Conceiving the Empire: China and Rome Compared

CONCEIVING THE EMPIRE C H I NA A N D RO M E C O M PA R E D Edited by Fritz-Heiner Mutschler and Achim Mittag

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Conceiving the Empire China and Rome Compared Edited by FRITZ-HEINER MUTSCHLER AC H IM M I T TAG

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Great Clarendon Street, Oxford ox2 6dp Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With oYces in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York # Oxford University Press 2008 The moral rights of the authors have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2008 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose the same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Data available Typeset by SPI Publisher Services, Pondicherry, India Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham, Wiltshire ISBN 978–0–19–921464–8 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

Contents List of Abbreviations—Note on Romanization and Citation List of Illustrations and Tables Notes on Contributors Preface

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PART I. THE BIRTH OF THE IMPERIAL ORDER A. The Idea of ‘Empire’: Its Genesis before and its Unfolding after the Emergence of the Empire City and Empire Albrecht Dihle (Cologne) Interlude: Kingship and Empire Zhu Weizheng (Shanghai) The Rhetoric of ‘Empire’ in the Classical Era in China Michael Nylan (Berkeley)

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B. Historiography and the Emerging Empire Imagining the Empire? Concepts of ‘Primeval Unity’ in Pre-imperial Historiographic Tradition Yuri Pines (Jerusalem) The Emergence of Empire: Rome and the Surrounding World in Historical Narratives from the Late Third Century bc to the Early First Century ad Huang Yang (Shanghai) and Fritz-Heiner Mutschler (Dresden)

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PART II. THE FIRMLY ESTABLISHED EMPIRE A. Imperial Grandeur and Historiography a` la Grande The Problem of ‘Imperial Historiography’ in Rome Fritz-Heiner Mutschler (Dresden) Forging Legacy: The Pact between Empire and Historiography in Ancient China Achim Mittag (Tu¨bingen)

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B. The Spatial Dimension of the UniWed World: Imperial Geography and Cartographical Representations Diagram (tu) and Text (wen): Mapping the Chinese World Helwig Schmidt-Glintzer (Wolfenbu¨ttel) Text and Image: Mapping the Roman World Katherine Clarke (Oxford)

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C. Self-Image and the Formation of Imperial Rhetorics Announcements from the Mountains: The Stele Inscriptions of the Qin First Emperor Martin Kern (Princeton) The Res Gestae Divi Augusti and the Roman Empire Christian Witschel (Heidelberg)

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D. The Power of Images: Imperial Order and Imperial Aura as Represented in Art and Architecture Image and Empire: The Shaping of Augustan Rome Rolf Michael Schneider (Munich) Imperial Aura and the Image of the Other in Han Art Miche`le Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens (Paris)

269 299

PART III. THE WANING OF THE IMPERIAL ORDER A. History Writing in the Face of Crisis The Impact of the Empire’s Crises on Historiography and Historical Thinking in Late Antiquity Hans Armin Ga¨rtner (Heidelberg) and Ye Min (Tianjin) Empire on the Brink: Chinese Historiography in the Post-Han-Period Achim Mittag (Tu¨bingen) and Ye Min (Tianjin)

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B. When the Imperial Order Disintegrates: Rethinking the ‘Empire’ under Religious Auspices New Tendencies, Religious and Philosophical, in the Roman Empire of the Third to Early Fifth Centuries Gerard O’Daly (London) New Tendencies, Religious and Philosophical, in the Chinese World of the Third through Sixth Centuries Thomas Jansen (Cambridge)

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Contents

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Epilogue

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Chronological Table Maps of Ancient China and Rome Glossary of Chinese Characters Index of Names Index of Subjects

449 452 455 465 471

List of Abbreviations—Note on Romanization and Citation 1.

On the Roman side:

OCD

The Oxford Classical Dictionary, ed. Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth. 3rd rev. edn. New York (Oxford University Press) 2003.

RE

Paulys Real-Encyclopa¨die der classischen Altertumswissenschaft, ed. Georg Wissowa, Wilhelm Kroll et al. Berlin/Stuttgart (Druckenmu¨ller) 1893– 1978.

2.

On the Chinese side:

Pinyin is used for transcriptions throughout the text. Exceptions are made in regard to established forms of romanization such as Taipei, Yangtze River, etc. Note that Chinese names are given in the Chinese form, i.e. starting with the surname. The Thirteen Classics with their commentaries and subcommentaries are cited according to the 1816 standard edition prepared by Ruan Yuan 阮元 (1764–1849), Shisanjing zhushu (fu jiaokanji) 十三經注疏 (附校勘記), repr. in 2 vols. Beijing (Zhonghua shuju) 1980. The works cited without having an entry in the References are the following: Zhou Yi 周易 (Yijing 易經), Shangshu 尚書, Mao Shi 毛詩 (Shijing 詩 經), Zhouli 周禮, Li ji 禮記, Chunqiu 春秋, Zuo zhuan 左傳, Gongyang zhuan 公羊傳. The Twenty-Five Dynastic Histories (Ershiwushi 二十五史) are cited according to the standard editions of the Zhonghua Publishing House (中華書局). The works cited without having an entry in the References are the following: Shi ji 史記, Han shu 漢書, Hou-Han shu 後漢書, Sanguo zhi 三國志, Jin shu 晉書, Song shu 宋書, Liang shu 梁書, Nan shi 南史, Wei shu 魏書. The early philosophical writings are cited—if not otherwise indicated—according to the Zhuzi jicheng 諸子集成, repr. 12 vols., Shijiazhuang (Hebei renmin chubanshe) 1992. The works cited without having an entry in the References are the following: Lunyu 論語, Mengzi 孟子, Xunzi 荀子, Laozi 老子, Zhuangzi 莊子, Mozi 墨子, Guanzi 管子, Shangjun shu 商君書, Han Feizi 韓非子, Lu¨shi chunqiu 呂氏春秋, Xin yu 新語, Huainanzi 淮南子. Note that all Chinese emperors’ names are posthumously given names. For this reason, the often occurring second character di 帝, commonly translated as ‘emperor’, is retained when referring to ‘Emperor Wudi’, ‘Emperor Wendi’, etc.

List of Illustrations and Tables Fig. 1. TLV Bronze Mirror (Han)

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Fig. 2. Topographical Map from central China, third century bc

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Fig. 3. ‘Topographical Map’ (‘Dixing tu’), excavated from Mawangdui Tomb No. 3 (c.168 bc)

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Fig. 4. ‘Garrison Map’ (‘Zhujun tu’), excavated from Mawangdui Tomb No. 3 (c.168 bc)

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Fig. 5. ‘Map of China and the Barbarian Peoples’ (‘Hua yi tu’), engraved on stone (ad 1136)

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Fig. 6. Map showing ‘China and the barbarian peoples from all ages’ from the historical atlas Maps Presenting at a Glance the Geography throughout the Ages (Lidai dili zhizhang tu), printed c. ad 1135

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Fig. 7. Portions of segmenta 4 and 5 of Tabula Peutingeriana

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Fig. 8. The surviving fragment of the Langye inscription

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Fig. 9. Map showing the destinations of the First Emperor’s journeys, sacriWces, and inscribed stelae

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Fig. 10. Reconstruction of the mausoleum Augusti in Rome

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Fig. 11. The cella of the temple of Roma and Augustus in Ancyra

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Fig. 12. Reconstruction of the statue-base in Apollonia

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Fig. 13. Rome, model of the Augustan city (detail)

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Fig. 14. Rome, Forum Romanum. Second century bc

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Fig. 15. Rome, Forum Romanum. Early Wrst century ad

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Fig. 16. Rome, Circus Maximus. Imperial times

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Fig. 17. Rome, Forum Augustum with temple of Mars Ultor. 2 bc

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Fig. 18. Rome, Campus Martius: Mausoleum Augusti, Solarium Augusti, obelisk, and Ara Pacis Augustae. After 9 bc

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Fig. 19. Wigs of Wve German party leaders. General election of 2002

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Fig. 20. The main portrait types of Augustus, each with a drawing of the front-lock pattern (a) Left: Wrst type. From about 40 bc (b) Middle: main type. From about 30 bc (c) Right: third type. Possibly from about 30 bc Fig. 21. Cuirass statue of Augustus, from the Augustan villa at Prima Porta. Detail of the Roman and the Parthian. About 17 bc

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Illustrations and Tables

Fig. 22. Oriental cup-bearer with wine ladle as table-leg, from Pompeii (Casa del Camillo). Before ad 79

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Fig. 23. Statue of Ganymede made of marmor Phrygium, from the stately villa at Sperlonga. About 10 bc–ad 10

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Fig. 24. Torso of a standing oriental made of marmor Phrygium, from the Basilica Aemilia in Rome. After 14 bc

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Fig. 25. Reconstruction of the oriental torso

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Fig. 26. Statue of a kneeling oriental made of marmor Phrygium, from Rome. After 20 bc

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Fig. 27. The Delphic tripod. After 479 bc

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Fig. 28. Three kneeling orientals carrying a tripod, originally set up in Rome and Athens. After 20 bc

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Fig. 29. Portrait of the defunct, the wife of the Noble of Da, detail of the silk banner from Tomb No. 1 at Mawangdui, Changsha (Hunan), soon after 168 bc

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Fig. 30. Jade bi disc from the tomb of Prince Liu Sheng at Mancheng (Hebei), 2 cent. bc

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Fig. 31. Drawing of the paintings in the antechamber of Tomb 1 at Wangdu (Hebei); second half of the 2nd cent. ad

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Fig. 32. Map of Chang’an in the Former Han dynasty

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Fig. 33. Bronze lamp supported by a Xiongnu, from the tomb of Prince Liu Sheng at Mancheng (Hebei)

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Fig. 34. Head of a Hu barbarian; glazed earthenware; height 19.7 cm; Later Han

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Fig. 35. Battle between Chinese and Xiongnu; engraved stone slab No. 2 from a que gate-pillar dated ad 178

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Table 1. Overview I: Periodization of the Wei-Jin-Nanbeichao Era (220–589)

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Table 2. Overview II: Selected texts and their authors

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Chronological Table

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Maps of Ancient China and Rome

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Notes on Contributors Katherine Clarke, Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of Oxford, and Fellow and Tutor at St Hilda’s College, Oxford. Albrecht Dihle, Professor Emeritus of Classics at the University of Heidelberg, now residing in Cologne. Hans Armin Ga¨rtner, Professor Emeritus of Classics at the University of Heidelberg. Huang Yang, Professor of Ancient History at Fudan University, Shanghai; presently a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at Harvard University. Thomas Jansen, Lecturer in Chinese Studies, Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Cambridge. Martin Kern, Professor of Chinese Literature at Princeton University. Achim Mittag, Professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Tu¨bingen. Fritz-Heiner Mutschler, Professor of Classics at the University of Dresden. Michael Nylan, Professor of History at the University of California at Berkeley. Gerard O’Daly, Professor Emeritus of Latin at University College, London. Yuri Pines, Michael William Lipson Professor of Chinese Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Miche`le Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, recently retired from her position as Directeur d’E´tudes (Arche´ologie de la Chine) at the E´cole Pratique des Hautes E´tudes, Paris. Helwig Schmidt-Glintzer, Director of the Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbu¨ttel, and concurrently Professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Go¨ttingen. Rolf Michael Schneider, Professor of Classical Archeology at the University of Munich.

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Christian Witschel, Professor of Ancient History at the University of Heidelberg. Ye Min, Associate Professor of Ancient World History at Nankai University, Tianjin. Zhu Weizheng, Senior Professor and Director of the Research Section of the History of Chinese Thought and Culture at Fudan University, Shanghai.

Preface This collection of essays grew out of a conference held at the Institute of Advanced Study in the Humanities (Kulturwissenschaftliches Institut), Essen, from 20 to 23 April 2005. The conference was the culmination of a Rome/China Research Project, ‘Empire’ and ‘World’: Constructions of the ‘Self’ and the ‘Other’ in the Historical Discourse of Ancient Empires. Rome and Ancient China as Examples, directed by Fritz-Heiner Mutschler in collaboration with Achim Mittag and generously supported by a grant from the VolkswagenStiftung. Project and conference came about at a time when, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States emerged as the only remaining superpower, awe inspiring and seemingly uncontestable. This has changed within remarkably few years. Yet the notion of ‘empire’ has again begun to play an important role in political and public discourse. In most cases, to be sure, reference is made to the United States, be it in a critical or apologetic tone, or be it neutrally in the sense of taking the American imperium as a fact of life.1 However, there are inXuential scholars of political science who criticize the use of ‘empire’ to describe America’s ambitions,2 while others deploy it in an entirely diVerent sense. One example of the latter is as a metaphor for the new decentered and deterritorialized global form of sovereignty that emerged along with the global market and global circuits of production that transcend the modern system of nation-states.3 A characteristic of this politically oriented ‘empire’ discourse is that historical references are mostly limited to Europe and the Modern Age, with ancient Rome being cited occasionally as the model for the United States.4 The new interest in ‘empire’ has, on the other hand, also inspired a wave of more historically oriented ‘empire’ studies set upon investigating, from diVerent perspectives and in diVerent formats, empires from antiquity to the present.5 This new research trend is accompanied by attempts at ‘theorizing 1

Bacevich 2002; Boot 2002; Mann 2003; Speck and Sznaider 2003; Ferguson 2004a. e.g. Zelikow 2003. 3 Hardt and Negri 2000. 4 Bender 2003; Bollmann 2006. 5 Reference should Wrst be made to three special issues of academic journals dedicated to ‘empire’ studies: (1) Daedalus: Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 134: 2 (2005); (2) History and Theory, 44: 1 (2005); (3) Zeithistorische Forschungen/Studies in Contemporary History, Online-Ausgabe, 3: 1 (2006). For a most comprehensive study, see Mu¨nkler 2005. A good deal of historically oriented ‘empire’ studies takes as its point of departure the 2

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empire’.6 Even an ‘imperial turn’ in historical studies has already been announced.7 Since this Weld has only recently been the subject of penetrating review,8 we may limit ourselves here to acknowledging our particular indebtedness to those studies which have taken up, consciously or unconsciously, the comparative approach pioneered by Shmuel Eisenstadt in his The Political Systems of Empires9 and which also consider the empires of the ancient and early medieval worlds.10 But our project has its own contours. Its aim has been to explore the conception of ‘empire’ with regard to the Roman and the Chinese empires, i.e. with regard to antiquity and to two quite diVerent regions of the world. Why ancient Rome and China? First, the Roman and the Chinese empires evolved by and large at the same time, and both were unprecedented as to their territorial and chronological extent. Second, both empires produced a wealth of written sources and other historical artefacts, which provide a solid basis for comparison. Third, although the new empire discourse was, and mostly still is, focused on the United States, there are now numerous experts in international politics who predict the imminent rise of a new empire with the potential to challenge America: China. To be sure, today’s United States is as far removed from Rome as is the People’s Republic of China from the empire of the Qin and Han dynasties (221 bc–ad 220). However, both ancient empires had a great impact on the development of western and East Asian civilizations and political structures. Comparing the Roman and Chinese empires contributes not only to understanding the trajectories along which the two civilizations developed, but also to heightening our awareness of possible analogies between the present and the past, be it with regard to America or China. In this sense, the volume at hand can be said to relate to the current ‘empire’ discourse. However, its aim is not to provide political counsel by twentieth-century and post-1989 ‘empire’ formations and operates with a broadly deWned notion of ‘empire’ or tends to perceive empire as a power structure rivaling the modern nation-state and hence focuses on the early modern and modern periods; e.g. Kennedy 1989; Pagden 1995; Armitage 1998; Bosbach and Hiery 1999; Abernethy 2000; Lieven 2000; Miller and Rieber 2004; Ferguson 2004b; Jaberg and Schlotter 2005; Clarke 2007. The newly established journal Ab imperio (since 2005) pursues the ‘new imperial history’ in Russia and Eurasia (). 6 Pomper 2005. Pomper acted as the editor of the Theme Issue ‘Theorizing Empire’ in History and Theory cited in n. 5 under (2). 7 Burton 2003. 8 Osterhammel 2006. 9 Eisenstadt 1963. 10 Alcock et al. 2001; Mu¨nkler 2005; Herzog 2006. Reference should also be made to the Copenhagen-based international research project ‘TEC—Tributary Empires Compared’ ().

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what has been derided as opening ‘a dusty, venerable chest of ideas’.11 In comparison with other historically oriented empire research, the volume is at the same time more modest and more ambitious. It is more modest in that it limits its scope to Rome and China12 and, mainly, to the history of ideas. It is more ambitious in that, by restricting its scope, it hopes to gain in depth what it loses in breadth. It is not the political, administrative, or economic structures of the Chinese and the Roman empires and their historical development that interest us, attractive as these topics are.13 What we are concerned with are the mental images of ‘empire’ and ‘world’ that emerged with the formation of political macro-entities in the Mediterranean world and in China. How are we to understand these mental images, these bodies of conceptions, representations, and values? When and how did they come into being? In what respects do they diVer, East and West, what do they have in common? How did they aVect the political and social dynamics? And in what way were they in turn inXuenced by changing political and social realities? In the Rome/China Project we addressed these questions by focusing on historiography. Historical works provide valuable insights into the factual historical processes and intellectual debates revolving around the emerging empires. But they do not simply mirror the world: to a certain extent they also help to shape, modify, and transform it. Studying historiography and historical thinking from a comparative perspective, which takes the notion of ‘empire’ as its central point of reference, therefore opens up new vistas. A good example of this concerns Sima Qian (c.145–c.90/85 bc) and his western counterparts. The Chinese historian has more than once been likened to Herodotus. Yet we Wnd it more illuminating to study Sima Qian, together with his ‘successor’ Ban Gu (ad 32–92), in comparison with Livy (59 bc–ad 17), Velleius Paterculus (c.20 bc–after ad 30), and Tacitus (c.55–c.120) than with Herodotus or, as has recently been done, Thucydides. It is the founding and administration of the empire and the creation of the oYce of emperor, to which the Roman and the Chinese historians addressed themselves, that provides for a solid basis of comparison. This general similarity makes it valid to inquire into the diVerences and divergences between the Roman and Chinese historiographical traditions. Thus the Rome/China Project has followed the lead of Sino-Hellenic studies, which have burgeoned over the last decade,14 but has shifted the focus of the emerging Weld of East–West 11

Zelikow 2003. This is also the case with the Stanford Ancient Chinese and Mediterranean Empires Comparative History Project recently initiated by Walter Scheidel (), which, however, focuses on diVerent subjects. 13 These are just the topics on which the Stanford Project (cf. n. 12) is concentrated. 14 Lloyd 1990; 1996; 2004; Lloyd and Sivin 2002; Hall and Ames 1987; 1995; 1998; Shankman and Durrant 2000; 2002. 12

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cross-cultural studies to the essential feature of the ancient Mediterranean and Chinese worlds: the emergence of an ‘empire’ and the enduring inXuence of the ‘imperial’ order. The problems of our routine work as philologists, sinologists, or historians bulk small compared to the diYculties that we encounter in cross-cultural studies. To highlight these diYculties, it suYces to consider the idea of empire itself. In China, the concept of tianxia, ‘All-under-Heaven’, connotes the ordered world in which, ideally, peace and harmony prevail. The corresponding Roman concept is imperium. This term refers in the Wrst instance to the power of the highest magistrate and means ‘command’, ‘rule’, with the implication of its holder’s being able to decide over life and death. It was only subsequently used to describe the rule of the Roman people over others. Accordingly, the empire’s administration, including, to be sure, the enforcement of peace, plays a much more important role in Chinese than in Roman historical texts, which, at least with respect to the period of expansion, stress the wars through which the empire has been gained. A further diVerence lies in the fact that in China the idea of tianxia is very early central to political thinking, at any rate, long before the founding of the Qin/Han empire. The Roman idea of imperium as ‘Reich’, on the other hand, only develops in step with the actual materialization of the phenomenon. At the same time it is striking to see that the idea of empire still Wgures prominently in both Roman and Chinese historiographical works, even when the empire is faced by profound crises (Rome) or has fallen apart (China). The speciWc approach of the project and the Wnal conference has therefore inXuenced the organization of the present volume in several ways. There is Wrst of all the aspect of comparison. In order to relieve individual contributors of the strain of constant comparison between the two cultures, we asked them to concentrate their discussion on either the Roman or the Chinese perspective according to their expertise. It seemed to us that in this way the authors’ competence would be utilized most eVectively. This does not mean, of course, that occasional comparative observations were excised. But the key idea was to bring the comparative aspect into focus by pairing two experts on each topic and thus to inspire a future dialogue between the two Welds. For such an attempt to be successful, the arguments have to be accessible. Authors were therefore urged to write in such a way that their papers, while, of course, in line with the current state of research in their Welds, would at the same time be intelligible to experts from other disciplines and to a general readership. Thus, this volume is, we hope, fully accessible to the non-specialist.15 15 We should like to point out that we explicitly asked our contributors to minimize footnotes and bibliographical references.

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Finally, it seemed necessary not only to combine competence in Classical and Chinese historiography, but also to bring in related Welds such as epigraphy, art and architecture, cartography, and more generally, the history of ideas to give our enterprise a truly interdisciplinary character. The collection broadly comprises eight pairs of papers.16 Two pairs are devoted to the pre-imperial period (Part I), four to the period of the newly established empires, i.e. the early principate in Rome and the Qin-Han epoch in China (Part II), and two to late antiquity (Part III). The order within each pair of papers, i.e. whether ‘Rome’ comes before or after ‘China’, depends on their chronological scope or the sequence of their composition. As mentioned above, at the core of the Rome/China Project lay the attempt to compare Roman and Chinese historiography in its relation to the ‘imperial’ world order. In the volume this topic is treated in the three stages of empire— ‘genesis’, ‘height’, and ‘decline’—in three pairs of related papers (Part I: Yuri Pines 1 Huang Yang/Fritz-Heiner Mutschler; Part II: Fritz-Heiner Mutschler 1 Achim Mittag; Part III: Hans Armin Ga¨rtner/Ye Min 1 Achim Mittag/Ye Min). However, to get a better understanding of the ‘imperial’ world picture, it seemed necessary to elaborate on other facets, at least for the core period of the Augustan principate and the Qin and Han dynasties. This is done in the three additional pairs of papers of Part II. The Wrst treats the spatial extension of the ‘imperial’ world and explores the geographical knowledge and cartographic representations of the empire (Helwig Schmidt-Glintzer 1 Katherine Clarke). The other two deal with Qin Shihuangdi’s and Augustus’ epigraphic mise-en-sce`ne of their achievements (Martin Kern 1 Christian Witschel), and representations of empire and emperor in art and architecture (Rolf Schneider 1 Miche`le Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens). The papers of Parts I to III are framed by two pairs which elaborate on the intellectual contexts within which the emergence and transWguration of the ‘imperial’ world picture in Rome and ancient China occurred (Part I: Albrecht Dihle 1 Zhu Weizheng–Michael Nylan; Part III: Gerard O’Daly 1 Thomas Jansen). In a concluding paper we have set out to summarize the eight pairs of essays from a comparative perspective and to oVer some general conclusions. Here, however, we must emphasize, we do not aim to formulate deWnite conclusions, but rather to stimulate future research. To close we would acknowledge those individuals and institutions who helped to bring this experiment in comparison to fruition. 16 It should be pointed out that the Wrst ‘pair’ actually consists of three papers, one on the Roman side (Dihle) and two on the Chinese side (Zhu and Nylan).

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Our thanks are owed to the VolkswagenStiftung for Wnancial support over more than two years (2003–5), with Antje Gunsenheimer as its always friendly and positive representative. We are deeply grateful to Jo¨rn Ru¨sen, former President of the Kulturwissenschaftliches Institut, who from the very beginning gave the Rome/China Project passionate encouragement and intellectual stimulation. He also saw to the project’s aYliation to the KWI, whose committed and warm-hearted staV provided a most welcoming academic environment. It was a pleasure to work with the members of our research group, with ‘the old masters’ (Hans Armin Ga¨rtner, Wang Dunshu, and Zhu Weizheng) providing experience and wise counsel, and younger colleagues (Huang Yang, Ye Min, and Zhang Ronghua) injecting enthusiasm. We are greatly indebted to all participants at the conference—not just the contributors of this volume but also those who presented papers which unfortunately, for reasons of thematic scope, could not be included here. This is particularly so in the case of the inspiring inaugural lecture given by the former President of the Federal Republic of Germany, Professor Roman Herzog, who generously agreed to share his reXections on the question as to what holds large empires together, and of the papers of Andrea Riemenschnitter (Zurich) and Hans-Georg Lippert (Dresden), who gave us a fascinating introduction to representations of the ancient Chinese and the Roman empires in the recently produced Wlms Hero and Gladiator. Michael Alram (Vienna), Horst Walter Blanke (Bielefeld), Maximilian Braun (Dresden/now Munich), Hans van Ess (Munich), Michael Friedrich (Hamburg), Masayuki Sato (Kofu), Heiner Roetz (Bochum), and Wang Dunshu (Tianjin) both chaired sessions and stimulated the conference’s discussions. We received much support in preparing this volume for publication. Gerard O’Daly established contact with OUP and provided advice, encouragement, and concrete help. For invaluable practical assistance we are grateful to Andre´ Walther (Dresden). Kim Emily Fechner (Tu¨bingen) and John Drinkwater (Nottingham) kindly suggested improvements in the English. Richard Szydlak (Tu¨bingen) drew for us the two maps. OUP’s Hilary O’Shea and her team guided us with great patience and friendliness throughout the publication process. Most of the preparatory work for the project and the Wnalization of this volume was done at the Mutschler home in Dresden. None of this would have been possible without the patience and long-distance assistance of Dan-wei Zhu-Mittag and the care and cheerfulness of Hanna Roszkowska-Mutschler. Dresden and Tu¨bingen F.-H. M. September 2007 A. M.

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References Abernethy, David B., The Dynamics of Global Dominance: European Overseas Empires, 1415–1980. New Haven/London (Yale University Press) 2000. Alcock, Susan E., D’Altroy, Terence N., Morrison, Kathleen D., and Sinopoli, Carla M. (eds.), Empires: Perspectives from Archaeology and History. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2001. Armitage, David (ed.), Theories of Empire, 1450–1800 (An Expanding World: The European Impact on World History, 1450–1800, vol. 20). Aldershot (Ashgate Variorum) 1998. Bacevich, Andrew J., American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of U.S. Diplomacy. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 2002. Bender, Peter, Weltmacht Amerika: Das Neue Rom. Stuttgart (Klett-Cotta) 2003. Bollmann, Ralph, Lob des Imperiums: Der Untergang Roms und die Zukunft des Westens. Berlin (wjs verlag) 2006. Boot, Max, The Savage Wars of Peace: Small Wars and the Rise of American Power. New York (Basic Books) 2002. Bosbach, Franz, and Hiery, Hermann J. (eds.), Imperium/Empire/Reich: Ein Konzept politischer Herrschaft im deutsch-britischen Vergleich. Mu¨nchen (Saur) 1999. Burton, Antoinette M. (ed.), After the Imperial Turn: Thinking with and through the Nation. Durham, NC (Duke University Press) 2003. Clarke, Peter, The Last Thousand Days of the British Empire. London (Allen Lane) 2007. Demandt, Alexander (ed.), Das Ende der Weltreiche: Von den Persern bis zur Sowjetunion. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1997. Eisenstadt, Shmuel, The Political Systems of Empires. New York (Free Press) 1963. Ferguson, Niall, Colossus: The Price of America’s Empire. Harmondsworth (Penguin Books) 2004 [¼ Ferguson 2004a]. —— Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World. Harmondsworth (Penguin Books) 2004 [¼ Ferguson 2004b]. Hall, David L., and Ames, Roger T., Thinking through Confucius. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1987. —— and Ames, Roger T., Anticipating China: Thinking through the Narratives of Chinese and Western Culture. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1995. —— and Ames, Roger T., Thinking from the Han: Self, Truth, and Transcendence in Chinese and the Western Culture. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1998. Hardt, Michael, and Negri, Antonio, Empire. Cambridge, Mass./London (Harvard University Press) 2000. Herzog, Roman, ‘Was ha¨lt große Reiche zusammen?’, in: Kulturwissenschaftliches Institut (ed.), Jahrbuch 2005. Bielefeld (transcript) 2006, 11–22. Jaberg, Sabine, and Schlotter, Peter (eds.), Imperiale Weltordnung: Trend des 21. Jahrhunderts? (AFK-Friedensschriften 32). Baden-Baden (Nomos) 2005.

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Kennedy, Paul M., The Rise and the Fall of the Great Powers: Economic Change and Military ConXict from 1500 to 2000. 1st edn. New York (Random House) 1987; repr. New York (Vintage Books) 1989. Lieven, Dominick, Empire: The Russian Empire and its Rivals. New Haven (Yale Nota Bene) 2000. Lloyd, GeoVrey E. R., Demystifying Mentalities. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1990. —— Adversaries and Authorities: Investigations into Ancient Greek and Chinese Science. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1996. —— Ancient Worlds, Modern ReXections: Philosophical Perspectives on Greek and Chinese Science and Culture. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 2004. —— and Sivin, Nathan, The Way and the Word: Science and Medicine in Early China and Greece. New Haven/London (Yale University Press) 2002. Mann, Michael, The Incoherent Empire. London/New York (Verso) 2003. Miller, Alexei, and Rieber, Alfred J. (eds.), Imperial Rule. Budapest/New York (Central European University Press) 2004. Mu¨nkler, Herfried, Imperien: Die Logik der Weltherrschaft - vom Alten Rom bis zu den Vereinigten Staaten. Berlin (Rowohlt) 2005. Osterhammel, Ju¨rgen, ‘Imperien im 20. Jahhundert: Eine Einfu¨hrung’, Zeithistorische Forschungen/Studies in Contemporary History, Online-Ausgabe, 3: 1 (2006). Pagden, Anthony, Lords of All the World: Ideologies of Empire in Spain, Britain and France, c.1500–1800. New Haven (Yale University Press) 1995. Pomper, Philip, ‘The History and Theory of Empires’, History and Theory, 44: 4 (2005), 1–27. Shankman, Steven, and Durrant, Stephen W., The Siren and the Sage: Knowledge and Wisdom in Ancient Greece and China. London/New York (Cassell) 2000. —— and —— (eds.), Early China/Ancient Greece: Thinking through Comparisons. Albany (State University of New York Press) 2002. Speck, Ulrich, and Sznaider, Natan (eds.), Empire Amerika: Perspektiven einer neuen Weltordnung. Mu¨nchen (Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt) 2003. Zelikow, Philip, ‘The Transformation of National Security’, The National Interest, 71 (2003), 17–28.

Part I The Birth of the Imperial Order

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A. The Idea of ‘Empire’ Its Genesis before and its Unfolding after the Emergence of the Empire

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City and Empire Albrecht Dihle (Cologne)

The Persian Wars of 490 and 480/79 bc, remembered and gloriWed for centuries, had a great impact upon the feelings of national identity among the Greeks. The Persian Empire, founded in the sixth century bc, stretched from Egypt to the Caucasus and from India to Asia Minor. In 480 bc the Persian Great King joined the forces of all his tribes and nations and led a powerful Xeet and a huge army against Greece to conquer this small piece of land. The Greeks were conscious of their common cultural and religious background, but politically split into many independent little communities, called Poleis, with or without an urban settlement, centered at the cult of local divinities, and governed in various ways. Some of them had a territory of no more than 200 to 300 square kilometers, the greatest ones, Athens and Sparta, 2,500 and 8,000 square kilometers respectively, with approximately 120,000 to 180,000 inhabitants, including women, children, and slaves.1 Most of the Greek Poleis were prepared to surrender immediately. The Greek cities in Asia Minor had experienced Persian rule, which was not oppressive. The Persians honored the religious traditions in the conquered countries, in the case of the Jews for instance. Moreover, the large empire oVered many opportunities to people as gifted for trade, handicraft, and seafaring as the Greeks. But Sparta and Athens with very few allies decided to Wght for freedom. The Athenians even evacuated their city and relied solely on their Xeet. Eventually, the invaders were utterly defeated, driven from Greek soil, and even the Greek cities of Asia Minor were freed from Persian domination. Such a surprising triumph requires explanations. Aeschylus, in a tragedy of 472 bc, told the Athenians that the expansion of the Persian Empire would have violated the divinely Wxed boundaries between Greeks and barbarians. The explanations in the Histories of Herodotus and early medical literature of the late Wfth century testify to the Wrst steps of Greek science. Physicians paid 1

Ehrenberg 1957, 21–8.

6

Albrecht Dihle

much attention to environmental inXuence, concluding that the climate and the poverty of Greece greatly stimulated courage and inventiveness among the inhabitants, which caused the recent victory. Herodotus derived his explanation from political experience in the following argument: Soldiers of the Persian army, as all his subjects, have to obey the commands of the Great King. These reXect the intentions or even whims of a single man which are likely to change continuously. The Greeks, on the other hand, obey only their laws, and these prescribe always the same (later, Aristotle was to deWne the law as
~ı ¼
ı Oæø ‘reason without intention’). The stability of the legal order, according to Herodotus, produces collective capacities of the community: The individual Greek warrior is not necessarily superior to his Persian adversary, but the organized Greek phalanx has won the battle. In addition, citizens of a free community Wght for their own sake, whereas the subject of a ruler Wghts for the beneWt of someone else. That is why every community increases their military eYciency, when they have turned from the rule of men to the rule of law.2 In their early history, the Greeks sincerely admired the superior civilization of the great eastern empires, eagerly learning from these neighbors, visiting their countries, and imitating what they had seen of the barbarian world. (The word ‘barbarian’ had no derogatory connotation at that time. It only denoted people of non-Greek language.) So the Greeks willingly admitted that medicine had come to them from Egypt, astronomy from Mesopotamia, and so forth—together with religious ideas and motifs of visual art, as we may add. The Greeks even tried to discover genealogical links between eastern traditions and their own mythology which, after all, brought home to them their social and moral standards. But despite the prestige of the barbarian world the Greeks had always felt superior to all their neighbors in one particular Weld, namely the legal order of their communities. In 612 bc the great Assyrian Empire, much feared and admired, collapsed. Its capital Nineveh was destroyed by Medes and Babylonians. The contemporary Greek poet Phocylides commented on the event as follows: ‘The small but wellordered city, built on poor, rocky ground, is stronger than stupid Nineveh’.3 One hundred years later the philosopher Heraclitus, also from a Greek city in Asia Minor, summoned his compatriots: ‘Citizens ought to Wght for their laws more fervently than for their town-wall’.4 This pride resulted from a development which took place, at various times according to diVerent economic conditions, in most Greek communities 2 Herodotus 5.78, 7.101–4; Hippocrates, De aeribus 12, 16, 23; De natura hominis 1; cf. Euripides, Supplices 312 f., 403 V. 3 4 Phocylides 4 (Diehl). Heraclitus B 44 (Diels/Kranz).

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7

during the seventh and sixth centuries bc. In the earlier days, Greek communities had been ruled by kings or aristocrats as shown, for instance, in Homer’s Odyssey. They came from privileged families that owned most of the land and regarded themselves as descendants of gods. This claim gave them the monopoly both in the necessary intercourse with the local divinities and the administration of justice according to rules which were handed down orally in the family tradition. The predominance of that class became intolerable after economic changes, above all the use of coined money. Money remained short and, in consequence, interest rates excessively high. Indebted peasants often lost their land and sometimes even their freedom. Thus, any reform responding to the new problem had three main issues: Release of debts, redistribution of the arable land, and written laws. The third item turned out to be of great importance in Greek history. This can already be seen from the comparatively small number of inscriptions, both private and public, that have come down to us from the seventh and early sixth centuries. Most of these few contain or refer to new legislation. In addition, these legal texts are elucidated by the poems of the Athenian Solon. He was one of the early lawgivers, and lived around 600 bc. His poems—a way of public discussion in those days—impressively describe the social situation of the predominantly rural population and the intention of the author.5 The written law changed the social and political situation. Now everyone could know the rules according to which a social conXict had to be settled and review the judge’s decisions. The new legal order also paved the way to a new system of government, since the early legislators also regulated the appointment of oYcials and their time in oYce. So they did away with any rule authorized by tradition only. A jury, installed by election or lot, now represented the whole citizenship. Procedures foreseen in the new laws sometimes even drastically restricted the power of the oYcials. They and the judges had to take an oath at the beginning of their service. Thereby the gods, who protected the life and welfare of the community, were constantly involved in all political procedures. They no longer had a special relationship with a leading family. This, in its turn, led to the well-deWned diVerence between public and private cult. Although a tendency toward siding with the poor pervades many of the early laws, the traditional authority and the wealth of big families made their members more eligible for leading positions than ordinary people. Moreover, the full right of citizenship depended on the service in the armed forces which required some means, since the armor of the heavy infantry was expensive. Only from the Wfth century onwards did service in the Athenian Xeet provide 5

Solon 4, 5, 36 (West); Gehrke 1995.

8

Albrecht Dihle

full participation also to lower-class people. But the Wrst step towards political participation of all citizens had, in fact, already been taken.   
 Æ, same rights for everyone, became the term to denote what was later called ‘democracy’. The historian Thucydides, in the late Wfth century, regarded written laws as the most important factor of a democratic constitution.6 We should not forget, however, that non-written laws, conventions, or rules of conduct,
Ø ¼ªæÆçØ in Greek, played a much greater part in Ancient Greece and other early civilizations than in modern societies, both in political and private life. So the value attributed to written law at such an early date is remarkable. Tradition sometimes raised famous legislators of the early days to semidivine status. The citizens who had to vote for a new law in the people’s assembly understood all subsequent legislation as a continuation of the Wrst one. Therefore the legal order, in spite of frequent changes, remained shielded by the authority of the founding fathers. Unlike the Romans, the Greeks tended to attribute nearly every existing condition in social life to the inXuence of laws: Internal strife or peace, military weakness or strength, detached or close relations with the gods, unfair or fair distribution of rights and duties. Thus, the laws of the city were conceived of as the decisive factor of moral education, both collectively and individually. This can lead to a proper understanding of Herodotus’ comparison between the rule of a monarch in the Persian Empire and the rule of law in Greece. We Wnd the same conception at the beginnings of Greek political theory. Plato doubted the statesmanship of some famous Athenian generals and politicians: In his view, their legislation had not morally uplifted the citizens.7 In the political life of a Greek Polis, the same people were assiduously alternating in ruling and being ruled, judging and being judged, and there were long periods of military service in the individual life of every citizen. This was likely to work only in a small community where most people knew each other, which also facilitated the frequent voting. According to Aristotle, in any Polis of the Greek type the size of the citizens’ general assembly should not exceed the number of individuals that are able to perceive the announcement of a single herald.8 The Greek Poleis waged many wars against each other. Nevertheless, the Greeks kept a sense of common identity, continuously renewed through Panhellenic cults and festivals where no barbarians were admitted. Some of the Poleis succeeded, in their striving for supremacy, in reducing smaller ones to a tributary status. The political system I tried to describe may have 6 7 8

Thucydides 3.37. Plato, Gorgias 515b6–517a6; Dodds 1959; cf. ThesleV 1965, p. 99.26 V. Aristotle, Politica 1326b5–7.

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stimulated the foundation of trading posts and new cities abroad in order to secure economic predominance. But large-scale territorial expansion, due to planned wars of conquest and the rule over foreign nations, typical of great empires, was not on the agenda of Classical Greece. Plato recommended that cities should deliberately restrict their needs and aspirations. By being selfsuYcient, they are not compelled to occupy foreign territory.9 Nor were the Greeks encouraged to join their political and military forces under those conditions. The multi-centricity of the Greek world, the mobility of its people, and the participation in cultural activities of a remarkably large proportion of the population, especially in Athens, stimulated cultural innovation. Most of literature and Wne arts belonged, in some way or the other, to the religious and thus to political life, for instance the whole theatre production. For that reason, the Greeks laid the foundations of European culture in the Wfth and fourth centuries. Their productivity in Welds as various as poetry, drama and music, art and architecture, historiography and rhetoric, sciences and philosophy, state administration, banking and book production, military strategy and many technologies during that period is extraordinary. An Athenian, for instance, could attend performances of twenty-seven new dramas every year, Wnanced by wealthy citizens in the same way as the equipment of a battleship.10 So the artistic, scientiWc, and technical achievements of the Greeks came to surpass those of their oriental teachers by far. Greek doctors and architects, sailors and mercenaries were hired by the Persian king. Some barbarian princes inside and outside the Persian Empire modernized their territories along Greek lines and with the aid of Greek experts. Thus, the Persian king and other barbarian or semi-barbarian rulers again entered the political game, better equipped with territory, manpower, and economic resources than any Greek city, and not conWned by the slow procedures of a republican constitution. The Greeks had to realize that intellectual and cultural superiority could not compensate for their lack of political unity, or the bravery of a citizens’ militia match the eYciency of professional soldiers. Persian money and Macedonian armies were able to outdo the Greek Poleis, divided as they were by internal conXicts. Some intellectuals rightly diagnosed this clash between political potential and achievement and proposed radical reforms. These publicists paved the way towards the political philosophy of Plato and Aristotle. Monarchy was an important theme of these discussions, as the modernized barbarian states were monarchies. What should such a ruler be like? Which 9

Plato, Respublica 372e–374a.

10

Rhodes 1999.

10

Albrecht Dihle

qualities could elevate him above his subjects? Xenophon and Antisthenes,11 both pupils of Socrates, wrote Wctitious biographies of Cyrus, the founder of the Persian Empire, to explain their concept of ideal rulership and its moral requirements. The same moral approach can be seen in the writings of Plato’s contemporary Isocrates, addressing the local rulers of Cyprus, who were at that time loosely connected with the Persian Empire.12 These writings initiated the long tradition of the so-called ‘Princes’ Mirrors’. It remained disputed, in this tradition, whether the qualities of the ideal ruler originate from his inborn or even divine charisma, or whether he only requires an excellent education. This problem was still present in Seneca’s ‘Mirror of Princes’ written for the future Roman emperor. None of the theorists of the fourth century bc, including Plato and Aristotle, abandoned the model of the Polis, the comparatively small community. Its political order could be implemented, as they believed, in the way of monarchy, aristocracy, or democracy—as long as free citizens, including their leaders, remained faithful to the law. Neither did they abandon the idea that the law had to be not only a ruler but also an educator. Consequently, tensions inside the community such as the conXict between the poor and the wealthy were thought of as moral, rather than social problems. Laws had to produce the right moral attitude in every individual, which was supposed to lead to adequate political decisions. This belief is one reason why the Greeks never conceived of jurisprudence as a science of its own right, separate from the theory of ethics and politics. Isocrates praised the Cypriot ruler for having turned barbarians into Greeks by sheer education.13 He believed that taking part in Greek civilization turned every barbarian into a Greek, thus identifying the modernized kingdom with a Greek Polis in its quality as an educational institution. According to Plato and Aristotle, human nature cannot attain its perfect condition outside a Polis. Thus, barbarians can never become perfect human beings. Aristotle’s famous deWnition of man as a ‘political animal’ explicitly refers to the Greek Polis, not merely to man’s natural sociability.14 Good laws that rule the Polis, in the context of monarchy, aristocracy, or democracy, create virtuous citizens, and such a citizen is, at the same time, the perfect human being.15 Plato’s Politeia is diYcult to evaluate as a contribution to political theory, despite the great number of pertinent remarks about political life. The author 11

Xenophon, Cyropaedia; Antisthenes fr. 19–21, 29–35 (Decleva-Caizzi). Isocrates, Nicocles passim. 13 Isocrates, Euagoras 66; Panegyricus 50. 14 Aristotle, Politica 1253a3; Ethica Nicomachea 1097b11. 15 Aristotle, Politica 1333a11 V., 1278a8, 1286a9, 1288a32–b6; Ethica Nicomachea 1129b19; cf. Plato, Symposium 186c. 12

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himself calls his utopian community a model of the human soul, a large-scale model, as the soul is so diYcult to perceive. Yet the choice of such a model with its strict analogy of social classes and the components of the human soul betrays Plato’s belief that human nature demands a political community.16 Plato’s great treatise on the Laws, full of empirical and historical material, has close relations with the real conditions of fourth-century Greece and again presupposes the system of the Polis. A kingdom where the king owns the land and the inhabitants depend upon his will is completely disregarded, let alone the empire of the Persian type. They are not worth being considered. Only where the law rules can the ‘good life’ according to the presuppositions of human nature be aimed at. The same holds true for Aristotle, whose writings on politics and ethics, therefore, frequently overlap thematically. This applies, for instance, to the problem of justice or the question, already discussed in Plato’s dialogue On the Statesman, whether the legal system itself or the statesmanship and moral qualities of leading politicians have a greater impact upon the condition of a political community. Aristotle’s detailed treatment of political institutions, social behavior, social strife and solidarity, religion as a political factor, wealth and poverty, and many other items initiated the tradition of European political theory. The two classical philosophers reWned the traditional typology of the three constitutions and introduced a theory of how they develop and deteriorate: Monarchy turns into tyranny, aristocracy into oligarchy, and democracy into ochlocracy, the rule of the mob. This inevitably happens time and again. People change their political system once they no longer tolerate the deterioration of the present one. Thus, a permanent but regular rotation of constitutions is brought about in the course of history.17 All this refers, in Aristotle’s treatise, to the Greek states and perhaps Carthage and the Etruscan cities. In his writings on ethics and politics the philosopher never mentions the great empire which his pupil Alexander conquered at the very same time. This was not, in his view, worth studying as a political phenomenon, although many pieces of information in his biological works came from Alexander’s campaign. After all, Aristotle’s nephew had accompanied the king. This campaign between 334 and 323 bc changed the world. Macedonia was one of the modernized monarchies, barbarian in the Greek view, although the dynasty claimed to be of Greek descent and had been inviting Greek experts and poets to the royal court for a long time. In a series of wars, Alexander’s father Philip forcibly united the Greek cities to a confederacy under his command. This was welcomed by all those Greeks who advocated Greek unity. His son, eventually, waged the great war against the Persian Empire 16

Plato, Respublica 435c V., 441d V.

17

Plato, Respublica 576e.

12

Albrecht Dihle

with the joined forces of Macedonia and Greece. He dismissed the Greek soldiers, when the Persian king had been defeated, but continued the war in order to occupy all the territories of the empire. He wanted to be the legitimate successor of the Great King, according to ‘the law of the spear’. In the course of history many empire-builders have regarded conquest as the basis of legitimate rule. Thus, Alexander founded his empire explicitly in the long tradition of many oriental rulers as a successful conqueror. But, at the same time, he regarded himself as the bringer of Greek civilization. He opened up vast territories to Greek immigration and culture. It was reported that Aristotle advised his pupil to treat the barbarians as subjects, meanwhile Greeks and Macedonians as free citizens to dominate over the barbarians. This advice is nowhere attested in Aristotle’s writings, although he believed in the political inferiority of barbarians. But Isocrates gave that very advice to Alexander’s predecessor Philip. Alexander, however, acted otherwise and tried to win over his new oriental subjects, above all the Persian noblemen, the leading group in the empire whose inheritance he laid claim to.18 Wherever we observe early empires emerging, we notice wars and conquest. But their existence is usually justiWed in religious terms. All the rulers of the Ancient Near East enjoyed a special relationship with the divine, mostly the supreme god of their homeland. Some were divinely elected, others claimed to be of divine descent. Because of this divine or semi-divine status, far above his subjects, the ruler had to provide prosperity, peace, and justice for his people, but also military success and overlordship in adjacent regions. Such divine or divinely authorized rulership stimulated continuous conquest and provoked, eventually, the idea of world domination. This is attested, at a very early date, in some cuneiform texts about the reign of Sargon I, who Wrst united Akkadian and Sumerian territories of Mesopotamia in the third millennium bc.19 The Persian Cambyses conquered Egypt, although he had taken over a suYciently great empire from his father, and the Pharaoh posed no threat to his position.20 The idea of world domination stimulated, in its turn, wars of conquest and, at the same time, underlined the cosmic dimension and legitimation of rulership, very much in contrast to the classical Greek conception of the small but self-suYcient political community. Identifying one’s own kingdom in its boundaries with the well-ordered universe as strictly separate from the pre-cosmic chaos represented by the countries outside, was another way to give the king’s rule a cosmic dimension—and a more peaceful one. By ruling over limited territories, too, the 18

Eratostenes ap. Strabo, 1.4.9; Aristotle, Politica 1275b12, 1280b36; Isocrates, Epistulae 3; Badian and Berchem 1976. 19 20 Pritchard 1969, 266–8. See n. 9.

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ruler thus contributed to the divine, cosmic order. This idea could restrict the drive toward permanent conquest, inherent in the conception of religiously sanctioned world domination. In fact, such an idea had justiWed the rule of the pharaoh in Ancient Egypt for a long time.21 The Persian Great King was not very far from dominating the whole world known to people around the Mediterranean, and Alexander even more so. That is why he eagerly embraced the idea of universal domination, believed in his divine ancestry, and regarded himself as a second Dionysus. He was believed to have experienced a kind of Dionysian revelation during his campaign in India. Like him this god, the son of Zeus, had made his way through the world, though in the opposite direction from India to Greece, and had established his rule everywhere. Whatever may hide behind that story—the great scholar Eratosthenes was skeptical of it—Dionysus remained a dominant divinity in the Hellenistic ideology of kingship. The Alexandrians were said to have noticed that the god left the capital of the Ptolemaic kingdom, together with his corte`ge, immediately before the catastrophe of Actium in 31 bc.22 Alexander’s successors in Egypt, Syria, Iran, and Asia Minor adopted the idea of divine rulership with the inherent, though never realized, claim to world domination. So the cult of the rulers, the living and the deceased, spread over the Greek world which now stretched from India to the western Mediterranean. Some traditional ideas of Greek religion supported this development, as no distinct borderline separated gods from men in Greek mythology. Gods had intercourse with mortal women, thus providing divine ancestors for a number of families, and sometimes they gave their mortal favorites miraculous gifts and talents. The cult of the deceased elevated those who had distinguished themselves in their lifetime to heroes of superhuman status. Moreover, some of the most popular gods, Heracles and Asclepius, were believed to have been raised to divine status because of their accomplishment on earth. Plato’s followers deWned ‘becoming similar to god’ as the goal of moral progress, and Stoic philosophy produced the idea of the perfect sage, a being hardly to be found in the empirical world, but the ultimate goal of moral progress.23 Like Heracles, the sage raises himself to divine status through innumerable toils and hardships. All this could easily be applied to the ruler, and the old question of whether his dignity rested on his divinely given charisma or his own moral performance could be answered in both ways. Isocrates already acclaimed Alexander’s father as a god, since he had 21 22 23

Assmann 1990, 200 V. Arrianus, Anabasis 5.1–3; Plutarch, Antonius 75. Stoicorum veterum fragmenta 3.606–7; Plato, Theaetetus 176b.

14

Albrecht Dihle

united the Greeks, and the Athenians decreed a cult of Demetrios Poliorcetes, when he had liberated them temporarily from Macedonian overlordship.24 Even some Greek philosophers acknowledged divine rulership. At a very early time, reXection on and admiration of the perfect order of nature had led Greek philosophers to the idea of monotheism. The universe could not possibly be ruled by the traditional multitude of gods with their diVerent intentions and predilections. These gods of the popular religion had to be seen as servants and messengers of the one, supreme, cosmic god. The ruler in his kingdom on earth, divinely elected and raised to superhuman dignity, mirrors the cosmic god. He bestows peace and welfare to his subjects, thus imitating his cosmic prototype. Similarly, the king rules with the aid of servants and messengers. This is pointed out, for instance, in a treatise of the Wrst century ad falsely attributed to Aristotle. The conception of the ruler imitating the cosmic god occurs in a considerable number of books on kingship. The early ones, written by Pythagoreans, are diYcult to date, but the idea was widespread in Hellenistic and Roman times and supported by the earlier opinion that statesmanship was the most venerable of all morally relevant activities.25 Thus, the idea of the divine ruler and his claim to world domination became even philosophically justiWed. Yet this ideology, useful as it was for Hellenistic kings and Roman emperors, did not correspond to the tradition of the Polis, so deeply rooted in the Greek mind. As pointed out above, Alexander and his successors regarded themselves as the bringers of Greek civilization to the East. They founded cities in their territories, populated them with veterans of the armies and immigrants from Greece, and gave them the usual institutions of Greek political communities. Only the Ptolemaic kings retained the Pharaonic centralism of Egypt and did not admit municipal autonomy even in Alexandria. But they privileged ‘the people of the gymnasium’ organized in so-called ºØ ÆÆ, Greek corporations in the countryside. All kings carefully preserved the heritage of Greek urban culture, and made Greek science and scholarship Xourish. Cities attracted the natives; therefore many Syrians or Egyptians became Greeks, and even some old oriental cities Greek Poleis.26 The kings depended on the cities, the old as well as the new ones. Initially, only Greeks and Macedonians served in the royal armies, and throughout the Hellenistic period the royal administration recruited leading functionaries from the urban upper class. The cities controlled most economic activities 24

Isocrates, Epistulae 3; Plutarch, Demetrius 10 V.; Nilsson 1961, 135–85. ThesleV 1965, pp. 72.19 V., 80.18 V., 86.4 f.; Ps. Aristotle, De mundo 397b9–398a35; Cicero, De republica 1.12; Bringmann 1993. 26 Habicht 1956; Giovannini 1993; Meyer 1992 with further references. 25

City and Empire

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and substantially contributed to the general prosperity and the royal budget. Under these conditions, Greek became the common language and social success depended, to a large extent, on the familiarity with Greek language, civilization, and urban style of life. Hence, the kings very much cared for the cities and kept founding new ones—as did the Romans during the following period. Yet apart from economic opportunities alongside schools, theatres, libraries, public baths, festivals, etc., the self-government of free citizens was an attractive feature of urban life. Local administration and jurisdiction were performed by annually elected oYcials, cities had their own legislation, calendar, and of course, their own gods. So the citizens were constantly reminded of the old days of sovereignty. This was over now, as kings only had a say in foreign and military aVairs, even where, as in the case of Rhodes, the old independence had survived for some time. The king ruled over the country, including the self-governing cities. He was responsible for peace and security. Free citizens, too, had to be loyal to the king, not only pay taxes. A precarious though necessary balance between royal rule and municipal freedom had to be kept, as both depended on each other. This was stabilized by some Wctions which seemed to acknowledge the independence of the cities and fostered their prestige. Ordinances of the king could be called messages, above all, if the cult of the king had won its place in the religious life of the city. Taxes could be called donations, the relationship between king and city deWned as an alliance and their intercourse oYcially conducted through embassies. Treaties were also signed between cities which underlined their independence without interfering with the king’s interests. By the titles, style, or dialect of public documents the municipal authorities imitated the glorious past and sometimes even compared themselves with Pericles or Themistocles. This was well accepted in a cultural environment where classicism pervaded intellectual life and the classical heritage dominated over the system of education.27 Although nobody could possibly ignore the real distribution of power between king and city, the spirit of civic freedom never died. It was constantly nourished by the much-cherished memories of a glorious past as the basis of cultural identity, above all on new, colonial soil. The immigrants knew whence they or their ancestors had come. Such feelings were shared by the royal counselors who came from the Greek cities. Above all, the consciousness of being responsible for one’s local community was kept alive. This was diVerent from what we know about the empires of the Ancient Near East.

27

Dihle 2004.

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As pointed out, the oriental ideology of divine rulership and its inherent claim to world domination coexisted with the Greek tradition of civic freedom and self-governing communities in the Hellenistic world around the eastern Mediterranean. This can even be seen from a detail of post-classical Greek. Words derived from ºØ like ‘politics’, ‘political’, so common in the vocabulary of modern European languages, never denoted, at that time, any public activity for a kingdom or empire. They always referred to participating in municipal self-government as, for instance, in Plutarch’s political writings. Politics, in this usage, were ‘our aVairs’ and diVerent from ‘the king’s business’.28 Sometimes the political vocabulary simply refers to the urban lifestyle. This is reminiscent of Aristotle’s disdain for states other than Poleis. Service in the army or administration of a ruler was never ‘political’, since its moral basis was loyalty to the sovereign rather than the community. Yet every Greek highly valued politics in this particular sense. The upper class took pride in taking over municipal charges, and this was seen as some sort of muniWcence for the beneWt of one’s community, very much like the donation of a public building. A Greek felt emotionally attached to the city of his family, less so to the kingdom to which the city belonged. His legal status, too, referred to the city where he was born or had become a citizen, but never to a kingdom or empire. We have seen so far how Greek political theory and practice still had its focus, during the time after Alexander, on the conception of the Polis. The self-governing community of free citizens had to tolerate its integration into monarchies whose territories had been conquered in the past and were now being ruled by powerful dynasts. In the empires of the Ancient Near East, on the other hand, the inhabitants of cities were primarily subjects. The successors of Alexander, though sharing the superhuman status with their oriental forerunners, acknowledged the Greek tradition of free communities. Only the natives in the countryside were in a position similar to that of subjects to a king in the pre-Hellenistic Near East and thus hopelessly underprivileged. From the second century bc onwards, however, the Greeks had to realize that a republic, very much of the Polis type, was about to build an empire, even a greater one than all preceding conquerors. A Greek aristocrat wrote a detailed history of the crucial period between 240 and 144 bc to explicate how the Romans managed to establish their overlordship in most countries of the Mediterranean world and even surpassed the achievement of Alexander. This man, Polybius,29 had served in the 28

e.g. Plutarch, Politica praecepta. That ‘politics’ was diVerent from royal administration is clear from public inscriptions of the Wrst century bc (Dittenberger 1915–20, no. 742.10, 709.40, 741.15). 29 Walbank 1974.

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army of a regional confederation in Greece which became involved in the war between the Macedonian monarchy and Rome. He was deported to Italy, and, living in Rome for seventeen years in close contact with Roman aristocrats, he became the friend of one of the inXuential statesmen and generals of the time, Scipio the Younger. Polybius did not only write as a historian; his interests included, among others, geography and political theory. Being a keen observer, he had noticed that Roman imperialism was diVerent from the traditional one which originated from the ambition and initiative of great conquerors. In Rome, a number of oYcials ran the republic, recruited from leading families and elected annually. They were exposed to the control of their equals before, during, and above all, after the year in oYce. The authority and the rivalries of their families, distinguished by ancestry and with a large clientele at their disposal, played a decisive part in political life. Traditions, religious ones and others, shaped the whole social fabric. In this atmosphere the administration of justice was implemented mainly through meticulous interpretation of unchanged laws by well-trained experts. To a large extent, this superseded new legislation. Such a society was not up to military and political adventures. For centuries, long-term projects were completely absent from Roman politics, although wars could be useful because of Wnancial or territorial gains. Already in their early history, the Romans had developed a remarkable military capacity. Hence, they did not avoid involvement in wars abroad once they had become the dominating power in Italy. Roman politicians and generals came from competing families and constantly needed money to buy voters and promote their political career. Booty collected from defeated enemies was always welcome. Roman diplomacy was crafty, Roman warfare ruthless, and occupied countries, having been turned into Roman provinces, became victims of merciless exploitation by short-time administrators. Over quite a long period the ambition of leading politicians pushed Roman expansion, not deliberate planning, and the institutions of the republic, the playground of politics, were not adapted to the growing area of Roman rule. Polybius admired the stability of the Roman republic, the army, the coherence of Roman society, and the patriotism of the citizens. He tried to explain, in terms of Greek philosophy, these remarkable advantages, since the Roman republic seemed to him not too diVerent from a Greek Polis. So his Wrst question dealt with the constitution or legal order. Rome’s superiority, in his view, came from her mixed constitution. The consuls enjoyed, during the year in oYce, nearly unlimited power. Their so-called imperium maius contributed a monarchic element. But they had to cope with their peers in the senate,

18

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where they returned after a year. This and the senate’s prerogative in the administration of Wnances, distribution of provinces and armed forces, and also diplomatic relations added an aristocratic element. The people’s assembly, which elected the oYcials every year and voted for or against new laws proposed by the oYcials, guaranteed the democratic participation of free citizens. In Polybius’ eyes such a mixture prevented the Roman constitution from the inevitable deterioration, as described by Plato and Aristotle.30 Polybius believed in the longevity of Roman rule in comparison with other empires, not in its permanence. He shared the moral aspect of traditional political theory and expected that expanding domination and growing wealth would cause envy, greed, and luxury among the citizens and destroy the sense of concord and political responsibility. In his view, the Roman Empire, too, was doomed to fall, eventually, from all its power and glory.31 Polybius was one of the Greek intellectuals who came to Rome, during the second and Wrst centuries, as ambassadors, teachers, hostages, prisoners, or slaves. They introduced Greek learning and philosophy into the Roman upper class. Thereby Greek became the second language of educated Romans, and Rome a centre of Greek intellectual life. Philosophy, in particular, which claimed to show the right way of life, was taught exclusively in Greek. This changed in the Wrst century bc. Cicero, a leading politician of the Wrst half of that century, was trained not only as a lawyer and orator, but also in philosophy, which he had thoroughly studied both at home and in Athens. With great literary skill he presented, in a number of Latin dialogues written during intervals in his political career, the great variety of philosophical doctrines. Rendering the complicated systems and their reWned terminology, he initiated a Latin tradition of philosophy. One of Cicero’s early works in this Weld clearly emulates Plato’s famous Politeia,32 but with thoroughgoing references to Roman conditions as, for instance, the Roman concern for the interpretation of law, the principal subject of another treatise of his. Here again we Wnd the doctrine of the circular changing of constitutions, the praise of the mixed constitution, and other traditional items of Greek philosophy. The book has come down to us only in fragments, and we cannot tell to what extent it also dealt with the problems of Rome’s imperial expansion. The fact, however, was obvious and is frequently mentioned in Cicero’s books and political speeches. In this context, we need a closer look at the Latin word imperium. It has not the same meaning as ‘empire’ in modern European languages. Like its Greek equivalent Iæå, imperium does not primarily denote the cluster of several 30 32

31 Polybius 6.11–18, 1.3.7 V., 3.2.6. Polybius 6.67. Cicero, De republica 1.42–5, 65–8; Stoicorum veterum fragmenta 3.700.

