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The Tang Dynasty

Imperial examinations

Following the Sui Dynasty's example, the Tang abandoned the nine-rank system in favor
of a large civil service system. Students of Confucian studies were potential candidates
for the imperial examinations, the graduates of which could be appointed as state
bureaucrats in the local, provincial, and central government. There were two types of
exams that were given, mingjing ('illuminating the classics examination') and jinshi
('presented scholar examination'). The mingjing was based upon the Confucian classics,
and tested the student's knowledge of a broad variety of texts. The jinshi tested a student's
literary abilities in writing essay-style responses to questions on matters of governance
and politics, as well as their skills in composing poetry. Candidates were also judged on
their skills of deportment, appearance, speech, and level of skill in calligraphy, all of
which were subjective criteria that allowed the already wealthy members of society to be
chosen over ones of more modest means who were unable to be educated in rhetoric or
fanciful writing skills. Indeed there were a disproportionate number of civil officials
coming from aristocratic as opposed to non-aristocratic families. The exams were open to
all male subjects whose fathers were not of the artisan or merchant classes, although
having wealth or noble status was not a prerequisite in receiving a recommendation. In
order to promote widespread Confucian education, the Tang government established
state-run schools and issued standard versions of the Five Classics with selected
commentaries.

This competitive procedure was designed to draw the best talent into government. But
perhaps an even greater consideration for the Tang rulers, aware that imperial
dependence on powerful aristocratic families and warlords would have destabilizing
consequences, was to create a body of career officials having no autonomous territorial or
functional power base. The Tang law code ensured equal division of inherited property
amongst legitimate heirs, allowing a bit of social mobility and preventing the families of
powerful court officials in becoming landed nobility through primogeniture. As it turned
out, these scholar-officials acquired status in their local communities and in family ties,
while they also shared values that connected them to the imperial court. From Tang times
until the end of the Qing Dynasty in 1912, scholar-officials functioned often as
intermediaries between the grassroots level and the government. Yet the potential of a
widespread examination system was not fully realized until the Song Dynasty, where the
merit-driven scholar official largely shed his aristocratic habits and defined his social
status through the examination system. As historian Patricia Ebrey states of the Song
period scholar-officials:

The examination system, used only on a small scale in Sui and Tang times, played a
central role in the fashioning of these new elite. The early Song emperors, concerned
above all to avoid domination of the government by military men, greatly expanded the
civil service examination system and the government school system.
Nevertheless, the Sui and Tang dynasties institutionalized and set the foundations for the
civil service system and this new elite class of exam-drafted scholar-officials.

Buddhism Under Tang

Buddhism, originating in India around the time of Confucius, continued to flourish during
the Tang period and was adopted by the imperial family, becoming thoroughly sanitized
and a permanent part of Chinese traditional culture. In an age before Neo-Confucianism
and figures such as Zhu Xi (1130–1200), Buddhism had begun to flourish in China
during the Southern and Northern Dynasties, and became the dominant ideology during
the prosperous Tang. Buddhist monasteries played an integral role in Chinese society,
offering lodging for travelers in remote areas, schools for children throughout the
country, and a place for urban literati to stage social events and gatherings such as going-
away parties. Buddhist monasteries were also engaged in the economy, since their land
property and serfs gave them enough revenues to set up mills, oil presses, and other
enterprises. Although the monasteries retained 'serfs', these monastery dependents could
actually own property and employ others to help them in their work, including their own
slaves.

The prominent status of Buddhism in Chinese culture began to decline as the dynasty and
central government declined as well during the late 8th century to 9th century. Buddhist
convents and temples that were exempt from state taxes beforehand were targeted by the
state for taxation. In 845 Emperor Wuzong of Tang finally shut down 4,600 Buddhist
monasteries along with 40,000 temples and shrines, forcing 260,000 Buddhist monks and
nuns to return to secular life; this episode would later be dubbed one of the Four Buddhist
Persecutions in China. Although the ban would be lifted just a few years after, Buddhism
never regained its once dominant status in Chinese culture. This situation also came about
through new revival of interest in native Chinese philosophies, such as Confucianism and
Daoism. Han Yu (786–824)—who Arthur F. Wright stated was a "brilliant polemicist and
ardent xenophobe"—was one of the first men of the Tang to denounce Buddhism.
Although his contemporaries found him crude and obnoxious, he would foreshadow the
later persecution of Buddhism in the Tang, as well as the revival of Confucian theory
with the rise of Neo-Confucianism of the Song Dynasty. Nonetheless, Chán Buddhism
gained popularity amongst the educated elite

