Imperial Decision-Making and Communication in Early China
A Study of Cai Yong's Duduan
by Enno Giele
(Hardback) (Published)
(March 2006)
ISBN: 9783447053341
6.65 x 9.45 inches
Price: $95.00
Out of stock
The emerging Chinese empire was faced with a dilemma typical for empires, be they Roman, Mesopotamian, or Carolingian. The realm was “won on horseback, but could not be ruled from horseback,” as an advisor of the Han dynasty put it. Military conquest had to be buttressed by a convincing legitimation of the supreme rule, including certain forms of power sharing, as well as by the establishment of a courtly protocol and a bureaucracy that provided for both a smooth operation of government and checks and balances. Here, the communication to and from the imperial court attained a crucial role. This study identifies the characteristics of different types of documents – imperial edicts as well as memorials, petitions, etc. – that helped to shape imperial policies. It contrasts a classification of documents by the famous intellectual Cai Yong (second century A.D.) with the remnants of courtly communication in the received sources and is able for the first time to make sense of the terse explanations that have long baffled historians of ancient China.
- By (author) Enno Giele
Other Titles in this Series
Tan Sitong (1865-1898)
Jenseits vom Reich der Mitte: Positionen des politischen und philosophischen Diskurses der spaten Qing-Zeit
Volume 25
Der Westen und das Reich der Mitte
Die Verbreitung westlichen Wissens im spatkaiserlichen China
Volume 27
Gesellschaftsunternehmen und Gesellschaftsrecht in China und Europa
Ein Beitrag zur Max Weber-Forschung
Volume 28
Kulturelle Identitatskonstruktionen in der Post-Suharto Zeit
Chinesischstammige Indonesier zwischen Assimilation und Besinnung auf ihre Wurzeln
Volume 21
Krieg, Staat und Militar in der Ming-Zeit (1368-1644)
Auswirkungen militarischer und bewaffneter Konflikte auf Machtpolitik und Herrschaftsapparat der Ming-Dynastie
Volume 22
Selbstkultivierung und Weltgestaltung
Die praxiologische Philosophie des Yan Yuan (1635-1704)
Volume 23
Dangerous Tunes
The Politics of Chinese Music in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the People's Republic of China since 1949
Volume 3
The Dunhuang Region during Tibetan Rule (787-848)
A Study of the Secular Manuscripts Discovered in the Mogao Caves
Volume 24
Chinese Basket Babies
A German Missionary Foundling Home and the Girls It Raised (1850s-1914)
Volume 26
Similar Books
Gender in Gandharan Art
Representations and Interactions in the Buddhist Context (1st-4th centuries CE)
Kings of Cities and Rulers of the Steppes
Representations of Kingship in Pre-Islamic Central Asia
Volume 22
Liberating the Repressed Self among Contemporary Chinese
A Theoretical Study Involving Tu Weiming and Jürgen Moltmann
Volume 41
The Lizhi (Lychee) in Chinese Literature
Translation of Chinese Sources by Michael J. Hagerty
Volume 66
Der altorientalische Mensch in seiner Umwelt
11. Internationales Colloquium der Deutschen Orientgesellschaft, 16.-19. Juni 2022 in Leipzig
Volume 11
Der Konigsgruftkomplex von Qatna. Teil 2
Die Grabkammern. Befund, Kontextualisierung, Interpretation
Volume 9
Eine Welt aus Tau
Japan: Rollbilder und Werke der Gegenwartskunst in der Sammlung Dr. Christiane Hackerodt
Fundmunzen aus Usbekistan, Band 2
Schatzfunde kushano-sasanidischer Kupfermunzen und ihr Beitrag zur Kenntnis von Pragesystem und Geldumlauf im kushano-sasanidischen Herrschaftsbereich. In Kooperation mit Shakir Pidaev
Volume 557
Individualitat und Kollektivitat
Deutsche und japanische Perspektiven auf Recht, Kultur und Rechtskultur
La gestion de l’eau dans les civilisations de l’Asie
Actes du colloque international organisé par l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, la Société asiatique et le Collège de France à l'Institut des Civilisations du Collège de France et à l'Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, les 4 et
In Search of Cultural Identities in West and Central Asia
A Festschrift for Prudence Oliver Harper
Volume 3
Joseph Francis Rock (1884-1962). Travel diaries of a botanist and ethnographer from Lanzhou to Koko Nor (Qinghai) 1925 and from Chone to Songpan 1927 (Eastern Tibet / West China)
Edited from Rock's revised manuscripts by Hartmut Walravens
Volume 136