candidates, collectively known as Gentlemen (lang), had either been recommended as Filially Pious and Incorrupt (hsiao-lien) by the commanderies and kingdoms, or had been nominated as close relatives by high officials after three years in service (for details see pp. 132–3, 134ff). Armed with lances, they served as bodyguards within the palace compounds, in particular at interior gates and doors. When the emperor left the palace, they protected his chariot. Those who proved their character were eventually promoted to regular offices in the civil service...The Gentlemen in each of the three units were appointed at three different levels. The Gentlemen-of-the-Household (chung-lang) ranked Equivalent to 600 shih, the Gentlemen-in-Attendance (shih-lang) Equivalent to 400 shih, and the Gentlemen-of-the-Palace (lang-chung) Equivalent to 300 shih."
Page 24: Now for the fourth unit, QUOTE: "The other two units were manned by ordinary imperial bodyguards. They also had the title of Gentlemen (lang) but were not candidates for higher office. The first of the units was established in 138 B.C. It enrolled the Attendants at the Gates (ch'i-men), under a Supervisor of the Attendants at the Gates (ch'i-men p'u-yeh) who ranked Equivalent to 1000 shih. At most, this contingent numbered 1000 men during Former Han. In A.D. 1, the Attendants at the Gates were renamed Gentlemen Rapid as Tigers (hu-pen lang) and placed under the command of a General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household Rapid as Tigers (hu-pen chung-lang chiang) ranking Equivalent to 2000 shih. At that time Wang Mang was in power, so that the change of nomenclature must have been due to him. The Gentlemen Rapid as Tigers were cavalrymen...Nothing is known about their ranks."
Page 24-25: Now for the fifth unit, QUOTE: "The second unit also consisted of cavalrymen. It was established in 104 B.C. as a palace guard under the name of Cavalry fo the Encampment at the Palace of Established Brilliance...At an unknown date, but before Emperor Wu's death in 87 BC...it was renamed Cavalry of the Feathered Forest...These cavalrymen, also known as the Gentlemen of the Feathered Forest...were first commanded by one Prefect of the Feathered Forest...aided by one Assistant. From the time of Emperor Hsüan (r. 73–48 B.C.), a General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household of the Feathered Forest... and a Chief Commandant of Cavalry...were in charge of the unit, each ranking Equivalent to 2000 shih. The offices of the Prefect of the Feathered Forest and his Assistant were presumably abolished, even though the sources are silent on this point."
Page 25: QUOTE: "HS says nothing about the rank or ranks to which the Gentlemen of the Feathered Forest were appointed, but states that they were recruited from among the sons and grandsons of soldiers who had fallen in battle. These youngsters were referred to as the Orphans of the Feathered Forest...raised in the barrakcs of the Feathered Forest, and trained in the use of weapons...For imperial processions, Gentlemen of the Feathered Forest were detached to act as Standard Bearers (mao-t'ou), ride in front, and clear the road. Their standards consisted of the tails of wild oxen."
Page 25: QUOTE: "The second major duty of the Superintendant of the Imperial Household was through his staff to provide the emperor with advice and criticism. Foremost among the advisers were the Palace Grandees," renamed Imperial Household Grandees in 104 BC. Bielenstien then goes on to say these officials, in three rank-salary grades, did not initiate advice but only answered questions; however, in their private time, they could draft their own memorials to the throne. They also conducted the mourning ceremonies of kings and marquises, and had their successors installed. They could also be sent to the provinces on tours of inspection.
Page 26: Although it is unknown to what extent they did this, the Grandee Remonstrants (jiandafu) appointed as early as 118 BC (earning Equivalent to 800 shi) were supposed to speak up and criticize the emperor when he failed in his duties. They were also sometimes sent out as provincial inspectors and report unjust law cases.
Page 26: In this ministry, there were also the Internuncious (yezhe), ranked at Equivalent to 600 shi, who were subordinate to the Supervisor of the Internuncios (yezhe puye), ranked at 1,000 shi. QUOTE: "The Internuncios assisted at imperial ceremonies, condoled on behalf of the emperor at the deaths of medium-level officials, and did various kinds of errands for the government, in the capital, in the provinces, and even beyond the borders of the empire."
Page 26: The Superintendant of the Imperial Household had a Bureau Head of the Left and a Bureau Head of the Right, each earning 2000 shi, as his subordinates. QUOTE: "The role of the two honorary Bureau Heads seems to have been that of intermediaries in the transmission of documents from the office of the Masters of Writing, i.e. the imperial secretariat, to the emperor or his delegate."
Page 26-27: During Eastern Han, the Assistant and Master of Affairs were still kept under the Superintendant of the Imperial Household. The General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household for All Purposes, the General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household of the Left, General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household of the Right still had the rank-salary of Equivalent to 2000 shi and were still in charge of candidates for office. However, their three units were now termed as the Three Corps, with all Filial and Incorrupt nominees aged 50 and above placed under the Gentlemen-of-the-Household for All Purposes, and any of these nominees under age 50 placed in the other two units. Just like Western Han, these gentlemen were divided into three groups by salary-rank (Equivalent to 600 shi, Equivalent to 400 shi, Equivalent to 300 shi).
Page 27: QUOTE: "The other two units continued to be manned by imperial bodyguards who were not candidates for office. The founder of Later Han briefly abandoned the term Rapid as Tigers and revived the earlier terminology used from 138 B.C. to A.D. 1. An Acting Supervisor of the Attendants at the Gates...was appointed in A.D. 26...and Attendants at the Gates...are mentioned for A.D. 29 and 34...But no later than the early forties, the title of General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household Rapid as Tigers...was again in use, at the old rank of Equivalent to 2000 shih."
Page 28: There were four levels or grades of Gentlemen Rapid as Tigers during Eastern Han, ranging from Equivalent to 600 shi, then to 400, 300 and the lowest at Equivalent to 200 shi. According to one author the Gentelman Rapid as Tigers was a hereditary position, and allegedly numbered 1500 men.
Page 28: The Eastern Han Dynasty also retained the Gentlemen of the Feathered Forest and their General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household of the Feathered Forest, although the Chief Commandant of Cavalry was scrapped. Unlike other Gentlemen units who had levels of ranks, Gentlemen of the Feathered Forest were all the same rank, Equivalent to 300 shi, while their General earned Equivalent to 2,000 shi.
Page 29: In the Eastern Han, the Chief Commandant of Cavalry earning Equivalent to 2000 shi was not a commander of the Feathered Forest like he was in Western Han; instead, there were generally ten of these officers who led and commanded troops during war.
Page 29-30: The imperial advisers of the Superintendant of the Imperial Household remained unchanged during Eastern Han, with one exception: some of their salary ranks were tweeked so that the Imperial Household Grandees dropped from 2000 shi to Equivalent to 2000 shi; in contrast, the status of Grand Palace Grandee was elevated from Equivalent to 1000 shi to the slightly higher rank of 1000 shi. A new position known as Palace Attendant Grandees was also created (sometime during Wang Mang's reign), and were ranked at 600 shi; this was retained by Eastern Han.
Page 30: The censors known as Grandee Remonstrants were renamed Grandee Remonstrants and Consultants during Eastern Han, earning 600 shi.
Page 30-31: The Internuncios and their Supervisor were retained in Eastern Han, but the single rank for Internuncios found in Western Han was expanded to include three different ranks in Eastern Han, ranging from Equivalent to 600 shi, to 400 shi, to Equivalent to 300 shi. The middle grade rank was not achieved until a full year of service.
Page 31: Emperor Guangwu of Han abolished the Superintendant of the Imperial Household's subordinates known as the Bureau Head of the Left and Bureau Head of the Right, so that the emperor himself could supervise the Masters of Writing, i.e. imperial secretariat, while using eunuchs as his messengers, transmitters, and intermediaries instead.

The Commandant of the Guards[edit]

Page 31: The title Commandant of the Guards (wei wei) was changed to Prefect of the Palace Grandees during Emperor Jing of Han's reign, but it was reverted back to its earlier title Commandant of the Guards in 143 BC and remained so until the end of Eastern Han.
Page 31: The ministry of the Commandant of the Guards was located within the palace during Western Han, and outside the palace during Eastern Han.
Page 31: One of the major duties of the Commandant of the Guards was to supervise the conscripted guards stationed at the entrances to palace compounds as well as in guard houses along the walls. These conscripts were also used as patrols along palace walls, covered passageways, and along palace lanes. They did not guard the private apartments where eunuchs were the guards, and they did not guard places considered public, which was where the Gentlemen under the Superintendant of the Imperial Household acted as guards.
Page 31: Terms of duty for these conscript guards lasted a year, and at the end of their service the emperor threw a congratulatory feast for them before demobilization.
Page 31-32: During Western Han, the Commandant of the Guards had an Assistant ranked at 1000 shi. There were three different units of Guards (wei shi), each one with a different commander; these were the Prefect of the Majors in Charge of Official Carriages (responsible for the Gates of Official Carriages), the Prefect of the Guards (responsible for every entrance to palace compounds), and the Prefect of the Emergency Cohort (little is known about his duties, although he had an Assistant like the Prefect of the Majors for Official Carriages; the Prefect of the Guards had three Assistants). The contingents under the Prefect of the Guards were the Majors of the Garrison Guard and Captains of the Garrison Guard, numbering 22 in all.
Page 32: These officers' main base was the Eternal Palace (Weiyang Palace), the main palace of Chang'an, while other palaces had similar arrangements, although not always constantly filled by parallel posts found at Weiyang.
Page 32: During Eastern Han, the Commandant of the Guards still had an assistant, although more details are known about his personal staff, which included scholars, clerks, apprentices, a physician, 42 officers, and 60 guards. The Prefect of the Majors in Charge of Official Carriages was retained, aided still by one Assistant, and managed the Gates of Official Carriages at both the Southern Palace and Northern Palace of Luoyang. During Eastern Han, there were also two Prefects of the Guards, a Prefect of the Guards of the Southern Palace and a Prefect of the Guards of the Northern Palace. Both had one assistant, both ranked 600 shi like the Prefect of the Majors in Charge of Official Carriages, but nothing is known of their duties. The southern prefect had 95 officers and 537 guards, while the northern prefect had 72 officers and 427 guards.
Page 32-33: Unlike Western Han, the Eastern Han Prefects of the Guards did not control the gaurd units at each entrance to palace compounds, since the seven Majors in charge of these units in Luoyang all ahd higher ranks at Equivalent to 1000 shi. QUOTE: "Perhaps it was considered dangerous to concentrate too much power in the hands of only two men." Bielenstein then goes on to list the different majors and how many guard units each commanded.
Page 33: QUOTE: "At all gates, the majors were in charge of preventing unauthorized entry. Those who lived within the palace compounds always came and went through the same appropriate gates, where their names and offices were entered on a register. They identified themselves by iron tallies, whose other halves were kept at the respective gate. Persons who entered on special errands were issued by their superiors with wooden credentials, decorated with a picture of a lance. These credentials also consisted of two halves, one of which was retained at the gate until the departure of the person in question. Officials who entered the palace compounds on regular duty were announced by attendants...During emergencies, the tallies were collected, which effectively prevented entry other than by force."
Page 33-34: Emperor Guangwu of Han abolished the Prefect of the Emergency Cohort while establishing new officers, the Captain at the Capital of the Left and Captain at the Capital of the Right, each earning 600 shi. They commanded Warriors with Swords and Lances, who were patrolmen assigned to the palace grounds and carried out imperial arrests and interrogations. The Left Captain had 28 officers and 383 guards; the Right Captain had 22 officers and 416 guards.

The Grand Coachman[edit]

Page 34-35: The title Grand Coachman (taipu) remained the same throughout the Western and Eastern Han Dynasty. The Grand Coachman in Western Han times had two Assistants, each earning 1000 shi, while the Grand Coachman in Eastern Han times had one Assistant, earning Equivalent to 1000 shi.
Page 34: He was in charge of raising and supplying horses for the army, imperial stables, and imperial carriages. In Western Han, there were 36 Master Herdsman's Pastures spread out over northwestern China, which collectively maintained some 300,000 horses. Some 30,000 slaves were employed as stockmen for these pastures, where sheep and cattle could be raised as sacrificial animals for state rituals. Each pasture was administered by a Prefect of the Master Herdsman's Pastures. There were a number of imperial stables and coachhouses at Chang'an, each commanded by a fancy-titled prefect ranked at 600 shi.
Page 35: A number of "Chief Inspectors" were the officials in charge of the stables outside the city walls, including the Chief Inspector of the Stables for Tall Horses, who managed the Fergana horses taken from Central Asia (a thousand of these fine horses were brough to China in 101 BC).
Page 35: Besides the one assistant already mentioned, the personal staff of the Grand Coachman during Eastern Han included scholars, clerks, apprentices, mounted officials, a physician, and 70 officers.
Page 36-37: The numbers of pastures throughout Eastern Han fluctuated as the needs for them diminished or increased; the founder, Emperor Guangwu of Han, allegedly abandoned all but one of the 36 pastures during his reign, but later records reveal the establishment of new pastures for the campaigns against the Northern Xiongnu and Tibetans. Likewise, the exact number of stables is also uncertain (known to have fluctuated throughout Eastern Han), while in Western Han Chang'an it was known that there were exactly thirteen stables, four coachhouses, and one pen.
Page 37-38: Perhaps inspired by the use of the Grand Coachman's horses transporting military arms to the state armory, the Prefect of the Complete Workman Office (ranking 600 shi) that once worked for the Privy Treasurer during Western Han was transferred to the Grand Coachman's ministry during Eastern Han. The Prefect of the Complete Workman Office was responsible for the crafting of bows, crossbows, swords, armor, seal cords, and other objects that were transported, when finished, to the armory by the Bearer of the Gilded Mace. However, it became the practice to fill the Prefect of the Complete Workman Office's post with a eunuch Inspector (ranking 600 shi), so it is possible that during the late Eastern Han the office was at least partially out of the hands of the Grand Coachman.

The Commandant of Justice[edit]

Page 38: The name of this minister changed a few times during Western Han, from Commandant of Justice to Grand Judge in 144 BC, then back to Commandant of Justice in 137 BC, then back to Grand Judge in 1 BC, and then with the establishment of Eastern Han, only the title Commandant of Justice was used.
Page 38: QUOTE: "The Commandant of Justice was the chief interpreter of the law. He ruled on dubious cases referred to him. He was the chief judge in all trials conducted in the Imperial Prison...attached to his ministry...and he participated through subordinates in some of the trials held by local administrators. He also was in charge of the standards for linear measures."
Page 38: During Western Han, the Commandant of Justice's senior staff (all three ranking 1000 shi) composed of a Director, Inspector of the Left, and Inspector of the Right. Before 66 BC, low-ranking Clerks under the Commandant of Justice were sent to assist the commandery and kingdom officials in adjusting law cases. However, the clerks were replaced by four referees, each ranking 600 shi, in 66 BC, so that they could exercise greater influence.
Page 38: Starting during the reign of Emperor Wu, Chang'an had 26 prisons designated for officials who had committed crimes; each prison was overseen by a prefect. The Imperial Prison maintained by the Commandant of Justice must have been one of these, but it is uncertain if the Commandant of Justice oversaw all 26 of them.
Page 38-39: Like the other ministries, the Commandant of Justice had burueas under him that were each led by a Division Head.
Page 39: Other subordinates of the Commandant of Justice that are known were simple Clerks Who Are Literary Scholars and Accessory Clerks for Documents.
Page 39: In the Eastern Han Dynasty, the Director was retained, but of the Inspectors, only the Inspector of the Left was kept. Likewise with the referees, instead of four there was now only a Referee of the Left (still ranking 600 shi). His chief assistants were also reduced in number. The Imperial Prison was the only one maintained by the ministry, and its trials were heard by the Referee of the Left. During Eastern Han, the Commandant of Justice had 140 subordinate officials in his personal staff, including scholars, judiciary clerks, mounted officials, and a physician.

The Grand Herald[edit]

Page 39: The original title of this minister was Director of Guests, changed to Prefect Grand Usher in 144 BC, and then Grand Herald in 104 BC, a title that was retained into Eastern Han.
Page 39-40: QUOTE: "The Grand Herald was in charge of visitors to the court and matters arising from such visits. When the kings of the imperial house came to the capital, he welcomed them in the suburbs. He condoled on behalf of the government at the deaths of kings, and memorialized the posthumous names of kings and full marquises. Through this, he came to be responsible for the orderly inheritance of noble titles and fiefs among the kings and full marquises. When the Officials in Charge of Accounts...arrived in the capital for the New Year festivals in order to present the annual accounts of the commanderies and kingdoms, it was the Grand Herald who received them. The Grand Herald administered all barbarians who had 'attached themselves to righteousness', which, in practice, meant the reception in the capital of foreign missions and hostages, the negotiations with foreigners, and the occasional conferring of Chinese titles. Finally, the Grand Herald directed the participants at imperial ceremonies. While the Grand Master of Ceremonies was responsible for the proper performance of the ritual and for guiding the emperors through its intricacies, the Grand Herald assisted the various officials, nobles, and foreigners to their appropriate places and instructed them in their roles."
Page 40: The Grand Herald was assisted by one Assistant (at 1000 shi), three prefects, and a Chief of the Commandery Quarters. The latter prepared and maintained the living quarters in each commandery and kingdom where officials traveling to the capital could lodge. There is evidence that in the Eastern Han these quarters also accomodated private citizens. A Master of Guests was most likely an official in charge of receiving foreigners. The Grand Herald is also known to have had literary scholars in his staff, but nothing else is known about the size or scope of his personal staff in Western Han.
Page 40: When the post of Director of Dependent States was abolished in 28 BC, the Grand Herald took over his duties. Thus, the Chief Commandant of Dependent States became the subordinate of the Grand Herald, but this arrangement did not survive into Eastern Han.
Page 40-41: During Eastern Han, the Assistant to the Grand Herald had his salary-rank lowered to Equivalent to 1000 shi. In Eastern Han, the personal staff of the Grand Herald consisted of literary scholars, mounted officials, apprentices, accessory clerks, five physicians, and a number of other officials.
Page 41: However, instead of three prefects in Western Han, only one prefect was retained in Eastern Han, the Prefect Grand Usher (at 600 shi). Although this meant that the Prefect of the Office of Interpreters was no longer employed, this did not mean that the Eastern Han did not employ interpreters, as they were constantly needed. There is evidence instead that other ministries had their own interpreters, while the interpreter for the Grand Herald was most likely placed in a minor position under one of the Grand Herald's subordinates. Also, the Dependent States were withdrawn from the jurisdiction of the Grand Herald's ministry and even the central government; their affairs were entrusted to local administrations.

The Director of the Imperial Clan[edit]

Page 41: Although his name was briefly changed to Elder of the Imperial Clan in 4 AD, the Eastern Han reverted back to the original title of Director of the Imperial Clan (zong cheng) for this ministry. He kept a register of all the members of the imperial clan, updated every Chinese New Year. If a member of the imperial clan committed a serious crime, this was first reported to the Director of the Imperial Clan, who relayed the case to the emperor for a decision.
Page 41: Like the other Nine Ministers, the Director of the Imperial Clan had an Assistant earning 1000 shi (changed to Equivalent to 1000 shi in Eastern Han), a personal staff of officials, clerks, a physician (and even two legal experts), as well as a number of subordinate chiefs and prefects who dealt with specialized affairs of imperial relatives, including giving them instructions about ordinances, examining them if they were suspects in a crime, and hearing their grievances if they were treated unjustly by someone.
Page 41: Under the supervision of the Director of the Imperial Clan were the Prefects of the Household and Commandants of the Gates for all imperial princesses, the latter who were kept under strict surveillance and watch by these officials. This is in contrast to the personnel staffs of kings and marquises, who were not subject to the Director of the Imperial Clan or any of the Nine Ministers for that matter.

The Grand Minister of Agriculture[edit]

Page 43: Originally the Clerk of the Capital for Grain, changed to Grand Prefect of Agriculture in 144 BC and then to Grand Minister of Agriculture in 104 BC (a title that remained as thus until the end of Eastern Han), this minister was the government treasurer, despite his title's emphasis on agriculture.
Page 43: The Grand Minister of Agriculture, QUOTE: "did not collect the poll and land taxes but stored them, whether in kind or in cash. It is not surprising that he also was in charge of the standards for capacity measures. From his storehouses, he provided the funds needed for the upkeep of the civil service and the army. He was in Former Han times responsible for the monopolies on salt, iron, and, for a time, fermented liquor, and throughout both dynasties he managed price stabilization. In short, the Chancellor drew up the budget (see p. 8), and the Grand Minister of Agriculture paid the bill."
Page 43: In Western Han times, the Grand Minister of Agriculture had two Assistants (1000 shi each), a personal staff, and subordinate officers who supervised different aspects of the treasury. There was a Prefect of the Great Granary, who looked after the Great Granary where all the tax grain collected from the provinces were stored (near the capital). It was at this place where the central government kept its standards for capacity measurements. The Imperial Treasury itself was administered by the subordinate called the Prefect of the Imperial Treasury, who oversaw the storage of money, silk, and other valuable items. A place called the Sacred Field, where the emperor himself performed ceremonial plowing during the first or second month of the year, was maintained by the Prefect of the Sacred Field, a subordinate of the Grand Minister of Agriculture.
Page 43-44: The Prefect of Price Adjustment and Transportation as well as the Prefect of the Bureau of Equalization and Standards were established in 110 BC. The former official had the responsibility to QUOTE: "substitute native products for the poll taxes in cash. Such products were then transported by the government to other parts of the empire in an effort to stabilize prices." The latter official mentioned above was in charge of another program where QUOTE: "commodities country-wide were bought by the government when prices had fallen too low, and sold when they had risen too high."
Page 44: In regards to the officials mentioned on this page and the previous one, QUOTE: "All five Prefects mentioned so far had one Assistant (ch'eng) each."
Page 44: Established in 117 BC and retained throughout Western Han except for a brief interruption from 44 to 41 BC, the state monoplies on salt and iron were mainted by the Chief of the Controlling Office and Chief of the Market of Iron (running the Offices of Salt and Offices of Iron), both subordinates of the Grand Minister of Agriculture. The monopoly on fermented liquors was also handled by the Ministry of Agriculture, but it only lasted from 98 to 81 BC. Ironically, the state monopoly on coinage was not handled by the Ministry of Agriculture; it was administered by the Chief Commandant of Waters and Parks (see p. 83).
Page 44: Beginning with the reign of Emperor Wu, a military officer known as the Chief Commandant Who Searches for Grain became an irregular subordinate to the Grand Minister of Agriculture, his duties perhaps limited to providing provisions for the army.
Page 44-45: The Grand Minister of Agriculture was also aided by Inspectors of Granaries (job should be obvious from the title), Inspectors fo Agriculture (probably audited land tax collections), and Chief Directors of Waters (supervised the taxation of fishermen). In 1 AD, thirteen posts for Divisional Assistant was established in each province, their main purpose being to encourage the growth of agriculture and sericulture in their local areas.
Page 45: For a while, the Eastern Han Grand Minister of Agriculture only had one Assistant ranking at Equivalent to 1000 shi, but in 82 AD a second Assistant was installed earning less at 600 shi, but was put in charge of the Treasury of the Grand Minister of Agriculture. The Grand Minister's personal staff was 164 men, including officials, literary scholars, clerks, apprentices, and one physician. Like the Western Han, there was a Prefect of the Great Granary, earning 600 shi.
Page 45-46: The Book of Later Han lists the duties of the Prefect of the Bureau of Equalization and Standards as being "in charge of knowing the prices of commodities" and supervising "the boiling and dyeing of silk and the fashioning of variegated colours." However, this passage in Book of Later Han is very vague and censors itself from the truth about the continued role of price stabilization, in order to fit Eastern Han Dynasty political propaganda. QUOTE: "During the civil war which toppled Wang Mang, the supporters of a Han restoration castigated Wang Mang's price stabilization program as criminal folly. This was a hollow accusation, as Wang Mang simply had continued Former Han practice. It also proved a political embarrassment when the Later Han resumed price stabilization in A.D. 62. The historians were in a dilemma. The could not bring themselves to acknowledge the resumption of the policy and therefore suppressed the matter altogether. This is the reason why the establishment of the Ever Full Granary is nowhere recorded in HHS and other contemporary texts and only is known through the Chin shu. This, I believe, is also the reason why the HHS treatise wilfully misstates the responsibilities of the Prefect of the Bureau of Equalization and Standards. There can be no question that the Prefect, in spite of the HHS treatise, had the same duties as his predecessor during Former Han."
Page 46: In addition (in regards to price stabilization in Eastern Han), QUOTE: "In A.D. 175, price stabilization was withdrawn from the ministry of the Grand Minister of Agriculture. The title of the Prefect of the Bureau of Equalization and Standards was changed to Palace Prefect of Standards...It was ordered taht only eunuchs be appointed to this position and its assistantship, and that the Bureau henceforth be among the palace offices...This means that the new eunuch Prefect and his staff, at least nominally, belonged to the ministry of the Privy Treasurer."
Page 46: As stated before, one of the Grand Minister's two Assistants was put in charge of the Imperial Treasury in 82 AD, so for most of the Eastern Han there was no more Prefect of the Imperial Treasury. Likewise, the Bureau of Price Adjustment and Transportation was abolished. Just how the salt and iron monopolies were decentralized, there is no mention in Eastern Han of the Prefect of the Sacred Field, the Chief Commandant Who Searches for Grain, the Inspectors of Granaries, the Inspectors of Agriculture, etc. In addition, the Chief Directors of Waters were not abolished but were transferred to local administration.
Page 46: The Prefect of the Office for the Selection of Grain (600 shi), who had been under the Privy Treasurer during Western Han, was now transferred to the ministry of the Grand Minister of Agriculture, bringing with him 112 subordinate officials. His job was to hull and select grain for the imperial court, as well as preparing dried provisions.
Page 46-47: QUOTE: "One last important point needs to be made. The private purse of the emperor and the public purse of the government had been kept separate in Former Han times, the Privy Treasurer administering the first and the Grand Minister of Agriculture the second. During Later Han, both were placed under the Grand Minister of Agriculture...He had no part in collecting any of these funds, but was responsible for their disbursement. The fusion of the two purses proved a retrograde step, since it blurred the distinction between mine and thine and led to abuse by irresponsible emperors, especially Ling. He created in A.D. 178 a treasury in the Western Garden (Hsi-yüan), called the Western Quarters (Hsi-tu), and stored there the forced contributions exacted from high officials in exchange for office, as well as the proceeds from the sale of noble ranks. In A.D. 185, he established in the same Western Garden the Hall of Ten Thousand Gold Pieces (Wan-chin t'ang) and stocked it with gold, cash, and silk from the treasury of the Grand Minister of Agriculture...Such indulgence, not to say corruption, would have been difficult or impossible under the financial accounting system of the Former Han."
Page 47: QUOTE: "The amalgamation of the two purses logically led to the shifting of the imperial mint to this ministry. It had been managed in Former Han times by the Chief Commandant of Waters and Parks (see p. 83). Wang Mang had placed it with the Privy Treasurer (see pp. 68–9). The founder of Later Han subordinated the imperial mint to the Grand Minister of Agriculture, which means that it must have been located in or near Lo-yang."