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countries under the same rule. Its basic meaning is ‘legally sanctioned competence to rule, including judicial sentences and military command’. The owner of an imperium was meant to be, for a limited time, in full control of a strictly deWned group of people, such as an army or the inhabitants of Rome. A territory, too, could be spoken of as under the imperium of somebody. A future governor, for instance, was given by the senate ‘a province together with an imperium’ according to the oYcial formula. From such a usage stems the exclusively local meaning of the word, which already occurs in classical Latin. Cicero, in the famous Dream of Scipio at the end of the above-mentioned dialogue has his hero raised to the stars, where he realizes from above how tiny the earth is and the whole Roman imperium—in the modern sense of ‘empire’—is just a dot.33 Nevertheless, the most important connotation remained that of legal rule both in administrative or military positions. Cicero shared the traditional opinion according to which the victor was entitled to rule permanently over the vanquished after a war which legitimized imperial expansion. But Cicero underlined that the preceding war had to be a just one, that is to say formally declared and made as defense or retaliation, also for the beneWt of allies.34 The ensuing rule should be benevolent and guided by mutual help and responsibility, as is customary in the Roman tradition, he says.35 That is why foreign nations prefer their peaceful life under Roman rule to own domination.36 This Xattering justiWcation of Roman imperialism was cherished throughout Roman history,37 though contradicted by Roman politics and warfare time and again. Cicero, however, though paying tribute to the oYcial ideology in his speeches, was well aware of the fact that people like ruling with injustice better than being ruled with fairness.38 Nevertheless, the administration of justice had a great impact upon Roman public life, which aVected foreign politics as well. According to Cicero, only a group of individuals sharing the same ideas of right and wrong can become the people of a political community.39 Polybius had predicted social tensions following or even accompanying the expansion of Roman rule and the growing wealth of the leading families. For about 100 years, Rome went through a horrible period of civil wars. What Polybius did not see was the diYculty for a republic under annually changing oYcials to set up a decent administration of so many diVerent provinces. Roman administrators extorted from the provinces as many riches as possible 33 34 36 38

Kunkel 1995, 22 V.; Cicero, Pro Sestio 128; De republica 6.16. 35 Cicero, Pro lege Manilia 6; De republica 4.34 f. Pro Balbo 22 f.; In Verrem 2.2. 37 Pro lege Manilia 41. Cf. Seneca, Ad Polybium 12.3. 39 De republica 3.28. Ibid. 1.39.

20

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to buy voters and to stand their political rivalries. Cicero knew of this disease, but he seems to have been convinced that it could be healed, as a predominantly moral shortcoming, in the traditional frame of the republic. He gave the Wrst rank to Rome’s mixed constitution and stressed the democratic element thereof,40 the stronghold of civic liberty in his view, but also the decisive role of the statesman of outstanding moral qualities. This is reminiscent of Greek philosophy. But Cicero did not believe that such a vast empire demanded the rule of a monarch, as many Greek contemporaries did. The dislike of kingship was deeply rooted in the Roman tradition, and the expulsion of the Etruscan dynasty a much cherished memory. Nevertheless, by ranking monarchy as second best, Cicero paid his tribute to modern ideas as well. Caesar, Cicero’s contemporary, tried to introduce monarchy, after he had overcome all his opponents. But he was assassinated by the defenders of the republic. Only Octavian, later called Augustus, Caesar’s adopted son and successor, succeeded in transforming the Roman state after a series of cruel civil wars which uprooted many of the senatorial families.41 The new order which he introduced was, in fact, a monarchic one, but veiled as the restitution of the old order, so badly disWgured by the warlords of the preceding period. Augustus deWned the bundle of legal competences which gave him unlimited power as exceptional but necessary in the actual situation as well as traditionally republican and thus legitimate. This, together with the largescale restitution of ancient cults, priesthoods, and ceremonies, silenced the traditionalists. Above all, everybody welcomed the new peace. The Roman upper class fully realized that their own cultural identity had been deeply inXuenced by Greek art, science, and philosophy. In this atmosphere, the poet Virgil praised the culture of the Greeks and charged the Romans with bringing peace and civilization to the rest of the world through their military power.42 In fact, the provinces enjoyed, for the Wrst time under Roman rule, a reliable administration. Some were governed by professional oYcers, appointed by the emperor, others, though allotted by the senate, also under imperial supervision.43 The Greeks applied their ideology of divine kingship without hesitation to the emperor and welcomed the new order as the beginning of a Golden Age. In the Latin West, Augustus only reluctantly admitted the ruler’s cult except that of his divinized father. As the princeps, the Wrst among his senatorial 40

De republica 1.69. Syme 1960, 331 V. Virgil, Aeneid 6.842–53. 43 Dionysius Halicarn., De oratoribus veteribus 3–4; Weinstock 1971, 80 V.; Den Boer 1973; Epistle to Titus 2.2; Herodianus, Historia 1.6.5; Papyrus from Oxyrrhynchos 1185, 35; Berliner griechische Urkunden 588 (2nd–3rd century). 41 42

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peers, he carefully avoided the much resented title of king. His title of imperator was well known, denoting the military commander which the emperor really was for his lifetime. Even in colloquial Latin, nobody called the Roman emperor rex (‘king’), whereas the Greeks spoke of him as Æ Øº (‘king’) besides the new oYcial term ÆPŒæøæ. Monarchy became generally accepted in the course of the Wrst century ad, not only in the Greek half of the empire, although some opposition against Roman imperial rule persisted. Even defenders of the republican tradition had to admit the advantage of a strong, central government. ‘The body of so huge an empire cannot be kept in balance without a leader’, as Tacitus said.44 The growth of the empire, too, was generally welcomed.45 It seemed to comprise the civilized mankind and bring the Stoic ideas of cosmopolitanism46 almost to reality. Tacitus, however, remained skeptical because of many damaging consequences of that uniWcation47 and the unchallenged power of the Parthian Empire.48 He even took the view of conquered nations who, as pointed out in the Wctitious speech of a barbarian chieftain,49 experienced Roman domination as oppression, death, and destruction rather than the introduction of civilized life. Monarchs are always tempted to use their power excessively and place themselves above the law. Moreover, they want to keep the rule in their family. Both happened in Rome, although philosophers such as Seneca kept reminding the sovereigns of clemency and aVability as special virtues of a lawabiding ruler.50 Finally, the growing wealth turned the upper class, especially the ruler and his entourage, to luxury and extravagance. Seneca, educator of the emperor Nero, duly praised the frugal life and the poverty of the old days, the cradle of the genuine virtues of Rome and thus her present greatness.51 This corresponded to traditional teachings of nearly all philosophers. But many details of the imperial civilization apparently justiWed such admonitions. Hereditary rule was much resented in the Roman senatorial class since every senator was, in theory, eligible for the highest position. In addition, the best of the citizens rather than the ruler’s son should govern the country 44

Tacitus, Historiae 1.16.1; cf. Annales 1.12.3; Seneca, De clementia 1.4.1; Ad Polybium 12.5; Giovannini and Berchem 1986. 45 Seneca, Ad Helviam 7.7; De beneWciis 3.33.3; GriYn 1976, 202, 288. 46 De clementia 1.1.3; De beneWciis 4.18.3. 47 Tacitus, Historiae 4.68; Seneca, Ad Helviam 10.2 f.; Syme 1958, 506, 527 V. 48 Tacitus, Annales 15.13.9; Syme 1958, 496 V. 49 Tacitus, Agricola 32 f. 50 Seneca, De clementia 2.1; cf. Tacitus, Historiae 1.50. 51 Seneca, Epistulae 83.25, 87.41, 88.29 f.; Quaestiones naturales 1.17.9; De beneWciis 3.18.2.

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according to the philosophical doctrine of kingship. Consequently, both opposing senators and philosophers were suspected and repeatedly persecuted in the imperial period. Provincials did not necessarily object to a ruler who was regarded as a tyrant in the city of Rome or among the philosophers. The Greeks, in particular, had already been accustomed to the rule of semidivine kings for a long time. After all, Roman provincial administration worked well. The army secured the peace at the frontier, and no one inside the empire experienced war any more.52 The tendency towards despotism culminated in the reign of Domitian. He was assassinated in spite of his military and administrative achievements. Succession by adoption was introduced, a system that lasted for nearly a century and satisWed both senators and philosophers. The historian Tacitus, a defender of the senatorial tradition, welcomed the new system. ‘Now,’ he says, ‘monarchy and liberty have been reconciled and everyone can feel and think what he likes and even speak freely about it.’53 These emperors, though by no means less autocratic than their predecessors, tried to lead their private life according to the moral standards of the educated provincial aristocracy, the background of their families. They tried to appear as law-abiding citizens rather than rulers, in spite of the public opinion which placed the emperor above the law. In the legal system, too, the emperors’ ordinances were regarded as equivalent to laws.54 A speech of the Younger Pliny draws such a friendly image of the emperor Trajan,55 which is, to a certain extent, veriWed by the oYcial correspondence between the emperor and his legatus, when Pliny served in a province of Asia Minor. There we read the memorable words: ‘Prosecution on the basis of anonymous denouncement oVers a bad example and contradicts the spirit of our age.’56 Few periods in human history can lay claim to such a law-abiding government, and none to an equal inXuence of moral philosophy upon public and private life. The successful turn towards the new style at the end of the Wrst century had several reasons. Important seems to me the continuity of municipal selfadministration. The emperors supported municipal life and kept founding new cities, very much like their Hellenistic forerunners.57 Cities remained centers of cultural and economic activities. They spread civilization over large areas, promoted prosperity, and turned natives to Greeks or Romans by language and to citizens accustomed to municipal self-government. True, the upper class was the main beneWciary and its members could use their right of citizenship as elected functionaries of the local government. But these 52 54 56

53 Tacitus, Historiae 1.88 f. Tacitus, Historiae 1.1; Agricola 2.3. 55 Corpus Iuris, Digestae 32.23; Codex 6.23.3. Pliny, Panegyricus 65.1. 57 Pliny, Epistulae 97.2. VittinghoV 1952 and 1994; Boatwright 2000.

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also shouldered most of the Wnancial burdens of the city. MuniWcence for the beneWt of one’s home city greatly added to social prestige, and the tradition of the citizen’s political responsibility was kept alive, in spite of the powerful, all-pervading imperial rule. This condition is clearly described in a speech in honor of Rome, held in the middle of the second century by the famous Greek rhetorician Aelius Aristides. Rhetoricians, also called ‘sophists’, together with philosophers and doctors were legally privileged at the time, and frequently rose to high positions in the municipal or imperial administration.58 Aristides calls the political system of the empire a true democracy. This is a gross exaggeration according to our standards, but less so in the view of a Greek of the second century. Aristides has three relevant points in this argument. Firstly, Roman rule is, he says, lawful. This, in fact, everyone could experience in everyday life, although the social classes were strictly separated as honestiores and humiliores, and important privileges were given to the upper ones in criminal and private law. Aristides was their spokesman. Still, diVerent from Hellenistic ideology which called the king ‘the living law’, Roman jurisprudence never used this term,59 notwithstanding the overwhelming and religiously sanctioned power of the emperor. Secondly, the Roman preoccupation with law in practice and theory, together with their administrative talent, pervaded the whole fabric of the empire. The professional lawyer, the iuris consultus, unknown in the Greek tradition, was highly esteemed in Roman society, with legal science oYcially and continuously being taught, in Latin, even on Greek soil.60 InXuential members of the imperial government were trained lawyers. The Romans tried to harmonize, gradually but successfully, the diVerent legal traditions in their empire.61 For the Wrst time, as Aristides noted, a regular sequence of judicial instances had been introduced. A lawsuit normally started in a local court according to local rules and could end up at the imperial judiciary, where only a citizen of Rome could apply directly. We know the procedure from the life of St Paul and Pliny’s correspondence. Thirdly, Aristides underlines the importance of the right of Roman citizenship. It had been freely given to provincials over a long period of time, primarily to educated and inXuential people, sometimes to clients of Roman aristocrats and emperors, and even to whole cities. A soldier of non-Roman descent acquired this status after twenty or twenty-Wve years of service. 58 60 61

59 Klein 1983; Bowersock 1969. See n. 54. Kunkel 1967; Gaudemet 1967, 588 V. Gaudemet 1967, 502–20, 570–2; WolV 2002, 110, 187.

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Thereby new cities founded for ex-soldiers all over the empire were inhabited predominantly by Roman citizens. Some of these colonies were given the socalled ‘Latin citizenship’. The distinction was reminiscent of the earlier days of Rome and had not much importance in the imperial period.62 The spread of Roman citizenship reXects the many ways of social advancement which were open to a considerable portion of the population. This right, referring, in theory, to the city of Rome, could not possibly lead so many individuals to political activity in the capital. Political activity, however, was expected from the upper class in their home city. This was facilitated, if the elected functionary could enjoy the prestige of Roman citizenship. In Aristides’ view, this right, though restricted in practice to a number of personal privileges, gave its owner the consciousness of belonging to a worldwide community. That is why he called, in traditional Greek terms, the Roman Empire a ‘great city’ which included the whole of civilized mankind. Thus, the barbarians outside the imperial boundaries were excluded, but Aristides did not mention the Parthian kingdom. Accordingly, Aristides applied Plato’s and Aristotle’s conception of the Greek citizen, the ºÅ, a perfect and fully developed human being, to the inhabitant of the Roman Empire. (They were all given the right of Roman citizenship Wfty years after Aristides.63) In the Wrst century ad many educated Greeks still took much pride in their superior civilization and contested the predominance of the Romans. Plutarch’s biographies were written to inspire the mutual respect of Greeks and Romans. He and the rhetorician Dio Chrysostom, both living around ad 100, tried to make their Greek compatriots aware of the advantages of Roman rule.64 In the second century, loyalty to the Roman emperor and the consciousness of being the citizen of a traditional Greek community was largely no longer felt as a contrast.65 In ad 143, the two most renowned teachers of Greek and Latin rhetoric held the consulate together, the most prestigious, though no longer politically important position, dating from the old days of the republic. Thus, the unity of the Greco-Roman society was achieved, whereas the state administration had already been bilingual for nearly two centuries.66 Greek families entered the senatorial class and took over Roman traditions. Greek-speaking people were living in Rome, not only Greeks but also Jews or Syrians. The Christian congregation of the capital turned from Greek to Latin as late as the third century ad.67 From the Byzantine period to the nineteenth century the Greeks

62 64 65

63 Gaudemet 1967, 521 V. Gaudemet 1967, 521–34; WolV 2002, 116. Plutarch, Praecepta gerendae reipublicae 10.32; Dio Chrysostomus, Orationes 32.95. 66 67 Bowersock 1969, 95. Krumeich 2004. Lampe 1987, 117.

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called themselves and were being called by their eastern neighbors by the name of Romans—  ø Æ~ØØ—citizens of the Roman Empire. Stoic and Cynic philosophers regarded themselves as citizens of the universe, since the sage is at home everywhere. In their view, man is a social, not a political animal, whose moral status does not presuppose political institutions.68 Aristides’ reasoning is diVerent. He stresses the idea of the rule of law as experienced all over the Roman Empire, despite the overwhelming power of the emperor. True, the historian is likely to discover very serious shortcomings in the social life of many groups and many regions. This applies in particular to rural areas where people, freeborn as well as slaves, did not share the advantages of urban life and had to suVer from all kinds of oppression. But in the view of an educated contemporary, justice was being aimed at by the imperial administration in the same way as in municipal communities. This came near to the concept of justice in the context of a Greek Polis, as pointed out at great length in classical Greek philosophy. That is why to Aristides and his educated contemporaries the Roman Empire seemed completely diVerent from other empires or kingdoms such as the Hellenistic monarchies. There the sovereign was not only the invincible ruler and semidivine bringer of peace and prosperity—as the Roman emperors, too, claimed to be—but also ‘the living law’, the
  łıå. Aristotle had deWned the law as ‘reason without intention’, since no human intention or emotion changes its written text. The Roman Praetor, called the viva vox iuris civilis, had to interpret the written law very much like a trained lawyer. Such interpretation could become law by tradition.69 But there was no ‘living law’ in the Roman world. The emperor, though an important legislator, was never called by this title like the Hellenistic kings, nor had the term been acceptable in classical Greek philosophy. To conclude: The coexistence of monarchy as the divinely authorized rule over large territories and municipal self-government on the basis of civic freedom, both under the control of law, was, in fact, the main source of internal peace and prosperity of the Greco-Roman world, predominantly during the second century ad. This did not last forever. New and long-lasting danger from barbarian invaders, economic diYculties, and new religious ideas prevailed in the following centuries. All this overturned the social conditions and changed the political structure of the empire and the style of government. Crisis and change are inevitable in human history. However, the conception of the rule of law over free citizens, never completely forgotten, 68

Stoicorum veterum fragmenta 3.337, 628. Aristotle, Politica 1287a32;
  łıå and viva vox iuris civilis: ThesleV 1965, p. 72.23 V., 76.2 V., WolV 1978, 32; 2002, 110, 187; Wieacker 1988, 465. 69

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came to new life in the Middle Ages, when the inhabitants of some European cities became aware of their economic power as a basis of political autonomy or even independence. This was the beginning of the long way towards modern democracy. So the knowledge of the legal order of the Roman Empire during its heyday, its historical background, and its interpretation in terms of contemporaneous philosophy and jurisprudence should remain a wellremembered part of our cultural heritage, also under changed and further changing conditions. References ¨ gypten. Mu¨nchen Assmann, Jan, Ma’at: Gerechtigkeit und Unsterblichkeit im Alten A (Beck) 1990. Badian, Ernst, and Berchem, Denis van (ed.), Alexandre le Grand (Entretiens sur l’antiquite´ classique, 22). Vandoeuvres/Gene`ve (Fondation Hardt) 1976. Berliner Griechische Urkunden [¼Aegyptische Urkunden aus den Ko¨niglichen Museen zu Berlin, Griechische Urkunden], vol. ii. Berlin 1898. Boatwright, Mary T., Hadrian and the Cities of the Roman Empire. Princeton (Princeton University Press) 2000. Bowersock, Glen W., Greek Sophists in the Roman Empire. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1969. Bringmann, Klaus, ‘The King as Benefactor: Some Remarks on Ideal Kingship in the Age of Hellenism’, in: Bulloch et al. 1993, 7–24. Bulloch, Anthony W., Gruen, Erich S., Long, Anthony A., and Stewart, Andrew F. (eds.), Images and Ideologies: Self-deWnition in the Hellenistic World (Hellenistic Culture and Society 12). Berkeley/Los Angeles/London (University of California Press) 1993. Decleva-Caizzi, Fernanda (ed.), Antisthenes Fragmenta. Milano (Istituto Ed. Cisalpino) 1966. Den Boer, Willem (ed.), Le culte des souverains dans l’empire romain (Entretiens sur l’antiquite´ classique 19). Vandoeuvres/Gene`ve (Fondation Hardt) 1973. Diehl, Ernst (ed.), Anthologia Lyrica Graeca. Leipzig (Teubner) 1925 [2nd edn. 1936–42; 3rd edn. 1949–52]. Diels, Hermann, and Kranz, Walter (eds.), Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker. 8th edn. Hamburg (Rowohlt) 1964. Dihle, Albrecht, ‘Klassizismus’, Reallexikon fu¨r Antike und Christentum, 20 (2004), 1227–33. Dittenberger, Wilhelm (ed.), Sylloge Inscriptionum Graecarum. 3rd edn. Leipzig (Hirzel) 1915–20; repr. Hildesheim (Olms) 1960. Dodds, Eric R. (ed.), Plato, Gorgias: A Revised Text with Introduction and Commentary. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1959. Ehrenberg, Victor, Der Staat der Griechen, vol. i: Der hellenische Staat. Leipzig (Teubner) 1957.

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Gabba, Emilio (ed.), Polybe (Entretiens sur l’antiquite´ classique 20). Vandoeuvres/ Gene`ve (Fondation Hardt) 1974. Gaudemet, Jean, Institutions de l’antiquite´. Paris (Sirey) 1967. Gehrke, Hans-Joachim, ‘Der NomosbegriV der Polis’, in: Okko Behrends and Wolfgang Sellert (eds.), Nomos und Gesetz: Urspru¨nge und Wirkungen des griechischen Gesetzesdenkens (Abh. Akad. Wiss. Go¨ttingen, phil.-hist. Klasse 3, 209). Go¨ttingen (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht) 1995, 13–35. Giovannini, Adalberto, ‘Greek Cities and Greek Commonwealth’, in: Bulloch et al. 1993, 265–86. —— and Berchem, Denis van (eds.), Opposition et re´sistances a` l’Empire d’Auguste a` Trajan (Entretiens sur l’antiquite´ classique 33). Vandoeuvres/Gene`ve (Fondation Hardt) 1986. GriYn, Miriam T., Seneca: A Philosopher in Politics. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1976. Habicht, Christian, Gottmenschentum und griechische Sta¨dte. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1956. Klein, Richard (ed.), Die Romrede des Aelius Aristides, hg., u¨bers. und mit Erl. vers. von R. K. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 1983. Krumeich, Ralf, ‘Klassiker im Gymnasion: Bildnisse attischer Kosmeten der mittleren und spa¨ten Kaiserzeit zwischen Rom und griechischer Vergangenheit’, in: Barbara E. Borg (ed.), Paideia: The World of the Second Sophistic (Millenium Studies 2). Berlin (de Gruyter) 2004, 131–55. Kunkel, Wolfgang, Herkunft und soziale Stellung der ro¨mischen Juristen. 2nd edn. Wien/Ko¨ln/Weimar (Bo¨hlau) 1967. —— and Wittmann, Roland, Staatsordnung und Staatspraxis der ro¨mischen Repuplik, vol. ii: Die Magistratur (Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft 10.3.2.2). Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1995. Lampe, Peter, Die stadtro¨mischen Christen in den ersten beiden Jahrhunderten. Tu¨bingen (Mohr/Siebeck) 1987. Meyer, Ernst, Einfu¨hrung in die antike Staatskunde. 6th edn. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 1992. Nilsson, Martin P., Geschichte der griechischen Religion, vol. ii: Die hellenistische und ro¨mische Zeit (Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft 5.2.2). 2nd edn. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1961. Pritchard, James B. (ed.), Ancient Near Eastern Texts. Princeton (Princeton University Press) 1969. Rhodes, Peter J., ‘Liturgie I. Politisch’, DNP 7 (1999), 358–9. Stoicorum veterum fragmenta, ed. Johannes von Arnim, vols. 1–3. Stuttgart (Teubner) 1903–5; repr. 1964. Syme, Ronald, The Roman Revolution. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1939; repr. 1960. —— Tacitus. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1958. ThesleV, Holger (ed.), The Pythagorean Texts of the Hellenistic Period, coll. and ed. H. T. A˚bo (A˚bo Akademi) 1965. VittinghoV, Friedrich, Ro¨mische Kolonisation und Bu¨rgerrechtspolitik unter Caesar und Augustus. Wiesbaden (Steiner) 1952.

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VittinghoV, Friedrich, Civitas Romana: Stadt und politisch-soziale Integration im Imperium Romanum der Kaiserzeit, ed. W. Eck. Stuttgart (Klett/Cotta) 1994. Walbank, Frank W., ‘Polybius between Greece and Rome’ in: Gabba 1974, 1–31. Weinstock, Stefan, Divus Julius. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1971. West, Martin L. (ed.), Iambi et elegi Graeci ante Alexandrum cantata. 2nd edn. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1989–92. Wieacker, Franz, Ro¨mische Rechtsgeschichte, vol. i.1: Einleitung, Quellenkunde, Fru¨hzeit und Republik (Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft 10.3.1.1). Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1988. ¨ gyptens in der Zeit der WolV, Hans Julius, Das Recht der griechischen Papyri A Ptolemaeer und des Prinzipats, vol. i: Bedingungen und Triebkra¨fte der Rechtsentwicklung (Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft 10.5.1). Mu¨nchen (Beck) 2002. ¨ gyptens in der Zeit der Ptolemaeer und des —— Das Recht der griechischen Papyri A Prinzipats, vol. ii: Organisation und Kontrolle des privaten Rechtsverkehrs (Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft 10.5.2). Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1978.

Interlude: Kingship and Empire Zhu Weizheng (Shanghai)

In Chinese history a single date as signiWcant as the Persian Wars in the West is the year 481 bc. It happened in this year—if we believe our sources—that a unicorn appeared, not at an appropriate time, since unicorns were regarded as auspicious omens of a benevolent rule under a virtuous prince—and exactly such a prince was dearly lacking in this turbulent age, at least in the view of Confucius, who, after having inspected the unicorn which had its left foreleg broken, set out to compile the Spring and Autumn Annals (Chunqiu; hereafter: Annals).1 Being a bizarrely terse chronicle of major events between 722 and 481 bc, centered on the court of Confucius’ native state of Lu, the Annals intend to be a chronicle of a dystopian world, absent of any ‘saint-rulers’ (sheng, shengwang), not to speak of gods and Homeric heroes.2 Who could imagine that the Annals were to become the basis of Chinese historiography? In fact, in 481 bc an unprecedented event took place in the state of Qi, which neighbored Lu: a ministerial family seized power from the ruling clan which had not been enfeoVed by the Zhou royal house. Hence, 481 bc, the Wnal year of the Spring and Autumn period, may also rightly be regarded as the beginning of the Warring States period (traditionally dated 403–221 bc). Both periods, yet in particular the latter, saw the proposal and realization of various models of rulership. At various points in time throughout the Chinese history of thought, these models have been taken up again, debated, reinstated, or discarded; thereby contributing to the casting and recasting of political ethics. The ultimate mold of all these models was the Zhou kingship. Already during the Western Zhou dynasty (c.1045–771 bc) the nobility, in fact, vied to emulate the Zhou royal house in ritual and burial practices, behavior, and perceived cultural sophistication.3

1

2 Kongzi jiayu, 16 ‘Bian wu’: 4/115–16. Cf. Yuri Pines’ paper in this volume. See esp. Cook 1997. For the social dynamics and the transformation processes which Chinese society underwent in the period under discussion here, c.1050–221 bc, see the recently published, outstanding book by Falkenhausen 2006. 3

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Zhu Weizheng

Closely connected with the Zhou kingship was the concept of the ‘Heavenly Mandate’ (tianming)—a key concept of the Chinese history of thought in general and Chinese historiography in particular. It originated with the rise of the Zhou, against the backdrop of the fundamental rupture which occurred with the downfall of the great Shang civilization, brought about by a former vassal people from the periphery of the realm. These circumstances put the new regime under high pressure of legitimation, even more so as the sudden death of the founder, King Wu (Wuwang; r. 1049/45–1043 bc), triggered an intense power struggle among the Zhou elite that led to rebellion and fratricide. At the core of the new dynasty’s ideology of legitimation lay the claim that Heaven (tian) had conferred King Wen, Wuwang’s father, the Mandate (ming or ling) to overthrow the Shang dynasty. This idea is expressed, for example, in an announcement of Wuwang’s son, the young King Cheng (Chengwang; r. 1042/35–1006 bc), addressed to his cohort and future oYcers’ squad: In past times, when your late fathers, the heads of your noble families, were alive, they ably came to the support of King Wen; and so King Wen received this great Mandate [to rule over the Four Directions (sifang)]. When King Wu had conquered the Great City Shang, he then in the court made an announcement to Heaven, saying ‘I will reside in this central region, and from this place govern the people.’4

There are two further points pertinent to our discussion of the Zhou kingship model; one relates to the Duke of Zhou (Zhougong), Wuwang’s younger brother; the other concerns the making and shifting of the center. (1) Historically, the Duke of Zhou, after Wenwang’s death, took over the government (she zheng) for his underage nephew, King Cheng, set out on an ‘eastern campaign’ to crush a rebellion by his three own brothers together with the leader of the remaining Shang people, and saw to the founding of Chengzhou (present-day Luoyang).5 Traditionally, the Duke of Zhou is credited with his determined, yet—allegedly—selXess acting as regent as well as

4 The He zun inscription dates back to the Wfth year of King Cheng (probably 1031 bc). For references and translation, see Eno 1990, 185–6. Later on the concept of the Mandate conferred by Heaven was supplemented by the assertion that the Shang lost the Mandate because of its oYcers and administrators in the homeland and the frontier regions having indulged in wine. See e.g. Da Yu ding inscription (981 bc); for an illustration of the inscription and the vessel, see Shaughnessy 1999, 321; for translation and references, see Cook 1997, 273–4. 5 Shaughnessy 1999, 310–17 (including the author’s ‘revisionist’ reading of the three Shangshu chapters. ‘Luo gao’, ‘Shao gao’, and ‘Jun Shi’, which—if we can accept their authenticity—are foremost documents of the Zhou founding era).

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31

with the consolidation of the newly founded dynasty and the creation of governmental institutions, including the system of rites and music; hence, also with the establishment of the nucleus of the Confucian canon. The Duke of Zhou’s veneration began with Confucius, who even felt uneasy about his having not seen the Duke in his dreams for long (Lunyu 7.5). Later on, in the Tang dynasty (618–907) for example, the Duke of Zhou was ranked even above Confucius. Both men stood for the ideal of ‘civil’ (wen) rule, as opposed to a form of government that gave priority to the military (wu), yet, additionally, the Duke of Zhou embodied the promise of restoration of the good old order through political reforms. (2) As noted above, among several other things, the planning and building of Chengzhou is attributed to the Duke of Zhou. Situated in the region between the Luo and Yi river, presumably adjacent to the imaginary ‘chamber of Heaven’ (tianshi),6 Chengzhou became the Zhou power center long before the moving of the royal court to here in 771 bc. The building of Chengzhou set the precedent for several dynasties of imperial China to build a new city and to move the capital to the new place, since the layout and construction of a new capital was believed to determine that dynasty’s future course—an idea which is also given expression in the Yijing (Book of Changes), i.e. in the Hexagram 43 ‘Breakthrough’, which extends the situation of a dynasty’s new beginning to the realm of everyday life.7 There is a nucleus of three foundational texts on the shifting of the center, the chapter ‘Pangeng’ in the Shangshu (Book of Documents) and the two Odes 250 ‘Gong Liu’ and 237 ‘Mian’ in the Shijing (Book of Odes); all three relating events from a time prior to the founding of the Zhou dynasty in the mid-eleventh century bc, namely the last of Wve relocations of the Shang capital and to two early resettlements of the Zhou people, respectively. The dating of the three texts, however, is problematic; one can only say for certain that they were written down at a time much later than the historical events to which they relate, perhaps in the late Western Zhou period, against the backdrop of the dynasty’s eVorts to stabilize the social order by carrying out sweeping ritual reforms, to which archeologists have recently drawn much attention,8 or even as late as the early Eastern Zhou period and possibly testifying to the traumatic events of the Zhou court’s Xight from its homeland in 771 bc. It may well be that it was also not prior to the shifting of the center to the east that the standardized version of the Heavenly Mandate doctrine as contained in the Book of Documents, especially in the chapter ‘Da gao’, was 6

Shi ji 4/129.

7

See Wilhelm 1977.

8

Falkenhausen 2006, chap. 1.

32

Zhu Weizheng

articulated.9 The reason is that the standardized version explicitly includes the possibility of the Mandate’s withdrawal from the Zhou, which concurs with the perceived deterioration of the close bonds between Heaven and the Zhou royal house, with the result that Heaven became regarded as being as changeable as the weather and as blind to good and evil: ‘God on high (di) is unpredictable, do not rely on him!’ (Shijing, Ode 224 ‘Wan liu’).10 In fact, to date there exists no evidence from Western Zhou bronze inscriptions of the full-blown doctrine of the Heavenly Mandate. With the power of the Zhou ruling house rapidly declining, the Western Zhou system of kingly domains, principalities, and feudal statehoods transformed into a multi-state system,11 which extended to include states with non-Zhou backgrounds such as Chu, Wu, and Yue among the Wfteen major states. The emergence of the multi-state system was accompanied by a process of state building, expansion of all major states through subjugation and annexation of smaller ones, and transformation of feudal principalities into territorial states with more or less distinct borders.12 Molding itself after the Zhou kingship model, not few among the emerging territorial states built new cities to house their capitals or shifted the court to a new place as e.g. the state of Qin, which successively shifted its capital from the banks of the Qian River to Pingyang in 714 bc, to Yong in 677 bc, to Liyang in 383 bc, and eventually to Xianyang (all locations in present Shaanxi) in 349 bc. Aimed at strengthening the Zhou king’s authority within this multi-state system and providing leadership in protecting the realm against intruding non-Zhou peoples, the institution of ‘overlord’ (ba) was created. The title of ba, implying the privilege of leading military campaigns on behalf of the Zhou king, was conferred to Duke Huan (r. 685–643 bc) of the eastern state of Qi, in 665 bc. Taking on his new role vigorously, Duke Huan, advised by his chief minister Guan Zhong (d. 645 bc), restored three principalities invaded by ‘barbarian’ tribes; thereby generating an incipient consciousness of a Zhou ecumene referred to as ‘zhu Xia’, literally ‘all the states of Xia’ (i.e. the states that presumably belonged to the Xia dynasty). This is reXected, among others, by favorable judgments on Guan Zhong such as that passed by Confucius: ‘Were it not for Guan Zhong, we would be wearing the hair loose and folding clothes to the left!’ (Lunyu 14.18.) This sentiment of shared ground among the nucleus of the elites was further enhanced by a series of interstate conferences, which were convened by the successive ‘overlords’ in the hundred-odd years from the mid-seventh 9 This point has already been made by Eichhorn 1976, 39. For the standardized version of the Heavenly Mandate, see Shaughnessy 1999, 314–15. 10 11 12 Eno 1990, 24–7. Hsu 1999, 545–86. Stumpfeldt 1970; Hsu 1999.

Interlude: Kingship and Empire

33

to the mid-sixth centuries bc. The last signiWcant of these conferences, which took place at Shangqiu in 546 bc, even succeeded in containing interstate warfare for four decades. With the patterns of diplomatic communication that were developed in these interstate conferences the foundation was laid for the exchanges and interactions with the non-Chinese kingdoms and peoples in early imperial China, in particular with the Xiongnu. The ba system eventually deteriorated with the rise of the two new peripheral states of Wu and Yue in the Lower Yangtze region around 500 bc, giving way to constant warfare among the contending states, which Xexibly formed ever-changing allegiances and paid ever less respect to the Zhou royal house, which was reduced to political insigniWcance. Characterized by enormous political, social, and intellectual dynamics, the Warring States period, as Mark Lewis has observed, led to ‘the creation of the major political institutions that deWned early imperial China’.13 The notion of ba allows for a glimpse into the freshness of this age’s political thinking. According to Mencius, ba denoted ‘the hegemon’ who rules by force, in contrast to the rule by ‘virtue’ (de) pursued by a ‘true king’ (wang) by practicing a benevolent government suited to the needs of the people and hence ‘getting’ (de*) their hearts.14 This Mencian juxtaposition of wang and ba foreshadowed the debates revolving around legitimate rule that waged throughout imperial China. It was articulated against the backdrop of contemporary political developments: within only two decades, from 344 to 323 bc, all major states had assumed the title of wang, which had previously been the prerogative of the Zhou monarch.15 Moreover, some newly risen kings aspired to become king of all China, in particular King Xuan of Qi (319–314 bc); Mencius’ conversations with whom being the subject of the second half of the Wrst and the entire second chapter of the book Mencius.16 Mencius, as he appears in the book named after him, represented an important, yet only one of the intellectual trends known as the ‘Hundred Schools’ (baijia), for which the Warring States period was after all the great age of Chinese intellectual history. Yet however widely rulership was discussed among these ‘Hundred Schools’, one can say dogmatically that all major thinkers and philosophers of this age espoused the monarchical system as a basic assumption of the way to organize an eYcient government and 13

14 Lewis 1999, 587. Nivison 1999, 771–3. The year 323 bc thus marks an important threshold; according to Michael Nylan, the beginning of the ‘classicist period’ (see her paper in this volume). It should be noted that as early as 706 bc the leader of Chu had already assumed the title of ‘king’. At that time, however, Chu was not regarded as a full member of the Zhou realm. 16 For an analysis, see Schaab-Hanke 2000. 15

34

Zhu Weizheng

secure its stability and continuity. The conception of such a monarchical system had been handed down as part and parcel of the Zhou kingship model and it persisted despite all disputes. The disputes that evolved concerned other issues. I am inclined to single out the following four as those which were contemporarily felt to be the most relevant to the body politic:17 (1) The question of how close the ruler should have his hands on the aVairs. Here the given answers ranged from emphasizing the ruler’s obligation of compassionately sharing hardships and pleasures with the people (Mencius) to proposing the monarch’s disengagement from the everyday aVairs of government (Laozi; Han Feizi). (2) The relationship between monarch and minister, coupled with the question of how to recruit able and loyal oYcials (xian)—a question which became paramount throughout imperial China. As widely as this subject was discussed, the debate rarely refrained from making abundant use of historical examples, such as the Wgures of the Duke of Zhou and Guan Zhong. (3) The issue of succession to the throne. Generalizing, one can say that throughout imperial China this issue was never solved in a conclusive manner; hence, it was subject to political negotiations time and again. In the age of Mencius, a fervent debate revolved around King Kuai’s (r. 320–312 bc) move to install his chief minister as his successor, instead of one of his sons. Although this attempt, inspired by the idea of entrusting the government to the most able person, utterly failed, the concept of ‘ceding the throne [to another meritorious family of excellence]’ (shanrang) was taken up again by the ‘usurpator’ Wang Mang (r. ad 9–23) to legitimize his abolition of Han rule and played an important role during the Six Dynasties (third to seventh centuries). (4) The attitude toward the past. Here we Wnd a range of greatly divergent views, from the praise of the legendary emperors Yao and Shun within the Mohist School to Confucius’ veneration of the Duke of Zhou in particular and Zhou culture in general (‘What a great culture! I follow Zhou’; Lunyu 3.14), and from Xunzi’s advocacy of learning from the ‘kings of later ages’ to the outright denial of any lessons that history can possibly teach, which we Wnd in Han Feizi but also in writings attributed to the Daoist School (Daode jing; Zhuangzi). Such was the intellectual background of Qin’s rise to dominance. Situated at the western periphery and therefore sometimes not fully recognized as a 17 Various aspects of these four issues are discussed in Michael Nylan’s and Yuri Pines’s papers in this volume and therefore need not be elaborated here.

Interlude: Kingship and Empire

35

member of the Zhou realm,18 Qin had succeeded to Zhou’s homeland in the Wei valley. As is clearly manifested in the rhetoric and stylistic pattern of bronze inscriptions from the Spring and Autumn period, the Qin rulers persistently aspired to emulate the early Zhou kings in their perceived cultural superiority. This put them into a frame of mind of even going so far as to claim the Heavenly Mandate and the rule over all the Four Directions (sifang).19 Hence, it is no surprise that the Qin staunchly held fast to the monarchical system. In historiography, this found an expression in a list of the Qin rulers in the order of their succession, including their burial places, which was part of the now lost Chronicle of Qin (Qin ji).20 So far we have only discussed one aspect of what Professor Mutschler has termed the ‘doubly imperial’ nature of ‘empire’, i.e. the monarchical form of rulership. Since the other aspect, i.e. imperial rule over large parts of the known world, is being treated in the following papers by Michael Nylan and Yuri Pines in this volume, we can make it brief. As noted above, the idea of unifying all China had gained ground by the late fourth century bc. At this time Qin consolidated its conquest in the southwest, in particular the Sichuan basin, which laid the foundation for its irresistible rise in the course of King Zhaoxiang’s (r. 306–251 bc) long reign. Toward its end, when the last Zhou king surrendered in 256 bc and sent the ‘nine cauldrons’ symbolizing sovereignty over the realm’s Nine Regions to the Qin court, it was strongly anticipated that King Zhaoxiang would inherit the Zhou kings’ throne—an anticipation, however, that was thwarted by Zhaoxiang’s death.21 Thirty-Wve years later uniWcation was eventually achieved. The fact that it was achieved by the state of Qin—and not by any other of the remaining six major states—was of great importance for the nature of the Chinese ‘empire’. To explain, I want to draw attention to two aspects: Firstly, although Qin Shihuangdi, by adopting the novel title of huangdi, ‘august emperor’, emphasized the historically unprecedented uniqueness of his rule, it cannot be denied that the Qin dynasty in fact Wrmly established the Zhou kingship model, at least as far as concerns (a) the monarchical system and (b) the idea of a movable center. As a result, the ‘empire’ was spatially not tied to one particular place and its center could be shifted variably, especially in early imperial China. Secondly, as to the second aspect, mention must be made of another two points: (a) the practice of recruiting the bureaucratic elite from all over the 18

See Pines 2005/06. As e.g. in the inscribed text on the eight bells from Tagongmiao, Baoji (Shaanxi; 7th cent. bc); cf. Falkenhausen 1999, 487–8 and ibid., n. 52. 20 21 See the appendix to Shi ji, chap. 6. See Shi ji 5/218. 19

36

Zhu Weizheng

realm—a practice which was vigorously advocated by Li Si (c.280–208 bc), chief minister under Qin Shihuangdi and the architect of the uniWed empire; (b) the institution of the junxian system, i.e. the division of the country into administrative units, i.e. commanderies and subordinate districts. Taken together, these two institutional features which were closely connected with the Qin dynasty worked to the eVect that the ‘empire’ was not bound to one particular nation or people of a common territorial identity or ethnic origin. That is why even Mongols and Manchus could establish their sovereign rule over All-under-Heaven (tianxia). Contemplating these two aspects, I want to conclude with the thesis that the empire established by Qin in 221 bc, with regard to its spatially and ethnically undetermined nature, can be characterized as a ‘weak’ empire. Yet it may well be that it persisted over more than 2,000 years just because of this ‘weak’ form. References Cook, Constance A., ‘Wealth and the Western Zhou’, in: Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, 60: 2 (1997), 253–94. Eichhorn, Werner, Die alte chinesische Religion und das Staatskultwesen. Leiden/Ko¨ln (Brill) 1976. Eno, Robert, The Confucian Creation of Heaven: Philosophy and the Defense of Ritual Mastery. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1990. Falkenhausen, Lothar von (1999), ‘The Waning of the Bronze Age: Material Culture and Social Developments, 770–481 B.C.’, in: Loewe and Shaughnessy 1999, 450–544. —— (2006), Chinese Society in the Age of Confucius (1000–250 BC): The Archaeological Evidence. Los Angeles (Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California) 2006. Hsu, Cho-yun, ‘The Spring and Autumn Period’, in: Loewe and Shaughnessy 1999, 545–86. Kongzi jiayu 孔子家語. Guoxue jiben congshu 國學基本叢書 edn.; repr. Shanghai (Shanghai shudian) 1987. Lewis, Mark Edward, ‘Warring States: Political History’, in: Loewe and Shaughnessy 1999, 587–650. Loewe, Michael, and Shaughnessy, Edward L. (eds.), The Cambridge History of Ancient China: From the Origins of Civilization to 221 B.C. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1999. Nivison, David Shepherd, ‘The Classical Philosophical Writings’, in: Loewe and Shaughnessy 1999, 745–812. Pines, Yuri, ‘Biases and Their Sources: Qin History in Shiji’, Oriens Extremus, 45 (2005/06).

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37

Schaab-Hanke, Dorothee, ‘Ein Philosoph in der Krise? Meng Ke und die Zeitenwende’, Bochumer Jahrbuch zur Ostasienforschung, 24 (2000), 113–32. Shaughnessy, Edward L. (1999), ‘Western Zhou History’, in: Loewe and Shaughnessy 1999, 292–351. Stumpfeldt, Hans, Staatsverfassung und Territorium im antiken China: U¨ber die Ausbildung einer territorialen Staatverfassung (Freiburger Studien zu Politik und Gesellschaft u¨berseeischer La¨nder 8). Du¨sseldorf (Bertelsmann Universita¨tsverlag) 1970. Wilhelm, Hellmut, ‘The ‘‘Own City’’ as the Stage of Formation’, in: id., Heaven, Earth, and Man in the Book of Changes: Seven Eranos Lectures, Seattle/London (University of Washington Press) 1977, 89–125.

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The Rhetoric of ‘Empire’ in the Classical Era in China Michael Nylan (Berkeley)

Empire exists because it can; it will Wnd justiWcations for itself when they are needed. This paper focuses on materials drawn from three discrete eras in the ‘classical period’ of China—roughly 323 bc to ad 316—whose reXections upon the closest equivalents to ‘empire’ do not precisely correspond to one another, let alone to the imperium under Rome.1 Works of the late third and early second century, anticipating the beneWts of uniWed rule in the Central States (Zhongguo)—standardization and coordination of vast public systems and enforcement of a lasting peace—seek mainly to strengthen the arguments for unitary rule under a wise leader whom the people regard as ‘father and mother’. Works composed c.100 bc, a century after uniWcation by Qin in 221 bc, take for granted the superiority of uniWed rule over all rival forms of government, even as they describe the catastrophic consequences of rulers’ despotic acts on an ever-grander scale. By contrast, the classicizing constructs from the closing decades of Western Han and the opening decades of Eastern Han (ad 25–220) focus on suprahuman precedents and ‘proofs’ for the legitimacy of the Han ruling house as serious questions are asked in the court and in the outlying provinces about the beneWts of uniWed rule. Of necessity, this paper analyzes only core samples drawn from the corpus of received and excavated writings of the classical era, for nearly all the extant literature in classical Chinese reXects upon the contemporary political situation, if only obliquely. As two sample cores drilled a few feet apart into actual bedrock will almost certainly produce two diVerent pictures of a stratum, explicit reference to the necessity of the sample core method of history is designed to acknowledge the severe limitations on our analyses built upon extrapolations from the evidence in hand, particularly when the extant corpus 1 ‘China’ refers here to the land mass corresponding to the People’s Republic of China, minus the Autonomous Regions. As its inhabitants were hardly identical with today’s ‘Han Chinese’, the term ‘Chinese’ is applied solely to the writing system employed there since 1300 bc.

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Michael Nylan

represents such a minute fraction of the writings of the time. The conceit of the sample core becomes valuable to the extent that it intentionally denies readers the luxury of a single, sweeping narrative, for the historian’s task is to present the evidence in a way that does not assume that the distant past is known in advance.2 At this remove, the written sample cores seem initially to register an exhilaration at the radically expanded reach of uniWed rule, which produced a much more marked ambivalence about the concentration of powers at center. Classicizing language was then constructed that conveyed a preference for the ‘old’ and ‘tried and true’ methods of governance ascribed to Zhou rule (howsoever ahistorically), for such language justiWed, even if it did not absolutely champion, a dramatically reduced role for the Eastern Han rulers. But whether this gradual shift in rhetoric reXected actual changes in the historical situation—that is a hypothesis that remains to be tested, not a fact already ascertained.3 On Wrmer ground, we note that the early texts mined for the ‘data’ now organized under the rubrics of myth, history, and philosophy were originally fashioned to persuade those in power of the ‘proper Way’ (dao) to address contemporary problems. Thus, a portrait of the Han founder written a hundred years after his death may tell us a great deal more about perceptions in 100 bc than about events of 200 bc. Quasi-historical reconstructions contrasting heroic antiquity with the decadent present—fac¸ons de parler long before Han—were practically required in late Western and Eastern Han, when court convention mandated all critiques of the ruling house be delivered through the ‘indirect remonstrance’ (feng) that allowed critic and ruler alike plausible deniability. (Nonetheless, many advisors openly described the political defects of the ruling house.) The past is rarely mentioned for its own sake in the writings sampled here, nor do the early writings invariably claim a sort of privileged access to eras far distant in time from their own. Indeed, it is not certain that the past was conceived of as a period wildly at variance with the present. Typically, writings looked to the past (gu) for a ‘useable past’ supporting persuasive alternatives to present failures. The modern propensity, nonetheless, to read in Han constructions of the past the reliable ‘traces’ of much earlier eras—a determination fueled by nationalists wishing to locate ‘unbroken continuities’ in China—hinders research today.4

2

Cf. Bagley 1999, 125. People have guessed this was the main reason why Liu Xiang’s recensions are called ‘new’, but see Kalinowski 2005, 131–68. 4 Bagley 1999, 124, notes: ‘It becomes increasingly evident that the centrality and cultural unity that are the essence of the traditional model are nowhere to be seen in the archaeological record [of Shang].’ 3

The Rhetoric of ‘Empire’

41

Though many classical sources lacked true historicity, the potential of historical events and agents to eventually ‘reveal their own evaluation’ was presumed before uniWcation under Qin in 221 bc. Policy proposals and ‘empty moralizing phrases’ (kongyan) gained credence when ‘veriWed’ by the past. This explains a very curious phenomenon: the proponents of classical learning (Ru) in the third and second centuries bc oVer no consistent account of antique rule by the legendary sage kings, but the classicists after centuries of uniWed rule boast of impossibly precise knowledge on the same subject.5 The very few recent Wnds that permit us to check the received records reveal that those early sources contain as many instances of exaggerations or outright lies as of corroboration,6 though it is the latter that garners the publicity. The old sources, for example, credit Liu Bang, the Han founder, with promulgating a revised version of the Qin penal code that dramatically reduced the categories of punishable oVenses, yet excavated manuscripts from Shuihudi (terminus ad quem 217 bc) and Zhangjiashan (c.186 bc) show how closely early Han law mirrors that of Qin in all respects.7 Then, too, nearly every document relating to the pre-Qin, Qin, and early Western Han histories underwent editing after 26 bc at the hands of Liu Xiang (79–8 bc), a member of the Han ruling house entrusted with preparing a preliminary catalogue for the holdings of the imperial libraries in Chang’an.8 The evidence concerning the scope of Liu Xiang’s editorial activities, though scant, points to such substantial editing of the received corpus that 26 bc is probably a date no less crucial to our notions of the Chinese past than the dates 221 bc, when Qin achieved uniWed rule, or 135 bc, the approximate date when Wudi (r. 141–87 bc) reserved the post of Academician to experts in the Five Classics.9 To ignore the possible ‘Xattening eVect’ of 26 bc on post-Han perceptions of the classical era is to compound the errors of scholars convinced that the received traditions about the past, with an assist from regional archeology, adequately convey the totality of a past coherent and cohesive.10 When all is said and done, the same archeological evidence now regarded as proof of strong empires can be interpreted diVerently. Perhaps, in the cases of Shang and Zhou, a number of smaller states brieXy came together in a league or empire which then exerted a powerful inXuence on the collective memory. Certainly, there are no real precedents for the Qin and Han realms.11 For at 5

For examples of classicists unable to speak about past institutions, see Shi ji, chap. 28. Robert Bagley, personal communication. 7 The memorials of Dong Zhongshu (c.134 bc) also show the Han followed Qin. 8 Of the excavated materials, none directly bear witness to imperial ideologies, although the Shuihudi and Zhangjiashan legal documents certainly relate to rulership. 9 No Wrm date is available for the decision. For Liu Xiang’s editing, see Kalinowski 2005. 10 11 See X. Yang 2004, preface. e.g. Shi ji 6/254. 6

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least two centuries before 221 bc the master-persuaders residing in the Central States territories had registered their intense longing for a single realm spanning the Yellow and Yangtze river valleys.12 Still, these thinkers of the fourth and third centuries bc were mindful of the obstacles they faced as they sought to devise and implement the precise mechanisms of an unmistakably new system of rule that their world had never known—among these, the strength of local resistance to domination by rival powers.13 The regional powers gradually developed many of the ‘basic institutions’ later associated with empire in China: (a) detailed ordinances and statutes; (b) well-deWned bureaucratic ranks and recruitment, (c) near-universal conscription; (d) registration of the population; (e) poll and income taxes; (f) the increased use of cavalry and other military innovations; (g) massive irrigation works; and (h) increased trade and the tools to promote it. Wherever possible, this paper employs ‘uniWed rule’ (yitong) or ‘realm’ in preference to ‘empire’ and ‘state’, as uniWed rule was far more an ideal and an experiment than an actuality in the era covered by this paper.14 Eventually, the idea of a vast bureaucratic apparatus emanating from the capital and embracing far-Xung territories—the very apparatus that would be attested by the extraordinarily rich Yinwan and Weiyang Palace Wnds, if administrative documents reliably matched sociopolitical realities—may yield way, as it has already done in other Welds, to a more intense study of the ways in which those around the throne garnered power and authority through the ruler’s body and personal relationships, through astute alliances, diverse cultural practices, massive civic projects, and the careful proliferation and propagation of royal imagery and symbolism.15 Complicating matters further, modern histories routinely translate as ‘empire’ two terms—tianxia (‘All-under-Heaven’) and junxian (‘commandery/ county’)—since both imply sovereign rule over extensive territories.16 Neither term connotes temporary military power (unlike the Latin imperium), and the two compounds rarely appear together in the same essay or treatise.17Tianxia initially referred to the lands and activities under the beneWcent supervision 12

Gu Jiegang 1927, 1–16. Hui 2005, 74, for the mobilization of whole populations. Shi ji, chap. 6 shows that Qin’s victory seemed likely only two decades before uniWcation. 14 Loewe 2005, 2: ‘Early in Han, the idea of empire was still experimental; by 220, it was seen as the norm.’ For yitong, see Shi ji 16/759. 15 For Yinwan, see Loewe 2004, chap. 2 (pp. 38–88); for the Weiyang Palace, see Han Chang’an cheng Weiyang gong 1996. Note that the Shi ji uses ‘zhushang’ or ‘shang’ of the ruler before 104 bc, as in Shi ji 107/2844. 16 Ba, ‘hegemon’, corresponds to the Greek tyrannos. 17 But Shi ji 6/235–6 contrasts the failures of the system of vassalage with the manifest advantages of the junxian system. 13

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of the ancestors of the ruling house. By a fairly easy extension, the term later suggested the imagined community that depended upon the moral ruler’s exemplary consciousness that he held his lands in trust for the ancestors above and the people below. Thus, employment of the term tianxia always signals the author’s concern with the moral dimension of the authority conjured by the title ‘Son of Heaven’ and a concomitant decision to underplay the relative importance to the throne of military and administrative superiority.18 No supreme ruler of the Central States was ever hailed as a living god within his own lifetime or after his death, as happened in Rome. Junxian, by contrast, emphasizes the uniform imposition of legal, economic, and administrative measures, in a pyramidal hierarchy of capital-commandery-county, over lands initially wrested by military conquest. The classical period had inherited the terms tianxia and junxian from the period before uniWcation, and the subsequent claim that the territory under the supervision of the ruling house belonged to yi jia (‘one family’) could not help but trigger furious debates in Qin and Han about the relation of ruler to ruled.19 Many such polemics focused on the irresolvable question whether the ruler’s presence lent dignity to his realm or whether he gained dignity by exemplifying his subjects’ highest values. The willingness to pose such basic questions over the four centuries of Qin and Han rule, as well as the malleability of the terms gong (‘in the public interest’) and si (‘family, personal, or selWsh matters’), is striking. Only until the reign of Han Wudi was the term gong applied unthinkingly to acts by the ruler or his appointed representatives that took priority over other considerations, insofar as they allegedly served ‘the common good’. The term gong was frequently hijacked by persons claiming to embody a source of moral legitimacy beyond the throne.20 The foregoing warns that the adoption of some basic terms liable to be exploited in cross-cultural studies on ‘empire’ may well obscure key diVerences in cultural context.21 Concerted eVorts to eschew all grand narratives, however tempting, prior to completing an overview of speciWc rhetorical usages, both literary and visual—that is the course that this paper will

18 See e.g. Bohu tong A/1a–b, where this is clearly spelled out. Texts such as the Yi Zhoushu outline the transition from military conquest to uniWed rule. 19 See Xing 1987, 55–9. The term guojia usually refers in Han to the ruling family. 20 In writings in the earliest test core, gong is pitted against si, family or personal aVairs. By the third core, the range of activities deemed to be gong has broadened; and activities outside government service come increasingly to be dubbed gong. 21 On problems generated by the historical scope of ‘translation’ exercises relating one time and place to another, see e.g. Montgomery 2000, ‘Introduction’.

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adopt, in consequence. As shown below, even a cursory survey of three sample cores selected at fairly evenly spaced intervals in time immediately generates a conundrum begging for solution.

