Tuesday September 21, 2010

• Angry peasants are involved in most dynasty transitions.
• The Shang demanded that the peasant pay taxes even years in advance.
• Zhou- led by King Wen.
• They are fighters and were natural born warriors- much like the Spartans in ancient greece.
• Viewed as barbarians.
• Qiang- goat. A mean name used for the people living in the North.
• The Zhou begin to harbor rebellious thoughts towards the Shang.
• King wen’s son, king Wu finishes off the Shang. He makes a capital and places it at Hao, and names the capital city Zhou.
• There is a great and final battle against the 2 dynasties. The Mu Ye battle.
• The Shang capital is captured, the palace is burned, and the last Shang king jumps into the flames, committing suicide.
• Mandate of heaven- Nature is an indicator as to when the leading dynasty’s reign Is over. No dynasty can rule forever.
• Each component of nature seems to know its own part, and humans need to be the same way. Zhou scholars look at the world of nature as a source of inspiration for human beings- in regards to how they should govern their societies.
• Not every Zhou scholar ceases to believe in the world of the dead and the deities they believed in.
• For Zhou, the relationship with heaven is impersonal. Not something you would really want to have a relationship with.
• Zhong Guo- The middle kingdom, made up of many states.
• The essence of being chinese is NOT necessarily racial, nor necessarily about appearance. It is about farming. Farming is the essence of being Chinese.
• King Wu is aware of the fact that he has a lot of enemies in the North China Plane. The reason, is because he knows that many of the people living up north are upset that he overthrew the Shang. What he does when he gets down to the north China plane, is that he appoints members of his family as Regional rulers. He gives them areas of China to rule over. These Zhou nobility are given various functions.
• Farm the Land
• Give sustenance to the people
• Forward taxes to the King
• During war, groups of men are to be contributed.
• King Wu does not completely wipe out the Shang ruler clan.
• Zhou Gong temporarily rules as a regent, until King Wu’s son is old enough to rule his area of China. Zhou takes charge of Zhou dynasty, crushes the Shang rebellion, wipes out most of the Shang royal family, and establishes something of a secondary capital.
• Loyang is the place, and it has a large concentration of troops.
• He keeps peace, institutes reasonable taxes and keeps the regional rulers in check.
• The duke of Zhou tutors his nephew and when his nephew reaches age, he steps down from the throne and hands it over to his nephew, the proper candidate, King Ch’eng.
• Confucius thinks that the duke of zhou is the epitome of good morals.
• He wishes that the leaders of his day were more like the duke of Zhou.
• The well-field system: 1/9 of the plot of land, handed over to the ruling Lord who takes a portion and forwards the rest to the Emperor. Tax rates approx. 1/9.
• Western Zhou is believed to be Chinas golden age. Confucius wholeheartedly believes this.
• Can the peasants take and sell their land during this time? No.
• Eventually, western Zhou falls. Regional lords begin to defy the Zhou king and view him as distant and they conclude that they are ruling their own affairs.
• Another problem? The so- called barbarians are also growing in number and wealth and they do not want to engage in agricultural events but they see the wealth it brings, so they begin to attack China.
• Ti- a dog person. A term used for the barbarians. Man (worms) was a term used for the people in the south. Western Zhou finds problems in the north and south.
• Zhou’s problem? External attack and internal problems.
• Bao Si (a concubine of the king) is blamed for the fall of the Zhou dynasty. Rumor? She liked to see the army coming together preparing for battle and so she rings the alarm twice, and the third time, the army doesn't assemble and it the threat was real. Kind of like the boy who cried wolf.
• Hao falls and they move to Loyang during the 700’s. King Ping
• Areas to the west are abandoned to the barbarians.
• The barbarians begin to see the value of agriculture so they begin to farm as well.
• Eastern Zhou: 770 BC.
• Confucius Is born during this period.
• Eventually, there are 4 states and they progress to 7.
• During eastern zhou, it is a crazy quilt. Many states all over. Enter temporary alliances and then return to fighting with each other.
• The Zhou dynasty king becomes nothing more than become a figure head during this time.
• All of the states, however, claim to be working for the King.
• Eater Zhou is further subdivided.
• 722- 481 BC; The Spring and Autumn Period.
• Period of uneasy equilibrium between states.
• Try to ally with each other while politically fighting.
• There was some fighting, rather, gentlemanly jousting. Not all out war.