The Privy Treasurer[edit]

Page 47: The title of Privy Treasurer (shaofu) was unchanged throughout the entire Han Dynasty. QUOTE: "This was the only minister who served the emperor exclusively. Although not castrated himself, many of his subordinates were eunuchs. He supervised those who, working in the palace, performed bureucratic duties for the emperor. He was in charge of certain intimate advisers and attendants of the emperor. He was responsible for the health and general well-being of the emperor and his household, for food, drink, clothing, equipment, valuables, and entertainment, for the administration of the harem, and for the upkeep and protection of the imperial apartments and grounds. To finance these activities, he managed during Former Han the emperor's private purse."
Page 47: QUOTE: Originally, certain agencies had belonged to the ministry of the Privy Treasurer, all of which were located in the large imperial hunting park west of Ch'ang-an knwon as the Park of the Supreme Forest (see p. 179 note 334). These agencies had been in charge of such matters as producing delicacies for the imperial table, taxation for the imperial purse, and the imperial mint...At that time, coinage was not yet a monopoly, and coins were cast not only by the imperial mint but also by the commanderies and kingdoms. The private coining of cash was explicitly permitted in 175 B.C. ...but made a capital offence in early 144 B.C. ...In 115 B.C., these agencies in the Park of the Supreme Forest were placed under the newly appointed Chief Commandant of Waters and Parks (see p. 82).
Page 47-48: The Privy Treasurer had an abnormally large ministry. He had six Assistants, earning 1000 shi each. The Masters of Writing, under a Prefect of the Masters of Writing, were the secretaries under the Privy Treasurer who processed and passed along all documents to the emperor, and who made copies of his replies and orders. In addition to helping the Prefect of the Masters of Writing perform the duty of sealing the documents coming from the emperor, the Supervisor of the Masters of Writing was also the paymaster for the office. When the Prefect was not around, the Supervisor was his substitute. In order to become a Master of Writing, you had to pass a 9000 Chinese character test given by the Prefect Grand Astrologer.
Page 48: Under Emperor Wu, four bureaus were established under the Privy Treasurer, each headed by a Master of Writing. There was the Bureau of Regular Attendants, which was responsible for the correspondence with the Grandee Secretary and Chancellor. There was the Bureau of Officials Ranking 2000 Shi which corresponded with the provincial Inspectors and Grand Administrators of the commanderies. The Bureau of the Common People handled all the memorials sent to the throne by commoners. Finally, the Bureau of Guests dealt with the correspondence with foreign peoples outside the borders. In 29 BC a fifth bureau headed by a Master of Writing was added, the Bureau of the Three Excellencies, which dealt with the correspondence of judicial matters.
Page 48: In addition to the subordinate Assistants, one for each of the Masters of Writing, there were also the Gentlemen of the Masters of Writing. The first Gentleman dealt with the correspondence with the shanyu of the Xiongnu. The second Gentleman was responsible for correspondence with the Tibetans and Eastern Barbarians (Koreans). A third Gentleman was responsible for the correspondence concerning registration of households, individuals, and cultivated land for taxes and labor service. The fourth Gentleman upheld correspondence dealing with offerings to the court.
Page 48-49: QUOTE: "In short, the office of the Masters of Writing or imperial secretariat acted as the conduit for all correspondence to and from the emperor, whether memorials from the officials and people, communication from foreigners, imperial replies, or orders issued on the emperor's initiative."
Page 49: Since the Masters of Writing were not eunuchs, they were not allowed into the Harem or the Lateral Courts, which made it a burden for some reclusive emperors who liked to keep to their private realm. Because of this, an office of eunuch Palace Writers was established as a counterpart to the Masters of Writing. It is written that Emperor Wu established the Prefect of the Palace Writers and Internuncios, but he perhaps simply formalized and institutionalized a position that his earlier predecessors had maintained with clerical assistance given by eunuchs. However, the Palace Writers were disbanded in 29 BC and their leading official's title diminished to Prefect of the Palace Internuncios. Furthermore, the latter and his personnel of Internuncios were no longer staffed with eunuchs like they were since the beginning of Western Han, hence they were not allowed to enter the Lateral Courts. Bielenstein writes, QUOTE: "It is, of course, unthinkable that the emperors henceforth did their own clerical work in their private apartments. They must have reverted to the informal secretarial assistance by eunuchs, which had been the practice before the reign of Emperor Wu (140–87 BC) [sic!]."
Page 49-50: The Privy Treasurer's subordinate Prefect of Insignia and Credentials issued all the necessary insignia to messengers to prove they had authority. The most powerful symbol of insignia was the Staff of Authority (節杖, jiezhang), which was made of bamboo and had a pendant at the top. QUOTE: "It conferred on the messenger special powers which normally were a perogative of the emperor. Other insignia were bronze tigers divided into halves, the so-called Tiger Tallies (hu-fu), and similar Bamboo Tallies (chu-fu), one part of which was given to the messenger. Perhaps this office, as in Later Han, also was in charge of storing the imperial seal or seals."
Page 50-51: The Prefect Grand Physician, once under the control of the Minister of Ceremonies, was transferred to the Privy Treasurer's ministry. His duty was to check the health of the emperor every morning, and accompanied the emperor on his trips outside the palace, such as on imperial hunts.
Page 51: The Prefect Grand Provisioner, overseeing a work force of 3000 slaves, managed all of the imperial food reaching the emperor's plate. The Prefect of the Office of Liquors was responsible for providing liquor, pastry, and fruit. The Prefect of the Office for the Selection of Grain was responsible for hulling and selecting grain, as well as preparing dried food provisions. Although his men were sometimes mobilized during times of war, the chief concern of the Prefect of the Bird Shooting Aides (changed to Prefect of the Sharpshooters in 104 BC) was to shoot down ducks and geese in the imperial park for the emperor and his royal family's consumption. The Chief of the Chefs was responsible for maintaining the imperial kitchen. The Inspector of Food had an obvious responsibility.
Page 51: There were also officials in the Privy Treasurer's ministry involved in producing and presenting imperial clothing for the emperor, his family, and favorites. There were the Prefect of the Eastern Weaving House and Prefect of the Western Weaving House, but the former was abolished in 28 BC and the latter was simply renamed Prefect of the Weaving House. A eunuch was established as the Prefect of the Imperial Wardrobe, who was responsible for sewing, mending, and washing imperial robes and garments. In charge of imperial apparel and curtains was the Prefect of the Valets, another eunuch.
Page 51-52: The Prefect of the Complete Workshop, changed to Prefect of the Complete Workman Office in 104 BC, was in charge of manufacturing equipment for the palace during Western Han. However, it was transferred to the Grand Coachman's ministry during Eastern Han when it became more associated with equipping the army (storing the goods at the Arsenal) than it did the palace. There was also the Prefect Director of Works in the Eastern District of the Capital and the Prefect Director of Works in the Western District of the Capital, who were responsible for convict labor in service of the court. The Prefect of the Masters of Technique were in charge of making knives, swords, and many other valuable items for the palace. The Prefect of the Artisans of the Eastern Garden were in charge of the imperial funeral workshops.
Page 52: The Bureau of Music established by Emperor Wu was in charge of performing music for state ceremonies and for entertaining the emperor's court. One of its tasks was to collect folk songs which existed from all across China and play them at court. It was headed by a Prefect of the Bureau of Music. This bureau was abolished in 7 BC and 441 musicians of it dismissed, even though 388 remaining musicians were simply transferred to the ministry of the Grand Master of Ceremonies, led there by a Prefect Grand Musician.
Page 52-53: The Lateral Courts were the concubine and ladies' harem administered by eunuchs. It was managed by a Prefect of the Long Lanes (changed to Prefect of the Lateral Courts in 104 BC), eight assistants, a Supervisor of the Palace Maids, and had many Palace Maids (government female slaves) who attended the empress and the concubines and sometimes served as nurses. They were dismissed when they reached 35 years of age and were married off. There was a special prison for women of the harem who made offenses.
Page 53: The eunuchs who personally attended to the emperor were headed by a Prefect of the Eunuchs who had seven Assistants. There was also a Prefect of the Yellow Gates, who had one assistant. A Chief of the Office of the House of Paintings existed in Eastern Han and may have existed in Western Han since there was a House of Paintings in the Eternal Palace of Chang'an where portrait paintings of statesmen and rulers past were stored.
Page 54: The Privy Treasurer in Western Han was responsible for overseeing the private purse of the imperial court, the revenues of which came from mountains, seas, ponds, and marshes, all of which the emperor was entitled to exploit (i.e. make taxes off the people who had to work there and trade there in markets).
Page 55: During Eastern Han there were major shifts in the Privy Treasurer's ministry. For one, the Prefect of the Office for the Selection of Grain was moved to the Grand Minister of Agriculture's ministry. The Prefect of the Complete Workman Office was moved to the Grand Coachman's ministry. The Privy Treasurer's right to handle the emperor's private purse was taken away and given to the Grand Minister of Agriculture. All the officers, prefects, and assistants associated with tax collecting under the Former Han Privy Treasurer were moved to the Grand Minister of Agriculture to form a single tax-collecting unit as part of the reform to combine the private and public purses of the empire.
Page 55: As for offices transferred to the Privy Treasurer's ministry, they are explained from now on.
Page 55: The number of Assistants to the Privy Treasurer by Eastern Han was reduced from six to one. This assistant ranked Equivalent to 1000 shi. There was also a Master of Records of unknown rank. In his personal staff, the Privy Treasurer had 34 men.
Page 55-56: Although the Secretariat was still located within a public palace precinct and administered by a Prefect of the Masters of Writing (1000 shi) and Supervisor of the Masters of Writing (600 shi), it was reorganized during Eastern Han. The Assistant of the Left (400 shi) dealt with memorials and replies to and from officials. The Assistant on the Right (400 shi) was in charge of seals and cords for the office, for paper, writing brushes, ink, and other supplies. He also assisted the Supervisor in his duties as paymaster.
Page 56: The Bureaus of the Imperial Secretariat numbered five by the end of Western Han, but they numbered six during Eastern Han. During Eastern Han, the Bureau of the Three Excellencies was abolished while two of the bureaus were subdivided into two. The Bureau of Attendants was in charge of correspondence with the Three Excellencies and the Nine Ministers. The Bureau of Officials Ranking 2000 Shi had the same responsibilities that it did in Western Han, that is corresponding with provincial Inspectors and Grand Administrators in commanderies. Bielenstein says that this Bureau of Officials Ranking 2000 Shi QUOTE: "was divided into two identically named Bureaus, but the texts say nothing about their division of authority." The Bureau of the Common People handled memorials to the throne from officials and commoners. The Former Han Bureau of Guests was now divided into two separate bureaus, the Southern Bureau in Charge of Guests and the Northern Bureau in Charge of Guests. Like in Western Han, these bureaus handled the correspondence with foreign leaders from beyond Han borders. Each bureau was headed by a Master of Writing (600 shi), who were still required to have knowledge of 9,000 Chinese characters and all major writing styles as determined in tests given by the Prefect Grand Astrologer. Each bureau also had six Gentlemen-in-Attendance (400 shi) and three Foreman Clerks (200 shi).
Page 56-57: In the Western Han era, Foreman Clerks could be promoted to Gentlemen of the Masters of Writing, who were one level down from Gentlemen-in-Attendance, after just one year of service, but this was changed by Emperor Guangwu of Han. Gentlemen-in-Attendance came from pool of Filially Pious and Incorrupt, or Xiaolian, who were from the Three Corps who were all aged under 50. For their initial year of service, they were called Acting Gentlemen-of-the-Palace of the Masters of Writing, and after a satisfactory year they could be promoted to Gentlemen of the Masters of Writing. After another three years of service they could become Gentlemen-in-Attendance. In 91 AD, it became customary to promote the Foreman Clerks to Prefects of small prefectures if they provided spotless service for the state.
Page 57-58: There is no evidence that the Western Han Palace Writers, abolished in 29 BC, were revived during Eastern Han, QUOTE: "so the emperor must have received informal clerical assistance from eunuchs, perhaps the Junior Attendants of the Yellow Gates." Although the Palace Internuncios, also abolished in 29 BC, were revived in Eastern Han, there is no definitive evidence to prove they were once again eunuchs. There is only a hint that they were from the crisis of 168 when the eunuchs were defending the Southern Palace and elevated passageways to the Northern Palace from the onslaught of Dou Wu. The eunuchs ordered the Palace Internuncios to protect these areas, to close the gates, and block the passageways between the palaces; to trust the Internuncios with such a vital task to their defense, they must have also been eunuchs.
Page 58: The Office of Insignia and Credentials was kept with only minor changes during Eastern Han. It was headed by a Prefect of Insignia and Credentials (600 shi) who no longer had an Assistant but had two then four Gentlemen-of-the-Palace Who Are Masters of Insignia and Imperial Seals, who were most likely legal experts.
Page 58: The Palace Assistant Secretary during Western Han had worked under the Grandee Secretary with duties of looking over memorials from officials, maintaining the imperial library, overseeing the impeachment of delinquent officials, and inspection of provincial administrations. However, the Grandee Secretary was abolished and replaced with the Grand Minister of Works from 8 to 5 BC and then from 1 BC onward. The title of the Palace Assistant Secretary changed to Chief Clerk and then Chief Clerk Secretary. He still had his same authorities over palace precincts but he no longer had a role in inspecting local administrations across the empire. The title of Palace Assistant Secretary (1000 shi) was revived in a different way during Eastern Han; this new office was placed under the Privy Treasurer's ministry. The staff of the Palace Assistant Secretary had to pass 9,000 character tests and examinations of all the major writing styles. They were responsible for receiving and transmitting memorials from the Three Excellencies, the Nine Ministers, and lesser officials.
Page 58-59: QUOTE: "The staff of the Palace Assistant Secretary received and transmitted memorials form the Three Excellencies, the Nine Ministers and all lesser officials...As in Former Han times, the purpose was undoubtedly to inspect the memorials for possible violations, before sending them on for processing by the imperial secretariat. The other censorial duties of the Palace Assistant Secretary and his subordinates consisted of deciding the right or wrong in suspicious matters of national importance, in impeaching delinquent officials, and in inspecting state rituals and imperial audiences for breaches of performance or etiquette...Clearly the censorial role of the Palace Assistant Secretary was no longer restricted to the palace. He had taken over duties which during Former Han had belonged to the second Assitant of the Grandee Secretary (see p. 10), namely general inspection of the central government other than the Three Excellencies. The duplication of censorial supervision by both the Three Excellencies and the Palace Assistant Secretary must, in typical fashion, have been intended to encourage honesty and efficiency. On the other hand, the Palace Assistant Secretary had permanently lost authority as chief inspector of all local administration, and edicts addressed to the commanderies and kingdoms no longer went through his office. Occasionally, a member of his staff would be dispatched on a speical errand to the provinces and then be given an appropriate title, such as [Attending] Secretary for the Investigation of the Army."
Page 59: Like in Western Han times, the Palace Assistant Secretary was responsible for the upkeep of the Imperial Library and thus the Gentlemen Collating Books (i.e. imperial librarians). However, he lost this duty in 159 AD when the position of the Inspector of the Imperial Libraries was established in the ministry of the Grand Master of Ceremonies.
Page 59-60: Another set of officials under the Privy Treasurer were the Palace Attendants, who also belonged to Western Han at a rank of 2000 shi but were diminished in rank during the Eastern Han to Equivalent to 2000 shi. QUOTE: "Their role was to offer advice and guidance to the emperor, and to be ready with answers to sudden questions. When the emperor went out in the Legal Carriage (fa-chia), the best-informed Palace Attendant rode with him. The others followed behind the carriage on horseback."
Page 60: Palace Attendants in Western Han were allowed to live within the Forbidden Aparments of the Emperor until 88 BC when one tried to murder Emperor Wu of Han. They were allowed back into the Forbidden Apartments of the palace during the reign of Wang Mang, and this practice continued into Eastern Han until 92 AD, when again a Palace Attendant threatened Emperor He of Han with a knife, thus they were banished from entering the palace on any other time they were off duty (when on duty they obviously could enter the palace).
Page 60: A Supervisor of the Palace Attendants had existed in Western Han, but this was changed to Libationer of the Palace Attendants in Eastern Han, an irregularly-filled office with a rank that is not mentioned in historical texts.
Page 60: Just as in Western Han times, the Eastern Han had Gentlemen-in-Attendance of the Yellow Gates who served as liasons between the palace and the outside world, although their rank was lifted from Equivalent to 400 shi to 600 shi. These men were not eunuchs. They perfomed many necessary tasks, such as guiding kingly guests to their floor mats during an audience with the emperor.
Page 60: Just like in Former Han times there was a Prefect Grand Physician, who ranked 600 shi and who may have had a raise in his rank to 1000 shi.
Page 60-61: Just like in Western Han, the Prefect Grand Provisioner of Eastern Han provided food and drink for the imperial dining table, but his staff was somewhat reduced in Eastern Han and the office of the Prefect of the Office of Liquors abolished so that an Assistant of Liquors could be placed under the Prefect Grand Provisioner.
Page 61: The Prefect of the Sharpshooters and Prefect of the Weaving House were abolished during Eastern Han while their duties were simply transferred to other offices. The Prefect of the Imperial Wardrobe, a eunuch official ranked at 600 shi, QUOTE: "managed not only the sewing, mending, and washing of imperial garments, but also the weaving of materials for the palace." His Assistant for the Weaving House replaced the Prefect of the Weaving House.
Page 61: During Eastern Han, the Complete Workman Office was shifted from the Privy Treasurer's ministry to the Grand Coachman's ministry. The eunuch Prefect of the Masters of Technique remained unchanged under the Privy Treasurer during Eastern Han.
Page 62: QUOTE: "The Bureau of Music had, of course, been abolished as early as 7 B.C., when more than half of the Musicians were dismissed and the remaining 388 transferred to the office of the Prefect Grand Musician in the ministry of the Grand Master of Ceremonies."

Other Palace Offices[edit]

Staff of the Empress[edit]

Page 69: The empress's quarters were known as the Palace of Prolonged Autumn and were separate from the emperor's private apartments. She was required in theory to spend every fifth night with the emperor while returning to her palace in the morning.
Page 69: The empress received an income which was gathered from the taxes of 40 different prefectures, slightly higher than that of kings. Her staff was a miniature parallel to that of the emperor's household. She had a eunuch senior official called the Supervisor of the Household (2000 shi) with one eunuch Assistant (600 shi) during Western Han. There was the Empress's Usher (2000 shi), changed to Grand Prolonger of Autumn in 144 BC, who had no subordinates. When the Supervisor of the Household's office was abolished in 18 BC, the Grand Prolonger of Autumn took over his duties. Little is known of this head official other than the fact that they were always eunuchs.
Page 69: The Western Han Prefect of the Empress's Palace of Prolonged Autumn was changed to Prefect of the Long Lanes in Eastern Han; this eunuch was in charge of the Palace Maids, who were government female slaves serving the empress. There were also the Prefect of the Private Storehouse, Prefect of the Granary, Prefect of the Office of Food, Prefect of the Stables, and Prefect Invocator, each aided by one Chief and one Assistant.
Page 69-70: However, during Eastern Han there is no longer mention of a Prefect of the Empress's Palace of Prolonged Autumn, a Prefect of the Granary, a Prefect of the Office of Food, or a Prefect Invocator. In Eastern Han there was a Grand Prolonger of Autumn (2000 shi) who had one Assistant (600 shi), who QUOTE: "received orders from the empress on the administration of her household, was her representative in dealings with relatives, and at audiences conducted them to and from her presence."
Page 70: The Prefect of the Long Lanes of the Empress (600 shi) directed the Palace Maids. The Prefect of the Private Storehouse of the Empress (600 shi) looked after the silk and other objects in the storehouse of the empress and manufactured, mended, and washed garments and coverlets. The Prefect of the Stables was replaced by a Coachman of the Empress (1000 shi), who was in charge of chariots and horses.
Page 70: The Empress's bodyguards were led by the Supervisor of the Extra Retinue of the Attendants of the Yellow Gates of the Empress (600 shi), a counterpart to the officer of the emperor's household.
Page 70: The Chief of Medicines of the Empress (400 shi) was the personal physician of the empress in charge of seeing after her health.
Page 71: When an empress became empress dowager, she retained her retinue of officials and officers. If she was not the natural mother of the next emperor, then a mini court would be established for the real mother who was given a staff just like that of the empress dowager. In 7 BC there were four mini courts, one for the Empress Yuan's widow Wang, Emperor Cheng's widow Zhao, Emperor Ai's mother Ding, and Emperor Ai's grandmother Fu.
Page 72: All of the empress's officials were eunuchs with just two exceptions, the Privy Treasurer and the Commandant of the Guards with his officers and men who protected the entrances to the empress's compound.

