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42-581: After King Wu of Zhou destroyed the Shang dynasty in 1046 BCE, his uncle Guo Shu received grants of land at Yong. The rulers of Western Guo held administrative positions in the court of the Zhou Kings through successive generations. A branch of Western Guo later founded Eastern Guo . Due to harassment and invasion by the Quanrong tribes Western Guo moved eastwards, eventually migrating to Sanmenxia in

84-461: A decentralized system of confederation -like government. The ruling class consisted of the Son of Heaven (king or emperor ) and aristocracy, and the lower class consisted of commoners categorized into four occupations (or "four categories of the people", namely scholar-officials , peasants , laborers and merchants ). Elite bonds through affinal relations and submission to the overlordship of

126-582: A concrete ideal of political organization. In particular, according to Confucius, during the Spring and Autumn period the traditional system of rituals and music had become empty and hence his goal was to return to or bring back the early Zhou dynasty political system. With the establishment of the Qin dynasty in 221 BCE, the First Emperor unified the country and abolished the fengjian system, consolidating

168-603: A counter system to the feudal order. Therefore, according to some historians, the term "feudalism" is not an exact fit for the Western Zhou political structure but it can be considered a system somewhat analogous to the one that existed in medieval Europe. According to Terence J. Byres in Feudalism and Non European Societies , "feudalism in China no longer represents a deviation from the norm based on European feudalism, but

210-480: A larger fēngjiàn system, the well-field system became strained in the Spring and Autumn period as kinship ties between aristocrats became meaningless. When the system became economically untenable in the Warring States period , it was replaced by a system of private land ownership. It was first suspended in the state of Qin by Shang Yang and the other Chinese states soon followed suit. As part of

252-432: A new system of administrative divisions called the junxian system (郡縣制, " commandery - county system") or prefectural system, with the establishment of thirty-six prefectures and a rotational system for appointing local officials. There are many differences between the two systems, but one is particularly worth mentioning: the prefectural system gave more power to the central government, since it consolidated power at

294-569: A political obligation to pay homage to the king, but as the central authority started to decline during the Eastern Zhou dynasty , their power began to outstrip that of the royal house and subsequently the states developed into their own kingdoms, reducing the Zhou dynasty to little more than a prestigious name. As a result, Chinese history from the Zhou dynasty (1046–256 BC) to the beginning of

336-593: Is likely to be in the Xianyang-Xi'an area. King Wu is considered one of the great heroes of China, together with the mythical Yellow Emperor and the legendary Yu the Great . Queens: Sons: Daughters: Fengjian Fēngjiàn ( Chinese : 封建 ; lit. 'demarcation and establishment') was a governance system in Ancient China and Imperial China , whose social structure formed

378-486: The Han dynasty an aristocrat with a place name in his title actually governed that place, it was only nominally true afterwards. Any male member of the nobility could be called a gongzi (公子 gōng zǐ), while any son of a king could be called a wangzi (王子 wáng zǐ, i.e. prince). The well-field system ( Chinese : 井田制度 ; pinyin : jǐngtián zhìdù ) was a land distribution method existing in some parts of China between

420-412: The Han dynasty , Confucianism became the reigning imperial ideology and scholars and court officials alike again began to look to the Zhou dynasty fengjian system as an ideal. These scholars advocated incorporating elements of the fengjian system into the junxian system. The Han dynasty emperors ultimately chose to parcel out land to their relatives and several other powerful officials, thus combining

462-709: The Liao dynasty and the Jin dynasty , nobles were granted titles but held no fiefs. The fengjian system was again revived in the Yuan dynasty when dynastic fiefs were once again established at various parts of the empire. This remained the same throughout the Ming dynasty and the Qing dynasty , albeit the number of fiefs in the Qing dynasty was drastically reduced. The four occupations were

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504-577: The Qin dynasty has been termed a "feudal" period by many Chinese historians, due to the custom of enfeoffment of land similar to that in Medieval Europe . However, scholars have suggested that fengjian otherwise lacks some of the fundamental aspects of feudalism . Each fengjian state was autonomous and had its own tax and legal systems along with its own unique currency and even writing style. The nobles were required to pay regular homage to

546-538: The Shang dynasty ; in the Book of Rites , however, it is assumed that his inheritance represented an older tradition among the Zhou of passing over the eldest son. (Fa's grandfather Jili had likewise inherited Zhou despite two older brothers.) Upon his succession, Fa worked with his father-in-law Jiang Ziya to accomplish an unfinished task: overthrowing the Shang dynasty. During the ninth year of his reign, Fa marched down

588-845: The Yellow River to the Mengjin ford and met with more than 800 dukes. He constructed an ancestral tablet with his father's posthumous name as King Wen and placed it on a chariot in the middle of the host; considering the timing unpropitious, though, he did not yet attack Shang. In 1046 BC, King Wu took advantage of Shang disunity to launch an attack along with many neighboring dukes. The Battle of Muye destroyed Shang's forces and King Zhou of Shang set his palace on fire, dying within. King Wu followed his victory by establishing many feudal states under his 16 younger brothers and clans allied by marriage, but his death three years later provoked several rebellions against his young heir King Cheng and