Tang Women

Women's social rights and social status during the Tang era were incredibly liberal-
minded for the medieval period. However, this was largely reserved for urbane women of
elite status, as men and women in the rural countryside labored hard in their different set
of tasks; with wives and daughters responsible for more domestic tasks of weaving
textiles and rearing of silk worms, while men tended to farming in the fields. There were
many women in the Tang era who gained access to religious authority by taking vows as
Daoist priestesses. The head mistresses of the bordellos in the North Hamlet (also known
as the Gay Quarters) of the capital Chang'an acquired large amounts of wealth and power.
Their high-class courtesans, who very much resembled Japanese geishas, were well
respected. These courtesans were known as great singers and poets, supervised banquets
and feasts, knew the rules to all the drinking games, and were trained to have the utmost
respectable table manners.

Although they were renowned for their polite behavior, the courtesans were known to
dominate the conversation amongst elite men, and were not afraid to openly castigate or
criticize prominent male guests who talked too much or too loudly, boasted too much of
their accomplishments, or had in some way ruined dinner for everyone by rude behavior
(on one occasion a courtesan even beat up a drunken man who had insulted her). When
singing to entertain guests, courtesans not only composed the lyrics to their own songs,
but they popularized a new form of lyrical verse by singing lines written by various
renowned and famous men in Chinese history.

It was fashionable for women to be full-figured (or plump). Men enjoyed the presence of
assertive, active women. The foreign horse-riding sport of polo from Persia became a
wildly popular trend amongst the Chinese elite, and women often played the sport (as
glazed earthenware figurines from the time period portray). The preferred hairstyle for
women was to bunch their hair up like "an elaborate edifice above the forehead," while
affluent ladies wore extravagant head ornaments, combs, pearl necklaces, face powders,
and perfumes. A law was passed in 671 which attempted to force women to wear hats
with veils again in order to promote decency, but these laws were ignored as some
women started wearing caps and even no hats at all, as well as men's riding clothes and
boots, and tight-sleeved bodices.
The Song Dynasty

Imperial examinations

During this period greater emphasis was laid upon the civil service system of recruiting
officials; this was based upon degrees acquired through competitive examinations, in an
effort to select the most capable individuals for governance. Selecting men for office
through proven merit was an ancient idea in China. The civil service system became
institutionalized on a small scale during the Sui and Tang dynasties, but by the Song
period it became virtually the only means for drafting officials into the government. The
advent of widespread printing helped to widely circulate Confucian teachings and to
educate more and more eligible candidates for the exams. This can be seen in the number
of exam takers for the low-level prefectural exams rising from 30,000 annual candidates
in the early 11th century to 400,000 candidates by the late 13th century. The civil service
and examination system allowed for greater meritocracy, social mobility, and equality in
competition for those wishing to attain an official seat in government. By using Song
state-gathered statistics, Edward A. Kracke, Sudō Yoshiyuki, and Ho Ping-ti supported
the hypothesis that simply because one had a father, grandfather, or great-grandfather
who had served as an official of state, it did not guarantee that one would obtain the same
level of authority. Robert Hartwell and Robert P. Hymes criticized this model, stating that
it places too much emphasis on the role of the nuclear family and demonstrates only three
paternal ascendants of exam candidates while ignoring the demographic reality of Song
China, the significant proportion of males in each generation that had no surviving sons,
and the role of the extended family. Many felt disenfranchised by what they saw as a
bureaucratic system that favored the land-holding class able to afford the best education.
One of the greatest literary critics of this was the official and famous poet Su Shi. Yet Su
was a product of his times, as the identity, habits, and attitudes of the scholar-official had
become less aristocratic and more bureaucratic with the transition of the periods from
Tang to Song. At the beginning of the dynasty, government posts were disproportionately
held by two elite social groups: a founding elite who had ties with the founding emperor
and a semi-hereditary professional elite who used long-held clan status, family
connections and marriage alliances to secure appointments. By the late 11th century, the
founding elite became obsolete while political partisanship and factionalism at court
undermined the marriage strategies of the professional elite, which dissolved as a
distinguishable social group and was replaced by a multitude of gentry families.