The Ladies of the Harem[edit]

Page 73-74: Ladies (furen), or concubines, of the imperial harem were given ranks and salaries just like officials. During the early Western Han there were only six ranks below that of the empress; they were Beautiful Lady, Sweet Lady, Eighth Rank Lady, Seventh Rank Lady, Senior Maid, and Junior Maid. Emperor Wu of Han (r. 140–87 BC) added four more ranks to these, which were Favorite Beauty, Graceful Lady, Elegant Lady, and Compliant Lady. Emperor Yuan of Han (r. 48–33 BC) added one more, the Brilliant Companion, while the complete set of 14 ranks were added at an unknown time. In falling sequence, here is the complete set of 14 ranks:
- 1. Brilliant Companion, status equal to a Chancellor of China
- 2. Favorite Beauty, status above the Nine Ministers.
- 3. Graceful Lady, Fully 2000 shi
- 4. Elegant Lady, 2000 shi
- 5. Beautiful Lady, Equivalent to 2000 shi
- 6. Eighth Rank Lady, 1000 shi
- 7. Compliant Lady, Equivalent to 1000 shi
- 8. Seventh Rank Lady, 800 shi
- 9. Sweet Lady, Equivalent to 800 shi
- 10. Senior Maid, 600 shi
- 11. Junior Maid, 400 shi
- 12. Maid for All Purposes, 300 shi
- 13. Constant Maid, 200 shi
- 14. Pure Maid, Tender Maid, Pleasing Maid, Soothing Maid, Sweet Maid, and Night Attendant, 100 shi

Page 73: It is written that the number of harem ladies increased until reaching roughly 3000 during the course of Former Han.
Page 73: Emperor Guangwu of Han abolished this entire 14-grade system and made three simplified categories for harem ladies: Honorable Lady was the highest, Beautiful Lady was the mid rank, and Chosen Lady was the lowest rank. They had no fixed rank salary like in Western Han; instead they were granted gifts irregularly. There were more Chosen Ladies than the other two types, and very few Honorable Ladies. By the time of Emperor Huan of Han (r. 146–168) the total number of harem ladies reached 6,000! This comes from a memorial in 166 AD saying that there were 5,000 to 6,000 Chosen Ladies alone.

Staff of the Heir Apparent[edit]

Page 74: Just like the empress, the heir apparent was given an income from the taxes of 40 prefectures. During Eastern Han, his quarters were referred to as the Eastern Palace.
Page 74-75: In the Western Han era, the heir apparents staff were organized into two divisions, one led by a Grand Tutor of the Heir Apparent (2000 shi) and a Junior Tutor of the Heir Apparent (unknown rank); the other division led by a Supervisor is discussed on page 76. The Junior Tutor was appointed only after a child heir apparent reached the age of eight, while the Grand Tutor could be appointed when the heir apparent reached the age of fifteen. These two officials were educators of the heir apparent. They were always men of distinguished scholarly background.
Page 75: These two tutors had their own staff of advisors, some of which were the Palace Cadets of the Heir Apparent whose advisory duties were similar to the Palace Attendants of the emperor. There were four hundred men called the Cadets of the Heir Apparent (400 shi) and the Members of the Suite of the Heir Apparent (200 shi), whose duties were to guard the heir apparent. Their roles were similar to the Gentlemen serving the Superintendant of the Household for the emperor. They were led by a Prefect Stationer of the Watches of the Heir Apparent (1000 shi). The Grand Tutor and Junior Tutor directed the Forerunners of the Heir Apparent, whose role was parallel to that of the Internuncios. They traveled in front of the heir apparent's chariot where they enforced appropriate conduct and etiquette.
Page 76-77: While one division of the staff of the heir apparent was led by the Grand Tutor and Junior Tutor, the other was led by the Supervisor of the Household (2000 shi), a parallel office to the empress. He had one Assistant (600 shi). He also had a Prefect of the Household of the Heir Apparent (1000 shi), who managed the budget and looked after the storage of supplies of food and drink. There was also a Chief of the Kitchen of the Heir Apparent (1000 shi), the Coachman of the Heir Apparent (1000 shi), the Chief of the Stables of the Heir Apparent (unknown rank), and the Chief Leader of the Guards of the Heir Apparent (Equivalent to 1000 shi). The latter commanded the guards at the gates of the heir apparent's palace compound. Conversely, the Chief of the Palace Patrol of the Heir Apparent (unknown rank) patrolled the palace grounds of the heir apparent.
Page 77: If an heir apparent was an adult, he had his own harem! Women were ranked as such in descending order: Principal Wife, Sweet Little Ladies, and Young Ladies.
Page 77-78: During Eastern Han, the Grand Tutor was no longer an administrative head and simply became the teacher of the heir apparent; his salary was also raised from 2000 shi to Fully 2000 shi. At the same time, the office of the Supervisor of the Imperial Household was abolished. The Junior Tutor of the Heir Apparent became the sole person in charge of the heir apparent's personnel and his rank during Eastern Han was finally made known at 2000 shi. Thus he remained a teacher and an administrator, aided by 13 minor officials. All other offices remained the same except for the loss of the Chief of the Kitchen of the Heir Apparent and the Household Prison of the Heir Apparent.
Page 78: When an heir apparent became emperor, his staff was disbanded until a new heir apparent was made.

Other Metropolitan Offices[edit]

Bearer of the Gilded Mace[edit]

Page 78: The Bearer of the Guilded Mace (Commandant of the Capital before 104 BC), who ranked Fully 2000 shi like each of the Nine Ministers, QUOTE: "was responsible for upholding law and order in the capital, outside the palace precincts. His staff regularly patrolled the city, and he personally inspected it three times each month. He furthermore was in charge of the Arsenal (Wu-k'u) and also responsible for coping with fires and floods."
Page 79-80: During Eastern Han the Bearer of the Guilded Mace's rank dropped from Fully 2000 shi to Equivalent to 2000 shi. During Western Han, the Bearer of the Guilded Mace had a wide array of subordinates, who were the Prefect of the Capital Rampart, the Chief Commandant of the Eastern Adjunct Capital Region, the Chief Commandant of the Western Adjunct Capital Region, the Prefect Director of Boats, the Prefect of the Prison of the Director of Boats, the Captain of the Left of the Standard Bearers, the Captain of the Right of the Standard Bearers, and the Captain of the Center of the Standard Bearers. All of these subordinates and their assistants, except for the Prefect of the Arsenal, were abolished in Eastern Han, as their duties were simply transferred elsewhere. For example, the abolishment of the Captains of the Standard Bearers meant that the Gentlemen in the emperor's entourage were responsible for clearing the road when the emperor left the palace and signalled his return with standard flags so that palace guards would open the palace gate.

The Court Architect[edit]

Page 80: The Privy Treasurer of Architecture was renamed Court Architect (2000 shi) in 144 BC, and his role in Western and Eastern Han was to oversee QUOTE: "constructing and repairing imperial palaces, temples, grave mounds, and funerary parks, and for planting trees along the road sides."
Page 80: In 28 BC, the Court Architect was one of those responsible in repairing damage to flood control works along the Yellow River. The Court Architect was in charge of corvée labor, especially after the abolishment of the Director of Retainers in 89 BC. However, the Court Architect temporarily relinquished this duty in 8 BC and then permanently relinquished this duty when it was shifted to the office of the new Grand Minister of Works.
Page 81: He had officials called Chief of Large Timbers and Prefect of the Stoneyard who must have been in charge of collecting materials for the building of imperial structures as well as for the carpenters and stonemasons working in construction.
Page 81: The Court Architect's position was immediately filled in Eastern Han, but then it was abolished in 57 AD, his duties shifted to an Internuncio in the ministry of the Superintendant of the Imperial Household. However, the Court Architect was reinstated in 76 AD with the same rank of 2000 shi. His two Assistants were reduced to one, while a large number of his subordinates such as the Chief of Large Timbers, Prefect of the Stoneyard, Captains of the Eastern, Western, and Central Regions, etc. were all abolished.
Page 81-82: The Prefects of the Enclosures on the Right, Left, Center, and Rear employed convict labor to get construction work done.

The Chief Commandant of Waters and Parks[edit]

Page 82: In 115 BC, several officials and officers who were once under the Privy Treasurer's ministry were withdrawn and formed their own independent offices. This includes the Chief Commandant of Waters and Parks (Equivalent to 2000 shi). In Western Han, he managed the Park of the Supreme Forest at Chang'an. He oversaw the hunting park, its detached palaces outside the capital, its rest stops, the provisions of fruit, vegetables, and game meat for the imperial dining tables, the collection of taxes (for the imperial purse) which were collected from common people utilizing the park space, and the manufacture of state's standard coinage currency. He had various subordinates, including the Chief of the Agricultural Granaries who oversaw the grain stores within the park and the Prefect of the Six Stables who oversaw the horse stables in the hunting park.
Page 83: An Inspector of Kennels had a staff of convicts who raised and trained hunting dogs for the Park of the Supreme Forest.
Page 83: The Chief Commandant's tax collectors (gathering revenues for the imperial purse) for the park were the Chief Director of Waters, the Chief Director of Waters of the Park of the Supreme Forest, and the Chief Director of Waters of the Palace of Sweet Springs. These taxes mostly came from fisherman.
Page 83: Ever since 115 BC, the imperial mint, where the standard currency was made, was taken out of the hands of the Privy Treasurer and was relocated within the park overseen by the Chief Commandant of Waters and Parks. In 112 BC [SIC! Nishijima and Loewe say 113 BCE!], the central government issued a monopoly on making currency throughout China and overseen by three officers: The Prefect of the Office for Assorting Copper, the Prefect of the Office of Coinage, and the Prefect of Price Adjustment and Transportation.
Page 83: The Chief Commandant of Waters and Parks was totally abolished by Emperor Guangwu of Han and revived it only once a year for a brief time to conduct the sacrifice for the Beginning of Autumn; immediately after the ritual, the office remained dormant until the next autumn. The hunting park at Chang'an was no more and one right outside Luoyang was established with the same exact name. The latter park was administered by a Prefect of the Supreme Forest, an officer who answered to the Privy Treasurer. Since the public purse and imperial purse were combined into one, there was no need for the tax agencies of the former park. All tax collection thus became the responsibility of local administrations. The imperial mint was also transferred to the ministry of the Grand Minister of Agriculture.

The Colonel of the City Gates[edit]

Page 83-84: Throughout Western and Eastern Han, the name of the Colonel of the City Gates remained unchanged. He was responsible for the garrisons located at the city gates of the capital, first Chang'an and then Luoyang.
Page 84: In Western Han the Colonel ranked 2000 shi and was aided by a Major and twelve Captains, one for each of the twelve gates of the capital which held garrisons. In Eastern Han the Colonel was demoted one rank to Equivalent to 2000 shi, but still had one Major (1000 shi) and twelve Captains (600 shi) since Luoyang also had twelve gates due to cosmological reasons.

The Director of Dependent States[edit]

Page 84: The Director of Dependent States (2000 shi) was in charge of missions to foreign territory and the management of foreign hostages. The authority of his office was enhanced in 121 BC when he was made responsible for overseeing the affairs of the Dependent States (Shuguo), which were defensive buffer territories straddling the northern and northwestern borders of the Former Han Empire. They were inhabited by barbarians "who had surrendered", who loosely recognized Chinese suzerainty, and could be of service to the Chinese when hostile tribes invaded. Each Dependent State had a Chief Commandant.
Page 84: The Director of Dependent States was abolished in 28 BC while his duties were usurped by the Grand Herald.

The Colonel Director of the Retainers[edit]

Page 84-85: As written by Zheng Xuan (127–200), the Director of Retainers in Western Han built roads and canals using convict labor of 1,200 prisoners. After the witchcraft and black magic crisis of 91 BC, Emperor Wu of Han created the Colonel Director of Retainers in 89 BC with a rank of 2000 shi and functions of the former Director of Retainers, only now he was given the Staff of Authority (Jiezhang 節杖) and new duties. During the witchcraft crisis, with his staff of authority he was given the power to arrest offenders in the name of the emperor. After the crisis he was relieved of his troops but he retained the Staff of Authority. He furthermore was given responsibility and privilege to make regular inspections of the conduct of officials in the capital region and seven nearby commanderies of Jingzhaoyin, Yufufeng, Zuopingyi, Hongnong, Hedong, Henei, and Henan (combined making a provincial-sized territory). Thus his powers of inspection were similar to those of the provincial Inspectors, the only difference being he retained the Staff of Authority and so could punish officials on the spot if he saw necessary. Hans Bielenstein says that Wang Yü-ch'üan (!!!) QUOTE: "is right in saying that at this time the Colonel Director fo the Retainers was an agent of the emperor, on whose behalf he exercised control over the bureaucracy in the capital territory."
Page 85: The powers of the Colonel Director of Retainers was significantly diminished when he was deprived of the Staff of Authority in 45 BC and thus no longer personally represented the emperor. The only thing that distinguished him from a provincial Inspector was his higher rank. In 9 BC the Colonel Director of Retainer's office was abolished while in 7 BC the Director of Retainer's office was restored. The Director of Retainers, like in his earlier role, only tended to public works using convict labor and had absolutely no powers of provincial inspection like the Colonel Director had when his office existed. Furthermore, the Director of Retainers became a subordinate of the Grand Minister of Works with a rank of Equivalent to 2000 shi.
Page 85: In Eastern Han, the Colonel Director of Retainers was reappointed but he was not given the Staff of Authority and his rank was lowered from 2000 shi to Equivalent to 2000 shi. He was, however, once again given the power to inspect the conduct of officials working within the capital region and the power to impeach them, but without the Staff of Authority he could not personally give orders to punish them.

Officials of the Capital Territories[edit]

Local Administration[edit]

The Provincial Staff[edit]

Page 90: From the beginning of Western Han, local administration was under the scrutiny and watchful eye of Inspecting Secretaries. However, they were replaced by Clerks working in the ministry of the Chancellor and dispatched from the capital at irregular times. It is possible that they were drawn from the Palace Assistant Secretary's office, which was under the control of the ministry of the Grandee Secretary. These Clerks would have been identical to the Attending Secretaries, who were given the temporary title of Special Commissioners Clad in Embroidered Garments when sent out to uncover criminal activities within local administrations.
Page 90: There were no Inspectors (Cishi) before the year 106 BC, when they were first appointed at the rank of 600 shi and were responsible for inspecting officials and administrations in territories known as provinces (zhou (country subdivision)) which included a grouping of commanderies together. The Inspectors answered to the Palace Assistant Secretary, who in turn answered to the Grandee Secretary who was the boss of the former. There is no information on any kind of provincial staff before the year 106 BC. From 106 BC onward, there were 13 provinces (excluding the capital region) and 13 Inspectors to oversee them. The capital region was also of provincial size but it was inspected by the Colonel Director of Retainers from 89 BC to 9 BC.
Page 90: The title of the Inspector was changed to Shepherd (Mu) whose rank was lifted to 2000 shi. In 5 BC this was reverted back to Inspector at 600 shi and reverted yet again to Shepherd at 2000 shi in 1 BC. After 1 BC, the Shepherds were no longer subordinates of a single ministry but instead reported to all Three Excellencies.
Page 90-91: The Eastern Han appointed Shepherds at 2000 shi but reduced the number of provinces (excluding the capital region) to twelve. Since there was considerable Xiongnu pressure in the north, the Shuofang Province located in the northern Ordos Desert was abolished in 35 AD while its territory became part of neighboring Ping Province.
Page 91: In 42 AD, the title of Shepherd was once again changed to Inspector with a rank of 600 shi. The Inspectors were appointed until 188 AD when their title was reverted back to Shepherd for the last time in the Han Dynasty. When Emperor Ling of Han died in the following year, the eunuchs were slaughtered, the central government lost its power, and local administrations no longer functioned according to times past.
Page 91: There was no functional difference between the Inspectors and Shepherds; both of them audited the administrations of the commanderies and kingdoms. They evaluated officials on their honesty and competence, obedience to the central government, adherence to the law, their carrying out of justice and treatment of prisoners, and looked for any sign of extortion, favoritism, factionalism, or abuse of power by prominent families. The reports of these officials could be used by the Palace Assistant Secretary and Grandee Secretary of Western Han and the Three Excellencies of Eastern Han to demote, dismiss, or prosecute officials who they viewed as lawbreakers or troublemakers. The administrations of the commanderies, kingdoms, and prefectures were thus given annual ranks as to their performance.
Page 91-92: While the Inspectors/Shephers of the Western Han were fully agents of the central government, as of 35 AD during Eastern Han the Inspectors/Shepherds were transferred to local administrations. Each Inspector/Shepherd carried out inspections during the 8th month of the year but he departed from and returned to the provincial capital on his tours of duty, and no longer traveled straight to the Han empire's central capital at Luoyang. From the provincial capital where he was located, his report was sent to the Imperial Court in Luoyang and arrived before Chinese New Year. The Official in Charge of Accounts at the capital then handled their reports.

The Commandery Staff[edit]

Page 93: Every province comprised a number of core administrative units known as commanderies (jun). Any commandery that was granted as a fief to the son of an emperor and his heirs was called a kingdom (wang guo). There were 57 commanderies and kingdoms when Emperor Gaozu of Han died in 195 BC. There were 72 commanderies and kingdoms by the time Emperor Zhang of Han died in 141 BC. There were 102 commanderies and kingdoms by the time Emperor Wu of Han died in 87 BC. From 81 BC to 9 AD (when the Western Han ended) there were 103 commanderies and kingdoms. Although Emperor Guangwu of Han abolished 10 of these on April 15, 37 AD, making only 93 commanderies and kingdoms, his successors created six more, thus boosting it to 99 commanderies and kingdoms overall by 140 AD.
Page 93: Known as the Commandery Administrator before 148 BC, the Grand Administrator (2000 shi) was the head civilian and military official in charge of the commandery, and handled both civil and criminal law. His Assistant (600 shi), the Official in Charge of Accounts, carried an annual report to the capital city each year evaluating the Grand Administrator's performance. In commanderies that formed the frontier borders of the empire, a Clerk (600 shi) was added to the staff of the Grand Administrator. The Clerk was in charge of maintaining horses and armaments. Each Grand Administrator also had his own Master of Records and a Privy Treasurer. The latter perhaps handled the private rather than public funds of the Grand Administrator.
Page 93-94: Any staff members of lower positions were placed into separate bureaus, each one headed by a Division Head.
Page 94: The Grand Administrator had a subordinate called the Chief Commandant (also known as the Commandery Commandant in the time before 148 BC) who ranked Equivalent to 2000 shi. The Chief Commandant carried out military orders given by the Grand Administrator. The Chief Commandant also had a sizeable staff organized into his own bureaus. He was in charge of raising militias and suppressing banditry. He inspected fortifications and beacon towers. Commanderies located on the frontier borders were susceptible to nomadic incursion, so security had to be beefed up with several Chief Commandants in a single commandery, each one appointed to a different Regional Division. Grand Administrators of commanderies on the frontier borders also had majors, captains, and millarians added to the regular staff.
Page 95: In Eastern Han the Grand Administrator's had a rank of 2000 shi and were aided by one Assistant. As of 30 AD, this Assistant was to act in the Grand Administrator's place should the latter fall seriously ill or become incapacitated. Border commanderies still retained the Chief Clerk. From 38 AD onwards there were no longer Assistants appointed to border commanderies since their duties were taken over by Chief Clerks.
Page 96: The Grand Administrator personally inspected the prefectures of his commandery each spring while checking on local agriculture and sericulture. He was to arrange for relief and aid to prefectures which fell on hard times. At the end of each year, the Grand Administrator recommended to the capital a fixed amount of candidates for Filially Pious and Incorrupt (Xiaolian). Each fall and winter he dispatched Officials Who Cause No Harm to the prefectures discern if any local criminal cases were judged unfairly. Each year he sent the Official in Charge of Accounts to the capital to give a general report and update the central court's records on the commandery's population and land registers. By 102 AD, the Officials in Charge of Accounts did not return to the commanderies and kingdoms but stayed in the capital so that they could be ready to fill vacancies of the Gentlemen of the Three Corps. This was rescinded in 162 AD and so that the Officials in Charge of Accounts were once again part of local administration. Sometime during Emperor Ling of Han's reign this was reverted back to having the Officials in Charge of Accounts stay in the capital city.
Page 96: In 30 AD the Chief Commandants throughout the non-borderland commanderies of the empire were abolished and their duties of suppressing banditry became just another responsibility of the Grand Administrator. However, the Grand Administrator was not allowed to mobilize troops on his own accord and could take no actions outside of his commandery. The annual training of militias was halted. The Chief Commandant was only revived during times of emergency in a commandery and existed only as long as the crisis lasted. In the frontier border commanderies, the Chief Commandant was never abolished and several for each Regional Division in a commandery still existed in Eastern Han.
Page 96-97: The bureaus of the Grand Administrator were structured as a parallel to those of the Three Excellencies in the capital city. There was a Bureau of Merit which sought men fit for Filially Pious and Incorrupt, a Bureau of All Purposes which managed general affairs and had overlapping jurisdiction with other bureaus, and a Bureau of Investigation. Each bureau was headed by a Division Head.
Page 97: Each commandery had five Regional Divisions, each of which had an Investigator working for the Bureau of Investigation. He was charged with drafting the reports on prefectural administrations and their conditions within his Regional Division.
Page 97: In addition to the other bureaus mentioned, there were the Bureau of Banditry (created solely to suppress banditry), the Bureau of Arms (handled military affairs), the Bureau of Arms and Horses (handled cavalry and their equipment), the Bureau of Decisions (dealt with criminal law), the Bureau of Statements (dealt with litigation), the Bureau of Households (dealt with population registers, sacrifices, agriculture and sericulture of commoners), the Bureau of Ranking (ranking people by age for possible government honors), the Bureau of Command (dealt with conscript soldiers, convict laborers, and transportation), the Bureau of Laws (upheld the postal stations and couriers), the Bureau of Gathering (dealt with accounts), the Bureau of Granaries (dealt with managing granaries and tax grain), the Bureau of Markets (managed market places and the taxes collected from its traders), the Bureau of Memorials (dealt with the transmission of memorials), and the Bureau of Consultation (this bureau offered advice and suggestions in governance).
Page 97: Some commanderies had additional specialized bureaus to meet local needs, such as the Bureau of Roads and Bridges, the Bureau of the Investigation of Beacons, the Bureau of Grain Transport by Water, the Bureau of Inspection of Fords and Canals, the Bureau of Medicine, the Bureau of Architecture, etc.
Page 98: The title of Privy Treasurer for each commandery is not observed in Eastern Han documents, so the fusion of the private and public purses on the commandery level during Eastern Han could have been possible (it would have matched the central government's decision to fuse the two on the national level).
Page 98-99: During Western Han the salt and iron industries were managed by the central government in a monopoly, but during Eastern Han all of these duties were shifted to local governments on the commandery and kingdom level. In each commandery with iron and salt industries, there was one or more Offices of Iron, Offices of Salt, Offices of the Direction of Waters, and Offices of Workmen, each having a Prefect leading them.