630-484: The fēngjiàn system differed from those of European feudalism in that people were not born into the specific classes, such that, for example, a son born to a gōng craftsman was able to become a part of the shāng merchant class, and so on. Beginning in the Han dynasty, the sizes of troops and domains a male noble could command would be determined by his rank of peerage, which from highest to lowest were: While before

672-639: The junxian and fengjian systems. The turning point came at the Rebellion of the Seven States , following which the autonomy of the fiefs was curbed and the fiefs were eventually abolished altogether. Subsequent dynasties also partially implemented the fengjian system alongside regular administration in other regions of the empire. From the Tang dynasty to the Southern Song dynasty , including

714-399: The shì (士) the class of "knightly" scholars, mostly from lower aristocratic orders, the gōng (工) who were the artisans and craftsmen of the kingdom and who, like the farmers, produced essential goods needed by themselves and the rest of society, the nóng (农/農) who were the peasant farmers who cultivated the land which provided the essential food for the people and tributes to the king, and

756-592: The shāng (商) who were the merchants and traders of the kingdom. Zōngfǎ (宗法, Clan Law), which applied to all social classes, governed the primogeniture of rank and succession of other siblings. The eldest son of the consort would inherit the title and retained the same rank within the system. Other sons from the consort, concubines, and mistresses would be given titles one rank lower than their father. As time went by, all of these terms lost their original meanings, yet Zhūhóu (诸侯), Dafu (大夫), and Shi (士) became synonyms for court officials. The four occupations under

798-522: The "turning the clock back" reformations by Wang Mang during the short-lived Xin dynasty , the system was restored temporarily and renamed to the King's Fields (王田; wángtián ). The practice was more-or-less ended by the Song dynasty , but scholars like Zhang Zai and Su Xun were enthusiastic about its restoration and spoke of it in a perhaps oversimplifying admiration, invoking Mencius 's frequent praise of

840-573: The 1930s. Guo Moruo's views dominated the official interpretation of historical records, according to which the political system during the late Zhou dynasty saw the gradual transformation of society from slave society into feudal society. It is argued that during the Warring States Period , society had started to develop institutions comparable to the feudalistic system in medieval Europe. Adhering to Marx's theory of historical materialism , Guo argues that models of society progress under

882-467: The Chinese Zhou dynasty . The chronology of his reign is disputed but is generally thought to have begun around 1046 BCE and ended with his death three years later. King Wu was the second son of Ji Chang (posthumously King Wen) and Tai Si . In most accounts, his older brother Bo Yikao was said to have predeceased his father, typically at the hands of King Zhou of Shang , the last king of

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924-500: The Yellow River valley between Xi'an and Luoyang. A new capital was built at Shangyang (上阳) straddling both banks of the Yellow River . Shangyang was called "Southern Guo" (南虢) and Xiayang (下阳) "Northern Guo" (北虢). Later chronicles often became confused with the relationships among the various Guo's, but archaeological discoveries support the view that Northern and Southern Guo were both parts of Western Guo. In 655 BCE Western Guo

966-532: The Zhou peasant was free to leave or, beginning in the Eastern Han dynasty, to purchase the land in small parcels. Moreover, in Europe, feudalism was also considered to be a hierarchical economic system in which the lords were at the top of the structure, followed by the vassals, and then the peasants who were legally bound to the land and were responsible for all production. In Zhou rule, the fengjian system

1008-431: The center section (公田; gōngtián) was communally cultivated on behalf of the landowning aristocrat. While all fields were aristocrat-owned, the private fields were managed exclusively by individual families and the produce was entirely the farmers'. It was only produce from the communal fields, worked on by all eight families, that went to the aristocrats, and which, in turn, could go to the king as tribute . As part of

1050-516: The feudal system instead of being integrated into it since the landed aristocrats were settled in manors. Thus, the towns and their people were independent of the influence of the feudal lords and were usually solely under the political authority of the monarchs of the European kingdoms. In China, these conditions were non-existent and the king and his officials depended greatly on the regional lords for all governance, within towns and without, except in

1092-458: The impact of technological advancements. For example, with the discovery of bronze and the emergence of bronze tools, society progressed from primitive communism into slave society. Similarly, with the introduction of iron metallurgy around the 5th century BCE, Chinese society gradually saw the centralisation of authority, the emergence of total war, and the departing from slavery as society's primary mode of production. Guo therefore argues that with

1134-469: The king and to provide him with soldiers in a time of war. This structure played an important part in the political structure of the Western Zhou which was expanding its territories in the east. In due course this resulted in the increasing power of the noble lords, whose strength eventually exceeded that of the Zhou kings, leading to dwindling central authority. The vassal states started to ignore

1176-539: The king date back to the Shang dynasty , but it was the Western Zhou dynasty when the Zhou kings enfeoffed their clan relatives and fellow warriors as vassals . Through the fengjian system, the king would allocate an area of land to a noble, establishing him as the ruler of that region and allowing his title and fief to be legitimately inherited by his descendants. This created large numbers of local autonomous dynastic domains . The rulers of these vassal states , known as zhūhóu ( 諸侯 ; 'many lords'), had