1 . S A M P L E C OR E 1: THE D E C AD ES PRIOR TO AND JUST AFTER 200 B C Jia Yi’s (200–167 bc) famous essay ‘Faulting Qin’ (‘Guo Qin lun’), written decades after the collapse of the Wrst attempt at uniWed rule, illustrates just how much even loyal subjects of the Han appreciated the stupendous achievement of uniWcation in 221 bc. By Jia Yi’s account, people were so eager to see an end to war that they ‘craned their necks and stood on tiptoe’, to catch a glimpse of the victorious Qin troops, in the hopes that total victory by Qin would bring peace to the Central States after centuries of conXict.22 Three major compilations that can be roughly dated to the Wnal decades immediately prior to uniWcation—two collections of essays ascribed to Xunzi and his pupil Han Feizi, and the Shangshu dazhuan (Great Commentary on the Documents) attributed to Fu Sheng—likewise suggest the level of excitement experienced by the most sober thinkers when faced with the prospect that uniWed rule might be attained.23 These three compilations, explicitly addressed to rulers intent upon vanquishing their rivals in a time (the late third century bc) and place (the Central States) when a formidable nomadic league was gathering strength along the northern frontier, juxtapose the dominant theory of Realpolitik and the moralistic alternatives to it.24 Han Feizi, as proponent of Realpolitik, argued from the four simple premises: that military strength is the paramount desideratum of the state, that such strength is underpinned by the ‘primary occupation’ of agriculture, that ‘might makes right’, and that ‘the ends justify the means’. For Han Fei, only the Wercest drive to compete, fueled by bloodshed and deception, can culminate in unity and peace. Han Feizi insists that the ideal ruler continuously intervenes to mediate the conXicting interests of his subordinates in order to enhance his own supremacy. To this end, the ideal ruler doles out rewards and punishments, binding ‘those below’ him through the twin emotions of greed and fear, these being the primary motivations for all human activities. 22

Shi ji 6/283. All three works contain interpolations and heavily reworked passages. Fu Sheng, court Academician for Qin and Han, probably died during the reign of Han Wendi (r. 179–157 bc). Most place Xunzi’s death and Han Fei’s before Qin uniWcation. 24 Few scholars realize that Maodun probably commanded more resources than Liu Bang. 23

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Han Fei’s ideal ruler takes extreme care not to let slip his thinking on major policy issues before his pronouncements become law. Hidden within his palaces, he acts upon information provided by his spies, for duty to his line, no less than self-preservation, requires that he sound out his subjects’ views at every opportunity. And while he conscientiously adheres to the laws that he and his forebears have promulgated, the ruler does his best to distance himself from the execution of those laws by his subordinates, lest his Draconian measures reXect badly on him. Only thus can he fend oV plots by members of his family and inner circle and forestall peasant rebellions in the provinces. The ideal ruler in this vision has no time or inclination for valor in the Weld, which would only expose him to danger. With a combination of luck, cunning, and skill, however, the ruler who sees the advantages of strategy and stealth can triumph over the multitude of his enemies, and impose an order upon the most recalcitrant of subjects.25 In this ideology, the uniWer is compared to an unseen natural force that draws no undue attention to itself. The ‘true lord’ ‘understands nothing, is capable of nothing, and does nothing’. Like the cosmic Way itself, he ‘does nothing, yet he sees that there is nothing left undone’.26 Withdrawn from the hurly-burly of everyday life, the ideal ruler can aVord to adopt a lofty, detached view of unfolding events. Thus he executes Heaven’s will or facilitates the inevitable course of events in an eYcient bureaucracy whose administration is designed to make the pursuit of proWt and the interest of the prince coincide,27 functioning as a distant star that in some mysterious fashion keeps all lesser luminaries in thrall. Proponents of this view did not dare to advise the ruler to yield to his ministers, for it was implicitly the ruler who upheld the cosmic order. Agency unseen was imbued with additional mystery, and mystery enhanced power. An alternative vision of uniWed rule, represented by the Xunzi and Shangshu dazhuan texts, proved more compelling to many. This second vision, equally enthralled by the prospect of standardized learning, road works, and weights and measures, located fatal Xaws in the arguments of Realpolitik: the ruler who motivates his populace through fear and greed paradoxically helps to create the very conditions that will undermine his supremacy, sooner or later.28 Trickery and force, albeit tempting strategies in the short term, almost inevitably damage the ruler’s interests over the long term. It was not only that 25

For Lu Jia’s dictum, see Han shu 43/2113. Lu¨shi chunqiu 25.4.1 (modiWed from Knoblock and Riegel 2000, 49); and Laozi, 48. 27 For point 1, see Chunqiu fanlu, 43: 11/5a–b; for 2, see Xunzi, 19 ‘Lilun’. For the Lord as ‘balance’, see Vankeerberghen’s forthcoming essay on quan. The ruler-North Star comparison comes from Analects 2.1. 28 See e.g. Xunzi, chap. 15. 26

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‘in general, as soon as men acting for the sake of rewards and commendations perceive the possibility of harm or injury, they stop short of giving their all.’29 It was moreover that those experiencing the negative emotions of fear and greed and schooled in habits of deception knew how to lash out eVectively against the powers-that-be whenever they felt themselves insecure or inadequately compensated. Furthermore, they had no sense of honor or loyalty to restrain them. Accordingly, even in a state with abundant natural resources in men and material, neither luck nor strategy nor a knowledge of topography and situation are as instrumental to success as concerted attempts to ‘gain adherents among the people’ (fu min). Such men, equating the ruler’s interests with their own, work hard to promote his interests in their capacities as ministers, generals, and Wghting men. If subordinates of suYcient merit can be found and employed, then the commoners will take up ‘the places which are proper to them’ of their own accord. Unity and order will henceforth follow, as day follows night, with all ‘obeying the orders and commissions for the beneWt of their lord and ruler.’30 Besides alleging the internal contradictions of Realpolitik, the moralistic counter-theory sought to brace an explicit system of rewards and punishments with a coherent ritual system designed to motivate the ruler’s subjects to lend him their unqualiWed support. In such a system, sumptuary regulations, as well as conferrals of rank and gifts, reinforce the value of those whose conduct is worthy of emulation. Far more successful than the ruler whom the people fear and envy is the ruler whom the people come to love (ai) as a father or mother.31 And, the moralizing texts insist, it is not so very diYcult for the ruler to win his subjects’ love. The ruler need only (1) instruct his generals that the armies under their command should not kill the young and old, nor trample the crops in summer and fall, nor take prisoners from among the commoners, nor slay the commoners who have Xed before his advancing armies; (2) employ his troops sparingly, with a view to replacing tyrannical rulers with better administrators; (3) realize that spears, lances, bows, and arrows are less eVective in building a population of loyal adherents than the ‘newer methods’ of digging massive irrigation works and preparing the citydwellers to withstand prolonged sieges; and (4) organize his administration in such a way that ‘events accord with the time, and he lightens the burdens of the people in order to harmonize and regulate them, raising them to maturity, like children in swaddling clothes.’32 As the moralistic ruler—unlike the ruler envisioned by Han Fei—insures the stability of the state he holds in trust for his forebears, his descendants, and his subjects, then his subordinates and 29 31

30 Ibid. 15/57, line 91. For the summary, see ibid. 15/57, line 4; 13/50, lines 10, 20. 32 Ibid.15/57, lines 66–8, 92–3. Ibid.17/62, lines 7–9.

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successors delight in emulating his virtues and assent to undertake the arduous course of cultivation to the degree that their station in life permits.33 The ultimate aim of the ruler, in the moralistic vision, is to have the lower orders and newly conquered peoples not only ‘fall in line with their ruler’s will’ but also, more importantly, ‘Wnd their security and pleasure in it’.34 Because the greatest talents must be induced to align their interests with those of the would-be uniWer, the ideal ruler displays his own virtues. Dutiful, broadly learned, and judicious, he eschews the pursuit of his own short-term desires and submits his person to a demanding ritual schedule that regularly produces edifying spectacles designed to induce the most profound admiration. Ritual, in this vision of governance, is conceived as the perfect medium to reveal the ruler’s equitable inner state, in addition to being a most convenient tool for maintaining social distinctions. ‘Rites, the highest expression of [personal] order and discrimination’, are therefore also the ‘root of strength in the realm’.35 If the ideal ruler is to unwaveringly exert his will upon ever greater areas and populations, his supreme authority must be clear from the amplifying gestures of ritualized settings that portray him convincingly as an insightful and empathetic ruler concerned with his people’s livelihood. To achieve this perception of balanced majesty and humanity, the ideal ruler works hard to build consensus within society; hence his determination to consult widely before undertaking new initiatives. In none of the moralistic writings is there any hint that such consultations are for the purpose of ferreting out inclinations toward disloyalty. The ideal ruler, ever discerning in selecting his oYcials, has them promote his purposes in court councils and to implement them in their administration of the realm. He knows that laws and a well-regulated economy may facilitate the process of civilization, but they possess no educative function in and of themselves.36 But allowing his people digniWed access to the civilizing ‘rites, music, and education’ (jiaohua) encourages his people to ‘reform and improve’ on their own, so that they eagerly ‘cultivate their persons, rectify their comments, accumulate [merits] in rites and duties, and honor the Way and virtue’.37 Thus is an enviable—and eminently enforceable—peace and prosperity brought to all the lands under the ruler’s supervision. By contrast with the Roman Empire, which advocated ‘divinely authorized rule’, on the one hand, and ‘municipal self-government on the basis of civic freedom’,38 on the other, the moralistic construction of uniWed rule devised for the Central States was predicated on the link between 33

34 35 For the summary, 16/62, line 78. Ibid. 15/57, line 99. Ibid. 15/56, line 78. Contrast Dihle’s paper in this volume, p. 8. 37 Xunzi 15/54, line 38. Cf. Mencius, book 1, predicated on ‘sharing one’s pleasures’, as analyzed in Nylan and Huang 2007. 38 Contrast Dihle’s paper in this volume, p. 25. 36

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the ruler’s self-mastery and his rule over others, and his subjects’ self-mastery, which obviated the need for either municipal self-government or civic freedom.39 Naturally enough, the enviable order of the sage ruler’s realm will attract families.40 The Xunzi, while conceding that the coercive methods used by the contemporary Qin state have allowed it to build up impressive strength ‘over four generations’, nonetheless predicts that Qin will never succeed in unifying the Central States unless it Wgures out how to better inspire the other ‘powerful and aggressive states . . . to hasten to its service’. The Shangshu dazhuan is far more speciWc than the Xunzi about the precise form of government that is to appear after uniWcation.41 It urges a mixed system, partly hereditary and partly meritocratic, designed to retain the chief advantages of the older system of indirect rule through vassals (necessitated by the slow pace of transport and communication between center and periphery), while introducing the supervisory mechanisms of the direct-rule junxian system. The local lords, as representatives of the center, were to be entrusted with limited powers to wage punitive campaigns against pockets of resistance and to adjudicate local disputes (including capital cases), but the throne was to rate the performance of those lords every three years, so that it retained the Wnal authority to exile its vassals and extinguish their lines. (The Romans would have appreciated this mixed system, for they knew that the success of empire ultimately rested on disturbing the regional power structures as little as possible.) Interestingly enough, in no writings ascribed to the last decades before uniWcation in 221 bc do we see extended references to the necessity for the ideal ruler to enlist the help of the gods in his endeavors, though we know that regular sacriWces were oVered in all the courts of the Central States and the workings of fate and timing were regularly discussed as possible agents in historical change.

2 . S A M P LE C OR E 2: THE D E C AD E S PRIOR TO AND JUST AFTER 100 B C In some twenty-Wve years on the throne the man known to history as the First Emperor or Qin Shihuang (r. 247–210 bc) managed to conquer all the rival Central States powers and thereby proclaim an end to war, despite his enforcement of a harsh penal code. Within a year of Qin Shihuang’s death 39 40 41

Xunzi 15/56, lines 72 V. Ibid. 14/52, lines 9–10. Cf. Keightley 1977. See Shi ji 6/237.

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in 210 bc, however, allegiance to the hitherto seemingly invincible house of Qin began to unravel. The speed of that unraveling, along with the unprecedented rise of a commoner to the exalted rank of Son of Heaven, could not but focus men’s attentions on patterns of political change. Those surveying recent events saw that nearly a century of Han rule elapsed before the Han tried to impose a comparable degree of direct rule over its territory. As readers will recall, it was only under Jingdi (r. 157–141 bc) and Wudi that the last signiWcant opposition to the centralized power was quashed, with the defeat of the rebel forces under the Seven Kingdoms in 154 bc and of Liu An, King of Huainan, in 122 bc. At about the same time, the threat posed by the Xiongnu confederation on the northern frontier was signiWcantly reduced as well, thanks to diplomatic and military initiatives. How luck, timing, wisdom, and virtue had converged in history to produce this admirable state of aVairs—this such massive compilations as Sima Qian’s Shi ji (Archivist’s Records; c.100 bc) sought to determine. Not surprisingly, in a sample of discussions c.100 bc on uniWed rule, most addressed to the Han ruling house, nearly all writings celebrated the expanded capacity of the centralized state to marshal huge forces to undertake exploration, irrigation, defense, and road works; to enforce the commercial and penal codes; to organize famine and Xood relief, and to sponsor the rudiments of a statewide school and postal system. Such encomia traced the Qin and Han institutions back to a halcyon time several millennia before, as in Sima Qian’s ‘Basic Annals’, describing the reign of the legendary Yellow Lord.42 At the same time, some of the most inXuential writings of midWestern Han expressed grave concerns lest the steady expansion of the Han dominion prove to be its undoing in the end. As a young man, Wudi chafed under the tutelage of senior advisors related to him through marriage. The older Wudi—apparently encouraged by another set of imperial relatives by marriage (waiqi) and their cronies—squandered the precious cultural and political capital his predecessors had so painstakingly built in four types of related activities. First, Wudi—suspiciously like the Qin Shihuangdi of Han legends—sought personal immortality from a group of magicians and quacks who gravitated to his court. Second, Wudi sponsored ever-more lavish spectacles for himself and his guests, built new palaces in Chang’an, enlarged his hunting parks and residences, and multiplied the staV employed for musical entertainments.43 Third, Wudi extended his military lines deep into present-day Central Asia, Vietnam, and Korea, adding some twenty-Wve commanderies to his realm, though four were perforce quickly withdrawn. ‘I slaughter and slay’, he reportedly 42

Xunzi 1/1–8.

43

Loewe 1974, chap. 8.

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boasted.44 To defend the frontiers, additional soldiers and supplies were requisitioned and great numbers of luxury items produced for diplomatic exchanges and outright bribes; evidently, the border commanderies bore the brunt of increased demands by the throne. Fourth, to Wnance these eVorts, advisors in Wudi’s inner circle persuaded him as early as 119 bc to raise money through state monopolies on basic necessities, including salt, iron, coins, and wine (the last needed for ritual libations), inducing an inXationary spiral. The last decades of Wudi’s reign saw mounting protests against the ageing ruler’s proXigacy. Banditry followed as soon as the reserves of cash and grain were exhausted, and the breakdown of communications with the eastern part of the realm, where a great many of the nobles resided. Widespread disaVection may explain why Wudi set out no fewer than eight times in his declining years, from 110 to 89 bc, upon hastily arranged imperial progresses (‘tours of inspection’) to destinations far from the capital.45 Harsh critiques of Wudi’s political choices became the starting point of many heated discussions by the closing years of his grandson’s reign. The calls for retrenchment that accelerated in the last decades of the Western Han, providing inspiration and vocabulary for a broad intellectual movement espousing a neoclassical ‘return’ to the moderation attributed to the legendary and semi-legendary rulers of the distant past. But in Wudi’s own time, Dong Zhongshu and Sima Qian paid dearly for remonstrating with Wudi. Sima Qian, accused of ‘defaming the Lord’, was castrated, and Dong was once condemned to death (though later pardoned). That both authors, who were the butt of cruel jokes during their own lives, had become tragic heroes by Eastern Han speaks to the shifting perspectives over two centuries of Han rule. Sometime between 136 and 134 bc, Dong Zhongshu, an expert in the Annals (Chunqiu) ascribed to Confucius, was invited in his capacity as court Academician to pronounce upon ‘the essentials of the Great Way’ of kingly rule. If the ruling house hoped to procure Heaven’s blessing, the young Wudi demanded to know, how far was it feasible and right to embrace models of governance derived from the distant past, given that rulers for the last 500 years, at least, had found it impossible to restore the Way of the Ancients? On the one hand, Wudi professed to be ‘terriWed’ lest prodigies and omens of late had been provoked by his lapses; he welcomed criticism, or so he said.46 On the other hand, the speciWc wording of his invitation to speak out made it well nigh impossible for members of his administration not to frame their replies 44

45 See Sima Xiangru’s version, in Knechtges, ii. 53–113. See e.g. Shi ji 30/1438. Han shu 56/2495–6 gives the text of Wudi’s invitation to speak, when Wudi was about twenty; Dong’s responses are ibid. 2497–511. 46

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in Wudi’s own terms, and Wudi had prefaced his remarks with the assertion that the imperial person was the sole mediating presence through which all lesser living things could experience heaven’s favor. Wudi therefore asked how state sacriWces to the supreme deities could be made to promote his pursuit of longevity. Dong’s responses are recorded in three memorials in his Han shu biography, in which Dong was careful to adopt and even elaborate Wudi’s rhetoric about the Son of Heaven’s pivotal role in sustaining cosmic order. He argued that high Heaven, in company with the animating energies of Yin and Yang qi, required the Son of Heaven to set a moral example for all his subjects. The ruler’s eVect on his subordinates would then be as gentle as the wind blowing over grasses. And since Heaven places mild spring before harsh winter, the ruler should give priority to less coercive methods of governance; thus ‘Heaven relies on suasive example, rather than on punishments.’47 SpeciWcally, the Son of Heaven must reject the old ways of governance inherited from Qin. That the Qin Empire had imploded a mere ten-odd years after uniWcation should be sign enough of the folly of continuing its ill-conceived policies, and since ‘rotten wood cannot be carved’, amending the Qin policies in piecemeal fashion would never work. Instead, the ruler should show himself to be the true ‘father and mother’ of the people, replacing legalistic impositions with a less deWned but stronger sense of mutual obligation and commonweal. If scions of the ruling house refused to reform their own conduct, Heaven surely would respond by issuing harmless prodigies Wrst and full-scale disasters afterward, so that the ruler would be forewarned of Heaven’s displeasure. Thus the single most important precept for rulers is that they bear the chief responsibility for the success or failure of the ruling house. For, lacking a suitable model, the common people would pursue proWt at the expense not only of one another but also of the court itself. Only with the moral ruler can the realm of All-under-Heaven function as the best form of government, meaning that most apt to produce a ‘right and proper’ (zheng) transformation in even the humblest subjects, and those separate transformations, as they are repeated time and again, eventually will lead to the creation of peace and order throughout the realm. In light of Xunzi’s denials of extra-human intervention in human societies, Dong’s insistence that the Son of Heaven aVected, for good or for ill, the entire range of cosmic operations is striking, though it may well have been settled convention once a ruler of the Central States also ruled most of the known world. What is interesting is the way in which Wudi’s propensity for self-absorption and self-aggrandizement was accommodated in Dong’s 47

Han shu 56/2502.

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rhetoric. Perhaps Dong was merely a good persuader, for was it not the rhetorician’s job to ‘rely on what delights his lord in order to induce him to enter upon the Way’?48 Still, Dong’s putting the ‘One Man’ on a par with the totality of ‘heaven-and-earth’ (i.e. phenomenal existence) virtually precluded serious attention to the unfortunate consequences of Wudi’s enormous appetites for lavish display and for foreign exotics. And once Dong had painted the Han throne as exalted in every possible way, it became harder for him to explain why the sought-after signs of Heaven’s favor had failed to arrive. At best, Dong could only skirt the two substantive issues to which Wudi’s inquiries had speciWcally alluded (whether to adopt a less activist stance and also avoid lavish displays) and conclude, rather lamely, that it would take time—perhaps a generation or two—for Heaven’s movements to register the good rule whose secular eVects would be apparent to mere mortals appreciably sooner. Thinkers around Dong’s time preferred to counter Wudi’s expansionist impulses with solemn reiterations that the throne’s administration should ‘leave no traces’, since the prevailing system of laws, customs, and rites functioned as a fully suYcient and equitable expression of cultural priorities. Theories of wuwei (‘non-interventionist government’) were Wrst articulated shortly after the Han founding in 206 bc, when the realm was weary from decades spent in the wars of uniWcation and the coVers of the ruling family were utterly depleted. The same rhetoric was now adapted for a court whose powers—Wnancial and military—were the greatest that the world had ever seen, a court that felt itself capable of embarking upon any and all foreign wars and forms of cultural experimentation and display. Even Wudi’s harshest critics, in his time and afterwards, were undeniably proud of the very fact of uniWed rule exerted by the Central States over vast territories. Sima Qian might mock Wudi for his failings, but he could not resist specifying the unprecedented scale of centrally directed water control.49 Nor did Qian’s distaste for the oVensive wars prevent him from praising the rich sheepherder Bu Shi, who oVered, in the years 124–121 bc, half of his immense fortune to aid Wudi’s eVorts to extinguish the Xiongnu.50 Sima Qian never doubted the superiority of the Central States civilization over the ways of life of the border peoples, though his occasional allusions to noble savages are meant to shame his compatriots into better behavior. A passage from the Shi ji draws attention to the material and psychic beneWts of uniWed rule: 48 49 50

Xunzi 13/51, lines 29–30. Contrast Shi ji, chaps. 28 and 29. Ibid. 30/1431, 1440.

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By the time the present ruler had been on the throne a few years, . . . over seventy years had passed since the founding of the Han. During that time, the nation had met with no major disturbances, so that, except in times of Xood or drought, every person was well supplied and every family had enough to get along on. The granaries in the cities and countryside were full and the government treasures were running over with wealth. In the capital, the strings of cash had been stacked up by the hundreds of millions until the cords binding them had rotted away and they could no longer be counted . . . The grain overXowed and piled up outside, where it spoiled and became unWt to eat. Horses were to be seen even in the streets and lanes of the common people or plodding in great numbers along the paths between the Welds. Anyone so poor as to ride a mare was disdained by his neighbors . . . The local oYcials remained at the same posts long enough to see their sons and grandsons grow to maturity . . . As a result, men had a sense of self-respect and regarded law-breaking as a serious matter.51

The sense of security and order engendered by strong centralized rule, in turn, engendered conWdence among the people that their ‘unXagging eVorts’ would improve daily life. By Sima Qian’s account, trouble only began when some were allowed to amass huge fortunes and exploit others, with ‘no limit’. From Sima Qian’s perspective, the ‘laws of change’ mandated that a time of Xourishing be succeeded by an era of decline, but it was Wudi’s Xagrant disregard for equity that left few of his subjects, rich or poor, feeling obliged to render the services they owed the realm by virtue of their stations.52 Thus the Han throne, which, in its early years, had single-mindedly deployed a mixture of guile and ruthlessness to crush the power of the nobility, found itself at the apex of its power sadly beholden to the money makers.

3. SAMPLE CORE 3: THE DECADES PRIOR TO AND JUST AFTER 1 B C , A ND THEIR LASTING IMPACT ON NEOCLASSICAL IDEALS Up to the time of Han Wudi, supporters of the realm had been largely deWned by their assumption that the larger the territory under the direct control of the center, the more rational the distribution of resources in the realm. With the defeat of the rebel Liu An in 122 bc, Han Wudi and his advisors commanded more power, perhaps, than any other single court in China—or anywhere else, for that matter—ever knew until early modern times.53 But by the time Wudi died, the resources—in men and mate´riel, as well as in cultural capital—to 51 52 53

Contrast Shi ji, chaps. 30/1420. Ibid. 30/1430 speaks of exemptions bought by the rich. See Han shu 6/173.

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which the Han sovereigns laid claim had shrunk dramatically. Any thoughtful person reviewing the reign of Han Wudi was led to wonder, in private or aloud, if all powers are concentrated in a single court, will not the evil or inept ruler’s misplaced priorities simply visit greater ruin upon more people? Whether it should be the realm’s Wrst priority to extend its reach as far as possible—this question was no longer so easily answered.54 In this context, a third sample of materials, drawn from the last decades of Western Han and the Wrst seventy-Wve years or so of Eastern Han rule, evinces yet another kind of ideal ruler, one who eschews all expansionist ventures, adheres strictly to the moral guidelines outlined in the Five Classics (with an emphasis on modesty and Wlial duty) and adopts the stance of primus inter pares among the scholars and oYcials in his administration.55 Parts of this rhetoric would have been familiar enough to students of Warring States history. The rhetoric of moderation, after all, can be traced back to the Mohist classics of the pre-Qin era. But probably the image of the ruler as student of the Classics, to take one example, was honed Wrst during the court conferences held at the Shiqu Pavilion in 51 bc and at the White Tiger Hall in ad 79, convened to determine the ‘correct’ interpretations of diYcult passages in the canons and commentaries. Before that, certainly, the Son of Heaven had observed debates between rival classicists, but he reportedly bothered to intervene only when those debates touched upon matters relating to the throne’s legitimacy.56 Few moderns have noted the singularity of such events designed to place the Son of Heaven at the helm not only of public policy, but also of all classical learning. Custom dictated the format of these debates: one scholar began by posing a question to scholars of opposing views; another recorded the content of the debates; and the ruler in attendance, presumably after consultation, pronounced the Wnal verdict on each issue before the assembly. Such events lend plausibility to passages in the Han History, compiled before ad 92, that lovingly detail the ruler’s performance as ritual master and as teacher of the Classics. Scholasticism, the rhetoric of moderation, and oYce-holding tended to complement each other, since excessive displays of wealth outside the court almost always implied Wscal corruption or collusion by disloyal administrators of the realm. To balance the portrait of the ruler as primus inter pares, the case was also built in late Western and early Eastern Han classicizing texts that the ruler was made of qualitatively diVerent stuV than other men; hence his anointment, by the gods themselves, to a position of unparalleled 54 55 56

See Yantie lun, chap. 3. Bohu tong A/9a–b; Tjan, I, 232, equates junzi (‘gentleman’) with tianzi. See e.g. Shi ji 121/3122; Hou-Han shu, chap. 79A.

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authority. According to the latter accounts, no individual, regardless of merit, could hope to found his own dynasty without divine sanction or an especially fortuitous situation within the cyclical cosmic phases. Perhaps the undeniable economic constraints had some bearing on this: the Han court soon after Wudi abandoned eVorts to limit the size of landholdings allowed commoners. In consequence, neither the Eastern Han founder nor his successor, Mingdi (r. 57–75), found it easy to carry out the cadastral surveys that the ruling house needed to determine its tax base and to redistribute resources fairly. Nor could the throne readily requisition men and taxes from great magnates whose estates rivaled those of the smaller Warring States before 221 bc.57 The throne’s real weakness—exacerbated by the continual frontier raids of nomadic bands—pushed its inner circle of advisors to devise better methods to pre-empt questions about legitimacy. Whereas the pre-Qin criterion for judging the ruler’s mettle had been the ‘appropriateness’ of the policies he espoused, now the sanction of unseen forces was invoked with growing insistence, perhaps because such forces were hardly liable to the rational tests of appropriateness proposed by Xunzi and like-minded thinkers centuries before. This elevated rhetoric disguised a number of unsavory realities. The last rulers of Western Han had been notorious for neglecting their duties. One ruler, Chengdi (r. 33–7 bc), reportedly was so besotted with two sisterconsorts that he murdered his infant heir at their request. Chengdi’s sudden demise—of poison, said the rumors—paved the way for the most prominent member of a waiqi clan, Wang Mang, to displace the Liu ruling house and act as head of state for over twenty years (2 bc–ad 23) before the founder of a ‘restored’ Han, Guangwu (r. 25–57), ascended the throne. Unfortunately, Guangwu, unlike Liu Bang, did not systematically destroy the comradesin-arms who had brought him to power. In consequence, for generations these allies and their descendants determined the succession through their nominees for empress; as sole sources of empresses, the pool from which high oYcials were drawn was limited also. Meanwhile, the powerful families in the capital and countryside controlled appointments, asserting the prerogatives they associated with their inherited status. The Eastern Han rulers therefore tried to stake superior claims to extraordinary virtue, in the face of widespread lapses from the norms of civilized behavior laid down in the Five Classics to which all paid lip service. If we ignore this precipitous decline in the real power and authority of the late Western Han and Eastern Han rulers, the key arguments in Ban Biao’s (3–54) famous essay, ‘On the Mandate of Kings’ (‘Wang ming lun’), make 57

See Yang Lien-sheng 1956, 103–34.

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little sense.58 Long before Ban Biao, the Han ruling house had already proclaimed that the Lius had secured the throne, seemingly against all odds, thanks to their descent from the antique culture-hero Yao. But Ban Biao’s essay on legitimacy was the most tightly argued polemic to claim that ‘this sacred vessel, the rule of the empire, is transmitted by mandate, with the result that it cannot be won either by craft or by force’. As Ban Biao put it, ‘The masses of people see that the First Ancestor (i.e. Liu Bang) arose from among the commoners and they fail to comprehend the reasons for his rise.’ They believe that, happening upon a time of violence and disorder, Liu Bang secured the throne because he was able to ‘wield his sword’ in the desperate free-for-all in which ‘success went to the luckiest and swiftest’. To counter such treasonous views, Ban Biao oVered several proofs of the extraordinary hereditary claims of the Han ruling house, chief among them that a tradition associated with the Chunqiu (Annals), attributed to Confucius, supplied a genealogy tracing Yao’s descendants in an unbroken line from antiquity to the founder of Western Han.59 Building on this, Ban oVered Wve supplementary claims: (1) Destiny plays a huge role in all lives, so something as important as the receipt of Heaven’s mandate to rule All-under-Heaven certainly requires ‘the blessings of the gods’; (2) Truly extraordinary individuals, such as Xiang Yu and Wang Mang, managed only brieXy to wrest power and authority away from the Liu ruling family, which suggests that all rivals of the Han will perish in the end; (3) Physiognomic traits and heavenly signs heralding the major stages in the First Ancestor’s life were visible to all who came in contact with him; (4) Portents also accompanied the birth and early career of the founder of Eastern Han; and (5) In every generation, the rightful heirs to the Han throne have succeeded to the throne, so that the line of inheritance has never been altered.60 (This last claim was especially bold, given Ban’s membership in the very sort of prominent waiqi clan liable to interfere in the succession.) Ban Biao’s essay is obviously a work of theology, rather than logic, as it oVers no rational support to the legitimacy of the Eastern Han throne. What in the essay might have impressed its early readers? Given the mediocrity of many descendants of the Han ruling house, asserting Heaven’s blessing might have seemed inWnitely preferable to discussing recent events and policies. By the last decades of late Western Han and the Wrst decades of Eastern Han, in order to shore up support for the Liu clan, regular appeals were made to

58 59 60

de Bary 1960, i. 177–80, modiWed. Sui Hong (X. 78 bc) may well have been the Wrst to assert the Han genealogy from Yao. Loewe 1974, esp. chaps. 2 and 8–9.

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cosmic prerogatives associated with the Five Phases,61 as well as to the Wgure of Confucius as patron saint of Great Han. The arguments regarding the ruling Phases are complex, but their underlying motivation is simple enough to understand: No matter whether the Han ruled by Water, Earth, or by Fire (i.e. as successor or as conqueror of Zhou or Qin), its rule had been established through a process characterized as ‘natural’, ‘organic’, and ‘inevitable’. As Foucault observed, ‘Each society has its regime of truth, its ‘‘general politics’’ of truth, that is, the types of discourse which it accepts and makes function as true.’62 There is little doubt that in the general politics of the Han dynasty, the essay of Ban Biao, like other treatises and apocrypha on the Five Phases, was designed to render unthinkable certain types of questions: Why was it Liu Bang, a Wgure not manifestly more capable than many of his early rivals, who Wnally managed to consolidate all authority in his commoner family? And why did the Han house, long after it had sunk into corruption, debauchery, and ineYciency, continue to exercise its sway over far-Xung regions? By correlative theory, the Han house arose because the appointed time for the ascendancy of its patron Phase and color had arrived, and the Han would continue to prevail—regardless of its merits—until its patron Phase declined of its own accord. Only ‘When the dynasty’s fortunes entered the disaster cycle, j Would Han’s net snap its cords.’63 Among the faithful servants of the Liu house, the hope was simply to prolong the beneWcent phase of the allied cosmic cycle for as long as possible—and a long time was possible, if the ruler’s virtue persuaded Heaven—whose power conceivably surpassed that of the individual Powers—to intervene in or overrule the regular schedule of the Phases.64 The Han rulers must therefore see to it that their sacriWces and their conduct allowed them to continue to enjoy the divine sanction of Heaven’s highest deity, variously identiWed as Tian and Taiyi, the Grand Unity. Notably, by the Mandate of Heaven the ruling house was deemed ipso facto to have ‘lost the Mandate’ as soon as the reigning Son of Heaven was defeated in the Weld or forced to abdicate. Reference to the Mandate’s sway, in consequence, was as apt to prompt debate as stiXe it on such diverse topics as taxation, balances of power among regions and distinct social groups, and frontier defenses.65 61 The Lu¨shi chunqiu is the earliest attempt to apply Five Phases cosmology to dynastic sequences; and a memorial of 36 bc, the Wrst to equate the Five Phases with Heaven’s order (Han shu 73/3122). Loewe 2004, chaps. 14 and 15, says that ‘marked attention to the Five Phases’ was ‘relatively short-lived, perhaps from 50 BCE to 50 CE’. 62 Foucault 1980, 131. 63 Zuo Si, ‘Wei Capital Rhapsody’, in Knechtges, i. 433. 64 For a revisionist view of tianming, see Loewe 2004, chap. 13. 65 Di Cosmo 2002, esp. p. 171.

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Meanwhile, the Eastern Han rhetoric of moderation scaled back the potential scope of the sovereign’s civilizing potential; it was now deemed impractical to bring many outlying groups into the fold of ‘the king’s subjects’.66 A full embrace of the splendors like those of Han Wudi’s court would not again be accepted without protests for centuries, not until the second major period of uniWed rule that began under Sui.67 The three sample cores extracted above suggest that the rhetoric of uniWed rule varied over time. So far as is known, no justiWcations for the status quo were ever explicitly rejected; instead, the battery of justiWcations marshaled for the defense just kept on accumulating. As recorded in our literary sources, the same justiWcations were brought to bear upon new historical contexts; they were protean in nature and potentially inWnite in number. All we know is that ambivalence toward uniWed rule was felt as soon as uniWcation was certain. Hence, the desire to push our inquiry into another area, that of the visual record, where we Wnd a curious lacuna in the stock repertoire of Han visual political imagery, a lacuna that presents a striking contrast with that of Rome under Augustus.

A CONUNDRU M AND SOME PRELIMINARY ANSWERS If historians of China were to consider the careful methods by which the imperial imagery was propagated, they would immediately confront a conundrum. The most obvious diVerence between the Roman and Han visual worlds is the absence of imperial Han images on Han coins, an absence repeated, so far as we know, in public spaces and in household cults. Why did the Han court, which was not only mindful of the importance of public display in general but cognizant of Roman coins in particular, choose to have its rulers remain invisible to its own subjects? Literacy rates, we imagine, would have been roughly the same for the two Han dynasties as for the Roman Empire, and standards of living comparable, so why was visual imagery less potent or more taboo in the Han? Possibly images on other objects besides coins and sculptures conveyed the unparalleled authority of the Son of Heaven. To take one example, the TLV bronze mirrors (see Fig. 1 in Schmidt-Glintzer’s paper, below), a square superimposed on a circle with a raised boss at center, is thought to represent square earth and the domed vault of the sky. Perhaps the boss, apart from its obvious function, signiWes the One Man residing in the center, his capital.68 66 68

67 Bohu tong B/12b (Tjan, II, 516). Wenwu 1999: 10, 60–8. For the TLV mirrors, see Loewe and Blacker 1979, chap. 3; MacKenzie 2004, chap. 10.

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But if this is so, it is curious that such powerful symbols do not refer to individual rulers, given the insistence on particular rulers’ suasive examples. Perhaps there was no pressing need for ubiquitous imagery to advertise the scope and depth of rule by Qin and Han. As far as the eye could see, the dynasties controlled nearly all the areas suited to sedentary agriculture, a way of life supporting a higher and more secure standard of living than the seminomadic or nomadic. It may also have been the case that images of the ruler were rarely if ever seen in public because this rhetoric makes the ruler invisible so that he can be all things to all his subjects. But one wonders if ‘the hidden ruler’ motif was not itself devised to screen from view the everyday realities of the Han court, which was most typically ruled not by a strong adult male but by women in the back palace and by the senior males of the waiqi clans related by marriage to the ruling Liu clan.69 A Shi ji passage concerning one of Wudi’s maternal uncles, Tian Fen, drives home the real power of the waiqi: Tian Fen, then acting as regent for the throne, is plaintively asked by Wudi, ‘Are you Wnished, my lord, with making your appointments? I might like to appoint a few oYcials, too.’ As the Shi ji tells it, ‘Whatever suggestions Tian made were always adopted . . . Thus Tian’s position outweighed that of the ruler, in point of fact.’ On another occasion, Tian Fen requested a loan of the imperial artisans to work on his estates, to which the ruler replied angrily, ‘Why yes! And while you’re about it, why don’t you take my arsenal as well?’70 It was years before Wudi felt conWdent enough to resist his regent’s inXuence, and when he brought instances of Tian’s misconduct before the court for discussion, Wudi’s mother protested so vociferously that Wudi was forced to oVer the most abject apologies as her ‘humble servant’ (chen). Many of the most important generals assigned to frontier duty were drawn from the waiqi families also.71 Since the occupants of the Han throne, aside from the dynastic founders and their adult sons, so seldom took to the battleWeld, to display the images of either the Han sovereigns or their generals might well have undermined, rather than magniWed, the power and prestige of the Liu clan member ostensibly ruling at a given time. The force of Han rhetoric, when combined with the public absence of rulers’ portraits, has worked surprisingly well to screen our view of the actual wielders of Han power— those operating from behind the screen. 69 Strong aYnes began with Empress Lu¨. Wudi seems during most of his reign to have been the pawn of one or another waiqi family. And in Eastern Han, only the Wrst three emperors had reached adulthood at their accessions. 70 Shi ji 107/2844. 71 Contrast empires where the emperor had to demonstrate his military prowess. On waiqi power, see Holmgren 1995; Han shu 36/1957; and Liu Xiang’s Lienu¨ zhuan, written to teach Chengdi how to rule palace women.

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In light of the foregoing, it is incumbent upon us to reconsider the evidence we have for Han public spectacles.72 Apparently, certain forms of public display in highly ritualized settings fulWlled much the same sort of function as the numismatic or sculpted imperial images. (The display was ‘public’ in one of two senses: either it took place outside the palace complexes or, if inside, word of the display was meant to be relayed to the outside.) Ultimately, of course, the objective behind all such displays was control over not only the political narratives of unfolding events, but also over the sort of political memory that ‘takes root in things, in the concrete, in spaces, gestures, images, and objects’.73 It was crucial, then, to transform intangible ‘ideas, values, stories, myths, and the like’ into material realities through ceremonial events, symbolic objects, and public monuments, in which form they could impress the viewing public, especially when relatively low rates of literacy limited the utility of propaganda in writing. However much the rhetoricians and persuaders might parry and thrust in court battles over the choice of ideological props for the Han throne, spectacle alone had the capacity to convince participants and onlookers alike of the invincible authority of the throne, to make the ruler’s person or his oYce the main subject of reverent contemplation. Hence, the continual reiteration of the importance of ‘The Lord fully displaying a regal demeanor.’74 Somewhat to the surprise of those who naively take the aforementioned rhetoric of moderation seriously, the funds devoted to public display in late Western Han and Eastern Han courts were stupendous. Rulers worthy of commendation were expected to be ‘arrayed in gorgeous robes with checkered patterns in bright colors’, and ‘the boats they traveled in to be black, with engraved images of birds, adorned with tapestries and meshwork curtains, topped with azure-blue canopies, with pennants festooned with rhinoceros tails’.75 The Han throne spent most of its privy purse in rituals requiring public display: by one account, one-third of the purse went annually to gift clients and retainers; one-third to the upkeep of the ancestral shrines; and one-third to the building of impressive mausoleums for members of the ruling house.76 Meanwhile, the adult Han rulers intent upon building up their own authority invested in three sorts of spectacles employed on their behalf: (1) new palace liturgies designed to impress members of the court; (2) semi-public rituals locating the ruler as ritual head of the oYcials; and (3) rituals designed to 72

73 Nylan 2005, 3–49. Nora 1989, 9. The Wrst quotation comes from Zhang Heng, ‘Eastern Metropolis Rhapsody’, in Knechtges, i. 261; the second from Ban Gu, ‘Eastern Capital Rhapsody’, in Knechtges, i. 167. 75 76 Shuo yuan 11.13. Jinshu 60/1651. 74

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impart to commoners a sense of belonging to an ‘imagined community’ of supremely civilized subjects of the realm. A glimpse of court life, as recorded in the Hou-Han shu, reveals the Liu ruling house, initially unfamiliar with the trappings of power, as quick studies when it came to wielding the credenza and miranda of authority. Displays were put on for ever-larger audiences in the capital. The funeral casket of deceased rulers, along with their eVects, went on annual parade in the capital district; formal excursions, public games, ritual hunts, and tours of inspection were frequent in Han.77 Irregular donations of rank and of grain, silk, and other goods were meted out to those deemed eligible just often enough to keep subjects marveling at the throne’s muniWcence and largesse.78 On display, too, were allusions to the main traditions to which the throne laid claim, as when a bronze tripod ‘discovered’ during Wudi’s reign was shown as divine aYrmation of the Liu clan’s claim to the Mandate.79 One signal advantage of public display was that it, like skillful rhetoric, could present related or even mutually contradictory ideas, values, stories, myths, and the like within a single ceremony. Zhang Heng’s ‘Eastern Metropolis Rhapsody’ incorporates competing images of the ideal ruler into one ritual performance, as when the ruler presides in sublime and godlike silence over his bureaucrats before interjecting his persona into the gift-giving portion of the event. By such means the Han court sought to inculcate and establish notions of pleasure that would unite its leadership to its populace, following the splendid theories of ritual display that Mencius and Xunzi in pre-uniWcation era had prescribed to redistribute wealth and foster a sense of cohesion throughout all sectors of the population. So long as the court knew how to use material splendor to entice its subjects and to parade its members as admirable models of good conduct for the entire realm, awe and emulation would conjoin to induce the fully socialized behavior that made for supreme stability in politics.80 Many of the standard interpretations of the received texts now require thorough re-examination in light of new archeological discoveries, changing fashions in historiography, and a growing awareness that models borrowed either from late imperial China or from ‘the West’ are generally unsuited to explanations of the classical era in China. Of course, modern historians are unlikely to gather at this remove suYcient evidence to allow them to ascertain the degree to which the illiterate or barely literate understood or upheld the 77

See Loewe 1999, esp. 48–50; Ban Gu, ‘Western Capital Rhapsody’, in Knechtges, i. 135; Bodde 1975, 206–9. 78 Hanshi waizhuan 3.31; 4.11 (Hightower 1952, 113 and 135). 79 80 Shuo yuan 11.6. Nylan 2001, 73–124; and Nylan and Huang (forthcoming).

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court’s conception of itself. Not surprisingly, precise equivalents to that supremely satisfying assemblage called ‘Aristotle’ may not be found in early China either, though classical authors like Xunzi oVered highly sophisticated analyses of the way that ritual and a hierarchy of hereditary ranks (jue), when supported by spectacle and sumptuary regulations, could unite subjects and rulers alike in an orderly and mutually proWtable imagined community.81 The historian’s job is less to lament the sources we lack than to begin to assess the unimaginably rich imagery, literary and visual, that we already possess. References Bagley, Robert W., ‘Shang Archaeology’, in: Michael Loewe and Edward L. Shaughnessy (eds.), The Cambridge History of Ancient China: From the Origins of Civilization to 221 B.C., Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1999, 124–231. Bodde, Derk, Festivals in Classical China: New Year and Other Annual Observances during the Han Dynasty, 206 B.C. –A.D. 220. Princeton (Princeton University Press) 1975. Bohu tong 白虎通. Sibu beiyao 四部備要 edn. Chunqiu fanlu 春秋繁露. Siku quanshu 四庫全書 edn. de Bary, W. Theodore et al. (eds.), Sources of Chinese Tradition, 2 vols. New York (Columbia University Press) 1960. Di Cosmo, Nicola, China and its Ancient Enemies: The Rise of Nomadic Power in East Asian History. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2002. Foucault, Michel, Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972–77, ed. and trans. Colin Gordon. Brighton (Harvester Press) 1980. Gu Jiegang 顧詰剛, ‘Qin Han tongyi youlai he Zhanguo ren duiyu shijie de xiangxiang 秦漢統一和戰國人對於世界的想像’, in: Gushi bian 古史辯, vol. ii, Beiping (Pushe) 1927, 1–16. Han Chang’an cheng Weiyang gong: 1980–1989 nian kaogu fajue baogao 漢常安 城未陽宮: 1980–9 年考古發掘報告, edn. Zhongguo shehuikexueyuan 中國社 會科學院. Beijing (Zhongguo da baikequanshu) 1996. Han Feizi. Han Feizi jijie 韓非子集解, 2 vols., by Chen Qiyou 陳奇猷. Shanghai (Shanghai renmin) 1974. Hanshi waizhuan 韓氏外傳. Siku quanshu 四庫全書 edn. Hightower, James R., Han shih wai chuan: Han Ying’s Illustrations of the Didactic Application of the Classic of Songs. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 1952. Holmgren, Jennifer, Marriage, Kinship, and Power in Northern China. Aldershot (Variorum) 1995. Hui, Victoria Tin-bor, War and State Formation in Ancient China and Early Modern Europe. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2005. 81 See e.g. the opening passages of Xunzi’s ‘Li lun’ (‘On Ritual’). For Aristotle as construct, see Moraux and Wiesner 1983; and Reynolds and Wilson 1991.

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Kalinowski, Marc, ‘La production des manuscrits dans la Chine ancienne: une approche codicologique de la bibliothe`que fune´raire de Mawangdui’, Asiatische Studien/E´tudes Asiatiques, 59: 1 (2005), 131–68. Keightley, David N., ‘Peasant Migration, Politics, and Philosophical Response in Chou and Ch’in China’, unpublished paper, 1977. Knechtges, David R., Wen xuan or Selections of ReWned Literature by Xiao Tong, vols. i–iii. Princeton (Princeton University Press) 1982, 1987, 1996. Knoblock, John, Xunzi: A Translation and Study of the Complete Works, 3 vols. Stanford (Stanford University Press) 1988–94. —— and Riegel, JeVrey, The Annals of Lu¨ Buwei: A Complete Translation and Study. Stanford (Stanford University Press) 2000. Loewe, Michael, ‘The Orders of Aristocratic Rank of Han China’, T’oung pao, 48 (1960), 97–174. Loewe, Michael, Crisis and ConXict in Han China. London (George Allen & Unwin) 1974. —— ‘State Funerals of the Han Empire’, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, 71 (1999), 5–72. —— The Men who Governed Han China: Companion to a Biographical Dictionary of the Qin, Former Han and Xin Periods. Leiden/Boston (Brill) 2004. —— ‘Questions at Issue’, unpublished paper, 2005. —— and Blacker, Carmen, Ways to Paradise: The Chinese Quest for Immortality. London (George Allen & Unwin) 1979. Lu¨shi chunqiu 呂氏春秋. Siku quanshu 四庫全書 edn. MacKenzie, Colin, ‘Liubo: The Five Hundred Year Craze’, in: id. (ed.), Asian Games: The Art of Contest. New York (Asia Society) 2004. Montgomery, Scott L., Science in Translation: Movements of Knowledge through Cultures and Time. Chicago (University of Chicago Press) 2000. Moraux, Paul, and Wiesner, J., Zweifelhaftes im Corpus Aristotelicum. Berlin (de Gruyter), 1983. Nora, Pierre, ‘Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Me´moires’, Representations, 26 (1989). Nylan, Michael, ‘The Politics of Pleasure’, Asia Major 3rd ser., 14: 1 (2001), 73–124. —— ‘Toward an Archaeology of Writing, Ritual, and the Culture of Public Display in the Classical Period (475 B.C.E.–220 C.E.)’, in: Martin Kern (ed.), Text and Ritual in Early China, Seattle/London (University of Washington Press) 2005, 3–49. —— and Huang, Harrison, ‘Mencius on Pleasure’, in: Marthe Chandles and Ronnie Littlejohn (eds.), Polishing the Chinese Mirror: Essays in Honor of Henry Rosemont, La Salle, Jll. (Association of Chinese Philosophers of America and Open Court) 2007, 1–26. Reynolds, L. D., and Wilson, N. G., Scribes and Scholars: A Guide to the Transmission of Greek and Latin Literature. 3rd edn. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1991. Shuo yuan 說苑. Siku quanshu 四庫全書 edn. Vankeerberghen, Griet, ‘A Trinity of Meaning’, Early China, 29 (forthcoming). Xing Yitian 邢義田, Qin Han shi lungao 秦漢史論稿. Taipei (Dongda) 1987.

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Xunzi 荀子. Xunzi yinde 荀子引得 edn. (Harvard-Yenching Institute Sinological Index Series, Suppl. no. 22). Repr. Taipei (Chengwen) 1966. Yang, Lien-sheng, ‘Great Families of the Eastern Han’, in: E-tu Zen Sun and John De Francis (eds.), Chinese Social History. Washington (American Council of Learned Societies) 1956, 103–34. Yang, Xiaoneng et al. (eds.), New Perspectives on China’s Past: Chinese Archaeology in the Twentieth Century. New Haven (Yale University Press) 2004. Yantie lun 鹽鐵論. Siku quanshu 四庫全書 edn.

B. Historiography and the Emerging Empire

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Imagining the Empire? Concepts of ‘Primeval Unity’ in Pre-imperial Historiographic Tradition Yuri Pines (Jerusalem)

In the year 221 bc, the state of Qin eliminated the last of its rivals, thereby unifying the ‘Chinese’1 world after centuries of endless wars. Proudly, the king of Qin assembled his oYcials to discuss administrative and ritual adjustments appropriate to commemorate his achievements. The oYcials in response praised the king: In antiquity, the lands of the Five Thearchs2 were one thousand li squared, beyond which was the overlords’ domain and the aliens’ domain. The overlords sometimes came to the court and sometimes did not, and the Son of Heaven was unable to regulate this. Now, your Majesty has raised a righteous army, punishing the savage criminals, has paciWed and stabilized All-under-Heaven, turning the territory between the seas into commanderies and counties; and laws and ordinances have a single source. From antiquity it has never been so; the Five Thearchs could not reach this!3

This declaration, echoed elsewhere in Qin’s propaganda, proclaims the superiority of the First Emperor of Qin (Qin Shihuangdi, literally, the First August Thearch, r. 246–221–210 bc) over the former paragons, such as the legendary Five Thearchs (wu di) or the semi-legendary founders of the Three Dynasties (Xia, Shang, and Zhou, c. 2000–256 bc).4 It sets a good framework This research was supported by the Israel Science Foundation (grant No. 726/02-1). I am indebted to the conference participants for their insightful remarks on the earlier draft. 1 The term ‘Chinese’ is certainly anachronistic with regard to pre-imperial ‘China’ and is used here only as a scholarly convention. 2 Five Thearchs (wu di) are legendary pre-dynastic rulers of ‘China’; I adopt the term ‘Thearch’ for di, since this neologism aptly conveys both the divine and the mundane aspects of di’s power. 3 Shi ji 6/236. 4 For a similar statement, see e.g. the Langye inscription (Shi ji 6/245; Kern 2000, 31–4).

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for comparing Chinese and Roman imperial experience. The diVerence between both empires is twofold, with the Chinese being both newer and older than the Roman. The Roman imperium was an outcome of a long process of Rome’s expansion, and its birth date cannot be clearly agreed upon. The Chinese empire was ostensibly a new creation of 221 bc: by adopting a new title and establishing a new political and ritual system, the First Emperor consciously distanced himself from his predecessors, the territorial scope and eVectiveness of whose rule were incomparably smaller than those of Qin. However, the mere existence of earlier examples of the supposedly uniWed rule is another source of diVerence between Rome and China. The Roman uniWcation of the Mediterranean world, or more precisely, of its western part, lacked historical or mythical precedents,5 while the case of Qin was markedly diVerent. The notion of a single omnipotent ruler who should preside over ‘All-under-Heaven’ (tianxia) was allegedly pronounced in Chinese political tradition ever since the establishment of the Zhou rule, if not earlier, and it was not impossible for the First Emperor to claim that he merely restores the normative situation of the past. That the emperor did not proclaim inheritance from former rulers is a point of bewilderment. Presenting himself as a restorer rather than a founder of a new entity could very well serve his dynastic legitimacy and probably diminish hatred from the people of the conquered states toward Qin. Why then did the emperor—who did not hesitate to appropriate earlier cultural traditions in many other aspects of his rule—discard this option? Was it merely a manifestation of his hubris, or did this rejection of the past models reXect deeper tendencies in pre-imperial historiography and thought? To answer this question I shall focus on views of primeval unity in the texts dating from the Western Zhou (c.1046–771 bc), Chunqiu (Springs and Autumns, 771–453 bc), and Zhanguo (Warring States, 453–221 bc) periods. When did the tradition of presenting dynastic founders or pre-dynastic rulers as omnipotent universal monarchs begin? To what extent did such presentations of the past inXuence the drive toward uniWcation during the centuries of disunion prior to the establishment of the Qin empire? And why did the First Emperor discard those historical precedents? I hope that the answers will help to elucidate complex interrelations between political thought and historiography in pre-imperial China going beyond the common view that Chinese thinkers uniformly ‘used the past to serve the present’ (yi gu shi jin). 5 See Mutschler’s and Huang Yang’s paper in this volume for the gradual comprehension of Rome’s exceptionality by its historians. It is not surprising perhaps, that the first historian who placed Rome into imperial sequence was Polybius, an oriental outsider. In the Western Mediterranean the universal rule of Rome was entirely unprecedented.

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1 . T HE BACKGRO UN D : RU LE R’S O M NI P OT EN C E IN WE STERN ZHOU TEXTS The replacement of the Shang by the Zhou dynasty around 1046 bc was the single most important event in the Wrst millennium of China’s written history. Although details of this replacement are marred by later legends and biased accounts, it is clear that shortly after its victory Zhou emerged as an unrivaled superpower in the middle and lower Yellow River basin and beyond. The power of the new dynasty was manifested in its Wrst years when the dynastic founders, King Wu (d. c.1043 bc) and his de facto heir, the Duke of Zhou (d. c.1035 bc), ordered their kin and allies to establish numerous Wefs at strategic sites in the newly occupied areas. The imposition of the conquering elite on local population, just as concomitant massive relocation of the Shang subjects to the periphery, passed without massive acts of deWance, which suggests widespread compliance with the Zhou rule. The prestige of the new dynasty was extraordinarily high and for this early period we can deWnitely speak of the Zhou rule as both more eVective and much more extensive territorially than that of the late Shang dynasty.6 As we shall see, this early dynastic potency later inspired those who attributed the Zhou founders and their predecessors with universal and unrivaled power in All-under-Heaven. In the course of the Western Zhou history, the dynastic power began declining, as nominal Wefs became increasingly autonomous, and erstwhile allies turned against the kings. Nonetheless, religious and cultural prestige of the Zhou remained largely intact allowing the kings to continue their powerful presence throughout most of the original realm. Religiously, the kings monopolized the position as the sole representatives of the supreme deity, Heaven (tian), as exempliWed in their exclusive honoriWc title of ‘Sons of Heaven’ (tianzi).7 Being a sort of pontiWces maximi, the kings (or their aides) dictated changes in ritual practices and norms throughout their realm; hence, long after their power had declined they were able to initiate series of profound ritual changes (the so-called Western Zhou ritual reform), which were promptly adopted throughout the Zhou world. The metropolitan

6 For the territorial extent of the Shang power, see Keightley 1982; for the early Zhou, see Shaughnessy 1999, 307–13. 7 From the very beginning of their dynasty the Zhou kings claimed that they acted in Heaven’s name, see e.g., the He zun, cast in 1036 bc, at the very beginning of Zhou rule (discussed by Shaughnessy 1997, 77–8). The title of ‘Sons of Heaven’ was appropriated later, but by the middle of the Western Zhou period it was already firmly associated with the kings (Takeuchi 1999). Throughout the Zhou history this title remained restricted to the Zhou monarchs.

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area remained moreover the unrivaled cultural center of the realm, dictating norms regarding aesthetical tastes and especially written culture.8 This ongoing prestige of the royal house preserved much of its inXuence even when its economic and military prowess had signiWcantly declined. This background allows us to understand the appearance of nascent prounity sentiments in the Western Zhou texts. While most of the extant Zhou portions of the Classic of Poetry (Shijing) and Classic of Documents (Shujing) were prone to manipulations by later scribes and thinkers and may not be entirely reliable, we have also plenty of contemporaneous bronze inscriptions that are useful in restoring aspects of the Zhou oYcial ideology.9 From the inscriptions, as well as from the received texts we can discern many ideas which would later be incorporated into the oYcial imperial lexicon of the uniWed rule, in particular frequent hails of dynastic founders as rulers of the Four Directions (sifang) and paciWers of the ‘myriad states’ (wanbang); such references are particularly visible in late Western Zhou texts.10 We should be cautious, however, in projecting later interpretations of these statements backward into the early Zhou time. While understandably territorial expansion under the dynastic founders was lauded by late Western Zhou statesmen, these laudations do not necessarily imply that the royal power was considered truly universal. First, it is clear from early texts that broad as it is, the Zhou realm was not all inclusive; aliens living beyond the Zhou cultural sphere were not supposed to heed the king’s orders and clashes with them were treated as foreign invasions and not as internal ‘rebellions’.11 Second and more importantly, there is no evidence in the Zhou texts that

8

For the ritual reform initiated in the second half of the Western Zhou, see Falkenhausen 2000; 2006, 29–73. For the importance of the metropolitan area for the Zhou bronze production and especially the written culture, see Li Feng 2002. 9 The dating of many supposedly early Zhou documents, particularly those assembled in the Shujing, is highly problematic, as many of them might have been modified (or even invented) centuries after the alleged date of their compilation. See Jiang Shanguo 1988; cf. Vogelsang 2002. My discussion, therefore, focuses on those aspects of the early Zhou ideology which have inscriptional corroboration. 10 See e.g. Shangshu, ‘Luo gao’: 15/216b; Mao Shi, 177 ‘Liu yue’ 10/425b; 235 ‘Wen Wang’ 16/505c; 294 ‘Huan’ 19/604c. For bronze inscriptions, see Xing-zhong and Shi Qiang-pan (Shirakawa, vol. l, add. Nos. 15, 335–70 and 387–93); Yu-ding (Shirakawa, vol. xxvii, Nos. 162, 442–63); and the recently discovered Qiu-pan discussed by Li Xueqin 2003, 66–7; all these inscriptions date from the second half of the Western Zhou. 11 Zhou inscriptions clearly distinguish between external and internal rivals. Thus, the Jinhou Su-bianzhong inscription (discussed by Shim 1997) differentiates between the states that are considered subordinate to the Zhou, and which the king ‘inspects’, and the alien Suyi tribesmen whom the king ‘invades’; similarly, the Xi Jia-pan inscription distinguishes between the alien enemies, the Xianyun, and the internal ‘rebels’, the Huaiyi (Shaughnessy 1999, 346; Shirakawa, vol. xxxiii, No. 191).

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the kings were supposed to exercise eVective authority in their nominal Wefs, the rulers of which, while being ritually subordinate to the kings, were apparently considered entirely autonomous within their borders.12 It seems, therefore, that references to the royal prowess in Western Zhou texts do not necessarily imply that the monarch’s power was envisioned as imperial-like universal and omnipotent rule. Similar caution should be exercised with regard to another important contribution of the early Zhou texts to the later imperial historiographic tradition, namely projection of the uniWed dynastic rule back into the preShang past. The supposedly early Zhou documents clearly state that the Xia dynasty preceded the Shang and was replaced by the latter much like the Shang itself was later replaced by the Zhou. Other texts mention a legendary hero Yu, who overcame the primeval Xood and later ordered the Earth. Since Yu is clearly a universal godlike hero, and since he had been later identiWed as the founder of the Xia dynasty, it may be inferred that already in the Western Zhou the notion of the universal Xia rule (followed by the Shang and by the Zhou itself) was Wrmly established. The problem of this inference is the lack of clear Western Zhou evidence which connects Yu with the Xia dynasty, and if so, there are no clear indications that the Xia should be considered a universal power.13 In the Western Zhou we may therefore discern certain seeds of the future perception of All-under-Heaven eternally ruled by a single dynasty, but there is no Wrm evidence to conclude that such a view of the past was indeed promulgated by the Zhou elites. Another early Zhou idea that would enormously inXuence the future imperial rhetoric is a statement made in the late Western Zhou ‘Bei shan’ Ode of the Shijing: ‘Everywhere under Heaven is the King’s land, each of those who live on the land is the King’s servant.’14 In later periods this line was repeatedly evoked to justify limitless authority of the monarch, but once again it would be wrong to jump to far-reaching conclusions, particularly if we

12 The superiority of the kings over the fiefs’ rulers is unquestioned: e.g. the Jinhou Su-bianzhong inscription mentioned above clearly shows that the king could ‘inspect’ the fiefs and order their rulers to support him militarily. It is much less clear, however, whether or not the royal intervention in the fiefs’ internal affairs was legitimate. Occasionally, for instance, the kings could intervene in the succession struggles within the fief (see e.g. Shaughnessy 1999, 347), but such interventions were apparently considered as overstretching the royal authority and were accordingly criticized (see e.g. Guoyu, 1.7 ‘Zhou yu, shang’: 1/22–3). 13 The earliest notice of Yu’s merits in subduing the flood is the recently published Bin gong xu inscription, dated to the reign of King Gong of Zhou (c.922–900); see Xing Wen 2003. However, neither this inscription, nor any other reliably datable Western Zhou text, identifies Yu as a progenitor of the Xia dynasty. 14 Mao Shi, 205 ‘Bei shan’: 13/463.