The Prefectural Staff[edit]

Page 99: Each commandery had a varying number of prefectures (xian), or counties. There were 1577 prefectures in the year 2 AD and 1179 prefectures in the year 140 AD.
Page 99-100: Although both the Book of Han and Book of Later Han claim that in any territory included a mixed population of Chinese and barbarian foreigners, it was not called a prefecture but a March (Dao); it is recorded that there were only 30 Marches in 2 AD and only 19 Marches in 140 AD. Bielenstein says that this is not true, as barbarians lived in many commanderies outside the North China Plain, so the number of Marches should have been much higher. He writes, QUOTE: "A map showing their geographical distribution proves conclusively that in reality they were an administrative device for controlling barbarians in certain sensitive areas, especially the border regions."
Page 100: Although not strictly observed, especially in border regions, in theory any prefecture with 10,000 households or more was governed by a Prefect (ranking 600 shi or 1000 shi depending on size of population) while any prefecture with less than 10,000 households was governed by a Chief (ranking 300 shi to 500 shi depending on the size of the populace). These were the lowest officials of local administration who were directly appointed by the central government. They had to enforce the law and keep order in their prefectures. They had to supervise the commoners in their seasonal work. They were in charge of storing grain as a measure against famine. They had to register people and properties for taxation. They had to mobilize members of the populace for corvée labor service. They were in charge of supervising public works, the performance of rituals, and the upkeep of schools. They had to judge civil and criminal cases brought forth in their prefecture.
Page 100: With such a litany of daunting tasks, a Prefect or Chief had to gradually gain experience in office to get it right, and in the meantime relied heavily on their Assistant, who was in charge of documents, granaries, and legal matters. Each of the larger prefectures also had a Commandant on the Left and a Commandant on the Right, while a smaller prefecture had just one Commandant. They were responsible for QUOTE: "suppressing banditry and for identifying the chief culprits." Assistants and Commandants were ranked either 200 shi or 400 shi, depending on local conditions.
Page 100: Each prefecture, like the commandery governments and the central government, also had their own bureaus, each one led by a Division Head. There was the Bureau of Merit, the Bureau of Litigation, and the Bureau of Markets.
Page 101: Some prefectures operated public schools, a practice which began during the reign of Emperor Wu of Han (r. 140–87 BC) when he ordered that commanderies and kingdoms should maintain public schools. These public schools did not exist everywhere, though. In the year 3 AD, QUOTE: "regulations were promulgated for schools in lesser units, such as districts...but these were certainly unenforceable." The teachers in public schools from 41 BC onward were titled Clerks Ranking 100 Shi for the Five Classics.
Page 101: Just like in Western Han, the Eastern Han retained the distinction between the Prefect and the Chief of large and small prefectures, respectively. All Prefects allegedly now earned 1000 shi according to the Book of Later Han, but this is contradicted by mention in historical sources of Prefects still earning 600 shi in some areas. Chiefs now earned either a rank of 300 shi or 400 shi, whereas beforehand they could have earned as much as 500 shi. Prefects and Chiefs continued to have one Assitant and two or one Commandants depending on the size of the prefecture.
Page 101: QUOTE: "The Later Han texts are slightly more informative about the annual routine of the Prefects and Chiefs. Each fall and winter, they had to update the registers which recorded the total number of households and individuals in the prefecture, the area of cultivated land, the amount of taxes collected, the prefectural expenditures, and the current state of law and order. These registers were then sent to the office of the Grand Administrator in the capital of the commandery, amalgamated with the reports from the other prefectures, and at the end of the year brought to the capital by an Official in Charge of Accounts."
Page 102: There were more prefectural bureaus mentioned for the Eastern Han than the Western Han, each one once again led by a Division Head. These were the Bureau for All Purposes, the Bureau of Merit, the Bureau of Banditry, the Bureau of Arms, the Bureau of Households, the Bureau of Laws, the Bureau of Litigation, the Bureau of Gathering, the Bureau of Granaries, the Bureau of Markets, and the Bureau of Consultation. Specialized bureaus like the Bureau of Metal, the Bureau of Water, and the Bureau of Roads and Bridges existed in some prefectures but not all, since they were based on local conditions. In addition to the bureaus there was one Master of Records for each prefecture.
Page 102: Like in Western Han times, public schools were maintained in some prefectures of Eastern Han.
Page 103: The prefecture, although being the smallest national unit where the central government appointed an official, was nonetheless not the smallest unit possible. Each prefecture was divided into districts (xiang). Each district was further subdivided into communes (ting), which were further subdivided into hamlets (li). In 2 AD, there were 6,622 districts with 29,635 communes. In 153 AD there were only 3,681 districts and only 12,443 communes. Districts was managed by a Thrice Venerable, a Patrol Leader, and either a Petty Official with Rank or Bailiff depending on size. If a district had 5,000 or more households, it was administered by a Petty Official with Rank (100 shi in Eastern Han), while districts with less than 5,000 households were administered by a Bailiff. The Petty Official with Rank or Bailiff were responsible for collection of taxes, corvée labor, and administration of justice. The Patrol Leader was the local chief of police who was responsible for law and order. The Thrice Venerable simply gave moral leadership.
Page 103-104: Before he became Emperor Gaozu of Han, Liu Bang had decreed in 205 BC that every Thrice Venerable appointed to a district should be at least fifty years of age. The Thrice Venerable was responsible for the identification of filial sons, obedient grandsons, virtuous daughters, righteous wives, men who charitably yielded property to aid in times of distress, and literati who could be models for the people. By tradition, their households were honored with inscribed tablets fixed to the gate.
Page 104: It is important to note that while Petty Officials of Rank in larger districts were appointed directly by the Grand Administrator of the Commandery, the Bailiffs of smaller districts were appointed by the Prefect of the prefecture. The Thrice Venerable and Patrol Leader were appointed in their district by the Petty Officials of Rank or the Bailiff.
Page 104: Each district had communes, and each commune was administered by a Chief of the Commune appointed by the district's Prefect or Bailiff. The Chief of the Commune, in both Western and Eastern Han, had to enforce law and order, maintained one postal station, and had a headquarters which functioned as both an inn and a police station. He was aided by Commune Accessory Clerks.
Page 104: Although the Book of Han says nothing of the hamlets, the Book of Later Han says that they were simply a group of five or ten families who pledged to look after each other and inspect each other's conduct. They were even supposed to report their findings of any irregularities to local officials. The hamlet was led by a Headman of the Hamlet, the lowest administrative unit in the empire, which the common people could use in order to sustain a bit of their own self-government and independence.

The Staff of Fiefs[edit]

The Kingdoms[edit]

Page 105: Emperor Gaozu of Han had elevated some of his chief supporters in the civil war before Han to the level of kings (wang). He discontinued this policy after he became emperor and reduced the number of these types of kingdoms from seven to one. He swore in a covenant with his high ministers that he would only appoint members of the imperial Liu family as kings and no one else, an QUOTE: "important element in Han political thought." Thus all sons of the emperor were given kingdoms except the heir apparent; these kingdoms were inherited by the eldest son born to the king's queen. If his brothers were grandsons of the emperor, they were made full marquises; if he was not a grandson of an emperor, he was a commoner. This rule was changed in 127 BC when all sons of kings, excluding the heir apparent to the kingdom, were made full marquises.
Page 105: Throughout both Western and Eastern Han there were never less than 8 kingdoms and never more than 25; their total was determined by the fertility of the imperial house. QUOTE: "The kings of early Former Han were vassals of the emperor, and subject to law. The central government ensured that the kingdoms were inherited according to the rules, and sometimes interfered with the succession. Nevertheless, the kings enjoyed such an independence in the appointment of officials and the administration of their fiefs that an eventual collision between their interests and those of the central government could not be avoided."
Page 105: Hans Bielenstein calls the administration of each kingdom a "miniature copy of the central government." Each kingdom had a Grand Tutor who ranked 2000 shi, although he was not an administering official but a moral guide and mentor to the king. Each kingdom also had a Chancellor (2000 shi) and Grandee Secretary (2000 shi) with occupations similar to those highest officials of the central government with similar titles. However, a Grand Commandant was not appointed for any of the kingdoms since it was assumed that none of them would be engaging in warfare. Each kingdom had Nine Ministers (2000 shi) who had similar responsibilities and jurisdictions that those in the capital city had, although their ministries were more modestly staffed with a smaller amount of subordinates.
Page 106: Just like in the capital of Chang'an, each kingdom had its own Commandant of the Capital (2000 shi) who was responsible for law and order. The Clerks of the Capital (2000 shi) had duties similar to a Grand Administrator of a commandery.
Page 106: It should be noted that at this point, the only official of the kingdoms who was appointed by the central government in Chang'an was the kingdom Chancellor; all other officials were appointed by the king.
Page 106: The Rebellion of the Seven States in 154 BC forever broke the power of the kings. In 145 BC they were stripped of their right and privilege to appoint their own officials above the rank of 400 shi, a duty now carried out by the central government. The kingdoms' ministries of the Grandee Secretary, Commandant of Justice, and Director of the Imperial Clan were all abolished. The kingdoms' Privy Treasury ministry was also abolished, which meant that the kings no longer managed their own finances but relied on a stipend from the central government. While the kingdoms' ministries of the Grand Coachman and Prefect of the Gentleman-of-the-Palace were retained, nothing is known of the fate of the other ministries, although it is known that they were abolished by at least the end of Western Han. The entire staff of lesser officials was also reduced in size.
Page 106: In 104 BC the ranks of the kingdoms' Prefect of the Gentlemen-of-the-Palace and the Grand Coachman were lowered from 2000 shi to 1000 shi. The Grand Coachman's title was also shortened to just Coachman. It took until 8 BC for the Clerk of the Capital to finally be abolished in all the kingdoms; his duties were assumed by the centrally-appointed Chancellor. The Commandant of the Capital in each kingdom also came to be corresponded with the Chief Commandant of the commandery level government. Sometime around 8 BC the title of the kingdoms' Grand Tutor was also shortened to just Tutor.
Page 106-107: After the drastic reforms starting in 145 BC, Bielenstein writes that "In the end, no difference remained between the administration of a kingdom and a commandery. Even the senior personal officials of the kings received their appointments from the imperial court, although in contrast to the staff of the princesses, they were not responsible to any particular ministry in the capital. They acted as the agents of the government to keep the kings in check."
Page 107: It is clear from Eastern Han records that the kingdoms' Chancellors (2000 shi) had the same duties and status as a Grand Administrator of a commandery, even down to the Chief Clerk who corresponded to the Assistant in the commandery level government. To suppress banditry and maintain law and order, each kingdom still retained its Commandant of the Capital, now ranked Equivalent to 2000 shi. Lower ranking personnel were identical to that of a commandery.
Page 107: The centrally-appointed staff to the king included the Tutor (2000 shi) who performed mainly an honorary role. The Prefect of the Gentlemen-of-the-Palace (1000 shi) commanded the Gentlemen-of-the-Palace (200 shi), the Grandees (600 shi), and the Internuncios (Equivalent to 300 shi). The Gentlemen-of-the-Palace were bodyguards, the Grandees were messengers, and the internuncios assisted in ceremonies and completed errands. The Coachman (1000 shi) was responsible for horses and carriages. The king's secretaries were the Masters of Writing changed to Preparers of Documents (Equivalent to 600 shi) at an unspecified time. The Chief of the Guards (Equivalent to 400 shi) commanded the guards stationed at the gates of the royal palace compound. The Chief of Ritual Music (Equivalent to 400 shi) was in naturally charge of the musicians. The Chief Invocator (Equivalent to 400 shi) was in charge of prayers. The Chief of Physicians (Equivalent to 400 shi) was naturally in charge of physicians.

The Marquisates[edit]

Page 107: The emperor's sisters and daughters were given the title senior princess or simply princess. The senior princess was the equal of a king while the princess was the equal of a full marquis. Their estates (yi) were composed of whole prefectures, the heir to which was the eldest son of the full marquis. The daughters of kings were also princesses, but their estates did not contain whole prefectures but merely districts and communes which were not handed down to their heirs.
Page 108: QUOTE: "The household staff of a princess was likewise appointed by the central government and throughout both Han dynasties was responsible to the Director of the Imperial Clan (see pp. 42-3). This stood in sharp contrast to the personal officials of other nobles who were not formally responsible to any particular ministry."
Page 108: The senior male descendants of both the previous Shang Dynasty and Zhou Dynasty were made dukes (公 gong) in 8 BC, titles which were restored after Wang Mang's rule in 26 and 29 AD. These remained purely honorary until 37 AD when regular duchies (gong guo) were established in the Eastern han, yet nothing is known of how the duchies were administered; perhaps they were administered like the marquisates were.
Page 108: A Marquis (侯 hou) was the head of a marquisate (hou guo), which consisted of a number of households in prefectures, districts, or communes. It is not clear if the marquisates had full power over their fief territories before 145 BC like the kingdoms had enjoyed. If this was the case, it was certainly lost since each marquisate had its officials appointed by the central government. The administration of a marquisate in both Western and Eastern Han was identical to the administrative structure of the prefecture, district, and commune. The marquis himself had no role in the administration and merely received a stipend from the taxes collected in his nominal fief. Who would normally be the Prefect or Chief in a prefecture was under the Marquis honored with the title of Chancellor (whose rank depended on population size).
Page 108: The centrally-appointed household officials of the marquisate (whose ranks are unknown) were the Assistant of the Household, the Usher, the Grandee at the Gate, Forerunners, and Cadets (who were possibly bodyguards). The Usher, Grandee at the Gate, and Forerunners were all abolished in Eastern Han. In Eastern Han, marquisates with over 1,000 households or more were appointed an Assistant of the Household (Equivalent to 100 shi) and Cadets, but if the marquisate was smaller than 1,000 households, it was only given Cadets.
Page 109: Some marquises did not live on their own marquisates at all but resided in the capital city with their normal staff and retinue of servants and slaves. These types of marquises were called Servants at the Spring and Autumn Courts, which was a descriptive appelation and not a title or office of any sort.

Administration Beyond the Border[edit]

Page 109: Beginning in 121 BC, the Western Han government established several Dependent States along the northern and northwestern borders of the empire. These functioned as buffers between Han China and the hostile realm of the Xiongnu, Tibetan tribes, and others. It also served the purpose of controloling barbarian groups in the Ordos Desert. Dependent States had a majority population of non-Han peoples and was governed by a Chief Commandant (Duwei) who had a staff. The Chief Commandant was a subordinate of the Director of Dependent States until 28 BC, when in that year the Chief Commandants were transferred to the ministry of the Grand Herald.
Page 109: The Eastern Han government also retained Dependent States, which existed along the northern, northwestern, northeastern, and southwestern borders. They consisted of prefectures and marches. The Dependent State was still governed by a Chief Commandant who was ranked at Equivalent to 2000 shi. He was aided by an Assistant and one Master of Records; if he had a lesser staff, they are not described in historical sources. QUOTE: "The Chief Commandant seems to have been subordinated to the Grand Administrator of the adjoining commandery from which the Dependent State had received its name."
Page 109-110: The Chinese had embassies and skilled diplomats to deal with the barbarian groups it was not warring with, although these officials were not described systematically in the Book of Han. The Western Regions of the Tarim Basin and oasis of Turfan were brought under Chinese control, yet their authority over them was loose. Diplomats sent to these regions were often Messengers or Colonels.
Page 110: In 60 or 59 BC, the Protectorate of the Western Regions was established. The Protector General of the Western Regions, who was simultaneously of a high position such as Chief Commandant of Cavalry or a Grandee Remonstrant, was QUOTE: "China's chief representative in the Western Regions." His staff had one Lieutenant Colonel, one Assistant, one Chief Clerk, two Majors, two Captains, and two Millarians. The number of soldiers under his command is unknown. It is not known if the Protector General had any interpreters in his staff, although they might have been made unnecessary by the fact that the oasis city-states of the Western Regions had their own Chief Interpreters to deal with other states such as Han China. The Han Chinese QUOTE: "maintained the fiction that the chief officials in the various states of the Western Regions were its own representatives by conferring on them Chinese seals and seal cords."
Page 110: As of 48 BC, Wu and Ji colonels (Equivalent to 600 shi) were appointed as supervisors of the Agricultural Garrisons (i.e. self-sustaining military settlements) in Turfan. They were also charged with the pacification of the Western Regions by diplomatic and martial means. Thus, their jurisdictions and powers overlapped with the Protector General of the Western Regions. This is perhaps the reason why Emperor Ping of Han (r. 1–6) had the Protector General's office abolished and transferred all of his duties to the Wu and Ji colonels who still inhabited the Western Regions.
Page 110: Emperor Wu of Han created the Colonel Protecting the Tibetans and Colonel Protecting the Wuhuan in order to conduct formal relations and gain information about the Tibetans and Wuhuan. Both of these colonels had the Staff of Authority (Jiezhang 節杖) and ranked Equivalent to 2000 shi.
Page 111: A lesser officer called the Lieutenant Colonel in Charge of the Xiongnu appeared in records during the reign of Emperor Cheng of Han (r. 32–7 BC), yet Bielenstein says this office perhaps existed since 51 BC whent he Xiongnu made peace with Han China.
Page 111: In the Eastern Han, the position of Colonel Protecting the Tibetans was occupied in 30 AD, but the official filling the post died in that year. It was not filled again until 33 AD upon the request in a memorial of historian Ban Biao. (3–54). Emperor Guangwu of Han was receptive to this idea and by the end of the year the vacant office was filled once more, the Colonel given the Staff of Authority, and ranked Equivalent to 2000 shi. The Colonel had his own staff and headquarters at Lingju prefecture in Jincheng Commandery.
Page 111: In 49 AD, some of the Wuhuan tribesmen were allowed to settle in the northern border commanderies of Liaoxi, Yubeiping, Yuyang, Guangyang, Shanggu, Dai, Taiyuan, Yanmen, and Shuofang. In that year, historian Ban Biao once again sent a memorial to the throne, this time suggesting that the Colonel Protecting the Wuhuan should be revived. The Emperor agreed and gave the new Colonel the Staff of Authority and a rank of Equivalent to 2000 shi. The Colonel's headquarters and staff were located in Ning Prefecture of Shanggu Commandery. His jurisdiction actually did not end with dealing with the Wuhuan within the borders, as he also had contacts with the Wuhuan and Xianbei beyond the borders as well. He supervised seasonal markets in Ning Prefecture where the Chinese made sure to buy plenty of horses from the nomads.
Page 111-112: The Xiongnu and China were at war during the early Eastern Han, so there was no official appointed to oversee their affairs. However, when the Xiongnu Federation once again split into two (i.e. Southern Xiongnu and Northern Xiongnu) by 48 AD, the Chinese government made peace with the Southern Xiongnu and tended once again to diplomatic affairs. The Chinese negotiated that the Xiongnu could continue to inhabit the vast expanse of territory in northwestern China where Han governmental control had been weakened. This territory was composed of the commanderies of Dai, Yanmen, Dingxiang, Yunzhong, Wuyuan, Shuofang, and Beidi, as well as the majority of the Ordos Desert within the northern bend of the Yellow River.
Page 112: Emperor Guangwu of Han accepted the proposal that the Shanyu of the Southern Xiongnu should set up his residence at Meiji Prefecture in Xihe Commandery. The Eastern Han government appointed a General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household in Charge of the Xiongnu (Equivalent to 2000 shi), China's chief diplomatic representative to the Southern Xiongnu and even the Northern Xiongnu. He was given the Staff of Authority and given headquarters at Meiji Prefecture.
Page 112: After the loss of contact during the tumultuous fall of Wang Mang, the oasis city-states of the Western Regions desired to reestablish relations with China, but Emperor Guangwu refused. As a consequence, the region fell under the control of the Northern Xiongnu and Yarkand. This loss of relations was changed in 73 AD with the renewed Chinese offenses against the Northern Xiongnu. An Agricultural Garrison (i.e. self-sustaining garrison) was established at Yiwulu (Hami Prefecture) so that the trade route to Turfan could be secured. In 74 AD the Protector General of the Western Regions was revived after a long dormancy, along with the Wu and Ji Colonels. However, there was little success for the Chinese since the Northern Xiongnu were still quite powerful, and in 75 AD the new Protector General was killed and his forces wiped out by Karasahr and Kucha. His office was not immediately refilled, the Wu and Ji Colonels were dismissed in 76 AD, and the Agricultural Garrison at Yiwulu was withdrawn from on April 19, 77 AD.
Page 112-113: The tide did not turn until 89 AD, when the Northern Xiongnu were finally crushed by Chinese forces. In 92 AD the offices of the Protector General and the Wu and Ji Colonels were filled once more and for the next fifteen years Han China once more became the hegemon of Central Asia.
Page 113: On July 29, 107 AD the Protector General's office was abolished for good, yet a Lieutenant and Chief Clerk of his staff were continually appointed by the court (the court had the same strange policy from 76 to 92 AD when the Protector General did not exist; it was their way of hoping to retain their influence in Central Asia). From that point forth it was the Wu and Ji Colonles once more who were the sole ones responsible for representing China in the Western Regions. The Wu and Ji Colonels were appionted even until the end of the dynasty, even though China's hold on Central Asia ended by the middle of the 2nd century AD.

The Army[edit]