• A lot of diplomatic intrigue. These states are all China but were in essence, independent. Had their own money, armies, cultures etc..
• All of the states consider themselves equal. Diplomacy is treated with earnestness and finesse.
• North China gets scared of Ch’u. Who will protect North China from Ch’u???
• North states reason that if the King can’t unify them, Ba, or “hegemons”, would protect them from Ch’u.
• This is an alternative and is quite tasteless.
• The 1^st important strongman leading the hegemons is Duke Won.
• Chin disintegrates. States come and go at this time.

• 403- 221 BC; the Warring states period.
• At this time, war goes all out and gets nasty.
• Confucius and other reformers try to reverse this trend but its useless. Warfare is no longer a violent athletic contest. War is for raw, military power.
• If you have an enemy state is to go in and just swarm the state. Don’t engage the army, simply kill the peasants. No peasants= less agriculture.
• Salt is dumped on agriculture, wells are plugged, cities flooded, dead bodies used as weapons etc..
• War against population.
• On the North, the barbarians had figured out the secret of riding a horse. The Barbarians are already a mobile people- the riding of horses makes things easier.
• They combined horseback riding with bow and arrow shooting and they (the barbarians) conclude that they are quite deadly using this combination.
• One of them is worth 50 foot soldiers.
• The Northern states fight barbarians and other states as well.
• Sima Qian says that many of the barbarians children could ride a horse before they could walk.
• Some chinese states learn mounted archery and when they do, they win.
• Supreme irony > the population begins to grow instead of shrink at this time.
• Why? They are growing in part because the rulers are aware that large populations equal victory. Also, agricultural seeds are improving. More crops = more food.
• 350 BC= Population is about 60 million. Double Canada’s population today.
• Intellectual development. Schools of thought are cropping up everywhere and people are quite vocal concerning what they think. You weren’t attacked for what you believed or thought.
• The 100 Schools of thought debate quite vociferously with each other at this time.
• Some of the best chinese philosophical debates occur at this time.
• Every state wants to be the one that wins and puts China back together again.
• In 221 BC, Qin prevails over all of the other states, puts China back together again, and names the country after itself.
• Out in Qin, Qin people have to deal with the threat of the barbarians.
• In Qin, when boys are born, they are taken from their mothers and raised in a military fashion. They are very proud of this.
• Qin had an advantage over all other states. When the fights were occurring, they occurred elsewhere, never close to the state of Qin geographically.
• Qin China attaches great importance to talented people. If you know how to do things, Qin wants you.
• He crossbow becomes a very popular mechanism during the Qin.
• Qin officials scout other states for talent and late at night, these Qin scouts blackmailed people to come to their state. These Qin men were much like a chinese version of the godfather.
• If Qin wants you, they go get you.
• They recruit Shang Yang, through blackmail and enticement. He brings in new reforms.
• Get rid of the well- field system. Give the land to the peasants so that they can buy and sell it. They make a quota, give it to the government and keep everything else.
• Boaija- Punish one person by punishing all. Strongly discourages rebellion.
• Get rid of nobility hereditary system. People have to earn their position.
• Center, province, County, village. Streamline the organizations.
• Reward informants.
• Li Ssu is another, and he leads Qin to victory.
• Legalism is a rival school of thought to confucianism. There is no such thing as absolute right and wrong. Right is what the king wants and no good is what the king doesn't want.
• Ying Cheng emerges as the man who puts all of China together. He names himself the first emperor and calls himself Huang Di. He compares himself to the chief god Di.
• He believes Confucius thinkers are the greatest threat to the dynasty so he hunts them down. If they don't recant their beliefs, he kills them. Buried hundreds of Confucius scholars alive, to make an example of them.
• Builds a palace and has provinces, Counties, villages.
• He imposes all of the Qin writing characters on everyone else.
• He hates walled cities and he unifies the currency.
• He builds roads everywhere and he wants them all to lead to his capital city.
• He wants oneness, burns Confucius books and want everyone to think in a legalist point of view.
• He even requires axels on carts to be the same.
• Builds a wall demarcating the barbarian world to the north and the world of agricultural China to the south. This wall is NOT the great wall of China.
• He gets bored and decides o look for a way to live forever. Dabbles in immortality. He tries everything but becomes fascinated with mercury. He dies of mercury poisoning. After he dies, China slips into a 5 year period of turmoil but is eventually unified.
• In 202 (202 BC -220 AD), the Han unify China after Huang Di dies.