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read the Ode in the context of contemporary realities. The ‘Bei shan’ Ode deals exclusively with the royal domain, its author lamenting the decline of the royal authority in the vicinity of the capital. The reference to ‘Allunder-Heaven’—which by itself is extraordinarily rare in early Zhou texts— does not necessarily imply universality either. As I noted elsewhere in the Western Zhou period the term tianxia could refer occasionally to the area under the direct rule of the Son of Heaven—i.e. the royal domain—and not to the universe, as happens in later texts.15 To summarize, during the Western Zhou period we may discern foundations of the later ideas of unity, such as the notion of universal ritual supremacy of the Zhou kings, their supposedly limitless authority within their domain, if not within the entire realm, laudation of territorial expansion and possible emergence of a view of the eternally present single locus of worldly authority. Nonetheless, all these do not suYce to conclude that a kind of ‘quasi-imperial’ outlook emerged already during the early Zhou period. By the end of the Western Zhou period, as the dynastic rule disintegrated, we may discern voices of nostalgia for the past glory, but not proposals of the renewed uniWcation in the present. The idea of the universal empire did not emerge yet, although sprouts of the future pro-uniWcation sentiments are observable already in this early stage of Chinese political tradition.

2 . WOR L D FA L L S A PA RT: M E M O R I E S O F U N I T Y AT THE AGE OF DISINTEGRATION The shaky unity of the Zhou world was dealt a mortal blow in 771 bc, when the coalition of dissenting overlords and the alien tribesmen, the Quanrong, had overrun the royal capital, killed King You (r. 781–771 bc) and caused his heir to relocate the capital from the Wei river valley to the east. At their new location, near the modern Luoyang, Sons of Heaven lacked the resources of the former domain, and were militarily and economically powerless in comparison with powerful overlords (zhuhou). While the kings tried initially to maintain their leading position, soon they faced numerous challenges, beginning with an open attack by one of their closest allies, Lord Zhuang of Zheng (r. 743–701 bc) in 707 bc, and ending with series of internal rebellions within the royal family, which turned the kings into hapless prote´ge´s of their nominal subordinates, rulers of Qi and Jin. As the kings could no longer exercise their role as guarantors of order ‘within the Four Directions’ (sifang), 15

See Pines 2002b, 101–4.

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the Zhou world sank in endless wars which were to continue, almost uninterrupted, for Wve centuries. The period of political disintegration that began shortly after the capital relocation did not imply, however, that the royal authority had completely evaporated. At least one crucial aspect of the king’s power—his position at the head of ritual hierarchy—remained intact. Since the aristocratic Chunqiu society was based on strict adherence to the hierarchical ritual norms inherited from the Western Zhou period, overall sidelining of the Sons of Heaven would be unthinkable. Thus, while many of the royal ritual prerogatives were ‘usurped’ by the haughty overlords, the latter still dared not overstep the limits of acceptable ritual behavior. In particular the exclusive position of the kings as ‘Sons of Heaven’ remained unshaken, and it would remain so even into the subsequent Zhanguo period when the overlords adopted the royal title. The king’s unabated ritual superiority contrasted sharply with their actual weakness, resulting in an increasing gap between ritual and political reality, which is duly reXected in contemporary historical writings as well. The increasing tension between the actual state of events and ritual considerations is evident from the book which the name of the Chunqiu period is derived from—the Spring and Autumn Annals (Chunqiu; hereafter: Annals) from the state of Lu. This short text comprising succinct records of major activities of the Lu court and of the allied states during the period of 722 to 481 bc (or 479 bc), was eventually elevated to the position of the quasisacred revelation of the wisdom of Confucius (551–479 bc). For centuries this misinterpretation hindered scholarly analysis of the Annals. Elsewhere I have tried to show that the Annals might have originated in ritual records apparently made to inform the ancestors of the Lu lords of their descendants’ major activities. Read from this perspective, the text provides a useful viewpoint of political and ritual ideas of the eponymous epoch.16 The Annals are extraordinarily strict in their observance of ritual norms. Thus, the overlords are referred to exclusively according to their original ranks determined at the dawn of the Zhou era, notwithstanding their usurpation of higher titles; hence, leaders of such important polities as the southern superpowers, Chu, Wu, and Yue, whose rulers proclaimed themselves kings, are named in the Annals merely as ‘barons’ (zi). The Annals continuously emphasize the superiority of the Zhou house: the kings are respectfully referred to as ‘Heavenly kings’ (tianwang), and their envoys are invariably presented as presiding over the interstate alliances, which preserves the ritual illusion of international royal leadership. The reality reXected in the Annals is thus that of unshakeable royal superiority. The Annals, to a certain extent, 16

For my analysis of the Annals, see Pines 2002a.

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substitute political reality with ritual one, and this substitution will be, as we shall see, of signiWcant importance in Zhanguo and later historiography. Important as they are, the Annals, however, do not represent Chunqiu historiographic tradition in its entirety. An alternative, and no less inXuential view of Chunqiu history comes from the Zuo zhuan (hereafter: Zuo), a text which comments upon the Annals, but may be read also as an entirely independent historical writing. Unlike the Annals, which reXect a ritualistic thread in ancient Chinese history writing, the Zuo reXects what may be called ‘secular tradition’. Elsewhere I identiWed its major sources as narrative histories prepared by the scribes at the courts of major Chunqiu states. These histories were probably conceived of as political education materials for contemporary statesmen, providing them with useful information about the past events plus allowing the readers to draw proper lessons from successes and failures of earlier leaders. Being the product of this historiographic tradition, the Zuo provides its readers with much richer information than the terse Annals, and although the reliability of many of its accounts is disputable, in my opinion the bulk of the Zuo narrative does reXect actual conditions of the Chunqiu period and beliefs of contemporary statesmen.17 The immense richness of the Zuo turns it into an invaluable source for reconstruction of Chunqiu attitudes toward the idea of uniWed rule. A reader of the Zuo will not fail to notice the striking lack of references to the issue of unity in the past or in the present, which contrasts the Zuo sharply with almost any major later historical text. The Zuo author and his protagonists do not consider the multi-state system of the Chunqiu age as an aberration but rather as a normal, though not an ideal state of events. The Zuo pays little if any attention to the ritual superiority of the Zhou monarchs; thus it often neglects proper ritual terminology and refers to rulers of southern states as ‘kings’ (wang)—a designation that would be unthinkable in the Annals. Nor does the Zuo conceal the gloomy situation of the royal house, narrating in great detail the kings’ ongoing humiliations, their weakness and their ever-decreasing impact on the interstate dynamics. Moreover, the Zuo does not express any particular opposition to this state of events, evidently taking the decline of the Zhou as fait accompli. The Zuo protagonists are preoccupied neither with the restoration of the Zhou glory nor with political uniWcation of the realm, but rather with achieving viable modes of coexistence between rival superpowers.18 The Zuo thus appears in retrospect 17

For different views of the nature of the Zuo, see Pines 2002a and Schaberg 2001. Actually, the only statesmen in the Zuo who express explicit interest in ‘obtaining Allunder-Heaven’ (de tianxia) are the haughty leaders of the southern superpower, Chu, particularly its notorious King Ling (r. 540–529), which hardly turns unification into a legitimate goal (Zuo, Zhao 13: 1350; see also Zhao 19: 1402; Zhao 26: 1474–5). For more of the views of interstate order in the Zuo, see Pines 2002a, 105–35. 18

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as distinctively neglectful of the uniWcation perspective, accepting the multistate world as normal state of events. When we turn to the historical outlook of the Zuo protagonists we Wnd that it similarly lends no support to the idea of uniWed rule. The age of dynastic founders is occasionally mentioned in the text, but never is referred to as a model of political unity. To the contrary, most protagonists invoke early Zhou regulations to support the legitimacy of the current multi-state system (which was indeed rooted in massive enfeoVments at the beginning of the Zhou rule) and not to call for the restoration of political unity.19 The universality of the early Zhou rule is never mentioned in the Zuo and such terms as ‘myriad states’ or ‘All-under-Heaven’ as a politically uniWed realm rarely if at all appear on its pages. Two examples from the Zuo narrative will clarify the absence of the uniWcation agenda from this text. The Wrst is one of the ideologically most important speeches in the entire Zuo, namely a panegyric to the rule by ritual pronounced by the prominent Qi statesman, Yan Ying (c.580–520 bc). As many of his contemporaries—but with a higher degree of analytical clarity— Yan Ying came to the conviction that only comprehensive implementation of the Zhou ritual norms can save the society from complete disintegration, the seeds of which were apparent in his home state. I have analyzed this speech in greater detail elsewhere,20 and shall deal here only with the part of it which focuses on the eYciency of ritual norms as a means to preserve the extant sociopolitical order intact: According to ritual, the family’s favors do not exceed those of the state; the people do not drift; peasants do not move (to new lands), artisans and merchants do not change (their occupation), shi do not overXow (the nobles), oYcials do not exceed (their responsibilities), and the nobles dare not seize the lord’s proWts.21

Yan Ying proposed his vision of ritual-governed society as the only eVective means to restore social order in general and to prevent the descent of power in the state of Qi to the hands of the powerful ministerial lineage, the Chen (Tian), in particular. His recipe for curing the turmoil was simple: if everybody preserves ritual norms there will be no transgressions of social hierarchy. The order proposed by Yan Ying refers to every major segment of contemporary society, from the lord to his ministers, ordinary nobles, members of the lower nobility (the shi), and the commoners. It is striking therefore that the Son of Heaven is conspicuously absent from this account. The major reason for this omission may be contextual: Yan Ying’s patron and 19 20

See e.g. Zuo, Xi 24: 419–25; Xi 28: 474; Ding 4: 2535–42. 21 See Pines 2000a, 15–17. Zuo, Zhao 26: 1480.

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the addressee of the speech, Lord Jing of Qi (r. 547–490 bc), would not like being reminded of the ritual superiority of the Zhou monarch, since this would imply that the lord himself must cede his sovereignty to the king. But there is more behind Yan Ying’s omission: this astute statesman might have realized that the power of the royal house had deteriorated beyond the point of possible recovery, and preferred then to focus on solving social turmoil in a single state leaving the aVairs of All-under-Heaven beyond his immediate concern. This local focus is evident in many other Chunqiu speeches scattered in the Zuo. It may be demonstrated from the roughly contemporary account about the events in the state of Chu. King Ling (r. 540–529 bc) sheltered fugitives in his newly built palace, apparently enrolling them as possible supporters against the unruly nobles. He was reprimanded by one of his chief aides, Shen Wuyu, who said among others: According to the ancient system, the Son of Heaven arranges territorial divisions, while the overlords order their Wefs. Within the Wef ’s territory which land is not that of the lord? Among those who enjoy the land’s harvest, who is not the lord’s servant? Hence, the Ode says: ‘Everywhere under Heaven is the King’s land, each of those who live on the land is the King’s servant.’22

The king was reprimanded for indirect recognition of his vassals’ autonomy: indeed, if he considered the nobles’ subjects as his own servants, he should not have sheltered them but rather pardoned them altogether. Shen Wuyu’s support of centralization, akin to later Zhanguo approaches, contrasts sharply however with his view of the authority of the Zhou king. The task of the dynastic founders was that of conferring the Wefs to the overlords; after the Wefs had been conferred the kings were no longer considered masters of the Wef ’s land, which should be henceforth ruled exclusively by the overlord. The ‘Bei shan’ Ode’s reference to the royal authority is reinterpreted by Shen Wuyu as supporting the authority of the overlord rather than of the Zhou king. While Shen Wuyu traces the origins of the current multi-state world to the foundations of the Zhou dynasty, he clearly rejects a notion of his ruler’s possible allegiance to the Zhou house. That both Qi and Chu ministers considered the multi-state world as a normative state of aVairs is symptomatic of the Zuo approach toward the idea of unity. The authors of this text and of its original sources neither deny ritual superiority of the Zhou king, nor neglect the past importance of the Zhou; but this respect to the royal past is not translated into the call for the restoration of the uniWed rule in the present. Neither the author(s), nor 22

Zuo, Zhao 7: 1283–4.

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their protagonists had envisioned the empire. This lack of uniWcation perspective contrasts the Zuo with later texts and makes it an unparalleled monument to the non-monistic view of China’s past.

3. FUTURE IN THE PAST: EARLY Z HANGUO VISIONS O F U NITY Two centuries of eVorts by Chunqiu statesmen to stabilize the multi-state system ended in Wasco. By the late sixth century, the system of alliances that dominated interstate relations during most of the Chunqiu period collapsed, and the Zhou world entered into a protracted period of war of all against all. Concomitantly, military changes brought about a sharp increase both in the scope of military conXicts and the degree of devastation inXicted upon participants. The endemic and ever-escalating warfare of the ‘Warring States’ period became a major source of concern for contemporary statesmen and thinkers. As it became evident that no diplomatic solutions would ensure peace among the rivals, thinkers became increasingly receptive to the idea of political uniWcation of ‘All-under-Heaven’ as the only feasible way to universal peace. Elsewhere, I discussed in detail the formation and evolution of the ‘Great Unity’ paradigm which had the most profound impact on China’s history; there I tried to show that the notion of ‘stability is in unity’ was endorsed by almost any known thinker, with diVerences focusing on the ways to achieve unity rather than on the goal.23 Here I shall focus on the importance of the past precedents of unity—imagined or real—in shaping the thinkers’ argumentation in favor of future uniWcation. Was the uniWed empire envisioned as a novel solution, or was it supposed to be merely a restoration of the Zhou—or earlier—rule? The answer to this question is not simple. On one hand, we can discern a yearning for the Golden Age of the early Zhou already in the late Chunqiu period. Thus, for instance, the inscription on the Jingong-dian probably dating from the late sixth or early Wfth century, records the following statement by a lord of Jin: My august ancestor Lord Tang (the founder of Jin), received the Great Mandate, supported King Wu of Zhou, harmonized and transformed the hundred Man [aliens], broadly ruled the Four Directions, arriving at the royal court, so that nobody did not come to the King.24 23

See Pines 2000b. For the saying ‘stability is in unity’, see n. 51 below. Shirakawa, vol. xxxv, No. 202; for the dating of the inscription, see Shirakawa’s discussion, ibid., 110–22; cf. Li Xueqin 1985. 24

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The inscription was made on a vessel placed in the ancestral temple of the Jin lords, and it naturally embellishes the achievements of the vessel’s addressees, the meritorious ancestors. Aside from the inevitable Xattery, however, the inscription may reXect current discourse at the court of Jin. For almost two centuries, rulers of this powerful state tried to pose as protectors of the Zhou kings who should pacify the realm on the king’s behalf. Apparently, the inXated image of the founder of the state of Jin, Tangshu, as the pillar of the early Zhou order reXects a kind of self-legitimation by Tangshu’s successors, the lords of Jin, one of whom explicitly promises further in the inscription to emulate his ancestor’s achievements. But the inscription also discloses deeper sentiments: its explicit statement that ‘nobody did not serve the King’ at the beginning of the Zhou is indicative of the dream of universal peace under the aegis of a powerful king—a dream which became increasingly unattainable by the time this inscription was cast.25 Perhaps, speaking of the past, the Jin rulers were dreaming of the present—of the possibility to restore uniWed rule and put an end to the lasting bloodshed. Yearning for the orderly rule at the beginning of the Zhou period, when ‘rites, music, and punitive expeditions’ were issued exclusively by Sons of Heaven, is discernible in the Lunyu, a book that supposedly represents the views of Confucius, the Wrst major thinker of the so-called age of the ‘Hundred Schools’ of thought.26 The Lunyu presents not only longing for the Zhou but another important development in legitimation of the uniWed rule: it is the Wrst text to routinely invoke the past sage rulers, each of whom allegedly presided over the uniWed realm, bringing peace and tranquility to his subjects. In sharp distinction from the Zuo where pre-Zhou rulers were mentioned only in passing if at all, in the Lunyu the importance of these monarchs rapidly increases, and each of them, such as the legendary monarchs Shun and Yu, or Tang, the founder of the Shang dynasty, are credited with possession (you) of All-under-Heaven.27 This attribution of universal rule to the former paragons may be indicative of Confucius’ support for legitimacy of uniWcation in the present. Mozi (c.460–390 bc), a second major pre-imperial thinker, similarly sought in the past legitimation for unity in the present. In the Mozi, the emphasis on the universal rule of the former sage kings is much more pronounced than in the Lunyu, and it directly leads to political conclusions regarding current aVairs. Not only does the text routinely praise the sage kings of antiquity for 25 Interestingly, the inclusive language of the Jingong-dian which twice uses the compound mo bu (‘none . . . is not’) reminds us of that of the First Emperor of Qin in his steles (see Kern’s article in this volume). 26 See Lunyu 16.2: 174. 27 See ibid. 8.18: 83, and 8.20: 84; 12.22: 131; 4.5: 146.

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their abilities to unify All-under-Heaven and ‘correct the overlords’,28 but it is also the Wrst to create a historical narrative of the uniWcation in the past. According to this narrative, humankind originally suVered from a bestial life of war of all against all, until the worthiest and the most able [man] in All-under-Heaven was selected and established as the Son of Heaven. The Son of Heaven created a centralized state based on the imposition of the uniform concepts of ‘justice’ (yi) on the populace and overall surveillance of the power-holders. This ideal monarchy of the past should serve, in Mozi’s eyes, as a blueprint for the present.29 It is signiWcant for our discussion that Mozi had placed his primeval centralized ‘empire’ in the unspeciWed past, dissociating it from the sage kings of the past. The loose unity of the Western Zhou could no longer satisfy those thinkers who sought eVective uniWcation. Mozi’s creation of a new Wctional ‘imperial’ precedent shows the limits of the past models for radical proponents of the uniWed rule. The past was a source of inspiration—but it could easily become a burden for innovative thinkers, and its traps should be avoided. As we shall see, most of the later proponents of uniWcation had disassociated their vision from references to the past. One aspect of Mozi’s (and Confucius’) legacy, however, was adopted by almost all Zhanguo thinkers and their successors: namely, the assertion that a line of sage monarchs presided over the uniWed realm from time immemorial. While details of the sages’ rule were ardently debated, the idea of the eternal existence of the universal monarchy had never been rejected. Henceforth the existence of a single legitimate locus of authority from the very beginnings of Chinese civilization was taken for granted by thinkers and historians alike.

4 . R I T UA LI ZED H I S TORY: S HI F TI N G AWAY F ROM TH E PA S T Mozi’s departure from the Western Zhou model in his quest for true unity foreshadowed a similar trend among major Zhanguo thinkers who preferred to seek unity in the future rather than in the past. Intriguingly, this trend inXuenced even those thinkers whose call for unity was based on staunch support for the implementation of the norms of ritual hierarchy. Although these norms largely derived from early Zhou regulations, many Zhanguo 28

Mozi, ‘Shang xian zhong’: 9/75; ‘Jie yong zhong’: 21/254. For Mozi’s narrative, see Mozi, ‘Shang tong, shang’: 11/109–10. See further discussion of his views in Pines 2000b, 302–4. 29

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ritualists preferred to de-emphasize these links, distancing themselves from the Western Zhou model. Being ostensibly tradition oriented, these thinkers actually proposed novel ways of achieving unity under Heaven. This well-disguised novelty is characteristic of the Gongyang zhuan (hereafter: Gongyang), a late Zhanguo commentary attached to the Spring and Autumn Annals. While the Gongyang covers the same period and deals with the same events as the Zuo, both commentaries diVer enormously in their approach to the Annals. Unlike the Zuo, which focuses on providing historical background for the Annals’ entries, the Gongyang is focused on ‘the hidden meaning’ allegedly inserted into the Annals by their editor and publisher, Confucius. Thus, while closely following the Annals’ ritualistic mode of history writing, the Gongyang authors imbue it with a novel meaning, turning the terse text into a blueprint for the ideal political system.30 The notion of political uniWcation Wgures prominently in the Gongyang, and may be considered the single most important message of the text. Its pivotal role is clariWed at the very beginning of the commentary, which deals with the Wrst entry of the Annals: ‘The Wrst year. Spring, the king’s Wrst month [i.e. the Wrst month according to the king’s calendar]’:31 Why is it ‘the Wrst year’?—The Wrst year of the lord’s reign [in Lu].—Why ‘spring’?— It is the beginning of the year.—Who is called ‘the king’?—King Wen [of Zhou] is called so.—Why is it Wrst written ‘the king’s’ and then ‘the Wrst month’?—It is the king’s (calendar’s) Wrst month.—Why does the text begin with ‘the king’s Wrst month’?—To magnify the uniWed rule.32

Thus, according to the Gongyang the Annals were compiled (or edited) by Confucius in order ‘to magnify the uniWed rule’. This notion is ubiquitous throughout the text: the Gongyang authors clarify that nothing is external to the rule of the True King (wangzhe) and that the reigning Son of Heaven forever is the master of the overlords.33 The text furthermore emphasizes universal inclusiveness of the royal rule: the ‘barbarian’ periphery even if temporarily unruly will be incorporated into the uniWed realm immediately when the True King appears. This notion is clariWed in an entry that comments upon a meeting of the northern states’ representatives with the ‘barbarian’ envoys of Wu in 576 bc: 30

For a comprehensive study of the Gongyang, see Gentz 2001. Gongyang, Yin 1: 2196. In the Chunqiu period three calendars coexisted in different states, the so-called Xia, Shang, and Zhou systems, each of which fixed the new year in a different month. The Zhou year began in the month that contained winter solstice, the Shang—one month later, and the Xia—two months later than the Zhou. 32 Gongyang, Yin 1: 2196; italics are mine. 33 See respectively Gongyang, Yin 1: 2199; Xi 24: 2259; Cheng 12: 2295; and Yin 3: 2204; Ding 4: 2336. 31

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Why do (the Annals) particularly emphasize meeting with Wu (envoys)?—They consider Wu as external. What does ‘external’ mean?—The Annals consider their state [Lu] as internal, and All the Xia [‘Chinese’] as external, consider All the Xia as internal, and Yi and Di [‘barbarians’] as external,—(But) the True King wants to unify All under Heaven, so why talk of internal and external?—This means that he must begin with those who are close.34

It is clear that the Gongyang authors consider the uniWcation of All-underHeaven—including ‘Chinese’ and ‘barbarian’ parts—as the ultimate goal of the True King. But who is the ‘True King’? Evidently, this respected epithet does not refer to the reigning Zhou rulers, who are revered in the text, but whose achievements are denigrated, as is clear from the authors’ frequent lamentations about the ‘lack of the Son of Heaven above’.35 Nor does the text necessarily consider the dynastic founders (or earlier rulers) as True Kings. Rather, the Gongyang expectations of the True King are projected into the future, and Confucius’ moral-ritual blueprint in the Annals should serve this ultimate ruler. The past itself—whether the immediate background of Chunqiu events, or earlier ages of sage kings—is of marginal importance when compared with what Joachim Gentz aptly names the ‘ritual reality’ as presented by the text.36 The Gongyang is the most radical representative of the bunch of ritual texts which are preoccupied with the issue of unity. Its counterparts, like the ‘Qu li’ chapter of the Li ji, disperse historical connections altogether and discuss the ritually mandated unifying rule of Son of Heaven as devoid of any historical context.37 This overt ahistorical stand is revealing. It may well reXect the authors’ dissatisfaction with the actual Zhou model, which brought about eventual disintegration and the war of all against all. By distancing themselves from the Zhou legacy, the authors turn ritual into a timeless functioning mode of the proper rule, which can—and should—be implemented in order to ensure proper functioning of the universe. By de-historicizing their blueprint for the ideal rule the Gongyang and ‘Qu li’ authors furthermore avoided the thorny questions of how the ritual unity would be achieved in the 34

Gongyang, Cheng 15: 2297. See also Xi 4: 2249 for the eventual incorporation of the ‘barbarian’ periphery under the True King. 35 Shang wu tianzi. Gongyang, Zhuang 4: 2226; Xi 1: 2246; Xi 2: 2247; Xi 14: 2254; Xuan 11: 2248. 36 Gentz 2005, 235. 37 The ‘Qu li’ chapter presents a carefully constructed ritual pyramid with the Son of Heaven who ‘rules All-under-Heaven’ and ‘makes the overlords to arrive at his court’ at its apex (Li ji, ‘Qu li, xia’: 5/126). The ‘Qu li’ chapter belongs to an early layer of the Li ji and was probably compiled by the mid-fourth century bc (see Yoshimoto 1995). Another important representative of the texts which consider political unity as manifestation of timeless ritual regulations is the Xunzi discussed below.

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fragmented world of the Warring States or why the supposedly ritually blameless Zhou dynasty had eventually collapsed. Their textual empire was created as a kind of escape from dealing with the matters of an actual empire—in the past or in the future.38

5. TRUE OR IMPAIRED UNITY? PA ST AGAINST TH E PR ESE NT The second half of the Zhanguo period can be characterized as a protracted battle for uniWcation of the realm. Series of military, economic, and administrative innovations allowed the contending states to allocate huge resources for the ongoing warfare, turning the uniWcation of All-under-Heaven from an idle dream into a practical political goal. Many statesmen and thinkers realized that the conditions of their age diVered markedly from that of the past, and were increasingly prone to openly advocate new departures and to reject the legacy of the former kings. Shang Yang (d. 338 bc), the architect of the reforms in the state of Qin, under whose aegis this state rapidly turned into a major superpower, ridiculed the adherents of the past: Nowadays, powerful states are engaged in annexations, while the weak are devoted to forceful defense. Above, they do not reach the times of Yu (i.e. Shun) and Xia, below— do not follow [kings] Tang and Wu. The ways of Tang and Wu are blocked; hence, none of the ten-thousand-chariot states does not Wght; none of the one-thousandchariot states does not defend [itself]. These ways are blocked for a long time, but the rulers of our age are unable to dismiss them. Hence, the Three Dynasties lack the fourth.39

For Shang Yang, and for many of those who shared his perspective, the past was no longer relevant.40 The establishment of the ‘fourth dynasty’—i.e. the uniWcation of the realm under a new ruler—should be achieved by addressing current conditions rather than by restoring the legacy of earlier rulers. The appeal of this approach may explain the relative paucity of references to past uniWcations in late Zhanguo texts. Stories of the universal rule of the past paragons in these texts appear almost exclusively in the context of idealizations of the ancients’ rule, but not necessarily as a justiWcation for 38 For more of the idea of the ‘empire of writing’ as an alternative to actual empire, see Lewis 1999, 337–62. 39 Shang jun shu, 7 ‘Kai sai’: 54–5. 40 For similar rejection of the adherence to the past, see e.g. Han Feizi, 49 ‘Wu du’: 442–5; 50 ‘Xian xue’: 457; Lu¨shi chunqiu, 15.8 ‘Cha jin’: 934–6.

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future uniWcation. For instance, in a recently discovered text, Rong Cheng shi, ancient monarchs are repeatedly hailed for their ability to attain universal unity. Not only did those ‘from within the Four Seas’ (i.e. from the known world) submit, but also the outsiders, and even ‘birds and beasts arrived at court; Wsh and turtles submitted [tribute]’.41 Universal rule appears to be an indispensable feature of ideal political order, which explains why it is routinely mentioned in the texts that deal with reigns of the revered paragons, such as Yu, the Yellow Thearch (Huangdi), and others.42 Attribution of universal power to the sage kings of antiquity continued throughout the Zhanguo period, but my impression is that this topos is much less pronounced in the Zhanguo texts than in those dating from the Han (206 bc–ad 220) dynasty onwards.43 What is more remarkable is that it is almost impossible to Wnd a thinker who bases his advocacy of political uniWcation on the example of the former paragons. Such abandonment of historical argumentation, despite its pervasive commonality in other Welds of Zhanguo political discourse, is revealing. Most thinkers appear to be aware of the inadequacy of past uniWcations, which eventually deteriorated into the chaos of the Warring States. Thus, among late Zhanguo texts we Wnd references to dissatisfaction with the eVectiveness of former uniWcations44—and this dissatisfaction must have been fairly widespread to prompt angry reply by Xunzi (c.310–218 bc), one of the major pre-imperial thinkers and a staunch supporter of emulating the past: The vulgar (people) of (our) age claim: ‘Tang and Wu [i.e. the founding kings of the Shang and the Zhou dynasties, respectively] were unable to make their orders restrictive.’ Why? They say: ‘[The two states] Chu and Yue did not accept (royal) regulations.’ This is not true! Tang and Wu were the best under Heaven to make their orders restrictive. Tang resided in Bo, King Wu resided in Hao, each of which was only one hundred li squared; (but) All-under-Heaven was united, the overlords became subjects, and wherever their (inXuence) reached there was none who did not greet

41

See Rong Cheng shi, 254–5. Yu’s merits are discussed extensively in the (supposedly late Zhanguo) ‘Yu gong’ chapter of the Book of Documents, which deals exclusively with the all-encompassing scope of Yu’s rule. Huangdi stands at the center of the so-called Huang-Lao texts that were unearthed in Mawangdui (Hunan) in 1973. The first of the Mawangdui ‘Ten Great Canons’ (shi da jing) begins with the Huangdi’s following statement: ‘I received the mandate from Heaven, established my position on Earth and gained my reputation from men. Only I, the one man . . . match Heaven, establish kings and the Three Dukes, establish states and set up their lords and three high ministers’ (cited with slight modifications from Yates 1997, 104–5). 43 For the early Han texts which stress the universality of the former paragons’ rule, see e.g. Lu Jia’s (d. 178 bc) Xin yu, 4 ‘Wu wei’: 59; Jia Yi’s (c.200–168 bc) Xin shu, ‘Wei bu xin’: 3/131; Da-Dai Li ji, ‘Wu di de’: 7/117–25, and, of course, the Shi ji, chaps. 1–4, passim. 44 See, for instance, Lu¨shi chunqiu, 16.2 ‘Wu da’: 1706; 17.5 ‘Zhi du’: 1093. 42

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them with joined hands and submitted to be transformed compliantly. Why then do they say that Chu and Yue did not accept the regulations?45

Xunzi continues with a lengthy explanation of proper ritual regulations mandated by the former kings who Wxed sacriWcial obligations of every polity, Chinese and alien alike. He further explains then that while the rites performed by Chu and Yue might have been diVerent from those of the ‘Chinese’ states, the southerners were, in the Wnal account, Wrmly incorporated into the sphere of the universal monarchs’ rule. Xunzi argues that the ritual dominance of the Zhou (and supposedly Shang) house over the remote polities meant political dominance as well. However, this claim was not convincing for many supporters of uniWcation. For them, ancient monarchs lacked eVective political power—and their ritual superiority was of minor importance, insofar as they were unable to impose uniform order on their nominal underlings. These ‘vulgar’ views of Xunzi’s opponents allow us to address anew the issue raised at the beginning of this paper, namely, why the First Emperor and his entourage had chosen to ignore former uniWcations of the realm and claimed that their achievement is unprecedented. By doing so, the emperor distinguished himself from earlier ‘uniWers’ whose rule was primarily a ritual Wction, and who were never able to fully impose their will on the remote parts of ‘All-under-Heaven’. While conservative-minded statesmen in the court of Qin had repeatedly pledged the emperor to emulate Shang and Zhou founders and to adopt their model of establishing autonomous Wefs at the outskirts of the empire, their view, based on invocation of the past models, was rejected by the emperor’s major aide, the architect of the empire, Li Si (d. 208 bc). In one of the best-known episodes in the short history of the Qin dynasty, while arguing against the proposal to re-establish the Wefs, Li Si explained why the Zhou model was of no value for the Qin: Kings Wen and Wu of the Zhou enfeoVed many of their sons, younger brothers, and clan members, but later those became estranged and attacked each other like sworn enemies. As the overlords were intermittently attacking each other, the Zhou Son of Heaven was unable to forbid it. Now, the territory within the seas, relying on the spiritual might of Your Majesty, had been uniformly ruled, everything was turned into commanderies and counties . . . None under Heaven has a second thought: this is the art of ensuring peace. Establishing the overlords is not expedient.46

The Emperor endorsed Li Si’s views: All-under-Heaven suVered endlessly from bitter strife and warfare because of kings and overlords. Now, with the help of my ancestral temple, All-under-Heaven has been 45

Xunzi, 18 ‘Zheng lun’: 12/328–9.

46

Shi ji 6/239.

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paciWed at last. To re-establish states means to sow weapons: and will it not be diYcult to demand peace thereby? The view of the Commandant of Justice [Li Si] is correct.47

This exchange of views epitomizes Qin’s approach. Precedents of uniWcation in the past existed, but they were not precedents of true uniWcation. The unity of the Zhou was an impaired one; it was ephemeral and weak from the very beginning. By adopting new ritual norms, including the title of ‘the August Thearch’ (huangdi, ‘the emperor’), by avoiding the old Zhou title of ‘the Son of Heaven’ and by avoiding all references to Heaven from oYcial announcements, the First Emperor unequivocally distinguished himself from the past.48 The imagined unity created by historians and thinkers and attributed to former sages could not match the success of his actual uniWcation of the realm. The past paled in comparison with the present; it had to be abandoned and no longer adopted for current political choices. The real empire, upon its establishment, had no need in the empire of the texts; and those were eventually destroyed to allow for real power to triumph over the imagined one.49

E P ILO G U E : D I S C A R D I N G T H E PA S T TO S E RV E T H E P R E SENT. ZHANGU O HISTOR IOGRA PH Y AND P OLITICAL THOUGHT The above discussion leads to some surprising conclusions. It is commonly assumed that Chinese political thought was Wrmly embedded within a quasihistorical tradition of attributing one’s political ideals to the former paragons and creating a Wctitious pedigree for one’s radical ideas.50 While it is well known that some innovative thinkers, such as Shang Yang, Han Feizi (d. 233 bc), and Li Si disdained ‘using the past to serve the present’, even they were frequently compelled to justify their views through resort to historical narratives; and such resort was even more common among their intellectual rivals.

47

Ibid. This self-proclaimed novelty of the First Emperor’s rule did not prevent him simultaneously from borrowing and modifying aspects of the Zhou cultural traditions; see e.g. Kern 2000 and Kern’s article in this volume. 49 For the relation between the text burning of the year 213 bc and the attempt to suppress subversive historical narratives, see Petersen 1995. 50 This assertion stood at the foundation of Gu Jiegang’s famous assertion that early sages were invented by the contending thinkers to create a fictitious pedigree to their ideas (see Gu Jiegang 1988). 48

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And yet, the historical genre seems to be relatively insigniWcant in supporting the notion of uniWed rule. Careful reading of Zhanguo texts and their pro-uniWcation discussions indicates remarkable lack of interest in the past precedents of political unity. While Confucius’ notion of ritually based unity can be ultimately traced to the Zhou model, Mozi had already discarded this model in favor of a novel creation, which was not attributed to the past sages but placed in the primeval society of the most remote antiquity. Later thinkers did not require even this disguise; hence, Confucius’ major follower, Mengzi (c.379–304 bc) merely proclaimed that ‘stability is in unity’51 and felt no need to further justify his statement through references to the former sage kings. In the Laozi and the Laozi-related works, such as portions of the Guanzi, Han Feizi, and the Lu¨shi chunqiu political unity is often stipulated metaphysically, being considered a natural manifestation of the cosmic unity of Dao, and not a creation of former sages. In the ritual-oriented texts, such as the Gongyang, portions of the Li ji and the Xunzi, political uniWcation under the supreme ruler is embedded in strict implementation of the eternal ritual norms, which are largely dissociated from the early Zhou rule and are considered timeless attributes of the ordered human society. But more importantly, aside from philosophical and ritual stipulations, most of the above texts seem to agree that political uniWcation is primarily a practical necessity, being the only remedy to endless wars; and this common conviction does not require further debates. Thus, past uniWcations are invoked, if at all, only in the context of searching for proper ways to attain and to preserve the unity, and not in the context of justifying future uniWcation as such.52 This conclusion allows reappraisal of the common view regarding the place of historical narratives in ancient Chinese political thought. The past was invoked to serve the present not uniformly but selectively—and its usage increased in direct proportion to the controversiality of the idea under discussion. Past precedents could serve well to promote controversial ideas such as support of non-hereditary transmission of power or radical modiWcation of the extant social order;53 but they were unnecessary insofar as the topic concerned was less debatable or insofar as the advantages of the proposed policy were easily demonstrable in the present. In light of the above conclusion we may brieXy assess the resurrection of the interest in the past uniWcations at the beginning of the Han dynasty as a 51

Mengzi 1.6: 17–18. For the detailed discussion of the above examples, see Pines 2000b. For the importance of historical models in promoting controversial ideas, see e.g. Pines and Shelach 2005. 52 53

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direct response to the sudden uncertainty regarding the imperial model after the swift collapse of the Qin dynasty. In the early Han, such issues as the degree of centralization and the territorial scope of imperial expansion became debatable again, as resurrection of semi-independent Wefs threatened the very survival of Qin’s model.54 Moreover, the Han leaders had also abandoned pretensions for universal empire, preferring nominal (ritual) superiority abroad over costly attempts to impose eVective rule of the imperial house beyond the boundaries. The issues of imperial unity, its territorial and administrative scope, were raised anew, and the thinkers responded by searching in the past for convenient precedents for the Han monarchs. The subsequent ‘rehabilitation’ of the Zhou model and its reincorporation into a renewed imperial historical narrative come, therefore, as no surprise. References Da-Dai Liji 大戴禮記. Da-Dai Li ji jiegu 大戴禮記解詁, by Wang Pinzhen 王聘珍. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1992. Falkenhausen, Lothar von, ‘Late Western Zhou Taste’, E´tudes chinoises, 18: 1–2 (2000), 143–78. —— Chinese Society in the Age of Confucius (1050–250 BC): The Archaeological Evidence. Los Angeles (Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA) 2006. Gentz, Joachim, Das Gongyang zhuan: Auslegung und Kanonisierung der Fru¨hlingsund Herbstannalen (Chunqiu). Wiesbaden (Harrassowitz) 2001. —— ‘The Past as a Messianic Vision: Historical Thought and Strategies of Sacralization in the Early Gongyang Tradition’, in: Helwig Schmidt-Glintzer, Achim Mittag, and Jo¨rn Ru¨sen (eds.), Historical Truth, Historical Criticism and Ideology: Chinese Historiography and Historical Culture from a New Comparative Perspective, Leiden/Boston (Brill) 2005, 227–54. Gu Jiegang 顧頡剛, ‘Gu shi bian di yi ce zi xu’ 古史辨第一冊自序, repr. in Gu Jiegang gu shi lunwenji 顧頡剛古史論文集, vol. i, ed. Pian Yuqian 駢宇騫, Beijing (Zhonghua) 1988, 1–100. Guoyu 國語. Guoyu jijie 國語集解, by Xu Yuangao 徐元誥. Beijing (Zhonghua) 2002. Han Feizi 韩非子. Han Feizi jijie 韩非子集解, by Wang Xianshen 王先慎. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1998. Jiang Shanguo 蔣善國, Shang shu zongshu 尚書綜述. Shanghai (Guji) 1988. Keightley, David N., ‘The Late Shang State: When, Where and What?’, in: id. (ed.), The Origins of Chinese Civilization, Berkeley (University of California Press) 1982, 532–64.

54 Recently discovered Zhangjiashan legal documents suggest that the degree of decentralization in the early Han was so high that the ‘fiefs’ were treated just like alien states. See Zang Zhifei 2003.

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Kern, Martin, The Stele Inscriptions of Ch’in Shih-huang: Text and Ritual in Early Chinese Imperial Representation. New Haven (American Oriental Society) 2000. Lewis, Mark E., Writing and Authority in Early China. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1999. Li Feng, ‘Literacy Crossing Cultural Borders: Evidence from the Bronze Inscriptions of the Western Zhou Period [1045–771 B.C.]’, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, 74 (2002), 210–42. Li ji 禮記. Li ji jijie 禮記集解, by Sun Xidan 孫希旦. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1996. Li Xueqin 李學勤, ‘Jingong-dian de ji ge wenti 晉公奠的幾個問題’, Chutu wenxian yanjiu 出土文獻研究, Beijing (Wenwu) 1985, 134–7. —— 李學勤, ‘Meixian Yangjiacun xin chu qingtongqi yanjiu 眉縣楊家村新出青銅 器研究’, Wenwu 文物, 6 (2003), 66–73. Lunyu 論語. Lunyu yizhu 論語譯注, by Yang Bojun 楊伯峻. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1991. Lu¨shi chunqiu 呂氏春秋. Lu¨shi chunqiu jiaoshi 呂氏春秋校釋, by Chen Qiyou 陳奇 猷. Shanghai (Xuelin) 1990. Mengzi 孟子. Mengzi yizhu 孟子譯注, by Yang Bojun 楊伯峻. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1992. Mozi 墨子. Mozi jiaozhu 墨子校注, by Wu Yujiang 吳毓江. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1994. Petersen, Jens Østerga˚rd, ‘Which Books Did the First Emperor of Ch’in Burn? On the Meaning of Pai Chia in Early Chinese Sources’, Monumenta Serica, 43 (1995), 1–52. Pines, Yuri, ‘Disputers of the Li: Breakthroughs in the Concept of Ritual in Preimperial China’, Asia Major, 3rd ser., 13: 1 (2000), 1–41 [¼ Pines 2000a]. —— ‘ ‘‘The One that Pervades All’’ in Ancient Chinese Political Thought: Origins of ‘‘The Great Unity’’ Paradigm’, T’oung Pao, 86 (2000), 280–324 [¼ Pines 2000b]. —— Foundations of Confucian Thought: Intellectual Life in the Chunqiu Period, 722– 453 B.C.E. Honolulu (University of Hawaii Press) 2002 [¼ Pines 2002a]. —— ‘Changing Views of tianxia in Pre-imperial Discourse’, Oriens Extremus, 43 (2002), 101–16 [¼ Pines 2002b]. —— and Shelach, Gideon, ‘ ‘‘Using the Past to Serve the Present’’: Comparative Perspectives on Chinese and Western Theories of the Origins of the State’, in: Shaul Shaked (ed.), Genesis and Regeneration: Essays on Conceptions of Origins, Jerusalem (The Israel Academy of Science and Humanities) 2005, 127–63. Rong Cheng shi 容成氏, ed.by Li Ling 李零, in: Ma Chengyuan 馬承源 (ed.), Shanghai bowuguan zang Zhanguo Chu zhushu 上海博物館藏戰國楚竹書, vol. ii, Shanghai (Guji) 2002, 247–92. Schaberg, David C., A Patterned Past: Form and Thought in Early Chinese Historiography (Harvard East Asian Monographs 205). Cambridge, Mass./London (Harvard University Asia Center) 2001. Shangjun shu 商君書. Shangjun shu zhuizhi 商君書錐指, by Jiang Lihong 蔣禮鴻. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1996. Shaughnessy, Edward L., ‘Western Zhou Bronze Inscriptions’, in: id. (ed.), New Sources of Early Chinese History: An Introduction to the Reading of Inscriptions and Manuscripts, Berkeley (The Society for the Study of Early China and The Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California) 1997, 57–84.

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—— ‘Western Zhou History’, in: Michael Loewe and Edward L. Shaughnessy (eds.), The Cambridge History of Ancient China, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1999, 292–351. Shim Jaehoon, ‘The ‘‘Jinhou Su Bianzhong’’ Inscription and its SigniWcance’, Early China, 22 (1997), 43–76. Shirakawa Shizuka 白川静, Kinbun tsu¯shaku 金文通釋, 54 vols. Ko¯be (Hakutsuru bijutsukan) 1962–84. Takeuchi Yasuhiro 內竹康浩, ‘Seishu¯ kinbun uchi no ‘‘tenshi’’ ni tsuite 西周金文中 〈天子〉について’, in: id., Ronshu¯: Chu¯goku kodai no moji to bunka 論集: 中國古 代の文字と文化, To¯kyo¯ (Kyu¯ko shoin) 1999, 105–30. Vogelsang, Kai, ‘Inscriptions and Proclamations: On the Authenticity of the ‘‘gao’’ Chapters in the Book of Documents’, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, 74 (2002), 138–209. Xin shu 新書. Xin shu jiaozhu 新書校注, by Yan Zhenyi 閻振益 / Zhong Xia 鍾夏. Beijing (Zhonghua) 2000. Xin yu 新語. Xin yu jiaozhu 新語校注, by Wang Liqi 王利器. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1996. Xing Wen 邢文 (ed.), The X-gong Xu: Reports and Papers from the Dartmouth Workshop (International Research on Bamboo and Silk Documents: Newsletter, Special Issue). Dartmouth (Dartmouth College) 2003. Xunzi 荀子. Xunzi jijie 荀子集解, by Wang Xianqian 王先謙. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1992. Yates, Robin D. S. (trans.), The Five Lost Classics: Tao, Huang-Lao and Yin-Yang in Han China. New York (Ballantine Books) 1997. Yoshimoto Michimasa 吉本道雅, ‘Kyo¯kurei ko¯ 曲禮考’, in: Kominami Ichiro¯ 小南一 郎 (ed.), Chu¯goku kodai reisei kenkyu¯ 中國古代禮制研究, Kyo¯to (Kyo¯to University Press) 1995, 117–63. Zang Zhifei 藏知非, ‘Zhangjiashan Han jian suo jian Han chu zhongyang yu zhuhou wangguo guanxi lunlu¨e 張家山漢簡所見漢初中央與諸侯王國關係論略’, Shaanxi lishi bowuguan guankan 陝西歷史博物館館刊, 10 (2003), 308–14.

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The Emergence of Empire Rome and the Surrounding World in Historical Narratives from the Late Third Century bc to the Early First Century ad Huang Yang (Shanghai) Fritz-Heiner Mutschler (Dresden)

INTRODUCTORY RE MARKS The phenomenal expansion of the Roman Empire in the two centuries from the second Punic War (219–202 bc) to the reign of Augustus (27 bc–ad 14) coincided with the beginnings, development, and (Wrst) Xowering of Roman historical narrative. It is the purpose of this paper to describe, at least for two important periods, the ways in which the respective prose and verse works reXected the political process and to explore the extent to which ‘imperial thought’ can be apprehended in these texts.1 The two periods to be dealt with are from the late third to the mid-second century bc, which witnessed the decisive expansion of Roman power to the eastern part of the Mediterranean, and from the mid-Wrst century bc to early Wrst century ad, which saw a renewed dynamism of imperial expansion and a lasting (re)organization of the administrative structures of the empire. They represent the formative phase of literary narrative in Rome and the one richest in works of Roman self-representation. The works of the two periods will be dealt with in the main sections of the paper (2 and 3). As, however, Roman historical consciousness began to take shape prior to the Wrst literary narratives and since its non- and proto-literary forms already reXected Rome’s relationship with the 1 ‘Empire’ and ‘imperial’ are unfortunately ambivalent expressions, referring either to empire as ‘Reich’ or to empire as ‘Kaisertum’. In this paper the two terms are exclusively used in the Wrst sense.

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outside world, these forms will be brieXy dealt with in an introductory section (1). Our concluding remarks will take into consideration Augustus’ Res Gestae in order to see how the Wrst Roman emperor viewed his ‘imperial’ achievements (4).

1. NON- AND PROTO-LITERARY FORMS OF HISTORICAL CONSCIOUSNESS

(a) Oral tradition One of the non-literary forms in which Roman historical consciousness expressed itself was oral tradition: stories about people and events handed down both in the community at large and in individual (especially aristocratic) families.2 At least to a certain extent, these stories deWned the Romans’ view of themselves and of their relationship with the surrounding world. First, there was the Roman foundation myth with its two components—the stories of Aeneas and Romulus.3 It gained its Wnal form probably in the decades around 300 bc, when Rome was expanding its power over Italy and Wnally came into direct contact with the Greek cities of southern Italy and Sicily, i.e. the culturally advanced Hellenistic world. The foundation myth now served the deWnition of Roman identity in a perfect way. On the one hand, through the Wgure of a forefather, Aeneas, it integrated Rome into the world of Greek myth and thus put it on a genealogical par with all other Mediterranean polities. On the other, through the Wgure of a founder, Romulus, it showed how Rome had been founded and established itself successfully under precarious circumstances. That in both parts of the story the prowess and piety of a heroic Wgure and the protection of the gods formed the basis of the good outcome of events is a point to be noted. Second, there was the exempla tradition:4 stories like that of Horatius Cocles, who in the Wrst years of the Republic had heroically defended the Tiber bridge,5 or that of the Decii who, during the Samnite wars, ritually sacriWced themselves to secure victory. That the tradition of exempla stories started early is as certain as that it presented bravery and the readiness to 2

Cf. Timpe 1996. Scholars generally agree that the Trojan myth took root in Italy in the sixth century bc, but see Erskine 2001, 16, for a diVerent view. For a discussion of the coming into being of the Romulus legend see Wiseman 1995, 63–76. 4 Cf. Walter 2004, 51–62. 5 Referred to as part of Rome’s oral tradition already by Polybius 6.55. 3

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sacriWce oneself as part of the system of conduct that lay at the basis of Rome’s military and political success.

(b) Ritual But it was not only in oral tradition that historical consciousness began to manifest itself in Rome. There were also certain rituals in which the past played a role. Some pointed to or re-enacted the remote past—in the case of the Lupercalia the times of Romulus and Remus—and thus contributed to the formation and preservation of a spirit of community through reference to the common origins. More important in our context was a ritual which referred to the very recent past or even to the present as future past: the triumph.6 Its original function was religious: the fulWllment of vows taken before the campaign and the puriWcation of the army from the pollution of Wghting. In the course of time a sociopolitical function became more important: the celebration of victory and of the victorious army. Probably no other ritual strengthened the feeling of identity and the pride of the populus Romanus to the same degree as the triumph. In the victorious army and the conquered enemy (captives, booty, images of landscapes, and regions) the triumph presented to the Roman people its superiority over the surrounding world. History became visible and touchable. And it was a history of continual success and constantly growing power.

(c) Public monuments A similar division between reference to the early and to the most recent past can be observed in a third medium of historical memory: the public monuments.7 In the decades around 300 bc the Romans started putting up in public diVerent kinds of monuments commemorating persons and events of the past. Thus we know that an eYgy of the she-wolf and the twins was erected at the comitium, putting Rome’s political center under the sign of the foundation legend. On the Capitol, in front of the temple of Jupiter, there were statues both of the kings of Rome and of Brutus, who had ended their rule. Again at the comitium, another statue represented Horatius Cocles. The list could be easily continued.

6

See Ho¨lkeskamp 2006 with bibliography.

7

Cf. Ho¨lscher 2006.

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At around the same time the Romans began to document important military successes through public monuments. The prows of the enemy ships captured in the war against the Latins (338 bc) decorated the speaker’s tribune in the forum. During the wars against the Samnites, Sp. Carvilius took Samnite armor to build a huge statue of Jupiter on the Capitol, indicating the importance of the Roman victory. This series, too, could be continued ad libitum. Concerning the ways in which Rome related itself to the outside world, the monuments were important in two ways. On the one hand the statuary decoration showed Rome’s aspiration to be part of the Hellenized world.8 On the other, the monuments for the recent past, like the triumphs, symbolized above all Rome’s military superiority over its competitors.

(d) Aristocratic memorial culture The semi-private, semi-public memorial culture of the Roman nobility, in parts impressively described by Polybius in the famous sixth book of his Histories, consisted of several components involving the three media of image, ritual, and text. In the atria of the noble houses the death masks of the ancestors were preserved in shrines, while their names (and images?) with brief inscriptions concerning their public accomplishments were arranged in stemmata along the walls, to be seen and admired by every visitor.9 Each time a family member died, all the ancestors, impersonated by actors wearing the death masks and the robes of the highest oYces the dead had held, together with the body of the deceased moved in procession to the forum in the Wrst part of an extensive funeral ceremony.10 There, with all the dead seated on the rostra, one of the male members of the family delivered the funeral speech in which he praised the achievements both of the deceased and of all the ancestors. The memorial content of this complex of customs was characterized by a concentration on politics: internal in terms of oYces held, and external in terms of victories won and cities conquered. It stressed transgenerational continuity and the connection between eVort (in the service of the state) and reward (in the form of honors attributed by its citizens). The focus of

8 In one exceptional case, at around 300 bc, by order of the oracle of Delphi even statues of two Greeks—Alcibiades and Pythagoras as the bravest and wisest men—were put up in the comitium. 9 See Flower 1996. 10 See Flower 2006.

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attention was Rome, with the outside world coming into play mainly as the object of Rome’s military and political success.

(e) The notes of the pontifex maximus Finally, a word must be said about the Wrst written historical records, the notes of the pontifex maximus.11 Concerning their addressee, their purpose, and their subject matter, it seems reasonable to reckon with development. Originally, the pontiWcal records were probably kept as a source of information for the sole use of the collegium pontiWcum. Their purpose was religious: it was important for the preservation of the good relationship with the gods (pax deorum) to register both the signs by which the gods might have indicated their dissatisfaction with the community (eclipses of sun and moon, prodigies, etc.) and the measures the community’s priests took to reestablish the pax deorum (performance of rites of expiation etc.). In this way it could be ensured that the community acted properly in analogous situations. Later (maybe in the decades around 300 bc which brought about so many changes in Rome) the pontiWcal tabulae developed into what Cicero and Servius, our main sources, seem to have in mind: records put up in public ‘to preserve public memory’, ‘so that the people had the possibility to learn’12 not only of religious matters but of all ‘things worth recording, done at home and in war, by land and sea, on each individual day’.13 In these records the relationship with the surrounding world probably played a role only in statements about wars declared, treaties concluded, and triumphs celebrated. Interpretation of longer-term developments was not explicitly articulated. But underlying the notes was the assumption that the pietas and the religio of the community and its representatives were ensuring its well-being, while incorrect conduct entailed misfortune.

2. TH E F ORMATION OF HISTORICA L NA RR AT I VE I N RO ME We can turn now to our subject proper: the Wrst literary historical narratives in Rome, created over two generations between the end of the third and the middle of the second centuries bc.14 This was the period during which Rome 11 13 14

12 See Beck and Walter 2001, 20–1, 32–7. Cicero, De oratore 2.52. Servius ad Verg. Aen. 1.373. For the following, cf. Mutschler 2000; Walter 2004, 212–96.

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established itself as mistress of the Mediterranean. In the Second Punic War (219–202 bc) it decisively defeated its last rival of equal weight, Carthage, and gained control over the western Mediterranean. During the following decades it extended its power in a series of wars against the most important Hellenistic states and confederations in the eastern Mediterranean. The destruction of both Carthage and Corinth in 146 bc symbolized its Wnal supremacy.

(a) The Wrst generation (a) Q. Fabius Pictor Q. Fabius Pictor is generally acknowledged as the founder of Roman historiography.15 As a true archegetes he is responsible for several of its important characteristics. Even his social standing is typical of the Roman historian: the patrician gens Fabia belonged to the inner circle of the nobility. Quintus Fabius was born around 270 bc and, very probably, reached the praetorship in the 230s or 220s. His hour came when, after the defeat of Cannae, he headed a legation to the oracle of Delphi. It is quite probable that not long after his return from Greece he began work on what was to become the Wrst history of Rome. Like all other historical narratives before the middle of the Wrst century bc, it has come down to us only in fragments. Nevertheless, it is possible to discern some of its features. The Wrst to note is its language: not Latin, but Greek. Very probably it was meant to reach both the leading circles of the Greek world and the upper layer of Roman society, particularly the author’s peers. As to the formation of Roman historical consciousness, Fabius’ most important achievement was simply the constitution of Roman history. For the Wrst time the mythical prehistory and beginnings of Rome, the rule of the kings, their fall, and the establishment of the republic, important events of the Wrst centuries of the republic, and Wnally the wars fought by the preceding and current generations were comprehensively described as a continuous chain of events. The stories which had been circulating independently were now fused in one great narrative: they were turned into history. This had consequences. One of them was that certain chronological adjustments had to be made, such as the introduction of the series of thirty kings of Alba Longa to make up for the time diVerence between the Trojan War (Aeneas) and the foundation of Rome (Romulus).16 More interesting is 15 Text: Beck and Walter 2001, 55–136 (with introduction and commentary). Still important Timpe 1972. See further Suerbaum 2002, 359–69; Walter 2004, 229–55. 16 Cf. Beck and Walter 2001, 63.

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that since the small beginnings of the city were—for the Wrst time—woven into a single narrative together with the wars against Carthage for the dominion of the central part of the Mediterranean, it became clear that a development from small to great was taking place, even if the end was not yet in sight. The history of Rome appeared not as a simple continuum, but as a movement into a certain direction towards a destination yet to be determined. To discover whether eVorts were made to determine this destination we have to consider Fabius’ view of Rome’s relationship to the outside world. The topic is a complex one since in Fabius’ work the Roman Self is confronted with not one but several Others. One set of these Others is the Greeks. It seems to have been one of the goals of Fabius’ history to make clear that the Romans were part of the cultural community of the Greek world but still retained characteristics of their own.17 The foundation myth served this purpose well.18 Since the other passages in Fabius which worked in this direction concerned mostly matters of culture, nothing can be said about whether the historian propounded any speciWc idea concerning the political relationship of Rome and the Greek polities. A (small) number of fragments deal with Rome’s contemporary enemies. Fragments 30a and 30b (Beck/Walter) concern the invasion of two Celtic tribes into Etruria in 225 bc, and seem to indicate that Fabius presented Italy as something like a uniWed ‘political’ space into which the Celts unrighteously intruded, and out of which they were in the end driven by the united power of Rome and its faithful Italic allies. The fragments and testimonies concerning the struggle with Carthage correspond to what one would expect. They show that Fabius, wherever he had the opportunity, stressed Roman righteousness and valor—in contrast with Carthaginian covetousness and cunning. Through all of this he made clear that the victory of Rome would be the just outcome. Is there more? Are there indications that Fabius said anything about the future position of Rome in the Mediterranean world? One testimony might make us think so. From Arnobius we know that Fabius already had the story that work on the foundations of the temple of Jupiter on the Capitoline uncovered a skull and that this caused a public commotion.19 According to Livy, the Wnd was taken as a portent that ‘this [sc. the Capitol] would be the stronghold of the empire and the head of the world’.20 However, it seems premature to infer a similar statement in Fabius. Arnobius indicates that the

17 18 19

This was a general Roman strategy. Cf. Gruen 1990, passim. F 7a and 7b (Beck/Walter). Cf. Erskine 2001. 20 F 16 (Beck/Walter). Livy 1.55.5.

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reference to the Wnd served rather as an aition for the name of the hill. And it is in fact doubtful that Fabius would have cherished such high-Xown notions.