Page 114: QUOTE: "Both the Former and Later Han dynasties had military conscription." All able-bodied men became Regular Conscripts when they reached the age of twenty-three. They were trained for their first year of service in their home commanderies to become Skilled Soldiers, Cavalrymen, or Sailors of Towered Warships (type of training would depend on the locality).
Page 114: After this initial year they spent their second year as Garrison Conscripts and served as guards for either the Commandant of the Guards in the capital, as guards in the courts of kings, or as troops in commanderies along the frontier.
Page 114: When these two years of service were up, the men were dismissed and returned home where they could join a militia.
Page 114: In the Western Han militias were called for normal training exercises every eighth month, but in the Eastern Han period this was no longer a mandatory requirement of militias. Militias were mobilized during emergencies and their members were dismissed when they reached the age of fifty-six. Only nobles of grade 4 to 8 were exempt from this service in their localities while those of grade 9 were exempt from military duties altogether. If a man did not want to perform his conscription duties, he could pay a military tax or present the government with grain, horses, or slaves.
Page 114-115: The conscripts who became guards under the Commandant of the Guards became known as the Southern Army. Since they were rotated every year, they did not become a veteran fighting force. This is in contrast to the Northern Army, a standing army which consisted of professional soldiers. The first documented mentioning of the Northern Army comes from 180 BC, although it perhaps existed earlier. It's exact command structure in the early days is unknown, perhaps under a single general. Emperor Wu of Han is known to have changed the command structure of the Northern Army by incorporating five colonels, each ranking 2000 shi. These were the Colonel of the Capital Rampart, Colonel of Garrison Cavalry, Colonel of the Foot Soldiers, Colonel of Picked Cavalry, and Colonel of the Chang River Encampment. The Colonel of Foot soldiers commanded men stationed at the gates leading into the Park of the Supreme Forest. The Colonel of the Chang River Encampment commanded a regiment of nomadic barbarian cavalry and was headquartered near the Xuanqu Palace along the Chang River, a tributary of the Wei River located southeast of Chang'an.
Page 115: We know that at least some troops of the Northern Army wore armor, since a troop of Mailed Warriors of the Northern Army accompanied funeral processions in both Western and Eastern Han.
Page 115: Emperor Wu also established the offices of three more colonels (at 2000 shi) which can be seen as an extension of the Northern Army, although they were not stationed near the capital. One was the Colonel of Hu Cavalry stationed in Chiyang Prefecture in Zuopingyi Commandery, but he was irregularly appointed. Located just north of the Jing River, this colonel was used to guard a northern access point to the imperial capital. There was also the Colonel of Archers Who Shoot by Sound who commanded the Archers Who Shoot By Sound and Are Expectant Appointees (i.e. archers who had not yet been assigned to regular army units and were still in training). The third was the Colonel of the Rapid as Tigers who commanded light chariots.
Page 115: Each of these eight colonels mentioned had one Assistant and at least one Major if not several. The Colonel of the Capital Rampart also had a Commandant who served as a legal aide.
Page 115: The long reign of peace by the end of the Western Han period meant that some of the eight colonels spent their time as sinecures and never directly commanded troops. During the reign of Emperor Cheng of Han, the Colonel of Garrison Cavalry spent time compiling military texts for the imperial library. Wang Mang was appointed as Colonel of Archers Who Shoot By Sound. The famous scholarly father and son Liu Xiang (scholar) and Liu Xin, respectively, were appointed as Colonels of the Capital Rampart.
Page 115-116: The Northern Army was not the only military force assigned to the task of defending Chang'an, since there was also a Chief of the Cloud Rampart encamped at Zuopingyi Commandery. He was a subordinate of the Grand Administrator of Zuopingyi Commandery, yet his regiment in reality acted as another outpost located north of the Wei River which protected the capital region. Also, the two Chief Commandants of Passes guarded the two crucial passes which led to the Land Within the Passes, i.e. the Wei River Valley and capital city. Two other Chief Commandants of Passes guarded two other crucial passes in the Gansu Corridor which led to the Western Regions.
Page 116: Historians still do not know if the soldiers under the command of the Chief of the Cloud Rampart and the Chief Commandants of Passes were professionally trained or not. It is known that the Agricultural Garrisons (i.e. self-sustaining, where soldiers received land in exchange for frontier service) in the north were composed of professional career soldiers.
Page 116: QUOTE: "All offices discussed so far existed in both peace and war, and their military forces sufficed for minor emergencies. The situation was different in times of major conflicts, when armies were set up by mobilizing the militia, and generals were appointed to lead these armies. Such generals, who ranked above the Nine Ministers, received a variety of titles which normally were used again and again."
Page 116: When such a major conflict occurred, the most common types of generals summoned to lead these armies were the General of the Van, General of the Rear, General of the Left, and General of the Right, while others included the General-in-Chief, General of Agile Cavalry, General of Chariots and Cavalry, General of the Guards, General of Resolute Cavalry, and General of Skilled Soldiers. Beneath these were the Majors of the Army and the Captains of the Army. QUOTE: "When an emergency was over, the armies were demobilized, the generals dismissed, and the titles shelved until needed again."
Page 116-117: From 87 BC onwards the martial titles of General-in-Chief, General of the Agile Cavalry, General of Chariots and Cavalry, General of the Guards, General of the Van, General of the Rear, General of the Left, and General of the Right were bestowed on regents and other top court officials for political and honorary purposes instead of conferring actual command over troops. By this year the headquarters for these offices became permanent and were stationed in the capital of Chang'an, and were even divided into bureaus with Division Heads. A Master of Records also belonged to their staffs.
Page 117: The conscript army under the Commandant of the Guards was no longer called the Southern Army during the Eastern Han period. The Northern Army retained its name, though, and was also called the Troops of the Five Colonels. The Northern Army was reorganized by Emperor Guangwu of Han so that five (not eight) colonels existed. He abolished the Colonel of the Capital Rampart but the Colonel of Garrison Cavalry was revived on August 3, 39 AD. He kept the Colonel of Foot Soldiers. He Colonel of the Picked Cavalry was revived in 33 under a different name of Colonel of the Left of Green Turbans but renamed Colonel of the Picked Cavalry on August 3, 39 AD. The Colonel of the Chang River Encampment was abolished in 31 yet brought back into the fold on August 3, 39 AD. The Colonel of Hu Cavalry was appointed from 29 to 32, but his office was then abolished and fused with the Colonel of the Chang River Encampment, so that only one colonel and not two were in command of all the Han Empire's northern nomadic horsemen. The Colonel of Archers Who Shoot by Sound was abolished in 31 but reinstated on August 3, 39 AD. The Colonel of the Rapid as Tigers was abolished early on and fused with the Colonel of Archers Who Shoot by Sound (if you were paying attention, that leaves only these five: Colonel of Foot Soldiers, Colonel of Garrison Cavalry, Colonel of Picked Cavalry, Colonel of the Chang River Encampment, and the Colonel of Archers Who Shoot by Sound). Although located near Luoyang and nowhere near the Chang River anymore, the title of the Colonel of the Chang River Encampment remained unchanged as a leftover appelation.
Page 117-118: In Eastern Han, the rank of these Northern Army colonels was changed to Equivalent to 2000 shi. All five colonels, their subordinates, and a Captain of the Center of the Northern Army and his seven subordinates (who inspected the encampments of the five colonels) totalled only 3536 men in all, which Bielenstein says is not a large number for such an important army as the Northern Army, but the Book of Later Han is consistent on this issue in terms of numerical strength of military forces.
Page 118: In addition to protecting the capital, the Northern Army was also mobilized during emergencies where foreign invasion into the Han Empire was involved. Three other military encampments acted as defensive bases against northern incursions, as well as army reserves in case the Northern Army struggled. The first of these is the Encampment at Liyang set up by Emperor Guangwu of Han in 43 AD, located in Liyang Prefecture along the Yellow River. It contained 1000 infantrymen and cavalrymen. It was inspected by an Internuncio. The other two were not established until March 18, 110 AD; these were Encampment at Yong in Yufufeng Commandery and Tiger's Teeth Encampment at Chang'an. Both of these were headed by a Chief Commandant (Duwei).
Page 118-119: Although the Book of Later Han and the Hanguanyi both state that these latter two encampments were established to guard imperial grave mounds and funerary parks, we know that by this point these imperial pyramids were in total ruins since they were looted and vandalized by the Chimei rebels in 26 AD and were not renovated since. It hardly makes sense that the Han would want to guard a handful of ruins. Bielenstein asserts that their real purpose was to guard the lower Wei River Valley against invasions by Tibetan tribes and Xiongnu. Their strategic importance as obstacles to passes can be seen in the Southern Xiongnu's sacking and destroying of the Tiger's Teeth Encampment in the fall of 140 AD when they were allied with the Wuhuan and Tibetans. The Encampments at Liyang, Yong, and Tiger's Teeth Encampment also sometimes served offensive purposes in projected strikes against the Xiongnu, Wuhuan, Tibetans, and Chinese rebels.
Page 119-120: Emperor Guangwu of Han abolished the Chief Commandants of Passes in 33 AD but revived the Chief Commandant of the Hangu Pass in 43 AD. This was because the road connecting Luoyang with Northwest China passed through the Hangu Pass, thus travelers could be monitored and foreign assaults could be checked at that point.
Page 120: In Western Han, the General Who Crosses the Liao River (2000 shi) was a post that existed from 78 to 66 BC, but it was revived in Eastern Han in 65 AD for a completely different purpose than the original one. This position was at first successively appointed and then stationed permanently with a garrison at Manbo Prefecture of Wuyuan Commandery in 114 AD. Manbo Prefecture was located at a border wall just north of the northern bend of the Yellow River in the Ordos Desert. The garrison had actually been there since 51 AD, and the purpose of keeping an outpost here was to prevent the Southern Xiongnu from fleeing out of Han's control and to keep them separated from the Northern Xiongnu so that the two would not have a chance to reunite and pose a grave threat to China.
Page 120-121: The military hierarchy in Han can be explained as thus. The largest unit was the Division (ying) which was commanded by either a General-in-Chief, a General, or sometimes a Lieutenant General. The Division was divided into a number of Regiments (bu); the General-in-Chief's Division had five Regiments while the General and Lieutenant General had a smaller but unknown number of regiments in their Division. The Regiment was commanded by a Colonel (Equivalent to 2000 shi) and a Major of the Army (Equivalent to 1000 shi). On some occasions a Major might command his own Regiment. The Regiment was itself divided into Companies which were each headed by a Captain of the Army (Equivalent to 600 shi). The Company was divided into Platoons, each one of these headed by a Platoon Chief. This description is not entirely accurate for every single Division that existed throughout the Han Dynasty, as there was some variation.
Page 121-122: In the beginning of Eastern Han, the government upheld a policy of gradually shifting into a peacetime government, as the forty-three titles for generals created from 25 AD to 36 AD were reduced to just six in 37 AD, then to one in 39 AD, and then to none in 51 AD. Thus field commanders were no longer needed on a permanent basis and were only appointed when an emergency came or crisis loomed. It was not until the Yellow Turban Rebellion in 184 AD when all of the fancy general's titles were revived again so that a multitude of generals could be appointed to deal with the massive revolt.
Page 122: It should be noted that, although the titles mentioned above were rarely used in a military context in Eastern Han between 51 AD and 184 AD, the court did however bestow them on civilian officials as honors and sinecures, just like the Western Han government did starting with the period of relative peace (i.e. circa 87 BC to the end of Former Han). For example, on June 15, 57 AD Emperor Ming of Han bestowed on his younger brother Liu Cang the title of General of the Agile Cavalry.
Page 122-123: The General of Chariots and Cavalry was revived to deal with Xiongnu and Tibetan threats, given to such men as Ma Fang, Dou Xian, and Deng Chi, all brothers of an empress dowager. Yet even during this same period some incumbents holding the title of General of Chariots and Cavalry were given it for merely honorary purposes, such as with the court official Yan Xian when he was given this appointment the day his sister became Empress Dowager Yan (i.e. on May 4, 125 AD; she was formerly Empress Yan Ji).
Page 123: To deal with the Yellow Turban Rebellion, the court had to assign titles to many new field commanders. This included the leading officers, a General of Chariots and Cavalry of the Left from 184 to 185 AD, who was then dismissed and replaced as head commander by the General of Chariots and Cavalry from 185 to 186 AD. He was replaced by a eunuch but the crisis still loomed, so a General of the Chariots and Cavalry of the Right was appointed for the rest of 186. He Miao, who died on September 24, 189 AD during the fight at the Northern Palace in Luoyang between the eunuchs and the Yuan family was the last person in the Han Dynasty to hold the title General of Chariots and Cavalry (appointed two years earlier in 187).
Page 124: Quick note, the people often honored with general's titles although they did not command troops were imperial relatives and eunuchs.
Page 124: When the General-in-Chief title was revived in 89 AD, it became the title of the regent (10,000 shi) who ranked with the Three Excellencies.

The Salaries of Officials[edit]

Page 127: The average price of one hu of grain during Eastern Han was 100 cash coins.
Page 127: It should be noted that the salaries given to officials below was not strictly the only source of income officials could make. For example, the emperor bestowed three annual grants on his metropolitan officials during festivities of the year, which could include gifts of wine, food, and objects of great worth. As Bielenstein points out, during one of these annual grant-givings, an official making Fully 2,000 shi could be granted gifts of objects such as silk wares which were valued as high as 115,000 cash, or the equivalent of 1,150 hu of unhusked grain. This is an increase of a little over 50% of the annual salary of one ranked at 2,000 shi.
Page 131: QUOTE: "To conclude, the salary lists of A.D. 50 to 106 are identical, and the routine of paying each official one half of his salary in cash and the other half in grain, the halvees being of equal standard monetary value, was honoured by both. In A.D. 106, the cash part of the salary was calculated by multiplying one half of the number of hu of unhusked grain with 100. The other part was paid out in husked grain at a reduced volume in order to preserve monetary parity, the conversion ratio from unhusked grain to husked grain being 10 to 6. This practice may well have been followed in A.D. 50 also."
Page 131: This is the table on this page.
NOTE: Remember to note that a shi is a bushel and a volume unit of an ancient hu is 19.81 liters according to http://www.jiangnan.edu.cn/zhgjiu/u3-2.htm, while footnote 44 on pages 226–227 Michael Loewe's Crisis and Conflict in Han China says that a hu of grain was just under 20 liters. See Loewe's "The measurement of grain during the Han period", T'oung Pao, Volume 49, Numbers 1–5 (1961): pp. 64f.

Salary list of 106 AD
A. Rank (measured in shi)	B. Monthly Salary in Unhusked Grain (measured in hu)	C. Monthly Salary in Coin (standard currency)	D. Monthly Salary in Husked Grain (measured in hu)	E. C divided by half-value of B (measured in cash per hu)	F. Ratio of D to half-value of B
10,000	350	17,500	105	100	60%
Fully 2,000	180	9,000	54	100	60%
2,000	120	6,000	36	100	60%
Equivalent to 2,000	100	5,000	30	100	60%
1,000	90	4,500	27	100	60%
Equivalent to 1,000	80	4,000	24	100	60%
600	70	3,500	21	100	60%
Equivalent to 600	60	3,000	18	100	60%
400	50	2,500	15	100	60%
Equivalent to 400	45	2,250	13.5	100	60%
300	40	2,000	12	100	60%
Equivalent to 300	37	1,850	11.1	100	60%
200	30	1,500	9	100	60%
Equivalent to 200	27	1,350	8.1	100	60%
100	16	800	4.8	100	60%
Equivalent to 100	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Officials Whose Salaries are in Terms of Dou	11	550	3.3	100	60%
Accessory Clerks	8	400	2.4	100	60%

Civil Service Recruitment[edit]

Page 132: QUOTE: "The civil-service recruitment system of the two Han dynasties is the forerunner of China's famous examination system which reached maturity in Sung and Ming times. In comparison to its future glory, the Han system was crude and open to corruption. But in spite of flaws, Han civil-service recruitment provided the government with sufficiently competent candidates for office, and at the height of Former and Later Han the officials fulfilled their duties effeciently and well. All free men were eligible for official employment, unless they were enregistered as traders in the marketplaces. The exclusion of merchants had been in force from the beginning of Former Han (HS 24B:4a), and an edict of 142 BC refers to it as a matter of course (HS 5:10a). It is possible, nevertheless, that the rule was broken at times, since the high officials thought it necessary to restate in 7 BC that merchants should not be allowed to become officials."
Page 132: The most honorable way to gain office was through an imperial summons, which was very rare. The emperor could choose his own officials personally or accept the recommendations of high officials. These men who received a summons were brought to the capital by Official Carriage and if they were very prestigious they would be honored by traveling in a Comfortable Carriage. It should be noted that a summons did not guarantee employment. If a candidate did not live up to expectations, he was dismissed. It was possible to refuse a summons, although this was not easy.
Page 132-133: Another means of recruitment was via the ren privilege, which Wei Hong (fl. 25–57) described as such: officials ranking 2000 shi or higher who had served for at least three years could have a close relative (usually a brother or son) be appointed to an official position, given that they first served a probationary term as Gentlemen (lang). This was heavily criticized since it was not based on merit, and was finally outlawed in 7 BC. Dubs asserts that the Eastern Han continued to outlaw the practice but resorted to it only on really special occasions of imperial grace, yet Bielenstein says there is evidence in the Book of Later Han that the practice continued into Eastern Han.
Page 133: The majority of officials were recruited in one of two ways: recommendation or direct appiontment. The first edict describing the system of recommendation dates to 196 BC when it ordered for a nationwide recommendation of candidates; similar edicts were issued throughout the Han Dynasty.
Page 133: QUOTE: "It stands to reason that the colonial commanderies in the far south, such as those in Indochina, must have been difficult to comply with the edicts, if they tried to do so at all. Not surprisingly, several Former Han edicts restricted the search to the interior commanderies. In contrast, there is only a single Later Han edict which made the same limitation. The obvious reason is, that the great Later Han migration had increased the southern Chinese population, so that candidates for office had become more readily available."
Page 134: The origins of the examination system for candidates is sketchy. It is mentioned in the Book of Han that Emperor Wen of Han administered a test for candidates to office in 165 BC. It is also known that the Grand Minister of Ceremonies administered a test for candidates in 130 BC. But these are but two of only a few examples of examination during the Han. QUOTE: "It cannot be settled, therefore, when the examinations began, how regularly they were given, and who was in charge of them."
Page 134-135: As the demand for more officials grew during Western Han, the central government could no longer uphold the recommendatory system by itself. In 130 BC, Emperor Wu of Han accepted the proposal of Dong Zhongshu that each commandery and kingdom should send at least two men annually to the court as candidates for office, the Filially Pious and Incorrupt or Xiaolian. This system remained in place until 92 AD during Eastern Han. A Court Conference in that year determined that there was a serious flaw in allowing no distinction between those commanderies and kingdoms which were very populous and those which were not. Thus new quotas for each commandery and kingdom (as proposed by Minister over the Masses Ding Hong and Minister of Works Liu Fang) was accepted by the emperor. This quota was fixed so that one Xiaolian for every 200,000 inhabitants in every commandery or kingdom should be sent to the court annually. If a commandery had less than 200,000 people, one Xiaolian should be sent every two years. If a commandery had less than 100,000 people, one Xiaolian should be sent every three years. On December 21, 101 AD the quota system was further reformed so that the sparsely-populated northern frontier commanderies with populations less than 200,000 each only had to send one Xiaolian annually for every 100,000 people. If the population was less than 100,000, they only had to send one Xiaolian every two years. If the population was less than 50,000, they only had to send one Xiaolian every three years. Before the quotas, the amount of people nominated each year was 200 Filially Pious and Incorrupt. QUOTE: "As a result of these quotas, the recruitment of Filially Pious and Incorrupt was increased to 250-300 men per year."
Page 135: To make sure that the Xiaolian candidates were worthy of office, an edict of 196 BC (and strongly reaffirmed in 128 BC) stated that if an official sent an unworthy man to court as a Xiaolian, he would be punished with dismissal from his post. Until the year 126 AD when it was lifted, there was a law throughout Han which allowed only officials who had spent at least a full year in office to nominate Xiaolian candidates. The Xiaolian, after passing an initial test of scrutiny to become Gentlemen, or Lang, had to serve a sentence of probation (of undetermined length until 123 AD) as imperial bodyguards at court, a period of time when improper recommendations QUOTE: "were bound to be discovered." During Western Han, the Grandee Secretary and Chancellor had the privilege and duty of checking on Xiaolian to make sure an honest recommendation was made. During Eastern Han, this right was transferred to the Masters of Writing in the imperial secretariat.
Page 135: Once the Xiaolian became Gentlemen, or Lang, bodyguards to the emperor, they were divided into one of Three Corps. For any Xiaolian aged fifty and above during Eastern Han, they were always placed under the command of the General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household for All Purposes, while Xiaolian younger than fifty were placed in the other two corps led by the General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household of the Left and the General of the Gentlemen-of-the-Household of the Right.
Page 135-136: After serving an undetermined amount of time being Gentlemen, the worthy ones were promoted to office in the civil service and annually graded by the Superintendant of the Imperial Household. An edict of 43 BC stated that their initial rank should be decided on the basis of the Four Types of Virtuous Conduct: simple and straightforward, sincere and honest, humble and yielding to others, and showing good behavior.
Page 136: QUOTE: "In A.D. 132, the Prefect of the Masters of Writing, Tso Hsiung, proposed a change in the recruitment of Filially Pious and Incorrupt. Unless exceptionally qualified, they should henceforth be at least forty years old and undergo an examination on arrival in the capital. The tests should be on knowledge of the classics or on the ability to draft documents, and the grading should be done first by the ministries of the Three Excellencies, and then by the Masters of Writing, i.e. the imperial secretariat. In spite of strong protests, the proposal was adopted by edict on 13 December, A.D. 132...Opposition to the examination of Filially Pious and Incorrupt continued, but the new Prefect of the Masters of Writing, Huang Ch'iung, came out in spirited defence [sic] of the measure. He also proposed that Filially Pious and Fraternally Respectful (hsiao-t'i) should become a courtesty title additionally to Filially Pious and Incorrupt. The emperor approved in both cases."
Page 136: QUOTE: It is not recorded how long candidates for office had to serve as Gentlemen. The time must have varied according to circumstance. On 11 September, A.D. 123, an edict ordered that Gentlemen who understood the classics and had administrative ability should be recommended for office after a minimum of three years.
Page 136-137: During the early Western Han, Flourishing Talent was one of many moral prerequisites found in the irregular edicts issued from the central court looking for candidates throughout the country. On September 12, 36 AD, changed this to Abundant Talent, a new type of annually-presented candidate who was above the regular Xiaolian. One Abundant Talent had to be presented annually to the court by each of the following: the Three Excellencies, Superintendant of the Imperial Household, Colonel Director of the Retainers, and the Shepherds/Inspectors of provinces. This totalled seventeen men each year. Abundant Talents did not have to serve probationary periods and were directly appointed to office. They did not have an age limit either. Over the course of Eastern Han, 3,000 Abundant Talents were presented and appointed, while only a minority of these were already serving in an official post.
Page 137: QUOTE: In addition to the state-sponsored recommendatory system, all officials had the right on their own initiative to recommend to the emperor anyone they wished. Such individual recommendations could be made by memorial, or might be offered in a more informal way...Individual recommendations were, of course, an important method by which political factions attempted to increase their political power. To prevent blatant abuse, the government held the sponsors responsible for the conduct of their candidates. Conversely, sponsors themselves might insist that their candidates lived up to certain standards.
Page 138: "There can be no question that the various systems of civil service recruitment discussed so far provided the majority of officials for the higher echelons of the bureaucracy. However, another approach brought greater numbers of men into office. This was the direct and practically unrestrained appointment of junior staff by the Three Excellencies, Nine Ministers, and other high-ranking officials in the central government, and by the administrators of the provinces, commanderies, kingdoms, and prefectures in the local government. Naturally, most of these men spent their official lives in the lower levels of bureaucracy, although some of them could reach higher status through promotion or recommendation."
Page 138: Another form of official recruitment was through the Academy, or Taixue. The Western Han inherited the Qin Dynasty practice of appointing Erudits, who were specialists in ancient texts, a minority of whom at first only specialized in Confucianism. In 141 BC all Legalists were excluded from government careers and in 136 BC the chairs were limited to five, one each for the Book of Changes, Book of Documents, Book of Odes, Book of Rites, and Spring and Autumn Annals with Gongyang Commentary. In 124 BC, 10 disciples (age requirement of 18) were attached to each of the Erudit chairs, making fifty in all. These disciples were selected and examined in the commanderies and kingdoms before they were examined by the Grand Master of Ceremonies in the capital. They studied under the Erudits for one year before given an examination. Thus the first academy was established by Emperor Wu of Han, who must have built its first campus outside Chang'an.
Page 138-139: Emperor Zhao of Han increased the disciples to 100 while Emperor Xuan of Han increased the disciples to 200; the latter increased the number of chairs to 12 and raised the Erudits salary from 400 to Equivalent to 600 shi. In 41 BC the number of disciples was limited to 1000. Wang Mang enlarged the Academy in 4 AD, creating thirty chairs for six classics (i.e. he added the Classic of Music, now lost), enlarging the student body, building new dorms to house them, and giving the Academy its own market and granary.
Page 139: Emperor Guangwu of Han built a new Academy in the suburbs south of Luoyang in 29 AD. Another institution called the Hall of the Circular Moat, however, usurped many of the functions of the Academy in 59 AD, and half a century later during Emperor An of Han's reign the Academy was in disrepair. However, Emperor Shun of Han restored it on October 10, 131 AD with 240 buildings having 1,850 rooms. From 175 to 183, the Stone Classics were set up on campus.
Page 139: There were consistently fourteen chairs throughout Eastern Han, despite the student body growing to enormous levels. On May 23, 146 AD an edict made it so that all sons of officials from the regent down to rank 600 shi had to enroll at the Academy; by about this time the student body was more than 30,000.
Page 140: QUOTE: "The Erudits were not professors in the modern sense, but civil servants of scholarly achievements who at some time during their careers were attached to the Academy. They were supposed to be at least fifty years old...Vacancies among the Erudits were filled by direct transfers from other positions, on the basis of recommendations, or by imperial summons. Occasionally, a prospective Erudit had to undergo an examination. After some time in office, most Erudits were promoted to higher posts in the bureaucracy, even reaching the level of the Nine Ministers and Three Excellencies."
Page 140: QUOTE: "Regulations for the future official employment of students at the Academy were promulgated in 124 B.C. Civil-service examinations were to be given annually, and the best students passing these were to be offered appointment to lesser offices in the central and local administrations. It looks as though even at this early time the examinations were set at three levels of difficulty, leading to corresponding levels of official employment. Each candidate chose the type of examination for which he believed himself to be prepared. The system was further refined in A.D. 4 when Wang Mang held power during the nominal reign of Emperor P'ing. Henceforth, the 40 best students passing the annual civil-service examinations on the highest level were appointed Gentlemen-of-the-Palace, and the 20 best students passing the middle level were made Members of the Suite of the Hier-apparent, both being probationary offices in the capital (see pp. 24, 75). The 40 best students passing the lowest level were appointed Literary Scholars or Authorities on Ancient Matters in the commanderies and kingdoms...This meant that each year 100 students were absorbed into the bureaucracy, a small number considering the size of the student body."
Page 140-141: QUOTE: "While information of Later Han is extremely limited, there can be no doubt that the civil-service examinations on three levels were continued for students at the Academy. Nothing is known about the quota of men who annually entered the bureaucracy by this avenue. As acts of imperial grace, the quota could be temporarily increased, and additionally civil servants were occasionally recruited from the Academy via special examinations...It should be noted in conclusion that, whatever the quotas and additional dispensations, only a fraction of the students entered the bureaucracy directly from the Academy. All others had to strive for appointment as junior staff in the central and local administrations, for nomination as Filially Pious and Incorrupt or Abundant Talent, or for recommendation by a friendly official, unless they were prepared to abandon hope of official employment."

