Ancient China Simplified

E >> Edward Harper Parker >> Ancient China Simplified

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25

The probability is, so far as sane experience takes us, that the
Chinese had been exactly where we first find them for many
thousand years, or even for myriads of years, before their own
traditions begin. With the exception of the discovery of America,
which brought a flood of strangers into a strange land, and
speedily exterminated the aborigines, there do not appear to be
any authenticated instances in history of extensive and robust
populations being entirely displaced like flocks of sheep by
others. Any one who travels widely in China can see for himself
that, wherever unassimilated tribes live in complete or partial
independence, and, _a fortiori_, where the assimilation has
been carried out, all those tribes possess at least this point in
common with the original Chinese or the assimilated speakers of
Chinese--that their language is monosyllabic, uninflected, not
agglutinative, and tonic; i.e. that each word is "sung" in a
particular way, besides being pronounced in a particular way.
Probably those tribes before they were absorbed, or, despite their
not having yet been absorbed by the Chinese, had been there as
long as the Chinese had been in the contiguous Chinese parts. It
seems reasonable to suppose that the Chinese would absorb their
own race-classes more readily than they would absorb Tartars,
Japanese, and Coreans, all of whom belong to the same dissyllabic,
long-worded, agglutinative family. And so it is: the Chinese
followed the lines of least resistance (after themselves becoming
cultured) and worked their way down the rivers and other
watercourses towards what we call South China. From the very
first, their passage northwards across the Yellow River was
contested by the Tartars, whom they have since partly driven back,
and partly (with great effort) absorbed. They have never been able
to assimilate the Coreans, not to say the Japanese, though both
peoples took very kindly to Chinese civilization after our
Christian era, when first friendly missions began to be
interchanged. Indo-China contains many more of the monosyllabic
and tonic tribes than of others; if, indeed, there are any at all
of the dissyllabic and non-tonal classes; and the Chinese have no
difficulty in merging themselves with Annamese, Tonquinese,
Cambodgians, Siamese, Shans, Thos, Laos, Mons, and such like
peoples: but their own administrative base is too far north; the
conditions of food and climate in Indo-China are not quite
favourable for the marching of armies, especially when it is
remembered that the best troops used have always been Tartars,
used to warm clothes and heating food. There have, besides, always
been rival Indian religion, rival Indian colonization, rival
Indian language, and rival Indian trade influence to contend with.
No absorption of Indian races has ever been anywhere effected by
China. Tibetans never came into question in ancient times; if they
were known, it could only have been to Shuh (Sz Ch'wan) and Ts'in
or early Chou (Shen Si).

If it had not been the Chinese of Ho Nan who first used records,
it is just as probable that the tonic and monosyllabic absorption
which, as things were and are, moved from north to south, might
have moved from south to north. During the Chou dynasty (1122
B.C.-222 B.C.), when the extension of the Chinese race took place
(which had probably already for long gone on) in the clear light
of history, it will be noticed that the rulers of all the great
colony nations of the south--Ts'u, Wu, and Yueeh--had, in turn, to
remind the Emperor of China of their perfect equality with him in
spiritual claim and ancient descent; of their connection with
dynasties precedent to his; of times when his ancestor was a mere
vassal like themselves. No Tartars of those times ever put forth
claims like these, though, it is true, in much later times some of
the (non-Turkish) Tartar rulers of North China traced their
ancestors back to the mythical Chinese emperors who reigned in
Shan Tung. Again, the founder of the Hia dynasty (2205 B.C.) is
repeatedly said to have been buried at modern Shao-hing (between
Hangchow and Ningpo), and the King of Yueeh even sacrificed to him
there. So the Emperor Shun, the predecessor and patron of the same
founder, was traditionally buried near Ch'ang-sha in modern Hu Nan
province. The First August Emperor included both these "lions" in
his pleasure tours among the great sights of China. No sound
historical deduction, of course, can be drawn from these
traditions, however persistent: if false, they were, at any rate,
open to the criticism of a revolutionary and all-powerful Emperor
over 2000 years ago, and to a second, almost equally powerful, who
visited both places a century later; the suggestion inevitably
follows from the existence of these traditions in the south that
either the cultured Chinese whom we first find in Ho Nan had moved
northwards from Hu Nan, Kiang Si, and the lake districts
generally, before they spread themselves backwards; or that the
uncultured Chinese had moved north before the cultured Chinese
moved south; or that both north and south Chinese were at first
equally cultured, until within historical times the north Chinese
(i.e. in Ho Nan, along the Yellow River) so perfected their system
of records that they carried all before them. After all there is
no strain on the imagination in suggesting this, for early Western
civilization grew up in the same way.

