The empire
When Qin succeeded in unifying China in 221 BCE, its king claimed the title
of “First Sovereign Emperor,” Shihuangdi. He was a strong and energetic
ruler, and, although he appointed a number of capable aides, the emperor
remained the final authority and the sole source of power.
Shihuangdi made a number of important reforms. He abolished the feudal
system completely and extended the administration system of prefectures
and counties, with officials appointed by the central government sent into
all of China. Circuit inspectors were dispatched to oversee the local
magistrates. China was divided into some 40 prefectures. The empire
created by Shihuangdi was to become the traditional territory of China. In
later eras China sometimes held other territories, but the Qin boundaries
were always considered to embrace the indivisible area of China proper. In
order to control this vast area, Shihuangdi constructed a network of
highways to facilitate moving his troops. Several hundred thousand workers
were conscripted to connect and strengthen the existing walls along the
northern border. The result was a complex of fortified walls, garrison
stations, and signal towers extending from near the Bo Hai (Gulf of Chihli)
westward across the pastureland of what is today Inner Mongolia and
through the fertile loop of the Huang He to what is now northwestern
Gansu province. This defense line, known as the Great Wall, marked the
frontier where the nomads of the great steppe and the Chinese farmers on
the loess soil confronted each other. Yet the emperor failed in another great
project: digging a canal across the mountains in the south to link the
southern coastal areas with the main body of China. Shihuangdi, with his
capable chancellor Li Si, also unified and simplified the writing system and
codified the law.
All of China felt the burden of these 11 or 12 years of change. Millions of
people were dragooned to the huge construction jobs, many dying on the
long journey to their destination. Wealthy and influential men in the
provinces were compelled to move to the capital. Weapons were
confiscated. Hundreds of intellectuals were massacred for daring to criticize
the emperor’s policies. Books dealing with subjects other than law,
horticulture, and herbal medicine were kept out of public circulation
because the emperor considered such knowledge to be dangerous and
unsettling. These things have contributed to make Shihuangdi appear the
arch tyrant of Chinese history.
Some of the accusations leveled against him by historians are perhaps
exaggerated, such as the burning of books and the indiscriminate massacre
of intellectuals. Shihuangdi himself claimed in the stone inscriptions of his
time that he had corrected the misconduct of a corrupted age and given the
people peace and order. Indeed, his political philosophy did not deviate
much from that already developed by the great thinkers of the Zhanguo
period and adopted later by the Han emperors, who have been generally
regarded as benevolent rulers.
Qin tomb: terra-cotta soldiersPortion of the army of terra-cotta soldiers and horses
found in the tomb of the Qin emperor Shihuangdi, near Xi'an, Shaanxi province, China.
(more)
Shihuangdi was afraid of death. He did everything possible to
achieve immortality. Deities were propitiated, and messengers were
dispatched to look for an elixir of life. He died in 210 BCE while on a tour of
the empire. Excavation of his tomb, near modern Xi’an (ancient Chang’an),
revealed more than 6,000 life-size statues of soldiers still on guard.
His death led to the fall of his dynasty. The legitimate heir was compelled to
kill himself when his younger brother usurped the throne. Capable and loyal
servants, including Li Si and Gen. Meng Tian, were put to death. Ershidi,
the second emperor, reigned only four years. Rebellion broke out in the
Yangtze River area when a small group of conscripts led by a farmer killed
their escort officers and claimed sovereignty for the former state of Chu.
The uprising spread rapidly as old ruling elements of the six states rose to
claim their former titles. Escaped conscripts and soldiers who had been
hiding throughout the land emerged in large numbers to attack
the imperial armies. The second emperor was killed by a powerful eunuch
minister, and in 206 BCE a rebel leader accepted the surrender of the last
Qin prince.
Cho-yun Hsu
The Han dynasty
The Han dynasty was founded by Liu Bang (best known by his temple
name, Gaozu), who assumed the title of emperor in 202 BCE. Eleven
members of the Liu family followed in his place as effective emperors until
6 CE (a 12th briefly occupied the throne as a puppet). In 9 CE the dynastic
line was challenged by Wang Mang, who established his own regime under
the title of Xin. In 25 CE the authority of the Han dynasty was reaffirmed by
Liu Xiu (posthumous name Guangwudi), who reigned as Han emperor until
57. Thirteen of his descendants maintained the dynastic succession until
220, when the rule of a single empire was replaced by that of three separate
kingdoms. While the entire period from 206 (or 202) BCE to 220 CE is
generally described as that of the Han dynasty, the terms Xi (Western) Han
(also called Former Han) and Dong (Eastern) Han (also called Later Han)
are used to denote the two subperiods. During the first period, from
206 BCE to 25 CE, the capital city was situated at Chang’an (modern Xi’an),
in the west; in the second period, from 25 to 220 CE, it lay farther east at
Luoyang.
The four centuries in question may be treated as a single historical period
by virtue of dynastic continuity, for, apart from the short interval of 9–25,
imperial authority was unquestionably vested in successive members of the
same family. The period, however, was one of considerable changes in
imperial, political, and social development. Organs of government were
established, tried, modified, or replaced, and new social distinctions were
brought into being. Chinese prestige among other peoples varied with the
political stability and military strength of the Han house, and the extent of
territory that was subject to the jurisdiction of Han officials varied with the
success of Han arms. At the same time, the example of the palace, the
activities of government, and the growing luxuries of city life gave rise to
new standards of cultural and technological achievement.
China’s first imperial dynasty, that of Qin, had lasted barely 15 years before
its dissolution in the face of rebellion and civil war. By contrast, Han formed
the first long-lasting regime that could successfully claim to be the sole
authority entitled to wield administrative power. The Han forms of
government, however, were derived in the first instance from the Qin
dynasty, and these in turn incorporated a number of features of the
government that had been practiced by earlier kingdoms. The Han empire
left as a heritage a practical example of imperial government and an ideal of
dynastic authority to which its successors aspired. But the Han period has
been credited with more success than is its due; it has been represented as
a period of 400 years of effective dynastic rule, punctuated by a short
period in which a pretender to power usurped authority, and it has been
assumed that imperial unity and effective administration advanced steadily
with each decade. In fact, there were only a few short periods marked by
dynastic strength, stable government, and intensive administration. Several
reigns were characterized by palace intrigue and corrupt influences at
court, and on a number of occasions the future of the dynasty was seriously
endangered by outbreaks of violence, seizure of political power, or a crisis
in the imperial succession.
Dynastic authority and the succession of
emperors
Xi (Western) Han
Since at least as early as the Shang dynasty, the Chinese had been
accustomed to acknowledging the temporal and spiritual authority of a
single leader and its transmission within a family, at first from brother to
brother and later from father to son. Some of the early kings had been
military commanders, and they may have organized the corporate work of
the community, such as the manufacture of bronze tools and vessels. In
addition, they acted as religious leaders, appointing scribes or priests to
consult the oracles and thus to assist in making major decisions covering
communal activities, such as warfare and hunting expeditions. In
succeeding centuries the growing sophistication of Chinese culture was
accompanied by demands for more-intensive political organization and for
more-regular administration; as kings came to delegate tasks to more
officials, so was their own authority enhanced and the obedience that they
commanded the more widely acknowledged. Under the kingdoms of Zhou,
an association was deliberately fostered between the authority of the king
and the dispensation exercised over the universe by heaven (tian), with the
result that the kings of Zhou and, later, the emperors of
Chinese dynasties were regarded as being the sons of heaven.