Power in Government[edit]

Page 143: The Han Empire had no written constitution and relied on custom to relegate power. It was the emperor's choice to reign passively or actively, yet always reminded by his ministers that his power was not unlimited and that the empire belonged to the people. It was ideally accepted that the emperor share power with his officials and that they share power amongst themselves. It was ideally accepted that the emperor should allow the officials to criticize him, and that he should accept these remonstrances. In reality, there was a constant contention between the emperor and his ministers. The emperor's performance was constantly under institutional scrutiny. In sum, neither emperor nor officialdom were all-powerful, and the state relied on a system of checks and balances of competing interests between the influential organs of state.
Page 143: The emperor personally appointed the high-ranking officials, while the Chancellor presented candidates during Western Han. In Eastern Han, the emperor turned to a wider circle of people (than just the Chancellor) for advice on who to nominate for office. If the emperor did not follow advice of others, officials brought up natural phenomena like a solar eclipse as a warning to the emperor that he must heed their advice. The emperor was also limited in choosing officials by the fact that he had to please several different political factions represented at court.
Page 144: On the Court Conference: QUOTE: "Emperors made policy decisions usually after consultation. Various officials acted routinely as imperial advisers, in addition to which the rulers referred important matters for discussions and guidance. They might summon the appropriate officials to the palace and question them either personally or through delegates. At other times, officials were ordered to meet among themselves and then to summarize the results of their discussion...There were cases when officials stationed in the provinces participated in the deliberations through memorials...Important issues were debated at Court Conferences (tingyi or huiyi) in the palace. There also existed the institution of the Great Conference (dayi) which was not held in the palace but, at least in Later Han times, in the Hall for Court Meetings of the Hundred Officials...It was situated in the ministry of the Minister over the Masses. The emperor participated, and for that purpose travelled to the ministry...The discussions concerned such matters as the bureaucracy, the legal system, coinage, appointments and resignations of high officials, enfeoffments, ritual, banditry, and foreign policy. Participants were selected in accordance with the needs of the situation, and for full-scale debates might include the Three Excellencies, the Nine Ministers, Grand Palace Grandees, Gentleman Consultants, Attending Secretaries, Erudits, Division Heads, imperial sons, and fovoured nobles. The emperor was under pressure to accept unanimous advice. As a memorial of A.D. 31 expressed it, 'a hereditary ruler does not neglect precedents and the unanimous recommendations of officials.' ...But the very fact that this needed to be said in a memorial shows that the emperor had to be reminded. It is certain that he was not bound by majority proposals, and frequently accepted minority opinions."
Page 144: Until 8 BC, the office of the Chancellor of China was the highest-ranking civil official, could act as a spokesman for the bureaucracy in his retirement, and provided a check on the power of the throne. His office had great prestige; until 124 BC, all the incumbents were chosen from among full marquises, but in that year a commoner was chosen. As soon as he was, though, he was made a full marquis. Only 7 of his 28 successors over the course of Western Han were originally full marquises before being appointed to the office (the other 21 were made full marquises once they were appointed).
Page 144-145: Before 8 BC, the Grandee Secretary was simply a chief censor below the Chancellor who formed a two-partite cabinet with the Chancellor. In that year, the Grandee Secretary was abolished and in his position was placed the Grand Minister of Works. The Chancellor was no longer the highest-ranking official and in 1 BC his title was changed to Grand Minister over the Masses. With the initiation of Eastern Han, the two-partite cabinet was transformed into a three-partite cabinet with the inclusion of the Commander-in-Chief, who shared the same rank and joint censorial responsibilities with the Grand Minister of Works and Grand Minister over the Masses.
Page 145: QUOTE: "What was the purpose behind the reorganization of the cabinet? One motive must have been to increase efficiency and honesty in censorial surveillance, another to upgrade public works. In addition, whether intentionally or not, the Chancellor/Grand Minister over the Masses suffered a relative decline in status. Having to share authority with first one and from Later Han two colleagues of equal rank, he was no longer automatically head of the cabinet, and spokesman of the bureaucracy, and therefore less powerful than his predecessors before 8 BC."
Page 145: Emperor Guangwu of Han obviously and intentionally did limit the powers of the Grand Minister over the Masses, though. While the first two Grand Ministers over the Masses were made full marquises, the third only recieved the lesser rank of marquis within the passes (raised posthumously to full marquis with an apologetic edict by the emperor in 37 AD), the fourth and fifth were already full marquises when appointed to office, but the sixth Grand Minister over the Masses (appointed January 30, 40 AD) was already a marquis within the passes and the emperor did not fulfill his promise of making him a full marquis. When the seventh Grand Minister over the Masses was appointed on July 27, 44 AD he was a commoner upon entering office, remained a commoner, and his successors were all commoners who did not recieve any marquisates.
Page 145-146: On June 8, 51 AD, to further limit the prestige of his ministers, Emperor Guangwu stripped the Grand Minister over the Masses and the Grand Minister of Works of their title prefixes of "Grand", thus making them Minister over the Masses and Minister of Works. The Commander-in-Chief was also made Grand Commandant. The edict proclaimed this act as following antiquarian tradition, but it was actually symbolic of the emperor's desire to limit bureaucratic authority. At this date, the Grand Commandant's office was also no longer filled with military men but merely civilian officials. Furthermore, over time, the Grand Commandant (although equal in rank) became the most powerful of the Three Excellencies; QUOTE: "In short, the formal power of the Former Han Chancellor was replaced by the informal power of the Later Han Grand Commandant."
Page 146: A person who had a biography written about them in the official histories signifies their importance. While 77.7% of Western Han Chancellors were given biographies in the Book of Han, only 39.6% of Eastern Han Ministers over the Masses (up to 189 AD, when government became dysfunctional) had biographies in the Book of Later Han.
Page 146: Furthermore, to highlight the greater importance of the Grand Commandant's position in the Eastern Han hierarchy and officials' career paths, only one Grand Commandant was transferred to the office of the Minister over the Masses (after serving his initial job) while a total of ten Ministers over the Masses were made Grand Commandants after serving in their first occupation.
Page 146-148: In Western Han, 16 different Chancellors and Grandee Secretaries met violent deaths (execution or forced suicide), while only 10 different Excellencies in Eastern Han met violent deaths. This demonstrates the higher level of tension between powerful high ministers of state during Western Han (who competed with the emperor) and the less-entrenched high ministers of Eastern Han. The emperors of Eastern Han effectively reduced their ministers power of entrenchment in office by limiting their time in office (faster rotation could also exemplify factional struggles than just merely the emperor's initiative). The average tenure of a high official (i.e. Grandee Secretary or Chancellor) in Western Han lasted 21 months, while the average tenture of a high official (i.e. Minister of Works, Minister over the Masses, Grand Commandant) in Eastern Han lasted only 10 months. The two tables below (on page 148) show the number of Chancellors and Grandee Secretaries appointed in Western Han in fifteen-year intervals and the number of Excellencies appionted in Eastern Han in fifteen-year intervals. Keep in mind, QUOTE: "The higher the number, the more frequent was their replacement."

Tenure of high officials in Western Han
15-year periods	Number of Excellencies appointed to office
202 BC to 188 BC	6
187 BC to 173 BC	9
172 BC to 158 BC	3
157 BC to 143 BC	9
142 BC to 128 BC	9
127 BC to 113 BC	9
97 BC to 83 BC	5
82 BC to 68 BC	9
67 BC to 53 BC	7
52 BC to 38 BC	8
37 BC to 23 BC	9
22 BC to 8 BC	8
7 BC to 8 AD	19

Tenure of high officials in Eastern Han
15-year periods	Number of Excellencies appointed to office
25 AD to 39 AD	11
40 AD to 54 AD	9
55 AD to 69 AD	9
70 AD to 84 AD	9
85 AD to 99 AD	13
100 AD to 114 AD	17
115 AD to 129 AD	21
130 AD to 144 AD	14
145 AD to 159 AD	24
160 AD to 174 AD	36
176 AD to 189 AD	38

Page 148-149: In terms of censorial power in government, QUOTE: "Overlapping of duties, checking up on the activities of subordinates, and reporting on the performance of immediate predecessors in office were chief features of the Han official system. In addition, the Chancellor and Grandee Secretary had the specific responsibility before 8 B.C. of scrutinizing all officialdom in the central and local administrations. For the capital territory, their activities were duplicated from 89 B.C. onward by the Colonel Director of the Retainers. In Later Han times, chief censorial surveillance became a joint responsibility of the Three Excellencies. The Later Han Colonel Director of the Retainers continued his independent inspection of the capital territory, while the Palace Assistant Secretary kept a separate watch on, particularly, the central government. The latter official had been a subordinate of the Grandee Secretary before 8 B.C., but during Later Han belonged to the ministry of the Privy Treasurer."
Page 149: QUOTE: "Among the various officials charged with censorial duties, only the Colonel Director of the Retainers had been a personal representative of the emperor from 89 to 45 B.C. When he lost the Staff of Authority in 45 B.C., he became indistinguishable from the Inspector of a province. None of the others acted on the emperor's direct behalf, not even the Palace Assistant Secretary. Although the office of the Palace Assistant Secretary was located within the palace precincts during Former Han, and although his Later Han superior served the emperor exclusively, he was a career official and not an agent of the throne. The Han censorate was therefore not an imperial tool, but rather a device by which the bureaucracy disciplined itself."
Page 149: The counterweight to the bureaucracy was the imperial secretariat established by Emperor Wu of Han, who organized its Masters of Writing into four bureaus. A fifth bureau was added in 29 BC. Emperor Guangwu of Han added a sixth bureau during his reign. QUOTE: "The imperial secretariat processed all communication to and from the throne, whether coming from or addressed to officials or common people, Chinese or foreigners. The Prefect of the Masters of Writing, who headed the imperial secretariat, possessed the lowly rank of 1000 shih, far beneath the 10,000 shih of the Three Excellencies in 8 B.C. But he and his staff equalled or surpassed the Excellencies in power."
Page 149: During the reign of Emperor Yuan of Han (r. 48–33 BC), the imperial secretariat became a rival institution to the cabinet of Three Excellencies. During Eastern Han its censorial powers were expanded even further, yet the effective Han system of checks and balances always kept it from gaining total authority.
Page 150: QUOTE: "The eunuchs were still another focus of potential power. They were institutionally restricted to the imperial quarters of the palace, and there charged with ensuring the safety and well-being of the emperor and his women. But they were also informally consulted on matters of policy. This was formalized by the founder of Later Han, when he created the eunuch office of Regular Palace Attendant. Its incumbents were to act as general advisers to the throne."
Page 150: It was only during the reign of Emperor Yuan of Han that eunuchs gained any sort of power in Western Han times, his reign being a clear exception. However, the eunuchs' power grew steadily in Eastern Han, the number of Regular Palace Attendants being four during the reign of Emperor Ming of Han but increased to ten by Emperor He of Han while the lesser eunuch staff grew simultaneously. A Regular Palace Attendant aided Emperor He in vanquishing the Dou clan in 92 AD, and for this he received a marquisate in 102 AD while his adopted son was allowed to inherit this fief in 114 AD. When Emperor Shun of Han came to power on December 16, 125 AD, he did so only with the support of an eighteen-member eunuch coup. These eunuchs received marquisates and by March 18, 135 AD had the emperor send out an edict proclaiming the right of all eunuchs to hand down their noble titles and fiefs to adopted sons. Again, when Emperor Huan of Han rid himself of the Liang faction on September 9, 159 AD, he did so only with the support of the eunuchs, who were granted fiefs and gifts. From that year forward, the eunuch power at court became cemented with the Regular Palace Attendants becoming the de facto leaders of the eunuchs. Eunuch influence spread far beyond the palace precincts after 159 AD.
Page 150: Dou Wu attempted to destroy the eunuch power at court on October 25, 168 AD, but he failed and committed suicide. Eunuch control over the central government did not cease until two thousand of them were slaughtered on September 25, 189 AD.
Page 150-151: Although the eunuchs abused their power, their element at court also helped to stabilize it against the ambitions of powerful regents and their allies in the career bureaucracy. Neither gained total dominance over the central administration, and Bielenstein asserts that this setup actually created a necessary division of authority which kept people in check. He notes that after the eunuchs were eliminated in 189, the long age of orderly government in the Eastern Han came to an end.
Page 151: Although the power of the secretariat was enhanced during Eastern Han, this did not mean the Privy Treasurer gained extraordinary powers over government. In fact, many of them did not ascend to higher office. Only three Privy Treasurers were promoted to Grandee Secretary during Western Han and only two of them became chancellors in Western Han. In Eastern Han, only a single Privy Treasurer rose to become one of the Three Excellencies, a Minister of Works.
Page 151: The regency was established (ever since 87 BC) due to the emperors wanting to honor a favorite as well as their need to lessen the burden of government by having a substitute who could act in their stead. The regents shared power with the throne but did not have total control over the ruler. They often became rivals with the acting empress dowager. The bureaucracy did not lose power when a regent was established; QUOTE: "The institutional forces which acted as a check on the emperor's influence applied to the regent as well."
Page 151-152: Regents during Western Han times were always given the title Commander-in-Chief, and of the nineteen regents in Western Han, only the first and last acted for child emperors, the rest commissioned during the reigns of adult rulers. A third of them held only nominal power. Only two met violent deaths.

Ethics and Statecraft[edit]

Csikszentmihalyi's book[edit]

Csikszentmihalyi, Mark. (2006). Readings in Han Chinese Thought. Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. ISBN 0872207102.

NOTE: More notes from Csikszentmihalyi's book can be found in User:PericlesofAthens/Sandbox5 and User:PericlesofAthens/Sandbox6.
Page xxv-xxvi: QUOTE: "This period of decline saw a major change in the imperial cult in 31 B.C.E. when Emperor Cheng established a sacrifice to Heaven (Tian...) that displaced the imperial sacrifice to the five powers. The first century B.C.E. also witnessed an explosion of interest in portents and the spirits. According to the treatise on sacrifices in Ban Gu's...(32–92 C.E.) History of the Han] (Hanshu...), there were thirty-seven thousand shrines to spirits constructed in a year at the beginning of the brief reign of Emperor Ai."

Education[edit]

Introduction to Education[edit]

Page 5-6: This section covers Dong Zhongshu's (d. 104 BCE) essay "An In-Depth Investigation into Names" ("Shencha mingchao") in the Luxuriant Dew of the Spring and Autumn Annals. In it, Dong uses the metaphor of the rice kernal and its need of environmental factors to flourish to symbolize the need of the individual to be educated in order to become self-cultivated. QUOTE: "Dong places human beings into a hierarchy with the Son of Heaven at the top, followed by feudal lords, high officials, low officials, and common people. Examining the origins of these terms for types of people allows him to attack the position of the Mengzi that people have an innate disposition to goodness. Yet as this selection from the essay makes clear, it is not the case that there is no goodness in human nature either. Dong begins by making an etymological connection: the word for 'people' is related to the word for 'asleep.' From this unlikely beginning, he draws parallels between these like-sounding terms, concluding that individual potential needs outside nourishment to develop morality, and that the need to 'awaken' people is confirmation that human nature is not originally good. Where the Mengzi uses the metaphor of a seedling to emphasize the importance of developing preexisting tendencies, Dong uses a contrast between a kernal of rice and the plant that develops out of it to emphasize how external influence is equally important. Later in the essay, Dong develops his theory that human nature has a dual aspect (along the lines of the balance between the feminine and masculine principles of yin and yang): affective dispositions (which need to be regulated) and human nature (which may be good, but needs to be awakened). As a result, the imperative to curb desires, something that takes on cardinal importance in Han discussions of ethics, is integrated into the discussion of self-cultivation."
Page 6: This section also covers Jia Yi's "Protecting and Tutoring" ("Baofu") within "Traditions Surrounding Jia Yi" ("Jia Yi zhuan") in chapter 48 of the Book of Han by Ban Gu. This written work QUOTE: "is a memorial to the throne by the poet and statesman Jia Yi. An idealized re-creation of a bygone system for educating the crown prince, the text locates the process of self-cultivation in his orderly progression through a series of 'studies' (xue...), each one inculcating a different virtue. Jia's writings reveal the influence of both the Mengzi and the Xunzi, and synthesize their opposing perspectives on human nature to portray a malleable nature without innate dispositions to good or evil. He is generally unconcerned with original nature, arguing that the excesses of the Qin dynasty were the fault of the unprincipled education of the crown prince."
Page 6-7: QUOTE: "The third selection is the complete first chapter of Yang Xiong's Model Sayings (Fayan 法言). From its first sentence, beginning 'Putting Learning into Action' (Xuexing...), it is dense with allusions to the Analects. The Analects begins with the phrase...'To learn something and put it into practice at the right time,' and learning and practice are also at the heart of the first section of the Model Sayings. Neither texts develops by tracing a single argument, but rather each offers chains of associated ideas concerning learning, mostly in dialogue form. When Yang turns to the discussion of self-cultivation and education, he portrays Kongzi (identified as Zhong Ni 仲尼) as having an almost supernatural ability to transform others. Kongzi's effect on his disciple Yan Hui (called Yan Yuan...in the Model Sayings) is also seen by Yang as a paradigm for the kind of inspiration that a student today may receive from the sages of the past. Yang is particularly concerned about the popularity of the idea that it is better to excel at technical arts or to be rich than to cultivate oneself. For Yang, Kongzi's Way was under siege from alternative systems of value. Yet he rarely discussed the content of moral action, and for this reason the chapter at times reads more like a reactionary defense of bygone values than a genuine revival of them."

An In-Depth Investigation into Names[edit]

Page 7-8: QUOTE: "Dong Zhongshu, whereas today identified with the resurgence of the study of Confucian classics and with the rise of the correlative thinking that linked events in the human and natural realms, was known in his day primarily as an exegete and devotee of the Spring and Autumn Annals (Chunqiu 春秋), the terse chronicle thought to have been compiled by Kongzi, and its Gongyang Commentary (Gongyang zhuan 公羊傳). The extant Luxuriant Dew of the Spring and Autumn Annals (Chunqiu fanlu 春秋繁露) has 17 parts containing 123 chapter titles, of which 79 chapters survive. Because of its reliance on the Spring and Autumn Annals (its title is a modest comparison of itself to the ornamental beads on a scholar's hat), Dong's text has much in common with loosely exegetical collections from the same century, such as the Han's Exotic Transmission of the Odes (Hanshi waizhuan...) and the Great Transmission of the Past Documents (Shangshu dazhuan...). Many scholars cite the way the text elaborates underlying connections between Heaven and Earth and provides cosmological explanation for the authority of the ruler, and on that basis identify Dong as the first writer to provide a religious rationale for the new government structures of imperial China. Because of its diverse content and its inconsistencies with historical descriptions of Dong's views in the standard histories, there is speculation that some chapters of the Luxuriant Dew of the Spring and Autumn Annals may not have been written by Dong."

Protecting and Tutoring[edit]

Page 9-10: QUOTE: "The classical scholar, philosopher, and poet Jia Yi served in the offices of erudite (boshi...) and palace grandee (taizhong daifu...) during the reign of Emperor Wen 文 of the Han dynasty. After being slandered at court, Jia was sent away from the capital to serve as grand tutor (taifu 太傅) for the Prince of Changsha...A year later, Jia was rehabilitated and served briefly as grand tutor for the prince of Liang...before dying at the age of thirty-three. According to his official biography in the History of the Han, Jia studied the classic Spring and Autumn Annals and its Zuo Commentary (Zuozhuan 左傳) Despite his early death, a great deal of his work is preserved in his biography and the fifty-five chapters of the New Writings (Xinshu 新書). The combination of emphasis on classical learning in these works and his record of service in government earned Jia a reputation as an exemplary Confucian official as early as in the writings of Liu Xin 劉歆 (46 B.C.E. – 23 C.E.). However, Jia's metaphysical and poetical writings reveal the strong influence of texts such as the Laozi and the Zhuangzi. This underscores the fact that Jia was writing prior to the 136 B.C.E. establishment of the Five Classics as the material for the official examination. Consequently, his writings represent the apogee of the syncretistic and synthetic tendencies of the early decades of the Han dynasty."
Page 10: QUOTE: "The essay on 'Protecting and tutoring' the crown prince survives in several versions. It comprises the second half of section 5 of the transmitted New Writings, is part of a chapter of the same name in the Elder Dai's Record of Ritual (DaDai liji 大戴禮記), and also is part of Jia's biography in the History of the Han. Whereas the last of those three texts is translated here, there are only minor variations between them. 'Protecting and tutoring' also appears to have circulated separately during the Han, and was seen as a uniquely accessible treatment of education during antiquity. We can infer this from a comment by Emperor Zhao 昭 in an edict of 82 B.C.E. included in another section of the History of the Han. The emperor says that he comprehends (tong...) 'Protecting and Tutoring' comparing and contrasting this (commentators disagree on how to parse the sentence) with texts like the Classic of Filial Piety (Xiaojing 孝經), the Analects (Lunyu 論語), and the Past Documents (Shangshu 尚書). More recently, a partial version of the text was found in the tomb of a prince of the state of Zhongshan who died in 55 B.C.E. Given its accessible rhetorical style, it is quite possible that Emperor Zhao and the prince of Zhongshan treasured this essay as a more comprehensible guide to antiquity than works written in more archaic styles."

Putting Learning into Action[edit]

Page 16: QUOTE: "Yang Xiong's Model Sayings is a collection of short dialogues explicitly patterned on the Analects. Historically, Yang has been both excorciated for his penchant for imitation and celebrated for his ability to craft elaborate works in a classical style. As a philosopher, Yang reacted against the eclectic influences that he saw as diluting the classical message of Kongzi. In his History of the Han biography, Yang explains that he wrote the Model Sayings to reestablish the primacy of the teachings of Kongzi in an age deluded by the heterodox teachings of the 'many masters' (zhuzi...). As with the Analects, each chapter title of the Model Sayings is composed of the first two characters of the chapter itself, and both works are primarily concerned with self-cultivation and the exceptional characteristics of the sage."