There is not the smallest hint of any immigration of Chinese from
the Tarim Valley, from any part of Tartary, from India, Tibet,
Burma, the Sea, or the South Sea Islands: in fact, there is no
hint of immigration from anywhere even in China itself, except as
above hypothetically described. There the Chinese are, and there
they were; and there is an end to the question, so far as
documentary evidence goes. Of course, the persistent Tarim Valley
scheme proposed is only a means to get in the thin end of the
wedge, in order to drive home the thick end in the shape of a
definite start from the Tower of Babel, and an ultimate reference
to the Garden of Eden. If there are still people who believe it
their duty on Scriptural principle to accept this naive Western
origin of the Chinese, there is no reason why religious belief or
imagination should not be perfectly respected, and even find a
working compromise with the principle of strict adherence to human
evidence. If supernatural agencies be once admitted (as the
limited human intellect understands Nature), there seems to be no
more reason for accepting the creation of a complete whale
(already a hundred years old, according to the growth period of
later whales), than for accepting the creation of complete men
with 1000 years' history behind them instead of 100; or that of
the earth with 20,000, or even 20,000,000 years' history behind
it, and even before it; for as the first whale, or pair of whales,
must set the standard of natural history for all future whales, so
the man created with history behind him may equally well have
history created in front of him. "Nature," according to the
imperfect human understanding, is no more outraged in one case
than in the other, nor can mere time or size count as anything
towards increasing our wonder when we tell ourselves what
supernatural things unseen powers superior to ourselves may have
done. This amounts to the same thing as saying that dogmatic
belief, personal religious conviction, agnosticism, superstition,
and imagination are all on equal terms, and are equally
respectable factors when confronted with human historical
evidence, so long as they are kept rigidly apart from the latter,
As an eminent Catholic has recently said: "The Church has no more
reason to be afraid of modern science than it was of ancient
science." In other words, however pious and religious a man may be
(as we understand the words in Europe), there is no reason why, as
a recreation apart from his faith, he should not rigidly adhere to
the human evidence of history so far as it goes. On the other
hand, however sceptical and discriminating a man may be, from the
point of view of imperfect human knowledge, in the admittance of
humanly proved fact, there is no reason why, from the emotional
and imaginative side of his existence, he should not rigidly
subscribe to dogma or personal conviction, whether the abstract
idea of virtue, the concrete idea of love for some cherished human
being, or the yearning for some supernatural state of sinlessness
be concerned. A distinguished financier, for instance, may regale
his imagination with socialistic dreams of a perfect Utopia; but,
when the weekly household bills are presented to him, he deals
with overcharges in pence like any other practical individual.

From one point of view, the Chinese, already provided with their
tonic language at the Confusion of Tongues, marched to the Yellow
River, where we find them. From the other, there is no evidence
whatever to connect the Chinese with any people other than those
we find near them now, and which have from the earliest times been
near them; no evidence that their language, their civilization,
their manners, ever received anything from, or gave anything to,
India, Babylonia, Persia, Egypt, or Greece, except so far as has
been suggested above, or will be suggested below.