(b) Cn. Naevius The Wrst historical narrative in Latin was not a prose history but an epic poem, written by Fabius’ contemporary, Cn. Naevius.21 In contrast to Fabius, Naevius, like all early poets, was of relatively low social standing. He was not even a native Roman, but was born in Campania. After the First Punic War, in which he had fought in the legions of the allies, he moved to Rome, and in the 230s became one of its leading dramatists. Probably towards the end of the Second Punic War he started writing his Bellum Poenicum. Its topic was the Wrst war against Carthage, and it was probably aimed at bolstering Roman conWdence in times of crisis. Like Fabius, Naevius presented Roman history as a unit, but in a diVerent, so to speak more poetic, way: He took the mythical beginnings of Rome and the First Punic War and combined them in a complex narrative structure. Very probably the story of the First Punic War formed the foreground into which the complete foundation myth was inserted. These two parts of Rome’s history were not only formally combined but also thematically connected. By narrating Aeneas’ wanderings, his detour to Africa and his unfortunate love aVair with the Carthaginian queen Dido (or her sister Anna) he gave the war with Carthage a mythical prehistory and thus a more fundamental signiWcance. In this, Naevius was probably trying to bring out that it was the Romans (like their Trojan ancestors) who deserved the support of the gods, and so Wnal victory. Whereas the scarce fragments do not allow us to say anything about the representation of Rome’s enemies, they suYce to show that the exemplary conduct of Trojans and Romans—their religious correctness (pietas), their Werceness and valor (virtus), their faithfulness (Wdes) to each other and to the common cause—was brought to the fore.22 Naevius’ epic must have conveyed the feeling that the Roman people could be expected and could expect to be victorious in the Wercest struggles with any foe. That the poet went so far as to predict Rome’s worldwide rule is improbable. 21 Text: Bu¨chner 1982. As to the interpretation, cf. Albrecht 1979a; Goldberg 1995, passim; Suerbaum 2002, 111–15; Walter 2004, 221–9. 22 Two of the handful of longer fragments refer to Anchises performing prayer and sacriWce to the gods (F 9 and F 25 Bu¨chner); two others describe with due pathos the readiness of (probably) Roman soldiers to die and the caring of the leadership which does not want to forsake their men (F 50 and F 51 Bu¨chner); and still another one describes in simple, but all the more impressive syntax the shocking eYciency of a Roman expedition (F 37 Bu¨chner).

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(b) The second generation The next two authors to be dealt with wrote during the decades when Rome in a series of successful wars in the East was deWnitely establishing itself as the dominant power of the Mediterranean. Once again, we are dealing with a poet and a prose writer, with an immigrant from southern Italy and a member of the senatorial order: Q. Ennius, the author of an epic poem, the Annales, which narrates the history of Rome from its origins to his own day, and M. Porcius Cato, the author of Rome’s Wrst historical work in Latin prose, the Origines.

(a) Q. Ennius Ennius had come to Rome from southern Italy towards the end of the third century bc and, under the patronage of several leading politicians of the time, had become its most versatile and successful poet. The impact of his magnum opus, the Annales, on Roman historical consciousness can hardly be exaggerated.23 Ennius’ presentation was signiWcant in several respects. First, he followed and stabilized Pictor’s conception of Roman history as a uniWed whole, combining into one continuous narrative everything from the foundation legend24 to reports on the latest campaigns. Second, by dividing his works into books and by grouping these books into triads he presented Roman history for the Wrst time as a structured whole and thus constituted epochs still observed today: beginnings and regal period, early republic and conquest of Italy, era of the Wrst two Punic Wars, period of the Macedonian Wars, etc.25 Third, Ennius provided Roman history with a convincing interpretation, integrated into the context of Roman virtus discourse and exempla tradition and expressed quintessentially through the formula: ‘On the old ways of conduct rests the Roman cause/state and on the men.’26 Along these lines the poet created many impressive scenes which presented Roman mores and viri in action:27 Rome’s success was explained as the consequence of Roman ways of conduct and the corresponding support of the gods. 23 Text: Skutsch 1985 (with introduction and commentary). Helpful: Albrecht 1979b; Classen 1992; Goldberg 1995, 83–134; Suerbaum 2002, 133–9; Walter 2004, 258–79. 24 The description of the solemn scene of auspicium auguriumque of Romulus and Remus is still preserved in one of the longest fragments we have (F 72–91 Skutsch). 25 Cf. Classen 1992, 133–4. 26 Moribus antiquis res stat Romana virisque (F 156 Skutsch). 27 As the one preserved of a tribunus defending himself bravely against a rain of hostile spears (F 391–8 Skutsch).

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With wars constituting the bulk of the Annales’ subject matter, Rome’s relationship to the outside world must have been—implicitly or explicitly— present throughout. The question is to what extent Ennius addressed the political consequences of Rome’s victories. The most interesting fragment in this respect is one of the longest extant.28 It concerns Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, who fought three Werce battles with the Romans, before in the end withdrawing to Greece. The fragment presents Pyrrhus’ answer to a Roman embassy come to ransom prisoners. Pyrrhus’ words show him noble and generous, a hero of Homeric stature. He refuses to negotiate ransom, challenges the Romans to a decisive battle, and returns the prisoners for free. The key lines are 186–7: ‘Let’s try out by manliness, whether Fate wants you or me to rule and what it [i.e. Fate] brings.’29 For here Pyrrhus refers to rule over others or dominion in a certain area as the consequence of military victory.30 There are also interesting fragments concerning the struggle with Carthage. Ennius did not represent the Carthaginians very favorably, as can be seen from references to their custom of sacriWcing children, their superbia, and their perjury.31 At the same time, he seems to have been at pains to stress Roman righteousness even where it was more than doubtful, as at the beginning of the First Punic War.32 None of this is surprising. More important in our context are two short fragments apparently emphasizing the worldwide character of the struggle between Rome and Carthage. When Ennius speaks of the ‘wave’ which ‘divides Europe and Libya’,33 and when he asserts that, probably on the arrival of Scipio, ‘the African earth trembled shuddering in terrible tumult’,34 the reader knows that the war is not between Rome and Carthage but Europe and Africa. Thus it seems possible that in Ennius’ books on the Second Punic War, the future worldwide dominion of Rome was being somehow suggested.

(b) M. Porcius Cato The founding phase of the literary historical narrative in Rome came to its conclusion with Cato’s Origines.35 The work, which Cato wrote in the later 28

F 183–90 (Skutsch). Vosne velit an me regnare era quidve ferat Fors j virtute experiamur. 30 This against Skutsch 1985, 437, who wants to understand regnare simply as the ‘mastery’ of the victor in battle without the ‘rule of the victor over the conquered’ being ‘involved’. 31 Cf. F 214 and 287, Vestigia vi (Skutsch). 32 Cf. F 216 (Skutsch) with Skutsch’s commentary. 33 F 302 (Skutsch). 34 F 309 (Skutsch). Cf. Skutsch’s commentary. 35 Text: Beck and Walter 2001, 148–224 (with introduction and commentary). Still valuable Astin 1978, 211–39. See further Mutschler 2000, 105–12; Suerbaum 2002, 387–94; Walter 2004, 279–96. 29

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years of his life (235–149 bc), was as peculiar as its author, the most successful and, after Cicero, most famous homo novus in Roman history. There are several traits of the Origines which were truly original, though only the ones directly connected with our topic can be referred to here. As the title (plural!) indicates, Cato dealt not only with the origin and the history of Rome, but with the origins and the histories of many Italian tribes, communities, and polities. Some, like the Ligurians, were dismissed as ‘illiterate’, ‘false’, and ‘deceitful’,36 but others, like the Sabines, were considered as having contributed substantially to the development of the Roman character.37 In addition, Cato remarked that the Alps ‘protected Italy like a wall’.38 Even if this was a geo-military more than a geo-political statement, it suggests that Cato was prepared to see Rome and Italy as some kind of unit. Rome’s relationship to the world outside Italy was presented as being Wrst of all determined through Roman military prowess and discipline.39 These qualities, which Cato evidently took pains to bring into focus, distinguished the Romans from the two most important Others, the Carthaginians and the Greeks. At the same time, Cato seems to have made sure that his compatriots appeared not only militarily, but also morally superior. More interesting is what surfaces concerning events of the last two decades of Cato’s life. It has been suggested that Cato considered the year 168, that of the battle of Pydna, as one of epochal historical signiWcance, ‘because now all the states of the Mediterranean would have to submit to the will of Rome’.40 At any rate, we can state that Cato’s Origines is the Wrst extant Roman historiographical text which discusses problems of imperial politics, i.e. problems of a state exerting power over other nations and peoples. There are two series of fragments pertinent to this issue. In both cases Cato records speeches delivered by himself; and in both cases he appears less as a hardliner than as a prudent and far-sighted politician.41 First, there is Cato’s speech on the Rhodians. In Rome’s conXict with the Macedonians under Perseus (171–68), the Rhodians had not clearly backed Rome. Thus, after victory had been achieved there were voices in the Roman senate advocating war against the rich island. Cato, however, considered the Rhodians’ and other peoples’ and nations’ desire ‘not to be under our sole rule (and that is) in our servitude’42 as a legitimate motive for their conduct and advised restraint. 36 37 39 40 41 42

F 2.1–2 (Beck/Walter) inliterati, mendaces, fallaces. 38 F 2.22 (Beck/Walter). F 4.10 (Beck/Walter). Cf. F 4.6, 4.7a, 4.7b (Beck/Walter). Flach 1998, 72. Cf. also Beck and Walter 2001, 151. Cf. Fantham 1991. F 5.3 (16/b) (Beck/Walter): ne sub solo imperio nostro in servitute nostra essent . . .

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The second case concerns the Lusitanians, a tribe on the Iberian Peninsula, which after prolonged struggle had Wnally agreed to submit to Roman rule, but was then maltreated by the Roman commander, Sulpicius Galba. Galba was subsequently prosecuted in Rome and, in spite of his old age, Cato stepped forward and pleaded for Galba’s conviction.43 We cannot reconstruct Cato’s precise argument, but we know from fragments of other speeches in similar cases that he made a point of harshly criticizing unreasonable action by Roman oYcials against socii or provincials. He was, apparently, deeply worried about this kind of excess because, like the corruption of the mores in other spheres of life, it endangered the stability of both the Roman state and its imperium.

(g) The view from inside/outside: polybius For an adequate description of the development of historiography in Rome during the Wrst half of the second century bc one more work needs to be considered. This is not a piece of Roman historiography in the sense of being written by a Roman, but is concerned with Rome and was, at least in part, written in Rome (about the same time as Cato’s Origines). Its author was a Greek aristocrat, Polybius, who had been among the 1,000 Achaean hostages brought to Italy after the battle of Pydna (168 bc).44 Living in Rome for almost two decades, he was well equipped to undertake his great work: a history of Rome’s ascension to dominion over ‘nearly the whole inhabited world’. It addressed Wrst of all the leading circles in the Greek world, but it also strongly inXuenced Roman historical and political thinking. Of particular importance in our context is its contribution to the development of the idea of empire in Rome. This is no coincidence, but is closely connected with Polybius’ choice of theme. In the proem of the Wrst book Polybius denotes as his subject matter the ‘period of a little less than Wfty-three years [sc. from the beginning of the Second Punic War to the battle of Pydna] within which almost the whole inhabited world has fallen under the dominion of Rome’ and sets himself the task to explain ‘how and thanks to which kind of constitution’ this has happened.45 Still in the introduction, the category of empire proper oVers Polybius the opportunity to underline the extraordinariness of his subject, since the Romans ‘have subdued not only individual parts, but almost the 43

F 7.1-5 (Beck/Walter). Fundamental for all problems concerning Polybius is Walbank 1957–79. See further Walbank 1966; Walbank 1972; Sacks 1981; and most recently Walbank 2002. 45 Polybius 1.1.4-6. 44

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whole world and thus have led their rule to such heights that no former power can compete with them, no future power will be able to surpass them’.46 Clearly Polybius believes in the singularity of his topic. And more than that. He is convinced that the peculiar character of the events to be described demands a speciWc historiographical approach. With Rome expanding into the diVerent parts of the Mediterranean, ‘history’, for the Wrst time, becomes a ‘unity’,47 and this new ‘body-like’ unity of history demands a new kind of historiography, namely ‘universal history’.48 Polybius’ work, then, is supposed to be genuine universal history in correspondence with its topic: the universal rule of Rome. Scholars have pointed out that Polybius’ reXections on and practice of universal history are not fully convincing.49 However that may be, it is quite probable that his insistence on the necessity of a new, universalistic historiographical approach serves also to emphasize the extraordinariness of his topic. In a similar way we can probably interpret his remarks on Tyche. Although Polybius’ use of Tyche /tyche is far from unequivocal, it seems clear that whenever he employs the term in the context of Roman expansion he seems to speak about a divine force: Tyche, the great Hellenistic goddess, ruler of the life of men.50 This does not mean that he does not on other occasions, as for example in his famous sixth book, present other, immanent explanations of Rome’s success. But at the beginning of his work he was obviously not to dispense with the impressive eVect of a reference to a benign transcendent power promoting Rome’s cause and leading it to the dominion of the world. This is not, however, the whole story. As early as the proem of book 3, Polybius informs his readers about a change of plan concerning the scope of his work, which is now to be continued to the last Punic War and to contemporary unrest in Greece. The reasons Polybius gives are directly connected with his view of what constitutes an empire.51 He is convinced that an empire cannot be judged solely on the basis of its coming into being: such judgment must also take into account how it is maintained over time. Walbank rightly stresses both Polybius’ merit of raising the question and the fact that he ‘never makes any attempt to answer it’.52 Polybius indeed fails to develop ‘any theory of imperial justiWcation based on the advantage or disadvantage of the ruled’.53 Nevertheless, the very possibility of his having

46

47 48 Polybius 1.2.7. Ibid. 1.3.3–4. Ibid. 1.4.1–2. Sacks 1981, esp. 104. 50 Cf. Walbank 1966, esp. 56–8. The point is argued in greater detail in Walbank 1972, 60–5 and 67–8, and again more succinctly in Walbank 2002, 181–3. 51 52 53 Polybius 3.4. Walbank 1972, 181. Ibid. 181 f. 49

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alerted his readers to the justice of such a consideration remains an important step in the development of imperial thought in Rome. There is one more point to be made. As impressed as the historian is by Rome’s worldwide rule and in spite of the fact that this rule has just been established, Polybius is distanced enough to see it as Wnite. That the Roman empire, too, will one day vanish and be replaced by others is implied in passages already referred to.54 It follows from the theory of the cycle of the constitutions, which a state may slow down but cannot stop;55 and it is the unavoidable consequence of the fact that ‘it is the nature of all things to decline after reaching their apogee’.56 That this point found favor with his Roman readers we have reason to doubt.

3. T H E H EY DAY O F RO M A N S E L F- R E P R E S E N TAT I ON After the destruction of Carthage and Corinth in 146 bc, Rome continued to enlarge its dominion, but at a restrained pace, without the spectacular victories and conquests of preceding decades. All along, historical narrative maintained its development, generating new genres like the historical monograph, contemporary history, epics on particular campaigns, autobiographical sketches, etc.57 Unfortunately, we have even less of these works than of those of the previous period, which makes their treatment too intricate for this context. In terms of both politics and literature the situation changed in the last decades of the republic and the beginning of the imperial period. With the military successes of Pompey and Caesar Roman expansion took on a renewed dynamism in the East (Asia minor, Armenia, Syria) and the Northwest (Gaul, with Germany and Britain), and a few years later, Augustus, by consolidating and securing these new acquisitions and by reorganizing the provincial system in general, gave the empire deWnite shape. In these same years, several works came into being which count among the most important pieces of Roman self-description and which, to a considerable extent, have survived. Two of their authors belong to the last generation of the republic, two to the Wrst of the imperial period.58

54 57 58

55 56 Polybius 1.2.7, 3.4.7. Ibid. 6.9.12. Ibid. 6.57.1. Cf. Mutschler 2000, 112–24; Walter 2004, 296–356. As to the use of the term imperium in this period cf. Richardson 2003.

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(a) The last generation of the republic (a) Cicero Cicero is not usually known as a historian.59 But as the introductory part of De legibus shows, he (possibly with others) considered himself as the only writer able to raise Roman historiography to the level of Greek. Busy as he was with politics and his philosophical and rhetorical writings, he never got around to composing history proper. However, in his De republica—like De legibus a philosophical dialogue written in the second part of the Wfties, i.e. in the period of Caesar’s Gallic wars—he became a kind of historian, by sketching in book 2 the historical development of Rome’s constitution, and by discussing in book 3 the problem of Rome’s imperial rule in a historical perspective. It is the latter issue which interests us.60 The general theme of book 3 is the relationship between state and justice. The text is only partially preserved, but with the help of references in later writers at least part of the argument can be grasped. As it seems, the relationship between state and justice was discussed in two respects: in terms of internal justice, especially concerning the distribution of power; and in terms of the justness of Rome’s relationship to the outside world. Concerning the second problem, one of the interlocutors, Philus, plays the advocatus diaboli. Taking up arguments which Carneades, head of the Academy during a visit to Rome in the middle of the second century bc had uttered in public, he lays serious charges. These are that the Roman people gained possession of the whole world ‘by legitimately committing injustice’61 (referring to the painstakingly performed rituals of declaring war); that if the Romans wanted to be just, ‘they would have to return to their huts and to lie in poverty and misery’;62 that they praised to the skies those who enriched their commonwealth by the eversions of states and the destruction of peoples,63 etc. However, these reproaches are not Cicero’s Wnal word. They are countered by Laelius, friend of the great Scipio (the younger) and a man of high authority. Laelius asserts the justness both of Rome’s wars, all of which were waged for the sake of the allies or Rome’s own safety,64 and of Roman rule, under which those who wanted to do evil were deprived of the opportunity of doing so:65 ‘Don’t we therefore see that rule (dominatus) is given to the best by nature herself to the highest advantage of the weaker ones?’ 59

As to Cicero’s relation to history and historiography cf. Ga¨rtner 2005 (with bibliography). For a general discussion of Cicero’s views concerning the Roman Empire see Brunt 1990, 288–323. 61 62 De republica 3.20. Ibid. 3.21. 63 64 65 Ibid. 3.23. Ibid. 3.34. Ibid. 3.36. 60

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Cicero’s discussion is telling. It shows that, inXuenced by Greek thought, Roman intellectuals were capable of reXecting on the problems of Rome’s conquests and imperial administration, and were willing to explore arguments against both. On the other hand, it makes clear that even a humanist like Cicero was ready to assume that, at least in principle, the establishment of the empire was justiWed through the justness of its wars,66 and that despite particular shortcomings Rome’s dominion was for the good of rulers and ruled alike.

(b) Sallust Sallust, the earliest of Rome’s three great historians—the other two being Livy and Tacitus, was a younger contemporary of Cicero’s. A former follower of Caesar, he withdrew from politics after the dictator’s death (44 bc), turned to history, and in the last years of the republic produced two monographs, on the conspiracy of Catiline (63 bc) and the war against Jugurtha (113–105 bc) respectively, and a history of the twelve years after Sulla’s death (78–67 bc). Though his main interest was the internal state of the Roman commonwealth, and his great theme the decline of social and political morals, imperial rule surfaces as a topic in his works.67 Since his view probably did not change very much in this respect, we may start with his last work, the Histories, of which we have only a few fragments and a small series of speeches and letters excerpted and transmitted independently from the rest. One of the letters fundamentally calls into question the motives of Rome’s imperial rule. Mithridates, king of Pontos and arch-enemy of the Romans for almost thirty years (from the early 80s to the late 60s bc), asks Arsaces, king of Parthia, for help against them. His main argument is ‘that the Romans have only one old reason for war with all nations, peoples, kings: their deep greed for power and riches’.68 This is obviously the Carneades/ Philus argument, which a priori could be expected to circulate widely among Rome’s opponents. Other arguments of the kind are added. We do not know to what extent Mithridates’ letter was balanced by opposing statements in the Histories, but we can be fairly sure that Sallust did not in principle share this negative view of Rome’s power. This emerges, for example, from the role the idea of imperium plays in the Wrst excursus of the Catiline, where Sallust surveys Roman history from the beginning to his 66

Cf. De oYciis 1.35–8. Cf. Heldmann 1993. Historiae 4.69.5: . . . cupido profunda imperii et divitiarum. Cf. also the variations in §§ 17–20. 67 68

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own time (chaps. 6–13). In his view, Rome’s political success was the product of the boni mores, its ancient exemplary ways of conduct. The boni mores enabled the Romans gradually to expand their power, until their dominion comprised all of the Mediterranean. At this stage—encapsulated for Sallust in the destruction of Carthage—‘Fortuna began to rage and to turn everything upside down.’69 In particular the mores degenerated in all Welds of action, which meant among other things that Rome’s ‘rule (imperium) turned from the most just and best into a cruel and intolerable one’.70 As an earlier passage of the Catiline has already made clear, such a development is, after all, dangerous for those in power. For ‘fortune changes with conduct, and rule is always transferred from the less good to the best’.71 Thus, we can see that for Sallust rule over others and, in the end, empire presupposed certain moral qualities without which rule and empire were in danger of being lost. Justness (aequitas, 9.3; iustitia, 10.1) was counted as one of these qualities. But we should not be misled. This is not a theory of imperial rule (as hinted at in Polybius and sketched out by Cicero) in which the diVusion of justice among the ruled (or their general well-being) is presented as its Wnal aim or the decisive criterion for its justiWcation. Rather, decency in the state’s and its representatives’ dealings with the surrounding world is just one in a whole set of individual and social virtues, among which energy, valor, military competence, and competitiveness for glory still hold pride of place. Political power and, in the end, imperial rule are seen as the reward for or the natural result of this set of qualities, just as its degeneration puts rule and empire in jeopardy. The Bellum Iugurthinum conWrms this interpretation. For though this work describes a colonial war—Jugurtha being the king of Numidia in the neighborhood of the Roman province of Africa—and thus could be expected to deal with questions of empire and imperial administration, it does so only on a limited scale,72 whereas its main interest is still on the moral condition of Rome and its citizens. Thus, when it portrays and evaluates Roman leaders, it is not the justness, let alone the mildness, of their dealings with the provincials which is of interest. The questions at issue are rather how aVected or unaVected they are by material greed and how susceptible or resistant they are to Jugurtha’s attempts of bribery; and, above all, how competent and successful they are as military commanders.

69 70 71 72

De Catilinae coniuratione 10.1[0]. Ibid. 10.6. Ibid. 2.5–6. Cf. e.g. the end of Adherbal’s letter to the Roman senate (Bellum Iugurthinum 24.10).

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(b) The Wrst generation of the imperial period: Virgil and Livy Augustus consolidated the expansion of Roman dominion brought about by Pompey and Caesar. It is no coincidence that the Wrst two wholly or partially extant works which present us at least with elements of an ideology of empire stem from his reign: Virgil’s Aeneid and Livy’s Ab urbe condita. The Aeneid was written during the Wrst decade of Augustus’ principate, i.e. in the 20s of the Wrst century bc, after Virgil had already established himself as one of the leading poets of the age. It was almost complete at the time of Virgil’s death in 19 bc. During the same decade Livy, who, in contrast to the majority of his predecessors, never took an active part in politics, set upon his great undertaking, a history of Rome from the foundation to his own time. He was occupied with it until his death in ad 17. At the end he had completed 142 books, of which about one-quarter have come down to us. Whereas Livy’s Ab urbe condita is straightforward historical narrative, Virgil’s Aeneid, like Naevius’ epic on the First Punic War, combines myth and history. However, in this case the mythical events, Aeneas’ journey from Troy to Italy and the war he has to Wght in Latium, are in the foreground of the narrative whereas Roman history proper Wgures only in three ‘visions’ of the future (in books 1, 6, and 8). Despite this, it seems reasonable to treat the historical work and the epic poem together, as their views of the empire are similar.73 The Wrst point to be stated is that for both writers Roman worldwide rule is a self-evident fact, even if in the Aeneid this ‘fact’ can only be presented as the ‘future fate’ of Rome.74 Livy, in his preface, speaks of Romans as the ‘leading people on earth’75 and claims that ‘the human peoples will bear’ Rome’s divinization of its origins ‘with the same equanimity as they bear its imperial rule’.76 Second, both works present Rome’s imperial rule as willed from the beginning by fate and the gods and as unlimited in time and space. Though there are hints in this direction in earlier texts, the explicitness of these claims is new. Concerning the Aeneid, it is enough to point to Jupiter’s words in book 1:77 ‘To them [i.e. the Romans] I set no limit to their fortunes and no time: I have given them empire without end. Even bitter Juno will . . . hold the Romans dear together with me, the masters of things, the race that wears the 73

As to our topic concerning Virgil cf. Adler 2003, concerning Livy cf. Petzold 1983. Cf. Aeneid 1.257–96: speech of Jupiter; 6.679–886: souls of the heroes of Rome’s future history; 8.526–728: scenes of Rome’s future history on Aeneas’ shield. 75 Praef. 3: principis terrarum populis. 76 Praef. 7: gentes humanae patiantur aequo animo quam imperium patiuntur. 77 1.277–83. 74

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toga.’ In Livy’s Ab urbe condita, already in book 1 Aeneas’ landing in Italy happens under the guidance of fate.78 Even more impressive is that during work on the temple of Jupiter on the Capitoline hill, the gods send two signs. One—the birds of the augurium preventing the relocation of the shrine of Terminus—indicates the stability and eternal duration of the empire; the other—a skull found during the excavation for the foundations of the temple—portends Rome’s future as caput mundi, i.e. the worldwide extension of its rule.79 Hints, comments, and statements to the same eVect can be found throughout the work.80 Third, for both authors the empire is not only founded on virtue, but also fulWlls a world-historic mission. In the Aeneid this idea can be grasped throughout the narrative in the Wgure of its hero, Aeneas. It is also explicitly expressed in the words of Anchises, towards the end of the second vision of the future history of Rome in book 6:81 ‘But you Roman, remember, to rule the peoples by your order—these will be your arts—and to teach the ways of peace, to spare defeated peoples, to defeat the proud.’ Roman rule appears as a means of establishing peace and order among the peoples of the world. In Livy, at the latest from book 31 onward, when he describes the completion of Rome’s Mediterranean expansion, several passages, most of which are put in the mouths of people aVected, also sketch out Rome’s imperial ‘mission’. One summarizes the thoughts and conversations among the Greeks after T. Quinctius Flamininus has announced the liberty of the Greek cities at the Isthmian games in 197 bc. The Greeks rejoice:82 that there is on earth a people, which at its own expense, and through its own eVort and danger wages war for the liberty of others, and which performs this service not only for people in its vicinity or on the same stretch of land, but crosses the sea in order that in the whole world there might be no unjust rule and that everywhere human and divine right and law are in full potency.

Here, Rome’s imperial mission, abrogating direct rule, guarantees freedom and the rule of justice and law. Other passages stress peace and security, and, it seems, though indirectly, even culture and education.83 The gist of all these passages is that Roman rule is more than rule for rule’s sake: that it has a purpose beyond itself which includes the welfare and the well-being of those ruled. 78

1.1.4: ducentibus fatis. 1.55.3–6. 80 As to the eternal duration of the empire cf. 4.4.4, 28.28.11; as to its worldwide extension cf. 36.17.14, 37.25.5, 38.60.5. 81 6.851–3. 82 33.33.5–7. 83 Cf. Petzold 1983, 254–63. 79

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In spite of the fragmentary state of the evidence, it seems relatively safe to state that in Rome concepts and ideas concerning empire and imperial rule did not exist before the phenomena themselves, but appeared with them and developed to accommodate and reXect the changing political situation. This can be shown with respect to three elements of the ideological complex. The Wrst is the spatial and temporal scope of Rome’s dominion. Well before the emergence of Roman literary narrative, stories, monuments, and funeral speeches must have given Romans a clear impression of their military superiority and increasing power over communities in Italy and Magna Graecia. The Wrst historical narratives described larger-scale wars and victories: Ennius indicated that the Punic Wars were not between two polities but between two continents: Europe and Africa. The elder Cato was aware that Roman rule was already over peoples and nations. Finally, Polybius presented Rome as the successor of the great empires of old. A century later, Cicero, Sallust, and their contemporaries took Polybius’ concept of the imperium Romanum as an empire which comprised most of the inhabited world as self-evident. And in the time of Augustus, the idea arose that this empire should, and perhaps could, be unlimited in space and time. Similar stages of development can be discerned with respect to two other ideological issues which frequently appear in close connection with each other: the fundamental morality of Roman conduct and the gods’ support of the Roman cause. Already in early times, public rituals performed at the start and Wnish of wars helped the community to foster the feeling that it had conducted itself correctly, and that therefore the gods were with it. The commemoration of individuals exerting or even sacriWcing themselves for the public good further strengthened this conviction. The early works of historiography and epic poetry then gave almost systematic treatment to both the praiseworthy achievements of individuals and the correct conduct of the community in dealing with its opponents. The idea of the bellum iustum began to play a role, and with it the notion of a corresponding guarantee of continuous divine support. At the end of this period, Polybius even developed the idea that a transcendent power, Tyche, had been guiding Rome to imperial rule. However, he also asserted that Roman rule would have to be judged on its operation, not just its establishment; and his contemporary, Cato, touched upon the moral shortcomings of individuals and even the possibility of a general moral decline and the associated danger of a decline in Roman power. In the texts of the Wrst century these ideas were taken up in diVerent ways.

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Sallust, ever pessimistic, introduced Polybius’ Tyche under the name of Fortuna as the power ‘turning everything upside down’ after the destruction of Carthage, i.e. causing the degeneration of social and political morals he was so deeply concerned about. On the other hand, Cicero, though not without scruples, kept to the idea of Rome’s wars being basically just, and outlined the rudiments of a theory of imperial rule exercised for the beneWt of the ruled. Augustan writers, like Virgil and Livy, went a step further. In their presentation, Rome’s imperial rule was from the beginning willed by fate and the gods, and it was morally justiWed because it was directed towards the promotion of peace, justice, order, and civilization. Thus at the end of the development there seems to stand a concept of empire which at least as a concept, i.e. independently of the question of its realization, corresponds to an advanced moral standard. However, we have to be cautious. The single continuous trait to be observed in Roman selfawareness through the centuries is a consciousness of Roman superiority in military valor and prowess and the sense that this superiority naturally entailed political power. Such conviction may be discerned even in authors like Virgil and Livy. The most impressive part of Livy’s work as we have it, the third decade, describes the Second Punic War as the greatest war ever fought, and gives full attention to Rome’s military achievements. As for Virgil, the words of Anchises quoted above leave no doubt about the means of establishing peace and order; and the very last scene on Aeneas’ shield in book 8, though it is a peaceful one, shows Augustus receiving the tributes of the peoples of the world and not e.g. dispensing justice to them.84 Thus we can state that, in spite of the fact that by the second half of the Wrst century bc something like an ethically founded concept of empire had come into being, pride in Rome’s military achievements and the feeling that rule and in the end empire were in some way their meed and due was a widespread phenomenon among Romans down to the Augustan period. An important piece of evidence to substantiate the last point is Augustus’ report on his deeds, the Res Gestae, which he composed and published not long before his death (ad 14).85 It seems appropriate to end this paper with a brief look at this text, in which the man who gave the empire a lasting geographical and organizational shape presented his view of the imperium. The crucial section is the last part of the main body of the text (chaps. 26–33), where Augustus gives his record in ‘foreign aVairs’. These chapters reveal a basic concept of empire, but say strikingly little about the ethical justiWcation of imperial rule. In one passage, to be sure, Augustus claims that ‘against none of the [Alpine] tribes was war waged unjustly (per iniuriam)’ 84

Cf. Aeneid 8.720–8.

85

Cf. Witschel’s paper in this volume.

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(26); and in another he says that ‘many other peoples have experienced the Wdes of the Roman people under his rule’ (32). But this is all. In general, the essence of empire is blandly accepted as Roman rule for rule’s sake, and military force is presented as the means of establishing and maintaining it. The very Wrst sentence of the section is telling (26): ‘Of all the provinces which had neighbors who did not obey our command (imperium) I extended the borders.’ In one case (26: Ethopia and Arabia) the text speaks of the concrete implications of this: enemies cut down and cities conquered. Towards the end of the section Augustus reports that he had his stepson Tiberius defeat the tribes of Pannonia and ‘subject them under Roman rule (imperium)’ and that his army ‘forced the tribes of Dacia to endure the commands (imperia) of the Roman people’ (30). Throughout, Augustus catalogues the regions and peoples which his armies and Xeets have gained control of, and mentions the peoples which have sent embassies to ask for friendship or help and advice in internal struggles or to show their respect (26–32). The ethics of ruling and empire is of no real concern here. This does not mean that the princeps did not face problems of political morality. These, however, concerned not the empire but the transformation of the res publica Romana into monarchy. This problem was so grave that even at the end of his reign Augustus thought it wise not to discuss, but rather to conceal and deny it. Thus he stated at the beginning of his report that as a young man he ‘had freed the state from the oppression of a faction and restored it to liberty’ (1), and at its end that in his sixth and seventh consulate (28 and 27 bc) he had given back his extraordinary powers and ‘from then on [had] surpassed all in (personal) authority (auctoritas), but [had] had no more institutional power (potestas) than any of his colleagues in oYce’ (34). This claim to have restored the republic was, as is well known, at the heart of Augustan principate. But insistently as it was repeated, it could scarcely convince those with a deeper understanding of the workings of politics, making it all the more necessary for Augustus to point to other achievements. His unique contribution to the empire made up an important part of these. Because he knew his public, in presenting these contributions Augustus did not refer much to imperial ethics. Instead, he concentrated on military campaigns, political power, and the worldwide acknowledgment of Roman rule. He could be sure that his countrymen would be impressed. References Adler, Eve, Vergil’s Empire: Political Thought in the Aeneid. Lanham (Rowman & LittleWeld) 2003.

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Albrecht, Michael von, ‘Naevius’ ‘‘Bellum Poenicum’’ ’, in: Erich Burck (ed.), Das ro¨mische Epos. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 1979, 15–32 [¼ Albrecht 1979a]. —— ‘Ennius’ ‘‘Annales’’ ’, in: Burck (see above), 33–44 [¼ Albrecht 1979b]. Astin, Alan E., Cato the Censor. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1978. Beck, Hans, and Walter, Uwe (eds.), Die Fru¨hen Ro¨mischen Historiker, vol. i: Von Fabius Pictor bis Cn. Gellius, hg., u¨bers. und komm. von H. B. und U. W. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 2001. Brunt, Peter A., Roman Imperial Themes. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1990; repr. 1998. Bu¨chner, Karl (ed.), Fragmenta poetarum Latinorum epicorum et lyricorum praeter Ennium et Lucilium. 2nd edn. Leipzig (Teubner) 1982. Classen, Carl Joachim, ‘Ennius: Ein Fremder in Rom’, Gymnasium, 99 (1992), 121–45. Erskine, Andrew, Troy between Greece and Rome. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2001. Fantham, Eleonora, ‘Cato and the Conscience of Imperialism’, Cahiers des e´tudes anciennes, 26 (1991), 115–25. Flach, Dieter, Ro¨mische Geschichtsschreibung. 3rd edn. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 1998. Flower, Harriet I., Ancestor Masks and Aristocratic Power in Roman Culture. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1996. —— ‘Der Leichenzug: Die Ahnen kommen wieder’, in: Stein-Ho¨lkeskamp and Ho¨lkeskamp 2006, 321–37. Ga¨rtner, Ursula, ‘Cicero und die Geschichtsschreibung’, in: ead. (ed.), Ro¨mische Geschichte und Geschichtsschreibung. Potsdam (Universita¨tsverlag Potsdam) 2005, 21–52. Goldberg, Sander M., Epic in Republican Rome. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1995. Gruen, Erich S., Studies in Greek Culture and Roman Policy. Leiden (Brill) 1990. Heldmann, Konrad, Sallust u¨ber die ro¨mische Weltherrschaft: Ein Geschichtsmodell im Catilina und seine Tradition in der hellenistischen Historiographie. Stuttgart (Teubner) 1993. Ho¨lkeskamp, Karl-Joachim, ‘Der Triumph: Erinnere Dich, daß Du ein Mensch bist’, in: Stein-Ho¨lkeskamp and Ho¨lkeskamp 2006, 258–76. Ho¨lscher, Tonio, ‘Das Forum Romanum: Die monumentale Geschichte Roms’, in: Stein-Ho¨lkeskamp and Ho¨lkeskamp 2006, 100–22. Mutschler, Fritz-Heiner, ‘Norm und Erinnerung: Anmerkungen zur sozialen Funktion von historischem Epos und Geschichtsschreibung im 2. Jh. v. Chr.’, in: Maximilian Braun, Andreas HaltenhoV, and Fritz-Heiner Mutschler (eds.), Moribus antiquis res stat Romana: Ro¨mische Werte und ro¨mische Literatur im 3. und 2. Jh. v. Chr. Mu¨nchen/Leipzig (Saur) 2000, 87–124. Petzold, Karl-Ernst, ‘Die Entstehung des ro¨mischen Weltreichs im Spiegel der Historiographie: Bemerkungen zum bellum iustum bei Livius’, in: Eckard Lefe`vre and Eckart Olshausen (eds.), Livius: Werk und Rezeption. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1983, 241–63.

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Richardson, John, ‘Imperium Romanum between Republic and Empire’, in: Lukas de Blois, Paul Erdkamp, Olivier Hekster, Gerda de Kleijn, and Stephan Mols (eds.), The Representation and Perception of Roman Imperial Power. Amsterdam (Gieben) 2003, 137–47. Sacks, Kenneth, Polybius on the Writing of History. Berkeley (University of California Press) 1981. Skutsch, Otto (ed.), The ‘Annals’ of Quintus Ennius, ed. with introd. and comment. by O. S. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1985. Stein-Ho¨lkeskamp, Elke, and Ho¨lkeskamp, Karl-Joachim (eds.), Erinnerungsorte der Antike: Die ro¨mische Welt. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 2006. Suerbaum, Werner (ed.), Die Archaische Literatur: Von den Anfa¨ngen bis Sullas Tod. Die vorliterarische Periode und die Zeit von 240 bis 78 v. Chr. (Handbuch der Lateinischen Literatur der Antike 1). Mu¨nchen (Beck) 2002. Timpe, Dieter, ‘Fabius Pictor und die Anfa¨nge der ro¨mischen Historiographie’, Aufstieg und Niedergang der ro¨mischen Welt, 1: 2 (1972), 928–69. —— ‘ ‘‘Memoria’’ und Geschichtsschreibung bei den Ro¨mern’, in: Hans-Joachim Gehrke and Astrid Mo¨ller (eds.), Vergangenheit und Lebenswelt: Soziale Kommunikation, Traditionsbildung und historisches Bewußtsein. Tu¨bingen (Narr) 1996, 277–300. Walbank, Frank W., A Historical Commentary on Polybius. 3 vols. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1957–79. —— ‘Polybius’, in: Thomas A. Dorey (ed.), Latin Historians. London (Routledge & Kegan Paul) 1966, 39–63. —— Polybius. Berkeley/Los Angeles/London (University of California Press) 1972. —— Polybius, Rome and the Hellenistic World: Essays and ReXections. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2002. Walter, Uwe, ‘Memoria’ und ‘res publica’: Zur Geschichtskultur im republikanischen Rom. Frankfurt (Verlag Antike) 2004. Wiseman, Timothy P., Remus: A Roman Myth. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1995.

Part II The Firmly Established Empire

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A. Imperial Grandeur and Historiography a` la Grande

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The Problem of ‘Imperial Historiography’ in Rome Fritz-Heiner Mutschler (Dresden)

INTRODUCTORY RE MARKS Applied to Rome, the term ‘imperial’ is an ambivalent one. Thus, one could say that Rome became ‘imperial’ twice: for the Wrst time, when it expanded its rule over ‘almost all the inhabited world’1 so that after the destruction of Carthage (146 bc) ‘sea and land lay everywhere open to its sway’,2 for the second time when Augustus ended the civil wars which had disrupted the Roman republic and introduced a monarchical form of government (27 bc). First Rome became imperial by the establishment of its empire, later it became imperial by the establishment of an emperor. Historians think that both developments were not unrelated, since a worldwide empire could not for ever be ruled with the political system of a city-state. Be that as it may, starting with the last decades of the Wrst century bc, Rome was ‘imperial’ both with respect to the expansion of its rule and to its form of government.3 It is the historical consciousness of this new ‘doubly imperial’ Rome that the present paper is concerned with. The texts considered will cover the time span from the Augustan period (27 bc–ad 14) to the Wrst decades of the 1

Polybius 1.1.5. Sallust, De Catilinae coniuratione 10.1. 3 In scholarship the term ‘imperial period’ is usually used with reference to the ‘Kaiserzeit’, i.e. the period starting with Augustus and extending to the end of the Western Roman Empire. With the opposite notion being ‘republican period’, the term seems to stress the aspect of form of state. Nevertheless, the aspect of ‘Reich’ is often connoted, which would imply that the period of empire in the sense of ‘Reich’, too, starts only with Augustus. An argument for such a view, perhaps, can be gained from the use of imperium in Latin texts. As Richardson 2003, 140–2, argues, only in the Augustan period, namely in Augustus’ Res Gestae 13, imperium is for the Wrst time unequivocally used in a territorial sense, i.e. referring to the area of Roman rule. On the other hand, the common view is that there are cases of this use already in Cicero, Caesar, and Sallust. And few would deny that in the course of the second century bc Rome had become an imperial power, exercising its rule over a large assembly of diVerent regions and peoples. 2

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period of the so-called ‘humanitarian’ emperors (ad 96–180). Concretely, we will Wrst deal with Tacitus (ad c.55–c.120/5), then with the two most important Augustan poets, Virgil (70–19 bc) and Horace (65–8 bc), and the author of an abridged history of Rome, Velleius Paterculus (c.20 bc–after ad 30). The reasons for this selection of authors and for their non-chronological treatment will, hopefully, become clear from what follows. The purpose of the paper is not to trace step by step the development of historical consciousness in the aforesaid period, an undertaking which due to the state of transmission of the once copious literature would be impossible to fulWll, but to show that there existed in this period diverging evaluations of the new state of aVairs, and to attempt an explanation of this fact.4 As demanded by the structure of the volume this paper will be on Rome. Nevertheless, reference will be made to the Chinese side as well. In this way the speciWcity of the Roman case will come out more clearly. At the same time certain correspondences between Rome and China may point to constitutive elements of imperial thinking in general. That the glance at China will be undertaken by a non-specialist is less problematic than it might appear. The tertia comparationis proposed will or will not prove their usefulness in the actual business of comparison. And if the descriptive remarks on China should not all be fully adequate, if some of them should be mistaken, others simplistic or incomplete, they will be corrected, speciWed, and supplemented by Achim Mittag in the following contribution.

1. TACITUS’ PROBLEMS WITH ‘IMPERIAL HISTOR IOGR AP HY ’ If we ask ourselves who are the representative historians of the Wrst one or two centuries of ‘doubly imperial’ Rome, one name outshines all others: Tacitus.5 Livy (59 bc–ad 17), to be sure, wrote in the reign of Augustus, but in terms of content his work barely reached the beginnings of the principate, and with three-quarters lost, for us breaks oV around twenty years before the destruction of Carthage. The immediate predecessors of Tacitus, who lived in and wrote about the early principate, are not much more than names to us, since almost nothing of their works is preserved. Others like Velleius Paterculus 4 A helpful treatment of Roman ‘imperial thinking’ in general is to be found in Brunt 1990, 433–80. 5 For general information concerning the Roman authors and works mentioned see Albrecht 1994.

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(c.20 bc–after ad 30) and Suetonius (c.ad 70–130), whose works we have, wrote in ‘minor’ genres like historical digest or biography. Thus, for grand historiography from and about the Wrst one and a half centuries of ‘imperial’ Rome, of the Roman ‘Kaiserreich’, it is the chief works of Tacitus we have to turn to: the Histories, written at the beginning of the second century ad and covering the period from ad 69 to 96, i.e. from the year of the four emperors to the death of Domitian, and the Annals written subsequently and covering the period from ad 14 to 68, i.e. from the death of Augustus to the end of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. This situation makes it all the more striking that Tacitus clearly has certain diYculties with writing ‘imperial’ historiography.6 Though the historian, as will be seen in a moment, is a truly complex author, three problems can be pinned down relatively precisely. The Wrst two have to do with the two aspects of ‘imperial’: on the one hand, the monarchical system with the emperor at the top of the state (‘Kaisertum’) and, on the other hand, the dominion over a considerable part of the world (‘Reich’). The third one, closely related to the Wrst two, concerns Tacitus’ general view of the course of history. The Wrst problem, then, is connected with Tacitus’ attitude towards monarchy.7 It is not a simple one.8 There are passages where the historian seems to indicate that he considers the introduction of monarchy as a historical necessity, since Rome and her empire can no longer be ruled with the political instruments of a republican city state.9 But there are more passages, from which it is evident that monarchy, in Tacitus’ eyes, has such severe drawbacks that in spite of its possible inevitability it does not meet with his approval as a form of state. The beginnings of the Annals, for example, show the historian’s resentment very clearly.10 In his condensed summary of Augustus’ reign in the very Wrst chapters of the work Tacitus does not present the coming into being of the rule of one man in Rome as a historical necessity, but as the result of the clever and ruthless striving of an individual for personal power.11 The description of 6

For an interesting discussion of some of these diYculties see Clarke 2002. For a more recent treatment of the topic see Schotter 1991. Good description of this ambivalent attitude in Mellor 1993, 88–105. 9 As e.g. Historiae 1.16.1; Annales 1.6.3, 1.9.4, 4.17.3, 4.33.2. The problem is that almost all these passages represent utterances of dramatis personae, and that Annales 4.33.2 is uncertain as to its wording. 10 Since two thirds of the preserved books of the Histories (books 1–3) deal with the political and military confrontations of ad 69 before the establishment of Vespasian as emperor, the preserved books of the Annals, which cover the reign of Tiberius (books 1–6), the last third of the reign of Claudius, and most of the reign of Nero (books 11–16), are much more important for judging Tacitus’ attitude towards monarchy and empire. 11 See esp. Annales 1.2. 7 8

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Tiberius’ accession to the throne in the following chapters intensiWes the impression that in Tacitus’ eyes monarchy is not a blessing. In every line the text conveys the author’s disgust with the ways of conduct brought about by the new political system. These ways are characterized by fear, distrust, malice, and the hypocrisy of all agents involved, in particular the new princeps and the members of the senate.12 And the chapters on Tiberius’ accession to the throne are only a prelude to what follows. The debates in the senate, on which Tacitus feels obliged to report, are again and again marred by insincerity and second intentions of the participants, and soon13 the historian has to report on the Wrst trials de laesa maiestate, conducted in the senate, which in the sequel occupy more and more space. Thus, even if the introduction of monarchy as political system was unavoidable, its historiographical consequences are in any case dismal because they force the historian to describe what he loathes. In the descriptions of the reigns of Claudius and Nero in books 11–16, things look quite similar. Tacitus’ second problem with writing the history of the ‘imperial’ period has to do with empire as ‘Reich’.14 Things are less complex here than they may appear at Wrst sight. Tacitus, to be sure, in some parts of his works provides criticism of Roman imperialism through the personae of certain enemies like the Briton Calgacus in the Agricola,15 and he seems to have some sympathy for how these enemies perceive Roman rule. But this does not mean that he ceases to be an imperialist by conviction.16 On the contrary. What he resents is the fact that for some people the empire is, so to speak, already too well established and starting to be seen as being in a state of completion. Tacitus is disturbed by the historiographical consequences of this situation. Apart from the events in the capital, which are dominated by the tensions between emperor and senate and develop into a gruesome sequence of trials and deaths, what he has to report are mostly problems and measures of civil administration at home or in diVerent parts of the empire. He reports on these things with due diligence, but without enthusiasm.17 On the other hand, he revives, so to speak, as historiographer, when he can write about military 12

Cf. Annales 1.7–8 and 1.11–14. Remarkable already is the sentence by which the whole description starts (1.7.1): ‘At Rome, however, consuls, senators, and knights were rushing into slavery; the more exalted the personage, the grosser his hypocrisy and his haste, his lineaments adjusted so as to betray neither cheerfulness at the exit nor undue depression at the entry of a prince, his tears blended with joy, his regrets with adulation.’ 13 Starting with chap. 1.72. 14 For the latest, extensive treatment of Tacitus’ attitude towards the empire see Laederich 2001. 15 Agricola 30–2. 16 Cf. Benario 1991, esp. 3349 (summary). 17 Cf. e.g. in book 1 chaps. 54 (innovations in the religious sphere), 76, and 79 (measures in ¨ mterpolitik). connection with inundations), 78 (Wnancial regulations), 80–1 (Tiberius’ A

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actions or even about real campaigns with real battles. Unfortunately, this is seldom the case. In the Wrst two books of the Annals, Germanicus’ campaigns in Germany oVer such an occasion. But Germanicus is recalled by Tiberius, and in the following books the military actions Tacitus can describe are rather police expeditions against local or regional troublemakers than proper wars. Both problems described add up to the deeply felt frustration which the historian articulates in the famous chapter 4.32. In the preceding chapters Tacitus, once again, has reported on a particularly disgusting high treason trial in the senate (4.28–30), then on three other judicial decisions of the emperor: in a case of poetic slander against the emperor, a corruption case, and a case of false accusation de maiestate (4.31). At the end of this sequence follows Tacitus’ desperate declaration: (1) Most of what I have reported and of what I will report may, as I well know, perhaps look small and insigniWcant: but nobody should compare our Annals with the writing of those authors who wrote about the old history of Rome. Those authors narrated freely tremendous wars, conquests of cities, defeated and captured kings, or, if they for once preferred to turn to domestic aVairs, quarrels between consuls and tribunes, (disputes about) land-laws and corn-laws, struggles between the people and the optimates: (2) our labour moves in narrow conWnement and is without glory; peace was unmoved or only slightly disturbed, the aVairs of the city were gloomy, and the princeps was not interested in expanding the empire. Nevertheless it will, perhaps, not be useless to look into these things, which at Wrst sight may seem insigniWcant, but which are often the point of departure of great historical movements.

The chapter is signiWcant for several reasons. First of all, it explicitly states what Tacitus would like to write about and it indicates how the fact that he lacks the opportunity to do so is related to the political situation: Tacitus would like to write about wars and conquests, and therefore resents the fact that the state of the empire is considered satisfactory and that the princeps is proferendi imperii incuriosus. Unable to write about wars Tacitus would at least be able to write about internal disputes of signiWcance and suspense, and therefore must resent a political system in which the real power of decision is concentrated in one man. In addition, the chapter conceptualizes the change of situation on a more general level and refers the historiographer’s diYculties to the speciWc character history has taken on in ‘imperial’ Rome. What Tacitus—in good Thucydidean tradition—suggests is that ‘real’ history, history worth reporting, is dynamic, is characterized by development and change, and that therefore the historian who has to deal with a period which is static, in which things have come to a standstill—as in Tiberian Rome—is necessarily at a loss.18 18

4.32.2: immota quippe aut modice lacessita pax.

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Finally, the chapter is important, because it makes clear that Tacitus’ diYculties with ‘imperial historiography’ are not the result of historiographical idiosyncrasies of his, but rather a consequence of his belonging to a speciWc historiographical tradition, the norms of which he wants to fulWll. In formulating his frustration with the ‘imperial’ state of aVairs, Tacitus points to forerunners who were in the position of writing a diVerent kind of history. The writers he is talking about—qui veteres populi Romani res composuere—are obviously not his immediate predecessors in the imperial period but the republican historians (possibly up to Livy), who wrote about the republican period of Rome. What Tacitus says about the relation of his historiography to theirs is not without substance. On the contrary, one can claim that the problems Tacitus has as a historiographer were bound to arise in view of, on the one hand, the characteristics of republican historiography and, on the other hand, certain features of the political situation in the early principate. As to the character of the writings of those qui veteres populi Romani res composuere three points can be made in spite of the dismal state of transmission.19 An important topic of republican historiography was the internal development of Rome. In this development a consequential phase was the transition from kingship to the republican form of state in 510 bc (according to the traditional dating). As we can still observe from Sallust and Livy20 this transition was seen as something positive, as an event through which the Roman res publica came, so to speak, into its own, and which led to an outburst of civic energy and thus to further success of the common cause. As to the subsequent, the republican period, it was the struggles between individuals and groups each striving for more inXuence in the state—in Tacitus’ words: ‘quarrels between consuls and tribunes, (disputes about) land-laws and corn-laws, struggles between the people and the optimates’—on which the historians could and obviously did dwell in lively and suspenseful narratives. Generally, the impression was conveyed that through these disputes the republic continued improving its organizational form and its outward eYciency. Nevertheless, from a certain point in time an additional subdiscourse developed which pointed to the problem of moral degeneration in consequence of external success. The story of this external success was the second and, probably, the most prominent topic of earlier historiography: the story of Rome, the small village

19 20

Caesar’s commentaries and Sallust’s monographs are the only works which survived intact. Sallust, De Catilinae coniuratione 6.7–7.7; Livy 2.1V.

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on the Tiber, and its way to the position of caput mundi, the capital of the world. This story consisted mainly of an unending series of successful wars, which gave the writers every opportunity to revel in the description of battles and conquests, of competent military leadership and acts of soldierly valor and bravery. What changed was the scope of the wars, with the Wrst ones being waged against neighboring communities for survival, those in the third and second centuries against Carthage and the Hellenistic kingdoms for the dominion of the Mediterranean, and the ones in the Wrst century bc against exotic tribes and peoples for further expansion of Rome’s dominion at the fringes of the inhabited world. Taken all in all, this meant that the republican historians dealt with a kind of history which was dynamic and implied change, which was moving and had a direction. Since this or a similar view of Roman history had been presented for decades not only in historiographical works, but also in other forms of public memory and historical representation,21 it must have impressed itself deeply on the minds of the Romans in general, and of the members of their ruling class in particular. It is therefore understandable that problems arose the moment political circumstances changed in the way they did in the Augustan period. First of all, the idea of Rome ruled by one man must have been repugnant to most of the Romans, brought up in the republican tradition as they were, and especially repugnant to the members of the aristocracy. Second, the fact that from a certain point in time it seemed advisable to the princeps not to overstretch Rome’s capacities, but to be content with the administration and preservation of what had been gained, contradicted the Roman drive for the expansion of the power and the prestige of the state and restricted the traditional possibilities for the members of the aristocracy to gain personal glory through military feats. Third, it must have been disconcerting to many Romans that history had begun to take a form which was diVerent from the dynamic internal and external development of their res publica to which they had become accustomed. What we observed above in Tacitus is simply the historiographical consequence of this constellation. Before continuing our investigation of things Roman, a look at another case of ‘imperial historiography’ can show us the speciWcity of the Roman problem. At the same time this case will indicate in what way Roman political thinking could be expected to adapt itself to changed circumstances. The case I am talking about is, of course, the Chinese one. 21

Concerning art, architecture, and public space cf. Ho¨lscher 2000.

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Fritz-Heiner Mutschler 2 . C ON T R A S T: S I M A Q IA N ’ S SH I J I A S A M O DE L OF ‘IMPERIAL HISTORIOGRAPHY’

The work which I will take as object of reference is Sima Qian’s Shi ji (The Records of the Grand Historian), at the same time the most famous and for a Westerner most easily accessible work of ancient Chinese historiography. Written at around 100 bc, roughly a century after the foundation of the Han dynasty, the Shi ji represents a comprehensive history of China, from its legendary beginnings to the author’s own days.22 To keep things in a limited frame, I will simply deal with the three issues which have gained prominence in our discussion of Roman historiography: the problem of the form of state, the role of war and peace, and the general concept of the course of history. Since we started our treatment of Tacitus with his representation of Tiberius, the (adoptive) son and successor of Augustus, the founder of the principate in Rome, it seems feasible to turn to Sima Qian’s representation of Wendi, the son and (indirect) successor of Gaodi, the founder of the Han dynasty, in order to get a Wrst impression in what way the Chinese historian views things diVerently. Sima Qian’s representation of Wendi’s accession to the throne is already telling.23 It is as extensive as Tacitus’ representation of the accession of Tiberius, and even Wnds its completion in a similar scene, in which Wendi— just as Tiberius does in Tacitus24—several times declines to ascend the throne before Wnally agreeing to become Son of Heaven.25 Nevertheless the situations are seen by both historians in a very diVerent light. For Tacitus the issue is the legitimacy of the form of government, which he denies. For Sima Qian the issue is the legitimacy of the successor, which he conWrms. Thus Tiberius’ declining the senate’s oVer before accepting it is for Tacitus just another case of the new emperor’s hypocrisy and falsehood, the same behavior of Wendi for Sima Qian another sign of his modesty, the propriety of his conduct and, in the end, of his moral qualiWcation for the oYce of emperor. Generally speaking, whereas we saw that for Tacitus monarchy as a form of government is problematic, Sima Qian obviously does not Wnd any fault with it. 22

There are translations of large parts of the Shi ji by Chavannes (French) and Watson (English). A complete English translation, which I use here, is now under way by Nienhauser and his team (Nienhauser 1994 V.). The best introduction to Sima Qian and his work in English is still Watson 1958. There exist also two valuable recent monographs by Durrant 1995 and Hardy 1999. As to the comparison Tacitus–Sima Qian, see now Mutschler 2006 and 2007. 23 It is treated at the end of Shi ji 9, the chapter on Wendi’s predecessor, empress Lu¨, and at the beginning of Shi ji 10, the chapter on Wendi himself, to which I refer here. 24 Annales 1.11–13. 25 Shi ji 10, Nienhauser, ii. 151–2.

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The sequel conWrms this impression. The decision-making process, as presented by Sima Qian, is throughout the one to be expected in a monarchic system, and Wendi handles it in an exemplary way. He always consults with his ministers, he heeds their advice whenever he Wnds it convincing, he follows his own ideas when they seem to him better, but there is no doubt that the Wnal decision and therefore the responsibility lies with him. For Sima Qian the monarchic form of state is obviously natural, and the only question is whether the monarch is a good or a bad one. This holds for the whole work. Non-monarchical forms of government remain throughout outside the horizons both of the historian and the historical agents. Sima Qian’s treatment of Wendi is also signiWcant with respect to the role of war and peace in the Shi ji. Thus it is interesting to see which sides of Wendi’s activities Sima Qian presents. There are, Wrst of all, his achievements in the civil administration of the empire.26 Wendi does away with a number of stringent laws, such as the kinship liability and defamation of character laws; he selects a son as his oYcial heir and successor; he oYcially chooses an empress; he reduces the manpower of his guards, and puts imperial horses at the disposal of the postal service; he reintroduces the custom of symbolic plowing at the temples of the ancestors, etc. On the whole, Wendi pursues an administrative policy which improves the state of the empire and the situation of the population.27 In our context the decisive point is that Sima Qian is clearly interested in this, i.e. the civic side of his governance. The representation of Wendi’s foreign policy in the Shi ji tells a complementary story. When Sima Qian describes the sequence of events concerning the famous Xiongnu, the most important outside enemy—more concisely in chapter 10 of the Shi ji, which is the chapter on Wendi, and more extensively in chapter 110, which deals with the Xiongnu—he devotes much more space to the diplomatic than to the military activities of Wendi’s. Several letters to and from the shan yu, the ruler of the Xiongnu, are quoted in full, whereas the reports on campaigns comprise never more than a few lines. Since Wendi pursues a policy of appeasement, which does include military actions, if these cannot be avoided, but which, on the whole, aims at establishing a peaceful and harmonious relationship with this most dangerous of the barbarian tribes, Sima Qian’s description adapts, so to speak, to its object. Thus, whereas

26

They are reported through all of chap. 10. Cf. the positive comments of Wendi’s ministers (Nienhauser, ii. 157), the summary of his reign towards the end of the chapter (Nienhauser, ii. 179–80), the edict of his successor Jingdi about his achievements (Nienhauser, ii. 182–4), and Sima Qian’s Wnal commentary (Nienhauser, ii. 184–5). 27

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Tacitus is delighted when he can describe something like the campaigns of Germanicus in Germany28 and blames Tiberius for not being engaged in expanding Rome’s dominion,29 Sima Qian’s representation dwells on a policy which even in the struggle with the Wercest external enemy, in a process of continuous repetition, again and again tries to preserve or re-establish peace and harmony in the world.30 One could suspect that the representation of Wendi is a special case within the Shi ji. But already at the beginning of his work Sima Qian shows the same historical orientation.31 The Wrst chapter deals with the so called legendary emperors. Concerning the form of government, the only problem which comes up is that of hereditary or non-hereditary succession.32 The monarchical form of government itself is never called into question. As to the role of war and peace, though the work starts out with the description of how Xianyuan succeeds in forcing back to order some rebellious feudal lords and as a consequence is himself established as Son of Heaven under the name of Huangdi, ‘Yellow Emperor’, on the whole, war plays only a minimal role in this part of the work. Events which are treated more fully comprise e.g. a long consultation in which Emperor Shun discusses with his most important collaborators the diVerent tasks of the administration of the realm,33 the successful eVorts of the great Yu to improve the ways of communication and regulate the rivers and canals, and his inspection journey through all parts of the empire with the purpose of Wxing taxes fairly,34 and an audience, in which Shun discusses with Yu and two other advisors/helpers questions of the best way of governing.35

28

Annales 1.49–52, 55–71, 2.5–26. Cf. Vogt 1960, 119, with reference to similar parts of Tacitus’ works: ‘. . . werden die kriegerischen Ereignisse vom Geschichtsschreiber, der u¨berall Beispiele ro¨mischer Gro¨ße sucht, mit wahrem Heißhunger ergriVen, die Berichte daru¨ber mit Hingabe gestaltet, die siegreichen Feldherrn gern als bewundernswerte Nachfahren republikanischer Zucht und Gro¨ße bezeichnet.’ 29 4.32.2: princeps proferendi imperii incuriosus erat. 30 In accordance with this, in the summary-like section towards the end of chap. 10 Sima Qian explains Wendi’s motive for his politics of appeasement by his aversion to ‘causing the populace trouble and suVering’ (Shi ji 10, Nienhauser, ii. 180), just as shortly before he has explained the simplicity and modesty of his personal conduct by the wish ‘not to trouble the commoners’ (Shi ji 10, Nienhauser, ii. 179). 31 In this case the comparison with the Wrst Book of Livy’s Ab urbe condita is instructive. Cf. Mutschler (forthcoming). 32 It is treated extensively concerning the transition from Yao to Shun. Cf. Shi ji 1, Nienhauser, i. 8–13. 33 Shi ji 1, Nienhauser, i. 14–15. 34 Shi ji 2, Nienhauser, i. 22–32. 35 Shi ji 2, Nienhauser, i. 32–5.