Law and Punishment[edit]

Introduction to Law and Punishment[edit]

Page 23-24: QUOTE: "When the state of Qin completed its conquest of the previously 'Warring States' in 221 B.C.E., many of the measures that it imposed were outgrowths of the system of organization that aided its successful military expansion. Besides measures to standardize what had previously been regionally distinct economic networks and cultural conventions, the Qin imposed a uniform penal system that was both exhaustive and dependent on the omnipresent threat of physical mutilation. These are factors that Han statesman Jia Yi...(200–168 B.C.E.) pointed to in his famous 'Discussion Finding Fault with the Qin' (Guo Qin lun...) as the reasons for the defeat of the Qin within two decades of its unification of China, and its subsequent transformation into a laughingstock. Jia said of the Qin: ...'It applied neither benevolence nor righteousness, even though the dynamics of attacking and securing [a state] are different.' Implicit in this criticism of the Qin's inability to adopt a different system once their military conquest was complete may well have been an implicit appeal for the Han government to reduce its reliance on some elements of the Qin legacy. Since the inclusion of Jia's essay in the Records of the Historian (Shiji...), the contention that the brutality of the Qin penal system led to its downfall became the basis of the standard description of the dynasty that Frederick Mote has caricatured as follows: 'Its measures were Draconian...It was consequently overthrown by desperate masses who would no longer tolerate its existence.' Yet one thing that the readings in this chapter show is that even in the Han there was a debate over how harsh the Qin administration actually was."
Page 24: QUOTE: "Modern scholarship and recent archaeology have further cast doubt on the usefulness of a distinction between the 'draconian' Qin and 'benevolent' Han legal systems. In the 1940s and 1950s, Karl Bünger and A.F.P. Hulsewé examined Han legal codes and argued that the Han adapted both structural elements and specific regulations from the Qin. Hulsewé argued that the Han 'took over the administrative and legal rules of the Qin empire and their practical application in the government organization' to the ends of 'maintaining the stability of the government and of increasing its power.' Recent discoveries of legal documents from the Qin (e.g., at Shuihudi 睡虎地 in Hubei Province in 1975) and Han (e.g., at Zhangjiashan 張家山 in Hubei Province in 1993) dynasties have tended to reinforce the view that although the administration of laws may have changed under the Han, the laws themselves were remarkably similar to those of the Qin. In one excavated Han legal text, a collection of precedents for administering legal appeals, several of the precedents date from the Qin period. One of these precedents, the first document translated in this chapter, illustrates how the Qin attempted to limit its own use of violence."
Page 24-25: QUOTE: "Beyond the content of the two dynasties' legal regulations, however, a difference between the Qin and Han approaches to law is often described as that between 'Legalist' and 'Confucian' (or, more accurately, 'Classicist') currents. Sima Tan 司馬談 (d.c. 110 B.C.E.), the father of the famous Han historian Sima Qian 司馬遷 (c. 145 – c. 86 B.C.E.), portrayed Legalism and Classicism as two of the six major approaches to government inherited by the Han, and drew on both to advocate a hybrid approach to law and administration. Chapter 130 of the Records of the Historian preserves Sima Tan's attempted synthesis, and in it he uses the category 'Fajia' 法家 (Legalism, or literally, 'experts in law') to describe an approach to governing that is...'severe and skimps on kindness,' even while its 'rectification of the divisions between ruler and minister, superior and inferior,' is indispensable. This early-Han writer clearly thought that the Legalist application of law needed to be tempered by the kind of sympathy cultivated by the Classicists. What were the particulars of the system advocated by these experts in law? 'Legalism' as the term was used later in Han sources, is connected foremost with the theories of three Warring States writers: Shen Buhai 申不害 (d.c. 340 B.C.E.), Shang Yang 商鞅 (d. 338 B.C.E.), and Han Feizi 韓非子 (c. 280 – c. 233 B.C.E.). The most comprehensive of the three, the Han Feizi 韓非子, is attributed to a Prince Fei 非 who originally came from the state of Han 韓. The Han Feizi argues that government must rely fundamentally on the administration of law and on the application of punishments and rewards. It also praises Shen Buhai for his use of 'techniques' (shu...) and Shang Yang for his use of 'laws' (fa 法). In the Han Feizi, the former include sometimes ruthless methods to maintain political control, whereas the latter are the uniform laws and standards that keep the state well ordered. Han critiques of the Qin were often directed at the arbitrary or absolute application of these principles."
Page 25-26: QUOTE: "One aspect of Legalist techniques that was more explicitly accepted by many Han writers was the method of xingming...(...literally, 'forms and names'). This stress on ensuring that officials do no more and no less than their office requires is translated as 'performance and title' by Herrlee G. Creel. The Han Feizi describes the way a ruler applies this method as follows: ...'Empty and quiescent he waits, letting names define themselves and affairs settle themselves.' The emphasis on stillness and passivity may remind some readers of the strategy of 'nonaction' (wuwei 無為), and indeed there are a number of parallels between the Han Feizi and texts that promote nonaction such as the Laozi 老子. In the context of law, this approach assumed that one legal and administrative systems were in place, they functioned smoothly without resort to active intervention on the part of the ruler."
Page 26-27: QUOTE: "This approach to government was adopted by the Western Han faction that is described by Sima Qian as followers of the 'Yellow Emperor and Laozi' (HuangLao 黃老), and is also represented in a number of recently excavated Han texts. An example is the Classics About Law (Jing fa 經法) excavated at Mawangdui 馬王堆 in Hunan Province in 1973, a section of which incorporates Legalist vocabulary into cosmological schemes usually associated with texts such as the Laozi. The Classic About Law begins with the words 'The Way gave birth to law' (Dao sheng fa 道生法) as the start of a cosmogonic sequence that elevates the principle of law to something like the classical ideal of 'natural law.' As a result, the ruler must simply get out of the way of this quasi-natural system in order to allow society to function well: ...'Once names and forms are fixed, then things will regulate themselves.' As the quotation above from the Records of the Historian indicates, this aspect of Legalism was seen as its important positive aspect by no less than Sima Tan. Other writers in the Han, including Chao Cuo 晁錯 (d. 154 B.C.E.) and Huan Tan 桓譚 (43 B.C.E. – 28 C.E.), drew more explicitly on Legalism in their writings on government, espousing the idea that in certain historical epochs harsher punishments are needed. But even those writers who were critical of the universality or the proliferation of legal statutes, such as Jia Yi and Ban Gu 班固 (32–92 C.E.), did not fundamentally question the appropriateness of some version of these statutes."
Page 27: QUOTE: "Ultimately, the integration of Legalist assumptions about the social utility of the method of matching 'names and forms' into writings about law into the early empire indicates that some aspects of Legalism were not in the end so incompatible with a state that promoted the study of Classical texts."
Page 27-28: QUOTE: "The first of the four selections in this chapter is an account of an appeals case from the reign of the King of Qin who would later found the Qin dynasty that was recopied between 196 and 186 B.C.E. into a collection of exemplary cases that was likely to have been used by Han magistrates. The case itself records an appeal decided on the question of whether or not incriminating testimony had been coerced through the excessive use of force. The fact that the Han text draws on Warring States and Qin precedents argues strongly for a continuity between their legal systems, even as the content shows that the Qin code had procedures that allowed recourse for those who were unjustly convicted."
Page 28: QUOTE: "Following this actual legal document, two more abstract discussions of law from the Western Han describe several different visions of the ideal legal system. A section of Jia Yi's second-century B.C.E. essay The Platform Steps (Jieji...) claims classical precedence for dual systems of behavior modification: 'For the ancients, rituals did not reach down to the level of the common people, and punishment did not reach up to the level of the high officials.' Jia argued taht the inculcation of the virtue and integrity required for government officials could only be accomplished by treating officials according to ritual and exempting them from the threat of physical punishment. A related position, backed by an arsenal of classical allusions, is taken by Classical Studies scholars who participated in a first-century B.C.E. debate conducted under imperial auspices and recorded in the Discourses on Salt and Iron (Yantielun 鹽鐵論). Whereas these literati advocated the inculcation of the same virtues that Jia did, they were concerned not only with ministers but also with the general population. They held that laws were applied harshly and unevenly, and that their proliferation and complexity negated their deterrent effect. Against this position, a government representative argued for the position of the Han Feizi that social order would dissolve without the legal code."
Page 28: QUOTE: "The final selection, from a memorial by Cui Shi 崔寔 (d.c. 168 C.E.), describes a compromise different from the one that Jia had made three centuries earlier. Instead of portraying ritual and the pairing of punishment and reward as each appropriate to a different stratum of society, Cui makes a historical argument for an alternation between the appropriateness of these two factors. In doing so, he surveys the history of Han law in a somewhat revisionist manner."
Page 28-29: QUOTE: "Although these positions do not describe all the points of view on law in the Han, they do illustrate the wide variety of viewpoints on the proper way to administer law that were advocated in the period. The second-century B.C.E. position of Jia reflects what might be seen as a Confucian 'purist' approach to the legal code, but later documents reflect an acceptance of the uniform nature of the legal code and bear no trace of the dual system that Jia had championed. To be sure, Jia may well have influenced Emperor Wen's ban on capital punishment in 167 B.C.E., and perhaps even the numerous amnesties in the waning decades of the Western Han. Yet, in the second century C.E., Cui Shi rejected the myth of the leniency of Jia's patron, Emperor Wen, and ended up arguing that in an age after the reign of the sage kings, the reliable use of punishment is necessary."

A Case of Evidence Obtained through Torture[edit]

Page 29: The following several pages deal with "A Case of Evidence Obtained Through Torture," from the Legal Precedents (Zouyanshu), dated c. 186 B.C.E. QUOTE: "The Legal Precedents (Zouyanshu...) was excavated in 1993 from tomb 247 at Zhangjiashan 張家山 in Jiangling County, Hubei Province, near the modern city of Jingzhou. These bamboo strips were buried in the tomb of an official who died in 186 B.C.E. or shortly thereafter. In addition to this and another legal text, tomb 247 contained a calendar covering the years 202 through 186 B.C.E. and works on medicine, mathematics, and military strategy."
Page 29-30: QUOTE: "Written in black ink on 228 bamboo slips, the 'Legal Precedents' consist of records of 22 actual cases perhaps intended as a guide to legal decision making. In the longer cases, the records include basic details of the case and grounds for appeal, the original deliberation process, the first verdict, the appeals deliberation, and the appeals verdict. The cases are generally arranged from the most recent (196 B.C.E.) to the oldest (246 B.C.E.), although a couple of even older precedents are mixed in. I have made up the title 'A Case of Evidence Obtained through Torture' for the seventeenth of these cases, one in which the central issue is the reliability of testimony coerced through torture. The case record opens with a statement of appeal by a convict named Jiang, who had been convicted several months earlier based in part on the testimony of a man named Mao. First, the course of the earlier investigation and trial is laid out, mainly through successive interviews of the suspects and witnesses. When the focus shifts to the appeals, many of the same people are reinterviewed, their stories change, and the decision on appeal reflects those changes. Particularly noteworthy is the apparent scrupulous adherence to procedure during both phases of the process, and the ultimate willingness of the authorities to question the prior conduct of their peers."
Page 30: Note that Jiang was convicted of allegedly stealing cattle.

The Platform Steps[edit]

Page 35: Jia Yi's (d. 168 BCE) memorial essay "Platform Steps" appears in the 48th chapter of Ban Gu's Book of Han. It also appears as a chapter within Jia Yi's book New Writings (Xinshu). In this essay, QUOTE: "he argues for a two-tier approach to law and punishment. Harsh punishments should be applied to the common people, but not to ministers. His rationale is that ministers need to develop a sense of shame in order to cultivate the dispositions that they need to make moral decisions, so they need to know that they are trusted by their ruler. Jia's reasoning is consistent with most readings of Chapter 3 of Book 2 of the Analects: ...'Guide them with good government and keep them in line with mutilating punishment and the people will avoid certain things but be without shame. Guide them with virtue and keep them in line with ritual, and they will both have shame and behave according to standards.' It is precisely this sense of shame that Jia thought allowed Han officials to act properly in public situations such as the adjudication of legal cases, giving them a sense of when it was necessary to make exceptions to the law. Whereas creating official immunity to the uniform criminal code might seem to leave the system open to exploitation by unscrupulous officials, Jia's understanding of human nature was that the ruler's special treatment was the only way to ensure that his officials would themselves develop scruples. Echoing Kongzi, Jia writes, 'For a ruler to bring incorruptibility and shame, ritual propriety and dutifulness to his interactions with his ministers, yet have those ministers fail to respond to him by acting with integrity, this would not be human.'"

Punishment and Virtue[edit]

Page 37-38: QUOTE: "The Discourses on Salt and Iron is based on a series of imperially sponsored debates that took place in 81 B.C.E. The title of the work comes from the topic of the debate, which was the advisability of creating government monopolies on the production of salt and iron. In this chapter, the various voices are identified generically as 'Grandee [Secretary]'...'Secretary'...and 'Literati'...Commentators think that the first of these three voices was likely that of the Grandee Secretary Sang Hongyang 桑弘羊 (fl. 87–80 B.C.E.), but they do not know who the other voices represent."
Page 38: QUOTE: "'Punishment and Virtue' is an argument between the government representatives supporting a status quo of a complex uniform legal code (the first two voices) and classically trained scholars (the third voice) who argue for reducing the state's reliance on such codes. The two positions, which explicitly ally with Han Feizi and Kongzi, respectively, are characterized by Michael Loewe as 'Modernist' and 'Reformist,' respectively. The literati position is not one that criticizes the uniform application of the legal code, but rather the de facto arbitrariness of its application and the stress on law at the expense of ritual."

Memorial on Virtue and Punishment[edit]

Page 44-45: Cui Shi's 崔寔 (d. 168 BCE) 'Memorial on Virtue and Punishment', featured in the 52nd chapter of Fan Ye's Book of Later Han, QUOTE: "invokes the metaphor of the body politic to argue for the need for harsh punishment at certain phases of the life of the state. Cui, grandson of the famous poet Cui Yin...(77–142 C.E.) and son of the scholar official Cui Yuan...(d. 92 C.E.), served in several official posts, including grand administrator of far northwestern Wuyuan Commandery and Liaodong Commandery in the northeast. According to the official biography that contains this memorial, he also wrote a now lost work on politics called the Discussions of Good Government (Zhenglun...), and at one point worked with Bian Shao...This memorial begins with a discussion of both the Zhou and the Han courts, stressing that good rulers respond to the particular exigencies of their times. The conclusion of the memorial, translated here, begins with a metaphor that compares calisthenic and breathing techniques, understood as preventive measures, to medicine to treat disease. The past kings of the Han failed to apply the preventive generosity that their age called for, and even though Cui ends on a note that celebrates the sage kings and denigrates the Qin dynasty, the implication of his discussion of his own time is that now is the time to apply a system of uniform punishments."
Page 46: As Cui Shi states, Emperor Wen of Han reduced the old punishment of cutting off the nose to 300 lashes, cutting off the left foot commuted to 500 lashes, and cutting off the right foot commuted to being exposed in the marketplace. However, such excessive flogging often led to death, and it was not until the first year of Emperor Jing of Han's reign that the amount of flogging was also reduced so that people could still lead a normal life afterwards if they survived.

Governing by Non-action[edit]

Page 63: QUOTE: "The twenty-one chapters of the encyclopedic Masters of Huainan were written during the last half of the second century B.C.E. under the auspices of Liu An, the prince of Huainan. The preface by Gao You...(c. 168–212 C.E.) explains that the text was generated by a meeting of scholars at the court of that principality. The Masters of Huainan shows the influence of almost every earlier philosophical or religious current, often filtered through a synthetic worldview that attempts to unify them under a broader conceptual scheme."
Page 63: QUOTE: "This chapter, 'Responses to the Way,' takes quotations from texts like the Laozi and explains them in a variety of ways. This excerpt recounts a speech by Tian Pian...a Warring States figure from the state of Qi, identified elsewhere as a person who denied the existence of right and wrong because he believed in...'making the myriad things equal.' Here, his metaphor of 'not seeing the lumber for the trees' instructs the king that governing is but one of the many techniques of the Way, and that pursuing a holistic understanding of the Way, rather than employing distinctions related to governing, is the only way to reach the goals that he seeks."

The Natural World[edit]

Csikszentmihalyi's book[edit]

Csikszentmihalyi, Mark. (2006). Readings in Han Chinese Thought. Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. ISBN 0872207102.

Demons and Spirits[edit]

Introduction to Demons and Spirits[edit]

Page 116: QUOTE: "The phrase 'demons and spirits' (guishen 鬼神) pulls together a number of different ideas about otherworldly entities that exist alongside the living. Not only were there many different kinds of these beings, but there were many different kinds of interactions that people had with them, from the benign to the life-threatening."
Page 116: QUOTE: "The word 'demon' (gui 鬼) refers to the postmortem continuation of the body, animated by only part of what had been present in life. By the Han dynasty, the term 'demon' was linked with its hyponym 'to return' (gui 歸), and one of the selections in this chapter uses this etymology to explain that a demon is the form of a dead person that returns without its 'essential pneuma' (jingqi...). While in many contexts there was something threatening about the returned dead, hence the translation 'demon,' the term could also connote a more neutral 'ghost.' Demons could cause illness or be exorcised, and certain magical procedures and objects could keep one from being harmed by demonic influences."
Page 116-117: The concept of 'spirit' (shen 神) often refers to the consciousness or intelligence of the living, and to the incorporeal presence of a deceased member of one's clan. In this sense, a spirit is like a 'soul' in that it refers to both something that is part of the living person and something that might continue after death. However, in life the spirit had to be combined with the body and the essential pneuma, meaning that the Chinese idea of spirit connoted a more specific entity than the English 'soul.' The term is applied to animistic spirits of the mountains and rivers, such as the Earl of the Yellow River (He Bo 河伯). Sacrifices to these kinds of spirits could bring good fortune, whereas neglect could bring bad fortune. There were also anthropomorphic deities who had specific roles, such as the Grand Master of Fate (Siming...) and Queen Mother of the West (Xiwangmu 西王母). The former determined life spans, whereas the latter ruled over one of the realms of the immortals (xian 仙), the semihuman creatures that possess elixirs of immortality."
Page 117: QUOTE: "By the Han, 'demon' and 'spirit' were also sometimes used together to express the complementary halves of the person after death, yin and yang, and so their combination connoted the entirety of the diverse forms of postmortem existence. In this sense they refer to a tremendous diversity of local beliefs that persisted despite the centripedal tendencies of consolidation, a tribute to the persistence of beliefs about such beings at the local level."
Page 117-118: QUOTE: "Many of the Han works that have been continuously transmitted over the two millennia to the present are critical of customs surrounding the demons and spirits (Chapter 9 treats the popular view of demons in greater detail). Their criticisms speak volumes about the persistence of practices based on the workings of an unseen world of anthropomorphic deities. The following selections detail such beliefs, from the efficacy of offerings to the 'kitchen god' (zaoshen 灶神), to the view taht painful illnesses are caused by the cruelty of unseen demons. Yet the concern of these critical works was not to promote an alternate account of what happens after death, an 'omission' in early Chinese Thought that has caused consternation for some concerned with postmortem continuation of the soul. Instead, the most common perspective is that beliefs in demons and spirits serve an important function, and that those who truly understand their history and significance need to carefully regulate beliefs. From that perspective, writers occasionally censured practices related to the spirit world, or questioned the utility of other expenditures of resources on spirit-related ceremonies."
Page 118-119: QUOTE: "The precursors to many Han writings about demons and spirits are not speculations on their existence, but arguments about assigning agency to natural disasters, and ensuring debates about appropriate measures to alleviate disasters. A key concept in such debates was the notion of 'excess' in funerals and sacrifice. The condemnation of excessive expenditure on funerals is first seen in the fifth- and fourth-century B.C.E. writings of the followers of Mozi 墨子 (fl. 479–438 B.C.E.). Mozi's followers were staunch advocates of the retributive power of demons and spirits that delivered an automatic reward for acts that had positive social utility and punishment for those that did not. Indeed, demons and spirits were both omniscient and omnipotent: ...'The punishment of demons and spirits is something that neither the force of numbers that comes with wealth and rank, nor the bravery and might of strong soldiers, not yet hard armor and sharp weapons can avert. The punishment of demons and spirits will necessarily overcome all of these.' Sacrifice to the demons and spirits could not avert punishment for transgressions already committed. Since Mozi had a materialistic idea of what constituted utility, the only advantage of sacrifice was the benefit the community derived from such ceremonies. Yet there is never a sense that the actions of the demons and spirits are anything more than a means to enforce his consequentialist views."
Page 119-120: QUOTE: "After the Mozi, those who justified expenditure on funerals and sacrifices did so in at least two different ways. On one hand, many early stories document the way in which expenditure on sacrifices and funerals demonstrate an attitude of reverence toward the ancestors. Since securing the blessings of the ancestors was a central aspect of ancient Chinese religion, sacrifice was a concrete expression of a ruler's virtue, and so it was proof of his authority to rule. K.C. Chang has noted that, by extension, when a feudal lord was found to have carried out an incorrect sacrifice, he could lose rank. The idea that proper sacrifice reflects fitness to exercise authority is at the core of many classical justifications of such ceremonies. A second justification was the overall social utility of such ceremonies, an argument that responded directly to the criticisms made by the followers of Mozi. The third-century B.C.E. ritualist Xunzi 荀子 developed detailed arguments about the psychological advantages of ceremonies for the participants. Proper funerals gradually distanced the mourner from the corpse, allowing the mourner to experience first grief (ai 哀) and then respect (jing 敬), and eventually to return to ordinary life. Likewise, sacrifice aided people in dealing with fits of emotion aroused by memories of the dead, and in this way allowed them to continue to fulfill their duties."
Page 120: QUOTE: "It is this second argument that is better represented in Han writings. Indeed, the Xunzi's influence can be clearly seen in the assumption present in many Han texts that ceremonies have social utility that the common person cannot fathom, but that the sage alone may understand. Ordinary people's awe of the demons and spirits is what compels them to carry out the ceremony. As the Xunzi says of the function of sacrifice: ...'If it were not for the presence of sages, no one would understand it. The sage clearly understands [sacrifice] and scholars and gentlemen are content to carry it out. The officials take it as something to be preserved, and the common people as something that has become a custom. With the Gentlemen, it is considered part of the Human Way. With the common people, it is considered a matter of serving the demons.' Although the Xunzi's funtionalist approach to ritual is complex, it does not justify ceremonies based on the propitiation of demons and spirits. As with many Han writings that drew on the Xunzi, that text's primary justification of ceremonies was their social function."
Page 120-121: QUOTE: "Viewing all forms of postmortem existence as instances of a single phenomenon was a distinctively Han project. Whereas the selections in this chapter attest to the fact that different kinds of postmortem existence were still thought to mean different things, each document makes the case that there are some things common to all appearances of demons and spirits—a view that was possible once demons and spirits had become integrated into the universe of correspondences at the heart of Han cosmologies. The first piece, an examination of beliefs about the demons and spirits, argues that these beliefs served an important social function. The second piece, an anthology recording appearances of anomalies and spirits, was part of an argument that these records shared a symbolic vocabulary that could only be understood by the sage. Finally, the last piece discounts the idea that demons are postmortem continuations, and sees them as the accidental projection of the material component of consciousness."
Page 121: QUOTE: "The first selection is from the second-century B.C.E. Masters of Huainan (Huainanzi 淮南子), a work that was presented to Emperor Wu 武 in 139 B.C.E. This selection analyzes the function of popular customs based on demons and spirits in terms of their social utility and in the process develops its own theory of the origins of religion."
Page 121: QUOTE: "Whereas the first selection is part of a description of the proper perspective of the sage on popular practices involving spirits, the second selection is a collection of precedents for the sage to use in interpreting the significance of the appearance of spirits. This compilation of classical stories about demons and spirits from Liu Xiang's 劉向 (77–6 B.C.E.) Garden of Persuasions (Shuoyuan 說苑), presented to Emperor Cheng 成 in 17 B.C.E., was read as evidence for Liu's perspective that occurences that appeared to be supernatural were actually part of the natural world of omens and portents, a view that he believed that he shared with the great sages of the past. In many of these stories, the confident knowledge that Kongzi is said to have displayed concerning the varieties of anomalies and spirits is of a kind with Sherlock Holmes' familiarity with types of tobacco found at crime scenes. This set of classical stories derives from an older stratum of Confucian justifications of ceremonies that assume the importance of displaying certain virtues to the spirit world."
Page 121-122: QUOTE: "The third account is a slightly later product of a worldview that integrated demons and spirits into a naturalistic cosmology. The author, Wang Chong 王充 (27–c. 100 C.E.), however, agreed to a large extent with the perspective of the Xunzi that 'with the gentlemen, it is considered part of the Human Way. With the common people, it is considered a matter of serving the demons.' His explanation of people's sensing demons is that they are sensing something real, but what they are sensing is really self-created."

Far-Reaching Discussions[edit]

Page 122-123: QUOTE: "The encyclopedic Masters of Huainan was introduced earlier (see Chapter 3 and 4). Its 'Far-Reaching Discussions' (Fanlun 氾論) chapter is a masterpiece of Han synthetic writing. The subject of the chapter is the sage's attitude toward crucial issues of the day: ritual and the classics, the exercise of military power, cultivating virtue and administering law, and ghosts and spirits. The attitude of the sage toward each of these topics is always informed by the need to adjust to circumstances, and the chapter draws together a number of disparate historical anecdotes and discursive essays to support this argument. The imperative to continuously monitor changes and adapt to them is something the 'Far-Reaching Discussions' shares with another text that it quotes: the Appended Phrases (Xici...), one of the expository works (often called the 'Ten Wings') that became attached to the divination text the Classic of Changes (Yijing 易經). The sage who understands the principles of contingency in the 'Far-Reaching Discussions' and Appendend Phrases must master a variety of different methods, and then 'respond to changes according to the occasion'...This approach to reconciling theories that might otherwise be seen as contradictory became more and more common in the Han, and the chapter summarizes it succinctly using a metaphor: 'A hundred rivers flow from different springs, but all return to the ocean. The 'hundred experts' [baijia 百家] have different specializations, but all work toward good government.' The 'hundred experts' were the different theories on governing that developed during the Warring States period, and the Way was the 'ocean' to which these 'rivers' returned."
Page 123: QUOTE: "A similar attitude pervades the discussion of demons and spirits in the 'Far-Reaching Dicussions' chapter of the Masters of Huainan. The chapter draws a contrast between the popular reliance on explenations involving the ghosts and spirits and the sage's understanding that such explanations are merely expedients. Popular customs enforced with recourse to the possible punishment of demons and spirits were invented by the sages to present the common people with explanations for processes too complex for them to understand. The sage has a clam mind and guarded spirit, and so 'no external thing is sufficient to confuse' the sage. By contrast, most people do not have the level of mental and bodily discipline to correctly organize their perceptions. This contrast is explored in three different contexts: popular fear of strange creatures (guaiwu...), everyday taboos, and sacrifices to household deities. In each context, the sage's understanding of the true function of practices related to the demons and spirits is contrasted with the common attitude, one of awe and fear. The result is an anthropology of early Chinese popular customs."