CHAPTER XXXII

THE CALENDAR

Allusion has already been made to the eclipses mentioned in
Confucius' history as a means by which the probability of his
general truth as a historian may in a certain measure be gauged. A
few words upon the Chinese calendar, as it is and was, may
therefore not be amiss. The Chinese month has from first to last
been uncompromisingly lunar; that is to say, the first day of each
month, or "moon" as it may strictly and properly be called, always
falls within the day (beginning at midnight) during which the new
moon occurs. Of course, Peking is the administrative centre now,
and therefore the observations are taken there with reference to
the Peking meridian. As Confucius took his facts and records
mainly from the Lu archives, and (we must suppose) noted celestial
movements from what was seen by the Lu astronomers, it has always
been presumed that the eclipses mentioned by him were observed
from Lu too; that is, from a station over four degrees of
longitude and one of latitude removed from the imperial capital as
it then was (modern Ho-nan Fu). It was the duty of all sovereign
princes to proclaim the first day of the moon at their ancestral
temple; and even if the Chinese of those days had discovered the
difference in "time" between east and west, these princes must
each of them have proclaimed the day during which the new moon
occurred as it occurred to themselves, in their own State, and not
as it occurred to the Emperor's astronomers. On the other hand,
when eclipses were observed from the comparatively small territory
of Lu, it must have occurred, at least occasionally, that visitors
from other states had either the same eclipse or other eclipses to
report. If the Emperor's astronomer reported eclipses in Ho-nan-
Fu on a given day, it is difficult to see how Lu, which was a
centre almost of equal standing with the imperial capital for
orthodoxy in rites and records, could have entirely ignored such
reports.

But the Chinese year has always been luni-solar. From the earliest
times they had observed the twelve ecliptical "mansions" and
zodiacal signs, and also that the time occupied by the sun in
travelling through a mansion was rather longer than one lunation,
or the time intervening between two new moons. Their object has
accordingly always been to bring the lunar and solar years into
manageable combination, so that the equinoxes, solstices, and
"seasons" might occur with as much regularity as possible in the
same months, and so that the husbandman might know when to sow his
grain. Formerly they regulated this discrepancy according to the
mean movements of the sun and moon; but, ever since the Jesuits
first instructed them more accurately, they have regulated the two
years, that is, the solar year and the twelve lunations, according
to the true movements, and with reference to the meridian of
Peking. If the moons were each exactly 29 1/2 days in length,
instead of being 44 minutes 2.87 seconds longer, it would have
been a simple matter to halve the ordinary lunar year, and make
six months "large" (30 days) and six "small" (29 days); but the
extra 44 minutes and a fraction accumulate, and the result is that
there must always be a larger number of "great" months than
"small" in the year. The way the Chinese arranged this was to call
a month "great" (30 days) if the interval between mid-night
(beginning of the new-moon day) and the hour of the _next_
new moon was full 30 days or over in duration; if less than 30
days, then the month was a "small" one (29 days). Not more than
two long months ever followed in succession, and two short months
never did so.

But, in any case, even twelve regular moons of 291/2 days only
make 354 days, whereas a solar year is about 3651/4 days, whilst
the sun's time in passing through a "mansion" (one-twelfth of the
solar year) is about 301/2 days. Thus there was a "superfluity"
of about ten days in every lunar year, or about one lunation in
every third year; not to mention that a "mansion" was about a day
longer than a lunation, and that therefore the husbandman was
liable to be thrown out of his reckoning. In order to remedy this,
the Chinese intercalated a month once in about thirty-three moons,
and called the intercalary month by the same name as the one
preceding it, both with regard to the common numbers 1-12, and
with regard to the two endless cycles of twelve signs and sixty
signs, by which moons are calculated for ever, in the past and in
the future. Regarding the difficulty of seasons, the solar year
was divided into twenty-four "joints," and each "joint" was about
half a "mansion" (the difference rarely exceeding one hour).
However, the spring equinox is always the sixth "joint," and is
the middle of spring season: this and the other "joints" being all
about 151/4 days in length, the Chinese seasons can be symmetrically
divided with relation to both equinoxes and both solstices; for the
intercalary moon (judiciously made unobtrusive, and kept out of vulgar
sight as far as possible) settles the lunar year difficulty; and the
seasons conform, as of course they should do, to the heat of the
sun, which is a much more natural and practical arrangement than
our own arbitrarily assorted and unequal months.