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Thus, already the beginning of the Shi ji, is very much concerned with the good rule of the All-under-Heaven, as the aim of which it names repeatedly the peaceful and harmonious order of the world.36 What remains is a look at how Sima Qian views the course of history in general. Though this question is truly diYcult, some short remarks must suYce. The Wrst point to state is that Sima Qian in this as in other cases does not develop one consistent view, but rather oVers a plurality of pertinent remarks, which are not necessarily contradictory, but which add up to a multifaceted picture. Nevertheless, and this is the second point which can be made, there is nowhere the idea of a directional development towards a certain goal as we have it in Roman historiography. Instead we Wnd several concepts which contain the principal of repetition or point in one way or other to a cyclical movement of history. Thus, there are passages which hint at a continuous alternation between states of order and disorder or between a higher and a lesser degree of order. Then there are references to periodical movements within a Wxed number of years. But, most importantly, we have the concept of dynasties succeeding each other according to a pattern of establishment, growth, Xourishing, degeneration, and fall depending on the moral qualities of the ruler.37 To summarize: a Wrst glance at Sima Qian’s Shi ji already shows that we Wnd here historical interests, perspectives, and views which in several respects diVer from those in Roman historiography. (1) The basic form of government is never an issue. Nowhere does the question arise whether rule should be exercised by one person, by a group of persons, or by the people. The monarchical principle is the only one within the horizon of both the historical agents and the historian. (2a) Concerning the choice of subject matter, we see that the civic side of governance is of genuine interest for the historian. Sima Qian describes thoroughly and without disdain how ably the ruler chooses his helpers and distributes the tasks among them, how carefully the ministers fulWll their tasks, and, on the whole, to what extent the policy of the government is directed towards the well-being of the state and the populace. (2b) As to the relationship to the outside world we can state that, in a certain sense, there is no surrounding world since the empire is conceived of as tianxia, All-under-Heaven, and thus already comprises the world as a whole. Yet there

36 Shi ji 1, Nienhauser, i. 3: ‘The myriad states were harmonious . . .’ Shi ji 1, Nienhauser, i. 6: ‘. . . he harmonized the relations of the myriad states.’ Shi ji 1, Nienhauser, i. 13: ‘. . . so that within the country there was peace and without there was accord.’ Shi ji 2, Nienhauser, i. 32: ‘The world was then greatly ordered.’ 37 Concerning concepts of time in Chinese historiography in general and Sima Qian’s Shi ji in particular cf. Mittag 1997, 263–70.

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is, of course, room for maneuver. At the fringes or in the immediate surroundings of tianxia live barbarian tribes, diVerent ones in diVerent regions, who, every now and then, disturb peace and order, and against or with whom, every now and then, peace and order have to be re-established. It is noteworthy that Sima Qian does not seem to have a strong interest in the military side of these aVairs. (3) All of this is connected with ideas concerning the course of history which are not directional and linear, but, in one way or other, contain the principle of repetition, be it the idea of a continuous alternation between states of order and disorder, the idea of periodical recurrences of certain phenomena within a Wxed number of years, or the idea of a succession of dynasties with a repetitive pattern of rise and decline.

3 . B AC K TO ROM E : E L E M E N T S O F ‘ I M P E R I A L H I S TO R I C A L C ON S C I O U S NE SS ’ I N V I RG I L’ S AE NE ID, T H E L AT E ODE S OF HORACE, AND VELLEIUS’ HISTORIA ROMA NA On reXection it seems that the ideas we just described for Sima Qian’s Shi ji correspond to a large extent with what one would expect as constitutive elements of historical thinking in an empire which is monarchic in structure and worldwide—even if only in its own perception—in reach.38 If this is correct, then one should Wnd these ideas, at least in some form, in Rome as well, and if not in the preserved works of historiography, at least in other texts, in which historical consciousness could express itself. This is, indeed, the case. In the following section, I will try to show that the elements of ‘imperial historic consciousness’, which we have observed in Sima Qian’s Shi ji, are to be found in some form or other in Virgil’s Aeneid, in Horace’s late Odes, and in Velleius Paterculus’ Historia Romana as well. That is to say we Wnd these elements in texts much earlier than the writings of Tacitus, texts from the Wrst part of the reign of the Wrst and the middle part of the reign of the second princeps.

(a) Virgil’s Aeneid 39 We know that Augustus or in his name Maecenas had been pressing Virgil for an epic poem on the princeps and his achievements. What Virgil Wnally wrote 38 39

For the ‘logic’ of empires and worldwide rule see now Mu¨nkler 2005. Most recent treatment of certain aspects of the topic in Adler 2003, esp. 193–216.

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was something diVerent. He did not write a historical epic, but a mythological one on the prehistory of Rome, which, however, contained historical vistas: the prophetic speech of Jupiter in book 1,40 the presentation of the future heroes of Rome during Aeneas’ visit in the underworld in book 6,41 and the historical scenes on the shield of Aeneas in book 8.42 How, then, was the history of Rome presented in the Aeneid in general and in the aforementioned sections in particular? I will discuss this question in relation to the three points to which the Wrst sections of our study have drawn attention: the structure of the state, the role of war and peace, and the view of the course of history. (1) The hero of the Aeneid is not Augustus, but Aeneas. The events are set not in the contemporary period, but in the mythical time of the Trojan War and its aftermath. The usual, natural, and, in fact, only model of sociopolitical organization for this world is that of monarchic leadership of some sort. All the groups involved in the events around Troy are led by one man: their king, lord, or leader. The same applies to the (ethnically constituted) political groups in the Aeneid. This is sanctioned by tradition, unquestionable and therefore ideologically unproblematic.43 Thus, the ground is prepared for a similar presentation of Augustus. Virgil presents him in two of his vistas on Roman history. In the underworld scene of book 6 he is introduced as the man who will refound the Golden Age in Latium (792 f.) and who will expand Roman dominion to the limits of the world (794–7). On Aeneas’ shield in book 8 he even appears twice: in the middle of the description (678) directing the Roman Xeet against the forces of Antony (685) and Cleopatra (688) during the battle of Actium, and at the end of the description sitting in front of the temple of Apollo and receiving the homage of the peoples of the world (714–28). In the mythical-historical surroundings of the Aeneid Augustus’ monarchic position seems adequate and ‘natural’, and at any rate less oVensive than it would be outside this context. (2) As we have seen, warfare played an extremely important role in the historical consciousness of Rome. In addition, war was the characteristic subject matter of epic poetry. Thus war had to play an outstanding role in the Aeneid. And this is what it does. As to the main narrative, war Wlls the second book, where Aeneas relates the fall of Troy, and it Wlls almost all of the second half of the work, at any rate the last four books, which narrate the struggle between the Trojans and the people of Italy. In the vistas of 40 43

41 42 vv. 257–96. vv. 756–892. vv. 526–728. On the signiWcance of the concept of kingship in the Aeneid cf. Cairns 1990, 1–84.

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Roman history it plays an important role as well, as a quick look can easily show.44 Yet there is, nevertheless, another side to the coin. Nowhere, to be sure, does the text refer to anything like the civil component of the administration of empire. But, as Philip Hardie has pointed out, ‘a closer examination of the Shield of Aeneas shows that the contrast of war and peace, central to Augustan ideology and also one of the prescribed divisions in the panegyric of a city, is pivotal to the structure of the ecphrasis’.45 Thus, ‘the Wnal scene on the Shield, which shows representatives of the conquered oikumene
. within the walls of Rome, is at the same time an image of the city at peace’.46 One argument for this interpretation is the setting of the scene—in front of the temple of Apollo Palatinus, whom the cult statue presented not as archer, as he had appeared on the shield in the scene of Actium, but as lyre player, that is in an attire of peace. More important: the movement from war to peace is nothing new in Virgil’s interpretations of Roman history. Already the very Wrst vista on Roman history in the Aeneid, the speech of Jupiter in book 1, had led up to the ‘explicit association of Roman world-empire with universal peace’47 (291–6): Then when the wars have been done with, the rough centuries will grow mild: Greyhaired Trust and Vesta, Remus with his brother Quirinus will give laws; the dire gates of War will be closed by iron and tight bars; impious Fury, sitting on savage weapons and [hands] bound by a hundred bronze knots behind its back, will roar horribly with bloody mouth.

Thus, we can say that the vistas of Roman history in the Aeneid are, to be sure, full of wars, but that at the same time the idea is stressed that the series of wars under Augustus has led to its Wnal goal: the expansion of the Roman Empire to the edges of the earth, which is identical with the establishment of worldwide peace and order under Roman rule. (3) This leads us to the third point: the structure of Roman history as presented in the text. As we have just seen, something decisive is happening: the idea of a directed internal and external development of the res publica, which, as was pointed out before, had been characteristic of republican 44

Jupiter, at the beginning of his speech, talks about Aeneas’ wars in Latium (1.263), towards its end about Caesar extending the empire to the fringes of the earth (1.287). Among the future heroes are, of course, the most important military leaders of Roman history e.g. the Scipios (6.842–3) and the great Marcellus (6.855–9). The representation on Aeneas’ shield contains, as the narrator himself announces: ‘all the descendants of Ascanius [i.e. Aeneas’ son] and—in order—the wars fought’ (8. 628–9). 45 Hardie 1986, 358. 46 Ibid. 359. 47 Ibid. 358. Cf. also Adler 2003, 96–7 and 199–216.

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historiography, is complemented here by the consciousness that a Wnal state has been reached, which is now to be preserved. Concerning the future, instead of development there will be continuation: With the limitlessness of the imperium in terms of space comes the limitlessness of it in terms of time, as Jupiter puts it quite clearly (1.278–9).48 The directional development is, however, not only complemented by a state to be preserved or continued, but, in addition, is overarched by a structure of typological repetition.49 The most important of these typological relationships is, of course, the one between Aeneas and Augustus. With the story of Hercules and Cacus, told in book 8 by king Euander,50 the model is still further extended into the past.51 Thus we get the series: Hercules—Aeneas— Augustus accompanied by the series of opponents: Cacus—Turnus—Antony. The eVect of this device of typological repetition is that the course of Roman history, in addition to its structure of development, receives a structure of iteration, in the sense that once and again it is characterized by the struggle of forces of passion, wrath, and hatred against those of order and peace. Thus it is clear that peace and order have to be regained every now and then anew. Obviously, this was a model into which the idea of the more or less static future of a world-empire could easily be integrated.

(b) The late Odes of Horace All these elements of an ‘imperial historical consciousness’ can be observed in similar form in the late lyrics of Horace, that is in the Carmen saeculare and the fourth book of Odes. Since I discussed Horace’s way from a ‘republican’ to an ‘imperial consciousness’ as reXected in his lyrical poetry some years ago in greater detail,52 I restrict myself here to a few summary remarks concerning our three points of interest. (1) Whereas the Epodes and the early Odes present Octavian as the leader of one of two parties in a civil war—though, to be sure, the party which rightfully claims to represent the state—in Horace’s later lyrics Augustus 48 1.278–9: ‘I set no limit to their fortunes and no time, I have given them empire without end’ (his ego nec metas rerum nec tempora pono; j imperium sine Wne dedi). 49 Here again we can observe the advantage of Virgil’s device of writing, not a historical epic on Augustus, but a mythical-historical epic on Aeneas. This allows him to present the story of Aeneas as the preWguration of the events to come. 50 vv. 184–267. 51 Fundamental on book 8 as on the typological interpretation of the Aeneid in general: Binder 1971. 52 Mutschler 1990.

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appears as the consummate princeps, the ‘Wrst man’ of Rome, to whom all the others—concentrating on their lives as privati—can and do leave the management of the aVairs of the state and the responsibility for the safety and well-being of the populace. After comparable, though weaker formulations in earlier poems,53 Odes 4.5 and 4.15 call Augustus the ‘guardian of the people of Romulus’, the ‘good leader’ granting ‘long holidays’ to the Occident, and thus evoke him as the sovereign whose reign has brought back and guarantees wellbeing and prosperity.54 (2) As to the role of war and peace there are interesting developments to be perceived as well. Whereas in the earlier poems like Epode 9 and Ode 1.37 Antony and Cleopatra, the opponents in the civil war, are conquered, but conquered as opponents on one level with their conqueror, the outside enemies against whom the princeps is campaigning in book 4 are only of secondary rank and rather to be punished and kept in order than fought against and defeated. So it is quite appropriate if they appear only in series of four or Wve,55 not more than provokers of annoying disturbances which every now and then have to be dealt with for the sake of order and safety in the empire. Complementary to this new perception of war is the fact that in several of the late poems peace, order, and general well-being are evoked extensively and praised as the main achievement of Augustus. As above all certain passages of the Carmen saeculare and of Odes 4.5 and 4.15 show, the renewal is all embracing. It concerns economic life, especially in the countryside, as well as the political, social, and moral order in general.56 (3) Closely connected with this is the change one can observe with respect to how the actual course of history is perceived in the earlier and in the later poems.57 In both cases it is pairs of corresponding poems like Epodes 1 and 9, Odes 1.2 and 1.37, 3.8 and 3.14, 4.5 and 4.15, which bring out the diVerent perceptions most clearly. Whereas in the Epodes and the Wrst book of Odes the experience inscribed into the texts is one of crisis, of a development heading for a Wnal decision, already in the third book of Odes and deWnitely in book 4 the actual course of history is rather viewed as the steady Xow or the stable condition of an ordered and prosperous life, interrupted only now and then by military actions, which the princeps and close helpers take upon themselves to ensure the safety and tranquility of the others. 53

As e.g. 3.8 and 3.14. 4.5.1–2: divis orte bonis, optime Romulae j custos gentis . . . ; 4.5.37–8: ‘longas o utinam, dux bone, ferias j praestes Hesperiae!’ dicimus . . . ; 4.15.4–5: tua, Caesar, aetas j fruges et agris rettulit uberes j . . . 55 Cf. Odes 4.5.25–8, 4.15.21–4. The pattern appears already in 3.8.21–8. 56 Cf. Carmen saeculare, passim; Odes 4.5.17–24 and 29–32, 4.15.4–24. 57 For the following cf. Mutschler 1990, 124–5, 132, 134–6. 54

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Horace’s poems would undoubtedly deserve a more detailed analysis in this context. But instead of further elaborating on Horace, I would like to come back to historiography and look at a text in which the elements of an ‘imperial historical consciousness’ we observed in the Augustan poets are to be found as well, and this in historical prose several decades before Tacitus even started writing.

(c) Velleius’ Historia Romana58 As mentioned above, Velleius Paterculus did not produce historiography in the grand style. Instead, around half a century after Virgil and Horace, probably in ad 30, he published an epitome of all of Roman history, from the aftermath of the Trojan War to his own time, in two books. The little work, which has come down to us only with large lacunas, is terse and at the same time anecdotal. But, nevertheless, it brings out Velleius’ attitude towards the ‘imperial’ state of aVairs clearly enough. (1) This holds, Wrst of all, for his attitude concerning the form of state. As is well known, Velleius, who served in several military functions under Tiberius, was a great and unconditional admirer of him. This manifests itself in the impressive portrait which he draws of Tiberius as administrator and military leader in the last quarter of his work (starting with 2.94) and which provides us with a valuable complement to the gloomy picture by Tacitus.59 Just as Velleius views Tiberius positively, he has no doubts about the principate being the appropriate form of government for Rome and her empire. Thus he praises Tiberius60 not simply as an able administrator and general, just as he could have praised him in republican times as well, but as the born rules, who already as a young man had shown in his appearance the (future) princeps (2.94.2), who then, in the service of Augustus, proved himself as the permanent patron of the Roman Empire (2.120.1), and who Wnally, after the death of Augustus, because of his qualities, his merits, and the impressiveness of his personality (2.124.1: tantaque unius viri maiestas) was bound to succeed Augustus as head of the state. (2) As far as war and peace are concerned, Velleius’ attitude combines the traditional Roman (and, in addition, the old oYcer’s) esteem of military competence and achievement with the ‘imperial’ (kaiserzeitlich) appreciation 58

With Schmitzer 2000 there is now a new comprehensive representation of Velleius and his work available. 59 Cf. Kuntze 1985 and Schmitzer 2000. 60 In terms which more than once remind us of the way Virgil and Horace expressed themselves concerning Augustus.

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of peace, order, and ensuing prosperity. In the report on Tiberius’ service under Augustus, military feats take center stage several times. His greatest achievement comes after the defeat of Varus and his legions in ad 9. In this situation he takes upon himself the task of protecting the imperium against its most dangerous external enemies (2.120.1–2). The attention is fully on the military action. And it is stressed that this action is not limited to defense, but includes the oVensive move over the Rhine, the severe punishment of the aggressors of Varus, and the glorious return to the winter camp. Velleius, Tiberius’ former oYcer, presents this eVort of his general with obvious satisfaction. But there is the other side as well. It shows most distinctly in two passages. The Wrst one is part of the description of Tiberius’ return from Rhodes and concerns the hopes which people cherish with respect to Tiberius. As Velleius presents them, these hopes are directed towards a state of peace and order (salus, quies, pax, tranquillitas), in which everybody can concentrate on their private lives and strive for their own and their families’ well-being (2.103.5). The second passage is even more programmatic. Towards the end of the work Tiberius’ achievements as emperor are summed up in a comprehensive statement. Here, too, the stress is wholly on the peaceful side of aVairs (2.126.2–3): Trust and reliability have been recalled to the forum; justice, equity, industriousness, long buried and forgotten, have been given back to the citizens. The oYce-holders gained in authority, the senate in dignity, and the law-courts in importance. . . . Decency is rewarded, meanness is punished. The person of low standing respects the noble person, but he does not fear him; the noble person has the precedence of the person of low standing, but does not despise him. Whenever was the price for grain so low, whenever was peace more prosperous? Spread over all the countries in East and West, up to the borders in the South and the North, the peace of Augustus protects even the most remote areas of the world from the fear of bandit attacks.

The emphasis on the values of civil life is as impressive as the fact that here for the Wrst time, to my knowledge, the whole orbis terrarum is seen as beneWciary of the pax Augusta.61 (3) As to the perception of the course of history, Velleius does not oVer anything of particular sophistication. The eternity of Rome and its empire is unquestionably what he wants to believe in and what he prays for. Thus, he reports that the hopes which people connect with Tiberius’ return from his self-chosen exile on Rhodes extend towards ‘the everlasting security and eternity of the Roman empire’ (2.103.4). In the same vein is the prayer with 61 2.126.3: . . . pax Augusta per omnis terrarum orbis angulos a latrociniorum metu servat immunes.

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which he ends his little work. It addresses the gods who have ‘brought the mass of the Roman empire to the mightiest summit of the earth’ (2.131.1), and asks them for the custody, preservation, and protection of ‘this state (of aVairs), this peace, and this princeps’ (2.131.2), and after the latter’s late death for successors who will be as Wtting as he for the burden of ruling the world (2.131.2). Thus, we see that Velleius’ view of the course of Roman history, too, is comparable to that of Virgil and Horace. With the establishment of the empire as ‘Reich’ and ‘Kaisertum’ this course has reached its goal, and for the future, instead of further development, only stable duration is envisaged.

(d) Implications Our observations concerning Virgil, Horace, and Velleius show several things very clearly. First, there is a development in Roman historical consciousness from the period when republican Rome is continuously expanding its rule towards the dominion of all of the Mediterranean world and the adjacent regions to the period when the Roman Empire is Wrmly consolidated and has taken on a monarchical structure. Second, the elements which characterize the new consciousness are (a) the acceptance of the monarchic form of government, (b) interest in the civil side of government with the appreciation of peace, order, and prosperity as its essential achievements, and—complementary— (b’) the perception of wars as only punitive actions against troublemakers at the fringes of the realm, (c) a view of the course of history which stresses continuity and repetition instead of change and development. Third, these elements bring the Roman texts in close parallel to Sima Qian’s Shi ji, so that something like a type or a pattern of ‘imperial consciousness’ emerges which could possibly be characteristic of monarchically structured empires in general.

4 . F I NA L ‘ RO M A N ’ Q UE ST I O N Nevertheless, we have to ask here a Wnal question, which concerns Rome only: How can we explain that Tacitus in contrast with his Chinese colleague Sima Qian shows only little of ‘imperial consciousness’, whereas both the Augustan poets and Velleius, Tacitus’ minor predecessor as ‘imperial historiographer’, have so much more of it? In a case like this we, of course, have to reckon with multiple causes. But we are probably not oV the mark, if we assume that the sociopolitical background of the authors and their public contributed to the ideological alignment of their works.

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(a) Virgil and Horace For a long time Rome’s poets were of relatively low social standing and had to rely on the patronage of members of the aristocracy in order to be able to pursue their careers.62 Virgil and Horace still belong in this context. After, in the last decades of the republic, patrons like Caesar and Pompey had already outdone by far their senatorial competitors, with the establishment of the principate Augustus developed into a kind of super patron, though without excluding other aristocrats from the game. Another sign of his tact was that Virgil and Horace were not promoted by him directly. Instead, it was Maecenas, his friend and conWdant, who functioned as their patron. At the same time, it is appropriate to emphasize that the two poets were well connected with the new center of power. The audience for which both poets wrote is not easy to deWne and probably underwent a certain change in the course of time. Neither Virgil’s eclogues nor Horace’s early lyrical poetry were meant for the man in the street. On the other hand, when Virgil worked on the Aeneid he must have been aware of the fact that Livius Andronicus’ Odyssia and the Annals of Ennius, in the tradition of which the Aeneid was going to belong, were read in school and thus had a wide audience. Horace, as it seems, was inspired to his last book of Odes by Augustus’ commission of the public hymn for the secular games of 17 bc and in one of the poems of book 4 speaks proudly of the fact that he is now recognized and pointed at by the passers-by in the streets of Rome.63 Thus, for their later works Virgil and Horace could very well expect a broader public, namely the wide stratum of educated and propertied people in Rome and Italy, the larger part of which no doubt proWted from the new imperial order. It is less than surprising that in this sociopolitical framework Virgil and Horace created texts which were open to an ideology in which the princeps took central position and his successful restoration and preservation of a stable state of aVairs was viewed as an ultimate achievement.64

(b) Velleius Paterculus Concerning Velleius Paterculus Wfty years ago Albrecht Dihle, in his article in Pauly-Wissowa’s Realenzyklopa¨die, already made the decisive point: ‘We have 62

Cf. Gold 1987. Odes 4.3.22. Additionally, the fact that they wrote poetry, namely mythical-historical epic and festive lyrics, made it easier to formulate ideas which in sober prose would have sounded more problematic. 63 64

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to see in Velleius the representative of the new imperial civil servants’ and oYcers’ class, to whom faithfulness and loyalty to their master is more important than all ideas of ancient Roman virtus and libertas, as these, often in opposition to the monarchic order, survived for a very long time among the members of the senatorial aristocracy of the capital.’65 A few supplementary remarks will suYce. What Dihle says about Velleius’ social background probably holds true for the larger part of his audience as well. As Raymond Starr has put it, Velleius’ brief survey of Roman (and to a certain extent non-Roman) history ‘would have proved useful to men who . . . might be years away from their formal education, separated from it by long periods spent on military campaigns or in the imperial service’.66 More generally speaking, it might have been useful for that layer of society in Italy and in the provinces from which the emperor recruited his staV for the administration and military protection of the empire. That is to say, both Velleius and—at least in part—his readership belonged to a social stratum many members of which made their livelihood in the ever-growing apparatus of the imperial order and therefore had every reason to be favorably disposed towards ‘Kaiser’ and ‘Reich’.

(c) Tacitus The constellation was diVerent with Tacitus. To understand it, one has to put things into historical perspective. Historiography was in Rome the senatorial literary genre par excellence. For a long time historical works were written almost exclusively by members of the senatorial order, and they were written, Wrst of all, for their writers’ peers.67 In other words: historiography was the business of the social class whose members, cooperating and competing with each other, ran Roman politics. It is not surprising that these works presented history from an aristocratic-republican point of view, concentrating on the internal developments and the external successes of the res publica and, in particular, on the words and actions of the aristocratic individuals and groups who determined the course of these events. What we can observe in the works of Tacitus is the persistence of this perspective—more than a century after the republic had gone and Rome had become a ‘Kaiserreich’. Tacitus, probably of provincial, perhaps of Italic, 65

Dihle 1955, 652. Starr 1981, 173. Cf. also Elefante 1997, 19–50: ‘L’autore e l’opera’. 67 For the socio-cultural background of early Roman historiography cf. Beck and Walter 2001, 17–50. 66

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but certainly not of urban Roman origin, had gained access to the leading circles on the basis of his talents and the proper family connections. As often happens, the newcomer fully internalized the ideology of the social group into which he rose. In this group the traditional perspective on history was still valid. As Tacitus’ work shows, it was valid to such an extent that it caused the greatest of Roman historians to have problems with ‘imperial historiography’. References Adler, Eve, Vergil’s Empire: Political Thought in the Aeneid. Lanham (Rowman & LittleWeld) 2003. Albrecht, Michael von, Geschichte der ro¨mischen Literatur: Von Andronicus bis Boe¨thius, mit Beru¨cksichtigung ihrer Bedeutung fu¨r die Neuzeit. 2nd edn. Mu¨nchen (Saur) 1994 [Engl. translation: A History of Roman Literature. Leiden/Boston/Ko¨ln (Brill) 1997]. Beck, Hans, and Walter, Uwe (eds.), Die Fru¨hen Ro¨mischen Historiker, hg., u¨bers. und komm. von H. B. und U. W. 2 vols. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 2001 and 2004. Benario, Herbert W., ‘Tacitus’ View of the Empire and the Pax Romana’, Aufstieg und Niedergang der ro¨mischen Welt, 2.33.5 (1991), 3332–53. Binder, Gerhard, Aeneas und Augustus: Interpretationen zum 8. Buch der Aeneis (Beitra¨ge zur Klassischen Philologie 38). Meisenheim am Glan (Hain) 1971. Brunt, Peter A., Roman Imperial Themes. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1990; repr. 1998. Cairns, Francis, Virgil’s Augustan Epic. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1989; repr. 1990. Clarke, Katherine, ‘ ‘‘In arto et inglorius labor’’: Tacitus’s Anti-history’, in: Alan K. Bowman, Hannah M. Cotton, Martin Goodman, and Simon Price (eds.), Representations of Empire: Rome and the Mediterranean World. Oxford/New York (Oxford University Press) 2002; repr. 2004, 83–103. Dihle, Albrecht, ‘Velleius 5’, RE 8A1 (1955), 637–59. Durrant, Stephen W., The Cloudy Mirror: Tension and ConXict in the Writings of Sima Qian. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1995. Elefante, Maria (ed.), Velleius Paterculus, Ad M. Vinicium consulem libri duo, cur. adn. que M. E. Hildesheim/Zu¨rich/New York (Olms) 1997. Gold, Barbara K., Literary Patronage in Greece and Rome. Chapel Hill/London (University of North Carolina Press) 1987. Hardie, Philip R., Virgil’s ‘Aeneid’: ‘Cosmos’ and ‘Imperium’. Oxford/New York (Oxford University Press) 1986; repr. 1998. Hardy, Grant, Worlds of Bronze and Bamboo: Sima Qian’s Conquest of History. New York (Columbia University Press) 1999. Ho¨lscher, Tonio, ‘Die Alten vor Augen: Politische Denkma¨ler und o¨Ventliches Geda¨chtnis im republikanischen Rom’, in: Gert Melville (ed.), Institutionalita¨t und Symbolisierung. Ko¨ln/Weimar/Wien (Bo¨hlau) 2001, 183–211.

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Kuntze, Claudia, Zur Darstellung des Kaisers Tiberius und seiner Zeit bei Velleius Paterculus. Frankfurt/Bern/New York (Lang) 1985. Laederich, Pierre, Les limites de l’empire: les strate´gies de l’impe´rialisme romain dans l’oeuvre de Tacite. Paris (Economica) 2001. Mellor, Ronald, Tacitus. New York/London (Routledge) 1993. Mittag, Achim, ‘Zeitkonzepte in China’, in: Klaus E. Mu¨ller and Jo¨rn Ru¨sen (eds.), Historische Sinnbildung: Problemstellungen, Zeitkonzepte, Wahrnehmungshorizonte, Darstellungsstrategien. Reinbek (Rowohlt) 1997, 251–76. Mu¨nkler, Herfried, Imperien: Die Logik der Weltherrschaft - vom Alten Rom bis zu den Vereinigten Staaten. Berlin (Rowohlt) 2005. Mutschler, Fritz-Heiner, ‘Horaz und Augustus’, Wu¨rzburger Jahrbu¨cher, 16 (1990), 117–36. —— ‘Tacitus und Sima Qian: Eine Anna¨herung’, Philologus, 150 (2006), 115–35. —— ‘Tacitus und Sima Qian: Perso¨nliche Erfahrung und historiographische Perspektive’, Philologus, 151 (2007), 127–52. —— ‘Tacite (avec Tite-Live) et Sima Qian: ide´es politiques cle´s dans leurs oeuvres’ (forthcoming). Nienhauser, Jr., William H. (ed.), The Grand Scribe’s Records, trans. W. H. N. et al., vols. i, ii, v.1, vii. Bloomington (Indiana University Press) 1994, 2002, 2006, 1994. Richardson, John, ‘Imperium Romanum between Republic and Empire’, in: Lukas de Blois, Paul Erdkamp, Olivier Hekster, Gerda de Kleijn, and Stephan Mols (eds.), The Representation and Perception of Roman Imperial Power. Amsterdam (Gieben) 2003, 137–47. Schmitzer, Ulrich, Velleius Paterculus und das Interesse an der Geschichte im Zeitalter des Tiberius. Heidelberg (Winter) 2000. Schotter, David C. A., ‘Tacitus’ View of Emperors and the Principate’, Aufstieg und Niedergang der ro¨mischen Welt, 2.33.5 (1991), 3263–331. Starr, Raymond J., ‘The Scope and Genre of Velleius’ History’, Classical Quarterly, 31 (1981), 162–74. Vogt, Joseph, Orbis: Ausgewa¨hlte Schriften zur Geschichte des Altertums, hg. von Fritz Taeger und Karl Christ. Freiburg/Basel/Wien (Herder) 1960. Watson, Burton, Ssu-ma Ch’ien: Grand Historian of China. New York (Columbia University Press) 1958.

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Forging Legacy: The Pact between Empire and Historiography in Ancient China Achim Mittag (Tu¨bingen)

P R E LU D E Throughout pre-modern China there has been a close interconnection between ‘empire’ and ‘historiography’, meaning that one could not do without the other and vice versa. What is meant here by ‘empire’ was more than a political and social order, or, if political and social, was always part of a larger cosmic order commonly expressed by the idea of All-under-Heaven (tianxia). Toward one side, as concerns the often noted state-centeredness of Chinese historiography, the interconnection between ‘empire’ and ‘historiography’ is rather evident; one only needs to make reference to the Twenty-Five Dynastic Histories (Ershiwushi) as the spine of traditional Chinese historiography, the greater part of which was compiled under the auspices of the Bureau of Historiography (shiguan) set up in ad 629. And earlier ‘standard histories’ (zhengshi) as well were either oYcially commissioned, compiled by stateemployed historians, or written by historians who, in one way or the other, were part of or dependent on the imperial state. It is, however, the other side of the ‘empire’/‘historiography’ interconnection, the dependence of tianxia upon the historians, which interests us here, in particular the question in what way historiography and historical thinking contributed to bringing about and sustaining the imperial order which emerged with the founding of the Chinese empire in 221 bc. To address this broad question, we will focus our inquiry in two ways: Firstly, by limiting our discussion to those three issues which my ‘partner-incrime’ from the Roman side, Fritz-Heiner Mutschler, has discussed in his paper, i.e. (1) the monarchical structure of the state, (2) the role of war and peace, and (3) the general concept of the course of history. Secondly, by limiting our sources to three representative texts, which came into existence within a period of roughly 200 years, from c.100 bc–c. ad 100;

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the Wrst and third being the Wrst two and most eminent of the Twenty-Five Dynastic Histories, i.e. Sima Qian’s (c.145–90/85 bc) Shi ji (The Records of the Grand Historian) and Ban Gu’s (32–92) Han shu (History of the Former Han). Our second text is not a historical work in a narrow sense—the ‘Prefaces’ to the Book of Odes (Shijing).1 Its selection here is grounded on the fact that it is the epitome of the distinctively historical approach to understanding and interpreting the Odes, an approach which became the hallmark of the Odes exegesis ever since,2 with far-reaching repercussions for the Chinese conception of poetry in general. The question of the ‘Prefaces’ authorship, known as ‘the number one controversy’ of Chinese textual criticism, has plagued scores of native scholars and exegetes until today. We will leave this thorny issue aside instantly, yet need to remark that despite all controversies, there is nevertheless a broad consensus that the received recension of ‘Prefaces’ went through the hands of Wei Hong (1st cent. ad), a scholar who lived in the age of transition from the late Western Han to the early Eastern Han (c.50 bc–ad 50). Indeed, the ‘Prefaces’ abound with references to this transitional period (see below), thereby highlighting the change that historiography and historical thinking underwent in the two centuries from Sima Qian and Ban Gu. This change in the Weld of historiography is paralleled by a profound change of the current beliefs, which—following Michael Loewe—has been depicted as a change of ‘Modernist’ to ‘Reformist’ attitudes and policies. SuYce it here to say that the ‘Modernist’ outlook took Qin imperial rulership, exemplarily embodied by Qin Shihuangdi (r. 247–221–210 bc), as its model. It prevailed in the pivotal reign of Emperor Wudi (r. 141–87 bc), which was the longest of all Han emperors. Yet already in its late years, under the necessity of retrenching the expansionist drive into central Asia, the pendulum swung into the direction of ‘Reformist’ thought. Preferably projected onto the Duke of Zhou (Zhougong, 11th cent. bc), ‘Reformist’ policies came into full swing from Emperor Yuandi (r. 49–33 bc) onward, laying the ground for the rise of the ‘usurper’ Wang Mang (r. ad 9–23) and his later ubiquitously denounced Xin dynasty (see also Michael Nylan’s paper in this volume).3 The paper is rounded oV by some concluding remarks, which take up the notion of ‘pact’ used in the title. 1

Hereafter Odes; when referring to individual odes no italics are used. The odes and ‘Prefaces’ are only referred to by the numbers of the 306 odes; for the titles, see under ‘Shijing’ in the Glossary.—The ‘Prefaces’ consist of the so-called ‘Great Preface’ and the ‘Small Prefaces’; the latter containing the individual ‘Prefaces’ to each of the 311 odes. For an English translation, see Legge, iv. [34–81].—According to traditional scholarship, the Odes date from the 12th to the 6th cent. bc and their compilation was made by Confucius. For further information, see Michael Loewe, ‘Shih ching’, in: id. 1993, 415–23. 2 See Van Zoeren 1991, 80–115. 3 Loewe 1974, esp. 11–14; Loewe 1986a, 103–10.

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1 . S I M A Q IA N ’ S SH I J I 4 The Shi ji is the cooperative work of father and son; initiated by Sima Tan (d. 110 bc), it was to the greater part authored and completed by his son Sima Qian. The work set the model of a dynastic history in its four diVerent parts: benji or ji, ‘Fundamental Chronicles’; biao, ‘Tables’, shu (later on zhi), ‘Treatises’, and liezhuan or zhuan, ‘Arrayed Accounts’, or ‘Biographies’, since this part, aside from surveys of the foreign states and peoples with whom China entertained relations, consists of biographies of people of all walks of life.5 Yet the Shi ji is unique among the Twenty-Five Dynastic Histories in that it is conceived as a universal history, with a temporal scope that ranges over 2,000 years, from the Yellow Emperor (Huangdi) down to Sima Qian’s own time. Moreover, in the ‘Treatises’ the subject matter ranges from ritual, music, and astronomy to the calendar, waterways, and taxation. Another universal aspect can be seen in Sima Qian’s pursuit to encompass the entire knowledge as handed down in the Six Classics, the pertaining commentarial literature, and the copious writings of the Six Schools of Thought (liujia). In the recently burgeoning Shi ji research literature much attention has been paid to the Shi ji’s conglomerate nature: storylines are dispersed and sometimes divergent, even conXicting versions of one and the same event are presented at diVerent places.6 It appears to me that to some extent these discrepancies, inconsistencies, and unbalanced judgments are just owed to the fact that perceptions, notions, and concepts changed over the time span of roughly Wfty years in which the Shi ji was compiled, the very period in which the Han empire reached its zenith.7 More important for our reading and studying the Shi ji is the imaginary fault line which divides the Shi ji’s historical narratives in two halves: in the one half we hear the exuberant voice of the Grand Historian, who boasts of his ascendancy from the Zhou Scribe Yi and asserts himself to be herald of His Majesty’s glorious reign, 4

For references to translations and major monographic research studies, see F.-H. Mutschler’s paper, n. 22. In addition, I would like to gratefully acknowledge my indebtedness to many friends and colleagues of the international Shi ji studies community, notably Michael Nylan, Dorothee Schaab-Hanke, Hans van Ess, Martin Kern, Yuri Pines, and Hermann-Josef Ro¨llicke; their work and their insights helped me immensely in my eVorts to come to grips with the Shi ji. 5 Another part of the Shi ji, the ‘Hereditary Houses’ (shijia; chaps. 31–60), which, among others, contains the accounts of the major territorial states in the pre-imperial period, is missing from most of the later dynastic histories. It should further be noted that a few dynastic histories also lack ‘Treatises’ and/or ‘Tables’. 6 See e.g. Hardy 1999, 73–85. 7 A striking example of this change of notions and their meanings is the term ru, ‘Confucian’ or ‘scholar’; see Cheng 2001.

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whereas in the other half, this voice has transformed into an embittered critic of Wudi and his entourage, a voice that belongs to a man, who in his prime of life experienced the disastrous development of the dynasty’s fortunes after 104 bc and who himself was shrugged oV, humiliated, and eventually castrated. As this imaginary fault line often fades away or becomes blurred so that the two authorial voices mix and mingle, it is no easy task to assess Sima Qian’s attitude towards one particular historical Wgure or one particular event. With these cautions we now turn to the Shi ji’s treatment of the three issues speciWed above.

(a) On the monarchical structure Sima Qian’s aspiration to emulate Confucius as the epitome of early Chinese historical thinking is hardly concealed in the Shi ji’s last, autobiographical chapter; as to the structure of the work, it becomes nowhere more apparent than with regard to the ‘Fundamental Chronicles’. Serving as a guiding thread for the entire Shi ji, they create a uniWed history that is organized around and tied together by the succession of one monarch to the other. As Mark Edward Lewis has pointedly remarked, ‘[t]his reads the uniWed empire created by Qin back into the beginning of history and assumes that this undivided ‘‘sovereignty’’ passed from king to king or dynasty to dynasty without break from the Yellow Emperor to Emperor Wu [Wudi].’8 In Sima Qian’s understanding, Confucius’ central aim in compiling the Spring and Autumn Annals (Chunqiu; hereafter Annals) was the preservation of the idea of Zhou kingship. Hence, the conception of the Shi ji as being modeled upon the Annals substantially adds to the impression conveyed throughout the Shi ji that the Qin/Han empire did not establish a fundamentally new political order, but rather perpetuated the one being inherited from early times. This picture of an uninterrupted succession from the Yellow Emperor down to the Han is markedly diVerent from Ban Gu’s and later historians’ view of history, who regarded the Qin dynasty as illegitimate and hence conceived a rupture after the Zhou dynasty’s demise in 256 bc (see below). In contrast, Sima Qian had no doubts about accepting Qin as the legitimate successor of Zhou.9

8

Lewis 1999, 310. Pines 2005/6. This does not mean, however, that Sima Qian was unaware of the sweeping institutional changes that the establishment of the imperial order had brought about—an awareness which is reXected by a major stylistic break in the ‘Fundamental Chronicle’ of Qin Shihuangdi, which occurs with uniWcation in 221 bc; see Durrant 1994, 31. 9

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It should be noted that by expanding the historical horizon up to the Yellow Emperor, Sima Qian went farther back in time than Confucius and the early Confucian ‘School’. SigniWcantly, the Yellow Emperor is accorded an eminent role in the Shi ji: under him the bureaucratic government is inaugurated by appointing four oYcials in charge of ‘governing the people’ (zhi min).10 Additionally, the Yellow Emperor occupies the nodal point of all genealogical lineages, by which the ‘Wve sage rulers’, the ruling houses of the Three Dynasties (Xia—Shang—Zhou), and the Qin dynasty were being joined together.11 The house of Han is conspicuously left out from this genealogical super-system since Sima Qian considered Liu Bang, the founder of the Han dynasty posthumously known as Emperor Gaozu (r. 206/202–195 bc), as having arisen ‘from the lanes of the common people’12—an ‘error’ which was later corrected by Ban Gu (see below under 3.a).

(b) On the role of war and peace The ‘classic’ Chinese text of warfare is found in the Shangshu (Book of Documents; henceforth: Documents). Purported to give an account of the battle of Muye (c.1045 bc), in which the Zhou triumphed over the Shang, it consists in fact only of King Wu’s (Wuwang, r. 1049/45–1043 bc) speech in the morning of the battle, addressed to the oYcers of his own army and the commanders of the allied troops. However, the Documents as a whole are more concerned with the state-building project as begun by Yao, Shun, and the Great Yu, and completed by the early Zhou rulers. This contrasts with the Zuo Commentary of the Annals (Zuo zhuan), in which warfare ranks as a major theme, yet conceived as ‘a warfare of the mind’,13 focused on ‘the man who perceived, calculated, and decided, while those who actually carried arms and spilled blood were reduced to secondary roles’.14 Hence, descriptions of the battle Wghting are rather brief, even the one given as part of the lengthiest account of a battle, i.e. the battle of Chengpu in 632 bc.15 The Shi ji accentuates this habit of representing warfare. A case in point is the civil war between Xiang Yu (d. 202 bc) and Liu Bang. Their campaigns are largely reported as matter-of-fact records of often puzzling movements of army units forth and back on the large checkerboard of the Central Plains and the adjacent regions. These records, however, are augmented by elaborate 10

11 12 Shi ji 1/9. Shi ji 1/10–45 and 3/488–500. Shi ji 16/760. Lewis 1990, 104. 14 Ibid. 98. 15 Cf. Watson 1989, 50. For a translation of the accounts of the battle of Chengpu, see ibid. 50–64. 13

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narrative passages that bring to life the two protagonists and their closest companions-in-arms, often by scenes that are staged beyond the battleWeld such as the famous Hongmen banquet or Xiang Yu’s encampment at Gaixia before the Wnal battle—just to name the two best-known episodes.16 From the staggering Wgures of the body count that the Shi ji report for the hundred years before the uniWcation in 221 bc,17 one gets an idea of the immense losses and destructions caused by the ceaseless warfare among the few remaining large territorial states. Yet these Wgures are without meaning apart from the heroes of Sima Qian’s narratives, their strategic wisdom and heroic deeds—mostly audacious and strong-willed characters Wxed upon an aspiring aim in their lives (zhi or yi), who, however, in the end fail or are subdued. Among generals and military leaders Sima Qian Wnds some great protagonists exhibiting such a ‘nobility of failure’—to borrow Ivan Morris’s propitious term; with one notable exception all of them die by their own hand, most by cutting their throats with a sword.18 The biographies of these heroic Wgures count among the masterpieces of Chinese literature because of the colorful portrayals of the characters and the vivid narrative prose which skillfully employs a variety of dramatizing eVects. A special case in this category concerns Li Ling (d. 74 bc), who, after a heroic Wght against an enemy badly outnumbering his troops, surrendered to the Xiongnu in 99 bc.19 It is him whom Sima Qian pleaded to pardon, which inXicted Emperor Wudi’s wrath on the Grand Historian.

(c) On the general concept of the course of history As Professor Mutschler has already pointed out, there is not one guiding concept of the course of history which binds all the dispersed storylines in the Shi ji together into one comprehensive whole. Although the topic would require an elaborate discussion, I will limit myself to six aspects of Sima Qian’s sense of the past. (1) Coming closest to a ‘comprehensive whole’ is—as noted above—the idea of an uninterrupted chain of sovereign rulers from the Yellow Emperor to 16

Translated in Watson 1961, i. 49–55 and 70–1. When only summing up the reported casualties inXicted by the Qin army upon hostile armies in the hundred-odd years following the Qin ruler’s assumption of the title of ‘king’ in 325 bc until 221 bc, the number amounts to 1.4 million; adopted, with a diVerent time frame, from Bodde 1986, 99. 18 Bai Qi, chap. 73; Meng Tian, chap. 88; Xiang Yu, chap. 7; Han Xin, chap. 93; Li Guang, chap. 109. The one exception concerns the Prince of Xinling who drank himself to death (chap. 76). 19 See van Ess 2003, 26–8, with a comparison of the diVering accounts in Shi ji, chap. 109 and Han shu, chap. 54. 17

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the Three Dynasties and up to Sima Qian’s own age. Thus, from the earliest beginnings—no divine creation—history Xowed in rather straight lines, without any major interruption. There is also no teleological concept interpreting history as moving toward the advent of the house of Han, such as postulated by the Eastern Han commentator of the Gongyang Commentary of the Annals (Gongyang zhuan), He Xiu (ad 129–82).20 Thus, from Sima Qian’s perspective, much in the house of Han’s rise to power depended upon contingencies. Herein lies one reason for the Shi ji’s scandalization in the Eastern Han dynasty (see below under 3.). (2) There is a kind of a ‘technical’ periodization dependent on the source materials available to Sima Qian. Accordingly, we can distinguish four periods; the Wrst period covering the far ancient history from the Yellow Emperor up to the year 841 bc, from whence onward the Grand Historian was able to provide a year-by-year chronology (chap. 14). Acknowledging the dearth of reliable sources for the far distant period,21 Sima Qian could rely upon the Six Classics and the writings of the Hundred Schools of Thought for the age of the (legendary) ‘sage rulers’ Yao and Shun and the Three Dynasties, encompassing the second period from 841 to c.300 bc. For the third period from c.300 to 150 bc, there were ample documents and records available, but their preservation, as Sima Qian reminds us by the words of his father, was precarious.22 Finally, the fourth and last period, abundantly documented by archival materials and historical records, covers the roughly seventy years, to which the Grand Historian and his father were themselves eye-witnesses. (3) Apart from this ‘technical’ periodization, mention must be made of Sima Qian’s reXections on the sequence of the Wve major dynasties—Xia, Shang, Zhou, Qin, and Han. Probably drawing on a concept propounded by Dong Zhongshu (c.179–c.115 bc), Sima explains the sequence of the Three Dynasties as a succession of the virtues of good faith (zhong), reverence (jing), and reWnement (wen); the pursuit of each virtue being prone to a vice which aggravates over time and ultimately generates the rise of a new guiding virtue. According to the Grand Historian, the Qin, in the attempt to rectify the excesses of the Zhou dynasty’s valorization of ‘reWnement’ by strict laws and harsh punishments, rashly fell into the other extreme so that it was upon the Han to change and remedy this evil course. Sima Qian concludes that therefore the Han had rightly obtained the Mandate of Heaven.23 As has been convincingly argued, this discussion might have primarily been intended to criticize Emperor Wudi.24 Moreover, in the Shi ji such reXections 20 23 24

21 22 Cheng 1986. Shi ji 1/46. Ibid. 130/3295. Ibid. 8/175; translated and commented upon by Li 1994, 402. See Li 1994, 402 f.

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on the larger historical process remain on the surface level without aVecting the shape of the historical accounts. The same holds true for the cyclical concept of dynastic change based on the Five Elements (wuxing: wood, metal, Wre, water, earth).25 Moreover, this concept only became politically relevant through Wang Mang’s ascension to the throne in ad 9, and it was only thereafter that it attained a greater impact on historical thinking and writing (see below under 3.). (4) For Sima Qian, the ultimate rationale behind the succession of monarchs and dynasties was that Heaven (tian) had willed it. This becomes manifest in the Grand Historian’s reXections on the rise of Liu Bang to the Han founding emperor.26 In this remarkable mini-essay, Sima Qian argues that in the past—here the Grand Historian refers to the Xia, Shang, Zhou, and Qin dynasties—the rise of new dynasties had been the outcome of a long process during which the founding king himself or the founding king’s house had accumulated ‘goodness’ (shan) and ‘merit’ (gong). In the case of Qin this process, whereby Qin Shihuangdi had eventually found the approval of Heaven, had gone on over centuries.27 As the Grand Historian observes, this pattern changed in the recent past when ‘within the space of Wve years [i.e. 207–202 bc] the command of the empire changed hands three times’28— an observation by which Sima Qian is much bewildered: ‘Since the birth of humankind there have never before been such rapid changes of rulership!’29 (5) In accordance with his famous maxim, ‘To comprehensively inquire into the changes from the past to the present’ (tong gujin zhi bian),30 the Grand Historian was keenly interested in how human beings, living under diVerent circumstances, acted according to the expediency that these circumstances demanded. Thus, for Sima Qian there was no ‘classical age’ which already contained, as in a nutshell, all historical lessons for all generations to come. This becomes manifest in a comment on the Qin dynasty’s legacy, where the Grand Historian engages in the pre-Qin discussion about the lessons and values of the remote and the near past. Giving emphasis to the view associated with Xunzi (c.310–218 bc) that one should take for one’s 25 For the origin of this concept with Zou Yan ( X. 3rd cent. bc) and its development in Han political theory, see Loewe 2004, chap. 14, 457–95. 26 Shi ji 16/759–60; translated in Watson 1961, i. 120–1. 27 This point is elaborated at greater length in another mini-essay in Shi ji 15/685; for a discussion, see Pines 2005/6. 28 Shi ji 16/759. The notion of three changes, apart from Xiang Yu’s and Liu Bang’s seizing power, probably refers to the enthronement of the Second Emperor’s nephew Ziying as ‘king’ (wang) instead of ‘emperor’ (di). 29 Adopted from Watson 1961, i. 120. 30 Han shu 62/2735.

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model the kings of recent ages, Sima Qian provocatively asks, ‘Why must one learn only from ancient times?’31 Getting closer in time to his own age, it is the reign of Emperor Wendi (r. 180–157 bc), referred to by Professor Mutschler in his comparative analysis, which, in the eyes of the Grand Historian, carries all signs of a Golden Age. It should be remembered, however, that Sima Qian’s lavish praise of Wendi’s reign as a time when the ruler’s virtue (de) was of the highest order32 had a special critical intention, namely to pose an idealized age vis-a`vis the present age under Emperor Wudi. (6) Finally, we must draw attention to a time concept, which in a way is incongruent with the other concepts and periodizations discussed so far. This is the 500-year cycle according to which a ‘sage’ (sheng) appears once every 500 years to renew the kingly rule. First mentioned by Mencius (Mengzi 7B.38 and 2B.13), the Grand Historian, in the Shi ji’s Wnal, autobiographical chapter, takes it up as a thought pattern referred to by his father but infers that he—Sima Qian—claims the mantle to continue Confucius’ mission of preserving ‘this culture of Ours’ (siwen; cf. Lunyu 9.5).33 Although this time concept had no visible inXuence on the organization of the Shi ji as a whole, its impact on the self-understanding of Sima Qian and, in his wake, on the self-understanding of the Chinese historians’ caste in general, can hardly be overestimated.34

2 . T H E ‘ P R E FAC E S ’ TO T H E ODE S To appreciate the ‘Prefaces’ as an eminently historical work, one should point out that there are only a small number of odes which, by their contents, can be matched to historical events or known historical Wgures.35 This applies, in particular, to a group of about a dozen odes of the Da Ya (‘Major Elegantiae’) section (Odes 235–65), which deal with the Zhou tribe, from its mythical origins to the conquest of the Shang in the mid-eleventh century bc and to the ‘restoration’ under King Xuan (r. 827/825–782 bc). ClassiWed as the earliest examples of the genre of ‘historical poetry’ (shishi), these odes have been described as a rudimentary epic dubbed the ‘Weniad’.36 Yet, for the 31

32 Shi ji 15/686. Ibid. 10/437; Watson 1961, i. 366. Shi ji 130/1336; translated and commented upon by Li 1994, 360. 34 Mittag (1997a), 266–9. 35 By rather loose criteria, there are about 40 Feng and Ya odes which can be dated; see Lu and Feng 1956, i. 36–81. 36 Wang 1982. 33

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bulk of the Odes neither time nor place can be determined. Although some spadework in placing the Odes into a historical context had certainly been done earlier, notably within the pre-Qin Mao commentarial tradition, it was by the ‘Prefaces’ that these eVorts were systematized so that the Odes eventually became to be understood as one of the ‘Three Histories’ (san shi) allegedly authored by Confucius; the other two being the Documents and the Annals.37 As already noted above, the authorship of the ‘Prefaces’ is, and will continue to be, controversial. Nevertheless, since the ‘Prefaces’, as we will see, abound with ‘Reformist’ concepts and propositions, it can be made suYciently plausible that they, if not authored, were expanded and revised in the transitional period from Western to Eastern Han (i.e. c.50 bc–ad 50), against the historical backdrop of the rise of ‘Reformist’ ideas and the subsequent rise of Wang Mang as the paragon of ‘Reformism’. In this context it is noteworthy that, as an authoritative source of wisdom, the Odes gained prominence in court discussions through Kuang Heng (d. 30 or 29 bc), statesman and a leading proponent of ‘Reformist’ views.38 Yet it was not prior to Wang Mang that the exegetical tradition of the Mao Odes (Mao Shi), to which the ‘Prefaces’ belong, gained oYcial recognition.39 In fact, there are several outstanding features by which the ‘Prefaces’ clearly resonate with the contemporary discourse dominated by Wang Mang’s eVorts at legitimizing his regency and his eventual seizure of the throne; perhaps the three most important ones concern the following: (a) The exaltation of the Duke of Zhou,40 to whom Wang Mang was consistently likened.41 (b) The elevation of the opening two sections of the Odes, the ‘Zhounan’ and ‘Shaonan’ sections, to the status of a ‘normative canon’ (zhengjing); its twenty-Wve odes being interpreted as testifying to the ‘transformative inXuence’ of King Wen’s (Wenwang, r. 1056–1050 bc) moral-spiritual leadership (Wenwang zhi hua) in the lands south (nan) of the Yellow River.42 It is this

37

According to Wang Tong (584–618); see Wenzhongzi, ‘Wang Dao’, 1a (Baizi quanshu edn.). Loewe 1974, 154–92; 2000, 213–15. In all three memorials cited in Kuang Heng’s biography (Han shu 81/ 3333–44), citations from the Odes Wgure prominently. 39 In ad 4; see Dubs, iii. 192–3. 40 Thus, the Duke is identiWed as author of Ode 154 ‘Qi yue’, which is said to have ‘laid out the founding of the royal house’ (chen wang ye). In addition, he was attributed the Wrst and the last of the Wfteen sections of the Guofeng odes, the ‘Zhounan’ and ‘Bin’ odes (Nos. 1–11 and 154– 60, respectively). 41 Loewe 1974, 290–3. 42 Cf. ‘Prefaces’ Nos. 1, 7, 9–11, 18, 20, 23, 25. 38

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region where the territory lay with which Wang Mang had been enfeoVed, i.e. Xindu (Henan), and which he eagerly sought to further develop.43 (c) Our third point also relates to the ‘Zhounan’ and ‘Shaonan’ Odes: the interpretation of the last ode of each of these two sections as a Heavenly ‘response’ (ying) to the perfect government of the early Western Zhou kings (Nos. 11, 25).44 The same idea of Heaven responding to the worldly aVairs by portents was exploited by Wang Mang in his eVorts to legitimize his ascension to the throne.45 It is further noteworthy that certain interpretations singularly oVered by the ‘Prefaces’ and the Mao commentary to the Odes were variously referred to in the political discourse of the Wang Mang interregnum.46 Leaving an indepth inquiry into the ‘Prefaces’ historicity to a later point of time, we will now turn to our three topics as treated in the ‘Prefaces’.

(a) On the monarchical structure Whereas the Annals is a chronicle of the minor state of Lu only and whereas the Documents relate broadly the history of Yao and Shun and that of the Three Dynasties, the ‘Prefaces’ present the Odes as forming one single history solely dedicated to the Zhou dynasty, a history that spans over half a millennium, from the dynasty’s rise in the eleventh century bc down to the year 599 bc. It is the history of the ‘Middle Kingdom’ (Zhongguo; cf. Nos. 167, 177), the Zhou realm surrounded by barbarian peoples.47 Within the realm there is diversity—an idea which is given prominent expression by the division of the 43 Wang Mang’s policy of developing the southern regions is highlighted by his construction of the famous North–South Road (ziwu dao) cutting across the Qinling Mountain into the upper Han valley in ad 5; see Han shu 99A/4076; Dubs, iii. 212. 44 According to this interpretation, the Odes 11 and 25 should be understood as songs praising the appearance of fortuitous animals, a unicorn (lin) and a zouyu, a white tiger with black spots, respectively. 45 This idea was fully set forth in a book documenting forty-two cases of Portents Signaling the Bestowal of Heaven’s Mandate (Fu ming), which Wang Mang, following his ascension of the throne, ordered to be compiled and distributed empire-wide; cf. Dubs, iii. 288–94. 46 A case in point is the memorial by which Wang Mang’s daughter was recommended for marriage to Emperor Ping (r. ad 1–6): By characterizing the daughter as having ‘a graceful appearance’ (yaotiao zhi rong ; Han shu 99A/4052; Dubs, iii. 157–8), the memorial alludes to Ode 1 ‘Guan ju’, stanza 1, line 3. This allusion deserves our attention since the ‘Preface’s and the Mao Shi commentary’s interpretation of that ode as relating to a ‘graceful’ girl’s selection for marriage to a prince is quite diVerent from the interpretations in the other early Shijing commentarial traditions; cf. Mittag 1997b, 35–41, esp. 38, n. 23. 47 It should be noted, however, that it is a highly fragmented history with stupendous lacunas in terms of both the historical and geographical coverage.

