Western Zhou Dynasty
In Chinese history , the Zhou dynasty is generally divided into two periods. The first period from the establishment of the dynasty in the 11th century BC. BC to 771 BC The Western Zhou Dynasty ( 西周 ) is called. The period from 770 BC. Until the abdication of the last Zhou king in 256 BC. Is known as the Eastern Zhou Dynasty .
The designation west or east comes from the respective capital of the two periods. The western Zhou dynasty had its capital Hao ( 鎬 , Hào ) (Zongzhou ( 宗周 , Zōngzhōu )), near present-day Xi'an in Shaanxi province , while the eastern Zhou dynasty was in the eastern Luoyang ( 洛陽 , Luòyáng ) had established its capital in what is now Henan Province .
Extensive artifacts , excavation sites and contemporary documents are known from the Western Zhou Dynasty . The first comprehensive Chinese historiography and literature collection also appeared relatively soon, so that a lot is known about culture and life. The year 841 BC BC is the first year in Chinese history that can be dated to the date. Due to the daily recording of a solar eclipse on September 6th, 776 BC. Even the Chinese calendar of that time can be brought into line with today's calendar system down to the day.
Beginning
The Zhou tribe is said to have lived in the west of what is now Shaanxi Province during the time of the Xia Dynasty . Like all royal and princely houses of ancient China, they traced their descent to one of the legendary ancestors of the Chinese or reject kings. Of course, these legends can no longer be proven today. The family name of the Zhou is Ji (姬). However, during the Shang Dynasty , the Zhou tribe grew stronger. They relocated to the fertile area in central Shaanxi; agricultural successes laid the foundation for their aspiration. The economic strengthening was followed by the political and military. Through several campaigns they were able to push back the northern nomads and to advance further west to today's Sichuan . Their influence also increased politically, so that many neighboring tribes leaned politically to them. The excavation of the Zhou ancestral temples of this time as well as the over 100,000 oracle bones obtained from the excavation prove this process. This inevitably led to a conflict with the Shang dynasty, so that the latter had to send punitive military expeditions to the west. At the end of the Shang Dynasty, however, the power of the Zhou could no longer be ignored. At a meeting, the Zhou ruler was able to get the majority of the tribes behind him so that he could openly rebel against Shang.
In a decisive battle, the army of the last Shang king, Di Xin, defected to Zhou. He burned himself and his palace, ending the dynasty. This event is dated by some historians to the year 1057 BC. Counted backwards; however, the dating is controversial.
State and society
To keep the conquered land under control, the Zhou king enfeoffed the land to his relatives and loyal followers. According to later history, 71 princes were enfeoffed, 53 of whom were direct relatives of the king. Since the center of the Zhou was in the west of the country, particularly trustworthy princes were enfeoffed with the land in the east. The northernmost capital of these feudal states was near what is now Beijing . The southernmost state controlled the middle course of the Yangtze . The princes, for their part, enfeoffed the land to lower nobles. This system was continued through the nobility. The land could not be sold or distributed without the permission of the senior liege lord. The farmers who worked on these lands were tied to the land and were redistributed along with it. Especially in the fertile plains, the land was divided into square cells. At least at the beginning of the Western Zhou period, there were clear rules as to how much land a nobleman of a certain rank could or must own.
Ideologically, the local princes were bound to the central royal house via the system of the ancestral temple, which administered the temple of the ancestral ancestors. These ancestors were considered to be the heads of the other ancestors. This gave the king the office of chief priest. Even the princes and the lower-ranking nobles, down to the normal bourgeoisie, had their own ancestral temples (or shrines); however, their ancestors were considered to be secondary branches of the ancestral ancestors. Thus the central position of the king was secured on the sacred level.
During the Western Zhou period, the king enjoyed great authority among princes. The princes had to drive to the capital at fixed intervals to pay their respects there. It was precisely determined which gifts they had to hand over. The princes were also obliged to help the king with military undertakings or other activities. For larger celebrations such as religious ceremonies, birth, marriage or death in the royal family, the princes had fixed duties. In the event of a violation or neglect of duty, the princes had to expect penalties up to and including the loss of a fief.
The Zhou dynasty had a sophisticated system of officials. Most civil servant posts were passed on from fathers to sons. Some official titles were to survive until the last Chinese imperial dynasty.
After the establishment of the dynasty, the Zhou rulers continued to maintain a large army. The local princes also had their own armies, although the number of soldiers was also clearly regulated, at least at the beginning of the Western Zhou period. There were military clashes mainly south of the Yangtze and against the nomads in the north and west. On the orders of the king, the local princes had to provide military aid. Often times, the Zhou kings were personally at the head of the army. The main weapon of the army was the chariot .
The complex legal system of the Zhou period has been handed down in relatively great detail. Murder, robbery and theft were punished with particular severity. Nobles enjoyed special protection; the higher officials in particular enjoyed de facto impunity.
economy
In the Western Zhou period, society was divided into four major occupational groups: craftsmen, traders, farmers, and civil servants.
The basis of the Chinese economy has always been agriculture. The feudal system with the division of the land enabled the emergence of large farms; over tens of thousands of farmers worked on some. A variety of grains were grown. There were descriptions of how to make compost and how to control pests. In addition to enfeoffed land, there were also private lands. Most of them were created by lower nobles whose possessions were small and who had to cultivate the land themselves.