The endless sixty-year cycle of years is usually referred back to
for a beginning to either 2697 or 2637 B.C.; but, apart from the
fact that there is little or no accurate knowledge anterior to 842
B.C., it is of no importance when it began, so long as sixty pairs
of equinoxes and solstices are calculated backwards indefinitely.
It goes back, in any case, to a date beyond which the memory of
Chinese man runneth not to the contrary; it is unbroken and
continuous; we are free to take up any date we like at sixty-year
intervals, and say "here I agree to begin": we cannot deny that
1908 is the cycle year it purports to be; and even if we did,
batches of sixty years backwards from any other cyclic year called
1908, would always have a fixed relation to the other 4604 years
recorded; nor, having accepted 1908, can we deny 1808, 1708, and
so on, as far back as we like, in order to test how any given
event, eclipse or other, coincides relatively with our own date:
it is not a question of beginning, but of counting back, and
stopping. We find Confucius of Lu (Chou clan state) using the
calendar of the Chou dynasty (1122 B.C.-249 B.C.); whose founder
had said: "In future we make the eleventh month the beginning of
the year instead of the twelfth month." The previous dynasty of
Shang (1766-1123) had similarly said: "In future we make the
twelfth month begin the year instead of the first." The previous
dynasty of Hia (2205-1767) and the individual emperors before had
all said (or taken for granted): "The year begins in the first
month," from which we may naturally conclude that there could not
have been an earlier calendar, as no "sage" could reasonably begin
anywhere but at the beginning. At the same time, it must be
explained that the astronomical order of the months, counting the
first as being that when the sun enters Capricorn, is different
from the civil order. Thus the Hia, Shang, and Chou first civil
months were the third, second, and first astronomical months,
representing the sun's entry into Pisces, _Aquarius_, and
_Capricorn_, respectively. When the First August Emperor
conquered the whole of China, and proceeded to unify cart-axles,
weights and measures, written characters, and many other
discrepant popular arrangements, he said: "Let the tenth month be
in future the first in the year instead of the eleventh." That is
to say, he took as civil first month the twelfth astronomical
month, or that in which the sun enters _Sagittarius_. Thus we
see that in 2000 years the calendar had got about 90 days out of
gear; or, roughly, about an hour a year.

All the above may, perhaps, be understood more clearly by
considering the following unmistakably genuine statement made by
the Emperor in 104 B.C., a hundred years after the Ts'in dynasty
had been destroyed; after he had contemplated the tombs of the
ancient monarchs as explained in the last chapter; after the West
of Asia had been discovered; and when it is _possible_ (though
there is no record of it) that Persians, Indians, Greeks, etc., may have
intervened in discussion upon the calendar. He says: "After the
Emperors Yu and Li (the two who fled from their metropolis in 771 B.C.
and 842 B.C. respectively, as related), the Chou dynasty went wrong,
and those who were doubly subjects began to wield power; astrologers
ceased to keep reckoning of seasons; the princes no longer proclaimed
the first day of each moon. Hereditary astronomers got scattered; some
remained in All the Hia (orthodox China); others betook themselves to
the various barbarians. In the twenty-sixth year of the Emperor Siang (626
B.C.) there was an intercalary third month, which arrangement the
'Springs and Autumns' condemns (it should have been at the end of
the year)... The First August Emperor took the tenth month as the
beginning of the year... The present Emperor (of the Han dynasty)
appointed two astronomers, the second of whom (a native of East Sz
Ch'wan) advanced the calculations and improved the calendar. Then
it was found that the measures of the Sun and the Mansions agreed
with the principles adopted by the Hia dynasty... The first cyclic
day and also the first lunar day of the eleventh moon has now been
proved to be the winter solstice. I change the seventh year (of my
present reign-period), and I make of it the first year of the new
reign-period, to be called 'Great Beginning.'"--Accordingly what
had up to that date been the seventh year (of a reign-period
bearing another name) now became a year of 442 days; that is to
say, the three months postponed in turn by the Hia, Shang, and
Chou dynasties were taken up again, and accordingly that one
correcting year consisted of fifteen months. With slight changes,
always adopted only to be again rejected after a few years of
trial, this has been the basis of all later calendars; and for
this reason Confucius' birthday is kept on the twenty-seventh day
of the eighth moon instead of during the tenth moon, as it would
have been according to Chou dates.

