Week 4: Society in Transition

Shifting South

I. The Jurchen/Jin State (1115–1234)

1. History—Manchuria . . . “cooked” vs. “uncooked”
2. Jin administration—founded 1115 . . .Wanyan Aguda (r. 1113–1123)

II. The Southern Song (1127–1276)

1. The Fall of Kaifeng (1127)—Emperor Huizong (r. 1100–26)
2. The Southern court at Hangzhou—Emperor Gaozong (r. 1129–62) . . . peace treaty (annual payment of 300,000 ounces of silver, 1 million strings of coins, and 300,000 bolts of silk + one-time payment of 180 annual payments . . . Jurchen ruler as elder uncle)
3. The Case of Yue Fei (1103–42)—treaty of 1141 (return of the bodies)—Qin Gui (1090–1155) . . . “Full River Red“

III. Economic and Social Change

1. Demographic change—population expansion . . . southward shift
2. Agricultural developments—e.g., quick-ripening rice
3. Economic expansion—credits/paper money . . . commercialization (wine, charcoal, paper, textiles, silk, sugar cane, etc.) . . . Qingming scroll (Hansen’s intro) . . . material culture
4. Social change—the literati . . . civil service examinations

Rethinking the Way

I. Background

1. Confucius (Kongzi 孔子, ca. 551–479 BCE) . . . Spring and Autumn period (722–481 B.C.E.) . . . teacher/philosopher . . . transmitter of the Way (Dao 道)
2. “Confucianism”—Analects (Lun yu 論語) . . . gentleman/noble man/exemplary person (jun zi 君子) . . . human-ness (ren 仁) . . . rites/rituals (li 禮)
3. Revival of Confucianism—Buddhism . . . Han Yu (768–824) . . . “Ancient Style”

II. Song Confucianism

1. Politics—Fan Zhongyan . . . Wang Anshi . . . Sima Guang
2. Metaphysics—Zhou Dunyi (1017–1073) . . . Cheng Hao (1032–1085) . . . Cheng Yi (1033–1107) . . . Great Ultimate . . . correlative cosmology

III. Zhu Xi (1130–1200)

1. Intellectual Synthesizer
2. li 理 (principle; coherence) and qi 氣 (vital energy; material force) . . . Four Books (Great Learning, Doctrine of the Mean, Analects, Mencius)

IV. Local Society

Discussion

1. What social background did Yuan Cai [Yüan Ts'ai] (ca. 1140–95) come from?
2. What were Yuan Cai's major concerns? For whom did Yuan write Precepts for Social Life?
3. What can Yuan's text tell us about the social conditions of the Southern Song?
4. Why did a text such as Yuan's appear in twelfth-century China?

Maps

External links to Maps:

Northern Song | Southern Song

Physical Map

Source: National Museum of Chinese History, ed., A Journey into China's Antiquity, vol. 1 (Beijing: Morning Glory Publishers, 1997), pp. 8–9.

 

Physical Map by Satellite

Administrative Map

Source: SACU

Images

 

External Links to Images

Material Culture

 

References

• Chaffee, John W. The Thorny Gates of Learning in Sung China: A Social History of Examinations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985.
• Ebrey, Patricia Buckley. The Inner Quarters: Marriage and the Lives of Chinese Women in the Sung Period. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993.
• Gardner, Daniel K., trans. Learning to be a Sage: Selections from the Conversations of Master Chu, Arranged Topically. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1990.
• Gernet, Jacques. Daily life in China, on the Eve of the Mongol Invasion, 1250–1276. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1962.
• Hymes, Robert P. Statesmen and Gentlemen: The Elite of Fu-chou, Chiang-hsi, in Northern and Southern Sung. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.
• Liu, James T. C. China Turning Inward: Intellectual-Political Changes in the Early Twelfth Century. Cambridge, Mass.: Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1988.