Due to China's enormous population growth and the body of its appointed scholar-
officials being accepted in limited size (about 20,000 active officials during the Song
period), the larger scholarly gentry class would now take over grassroots affairs on the
vast local level. Excluding the scholar-officials in office, this elite social class consisted
of exam candidates, examination degree-holders not yet assigned to an official post, local
tutors, and retired officials. These learned men, degree-holders, and local elites
supervised local affairs and sponsored necessary facilities of local communities; any local
magistrate appointed to his office by the government relied upon the cooperation of the
few or many local gentry elites in the area. For example, the Song government—
excluding the educational-reformist government under Emperor Huizong—spared little
amount of state revenue to maintain prefectural and county schools; instead, the bulk of
the funds for schools was drawn from private financing. This limited role of government
officials was a departure from the earlier Tang Dynasty (618–907), when the government
strictly regulated commercial markets and local affairs; now the government withdrew
heavily from regulating commerce and relied upon a mass of local gentry to perform
necessary duties in local communities.

The gentry distinguished themselves in society through their intellectual and antiquarian
pursuits, while the homes of prominent landholders attracted a variety of courtiers
including artisans, artists, educational tutors, and entertainers. Despite the disdain for
trade, commerce, and the merchant class exhibited by the highly cultured and elite exam-
drafted scholar-officials, commercialism played a prominent role in Song culture and
society. A scholar-official would be frowned upon by his peers if he pursued means of
profiteering outside of his official salary; however, this did not stop many scholar-
officials from managing business relations through the use of intermediary agents.

Buddhism Under Song

Song intellectuals sought answers to all philosophical and political questions in the
Confucian Classics. This renewed interest in the Confucian ideals and society of ancient
times coincided with the decline of Buddhism, which was then largely regarded as
foreign, and as offering few solutions for practical problems. However, Buddhism in this
period continued as a cultural underlay to the more accepted Confucianism and even
Daoism, both seen as native and pure by conservative Neo-Confucians.

The conservative Confucian movement could be seen before the likes of Zhu Xi (1130–
1200), with staunch anti-Buddhists such as Ouyang Xiu (1007–1072). In his written work
of the Ben-lun, he wrote of his theory for how Buddhism had so easily penetrated
Chinese culture during the earlier Southern and Northern Dynasties period. He argued
that Buddhism became widely accepted when China's traditional institutions were
weakened at the time. This was due to many factors, such as foreign Xianbei ruling over
the north, and China's political schism that caused warfare and other ills. Although
Emperor Wen of Sui (r. 581–604) abolished the Nine Ranks in favor of a Confucian-
taught bureaucracy drafted through civil service examinations, he also heavily sponsored
the popular ideology of Buddhism to legitimate his rule. Hence, it was given free rein and
influence to flourish and dominate Chinese culture during the Sui and Tang periods;
historian Arthur Wright describes Confucianism in this period as being reverted to a state
of "stale archaism".

Although Confucianism was cast in stark contrast to the perceived alien and morally-
inept Buddhism by those such as Ouyang Xiu, Confucianism nonetheless borrowed ideals
of Buddhism to provide for its own revival. From Mahayana Buddhism, the Bodhisattva
ideal of ethical universalism with benevolent charity and relief to those in need inspired
those such as Fan Zhongyan and Wang Anshi, along with the Song government.[80] In
contrast to the earlier heavily Buddhist Tang period, where wealthy and pious Buddhist
families and Buddhist temples handled much of the charity and alms to the poor, the
Song Dynasty government took on this ideal role instead, through its various programs of
welfare and charity (refer to Society section).[81] In addition, the historian Arthur F.
Wright notes this situation during the Song period, with philosophical nativism taking
from Buddhism its earlier benevolent role:

It is true that Buddhist monks were given official appointments as managers of many of
these enterprises, but the initiative came from Neo-Confucian officials. In a sense the
Buddhist idea of compassion and many of the measures developed for its practical
expression had been appropriated by the Chinese state.