The above examination into the calendar question tends to show
still more clearly the good faith of the historians and the
administration; it also illustrates the continuity and painstaking
accuracy of the Chinese records, whatever other defects they may
otherwise disclose.

CHAPTER XXXIII

NAMES

One of the difficulties of Chinese ancient history is the
unravelling of proper names; but, as with other difficulties, this
one is owing rather to the novelty and strangeness of the subject,
to the unfamiliarity of scene and of atmosphere, than to any
inherent want of clearness in the matter itself. In reading
Scottish history, no one is much disconcerted to find a man called
upon the same page (as an imaginary instance), Old John, John
McQuhirt, the Master of Weel, the McQuhirt, the Laird o' Airton,
the Laird of the Isle, and the Earl of Airton and Weel; there are
many such instances to be found in Boswell's account of the
Johnsonian trip to the Hebrides; but the puzzled Englishman has at
least his own language and a fairly familiar ground to deal with.
When, however, we come to unpronounceable Chinese names of strange
individuals, moving about amid hitherto unheard-of surroundings
2500 years ago, with a suspicion of uncertainty added about the
genuineness and good faith of the whole story, things are apt to
seem hopelessly involved, even where the best of good-will to
understand is present. Thus Confucius may be called K'ung-tsz,
K'ung Fu-tsz, or Chung-ni, besides other personal applications
under the influence of _tabu_ rules, Tsz-ch'an may be spoken
of as Kung-sun K'iao, or (if he himself speaks) simply as K'iao.
And so on with nearly all prominent individuals. In those times
the family names, or "surnames" as we say in English, were not
used with the regularity that prevails in China now, when every
one of standing has a fixed family name, such as Li or Yiian,
followed by an official personal name, like Hung-chang or Shi-
k'ai. In old times the clan or tribe counted first; for instance
the imperial clan of _Ki_ included princes of several vassal
states. But, after five generations, it was expected that any
given family unit should detach itself. Thus, in 710 B.C.,
Confucius' ancestor, son of the composer of odes mentioned on page
175, took, or was given by the ruler of his native state, Sung,
the detached family name of K'ung-fu (Father K'ung), "Father"
being the social application, and K'ung the surname, which thence
became the family name of a new branch. The old original clan-
names were little used by any one in a current sense, just as the
English family name of Guelph is kept in the dim background so far
as current use goes. Nor were the personal names, even of Chinese
emperors and kings, so grave and decorous in style as they have
always been in later times. For instance, "Black Buttocks," "Black
Arm," "Double Ears";--such names (decidedly Turkish in style) are
not only used of Tsin princes with an admixture of Tartar blood
nearly always coursing more or less in their veins, but also in
such states as the orthodox Lu. The name "Black Arm," for
instance, is used both by Lu and by Ts'u princes; also by a Ts'u
private individual; whilst an orthodox Duke of Sung bears the
purely Turkish name of T'ouman, which (and exactly the same
pictograph characters, too) was also the name of the first
historical Hiung-nu (later Turkish) Khan several centuries later.
The name _Luh-fu_ or "Emoluments Father," belonging to the
son of the last Emperor of the Shang dynasty in 1123 B.C., was
also the personal name of one of the rulers of Ts'i many centuries
later. In the same way we find identical personal names in CH'EN
and Lu, and also in Ts'u and Lu princes. Eunuchs were not
considered to possess family names, or even official personal
names. If there had been then, as now, a celibate priestly caste,
no doubt then, as now, priests would also have been relieved of
their family name rights.