1218-477: The middle and latter phases of the Chinese fengjian society, the landlord system was instead to be found. In Europe, the feudal lordships were hereditary and irrevocable and were passed on from generation to generation, whereas the Zhou lordships were not always hereditary, required reappointment by the king, and could be revoked. The medieval serf was bound to the land and could not leave or dispose of it, whereas

1260-429: The ninth century BC (late Western Zhou dynasty ) to around the end of the Warring States period . Its name comes from Chinese character 井 ( jǐng ), which means 'well' and looks like the # symbol ; this character represents the theoretical appearance of land division: a square area of land was divided into nine identically sized sections; the eight outer sections (私田; sītián ) were privately cultivated by peasants and

1302-573: The nobility along with a number of civilians were captured by the Jin Army and taken to the area of what is now Fenyang , Shanxi Province where they became a prominent family with the name Guo . The remainder of the group either settled down in the locality or fled elsewhere. At the same time, people in Western Guo, with the help of the Qiang people , were attempting to build a new state amongst

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1344-437: The orders of the Zhou court and fight with each other for land, wealth and influence, which eventually disintegrated the authority of the Eastern Zhou into the chaos and violence of the Warring States period , where the great lords ended up proclaiming themselves as kings. During the pre-Qin period , fengjian represented the Zhou dynasty's political system, and various thinkers, such as Confucius , looked to this system as

1386-523: The political center or the top of the empire's political hierarchy. Tradition narrates that the Burning of books and burying of scholars was a result of Confucian scholars promoting the revival of the fengjian system. From the Qin dynasty onward, Chinese literati would find a tension between the Confucian ideal of fengjian and the reality of the centralized imperial system. After the establishment of

1428-485: The regent Ji Dan , even from three of his brothers . A burial mound in Zhouling town, Xianyang, Shaanxi was once thought to be King Wu's tomb. It was fitted with a headstone bearing Wu's name in the Qing dynasty. Modern archeology has since concluded that the tomb is not old enough to be from the Zhou dynasty, and is more likely to be that of a Han dynasty royal. The true location of King Wu's tomb remains unknown, but

1470-454: The royal demesne. Thus no independent political power existed to encourage the growth of the merchant class in an independent manner, although exceptions existed and some private individuals could become very wealthy. Chinese towns and villages were part of a fully integrated political system and the merchants remained under the political control of the aristocracy instead of setting up an independent trading or mercantile economy. Regardless of

1512-452: The ruins of the old one, known historically as Xiao Guo (小虢). This was the last in a total of five states called Guo. In 687 BCE, during the Spring and Autumn period , the State of Qin wiped out Xiao Guo. King Wu of Zhou King Wu of Zhou ( Chinese : 周 武 王 ; pinyin : Zhōu Wǔ Wáng ; died c.  1043 BCE ), personal name Ji Fa , was the founding king of

1554-424: The similarities of an overwhelmingly agrarian society being dominated by the feudal lords in both societies, the application of the term 'feudal' to the society of the Western Zhou has been a subject of considerable debate due to the differences between the two systems. The Zhou fengjian system was termed as being 'protobureaucratic' and bureaucracy existed alongside feudalism, while in Europe, bureaucracy emerged as

1596-488: The system. Marxist historians in China have described medieval Chinese society as largely feudal. The fengjian system is particularly important to Marxist historiographical interpretation of Chinese history in China, from a slave society to a feudal society . The first to propose the use of this term for Chinese society was the Marxist historian and one of the leading writers of 20th-century China, Guo Moruo in

1638-488: The unification of China under the first emperor Qin Shi Huang , China officially progressed into feudal (or fengjian) society. With Guo's work however, fengjian no longer referred to the classical system of 'demarcation and establishment' but was equated with the western historical stage of feudalism. Certain historians have identified the "near-pseudohistorical" nature of Guo's assessment and argue that Guo's use of fengjian

1680-410: Was an intentional misusage in order to remove decentralist and separatist ideologies. Under the Zhou fengjian society, the delegation of authority was based on kinship and there was a single direction of obligation, whereas in the European model, the lord and vassal had clearly specified mutual obligations and duties. Medieval European feudalism realized the classic case of the 'noble lord' while, in

1722-596: Was destroyed by the Duke Xian of Jin . (Jin first asked permission of the state of Yu to pass through its territory. After conquering Guo it conquered Yu. This was one of the Thirty-Six Stratagems ). The Guo leader Guo Gong Chou fled to the Zhou capital Luoyang along with some of the Guo nobility. Some time later they arrived in the State of Wen at the home of Guo Gong Chou's father in law. Afterwards some of

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1764-434: Was solely political and was not responsible for governing the economy. Furthermore, according to China: A New History by John K. Fairbank and Merle Goldman , dissimilarities existed between the merchant class of the two systems as well. In feudal Europe, the merchant class saw a marked development in towns located away from the influence of the manors and their attached villages. The European towns could grow outside of

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