The craft and the manual activities were already very differentiated in the Western Zhou period. They were collectively referred to as the "hundred craft trades". The use of bronze products increased significantly during this time. In addition to containers, tools, weapons, jewelry and musical instruments were also cast from bronze. Many of the bronze vessels that were found have inscriptions stating their user, the occasion of the casting, etc.; some bore inscriptions several characters long. Today they are very important documents that give an insight into court life at that time. In general, bronze products became more and more mundane, the engravings simpler and their structures more filigree over time. Among the artifacts excavated in Shaanxi and Henan Provinces are the first forerunners of porcelain . The earliest clay roofs discovered in China also date from the Western Zhou period. Another material, jade, became more important . During the Western Zhou period, jade was only allowed to be worn by nobles and enjoyed sacred significance.
Compared to the Shang period, inventory management was less pronounced in the Western Zhou period. Among other things, slaves were traded, with five slaves corresponding to the price of a horse.
Culture
The main features of Daoism can be found in contemporary documents from the Western Zhou period. Zhou Yi (literally translated 'the book of changes from the Zhou period') was a handbook of divination ; here the principles of yin and yang were explained for the first time. The five ancient Chinese elements were also recorded here : water, fire, metal, earth and wood.
The book of songs, which Confucius compiled 200 years after the fall of the Western Zhou, contains numerous songs and poems from that time. They range from songs that were sung for ancestor worship at rites at the royal court to those that reflected the lives of ordinary people. In general, music played an important role in the Zhou period and was culturally established as part of the rites. So far, extensive musical instruments have been excavated, so that the level of knowledge about the scale system at that time is quite detailed. The unearthed musical instruments range from bone wind instruments to sets of bronze bells that were put together and operated by several people.
Technology and science
The first mathematics book in China, the Zhoubi suanjing, is handed down from the Zhou period . It is an arithmetic book . At the beginning of the book a special case of the Pythagorean theorem is mentioned (a right-angled triangle with the legs of 3 and 4 has a hypotenuse of 5). Mathematics was considered one of the six arts that were a compulsory exercise in raising a young noblewoman.
Traditional Chinese astrology also comes from the Western Zhou period. The ecliptic is divided into 28 constellations . In addition, numerous observations of solar eclipses have come down to us from the Western Zhou period . To observe the position and course of the sun, huge sundials were erected, with which the people of that time could determine the length of the solar year with relative accuracy .
In order to administer the country, they began to draw up precise maps of the country, for which an office was set up.
In medicine, doctors emerged as an independent professional group. Above all, the rulers made their own doctors to protect and maintain their health.
The end of the Western Zhou Dynasty
In the middle period of the Western Zhou Dynasty, the weakness in the ruling structure became increasingly evident. Several severe military defeats south of the Yangtze and the renewed threat from the nomadic peoples from the north put the royal family under great pressure. Inside, too, the leaning system showed breaks after 150 years. Smaller nobles fell more and more under the wheels of the stronger; they became impoverished and lost their privileges. Finally, the tyranny of King Li, who ruled from about 877 to 828 BC, excited Prevailed, the discontent of the population. In the year 841 BC There were riots as a result of which the king was driven out of the capital. For the next 18 years until the king's death, the capital had to be administered by a deputy. It was not until his son King Xuan, who lived from 827 - 782 BC. Ruled, was able to return to the capital, but these unrest had seriously weakened the royal family. The king's loss of authority weighed heaviest with the princes. King Xuan's extensive military ventures, on the one hand, reduced the threat from the north, but on the other hand, were not always crowned with a victory (an expedition to the south, for example, ended in complete defeat), and so further diminished the power of the royal family. When the nomads in 771 BC BC invaded again, the royal house was at an end. King You, who lived from 781 to 771 BC. Ruled, was killed and the capital Hao devastated. His son King Ping (reigned 770 to 720 BC) fled to Luoyang under the protection of the surrounding princes and founded the Eastern Zhou Dynasty there.
Kings of the Western Zhou Dynasty
| Name 2 | Honorary name 2 | Reign 1 |
|---|---|---|
| Ji Fa 姬發 |
Wu 武王 |
1046-1043 BC Chr. 1 |
| Ji Song 姬 誦 |
Cheng 成 王 |
1042-1021 BC Chr. 1 |
| Ji Zhao 姬 釗 |
Kang 康王 |
1020-996 BC Chr. 1 |
| Ji Xia 姬 瑕 |
Zhao 昭王 |
995-977 BC Chr. 1 |
| Ji Man 姬 滿 |
Mu 穆王 |
976-922 BC Chr. 1 |
| Ji Yihu 姬 繄 扈 |
Gong 共 王 |
922-900 BC Chr. 1 |
| Ji Jian 姬 囏 |
Yì 懿王3 |
899-892 BC Chr. 1 |
| Ji Pifang 姬 辟 方 |
Xiao 孝王 |
891-886 BC Chr. 1 |
| Ji Xie 姬 燮 |
Yi 夷 王3 |
885-878 BC Chr. 1 |
| Ji Hu 姬 胡 |
Li 厲王 |
877-841 BC Chr. 1 |
| Government by proxy 共和 |
841-828 BC Chr. | |
| Ji Jing 姬 靜 |
Xuan 宣王 |
827-782 BC Chr. |
| Ji Gongsheng 姬 宮 湦 |
You 幽王 |
781-771 BC Chr. |
| 1 The first generally accepted year is 841 BC. The previous years are not certain and are controversial. The years given here come from the Xia-Shang-Zhou Chronological Project initiated by the Chinese government , which published these numbers in 2000; they are used here for reference only. | ||
| 2 The name of the Chinese rulers is complicated. Most often the rulers have several names. The first name is the real name, if you will, the real name. According to Chinese tradition, the family name comes before the personal name; this is also used here. The second name is an honorary name given posthumously by the successor or rulers of later dynasties. The rulers are best known under this name. That is why the link to the rulers is created from here. | ||
| 3 The seventh and ninth king have a very similarly transcribed honorary name (Yì and Yí). But they differ in the Chinese characters and pronunciation. | ||