It seems quite clear that many if not most family names began in
China with the name of places, somewhat after the Scotch style:
even in Lancashire the title of the old lord of the manor is often
the family surname of many of the village folk around. Take the
Chinese imperial domain for instance; in the year 558 one Liu Hia
goes to meet his master the new Emperor. His name (Hia) and
surname (Liu) would serve just as well for current use to-day, as
for example with the late viceroy Liu K'un-yih; but we are told
Liu Hia was so "named" by the historian in full because his rank
was not that of first-class statesman, and it is explained that
Liu was the name of his tenancy in the imperial appanage. At a Lu
funeral in 626 B.C. the Emperor's representative to the vassal
state is spoken of complimentarily by his social appellation in
view of his possessing first-class ministerial rank: he cannot be
spoken of by his detached clan-name, or family name, "because he
has not yet received a town in fee." A few years later, another
imperial messenger is spoken of as King-shuh (Glory Uncle),
"Glory" being the name of his manor or fee, and "Uncle" his social
appellation. In 436 B.C. the Emperor sent a present of sacrificial
meat to Lu by X. As X is thus "named," he must be of "scholar"
rank, as an imperial "minister" (it is explained) could not be
thus named. The ruler alone has the right to "affront a man" at
all times with his personal name, but even a son in speaking of
his own father to the Emperor may "affront" his father, because
both his father and himself are on equal subject footing before
the Emperor. To "name" a man in history is not always like
"naming" a member in the House of Commons. For instance, the King
of Ts'u, as mentioned in Chapter XXVII., was named for killing a
Chinese in 531, but not for killing a barbarian prince in 526 B.C.
It was partly by these delicate shades of naming or not naming,
titling or not titling, that Confucius hinted at his opinions in
his history: in the Ts'u case, it seems to have been an honour to
"name" a barbarian. Wei Yang, Kung-sun Yang, or Shang Kiin, or
Shang Yang, the important personage who carried a new civilization
to Ts'in, and practically "created" that power about 350 B.C.,
was, personally, simply named Yang, or "Bellyband." As he came
originally from the orthodox state or principality of Wei, he
might be called Wei Yang, just as we might say Alexander of Fife.
As he received from Ts'in, as a reward for his services, the petty
principality of Shang (taken in war by Ts'in from Ts'u), he might
be called the prince or laird (_kuen_) of Shang (of. Lochiel),
or Shang Kuen. As he was the grandson (sun) of a deceased earl
(called _kung_, or "duke," as a posthumous compliment), he
was entitled to take the family name of Kung-sun, just as we say
"Fitzgeorge" or "Fitzwilliam." Finally, he was Yang (= John) of
Shang (= Lochiel). In speaking of this man to an educated Chinese,
it does not in the least matter which of the four names be used.
In the same way, Tsz-ch'an (being a duke's grandson) was Kung-sun
K'iao. The word _tsz_, or "son," _after_ a family name, as for
instance in K'ung-tsz (Confucius), is defined as having the effect of
"gracefully alluding to a male." It seems really to be the same in effect
as the Latin _us_, as in Celsius, Brutus, Thompsonius, etc. When
it _precedes_, not the family name or the _tabu_'d personal
name, but the current or acquaintance name, then it seems to have
the effect of Don or _Dom_, used with the most attenuated
honorificity; or the effect of "Mr." _Fu-tsz_ means "The Master."

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25