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Odes’ Wrst part, the Guofeng (‘Airs of the States’), into Wfteen sections representing diVerent regions of the realm.48 A basic assumption throughout the ‘Prefaces’ is that in the various sections of the Odes—the Wfteen Guofeng sections, the Xiao Ya (‘Minor Elegantiae’), and Da Ya, respectively—the odes are arranged according to a strict chronological order. By and large, it is by this chronological order that the moral purport of each ode is determined. Thus, those odes believed to ‘sing the praises of ’ (mei) a king’s or prince’s good government are reserved to the Zhou founding era or the early ages of the states represented among the Guofeng. Analogously, those odes allegedly ‘directed against’ or ‘satirizing’ (ci) folly and vice of any ruler are attributed to later times, be it to the two proverbially bad late Western Zhou kings Li (r. 879–842 bc) and You (r. 782–771 bc), or to King Ping (r. 771–720 bc), who transferred the capital to Luoyang and thereby ended the Western Zhou dynasty, or be it to the various rulers of the Eastern Zhou states and princedoms.49 This organizational framework established by the ‘Prefaces’ adds enormous symbolic weight to the monarchical structure. Thus, the chain of the successive Zhou kings is construed as constituting the quintessential principle of the body politic and hence determining the waxing and waning of the realm.50 The key notion in this context is de, ‘moral-spiritual power’. As the house of Zhou had amassed ‘moral-spiritual power’ over generations (Nos. 236–7, 239, 241), Wenwang and his son Wuwang, both personally blessed with ‘illustrious’, ‘marvelous’, and ‘sagely’ moral-spiritual power (mingde, lingde, shengde; Nos. 236, 243), were eventually conferred the Heavenly Mandate (tianming). This accumulated stock of ‘moral-spiritual power’ was abundant enough to last over several generations even though an incipient decline had already set in after the Western Zhou founding era (No. 11). The two concepts of the Heavenly Mandate and the ‘moral-spiritual power’ de accumulated by an individual’s virtuous conduct and nurtured within a family over generations clearly relate to the political discourse of the Western to Eastern Han transitional period. In fact, it was again under Wang Mang that these two concepts rose to prominence. Having hardly occurred in the political discourse prior to a memorial of the above-mentioned Kuang Heng,51 the doctrine of the Heavenly Mandate was vigorously invoked by Wang Mang.52 Yet no less important was the ‘usurper’s’ claim to descent from 48

Cf. Dorofeeva-Lichtmann 1991. Note that the ‘Prefaces’ use several other categories apart from mei and ci. 50 It should, however, be noted that this chain is construed by only seven out of more than three dozen Zhou kings. 51 Han shu 81/3338; trans. Loewe 2004, 443. 52 Loewe 2000, 214 and id. 2004, 443 V. 49

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the (legendary) sage emperor Shun.53 Last but not least, Wang Mang inaugurated the ritual of conferring the ‘nine distinctions’ (jiuxi) as a mode of attaining public acknowledgment of his having accumulated extraordinary ‘moral-spiritual power’54—a ritual which in post-Han China became a constituent part of the throne abdication ritual known as shanrang. These various ideological and ritual inventions worked to the eVect of solemnizing the imperial and monarchical order. The ‘Prefaces’ clearly adhere to this tendency toward solemnization. As a consequence, the Zhou kingship model as conceived by the ‘Prefaces’ incorrigibly carries the stain of the brand of imperial ideology which developed under ‘Reformist’ thought and matured under Wang Mang.

(b) On the role of war and peace After the triumphal, yet not all-decisive victory over the Xiongnu in 119 bc, the topic of war and peace became the single most important and controversial issue in Han politics. By the way this topic is treated in the ‘Prefaces’, its inclination toward ‘Reformist’ ideas gets even more distinctive. At several instances throughout the ‘Prefaces’ the notion of ‘great peace’ (taiping; Nos. 171; 247–8, 267) or ‘harmonious peace’ (heping; No. 8) is evoked. Although originating in pre-Qin writings (Han Feizi; Zhuangzi), this notion developed into a concept of a world order of ubiquitous peace by the late Western Han. It was only then that a Book of the Great Peace (Taiping jing), allegedly revealed by Heaven, was presented to the throne. Subsequently, Emperor Aidi (r. 7–1 bc) took the title of ‘Emperor of the Great Peace’ (Taiping huangdi).55 Some years later, in ad 5, Wang Mang, after having settled border conXicts in the north, east, and south, is recorded as having brought about ‘great peace’.56 By evoking the notion of taiping, the ‘Prefaces’ strike a note of yearning for a peaceful world. If this is so, the ‘Reformist’ attitude toward war and peace which permeates the ‘Prefaces’ can be further substantiated by three additional observations as follows. Firstly, in the ‘Prefaces’ the Zhou dynasty’s founding and its southward expansionist drive are consistently depicted in terms of a moral endeavor;57 yet the ‘Prefaces’ are conspicuously silent about heroic deeds such as the 53

54 55 Dubs, iii. 278–9. Ibid. 196 V. Demie´ville 1986, 817. Han shu 99A/4077; Dubs, iii. 213. 57 The only exception is ‘Preface’ No. 244, which speaks of the ‘work of conquest’, which Wuwang brought to completion. 56

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crushing defeats of the peoples of Mi and Chong inXicted by Wenwang or Wuwang’s victorious battle at Muye.58 Secondly, the ‘Prefaces’ seek to present Wenwang and Wuwang as monarchs apprehensive of defending the endangered ‘Middle Kingdom’ against barbarian assaults such as by the Kun in the west and the Xianyun in the north.59 Yet it is the Duke of Zhou who is depicted as the ideal Weld-commander (No. 156). Apart from these cases, there are only a few instances where the ‘Prefaces’ positively evaluate the use of military forces and/or laud the respective ruler in command; all these instances concern campaigns against belligerent foreign tribes, either ‘to punish’ (fa; zheng; tao; Nos. 177–8, 128, respectively) or ‘expulse’ (rang; No. 50) them, or ‘to rescue’ (jiu; No. 64) an endangered state within the realm. Thirdly, clearly outnumbering the odes just referred to above, there are a number of odes which the ‘Prefaces’ interpret as laments by troops on service in the Weld for long (Nos. 33, 232–4), as laments over the disruptive eVects thereof on partnership, marriage, and the children’s obligations to care for their parents (Nos. 94, 110, 121, 205), and at large on society and the moral order (Nos. 93, 95), or as criticism directed against a monarch or prince for waging protracted wars, keeping troops stationed far away for long, and neglecting the needs of the common people (Nos. 62, 66, 68, 124, 133). In the focus of such criticism is King You (Nos. 205, 232–4), upon whom the ‘Prefaces’ places the greatest blame for the Western Zhou dynasty’s demise, followed by King Ping (Nos. 66, 68). In sum, by projecting the idea of ‘great peace’, adopting a critical stance toward protracted campaigns, and advocating vigorous, yet limited military strikes in case of foreign aggressions, the ‘Prefaces’ echo those contemporary ‘Reformist’ voices which had Wrst been raised in response to the extremely costly campaigns against Dayuan (Ferghana) in 104–100 bc. Having eventually gained the upper hand, these voices eVected a fundamental change of Han foreign policy towards the Xiongnu and the western regions, which resulted in the indictment of the expansionist, venturesome policy under Wudi in favor of new forms of settled colonialism and other administrative and diplomatic measures aimed at avoiding long and expensive campaigns.60 If our observation of a broad congruence between the ‘Prefaces’ and those ‘Reformist’ voices is not wholly mistaken, one is even tempted to interpret certain ‘Prefaces’ as political comments on historical Wgures and historical 58

Cf. Odes 241 ‘Huang yi’, stanzas 5–8, and 236 ‘Da ming’, stanzas 7–8, respectively. Cf. ‘Prefaces’ Nos. 167–9, according to which the three odes form a sequel of songs being sung on the occasion of sending oV the troops and on their return. 60 Loewe 1974, 211–51 (chap. 7). 59

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events from the late years of Wudi’s reign. This is in particular the case with the comparatively long ‘Preface’ to Ode 79 ‘Qing ren’, which interprets this ode as criticizing a general who, ‘being fond of gain’ (hao li) and despised by the ruler, was sent with an army to guard the northern frontier, but who at the end of the day Xed to the enemy. Yet the ‘Preface’ hastens to add that the ode is not only censuring the general, but also the ruler for his inapt way of procuring the general’s retirement. The whole ‘Preface’ in question reads as a scathing comment directed against Wudi and the brother of one of his consorts, Li Guangli, who had led the aforementioned campaigns into Ferghana, yet pressed on to be given another command and Wnally surrendered to the Xiongnu in 90 bc.

(c) On the conception of the course of history As to the course of history, the key idea espoused by the ‘Prefaces’ is what has later been termed the ‘dynastic cycle’.61 The trajectory along this ‘dynastic cycle’ is by and large determined by the moral-spiritual power of each monarch. Thus, this cycle is marked by a strong beginning under the three sage rulers of the early Zhou, Wenwang, Wuwang, and the Duke of Zhou,62 followed by a slight, yet steadily augmenting decline over a long period. According to the ‘Prefaces’, there are no odes preserved for this period, except several odes attributed to the reign of King Li (Nos. 253–7), with whom this decline hit its low point. Thereafter, King Xuan achieved a ‘restoration’ (zhongxing; literally, ‘mid-term upheaval’; Odes 177–90, 258–63), before an abrupt decline under the ‘bad last emperor’, King You (Odes 191–234, 264–5) set in again, which precipitated the dynasty’s demise under King Ping (Odes 65–74). Besides this model of a ‘dynastic cycle’, another important time concept espoused by the ‘Prefaces’ is the emotional attachment to, or the yearning for, the ‘past’ or ‘good old days’ (si gu; Nos. 210–11, 213, 216, 221–2, 231). This idealized period, of course, refers to the glorious age of the Zhou founding era, which was so much adored by proponents of ‘Reformist’ views. In no few cases, the ‘Prefaces’ also apply the interpretational pattern of the ode’s poet criticizing the present by eulogizing the ideal past (e.g. Nos. 73, 80, 103). Finally, there is, akin to the idealization of the past, the concept of melancholy caused by the sight of the ruins of a once magniWcent city. This concept

61 62

For a critical review of the ‘dynastic cycle’, see Bielenstein 1978. Odes 1–25, 154–60, 161–76, and 235–52, 258–63.

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is introduced in the ‘Preface’ to Ode 65 ‘Shu li,’ which has ever since been regarded as the ‘classic’ paradigm of Ruinenmelancholie.63

3. BAN GU’S HAN SHU We now turn to the Han shu, the dynastic history of the Western Han written by Ban Gu. Similar to Sima Qian, Ban Gu continued and enlarged an earlier work by his father Ban Biao (ad 3–54), which had been intended as a continuation of the Shi ji. In contrast to the Shi ji, the Han shu is by and large limited to the history of the Western Han period, including the rise and fall of Wang Mang and his Xin dynasty.64 This restriction to one single period set the precedent for all later ‘standard histories’. However, this basic aspect, important as it is, only partly explains why in premodern China Ban Gu, and not Sima Qian, came to be regarded as the master-historian par excellence;65 another important aspect was the criticism early voiced against Sima Qian and his Shi ji. Already by the time of Ban Gu, the Shi ji was held liable for denigrating the house of Han and thus perilously undermining its authority; hence being denounced as a ‘book full of slander’ (bang shu).66 In contrast, the Han shu pays heed to bolstering the Han dynasty’s claim to the Heavenly Mandate and validating its historical role as the legitimate successor of the Zhou dynasty. As to the historical background of the Han shu’s composition (c.ad 50–90), suYce it to say that the ‘Reformist’ outlook continued to hold sway, with some modiWcations and new developments. Most noteworthy in this respect is the emergence of the aforementioned Dong Zhongshu (c.179–c.115 bc) as the leading authority in Confucian political thought and the Wgurehead of the ‘Reformist’ imperial ideology.67 This is signaled by the fact that in the Han shu 63

SigniWcantly, the ode was interpreted diVerently by the other exegetical traditions, in particular the Han and the Lu Schools. Moreover, even the Mao Shi commentary does not clearly support the ‘Preface’s’ reading of the ode along the lines of Ruinenmelancholie. It seems likely that this particular reading was modeled after the beautiful scene of the Viscomte Ji’s singing a mournful song at the sight of the ruined Shang capital, which is contained in Shi ji 38/ 1620–1. 64 It should be noted, however, that the Han shu in some chapters such as the ‘Table of Men from all Ages’ (‘Gujin ren biao’; chap. 20) or the ‘Treatise on the Five Elements’ (‘Wuxing zhi’; chap. 27A–C) pursues a universalist perspective. 65 There were, of course, exceptions from this general opinion; the most notable being Zheng Qiao (1104–62). 66 Li 1994, 368. 67 For a thoughtful attempt at reconstructing Dong’s biography, see Arbuckle 1991; for some problematic issues revolving around Dong, who is conventionally known as the founder of imperial Confucianism, see Cheng 1998/9.

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Dong Zhongshu is given a lengthy biography (chap. 56), whereas he is only brieXy mentioned in the Shi ji (chap. 121). Above all, Dong Zhongshu’s name has ever been associated not only with the conception of extensive correlations between Heaven’s will, the various processes of nature, and the good or evil conduct of man, but also with a powerful reformulation of the Five Elements theory.68 According to this theory, the Five Elements succeed to one another by ‘production’ (xiangsheng xu), instead of by ‘conquest’ (xiangsheng* xu), as had previously been maintained.69 Entering the political discourse in the last decades of the Western Han, this new theory became inXuential with Wang Mang’s adoption of the patron element Earth for his newly founded Xin dynasty in ad 9, followed by the adoption of the patron element Fire for the house of Han after its restoration by Emperor Guangwu (r. 25–57) in ad 26.70

(a) On the monarchical structure In spite of the Han shu’s limitation to the Western Han dynasty only, Ban Gu followed the Shi ji’s precedent in dividing the ‘Fundamental Chronicles’ in twelve chapters, strictly dedicating one chapter to each ruler recognized as legitimate. This lent the ‘Fundamental Chronicles’ normative force; henceforth inclusion or exclusion of any monarch’s reign from this part of a dynastic history decided on its historical legitimacy. By this criterion, the Dowager Empress Lu¨ (r. 188–180 bc), treated in the third chapter of the ‘Fundamental Chronicles’,71 ruled as a legitimate monarch; not so, however, the two infant emperors set up by her, nor Liu He who in 74 bc was deposed after only twenty-seven days of his enthronement. Yet an even more prominent diVerence vis-a`-vis the Shi ji concerns the Han shu’s mystiWcation of Liu Bang, i.e. the Han founding emperor Gaozu. This is achieved by various means; the most important one being the claim of Liu Bang’s descent from the dragon-tamer Liu Lei, who had allegedly descended from the sage emperor Yao. Next comes several records of prodigious omens by which Liu Bang’s birth, adolescence, and beginning adulthood are sur-

68

It is generally acknowledged, however, that those chapters on the Five Elements, which are contained in the Chunqiu fanlu attributed to Dong Zhongshu, were certainly added later; see Loewe 2004, 472–7. 69 For the diVerent sequences of the Five Elements, see Loewe 2004, 477–82. 70 Loewe 2004, 515–17. 71 Han shu 3/95–104. In contrast to Shi ji, Huidi (r. 195–188 bc), son of Gaozu and the Empress Lu¨, is dedicated a ‘Fundamental Chronicle’ on his own (chap. 2), while in Shi ji his unspectacular reign is treated together with that of the Dowager Empress Lu¨ in one chapter (chap. 9).

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rounded.72 Finally, there is a prophesy of Qin’s demise and succession by Han, which is related in the form of the famous story of Liu Bang’s killing a large snake symbolizing the ‘white emperor’ (i.e. the Qin emperor).73 All these mystifying elements were already contained in an essay by Ban Gu’s father Biao. Entitled ‘On the Kingly Mandate’ (‘Wang ming lun’), this essay has been judged as ‘perhaps the most complete and clear statement of political principles that had yet appeared in Chinese literature’.74 Directed against Wang Mang’s claim to have legitimately succeeded to the Han dynasty, it in fact appropriated the former’s key idea of elevating the monarch to the nodal position of linking the body politic to the cosmic order.75 Yet Ban Biao’s essay would have lost half its meaning unless its arguments had been Xeshed out in the Han shu on a large scale.

(b) On the role of war and peace In the turmoils of the last years of Wang Mang’s reign the supremacy that the Han had exerted over the western regions since the days of Wudi crumbled. Although the Xiongnu tribes, the Han’s Wercest enemy in the northern and northwestern border regions, later on split into the northern and the southern Xiongnu in ad 50, control was not regained until the last decade of the Wrst century ad, after an able Protector-General of the western regions had been installed—none other than Ban Gu’s brother Chao (d. ad 102).76 Ban Gu’s keen interest in central Asia aVairs was further fostered by his personal experiences of taking part in a victorious campaign against the Xiongnu in ad 89. This heightened interest found expression in the Han shu by a considerable expansion of the account concerning the Xiongnu (chap. 94A–B) and the inclusion of a new ‘Account of the Western Regions’ (‘Xiyu zhuan’, chap. 96A–B). As to Ban Gu’s attitude concerning the crucial question of how to deal with the Xiongnu and other belligerent tribes, it is perhaps best described as having aYnities with that of the early Han statesman Jia Yi (200–168 bc), who had forcefully advocated a double-headed strategy of rapprochement and 72 This includes the account of a dragon’s appearance on the occasion of his mother’s conception; the information on his bodily marks, a dragon-shaped forehead and seventy-two black moles on his left thigh; and the records of auspicious physiognomizations of him and his wife, the future Empress Lu¨. See Han shu 1A/1–8; Dubs, i. 28–33. 73 Han shu 1A/8; Dubs, i. 34–7. 74 Loewe 1986b, 735. 75 Cf. Michael Nylan’s paper included in this volume. 76 For an overview, see Bielenstein 1986, 264–70.

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‘punitive’ campaigns. Jia Yi’s respective memorial is quoted at length in his Han shu biography.77 This is further corroborated by Ban Gu’s discussion of military aVairs in the ‘Treatise of Penal Law’ (‘Xingfa zhi’), which, as we should note in passing, counts among the Han shu’s historiographic innovations. There Ban Gu deWnes the role of the military as ‘the means to maintain intact what [otherwise] would have been destroyed and to safeguard continuation of what [otherwise] would have been cut oV, to rescue from turmoil and chaos and to extinguish harm and evil’78—a deWnition which shows that Ban Gu was realistic enough to acknowledge the necessity of the military alongside the Confucian ideal of ruling by ‘educating (the common people) by cultural reWnement and virtuous conduct’ (jiao yi wende).79 Discussing Wve diVerent ways of sustaining an army in the past, Ban Gu clearly gives preference to a system of conscript soldiers sustained either by light taxes and levies or the conscripts’ home villages themselves, which had presumably been in eVect in the Western Zhou and under the two Wrst ‘hegemons’ (ba) in the seventh century bc. At the same time, Ban Gu criticizes the keeping of large and drilled but costly armies by the territorial states in the Warring States period (403–221 bc). The message of this historical survey is evident—to give support to the ‘Reformist’ policy of colonial settlements while indirectly criticizing Wudi’s expansionist policy. Whereas in his ‘eulogy’, Ban Gu lavishly praises Wudi’s reign as ‘a grand endeavor that attained to the fame of the Three Dynasties’,80 this kind of concealed criticism is repeated at various other places, where Ban Gu is not hesitant about disclosing the exhaustion of resources in the last years of Wudi’s reign due to unending campaigns, with serious consequences for the entire realm in terms of growing banditry and famines which caused the common people ‘to eat again human Xesh’.

(c) On the concept of the course of history As to this topic, things are much clearer as compared to the Shi ji. Mainly, there are two cyclical time concepts in the Han shu that give structure to its numerous historical accounts and narratives; one being (1) the ‘dynastic cycle’ and the other (2) the cycle of the Five Elements. We presently turn to these two cyclical concepts. Firstly, the Han shu presents the history of the Western Han by and large along the ‘dynastic cycle’ as laid out in the ‘Prefaces’ of the Odes. There is, 77 78

Han shu 48/2230 V. Note that Jia Yi’s memorials are missing in his Shi ji biography (chap. 84). 79 80 Han shu 23/1089. Ibid. 23/1081. Ibid. 6/212; cited after Dubs, ii. 120.

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similar to the Zhou founding era, a strong beginning under Gaozu and his two sons, Huidi and Wendi, albeit interrupted by the regency of the Dowager Empress Lu¨ and an aborted coup d’e´tat by the Lu¨ clan. The waning of the Han house’s fortunes was marked by three further crises: The Rebellion of the Seven Kings under Emperor Jing (154 bc), the revolt of the King of Huainan, which was brought to an end in 122 bc, and Wnally the troubles that broke out at the end of Wudi’s reign between his consorts and their families (92–90 bc). These years were so marred with internal strife and economic crisis that the sentiment of the Han dynasty’s imminent demise arose. Only a ‘restoration’ (zhongxing) could possibly save the Han house from its downfall. Such a ‘restoration’ was achieved under Xuandi (r. 74–49 bc), who clearly is Ban Gu’s favored monarch. As Ban Gu concludes in his ‘eulogy’, ‘[Xuandi’s] achievements gloriWed his ancestors and his signal services are transmitted to his descendants’.81 In contrast to the Western Zhou’s rapid deterioration following its ‘restoration’, a gradual moral and physical degeneration set in after Xuandi, which extended over the reigns of Yuandi, Chengdi (r. 33–7 bc), Aidi, and Pingdi, accompanied by a rapidly growing number of recorded portents, prodigies, and calamities.82 In ad 9 Wang Mang eventually dismissed the infant emperor and ascended the throne himself. Secondly, as noted above, Ban Gu adopted from his father’s essay ‘On the Kingly Mandate’ the theory of the Five Elements succeeding one another by ‘production’, according to which the house of Han ruled under the patron element Fire, as had the sage emperor Yao. This theory of cyclical succession had three interesting implications for the historical outlook developed in the Han shu: . .

it bolstered the claim of the imperial Liu clan to descend from Yao; since Yao preceded Shun, it outrivaled Wang Mang’s powerful claim of descending from Shun and ruling under Shun’s patron element Earth; . It ‘proved’ the Han dynasty’s direct succession of the gloriWed Zhou dynasty, thereby eliminating Qin, the paradigm of ‘Modernist’ policies, from the succession of legitimate dynasties. The explanation of dynastic change as a movement in large cycles determined by the Five Elements was for Ban Gu a principal matter. The conception that ranked with it was the idea of ubiquitous correspondences between the celestial and terrestrial processes, the human aVairs, and, most importantly, the conduct of the monarch himself. As is enunciated in an edict by Wendi, ‘The good or bad government of the world depends upon Ourself.’ It adds that, ‘When the lord of men is not virtuous and his dispositions in his 81

Han shu 8/275; Dubs, ii. 265.

82

See Dubs, ii. 286–7, 362–5.

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government are not equable, Heaven then informs him [of that fact] by a calamitous visitation.’83 Unsurprisingly, the Han shu thus abounds with records of omens and portents, unusual phenomena and strange events. Moreover, Ban Gu makes even an attempt at systematizing these heavenly responses to human behavior in the extensive ‘Treatise of the Five Elements’, which occupies a central place in the Han shu.84 Its key idea that all was connected with everything became pervasive in the post-Han period; it contributed heavily to the concept that history Xows in cycles.

CONC LUDING RE MA RK S Our question at the outset of this paper—how did the Han dynasty historiography contribute to sustain the imperial order—has led us along an untrodden path. Instead of taking the usual route from Sima Qian’s Shi ji directly to Ban Gu’s Han shu, we made a detour via the ‘Prefaces’ of the Odes—indisputably an eminent work of early Chinese historical thinking since it prepared the ground for the historicization of the Odes. More important in our present context is that the ‘Prefaces’ conceivably served as the prototype of the dynastic history model inaugurated by the Han shu, and the ‘Prefaces’ did so in terms of the three aspects at which we looked in more detail, namely (1) by creating a uniWed history for one single dynasty (in case of the ‘Prefaces’, the history of the Zhou dynasty); (2) by giving priority to ‘moral transformation’ (jiaohua) and bolstering the preponderance of the ‘civil government’ (wen) over the ‘military’ (wu); and (3) by Wrmly establishing the concept of the ‘dynastic cycle’. Looking at the Shi ji and Han shu from the perspective of the emerging ‘empire’-oriented historiography inchoately articulated by the ‘Prefaces’, the diVerences between the two Wrst dynastic histories become even more distinctive. With subscribing to the Five Elements theory, which itself was embedded in the conception of ubiquitous correspondences, the Han shu became part of the emerging imperial ideology, which was paramount throughout medieval China (i.e. c.200–600)—the ‘pact’ between ‘empire’ and ‘history’ was thus concluded. In modern China this ‘pact’ came under attack from two sides. In the early twentieth century, it was Liang Qichao (1873–1929) who blamed it for having prevented the writing of a grand master-narrative centered on the 83

Shi ji 10/422; Han shu 4/116; cited from Dubs, i. 240–1.

84

Loewe 2004, 487–90.

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nation-state, and toward the end of the twentieth century an eminent Western sinologist identiWed it as the chief culprit for all that went wrong with China: ‘The tyranny of Chinese history and the history of Chinese tyranny are monsters that have long fed on each other.’85 Refraining from commenting on these two views here, I just want to conclude by pointing out that both critics take the close interconnection between ‘empire’ and ‘historiography’ in imperial China as predetermined and Wxed, yet in fact it must be seen as something which was not static but changed over time, being subject to negotiations time and again. References Arbuckle, Gary, ‘Dong Zhongshu: A New Biography’, British Columbia Asian Review, 5 (1991), 125–59. Bielenstein, Hans, ‘Is there a Chinese Dynastic Cycle?’, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, 50 (1978), 1–23. —— ‘Wang Mang, the Restoration of the Han Dynasty, and Later Han’, in: Twitchett and Loewe 1986, 223–90. Bodde, Derk, ‘The State and Empire of Ch’in’, in: Twitchett and Loewe 1986, 20–102. Cheng, Anne, ‘La ‘‘Maison des Han’’: ave`nement et Wn de l’histoire’, Extreˆme-Orient/ Extreˆme-Occident, 9 (1986), 29–43. —— ‘Sarah A. Queen, From Chronicle to Canon: The Hermeneutics of the Spring and Autumn, According to Tung Chung-shu. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996 ’ [Review Article], Early China, 23–4 (1998/99), 353–66. —— ‘What Did It Mean to Be a Ru in Han Times?’, Asia Major, 3rd ser., 14: 2 (2001), 101–18. Demie´ville, Paul, ‘Philosophy and Religion from Han to Sui’, in: Twitchett and Loewe 1986, 808–72. Dorofeeva-Lichtmann, Vera V., ‘Les ‘‘Vents des royaumes’’ (Guo feng): un sche´ma ge´ographique’, Extreˆme-Orient/Extreˆme-Occident, 13 (1991), 58–92. Dubs, Homer H. (trans.), The History of the Former Han Dynasty by Pan Ku, 3 vols. Baltimore (Waverly Press) 1938, 1944, 1955. Durrant, Stephen W., ‘Ssu-ma Ch’ien’s Portrayal of the First Ch’in Emperor’, in: Frederick P. Brandauer and Chu¨n-chieh Huang (eds.), Imperial Rulership and Cultural Change in Traditional China, Seattle (University of Washington Press) 1994, 28–50. Ess, Hans van, ‘Sima Qian und die Anfa¨nge der chinesischen Biographik’, in: Walter Berschin and Wolfgang Schamoni (eds.), Biographie: ‘So der Westen wie der Osten’? Zwo¨lf Studien, Heidelberg (Mattes Verlag) 2003, 15–32. Hardy, Grant, Worlds of Bronze and Bamboo: Sima Qian’s Conquest of History. New York (Columbia University Press) 1999. 85

See Jenner 1992, 1–2 and 47.

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Jenner, W. J. F., The Tyranny of History: The Roots of China’s Crisis. Harmondsworth (Penguin Books) 1992. Legge, James, The Chinese Classics, vol. iv: The She King or The Book of Poetry. 1st edn. Hongkong 1871; repr. Hongkong (Chinese University Press) 1960. Lewis, Mark Edward, Sanctioned Violence in Early China. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1990. —— Writing and Authority in Early China. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1999. Li, Wai-yee, ‘The Idea of Authority in the Shih chi (Records of the Historian)’, Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 54 (1994), 345–405. Loewe, Michael, Crisis and ConXict in Han China: 104 BC to AD 9. London (George Allen & Unwin) 1974. —— ‘The Former Han Dynasty’, in: Twitchett and Loewe 1986, 103–222 [¼ Loewe 1986a]. —— ‘The Concept of Sovereignty’, in: Twitchett and Loewe 1986, 726–46 [¼ Loewe 1986b]. —— (ed.), Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide. Berkeley (The Society for the Study of Early China and The Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California Press) 1993. —— A Biographical Dictionary of the Qin, Former Han and Xin Periods (221 bc–ad 24). Leiden/Boston/Ko¨ln (Brill) 2000. —— The Men who Governed Han China: Companion to A Biographical Dictionary of the Qin, Former Han and Xin Periods. Leiden/Boston/Ko¨ln (Brill) 2004. Lu Kanru 陸侃如 and Feng Yuanjun 馮沅君, Zhongguo shi shi 中國詩史, 3 vols. 1st edn. 1956. Peking (Renmin wenxue) 1983. Mittag, Achim, ‘Zeitkonzepte in China’, in: Klaus E. Mu¨ller and Jo¨rn Ru¨sen (eds.), Historische Sinnbildung: Struktur, Funktion und Repra¨sentation des Geschichtsbewußtseins, Reinbek (Rowohlt) 1997, 251–76 [¼ Mittag 1997a]. ¨ bersetzen?’, —— ‘Die ‘‘Lieder’’ und ihre Auslegung - was heißt da wissenschaftliches U Bochumer Jahrbuch zur Ostasienforschung, 21 (1997), 29–54 [¼ Mittag 1997b]. Pines, Yuri, ‘Biases and their Sources: Qin History in Shiji’, Oriens Extremus, 45 (2005/6), 10–34. Twitchett, Denis, and Loewe, Michael (eds.), The Cambridge History of China, vol. i: The Ch’in and Han Empires, 221 B.C.–A.D. 220. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1986. Van Zoeren, Steven, Poetry and Personality: Reading, Exegesis, and Hermeneutics in Traditional China. Stanford (Stanford University Press) 1991. Wang, C. H., ‘The Weniad: A Chinese Epic in Shih Ching’, in: Chan Ping-leung et al. (eds.), Essays in Commemoration of the Golden Jubilee of the Fung Ping Shan Library, Hong Kong (Hong Kong University Press) 1982, 105–42. Watson, Burton, Records of the Grand Historian of China: Translated from the Shih chi of Ssu-ma Ch’ien, 2 vols. New York/London (Columbia University Press) 1961. —— The Tso chuan: Selections from China’s Oldest Narrative History. New York (Columbia University Press) 1989.

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B. The Spatial Dimension of the UniWed World Imperial Geography and Cartographical Representations

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Diagram (tu) and Text (wen) Mapping the Chinese World Helwig Schmidt-Glintzer (Wolfenbu¨ttel)

INTRODUCTION Human beings have always imagined their environment, thereby creating ‘mental maps.’ Even before knowing how to write, they drew maps in order to come to terms with, and to take control over, the spatial dimension of their livelihood. An important aspect of this spatial dimension constituted communication with deities and ancestors of the netherworld. In ancient China religious experts took charge of this particular aspect. Moreover, as in many other cultures, conceptualizations of the cosmos were part and parcel of cosmogonic myths. In the course of a long-term rationalization process we Wnd that pacing the cosmos became the king’s prerequisite and, in later times, even that of members of the elite. We will begin our inquiry with some remarks on maps and mapmaking in general and in early China in particular (sect. 1). We then discuss the beginnings of mapmaking in ancient China (sect. 2) and the spatial ordering of the Chinese world through cartographic representations (sect. 3). One fundamental feature of maps is that they emphasize the notion of borders. Hence, we will take a look at the origin of borders in ancient China and their signiWcance for the conceptualization of the spatial world. In addition to the speciWc way of Chinese mapmaking and the signiWcant role of borders, we must take into consideration yet another important feature to study the spatial conceptions of the early Chinese imperial age: the notion of the capital as the center of the rituals conducted by the emperor. We will elaborate on these two points in the fourth and Wnal section before concluding with some Wnal remarks.

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Fig. 1. TLV Bronze Mirror (Han). Museum for East Asian Art, Ko¨ln.

1. THE NATURAL ENVIRONMENT AND THE NEED FOR MAPS Experience of space—experiences of extension, concepts of ‘near’ and ‘far’ as well as the notion of borders between the Self and the Other—has ever been a part of human orientation and self-determination, of communication and social negotiation. For moving from one place to another, doing Weldwork, hunting and Wshing, and a great deal of other activities, people had to image their surroundings. Such basic spatial experiences condensed into cosmological concepts, which in cosmogonic myths were enwrapped by narratives of descent and cosmogony. In general, an important feature of such cosmogonic myths concerns the separation of heaven and earth, which in early China was imagined by the dichotomy of round and square; ‘round’ being the assumed shape of heaven

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as well as of all matters pertaining to the Yang energy, while the earth and all Yin matters were considered to be ‘square’. Thus, ‘round’ and ‘square’ became a powerful symbol of and a pattern of representing the universe. We Wnd this pattern, for example, on bronze mirrors (Fig. 1), or in models of a chariot (yu), the cover and chassis of which are round and square, respectively (see below n. 33). In cosmogonic myths, the end of great Xoods marks the separation of land from water, and it is only thereafter that the land is taken control over, distributed, and settled. According to Chinese tradition, the merit of having successfully coped with the inundations throughout the realm was attributed to the Great Yu, who, after thirteen years of relentless eVorts to regulate the streams and rivers, was chosen to succeed Shun on the throne and who later founded the Wrst dynasty, the semi-legendary Xia dynasty (trad. r. 2205–1766 bc). Yu’s name is intimately linked to the foremost ‘classic’ geographical text of China, ‘The Tributes to the Great Yu’ (‘Yu gong’), a foundational text contained in the Book of Documents. Dating from the Warring States period or even from as late as the Qin period,1 i.e. roughly from the third century bc, this text purports to have been composed after Yu’s division of the realm into the ‘nine provincial areas’ (jiuzhou). It delineates each of the ‘nine provincial areas’ by providing some basic geographical information, it lists the quality of its farmland’s soil and its characteristic products, and records the tributes sent by each of the provinces in gratitude to Yu. According to the ‘Yu gong’ chapter and the extensive commentarial literature which grew around it, Yu thereupon cast nine ding cauldrons, which showed the respective province’s characteristic topographical traits so that, in their entirety, they conveyed an image of All-under-Heaven.2 Small wonder then that the nine cauldrons came to be regarded as the chief symbol of the uniWed empire as well as of monarchical power. Drawing maps must be seen as an early speciWc form of writing. From empirical studies we know how children and young adults exposed to a new environment represent the spatial relationships constituting a scene in an increasingly diVerentiated and cohesive manner.3 Perhaps since the appearance of the Homo sapiens, humans, or to be exact, adults, knew that a map is a small-scale representation of a particular place in the world and that one can possibly plan a trip knowing something about the area beforehand. Thus, from early onwards, maps have been used en route, for planning travels, 1

Edward L. Shaughnessy, ‘Shang shu (Shu ching)’, in: Loewe 1993, 376–89, here 378. Cf. Jin and Qiu 1984, 4–7. Note that in ancient Chinese literature there are three slightly variant references to the ‘nine provincial areas’, which in later imperial China was subject of continual scholarly debates; see ibid. 20–1. 3 See Wapner, Kaplan, and Ciottone 1981, 272. 2

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excursions, hunts, etc. While losing one’s way, getting lost, or forgetting the right way (in or out of a place), is a constituent part of one’s ‘space’-related knowledge and competence to deal with spatial information,4 mapping has become part of any intentional communication among people. A speciWc trait of Chinese cartography must be seen in the close interrelationship between text and image. Traditionally, this interrelationship was given a meaningful expression by the myth of a tu—in this case a ‘diagram’, i.e. a diagram that showed the eight trigrams—which was brought forth on the back of a dragon ascending from the Yellow River, and a ‘script’ (wen) brought forth by a turtle coming out of the Luo River (He chu tu, Luo chu wen).5 As Guolong Lai has shown in his recent study of an early Han diagram of the mourning system, the tu–wen interrelationship must be thought of as a very dynamic one.6 Thus, a map (tu) was conceived either as substituting, supplementing, or illustrating a text (wen).7 Accordingly, there were various kinds of tu: topographical maps such as, for example, of streets of a town; explanatory diagrams such as, for example, of the mourning ritual system; or illustrative diagrams such as, for example, of the female genitals. Diagrams were an integral part of encyclopedic knowledge; the climax of scholarly activities in this Weld being reached with the compilation of the monumental Sancai tuhui (Collection of Maps, Diagrams, and Illustrations Related to the Three Powers—Heaven, Earth, and Man) in the early seventeenth century (printed in 1609). In this respect, there are many parallels between the accumulation and codiWcation of knowledge in China and Europe. SigniWcantly, the close interrelationship of tu and wen in premodern China corresponds with the notion that in China ‘the classical conception of language does not view language as a mere descriptive tool that is a separate entity independent from the world it describes. Rather, language and the world are inseparably bound up.’8 There was an ‘isomorphic Wt’, as Robin Yates has put it aptly.9 Maps from traditional China are representations of this world-view. From early on, urban settlements, the layout of the city walls and the palaces, followed an astronomical orientation, especially along the north– south axis.10 Besides, early Chinese thinkers espoused what has been charac4

On spatial cognition, see Newcombe and Huttenlocher 2000. Lackner 1990, 136–7, and other publications on the topic by the same author. 6 See Lai 2003, 45. 7 See Sivin and Ledyard 1994, 26–7 and 29–30. 8 Zhiming Bao, ‘Language and World View in Ancient China’, in: Philosophy East and West, 40: 2 (1990), 195; quoted from Yates 1994, 59. 9 Yates 1994, 59. 10 See Wheatley 1971, 423. 5

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terized as an ‘astral-terrestrial correspondence between the archaic kingship in the Bronze Age and the north-pole (beiji)’.11 Thus, in the Analects the monarch is linked to the north-polar star, around which all the other heavenly bodies revolve (Lunyu 2.1). Resonating with this concept is the central idea of Chinese thought in the early imperial age, the idea of a ubiquitous system of correspondences between heaven and the human world that was conceived as being aVected by—to use Robin Yates’s apt term—a ‘celestial panoply’. As Yates explains, ‘Heaven itself was conceived of as being a kind of giant bureaucracy, the stars being the bureaucratic oYcials, mirroring the oYcials on earth. It was a kind of template: if something aVected a given star in the sky, something would happen to the holder of that speciWc oYce on earth.’12 Along the same lines, the earth was conceived as a macro-organic body, bestowed with arteries through which the vital energy (qi) Xowed. As stated in the Guanzi, ‘water is the blood and qi of earth and Xows through as though in the muscles and arteries.’13 The signiWcance of this idea is manifested in the biography of Meng Tian, the Qin general who, by the command of the First Emperor, was put in charge to oversee the construction of the Great Wall; after the First Emperor’s death he was accused of having cut through the arteries by building this defense line.14

2. THE BEGINNINGS OF CHINESE MAPMAKING It remains an open question from which part of the world and which culture the oldest map has come down to us. Of course, all depends on our understanding of what is meant by a ‘map’. At present, the epithet of the world’s oldest map is concurrently claimed for the ‘map’ discovered in Catal Hu¨yu¨k in southern Anatolia (present-day Turkey), which dates back to c.6200 bc and is now on permanent exhibition at the Museum at Konya,15 or for an image of a landscape which originates from Babylonia (present-day northern Iraq) and dates from the mid-fourth millennium bc.16 Be that as it may, without doubt some very early maps originate from China. As everywhere else, maps were used in China in various ways, for orientational purposes as well as for documenting claims of landownership, 11 12 13 14 15 16

Pankenier 2004. Yates 1994, 68. Guanzi, 39 ‘Shui di’: 235–8. Yates 1994, 68. See Harley and Woodward 1987, esp. 57, 74 (illustration), and 96. Kretschmer 1986, i. 60–3.

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property, and power relationships.17 Mostly serving a certain practical purpose limited in time and space, these early maps were seldom intended for transmission. Some maps were drawn ad hoc and withered before long. This is, for example, the case with the general Ma Yuan’s (14 bc–ad 49) famous ‘map’ formed by accumulating grains of rice, which enabled Ma Yuan to estimate the military strength of the opponent army and to inXict a decisive defeat on his enemy.18 The earliest extant Chinese map—by broad deWnition of what is understood by a ‘map’—is found on the outer side of a ding bronze vessel dating about 2100 bc. By a narrower deWnition of a ‘map’ as referring to a clearly identiWable location and intending to provide some sort of guidance, however, to date the oldest Chinese tu in the sense of ‘map’ or ‘plan’ is the plan of the mausoleum of King Cuo of Zhongshan (Pingshan County, Hebei Province), where it was unearthed in 1978. Since the king was interred around 310 bc, the ‘map’, or to be more precise: the construction plan, dates from the early fourth century.19 Of slightly younger date, i.e. either c.299 or c.239 bc, seven maps are drawn in ink on four pinewood boards, which were unearthed from a Qin army oYcer’s tomb at Fangmatan, Tianshui (Gansu) in 1986.20 The maps depict various areas stretching along rivers and their tributaries that are all parts of the same region, which has been identiWed as including the grave site, a region that held some strategic importance for the Qin state. The fact that we Wnd among the overall sixty-one marked locations several passes and other strategic points suggests that the maps served military purposes (Fig. 2). The same holds certainly true for at least two of three colored maps on silk that were unearthed from a tomb at Mawangdui near present-day Changsha (Hunan) in 1973. The tomb occupant, who was buried in 168 bc (the date ante quem of the manuscripts and documents of the Mawangdui Tomb No. 3), is identiWed as the son of a high-ranking nobleman of the Changsha 17

See Unverhau 2003. For the history of European maps, see Heitzmann 2006. Hou-Han shu 24/827. On Ma Yuan, cf. Loewe 2000, 432. Cao 1990, Pls. 1–3; China in Ancient and Modern Maps 1998, 18–19, Nos. 1–2; Jin and Qiu 1984, 14; Yee (1994a), 37, Figs. 3.1. Engraved on a bronze plate by the size of 48  94  1 cm and inlaid with gold and silver threads, the plan represents a walled area of c.191  414 m. It shows the mausoleum’s rectangular outer and inner walls and, within the inner encirclement, Wve sacriWcials halls above the tombs, of which, however, only two were built: the one for King Cuo himself and the other for one of his two queens. The reason for the unWnished construction work apparently was the subjugation of the Zhongshan kingdom shortly after King Cuo’s death; see Yee (1994a), 37. It should be noted that the plan contains more than 400 characters, by which the dimensions of the mausoleum’s various structures and also King Cuo’s decree on the mausoleum’s construction are recorded. 20 Cao 1990, Pls. 4–19; China in Ancient and Modern Maps 1998, 20–3, No. 3; Yee (1994a), 37–40, Figs. 3.2–3.5. The wooden boards measure c.26  15–18  1.1 cm; three of which are painted on both sides. For the dating problem, see Yee (1994a), 38, n. 8. 18 19

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Fig. 2. Topographical Map from central China, third century bc; excavated from the Qin tomb of Fangmatan (Gansu).

Kingdom. The Wrst map (96  96 cm), drawn in three diVerent colors— mostly brown for the mountainous regions and black for the rivers—and oriented to the south at the top, represents to a scale of c.1:180,000 and with remarkable accuracy the southern part of the Changsha Kingdom along the Xiaoshui river, a tributary of the Xiangjiang, with the Jiuyi Mountains to the east and the Pearl River on the utmost southern edge. The map, known as the ‘Topographic Map’ (‘Dixing tu’), gives the names of nine rivers, eight district seats, and Wfty-Wve other settlements, distinguished by, respectively, square and circular signs around the place names (Fig. 3). It further attempts to indicate the form and the height of the mountain ranges, with the peaks of the Jiuyi Mountains being marked by nine post-shaped signs.21 The second map (98  78 cm; scale 1:80,000 to 1:100,000) is even more sophisticated and its military purpose is so evident that it is generally referred to as the ‘Garrison Map’ (‘Zhujun tu’) (Fig. 4). Also oriented to the south, it depicts an area which corresponds to the portion southeast of the central part of the ‘Topographic Map’. During Emperor Wendi’s reign (r. 180–157 bc) troops were garrisoned in this area, which bordered on the Nanyue Kingdom in present-day Guangdong. A fortress, which served as the commanding general’s headquarters, 21 Cao 1990, Pl. 20; China in Ancient and Modern Maps 1998, 24–5, Nos. 4–5; Jin and Qiu 1984, 33–43; Yee (1994a), 40–1, 43, 46, Figs. 3.8 and 3.9.

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Fig. 3. ‘Topographical Map’ (‘Dixing tu’), excavated from Mawangdui Tomb No. 3 (c.168 bc).

is situated in the map’s center. The map further indicates the locations of the deputy commander’s headquarters and nine garrisons. Other military-related features, which are marked in red ink, include beacon-Wre outposts, roads, and some of the forty-nine settlements indicated by their location. In most cases the number of households is given in addition to the locations’ names and sometimes further information on people’s leaving their place and the distances between the settlements is provided.22 The ‘Garrison Map’ is an excellent example of what is said about the usefulness of maps in military aVairs in a chapter entitled ‘On Maps’ (‘Ditu pian’) in the Guanzi, a collection of diverse writings on statecraft dating from the fourth to the Wrst centuries bc.23 The third map is only half the size of the two other maps (48  48 cm) and it was in bad condition when it was unearthed. Therefore there is not much to 22 Cao 1990, Pls. 25–7; China in Ancient and Modern Maps 1998, 26–7, Nos. 6–9; Jin and Qiu 1984, 43–50; Yee (1994a), 41, 43, 46, Figs. 3.10 and 3.11. 23 Guanzi, 27: 159–60.

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Fig. 4. ‘Garrison Map’ (‘Zhujun tu’), excavated from Mawangdui Tomb No. 3 (c.168 bc).

say except that in the lower part it shows a walled city with gates, storeyed structures on the walls, streets and palaces within the walls. In short, this is until today China’s oldest city map.24 24

Cao 1990, Pls. 28–9; Jin and Qiu 1984, 50–2; Yee (1994a), 40–1, Figs. 3.6 and 3.7.

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Regarding the formative inXuence of the astral-terrestrial thinking on the early Chinese world-view, it is not surprising that from the third century bc onwards maps were drawn which conceived the known world as an entity, under one single ruler, self-containing and centered. The cohesiveness of All-under-Heaven was brought about by the ‘impartiality’ or the ‘sense for the public beneWt’ (gong), by which the sage kings ruled. This entity, however, was thought to be possessed not by one individual but by all human beings collectively. As the Spring and Autumn Annals of Lu¨ Buwei (Lu¨shi chunqiu) says, ‘The empire does not belong to one single person; it belongs to the whole world. (tianxia fei yi ren zhi tianxia ye; tianxia zhi tianxia ye).’25 We should note, however, that in early China there was also a countercurrent against the conception of a uniWed ecumene. Indicative of this counter-current is, for example, the notion of ‘people of one state growing old and dying without having had any dealings with those of another’. Originating with the Daode jing (chap. 80), this notion later developed into a widely used cliche´, just like the related notion, with which we are not unfamiliar from our experiences, namely that people were ‘reluctant to move to distant places’ (ibid.). In their origin, however, these notions were directed against the empire-building activities. However, the pursuit of a uniWed realm that could secure peace and stability was dominant in pre-Qin thinking (cf. the papers by Michael Nylan and Yuri Pines in this volume) and with the uniWcation in 221 bc this current of thought won a deWnite victory. So did the concept of a centered and cohesive realm encircled by the outer regions on its peripheries—a concept which, if we just think of the Medieval T-shaped maps in Europe, is quite diVerent from the world-view prevalent in the Western culture. As to the cartographic representation of this uniWed realm, mention must Wrst be made of the aforementioned belief that the nine cauldrons produced by the Great Yu depicted the main topographical features of the ‘nine provincial areas’. Legend has it that Lu Ban, a master craftsman of the Wfth century bc, who later rose to become the patron god of the carpenters, engraved a map of the ‘nine provincial areas’ in the stone of the rock cliVs near Luoyang.26 However, there can be little doubt that this map, the existence 25

Lu¨shi chunqiu 1.4.1; Knoblock and Riegel 2000, 70–1. Shu yi ji 2/3a. Shu yi ji (Notes Intended to Transmit Things of Unusual Quality) was written by Ren Fang (460–508). 26

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of which is attested in an early sixth-century ad miscellaneous work (see n. 26), originated from a time not prior to the Han dynasty.27 Furthermore, it was claimed early that there was a map—a comprehensive map of the known world—that was appended to the Shanhai jing (Book of Mountains and Seas), but which was lost in later ages.28 The Shanhai jing, next to the ‘Yu gong’ chapter and the ‘Geographical Treatise’ in the Han shu (to which we will turn later), ranks as the third great geographical compendium of the preQin and Qin/Han periods. In contrast to the other two works, it contains a bulk of mythological and Wctional accounts. In addition, it is surrounded by much scholarly controversy concerning its date and origin. SuYce it here to say that its authorship was traditionally attributed to the Great Yu and his assistant Yi and that it was understood to be the travelogue recorded during their travels when they were engaged in Xood-controlling works. Important in our context is that the world-view which the Shanhai jing adhered to was that of a uniWed and ordered realm, laid out in three concentric rectangles, the ‘central regions’ being surrounded by the Four Seas, which in turn were encompassed by the ‘great wilderness’. A similar conception is found in the ‘Yu gong’ chapter, which, somewhat diVerently, divides the world into Wve concentric zones: the royal domain, the domains of the princes, the paciWcation zone, the zone of allied barbarians, and the zone of savagery.29 Considering these various references, the question arises whether maps representing the ‘nine provincial regions’, or the world as imagined and depicted in the Shanhai jing, already existed prior to the uniWcation of the realm in 221 bc. To date, we do not know for certain, but in view of the Wnely done Mawangdui maps and the highly developed art of mapmaking in the second century bc, this does not seem unlikely. It is further corroborated by the Shi ji account of Su Qin (d. 317 bc), a political advisor who gained fame due to his brilliant rhetorical talent. According to this account, Su Qin, in his attempt to persuade the rulers of the six states threatened by Qin’s rising power to join in an alliance against Qin, unrolled a map supporting his argument that the six states together would surpass Qin in terms of military strength and resources by several times.30 Yet the Qin regime was also well aware of the great importance of maps, not only for military and strategic reasons, but also for governance. Thus, following 27

The reason is that the loss of pre-Han maps is already reported in the 3rd cent. ad; see below, n. 58. 28 For a recent study on the Shanhai jing (with a host of bibliographical references), see Dorofeeva-Lichtmann 2003. 29 See Smith 1996, 23–4, Fig. 3.1. 30 Shi ji 69/2241.

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the collapse of the Qin dynasty, the seizure of the maps stored in the Qin archives proved to be decisive for the course of the events at this juncture of Chinese history. It is Xiao He (d. 193 bc), chief advisor and later chancellor of Liu Bang, the later founding emperor of the Han dynasty, who ever since has been credited with the seizure of these maps and registers when Liu Bang’s army entered Qin’s capital Xianyang in 205 bc. From this point onward, Liu Bang enjoyed a decisive strategic advantage over his rival. As Sima Qian in the biography of Xiao He observed, ‘because of the maps and registries of Qin which Xiao He had in his possession, the King of Han [i.e. Liu Bang] was able to inform himself of all the strategic defense points of the empire, the population and relative strength of the various districts, and the ills and grievances of the people’.31 Mention should also be made of the First Emperor’s attempt to recreate the known world in his mausoleum, the most prominent feature being the modeling of the sea, the Yellow River, the Yangtze, and their tributaries, by the use of mercury which circulated via a hydraulic device.32 Yet references to pre-Qin and Qin maps of the known world are rare. More conclusive is the evidence of Han dynasty’s maps showing the realm in its entirety, either on one single map or on several maps which could be pieced together. These maps were known as yuditu, ‘universal (topographical) maps’.33 Thus, for the year 116 bc there is a record relating that an auspicious day was selected to present the emperor Han Wudi (r. 141–87 bc) with such a ‘universal map’.34 Some years earlier, Liu An (d. 122 bc), King of Huainan, is reported to have studied a ‘universal map’ day and night to favorably dislocate his troops.35 The use of ‘universal maps’ for strategic purposes is further attested by a record referring to Guangwudi (r. 25–57) in his campaigns to restore the Han dynasty.36 From this and other references we can infer that a yuditu did not only show the empire’s 100-odd commanderies and princedoms,37 but also apparently noted the far distances between important places in non-Han territories and Han frontier commanderies.38 Apart from the ‘universal maps’, there was a range of other types of maps used for diVerent purposes. This is indicated by a number of references in the Zhou li (Rites of Zhou), an elaborate, idealized plan of the bureaucratic 31

Watson 1993, ii. 91–2. Shi ji 6/265; translated by Yee 1994b, 78. 33 See Jin and Qiu 1984, 30–2; Yee 1994b, 76–7. The meaning of ‘universal’ conveyed by the character yu, which literally denotes a chariot, is derived from the idea of the square chariot chassis and the round cover symbolizing, respectively, earth and heaven; cf. Yee 1994b, 76, n. 42. 34 Shi ji 60/2110. 35 Han shu 44/2149. 36 Hou-Han shu 16/600. 37 Ibid. 24/833. 38 See the commentary to Han shu 6/189, n. 2. 32

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organization of government which is thought, to a certain extent, to mirror the reality of late Western Han bureaucracy. Basically, we can distinguish four diVerent types of maps in the Zhou li; each of the maps being assigned to diVerent oYcials.39 (1) Maps for military and/or strategic purposes, which are taken charge of by the Inspector of the Natural Barriers (sixian).40 (2) Maps which convey information of a region’s basic physical or geographical features, the size and distribution of its population, the crops being cultivated, the livestock, etc.41 It appears that in Han times such maps also existed in form of ‘universal maps’ (yuditu) showing each of the realm’s region’s ‘weal and woe’ (li - hai).42 (3) Maps used for local governance purposes, in particular cadastral maps to settle disputes over land property, as well as maps used for assisting the mining of metals and minerals.43 (4) Maps of tombs and burial districts.44 To the fourth and last category we may add maps showing the sites of cities and palaces in planning; examples of such maps are mentioned in early Chinese literature.45 As to the second type of maps, one should mention the long and venerable tradition of ‘maps’ or ‘illustrated works of tribute-bearing peoples’ (zhigong tu), which intended to give basic information on a foreign region and its inhabitants, including its local products.46 Ostensibly, these ‘maps of tribute’ are referred to in Ban Gu’s (32–92) ‘Dongdu fu’ (‘Eastern Capital Rhapsody’), where the Son of Heaven is said to ‘receive maps and registers from all within the Four Seas’.47 Maps of this type also held symbolic 39

Cf. Jin and Qiu 1984, 12–14, and Yee 1994b, 75, where the materials from the Zhou li are also presented, yet in a diVerent form. 40 Zhou li, ‘Xiaguan sima: Sixian’: 30/844a. 41 Zhou li, ‘Diguan situ: Dasitu’: 10/702a; ‘Xiaguan sima: Zhifangshi’: 33/861c; ‘Tianguan zhongzai: Xiaozai’: 3/654a; ibid.: ‘Sikuai’: 6/679b–c; ibid.: ‘Sishu’: 7/682a. 42 This derives from a commentary gloss by Zheng Xuan (127–200) to the Wrst Zhou li reference in n. 41. The term li - hai occurs in the passage indicated by the second Zhou li reference in n. 41. 43 Zhou li, ‘Diguan situ: Xiaositu’: 11/713b; ibid.: ‘Suiren’: 15/740b; ibid.: ‘Tuxun’: 16/747a. 44 Zhou li, ‘Chunguan: Zhongren’: 22/786a; ibid.: ‘Mudafu’: 22/786c. It is assumed that the plan of the Zhongshan king’s mausoleum discussed above illustrates this type of maps; see Jin and Qiu 1984, 13. However, as pointed out by Yee 1994b, 75, n. 32, the Zhou li does not refer to the burial sites maps as plans for the construction of tombs, which was clearly the function of the Zhongshan mausoleum plan. 45 See Shangshu, ‘Luo gao’: 15/214b (concerning the planning of Luoyang), and Shi ji 60/2110 (concerning the planning of the Weiyang Palace). 46 Later developing into a kind of pictorial ‘gazetteer’ (fangzhi), the zhigong tu genre culminated with the Huang-Qing zhigong tu compiled in the Qianlong era (1736–95); see Smith 1996, 19–22. 47 Adopted from Knechtges 1982, i. 165.

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signiWcance in acts of enfeoVment and surrender or submission, authenticating the intended transfer of land claims.48 Thus, the southern Xiongnu, before seeking admittance to the Han tributary system in ad 50, sent an envoy with a map of their territory.49 Already in the Han Feizi (3rd cent. bc) it is stated that, ‘When the map [of a certain territory] is submitted [to the enemy], the territory will be relinquished . . . When the territory is [completely] relinquished, the state will be extinguished.’50 This further brings to mind the famous narrative about the Prince Dan of Yan and the bravo Jing Ke, who is hired by Prince Dan to assassinate the King of Qin, the later First Emperor. Received by the latter at the court of Qin, Jing Ke unrolls a map of Dukang, Yan’s most prosperous district, as a false oVer by Prince Dan to surrender it to the King of Qin; the map being used by Jing Ke to hide a poised dagger.51 Mapmaking became more widespread during the two Han dynasties. One reason may have been the growing use of paper. Yet certainly more important was the expansion of the Han empire, the growing administrative requirements due to the addition of the vast territories over which the Han had established their rule or overlordship, and, in addition, the increased necessity for dealing with foreign peoples by ways of warfare and diplomacy. As Su Dongpo (1037– 1101), the famous poet and Northern Song statesman, had keenly observed, ‘There has never been the case that the relationship between China and barbarian people was established and administered without the use of maps.’52 There are several references to maps of border regions and regions settled by ‘barbarian’ people, which were made by Han military commanders and oYcials, which attest Su Dongpo’s observation.53 Maps also served to enlarge the geographical knowledge gained during the westward expeditions under the Han. Returning from one of these expeditions, which had been sent by Emperor Wudi to trace the Yellow River to its source, the emperor, on hearing the report about a mountainous region rich with precious stones, gave it the name ‘Kunlun’, but only after he had ‘consulted old maps and documents (tushu)’.54 48

See e.g. Hou-Han shu 10/410, where the second Eastern Han emperor is reported to examine a map prior to the enfeoVment of the crown prince. 49 Hou-Han shu 89/2942. 50 Han Feizi 49: 348. 51 Shi ji 86/2534–5. 52 From the ‘Foreword’ (‘Xu’) of (Songben) Lidai dili zhizhang tu. For an instructive example of the crucial importance of maps for dealing with border issues in Su Dongpo’s times, see Lamouroux 1997, esp. 2, 23–4. 53 These references concern maps that were made by Li Ling (d. 74 bc), Zhao Chongguo (137–51 bc), and Li Xun (1st cent. ad); see Han shu 54/2451; 69/2971, and Hou-Han shu 51/ 1683, respectively. 54 Shi ji 123/3173; Han shu 61/2696.