Discriminating Things[edit]

Page 127: Liu Xiang (scholar) (77–6 BC) wrote the book Garden of Persuasions (Shuoyan 說苑); QUOTE: "The stories below about spirits come from a chapter called 'Discriminating Things' (Bianwu 辨物) and center on the correct identification of spirits and anomalies. Liu's favorite protagonist is Kongzi, who uses his encyclopedic knowledge of the world to identify things that others simply could not explain."
Page 127-128: QUOTE: "The general impression that Kongzi was 'agnostic' about the ghosts and spirits may or may not hold true of the collection known as the Analects (Lunyu 論語), but many other texts celebrated Kongzi's ability to identify natural anomalies and advise rulers as to their significance. Indeed, the block of eight classical stories selected here from 'Discriminating Things' shows that maintaining the proper attitude toward matters of the spirits was very important. Liu had another motive, however, for collecting these stories: they provided important classical precedents for the art of omen interpretation. For Liu, omens were very much a live issue, because they were taking on increasing importance in the first century B.C.E. According to the then popular view of a universe where everything was connected via a system of elaborate correspondences, events on earth had their equivalents in the skies. Those who knew where to look were able to diagnose problems even before they had become evident in the human realm by examining their 'images' (xiang...) in the realm of the Cosmos. A treatise devoted to the description of such omens in the past, in Ban Gu's History of the Han (Hanshu 漢書), begins by quoting the Appended Phrases commentary to the Classic of Changes: ...'Heaven suspends images that reveal good and bad fortune, and the sage takes [these phenomena] as images.'"
Page 128: QUOTE: "Ban also provides examples of how Liu used these classical stories as precedents helpful for interpreting omens. Ban recounts a story about a hawk killed in the courtyard of the state of Chen by a particular kind of arrow, the features of which are recognised only by Kongzi. This story, whose earliest appearance is in the Warring States period Discussions of the States (Guoyu 國語), is the fourth of the stories translated here from the Garden of Persuasions. Ban summarizes Liu's reading of the story as follows:"
- Page 128-129: QUOTE: (of Ban Gu on Liu Xiang's reading of this particular story): "Liu Xiang thought that the hawk was not far from the black omens of bad fortune in the category of 'warnings of avarice' [tanbao...], and that the arrow piercing it was not far from an 'arrow portent' [sheyao...]. Its dying in the courtyard was a sign of the destruction of the state. This was an image of the state of Chen's coming disorder and defiance of the Zhou, and the appearance of a warning of avarice meant it was going to encounter disaster at the hands of the distant Yi...nations, which would mean its destruction."
Page 129: QUOTE: "Liu's interpretation of the omens in the story is predicated on an acceptance of the correlation between natural symbols and political outcomes that was a staple of Han omen interpretation. It reveals the way that ideas about the sources of knowledge had shifted between the early acceptance of the story, wherein it was likely meant to show how the historical erudition of Kongzi allowed him to make sense of an odd occurrence, and the Han interpretation of the story, wherein symbolic analysis allowed Liu to parse the signs and signals with which Heaven had foreshadowed future occurrences. The first and last of these stories underscores the crucial idea that the spirits judge people by their deeds and cannot be misled by generous (and, therefore, inappropriate) sacrifices. In the particular case of stories about demons and spirits, Liu's project was to show that correctly identifying spirits and anomalies in the service of reading omens and portents was part of a long tradition that could be traced back to Kongzi."

Revising Demons[edit]

Page 137: In his "Revising Demons" (Ding gui 訂鬼) chapter of the Balanced Discussions (Lunheng 論衡), Wang Chong 王充 QUOTE: "turns his materialistic sensibilities to the question of demons. As E.B. Tylor did much later, Wang makes the connection between dreams and the belief in demons. In order to revise popular belief in the existence of demons, Wang comes up with an alternative explanation based on people's projections of their own thoughts and fears. Central to his alternative explanation is the idea that during fears or intense concentration one's thoughts can be expressed through the medium of one's essence (jing 精). This essence can escape, creating exterior projections of the images of one's thoughts that one may use. In contrast to the approach of the Masters of Huainan, Wang's interest is solely in a materialistic explanation for seeing demons, and evinces no appreciation of any potential educational function of stories about them."
- Page 138: QUOTE (from the Lunheng): "In all cases of demons between the Cosmos and the Earth, they are not the result of the essential spirit of a dead person, but rather are brought about by a [living] person's thoughts while imagining or envisioning a thing coming into existence. What is the reason that [demons] are brought about? The reason is illness. When people fall ill, they are worried and frightened. And worry and fright is what brings out the demons. In all cases, before falling ill, people are neither afraid nor worried. Therefore, when they fall ill and lie on their mat they worry and fear the arrival of demons. They worry about and fear it and so thoughts come into existence. Once they have come into existence, people see things that are not there."
- Page 138: QUOTE (from the Lunheng): "How may we prove this?"
- Page 138: QUOTE (from the Lunheng): "[Master horsemen] Bo Le 伯樂 studied horse physiognomy, and soon everything he thought about and everywhere he looked there were nothing but horses. [Celebrated butcher] Pao Ding 庖丁 studied the carving of oxen and for three years he did not look at a live ox, and everywhere he looked there were nothing but dead oxen."
- Page 138: QUOTE (from the Lunheng): "These two used their essence as much as possible, so their longings or visualizations came into existence and they saw things others did not. When people fall ill and see demons, this is just like Bo Le's seeing horses or Pao Ding's seeing oxen. Since we know taht what Bo Le and Pao Ding saw was not horses or oxen, we also know that what a sick person sees is not a demon."
- Page 138: QUOTE (from the Lunheng): "During an illness, because people suffer terribly and their bodies ache, they say that demons brandish whips and lash them, as if they could see the demon standing guard at their side beating them with chains and ropes. It is the pain of their illness and the worry and fear that makes such things falsely appear."
- Page 138: QUOTE (from the Lunheng): "When a person first falls ill and is worried and fearful, he or she will see the demon approaching. When the illness gets serious enough to fear death, he or she will see the demon growing angry. Once the body starts to ache, he or she sees the lashes of the demon. All these instances are thoughts coming into existence out of nothing, and they never have any reality."

Death and Transcendence[edit]

Introduction to Death and Transcendence[edit]

Page 140: QUOTE: "Although it is tempting to reduce various references to burial and afterlives in Han China to a single theoretical model, this is one of the areas in which the political centralization did not result in a single set of standard, homogenized practices. Beyond variations by region and social stratum, there is the question of whether there ever was a well-defined theory behind burial practices. Pu Muzhou...has noted that in most places in the world, afterlives are 'never clearly in a defined place,' and it is not possible to 'locate the dead unambiguously in one place,' [sic, no period, just a comma here] This view is reminiscent of Mircea Eliade's idea of the 'paradoxical multilocation of the soul,' a phenomenon that he illustrates using a story about the burial of Saint Ambrose's brother's body, which reveals a tension about whether the soul was still located with his body or had gone to Heaven. The resulting question for the student of early China faced with multiple understandings of death and visions of afterlives is whether or not seemingly inconsistent accounts would really have seemed incompatible to a person in the Han. In other words, if a certain amount of cognitive dissonance about where essence, pneumas, demons, the spirit or spirits, and yin and yang aspects of the body went after death was the norm, is there any reason to try to draw a 'standard picture'?"
Page 140-141: QUOTE: "Archaeological finds have demonstrated that the view of a bipartite soul that separated upon death , only to be reunited through the ritual of 'summoning the hun to return to the po' (zhaohun funpo 招魂復魄), is an inadequate explanatory model for much of the mortuary art and many of the practices described in Han texts. This traditional picture, based on one of the models of the body outlined in Chapter 7, comes from the 'Summoning the Hun' (Zhaohun 招魂) and 'Great Summons' (Dazhao 大招) poems in the third century B.C.E. Songs of Chu (Chuci 楚辭) and to some extent was documented in the idealized records of Zhou rituals taht circulated in the Han. It argues that on death the hun, a word made up of the components 'cloud' (yun 云) and 'demon,' rises, and that there were ancient rites for calling it back to the po, the components of which are 'white' (bai 白) and 'demon.' As Kenneth Brashier has pointed out, however, many transmitted sources from the Qin and Han periods are not consistent with this model. The array of different burial customs and different depictions of postmortem journeys in recently excavated materials only confirms that in the early imperial period there were many different understandings of what happened after death."
Page 141-142: QUOTE: "The written materials placed in tombs in the early Han, and later above those tombs, indicate that popular religious practices were diverse and complex. Anna Seidel's study of early funeral texts, 'Traces of Han Religion in Funreral Texts Found in Tombs,' describes the 'land contract' (diquan 地券), which shows that the deceased owned the land on which he or she was buried, 'drawn up on the model of secular sales contracts.' Another category of text is the 'tomb-quelling texts' (zhenmuwen 鎮墓文, which Seidel calls 'documents to ward off evil from the tomb'), which she compares to passports, ones that enforce 'a strict separation between the living and the dead.' These documents begin to show up in tombs in the middle of the first century C.E., and indicate the extent to which the newly dead were thought to be a danger to the living."
Page 142: QUOTE: "Prior to this time, documents from a different genre of tomb text, called 'letters informing the underground' (gaodishu 告地書), were buried in several Han tombs in the Jiangling 江陵 area of the old state of Chu, including Fenghuangshan 鳳凰山 and Gaotai 高臺. These texts are also passports of a sort, recording names and belongings that accompany the dead. A document dated 153 B.C.E. was found in a tomb at the former site, and its text explains that it was written to 'inform the Ruler of the Underground' 告地下王. The document details the deceased's clothing, vessels, and implements and requests that the ruler instruct his officials to deal with them properly. Such documents indicate a different attitude toward the dead, one that is rather more sympathetic than the later, tomb-quelling texts. The dead, like the living, need letters addressed to the proper authorities, to keep them from being taken advantage of by those at the lower levels of the underworld bureaucracy."
Page 142: QUOTE: "The second-century C.E. protective talismans translated in Chapter 9 have characteristics of both tomb-quelling texts and 'letters informing the underground.' Like texts of the former genre, they were created to protect the living from demons that are the transformed dead who had died in 'unnatural' ways. As in the latter genre, the talismans have characteristics of bureaucratic documents and are addressed to high-ranking deities to instruct those under their control to protect the bearer."
Page 142-143: QUOTE: "The stele inscription translated in this chapter attests to still another approach to the afterlife, the belief in transcendence. The type of transcendence associated with Laozi (6.2 'The Laozi Inscription') was also long associated with the Yellow Emperor (Huangdi 黃帝). In the Records of the Historian (Shiji 史記), there are several accounts of experts in immortality called 'masters of methods' (fangshi 方士) who were patronized by Emperor Wu 武 (r. 140–87 B.C.E.). They told him stories of how the Yellow Emperor ascended to immortality, and advocated methods such as 'retreating from old age' (quelao [?]老). Most masters of methods were from the coastal regions of Qi and Yan (chiefly modern-day Shandong, Hebei, and Liaoning Provinces), and claimed knowledge of the immortals and the paths to transcendence. One story by a master of methods from Qi relates how the Yellow Emperor forged a bronze vessel, causing a dragon to descend. The Yellow Emperor climbed onto the dragon along with seventy ministers and concubines to ascend to immortality. We have already seen how Laozi was associated with the curbing of desires as a strategy to attain longevity. Lore about the Yellow Emperor's apotheosis suggests taht the popularity of HuangLao 黄老 techniques (i.e., those associated with the Yellow Emperor and Laozi) may have been due to these connections with longevity and immortality techniques."
Page 143-144: QUOTE: "Some masters of methods also promoted a set of imperial rituals called the feng 封 and shan 禪 sacrifices, which were to be conducted on sacred Mount Tai 台 [sic]. In 133 B.C.E., a master of methods named Li Shaojun...promoted an alchemical method that involved conducting a sacrifice to the spirit of the casting furnace, then using it to turn cinnabar powder (dan...) into gold and to cast the gold into vessels. The use of the vessels while eating and drinking would increase the emperor's life span so that he would be able to see the immortals dwelling on a mythical island called Penglai 蓬萊. Li concludes: ...'If you see the island [from Mount Tai] while conducting the feng and shan sacrifices, then you will not die. That is what the Yellow Emperor did.' Whereas the references to the techniques of the Yellow Emperor and Laozi were often directed to political situations in the Western Han (see Chapter 6), as the dynasty wen on, both figures were increasingly associated with transcendence and the possibility of immortality."
Page 144: QUOTE: "These different models for the afterlife, and for the relations between the living and the dead, often existed side by side. Pu Muzhou has argued that conceptions of the afterlife varied by class. In the tombs of the elite one finds paradise-like images of immortality such as those depicted on bronze mirrors. By contrast, texts that release the dead from corvée duty, or protect the living from being haunted by the demons of the dead, are more often present in tombs of the nonelite. The three pieces in this chapter represent writings by members of the former group, and the three in the next chapter represent writings by the latter. These examples, at least, support Pu's contention. They also illustrate how some members of the elite were critical of the theories and techniques of the masters of methods, whereas others enthusiastically used them."
Page 144-145: QUOTE: "Two of the three selections in this chapter express a strong skepticism about practices geared toward ensuring that a person can continue in some form after death. The first piece assumes a materialist position about what happens after death, and contends that all burial practices are in need of reform. Yang Wangsun's...request that he be buried naked is found in his last testament to his children and reproduced in Ban Gu's 班固 (32–92 C.E.) History of the Han (Hanshu 漢書). Yang's perspective introduces the notion of waste in matters of the spirit world and argues that traditional rituals and customs are not consistent with current understandings of postmortem existence. Wang Chong 王充 (27–c. 100 C.E.) takes aim at historical stories that are used to support the possibility of spirit transcendence. Specifically, he attacks Li Shaojun, the master of methods discussed in the introduction to this chapter. Wang notes that some of his contemporaries argue that Li and Laozi were of a kind, both practicing 'techniques of transcending the generation' (dushi shu...). This is one of several examples of 'falsehoods about the Way' (Dao xu...) that Wang attempts to debunk."
Page 145: QUOTE: "In stark contrast to these two selections is a second-century C.E. stele inscription that illustrates how 'techniques of transcending the generation' were popular around the capital several decades later. The 'Fei Zhi'...stele inscription is a commemoration of the successful collaboration between an Eastern Han master of methods named Fei Zhi and his patron, an official named Xu You...that resulted in the transcendence celebrated in the inscription. The stele was left in Xu's tomb and requested that, having gained immortal status, he confer benefits on his living family members."

Traditions Surrounding Yang Wangsun[edit]

Page 145: QUOTE: "The 'Biography of Yang Wangsun' 楊王孫 is included in Ban Gu's History of the Han, the work numbered by posterity as the second major dynastic history after Sima Qian's 司馬遷 (c. 145–c. 86 B.C.E.) Records of the Historian. Like its precursor, the majority of the History of the Han is in the form of biography (liezhuan 列傳, literally, 'arranged traditions'), and Yang Wangsun's is one of four such biographies in Chapter 67 of the latter work."
Page 145-146: QUOTE: "The story of Yang is a Han twist on the debate about appropriate burial practices first glimpsed in the critique of expensive funerals made by Mozi in the Spring and Autumn period. Yang was a contemporary of Han Emperor Wu 武 (r. 140–87 B.C.E.), and the story of his last will and testament was first compiled by Liu Xiang 劉向 (77–6 B.C.E.) and then revised by Ban Gu. The essential feature of Yang's will was his request that his children bury him naked (although the piece appears to indicate that he envisages his corpse being transported in a sack). His children are scandalized, but he is eventually able to convince them, arguing both that expenditures on coffins and funerals lacked social utility and that the current understanding of what happens after death made them obsolete. The second argument draws on the theory that the body is composed of essential spirit and form. Since the corpse is only form, attempting to preserve it from destruction will have the negative consequence of keeping the body's components from transformation (hua 化) and return (gui 歸), which are part of the natural order."
Page 146: QUOTE: "Did Yang's request seem as sensational in the Han as it might today? It seems so. The descriptor that Ban applies to the request is kuang—a term that connotes rash behavior and also has overtones of 'crazy.' Yang's rashness is not ideal, yet Ban praises Yang's wishes as superior to the excessive funeral practices of Qin Shihuang 秦始皇, the first emperor of the Qin dynasty (r. 221–210 B.C.E.). At the end of the chapter Ban paraphrases a passage from the Analects (Lunyu 論語) to praise Yang, noting that: 'In ancient times, Zhong Ni 仲尼 [Kongzi]' stated that 'if one is not able to [associate with those who] travel in the center, then one's thoughts turn to the rash and timid.' Observing the ambitions of Yang Wangsun, they are vastly more worthy that [sic] those of Qin Shihuang.' Ban acknowledges that Yang's position is rash, but he also makes the point that there are different degrees of rashness and that Yang's moderation in funerals is preferable to the extravagance of the first emperor of the Qin. The recent excavations of that emperor's 'terracotta army' bear out Ban's observation about the grand scale of the expenditure of his burial."

Falsehoods about the Way[edit]

Page 150: QUOTE: "Two selections from Wang Chong's Balanced Discussions (Lunheng 論衡) have been translated earlier (5.3 'Asking Questions about Kongzi' and 7.3 'Revising Demons'). In those texts, Wang proved himself a skeptic about conventionally accepted beliefs, and with this selection he does so again."
Page 150: QUOTE: "In 'Falsehoods about the Way,' Wang takes on one of the most famous of the 'masters of methods' featured in the Records of the Historian. In the Western Han, Emperor Wu 武 (r. 140–87 B.C.E.) and Liu An 劉安 (d. 122 B.C.E.), the prince of Huainan, were known for their patronage of masters of methods. Through their attempts to emulate the Yellow Emperor, they hoped to mimic his apotheosis and become immortal. Li Shaojun...advised Emperor Wu to copy the sacrifices and techniques of the Yellow Emperor, enabling the transformation of cinnabar to gold as a recipe for immortality. In this chapter, Wang uses a variety of arguments against the effectiveness of Li's arts and debunks some of the stories about him that appear in the Records of the Historian. In particular, he attacks the notion that Li taught and practiced the technique of 'separation from the corpse' (shijie 尸解). Borrowing a page from the same Gongyang commentators that he was known to criticize, at one point Wang uses the fact that Sima Qian wrote that Li Shaojun 'died' (si 死) to show that Li's spirit did not separate from his corpse upon death."

"Fei Zhi" Stele Inscription[edit]

NOTE: The Fei Zhi stele is dated c. 169 CE during the Eastern Han.
Page 152: QUOTE: "Discovered in a tomb outside of the former Eastern Han capital of Luoyang in Henan Province in 1991, the 'Fei Zhi'...stele inscription is dedicated to the master of methods named Fei Zhi. The tomb in which it was found belonged to Xu You...who was Fei's patron. Fei taught Xu his methods, which included traveling great distances in no time at all, and 'Xu followed him in 'transcending the generation.''"
Page 152: QUOTE: "The inscription was carved at the behest of either Xu's son Xu Jian...or another of Xu's descendents. It functions to commemorate Fei, and so, too, allows the departed ancestor Xu to bask in Fei's reflected glory. At the same time, it asks for the benefits that Xu and Fei, as immortals, might confer on their living family members. The stele describes Fei's being laid out, probably after his death in preparation for his apotheosis. The stele also relates a Master Xu (incidentally, the same surname that turns up in 9.1 'Cao Family' Talisman) to the Queen Mother of the West (Xiwangmu (西王母), a divinity associated with immortality."

Protective Talismans[edit]

Page 156: QUOTE: "One of the earliest extant references to using a 'talisman' (fu) for protection from demons is found in the third-century B.C.E. Qin bamboo slips excavated at Shuihudi 睡虎地 in Hubei Province. There, in order to invoke spiritual protection prior to departing from one's home state, a person is told to throw the 'talisman of Yu'(Yu fu 禹符) on the ground and then perform the ritual called the 'pace of Yu' (Yu bu 禹步). Such a procedure was necessary because, in Qin and Han popular culture, demons not only caused illness but were also potentially behind all sorts fo events that today are often described as the result of bad luck."
Page 156-157: "We do not know what the 'talisman of Yu' looked like, but archaeologically discovered talismans from late-Han dynasty tombs routinely invoke celestial or terrestrial protection against the ghosts of the dead. Among the earliest transmitted stories about talismans are those in the 'Traditions Surrounding [the Masters of] Methods and Techniques' (Fangshu zhuan 方術傳) chapter of the History of the Latter Han (HouHanshu 後漢書), compiled during the fifth century by Fan Ye 范曄. Early descriptions of the use of talismans generally resemble the story told about Qu Shengqing...who...'excelled at writing talismanic warrants in cinnabar ink used to suppress and kill demons and spirits, and to employ and command them.' A talisman quoted in the History of the Latter Han was used by Fei Changfang 費長房. Fei's discovery of a genie led to his education in matters of the spirits. Fei also received a bamboo staff and a talisman that read...'With this, rule the demons and spirits on the earth.' As a result, Fei was able to...'cure a multitude of illnesses, use a whip to lash the hundred demons, and submit requests to the Lord of the Earth Altar.' Fei's story has a tragicomic ending, however: ...'Later he lost his talisman and was murdered by a mob of demons.'"
Page 157: QUOTE: "Talismans played an important role in the social changes of the last centuries of the Han dynasty. In the waning years of the Eastern Han, as the actual reach of the imperial court dwindled, debates about matters like the proper application of the penal code probably had little significance for the ordinary person. Deprived of government measures that maitained social order, some turned to the newly autonomous religious communities. One of these communities, founded in the southwest by Zhang Ling 張陵, became the 'Five Bushels of Rice' (Wudoumi 五斗米) organization. Some say that Zhang was given the title 'Celestial Master' (Tianshi 天師, literally 'Cosmic Teacher') by the spirit Lord Lao (Laojun 老君). That movement became the basis for the succession of Celestial Masters that continued throughout the history of imperial Daoism."
Page 157-158: QUOTE: "'Even before the 'Five Bushels of Rice,' other religious movements made use of the talismans. One of earliest extant talismans from the Han calls on a spirit whose title was the same one used by a religious leader who was branded a 'pirate' by the official histories. In 109 C.E., Zhang Bolu 張伯路 led over three thousand fighters wearing light red turbans and clad in dark red clothing in an uprising in the coastal commanderies along the eastern seaboard. After an initial setback, the next year Zhang attacked again with reinforcements, taking the title 'Emissary' (Shizhe 使者). Fang Shiming...has shown that 'Emissary' was shorthand for 'Emissary of the Emperor of the Cosmos' (Tiandi Shizhe 天帝使者). This is the same spirit name to which the imperative in the earliest of the three talismans introduced in this chapter is addressed. Anna Seidel argued that movements like Zhang's were forerunners of the Yellow Turbans in that they 'assumed the dignity of the emperor and instituted an administration' while also issuing talimans [sic] and using religious means of establishing authority. Han dynasty protective talismans, then, were on the one hand used by individuals like Fei who carried them in the face of the lawlessness and danger that existed outside of the security of their home or city. On the other hand, they are a form of 'spiritual technology' produced by authorities like Qu Shengqing and Zhang who claimed to enjoy a direct connection with the spirits. As such, they were only one genre of legalistic documents widely produced and consumed in Han China, and recent archaeological finds have produced others."
Page 158-159: QUOTE: "Most Han talismans have two major parts. The esoteric component of the talisman is a set of diagrams resembling the seals used as official 'signatures' on documents. The diagrams include depictions and names of celestial bodies, the personifications of which are the deities to whom the talisman is addressed. The nature of the stylized script used in these diagrams makes them very difficult for the uninitiated to read. Next to these 'seal' diagrams, the talisman has a main text that is an imperative or curse, directed in formal language to the spirit world. The cumulative effect of these components is to make the talisman a sacred counterpart to the earthly writs and other official documents that gained their authority from the imprimatur of government officials. With talismans, however, the authority derives from the bureaucracy of the spirit world, and the writs are directed against the low-level 'demons' that are subject to the control of the spirits higher up in the nonhuman world."
Page 159: QUOTE: "The presence of talismanic objects in Han tombs and similarities between the iconography of tomb murals and protective talismans indicate that death and travel were both seen as dangerous passages in which the unprotected were at the mercy of demons. By invoking the protection of celestial and terrestial spirits, Han dynasty protective talismans show how the spirit hierarchy was controlled in order to defend their bearers from the always dangerous unseen world of demons."
Page 159: QUOTE: "The three talismans featured in this chapter are generally addressed to deities that can exert control over terrestrial demons, and are therefore primarily intended to protect the bearer. They may be seen as a popular counterpart to the previous chapter's examples of the less-threatening view of the afterlife and of the possibility of transcendence."