Although Buddhism lost its prominence in the elite circles and government sponsorships
of Chinese society, this did not mean the disappeance of Buddhism from Chinese culture.
Zen Buddhism continued to flourish during the Song period, as Emperor Lizong of Song
had the monk Wuzhun Shifan share the Chán (Zen) doctrine with the imperial court.
Much like the Eastern Roman Emperor Julian the Apostate promoting Roman paganism
and Theurgy amongst the leading members of Roman society while pushing
Christianity's influence into the lower classes, so too did Neo-Confucians of the 13th
century succeed in driving Buddhism out of the higher echelons of Chinese society.

Song Women

Women of the Song period are typically seen as well educated and interested in
expressing themselves through poetry, yet more reserved, respectful, "slender, petite and
dainty," according to Gernet. Evidence of foot binding as a new trend in the Southern
Song period certainly reinforces this notion. However, the greater number of documents
due to more widespread printing reveals a much more complex and rich reality about
family life and Song women. Through written stories, legal cases, and other documents,
many different sources show that Song women held considerable clout in family
decision-making, and some were quite economically savvy. Men dominated the public
sphere, while affluent wives spent most of their time indoors enjoying leisure activities
and managing the household. However, women of the lower and middle classes were not
solely bound to the domestic sphere. It was common for women to manage town inns,
some to manage restaurants, farmers' daughters to weave mats and sell them on their own
behalf, midwives to deliver babies, Buddhist nuns to study religious texts and sutras,
female nurses to assist physicians, and women to keep a close eye on their own financial
affairs. In the case of the latter, legal case documents describe childless widows who
accused their nephews of stealing their property. There are also numerous mentions of
women drawing upon their dowries to help their husband's sisters marry into other
prominent families.

The economic prosperity of the Song period prompted many families to provide their
daughters with larger dowries in order to attract the wealthiest sons-in-law to provide a
stable life of economic security for their daughters. With large amounts of property
allotted to a daughter's dowry, her family naturally sought benefits; as a result women's
legal claims to property were greatly improved. Daughters and sons had equal
opportunity to inherit property. Under the Song law code, if an heirless man left no clear
successor to his property and household, it was his widowed wife's right to designate her
own heir in a process called liji ("adopting an heir"). If an heir was appointed by the
parents' relatives after their deaths, the "appointed" heir did not have the same rights as a
biological son to inherit the estate; instead he shared juehu ("extinct household") property
with the parents' daughter(s), if there were any.

Divorcing a spouse was permissible if there was mutual consent between husband and
wife, while remarriage after the death of a spouse was common during the Song period.
However, widows under post-Song dynasties did not often remarry, following the ethic of
the Confucian philosopher Cheng Yi (1033–1107), who stated that it was better for a
widow to die than lose her virtue by remarrying.[ Widows remarrying another after the
death of a first spouse did not become common again until the late Qing Dynasty (1644–
1912), yet such an action was still regarded as morally inferior.

Despite advances in relative social freedoms and legal rights, women were still expected
to attend to the duties of the home. Along with child-rearing, women were responsible for
spinning yarn, weaving cloth, sewing clothing, and cooking meals. Women who
belonged to families that sold silk were especially busy, since their duties included
coddling the silkworms, feeding them chopped mulberry tree leaves, and keeping them
warm to ensure that they would eventually spin their cocoons. [In the family pecking
order, the dominant female of the household was the mother-in-law, who was free to
hand out orders and privileges to the wives of her sons. Mothers often had strong ties
with their grown and married sons, since these men often stayed at home. If a mother-in-
law could not find sufficient domestic help from the daughters-in-law, there was a market
for women to be bought as maids or servants. There were also many professional
courtesans (and concubines brought into the house) who kept men busy in the pursuits of
entertainment, relations, and romantic affairs. It was also common for wives to be jealous
and conniving towards concubines that their wealthy husbands brought home.

Misc Notes

One of the fundamental changes in Chinese society from the Tang Dynasty to the Song
Dynasty was the transformation of the scholarly elite, which included the scholar-
officials and all those who held examination degrees or were candidates of the civil
service examinations. The Song scholar-officials and examination candidates were better
educated, less aristocratic in their habits, and more numerous than in the Tang period.

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