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Later on, the trade along the Silk Road as well as the travels of Buddhist monks between China and India were additional stimuli for mapmaking. Yet it seems that from the late Western Han onwards, tu, meaning all representations in forms diVerent from script and writing, predominantly gained symbolic signiWcance. Thus, tu, in the sense of ‘charts’, were thought to be imperial prerequisites, tokens of Heaven’s investiture of the Son of Heaven, portents heralding the apparition of the saint-ruler, and symbols of the True Man’s (zhenren) power over spirits and supernatural beings.55 There are already ample references to such charts in the chenwei or prophetic texts, i.e. the ‘apocrypha’ to the Confucian Classics, which surfaced from the time of Wang Mang’s interregnum onward (ad 9–23). But it was not before the Han dynasty’s downfall that, under the inXuence of the emerging Daoist church, such charts became widespread and remained popular throughout the Six Dynasties.56 At the same time, at least on a Wrst glance it seems that the number of references to tu, in the sense of maps for practical purposes, declined. All the more so do the great achievements of Pei Xiu (224–71) in the Weld of cartography and mapmaking deserve mention. Known as the founding father of China’s scholarly tradition of mapmaking for articulating ‘six principles’ of mensurational cartography,57 Pei Xiu also produced two famous maps, the ‘Yu gong diyu tu’ (‘Map of the Lands According to the [Shangshu Chapter] ‘‘Tributes to the Great Yu’’ ’) and the ‘Fangzhang tu’ (‘Map Which Measures One Zhang [c.3 m] by Width and Length’); the latter apparently drawn to scale (c.1 : 1,800,000). For both maps Pei Xiu relied on Han dynasty maps and, by estimation to a relatively large extent, on textual sources.58 However, both maps did not survive. What survived is the preface to the ‘Yu gong diyu tu’ included in Pei Xiu’s biography in the Jin shu (History of the Jin Dynasty). Emphasizing the guiding framework provided by the ‘Yu gong’ chapter, it reveals Pei Xiu’s intention to identify and correct the geographical names, which had variously changed over time: I have studied the mountains and seas, rivers and streams, and the high and low marshlands in the ‘Yu gong’; the nine regions of antiquity; the sixteen provinces, the prefectures and principalities, and the counties and cities of the present; border areas and outlying districts; the names of places where ancient kingdoms concluded treaties; navigable waters and roads and paths. Then I produced this map in eighteen sections.59 55

Seidel 1983, 297–302, 316–23. Ibid. esp. 291–310, 323 V. Needham 1959, 539–40; Jin and Qiu 1984, 65–9; Yee 1994c, 110–12 (with the clearest exposition). 58 According to Pei Xiu, the imperial archives held Han maps, but the Qin maps were all lost; see Jin shu 35/1039. Pei Xiu’s heavy reliance on textual sources is stressed by Yee 1994c, 112–13. 59 Jin shu 35/1040; trans. Yee 1994c, 112. Another translation is found in Needham 1959, 539. 56 57

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Fig. 5. ‘Map of China and the Barbarian Peoples’ (‘Hua yi tu’), engraved on stone (ad 1136), Shaanxi Provincial Museum of Stone Tablets, Xi’an.

From the aforementioned sixth-century reference to the engraved map of the ‘nine provincial areas’ (see above) as well as from seventh and ninth centuries notes attesting the existence of the ‘Fangzhang tu’, we can infer that Pei Xiu’s maps, in one or the other copied form, served as a source for the Tang cartographer Jia Dan (729–805), who in Chinese cartography ranks second only to Pei Xiu. Jia Dan is merited with producing a large map of the entire known world entitled ‘Hainei Hua yi tu’ (‘Map of China and the Barbarian Peoples within the [Four] Seas’; c.10  9 m) in 801, after seventeen years of work.60 Although this map has also not been handed down to us, it 60

See Jin and Qiu 1984, 75–8; Yee 1994c, 113.

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was, in a downsized version (114  114 cm), engraved on stone in 1136 (Fig. 5). It is this map preserved in the Shaanxi Provincial Museum of Stone Tablets at Xi’an that caused Joseph Needham to exclaim, ‘Anyone who compares this map with the contemporary productions of European religious cosmography. . . cannot but be amazed at the extent to which Chinese geography was at that time ahead of the West.’61 What is striking about this map is the diligence with which the coastline, streams, and rivers are drawn. As far as streams and rivers are concerned, the same is true for the ‘Topographic Map’ and the ‘Garrison Map’ from Mawangdui Tomb No. 3 (see above). This indicates that in ancient China obviously mensurational techniques developed in connection with the surveying of rivers, works in Xood control, and water conservancy projects.62

4 . B O R DE RS , T H E D I V IS I O N O F T H E R E A L M , AND THE LOCATION OF THE CAPITAL In ancient China, borders developed in the Spring and Autumn period (722– 481 bc) when the power of the Zhou royal house faded away and the feudal states began to build walls to protect themselves from each other. These intrastate borders were of considerable importance for the formation of the Chinese world order and its inner diVerentiation.63 It should be borne in mind, however, that often these borders were not so much meant as lines of defense against the Others but rather as demarcations of one’s territorial claims or spheres of power and control. Seen from this perspective, they can even be viewed as manifestations of self-restriction. With Qin Shihuangdi’s founding of the empire in 221 bc, the ubiquity of the ‘empire’ covering All-under-Heaven materialized. This meant that the world could no longer be escaped from, but only be conceived and modeled in diVerent ways and guises thereafter. Among the educated elite, this inescapability prompted the search for this and that niche, which henceforth became a key feature of Chinese history. Besides, the rise of eremitism must be seen in this context.64

61 62 63 64

Needham 1959, 547. For elaboration of this aspect, see Jin and Qiu 1984, 52–61; Yee 1994c, 96–104. See my article: Schmidt-Glintzer 2002. Berkowitz 2000.

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Fig. 6. Map showing ‘China and the barbarian peoples from all ages’ from the historical atlas Maps Presenting at a Glance the Geography throughout the Ages (Lidai dili zhizhang tu), printed c. ad 1135.

SigniWcantly, it was under the First Emperor’s command that various walls of the former feudal states in northern China were connected to form what is now known as the world-famous ‘Great Wall’. To be sure, it was not prior to the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries that the Great Wall was built into a giant defense line.65 Yet much earlier, it had become a symbolic border that demarcated the borderline between the civilized world of China (Hua) and the ‘barbarian people’ (yi). A foremost example of this symbolic border is provided by the Wrst comprehensive historical atlas entitled Lidai dili zhizhang tu (Maps Presenting at a Glance the Geography throughout the Ages) and compiled by the otherwise unknown author Shui Anli (Wrst printed in 1099). The most striking aspect of almost all the forty-four maps contained in this work is the consistency which the Great Wall is shown with as an ever unchangeable outer border, even in periods earlier than the Qin dynasty; thereby accentuating the natural barrier of the deserts, which closed up the Chinese territory to the north (Fig. 6).

65

Waldron 1990.

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The maps in the Lidai dili zhizhang tu indicate that the Chinese empire was early deWned by natural barriers; by the sea towards the east and the south, and by mountains and deserts in the west and the north. It is no wonder therefore that the notion of ‘within the Four Seas’ (sihai zhi nei) came up very early as a synonym for the Chinese world. (In parentheses, we may add that this world-view was markedly diVerent from the Roman world-view, as the Roman Empire was not thought to be limited by the shores of the Mediterranean Sea.) As from early onward China’s outer borders were more or less Wxed, the focus of Chinese geographers and cartographers concentrated on the divisions within the realm, the changes which these divisions underwent, and the speciWc features of each and every unit. Hence, from the Qin/Han period onward, Chinese geography is characterized by the special emphasis laid on administrative features—an approach which tends to neglect physical features and for which it was later criticized, for example, by the Southern Song ‘polyhistorian’ Zheng Qiao (1104–62).66 The paradigm of this particular approach is, as already mentioned above, Ban Gu’s geographical treatise contained in the Han shu, which became the model of the geographical treatises in the dynastic histories. It unveils an imaginary map of the Han empire, taking account of the 103 commanderies and princedoms with its 1,578 districts, circuits, and marquisates, into which the empire was divided at around the year 10 bc.67 Deducing from what is known about the Han ‘universal maps’ as discussed above, it seems rather likely that Ban Gu’s geographical survey was accompanied by such a map. In our context, Ban Gu, apart from his authorship of the ‘Geographical Treatise’, is an important Wgure because of his two fu writings, or ‘rhapsodies’, that deal with the two Han capitals, i.e. Chang’an (modern Xi’an) and Luoyang. They belong to the earliest examples of a distinctive subgenre of fu poetry preferably used to convey one’s views on the promises of the present dynasty, alongside the promises of well-being for All-under-Heaven. Ban Gu’s two capital ‘rhapsodies’ are here of interest as they allow us to raise the question whether or not in China, as in the Roman world, all roads were thought to lead to the capital. The ‘rhapsodies’ are structured as a dispute between two persons, one hailing from the Western Capital (Chang’an), one from the Eastern Capital; the disputed issue discussing the best possible location of the present dynasty’s capital. The spokesman for the Western Capital dwells on the historical signiWcance of Chang’an as the political center of the Western 66

Cf. e.g. Tong zhi, ‘Zongxu’: 2b.

67

Han shu, chap. 28.

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Zhou, Qin, and Western Han dynasties and lauds the advantageous site ‘within the Passes’ (Guannei) shielded by almost inaccessible mountains. The spokesman of the Eastern Capital responds by downplaying the glory of the past in its value as providing orientation for the present age, before he continues:68 Moreover, to dwell in a remote area bordering the [barbarian] Western Rong, Blocked by steep barriers in all directions, And maintain ‘defense and resistance’, How can this compare with dwelling in the center of the country, Which is level and Xat, open and accessible, Where a myriad places converge like the spokes of a wheel? ... You recognize that the Han Valley may serve as a protective pass. But you do not realize that the true King sets no external boundaries.

Although Ban Gu toys here with the idea of the capital lying ‘in the center’ of the realm where ‘a myriad places converge like the spokes of a wheel’, he does not go so far as to identify the capital with the empire as Ovid did in his Fasti (2.684): ‘The world and the city of Rome occupy the same space. (Romanae spatium est urbis et orbis idem).’ Implied in Ban Gu’s notion of ‘the true King’ setting no external boundaries is that in ancient China, in contrast to Rome, the capital’s location was open to political negotiation. In fact, throughout imperial China the debates revolving around this question have ever since been, and remain until today, an essential element of the political process. The same notion of the absent external boundaries reminds us that there was yet another spatial dimension in ancient China. This dimension was part and parcel of the communication with spirits and ancestral deities, who were believed to reside at certain mountains, rivers, and other landmarks. In the beginning and for ages, this spatial and spiritual dimension was exclusively taken charge of by religious experts privileged with the power of journeying, touring, and roaming the universe. Afterwards the saint-rulers and sages were also thought to dispose of this power. ‘In a magniWcent manner’, says Confucius (or was believed to have said), ‘[the sage] comprehends the beginning and end [of all things] . . . Therefore he is able to mount the carriage drawn by the six dragons at the proper time and to travel through the skies.’69

68

Knechtges 1982, i: 171–3. From the Tuan commentary to Hexagram 1 ‘Qian’ from the Book of Changes; cf. Wilhelm 1989, 342. 69

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The image of the heavenly journey chariot drawn by six dragons derives from the myth of the sun goddess Xihe, accompanied by one of her ten sons, i.e. the ten suns, crossing each day the sky from one end to the other. It later became a metaphor of ordering the world and eVecting perfect harmony,70 and as such also an appropriate allegory of the imperial tours throughout the realm, undertaken by Chinese emperors, from Qin Shihuangdi (see Martin Kern’s paper in this volume) to the great Manchu emperors Kangxi (r. 1662– 1722) and Qianlong (r. 1736–95). In poetry, ‘pacing the void’—to borrow from Edward Schafer71—was imagined as emulations of these early cosmic journeys. An early example is from the ‘Li sao’ (‘Encountering Sorrow’), where Qu Yuan (340?–278 bc), poet and statesman without fortune, writes: I set oV in the morning from the Ford of Heaven; At evening I came to the world’s western end.72

Yet the ‘Li sao’ ends with Qu Yuan’s realization of his being unable to transcend this world: But when I had ascended the splendor of the heavens, I suddenly caught a glimpse below of my old home. The groom’s heart was heavy and the horses for longing Arched their heads back and refused to go on.73

We can understand these lines as a Wtting image of the inescapability of the imperial realm. Even when avoiding oYcial positions and aspiring a hermit’s life, the members of the educated elite remained conWned in this world. Since the imperial realm could not be escaped, all that could be done was to imagine the universe as being concentrated on one spot, variously represented by the imperial hunting park, the Hall of Light (mingtang), or a miniature garden.

CONC LUDING RE MA RK S We may conclude that in early China obviously there was more than one layer of spatial representations. Firstly, there was the notion of centeredness

70 71 72 73

See Chen 1992, 20. Schafer 1977. Hawkes 1985, verse 174. Ibid., verses 184–5.

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and the self-containing empire. Secondly, there was the openness towards the outer world. This was even programmatic since the transformation of an aristocratic into a bureaucratic society, which took place from the mid-eighth to the tenth centuries ad. Thirdly, what was crucial for the empire, however, were the cities, the capital as well as the cities scattered throughout the empire, which were often built to resemble the capital. Hence, the cities in the provinces multiplied the center, an aspect which is given further emphasis by the fact that from late Tang times onwards, the city god cult was partly Wnanced by the central authority. The importance of the cities and their maps is evident from the local and regional gazetteers (fangzhi). This especially holds true for the outpost cities in the frontier areas. Reaching beyond the Great Wall, these ‘Chinese frontier outposts, established in regions inhabited by Mongols, Tibetans, Uygur, and other peoples, have all survived to the present through centuries of expansion and contraction of the Chinese empire across the vast expanses of the frontier’.74 Here I refrain from going into details of frontier studies, a Weld of Chinese studies that has witnessed an ‘explosion of interest’.75 Instead, I just want to draw attention to a study by John Flower on historical memory in Yan’an County, Sichuan, a place on the frontier of the Chinese empire from Han times until the present.76 This town, with its own taste and quality, forms just one out of the multitude of towns, which, in their totality, make up the Chinese body polity, the realm that we conceive as China (Zhongguo) or as All-under-Heaven (tianxia). References Berkowitz, Alan J., Patterns of Disengagement: The Practice and Portrayal of Reclusion in Early Medieval China. Stanford (Stanford University Press) 2000. Cao Wanru 曹婉如 et al., Zhongguo gudai dituji, 中國古代地圖集 vol. i: Zhanguo Yuan 戰 國 - 元. Beijing (Wenwu) 1990. Chen, Robert Shanmu, A Comparative Study of Chinese and Western Cyclic Myths. New York et al. (Peter Lang) 1992. China in Ancient and Modern Maps, compiled by the Ancient Map Research Team of Chinese Academy of Surveying and Mapping Sciences. London (Philip Wilson) 1998.

74 75 76

See Gaubatz 1996, vii. See McMahon 2003, referring to the recent literature. Flower 2004.

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Dorofeeva-Lichtmann, Vera V., ‘Text as a Device for Mapping a Sacred Space: A Case of the Wu Zang Shan Jing (‘‘Five Treasuries: The Itineraries of Mountains’’)’, Go¨ttinger Beitra¨ge zur Asienforschung, 2: 3 (2003), 147–210. Flower, John M., ‘A Road is Made: Roads, Temples, and Historical Memory in Yan’an County, Sichuan’, Journal of Asian Studies, 63 (2004), 649–85. Gaubatz, Piper Rae, Beyond the Great Wall: Urban Form and Transformation on the Chinese Frontiers. Stanford (Stanford University Press) 1996. Harley, J. B., and Woodward, David (eds.), The History of Cartography, vol. i: Cartography in Prehistoric, Ancient, and Medieval Europe and the Mediterranean. Chicago/London (University of Chicago Press) 1987. Harley, J. B., and Woodward, David (eds.), The History of Cartography, vol. ii.2: Cartography in the Traditional East and Southeast Asian Societies. Chicago/London (University of Chicago Press) 1994. Hawkes, David, Qu Yuan and Others: The Songs of the South. Harmondsworth (Penguin) 1985. Heitzmann, Christian, Europas Weltbild in alten Karten: Globalisierung im Zeitalter der Entdeckungen. Wiesbaden (Harrassowitz) 2006. Jin Yingchun 金應春 and Qiu Fuke 丘富科, Zhongguo ditu shihua 中國地圖史話. Beijing (Kexue) 1984. Knechtges, David R., Wen Xuan or Selections of ReWned Literature, vol. i. Princeton (Princeton University Press) 1982. Knoblock, John, and Riegel, JeVrey, The Annals of Lu¨ Buwei: A Complete Translation and Study. Stanford (Stanford University Press) 2000. Kretschmer, V. Ingrid, et al. (eds.), Lexikon zur Geschichte der Kartographie: Von den Anfa¨ngen bis zum Ersten Weltkrieg, 2 vols. Wien (Deuticke) 1986. Lackner, Michael, ‘Zur ‘‘Verplanung’’ des Denkens am Beispiel der tu’, in: Helwig Schmidt-Glintzer (ed.), Lebenswelt und Weltanschauung im fru¨hneuzeitlichen China, Stuttgart (Steiner) 1990, 133–56. Lai, Guolong, ‘The Diagram of the Mourning System from Mawangdui’, Early China, 28 (2003), 43–99. Lamouroux, Christian, ‘Geography and Politics: The Song-Liao Border Dispute of 1074/75’, in: Sabine Dabringhaus and Roderich Ptak (eds.), China and Her Neighbours: Borders, Visions of the Other, Foreign Policy 10th to 19th Century, Wiesbaden (Harrassowitz) 1997, 1–28. (Songben) Lidai dili zhizhang tu (宋本) 歷代地利指掌圖. Shanghai (Shanghai guji) 1989. Loewe, Michael (ed.), Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide. Berkeley (The Society for the Study of Early China and The Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California) 1993. —— A Biographical Dictionary of the Qin, Former Han and Xin Periods (221 BC–AD 24), Leiden/Boston/Ko¨ln (Brill) 2000. McMahon, Daniel, ‘The Essentials of a Qing Frontier: Yan Ruyi’s ‘‘Conditions and Customs in the Mountains’’ ’, Monumenta Serica, 51 (2003), 309–34.

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Needham, Joseph, Science and Civilisation in China, vol. iii: Mathematics and the Sciences of the Heavens and the Earth. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1959. Newcombe, Nora S., and Huttenlocher, Janellen, Making Space: The Development of Spatial Representation and Reasoning. Cambridge, Mass. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press) 2000. Pankenier, David W., ‘A Brief History of Beiji (Northern Culmen). With an Excursus on the Origin of the Character di’, in: Journal of the American Oriental Society, 124: 2 (2004), 211–36. Schafer, Edward H., Pacing the Void: T’ang Approaches to the Stars. Berkeley (University of California Press) 1977. Schmidt-Glintzer, Helwig, ‘Kulturelle Komplexita¨t, Vagheit der Grenzen und Chinas Identita¨t’, in: Andreas Ackermann and Klaus E. Mu¨ller (eds.), Patchwork: Dimensionen multikultureller Gesellschaft. Geschichte, Problematik und Chancen, Bielefeld (transcript Verlag) 2002, 129–49. Seidel, Anna, ‘Imperial Treasures and Taoist Sacraments—Taoist Roots in the Apocrypha’, in: Michael Strickmann (ed.), Tantric and Taoist Studies in Honour of R. A. Stein, vol. ii, Bruxelles (Me´langes Chinois et Bouddhiques, 21) 1983, 291–371. Shu yi ji 述異記. Baizi quanshu 百子全 edn. Sivin, Nathan, and Ledyard, Gari, ‘Introduction to East Asian Cartography’, in: Harley and Woodward 1994, 22–31. Smith, Richard J., Chinese Maps: Images of ‘All under Heaven’. Hong Kong/Oxford/ New York (Oxford University Press) 1996. Tong zhi 通志. Shi Tong 十通 edn. Shanghai (Shangwu) 1936; repr. 4 vols. Taipei (Xinxing) 1965. Unverhau, Dagmar (ed.), Geschichtsdeutung auf alten Karten: Archa¨ologie und Geschichte (Wolfenbu¨tteler Forschungen 101). Wiesbaden (Harrassowitz) 2003. Waldron, Arthur, The Great Wall of China: From History to Myth. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1990. Wapner, Seymour, Kaplan, Bernard, and Ciottone, Robert, ‘Self-World Relationships in Critical Environmental Transitions: Childhood and Beyond’, in: Lynn S. Liben, Arthur H. Patterson, and Nora Newcombe (eds.), Spatial Representation and Behavior across the Life Span: Theory and Application, New York (Academic Press) 1981, 251–82. Watson, Burton, Records of the Grand Historian: Qin Dynasty; Han Dynasty I & II, 3 vols. Rev. edn. Hong Kong/New York (Chinese University of Hong Kong and Columbia University Press) 1993. Wheatley, Paul, The Pivot of the Four Quarters: A Preliminary Enquiry into the Origin and Character of the Ancient Chinese City. Edinburgh (Edinburgh University Press) 1971. Wilhelm, Richard, I Ging: Das Buch der Wandlungen. 1st edn. 1924. Mu¨nchen (Diederichs) 1989. Yates, Robin D. S., ‘Body, Space, Time and Bureaucracy: Boundary Creation and Control Mechanisms in Early China’, in: John Hay (ed.), Boundaries in China: Critical Views, London (Reaktion Books) 1994, 56–80.

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Yee, Cordell D. K., ‘Reinterpreting Traditional Chinese Geographical Maps’, in: Harley and Woodward 1994, 35–70 [¼ Yee 1994a]. —— ‘Chinese Maps in Political Culture’, in: Harley and Woodward 1994, 71–95 [¼ Yee 1994b]. —— ‘Taking the World’s Measure: Chinese Maps between Observation and Text’, in: Harley and Woodward 1994, 96–127 [¼ Yee 1994c].

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Text and Image Mapping the Roman World Katherine Clarke (Oxford)

It seems particularly appropriate that a cross-cultural, international, intercontinental collaboration should take as part of its theme the Roman Empire, which itself spanned so many diverse peoples and all the known continents. It is precisely this phenomenon of vast, unprecedented spatial extent, and how it could be conceptualized, imagined, and depicted that forms the subject of my paper. We all know how vague our mental geographies of lands unknown are; we have some sense of the shape of the continents, we have some sense of where the countries within them lie and perhaps, for our own country and those parts of the world which we visit regularly or in which we have a scholarly interest, Ancient Greece for example, a more detailed picture of the location of key cities, mountain ranges, and rivers. But having lived in the relatively small island of Britain all my life I still have diYculty in trying to locate all the English counties—Herefordshire and Hertfordshire, for example, with similar names, regularly confuse themselves on my mental map, perhaps because they hold no particular signiWcance for me. Conversely, I could draw from memory an extraordinarily detailed map of the villages and footpaths of the Chiltern Hills near to my home, and mark on it the location of herds of wild deer, or rare birds of prey, or where one can Wnd woods full of spring Xowers; or I could mark on a map historical features such as the crucial bridge over the River Thames at the local town of Wallingford, by which William the Conqueror made his tortuous way to London after his victory at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. The bridge as a strategic river-crossing was immediately protected by a castle, and the associated town was the Wrst in England to receive a royal charter in 1155. It was Queen Mathilda’s stronghold in her twelfth-century war with King Stephen; it was fortiWed by Royalists to protect their capital at Oxford during the English Civil War of the seventeenth

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century, and was besieged by Parliamentarians for sixteen weeks before being razed to the ground by Oliver Cromwell. The Wrst, then, a map of my local area structured by the routes of my own recreation, and punctuated by the Xora and fauna and tiny settlements; the other, a map of the same area conWgured by signiWcant events and journeys stretching across several centuries. I shall argue that, just as we create personally signiWcant maps which are often far more vivid and dominant in our minds than any kind of oYcial map, in which places are generally represented in proportion to their physical size, demographic, economic, and industrial signiWcance, so too did the Romans map the world in ways which were signiWcant to them collectively, be it administratively or economically or recreationally—the various faces of the imperium populi Romani—or were punctuated by meaningful events from the past. Furthermore, just as I could either draw a relatively to-scale map of the Chiltern Hills, with roads to link the largest villages and so on, or a symbolic map using pictograms for where the best spring Xowers are and a raised glass for where the best inns are—both visual representations; so too could I instead describe in words my experiences of these places, how to get from one to another, which paths are poorly maintained by the farmers, where it is easy to take the wrong turn, what the villagers are like, and so on, and the listener would begin to get a sense of what this world was like; or I could even evoke something for my audience by listing the wonderful ancient place names of the villages—Pishill Bottom, Middle Assendon, Russells Water, Maidensgrove, Turville Heath. If we investigated the etymologies—some relating to the agricultural traditions, some explained by changes through time—my audience would need a local inhabitant to explain that Lower Assendon and Middle Assendon are no longer followed by the predictable Upper Assendon, further up the valley, since its name was changed in 1896 to Stonor after the nearby manor house; or that Maidensgrove is not the grove of a mythological maiden, but is a corruption of its medieval name, ‘Menygrove’, meaning a ‘common clearing’; or that Pishill Bottom lies in the valley below the hill where ‘peas’ were grown. So, I could start to give a picture of not only the spatial conWguration of my world, but also of its historical aspects— whether coherently through time for a single place, as with my ‘historical’ map of Wallingford from the Norman Conquest to the English Civil War, or through more fragmented insights through the place names—not one of battles and river-crossings, but one of feudal estates and the patchwork of agricultural life. My contention is that the Romans used very similar strategies for mapping out the world known to them. Sometimes representing the space of the imperium visually as on the famous map of Agrippa, sometimes in verbal

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descriptions as in Strabo’s monumental Geography, sometimes in the form of lists as in the Res Gestae Divi Augusti, they found ways to depict the vastly extended world which reXected its signiWcance to them, the controllers, owners of the space. It is this range of ‘signiWcant depictions’, applied to the large world of the imperium Romanum rather than the small world of the Chiltern Hills, which I shall consider in this paper. It will be clear from what I have said so far that I do not wish to observe a sharp distinction between visual and verbal depictions of space, either for our own times or for the Roman world. This is not to say, however, that visual and verbal images are interchangeable or that they function in the same ways. It has been suggested (most notably by Brodersen) that the Romans did not think spatially, at least not in two-dimensional space, but rather that their primary means of representing spatial extent and spatial relationships was in the form of lists and descriptions.1 However, this can be refuted on at least two levels, of which the Wrst is the question of ancient cartographic interest. We have clear references in ancient literature to the existence of visual representations of space. In Herodotus’ account of the way in which Aristagoras of Miletus brought a map of Asia and the Royal Road to Susa to Greece in order to persuade the Spartans to join the Ionians against the Persian king, the map is the key instrument of his attempt at persuasion, being mentioned in Herodotus’ introduction to the episode: ‘Now, Aristagoras, ruler of Miletus, arrived in Sparta when Cleomenes was on the throne. According to the Spartans, Aristagoras came to talks with Cleomenes carrying a bronze tablet, on which was engraved a depiction of the whole earth, including all the sea and every river.’2 When he reaches the point in his exposition at which he wishes to show Cleomenes the relative positions of the various nations, he draws out the map and starts to point to peoples, rivers, lands—the very visual nature of the map and Aristagoras’ use of it is worth noting.3 Furthermore, Herodotus himself uses the episode to provide some detailed geographical information about Asia, in a way which seems to indicate reference to a road map, although Aristagoras himself does not use the pinax in this way. But when Aristagoras has been sent on his way by Cleomenes, having revealed that the distance to Susa from the sea was a journey of three months, Herodotus goes on to describe the route in his own authorial voice.4 It is very much the voice 1 See Brodersen 1995 for the classic exposition of this view. More recently, Brodersen 2001, 7–21, has defended his view against what he considers to be the lasting misconception of scholars that the Romans had scale-maps. 2 Herodotus 5.49.1. 3 Ibid. 5.49.5: ‘He enumerated these things on the depiction of the earth, which he had brought engraved on the tablet, and pointed them out (ØŒ
f).’ 4 Ibid. 5.52.1.

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of the periegetic writer, traveling through a terrain along a road punctuated with excellent inns, rivers with their ferry crossings, guard-posts, and exactly the kinds of features which would be found also on road maps of the Roman Empire. It is furthermore interesting, though perhaps not surprising, that, having failed to persuade the Spartans with the visual aid of his map, Aristagoras does not get it out of his bag at all when he moves on to Athens, using instead the technique of mass persuasion through the spoken word: ‘he appeared before the people and made a speech’.5 The map of Attica rolled out in Aristophanes’ Clouds again stresses the strongly visual nature of the physical object:6 Student: Here you have a depiction of the whole earth. Do you see? Here is Athens. Streps: What are you saying? I don’t believe you, for I don’t see any jurors sitting there. Student: But it really is and this is the region of Attika. Streps: Well, where are the members of my deme Kikynne? Student: They’re here somewhere. And here is Euboia, as you can see, which is stretched out right along here, opposite us.

However, for our purpose in examining the depiction of space in the period of the Roman Empire, the so-called map of Agrippa, which was, according to Pliny (Naturalis Historia 3.16–17) set up in the Porticus Vipsania by 2 bc, provides the most naturally adduced, but hotly debated, counter-example for the idea that space was not visually displayed. We do not know what exactly the map of Agrippa looked like, but it is possible to surmise various aspects from the description given by Pliny:7 Who therefore could believe that . . . Agrippa, a very painstaking man, particularly for such a work, when intending to set before the eyes of the City a map of the world, made a mistake, and with him also the deiWed Augustus? For it was Augustus who completed the porticus containing a plan of the world that had been begun by his sister in accordance with the design by Marcus Agrippa.

Proponere orbem spectandum clearly refers to a visual display and there seems little or no doubt but that the depiction of the world was, broadly speaking, what we would refer to as a map. It is uncertain exactly what the relationship was between the commentarii of Agrippa and this so-called map—Pliny the Elder cites Agrippa more than thirty times in books 3–6 as author of geographic measurements concerning the provinces, the seas, and the islands, 5

Herodotus 5.97.1. Aristophanes, Nubes 206–12. Note in particular the description of the map as a ª~Å æ and also the repeated use of strongly visual words, indicating that the student is pointing to a map on stage. 7 Naturalis historia 3.17. 6

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and the nature of the citations makes it fairly clear that he is referring to a text.8 Agrippa’s work followed directly in the wake of geographical enterprises undertaken by Julius Caesar, whose precise natures are themselves diYcult to ascertain, but which also involved measurements.9 But it is clear that Agrippa’s commentarii, whatever they exactly were, were complemented by the visual representation of the world known to Rome displayed in the porticus Vipsania, a neat combination of verbal and visual representations of empire.10 As Dilke points out, although most of Pliny’s references to the work of Agrippa are straightforward and relate to contested distances and measurements which could have been taken directly from the commentarii, he does also allude to direct consultation of the map in the porticus Vipsania: ‘Charax was previously 10 stades from the coast, and Agrippa’s portico too has it by the sea’ (Naturalis historia 6.139).11 I disagree with Dilke’s further conclusion that ‘the fact that such an insigniWcant and distant place as Charax was named on the map shows the detail which it embodied.’12 It seems to me that, if we accept the idea of mapping being determined partly by signiWcance, the attention paid to one ‘oYcially’ small place has no implications for the level of attention paid to any other ‘small’ place. However, regardless of that point, the dual depictions, both verbal and visual, of the world that mattered to Rome, are of great interest to us here. It is worth mentioning, in the context of complementary verbal and visual depictions of empire, the phenomenon of itineraria picta, which have often been adduced in recent debates concerning both the map of Agrippa and the Tabula Peutingeriana, about which more shortly. Notably, Brodersen has made this a strong element in his Wght against those whom he sees as arguing for Roman scale-maps.13 He adduces the passage of Vegetius (c. ad 400), who refers to itineraria provinciarum . . . non tantum adnotata sed etiam picta, and argues that this category might prove useful in describing other productions such as the recently discovered Wrst-century bc papyrus from Antaniupolis in Upper Egypt, which shows a visual representation of Spain, including animals, intersecting lines representing roads and rivers and so on, and the Tabula Peutingeriana itself. The idea of the itinerarium pictum is indeed a helpful one in moving away from the notion of scale-maps and towards the 8

See Nicolet 1991, 98. On these and the associated problems of chronology, see Nicolet 1991, 95–8. As Nicolet points out, the map was made explicitly in accordance with the commentarii, according to Pliny, so it is wholly reasonable to deduce aspects of the map from the fragments of the commentarii. 11 Dilke 1998, 50. 12 Ibid. 52–3. 13 See Brodersen 2001, 14, with Vegetius, De re militari 3.6. 9

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idea that Roman representations of space in general and empire in particular might be topologically accurate rather than geographically so. The combination of images with words on the papyrus of Spain (which also includes fragments of the text of Artemidorus of Ephesus) neatly reinforces the blurred boundary between visual and verbal, and their complementary nature. It seems to me incontestable that Roman maps were not, on the whole, scale-maps,14 and that this is commonly agreed. The scholarly dispute is thus one of terminology rather than one of concept. Brodersen objects to the use of the term ‘map’ to denote the kind of production which falls into his category of itineraria picta, but he does not, it seems, disagree with the consensus that the Romans used visual, as well as verbal, depictions of space, including the space of their empire. But Brodersen parts company from many other scholars of Roman geography in asserting the non-pictorial nature of the so-called map of Agrippa, in spite of his acceptance of the visual nature of other Roman ‘maps’, even if not to scale. Salway takes Brodersen to task on the point that the map of Agrippa was ‘an unillustrated collection of commentarii on the regions of the inhabited world’, that is denying the dual and complementary nature of Agrippa’s undertaking.15 For Salway, the comparative evidence of other Roman visual depictions, together with the testimony of an author such as Pliny, makes close to certain the illustrated nature of Agrippa’s map. Whatever the nature of the so-called map of Agrippa and its vexed relationship with later maps, such as that shown on the Peutinger Table, this much later depiction of the Roman Empire might allow us to draw some general points about the parameters of possibility for such a project. The Tabula Peutingeriana (a late twelfth- or early thirteenth-century map which is clearly based on a late Roman road map) has sometimes been thought plausibly to share similarities with Agrippa’s map, a theory mostly now discredited.16 But if the Tabula Peutingeriana is in any sense representative of Roman maps in general, as an image of the Roman Empire, it beautifully mirrors the ‘signiWcant mapping’ techniques that I started with.17 Rather than attempting a precise miniaturization of the world of Rome, the world simply brought 14 And indeed Brodersen, I think unnecessarily, blurs the boundary between what other scholars are propounding (that is, the existence of ‘maps’) and the proposition that there was a tradition of scale-maps in Rome, and tries to knock down more opponents than actually exist. 15 See Salway 2001, 22–66, esp. at 29. 16 Dilke 1998, 113, gives a helpful summary of the background of the map and its transmission. Nicolet 1991, 102–3, discusses the arguments for and against association between the map of Agrippa and the Tabula Peutingeriana. 17 Similar features are built into Herodotus’ extended authorial commentary on the route from the coast to Susa, presented as though with a road map in front of him, punctuated by staging-posts, inns, river-crossings, and so on.

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Fig. 7. Portions of segmenta 4 and 5 of Tabula Peutingeriana18

down to size, instead it highlights certain meaningful aspects at the cost of geographical accuracy, making clear why Brodersen was keen to categorize it as akin to the itineraria picta. It may be helpful brieXy to outline some features of that ‘map’ in order to illustrate this point. The overall shape of the map, a highly elongated parchment roll (6.75 m  34 cm), is itself testimony to the fact that the geography of the Roman Empire was a malleable and constructed space, with Italy occupying a huge and disproportionate amount of the middle ground. The map depicts the world known to Rome, with roads, places, mountain ranges, and rivers marked in a system of symbolic pictograms. Any clear association between its depiction of the Roman Empire and that shown in the porticus Vipsania is immediately dismissed by the chronological problems inherent in the map. The fact that it shows Pompeii, thereby referring to the world pre-ad 79, but also prominent personiWcations of both Constantinople and Antioch,19 suggesting a fourth-century ad point of reference, deWes the attempt to identify a single model. However, it is possible to turn this apparent deWciency into a positive feature of the map, and one which relates to my opening points about historically layered ‘mental maps’ of my local area; namely, that geographical depictions are capable of traversing the matrix of time as well as that of space. There are indeed many similarities between the possibilities for meaningful depiction of my local Chiltern Hills and that of the Roman Empire on the 18

Peutingeriana Tabula Itineraria in Bibliotheca Palatina Vindobonensi asservata nunc primum arte photographica expressa. Vienna: Ex Officina C. Angerer et Goeschl, 1888. Courtesy of Ancient World Mapping Center, The University of North Carolina at Capel Hill (www. unc.edu/awmc). 19 Dilke 1998, 117, connects the prominence of Antioch with the suggestion that the map might have been commissioned by Theodosius II, Emperor of the East (ad 408–50).

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Tabula Peutingeriana. The incorporation of places of not only current, but also historical and even mythological, signiWcance is clear on the Tabula Peutingeriana, which shows features such as the Pillars of Hercules at the far West, the place where Alexander the Great stopped in the far East (with the legend: hic Alexander responsum accepit: usque quo Alexander), the altars of the brothers Philaeni marking the boundary between the territory of Carthage and that of Cyrenaica, following the fable as related by Sallust.20 These are the equivalents of my signiWcant places in the Norman conquest and of my myths attached to place names. The Tabula Peutingeriana also has equivalents for my ‘recreational’ map of Xowers and animals and particularly pleasant walking-routes, but its pictograms are not of Xowers and glasses raised high, but of bath-houses and inns. Salway makes the point that, although the three primary cities of the empire are marked out as grand personiWcations, the allocation of status to lower-tier cities seems to be rather ‘idiosyncratic’.21 If, however, we accept the notion that maps are very much determined by the ‘signiWcance’ of places and routes (although we cannot always be conWdent from what perspective this is assessed), then this should not trouble us unduly. Salway makes the further, and more productive, point that the Tabula Peutingeriana, unlike written itineraries, can represent multiple routes simultaneously, thus giving it a further spatial dimension beyond the linearity of the individual route.22 The Tabula Peutingeriana thus, whatever its relationship to earlier depictions of the Roman Empire, such as that undertaken by Agrippa, shows some of the possibilities for representing the space of empire historically, mythologically, recreationally, and above all creatively (it should be noted that the areas over which Rome has no hold are aVorded minimal space and detail), in terms of the signiWcance of places for both author and viewer, we must suppose. This is not to deny any practical utility, underscored by the dominance of road, distances, and stopping-places, but rather to stress the constructed nature of the depiction, expressing not only how the world of Rome is, but also how it has become so, and even some hopes and aspirations for its future. We shall come back to the obviously imperial context in which such cartographic ventures belonged. Meanwhile, let us consider a further argument for a vivid and expansive sense of space in the Roman world; namely, the fact that literary representa20 See Sallust, Bellum Iugurthinum 79. At Jug. 19 Sallust says that the Carthaginians consider this the boundary between themselves and Egypt, not Cyrenaica. So the mythological geography retains its delineating function, but no longer matches its original story. 21 Salway 2001, 47. This is, of course, the same form of problem which troubled Dilke (see n. 12 above) about the prominence of Charax. 22 For this point, see Salway 2001, 43–4. This also accommodates the inclusion of coastingvoyages transferred to the land.

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tions of the empire, evoking images in words, are predicated on the existence of a visual concept of space. So this is the second level at which the notion that the Romans did not think spatially might be countered, and we might move more positively to an assertion of how, besides in explicitly visual media, they did conceptualize and depict the vast extent of their imperium. We have already noted the existence of itineraries, and Salway, like Brodersen, stresses the importance of itineraries (not necessarily picta), as an alternative means of mapping out the empire.23 Of course it was possible for these too, like maps, to carry a historical component—the Bordeaux pilgrim, for example, includes extensive notes on visiting sites from the Old and the New Testament.24 However, the world of itineraries and pilgrimage routes as a means of bringing the vastness of the Roman Empire to the mind’s eye is a huge subject area and lies outside the scope of this paper. Instead I shall focus brieXy on Strabo’s voluminous seventeen-book Geography of the whole world known to the Romans in the age of Augustus and on into Tiberius’ reign.25 The Geography oVers a striking illustration of the way in which authors of the Roman Empire, in this case a Greek-educated native of the Pontic region, could create a stunningly complex evocation of the space of the known world, and one which operated in several dimensions simultaneously. Although a considerable amount of scholarly energy has been devoted to the relationship between Strabo’s work and Agrippa’s map,26 I do not believe that solving that riddle is essential to explicating some of the similar ways in which they operate as depictions of the world of Rome. I have argued elsewhere in print that Strabo constructs the Roman world on many levels and in many diVerent spatial conWgurations.27 In spite of the fact that his is a work of literature rather than one of cartography, he nevertheless depicts the Roman Empire in a strongly visual way. At the most basic level he expounds the theory of three continents in his introduction to Asia (11.1.1), picking up on the world-view of Eratosthenes. Furthermore, he gives a vivid sense of the broader spatial layout of Rome’s world in 23 Not only literary, but also epigraphic itineraries are increasingly coming to light. So, for example, the recently published stadiasmus provinciae Lyciae, an inscription from Patar (c. ad 45), which records inter alia Claudius’ order to survey the province’s roads and describes the road network in the form of three itineraries. See Salway 2001, 56. 24 A visual parallel for the recording of historically signiWcant events in the context of a geographical representation is the map of Sardinia placed by Ti. Sempronius Gracchus in 174 bc in the Temple of Magna Mater to commemorate his victories: as Livy says, Sardiniae insulae forma erat, atque in ea simulacra pugnarum picta (41.28.10). 25 The date of composition has been vigorously debated, perhaps unnecessarily so, given the fact that such a voluminous work must necessarily have been composed over a span of time. On this issue, see Pothecary 2002, 387–438; Dueck 1999, 467–78, and Clarke 1997, 92–110. 26 See, for example, Nicolet 1991, 107. 27 See Clarke 1999.

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less immense geographical terms. Strabo sets out what comes within the compass of a geographical map: It is the sea more than anything else that deWnes the contours of the land and gives it its shape, by forming gulfs, deep seas, straits, and likewise isthmuses, peninsulas, and promontories; but both the rivers and the mountains assist the seas therein. It is through such natural features that continents, nations, favorable sites of cities, and other reWnements have been conceived, features of which a regional [chorographical] map is full; one also Wnds a quantity of islands scattered over the seas and along the coasts.28

Although this passage has generally been used in the attempt to assign the map of Agrippa to geography or chorography, in fact it tells us more obviously about Strabo’s rather vague distinction between large-scale and smaller-scale geography and his interest in his own work in a form of geography-chorography combined. Strabo further reWnes his visual picture of the world of Rome through the use of similes—Italy, for example, is described as being like an island; and geometrical Wgures—Britain, Italy, Sicily, and the Nile Delta could all be likened to triangles; India was shaped like a rhombus.29 But Strabo also creates the sense of an inhabited, functioning empire. His interest is not in the earth as a purely physical entity, a series of shapes, but a home for man. ‘The geographer undertakes to describe the known parts of the inhabited world, but he leaves out of consideration the unknown parts of it; just as he does what is outside of it.’30 This concern for the home of man is given an additional slant at the end of the work, where the focus of attention becomes not just the inhabited world, but the world of Roman rule. Although Strabo is keen to stress the diVerence between these—Rome cannot equate its empire with the whole of the known world as described in Strabo’s Geography31— still, the seventeen-book work ends with a spatial conWguration which is formulated in terms of imperial administration, namely a list of provinces. It is made plain that the situation is ever changing. Rome possesses the parts of the world which are most desirable (‘the best and the best known portions of it [sc. the inhabited world]’),32 and can therefore write oV as undesirable those areas which are so far unconquered, a technique clearly 28

Strabo 2.5.17. See Strabo 6.4.1 for Italy as island; 4.5.1, 5.1.2, 6.2.1, 17.1.4 for triangular areas; 15.1.11 for the rhombus. 30 Strabo 2.5.5. 31 The contrast is drawn out syntactically by the use of the contrasting particles 
and , the former to refer to the whole of the work so far, the latter to the last two chapters in which the Roman imperial administrative divisions are outlined (17.3.24). 32 Strabo 17.3.24. 29

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paralleled on the Tabula Peutingeriana. However, these areas can always be reassessed and added to the Roman Empire: ‘some further portion is constantly being taken from these peoples and added to the possessions of the Romans’.33 The issue of how the Other or the Barbarian might be depicted is treated by others in this volume,34 but here it should simply be noted that for Rome, with its incorporative empire, the problem was acute. Barbarians must be diVerent from Romans, but not so diVerent that they could not be envisaged as potential Romans, since the descendants of the Other might become senators one day. However, this very process of incorporation and the shifting of the limits of empire would inevitably threaten the special status and identity of Rome and the Romans themselves.35 For Strabo, then, the world of the Geography is not just the natural home for man, but made by him, a humanly constructed entity, and more speciWcally in the present an entity constructed by the imperial power of Rome. So, alongside the other vivid visual pictures which he draws in his text, of continents and geometrical shapes, we may add a conWguration that revolves around the imperial capital at Rome. Although, as I have discussed in detail elsewhere, there are other spatial focal points clearly in play for Strabo, such as his depiction of the cities of the Greek East as the home of intellectual life in the age of Augustus, or his own native Pontic region as a personal focus, nevertheless the dominant focal point in the work as a whole is clearly Rome itself.36 Strabo creates a mental image of the empire, which could be described as a spider’s web or a wheel with spokes converging on a center.37 Throughout his text, he evokes the magnetic power of Rome to attract people, goods, and ideas, to the degree that a vivid spatial image is constructed linking each place invisibly to the center by a thread of communication and transport of goods. I have discussed this in more detail elsewhere,38 but it is plain from Strabo’s description of the world of the early principate that he saw places around the empire as partly deWned by their contribution of people, food, wood, water, cloth, and so on, to Rome.39 33

Ibid. 17.3.24. See the contributions by Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens’ and Schneiders’ in this volume. For the paradox that imperial success and the extension of Romanitas meant the dilution of that concept and of its signiWcance, see Clarke 2004, 43–54. 36 For the multiplicity of authorial focal points in the Geography, see Clarke 1997, 92–110. 37 For the metaphor of the wheel with spokes in China see Schmidt-Glintzer’s contribution in this volume, p. 188: ‘. . . the center of the country . . . , where a myriad places converge like the spokes of a wheel.’ 38 See Clarke 1999, 219–23. 39 Envoys 4.3.2, 10.5.3, 14.1.26, 15.1.73; meat 4.3.2; textiles 5.1.7; papyrus 5.2.9; wine 5.4.3; water 5.3.13; rock 5.3.10; marble 5.2.5, 9.5.16; books 13.1.54; statues 6.3.1, 12.5.3. See also Aelius Aristeides, To Rome 10 for the notion that all the world’s produce could be found in the city of Rome. 34 35

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In this sense, Strabo conforms perfectly to the notion of ‘signiWcant mapping’, constructing his vision of the Roman Empire not only in terms of geographical features and abstract geometric Wgures, but also places signiWcant and meaningful to the imperial capital at Rome. But his vision goes beyond a complex picture of contemporary meaning. This is the point at which to return to the idea of historical and mythological matrices, as already noted on the Tabula Peutingeriana and indeed in my own mapping of my local area. Let us return to the passage where Strabo sets out his vision for what the business of the geographer involves. Having set out the importance of physical geography, since the features resulting from nature are permanent (ØÆ 
ı Ø), he then explicitly adds a historical dimension to the geographer’s task, in the form of recording man-made changes over time: He should indicate such of the latter [sc. man-made] attributes as can persist for a long time, or else such as can not persist for long and yet somehow possess a certain distinction and fame, which by enduring to later times, make a work of man, even when it no longer exists, a kind of natural attribute of a place (æ 
Ø
a ı çı~ Å ~Ø  Ø) . . . Indeed, it is possible to say concerning many cities what Demosthenes said of Olynthus and the cities round about it, which have so completely disappeared, he says, that a visitor could not know even whether they had been founded. But nevertheless men like to visit these places as well as others, because they are eager to see at least the traces of deeds so widely famed, just as they like to visit the tombs of illustrious men.40

The idea that the historic landscape, whether represented by visible remains or whether evoked imaginatively through verbal accounts of the history of a place, was a necessary part of the project to construct a meaningful picture of the Roman Empire is one which I have elaborated at length elsewhere.41 SuYce it here to say that Strabo systematically builds up his spatial vision of ‘meaningful places’ through a series of city histories,42 as well as through place-name aetiologies,43 and the travels of historic Wgures such as Alexander. Each time he reaches a new settlement in his description, his account traces the history of the place, from foundation to the present day, although his histories are necessarily selective and focus on the key stages in the transformation of the place. 40

Strabo 2.5.17. See Clarke 1999, esp. chap. 5. See, for example, the case of Taras in southern Italy, whose history could be traced back over eight centuries. Strabo’s account (6.3.4) includes detail from every single century from the foundation to his own day. 43 Plataea makes an interesting case study, since the name (meaning ‘Rowing oars’) could be explained by the lakeside position of the place, but then the settlement was moved, keeping its now inappropriate name (9.2.17). 41 42

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Some periods of the past feature regularly in his account—the Trojan War, the return of the sons of Herakles, the battle of Actium oVer more widely applicable punctuation marks set in amongst the individual life cycle of each place—its foundation, sometimes its re-foundation, often its demise. These commonly recurrent punctuation marks enable certain phases of the past to be ‘joined up’, as it were, across space. The time of the return of the sons of Herakles was, for example, the moment when the Achaeans emigrated from Laconia to Ionia (8.5.5), as well as being the time when the Ionians moved to join the Carians in Epidaurus (8.6.15); the period of transition aVected Attica too, since many exiles from other lands ended up there, a shift which worried the sons of Herakles, who attacked Attica, but were driven back to the point where they founded Megara (9.1.7). Similarly, many city foundations were carried out by heroes on their way home from the Trojan War, with the result that their histories were roughly coordinated with each other. Other connections in the past of the world which would become the Roman Empire are more localized, relating, for example, to certain phases of foundation. Between them, the ‘historical’ elements in Strabo’s account of the world of Rome provide a third dimension to the account and form a mesh of interconnections which reinforce the unity and consequent validity of the current empire. Thus, just as I could either draw or paint in words a map of my local area, so too was the Roman Empire prone to be depicted in diVerent media, with the visual force being sometimes literal, as on, for example, Agrippa’s map or the Tabula Peutingeriana, and sometimes imaginatively created through words, as in Strabo’s Geography. Both are ‘signiWcant’ maps. But they are signiWcant at many levels simultaneously, and it would be a mistake to see either ‘map’ as a two-dimensional plane surface. That layer exists, of course, represented either visually by the depiction of continents, places, road systems, and so on, or verbally in Strabo’s mixture of natural and human features that made up the world of the Roman Empire. For him it was very much an interconnected world, with its primary focus on Rome, the imperial capital to which all good things Xow. It was, however, also a world that held signiWcance at more than just the level of current political power. Rather than a plane surface, these depictions of empire, visual or verbal, oVer a palimpsest of signiWcance, a multi-layered portrait, stretching not only across space but also through history (and even into the future, since there are allusions to future conquests in both the literary Geography and our glimpses into the world of Roman cartography). Thus, in visual terms, we might imagine these conceptualizations of the Roman Empire as a three-dimensional model, containing not only links on the top surface, the connected world of contemporary Rome, but also, in a less coherent, more localized, but nonetheless signiWcant

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way throughout its past.44 The result is a rich, vivid, and compelling picture, which has depth as well as breadth, and thereby derives maximum validation for the current state of the world, subjected to Roman power, but uniWed not only through that but also through past interactions. Just like my mental map of the Chiltern Hills, the mental image created of the Roman Empire is complex and multi-dimensional. The past provides an aetiology for the nature of Rome’s present empire, made up of places with not only a current signiWcance for Rome, but also past resonance. But what was speciWcally imperial about the construction of this vast space? I have already indicated that one, indeed the dominant one, of Strabo’s layered conWgurations is a network which maps out the cities of the empire in terms of their relationship to Rome, the imperial capital. His project neatly illustrates the maxim that ‘all roads lead to Rome’, as indeed would Agrippa’s map, if it, as seems probable, like the Tabula Peutingeriana, placed Rome center-stage. But this was not just a construction of geographers and mapmakers. The centrality and superiority of Rome, enhanced by its connection to the world outside, lay at the heart of Roman imperial ideology, especially as consciously developed in the age of Augustus. So, for example, Augustus made much in his autobiographical Res Gestae of the way in which he not only beautiWed the imperial city itself, but also enhanced its links to the empire.45 Furthermore, the erection by Augustus of the so-called ‘golden milestone’, the aureum milliarium, in the Roman forum in 20 bc as the point to which and from which all distances in the empire would be made, enshrined the notion of Rome as the center of the signiWcant world and explicitly linked that spatially formulated centrality to Augustus’ own imperial ambitions, his own Golden Age.46 The centrality of Rome in Strabo’s Geography and in Roman cartography, as so graphically illustrated in the Tabula Peutingeriana, extends also to Italy. In Augustan literature, Rome and Italy combine to form the basis for imperial success.47 Vitruvius makes quite explicit that the perfect climatic balance that 44

I should like to thank Irad Malkin for his stimulating conversations during his time as Nellie Wallace lecturer in Oxford in 2005, in the course of which this idea of a multidimensional model developed. 45 ‘In my seventh consulship I restored the Via Flaminia from the city as far as Rimini, together with all the bridges except the Mulvian and Minucian’ (Res Gestae 20.7). See also Suetonius, Divus Augustus 30. 46 For the aureum milliarium see Dio 54.8; Pliny, Naturalis Historia 3.66. On the age of Augustus as one of gold, see Virgil, Aeneid 6.791–4; Georgics 2.538. 47 See, for example, Virgil, Georgics 2.136–49, where the cattle produced by fertile Italian soil ‘lead triumphant Romans to the temples of the gods’ (Romanos ad templa deum duxere triumphos); and 2.167–76, where the morally upstanding, sturdy Italian stock are the ancestors of Rome’s current imperial successes across the globe.

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could be enjoyed in Italy was fundamental to the imperial victories of Rome: ‘Italy presents good qualities which are tempered by admixture from either side both North and South and are consequently unsurpassed . . . Thus the divine mind has allotted to the Roman state an excellent and temperate region in order to rule the world.’48 It is worth noting that Rome is dependent on Italy’s advantages, but the conquests belong not to Italy, but to the populus Romanus. Strabo too, after outlining the temperate and balanced climate of Italy, concludes that ‘it is naturally well-suited to hegemony’.49 So, just as the Tabula Peutingeriana would give pride of place to Rome, but also a hugely disproportionate amount of space to its power base of Italy, so too was this reXected in the literary productions of the Augustan age. Geographical conceptions were clearly of vital importance in the presentation and justiWcation of the imperial mission. Rome was powerful, not just through the divine sanction given by Jupiter in Virgil’s Aeneid,50 but also through climatological, and therefore natural, advantage. Of course, the two forms of ratiWcation come together in Vitruvius’ notion that it was the divina mens (‘divine mind’) which had allocated such a privileged location to Rome and to Italy. So, in this last section I should like to consider mapping, in various media, as an imperial project, taking the visual and verbal mapping that was produced in the age of Augustus as part of a wider phenomenon. Strabo saw his geographical project as being both facilitated and motivated by the phenomenon of conquest and rule, that is imperialism.51 He saw part of his task as being to gain and impart an understanding of the world of Rome with a view to imperial rule;52 his work was speciWcally designed to be useful to rulers: ‘the greater part of geography has a bearing on the life and the needs of rulers.’53 Strabo is thus interested in the processes of acculturation, the increasing homogeneity of the empire, and so on.54 However, there is also a sense in which the attempt to map in text and image the world of the Roman Empire was not just an exercise in under48 Vitruvius, De architectura 6.1.11: ita divina mens civitatem populi Romani egregiam temperatamque regionem conlocavit, uti orbis terrarum imperii potiretur. 49 Strabo 6.4.1. 50 Virgil, Aeneid 1.279: imperium sine Wne dedi (‘I have given them empire without end’). 51 See Strabo 1.2.1 for the way in which Alexander, the Romans themselves, and Mithridates had made known the world through their conquests. I would see Agrippa’s map as similarly motivated by conquest, rather than an aid to that, pace Dilke 1998, 41, who claims that Agrippa’s map was ‘compiled to further Roman imperial expansion’. 52 By contrast, Polybius wrote in order to explain conquest primarily (1.1.5), although he ended up by continuing into the early period of Roman rule. 53 Strabo 1.1.18. 54 See, for example, 3.4.20, where he describes the increasingly Roman way of life of the people of Iberia (Spain), who ‘have become transformed, clad in their toga-robe, to their present gentleness of disposition and their Italian mode of life’.

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standing but one in intellectual control. It formed part of a broader trend to master the world. The media through which the Romans displayed and paraded the fact that they were masters of the vast majority of the known world were many and varied. The map as expression of imperial power is beautifully illustrated by a much-cited passage from the late third-century ad rhetorician, Eumenius, who writes of a map being planned for the school at Autun (Augustodunum): Also let the children see it in those porticoes and look every day at all the lands and seas and every city, race, or tribe that unconquerable emperors either assist by their sense of duty or conquer by their valor or control by inspiring fear . . . And may this map . . . permit them to review the magniWcent deeds of our valiant principes, making them see, when couriers arrive continuously, covered with sweat and proclaiming victory, the twin rivers of Persia, the parched plains of Libya, the curve of the Rhine’s branches, the manifold mouths of the Nile . . . Now indeed we have true pleasure in studying the map of the world, now at last we see that no country is foreign (alienum).55

The world as the realm of the emperors and their achievements, is clearly a constructed entity, brought under their sway Wrst through conquest and now reinforced through careful depiction.56 But it was possible to evoke the Roman Empire, its power, and its extent through other means: the census lists must have oVered spectacular proof of the vast scope of Rome’s world;57 the Res Gestae itself, Augustus’ own account of what he achieved in his reign, which was displayed not only outside his mausoleum after his death, but also around the empire, stressed the extent of imperial expansion under Augustus’ leadership.58 In each case, the rhetoric of listing the huge number of names and places which fell under the sway of Rome must have been extraordinarily powerful, and evocative of the more explicitly visual images created by the cartographers and the work of Strabo.59 55

Eumenius, Panegyricus 5.20–1. And here, as Nicolet 1991, 113, suggests, we may note the striking similarities between the exhortation in Pliny to view Agrippa’s map and that of the late rhetor, Eumenius, and we may legitimately wonder whether Eumenius is indirectly referring to that very map, set up not in Gaul, but in the heart of Rome. Can anything of Eumenius’ rather detailed description be cast back onto Agrippa’s project? Could one view Augustus’ res gestae on Agrippa’s map, just as the children of Autun are exhorted to do with those of their own emperors? 57 Being about to give a precise Wgure for the number of Roman citizens at any one time was clearly a feat of which emperors were proud. Augustus lists the Wgures for three successive census counts which he undertook as being 4,063,000, 4,233,000, and 4,937,000 citizens respectively, neatly illustrating the expansion of Rome at the same time (Res Gestae 8). 58 See Res Gestae 26–33. The combination of the adornment of the city of Rome and the expansion of the empire as the two dominant themes of the work makes it particularly intriguing to consider how the subjects of Rome around the empire received the document. 59 See Witschel’s contribution in this volume on the rhetoric of lists and numbers in the Res Gestae. 56

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The space of the empire could not only be enumerated in an evocative, expansive, and outward-looking way; it could also be miniaturized, selectively so, and brought to Rome itself in various forms. On the coinage, the expansive, detailed, three-dimensional world of Strabo’s Geography or maps such as that of Agrippa or the later Tabula Peutingeriana could be brought down to size and represented as a globe under the controlling foot of the emperor. Here the geographical space is taken in its undiVerentiated entirety as a Roman possession. But more selectively, exotica could be brought to the imperial capital and made to represent that vast extent of conquered space.60 Gowers has argued very interestingly for the Roman dinner party as a display of imperial power, with the world set out on the table; not the whole world in miniature, not a ‘scale-map’, but a signiWcant selection.61 Edwards has argued that the works of art which were plundered from around the empire functioned in the same way, as evocations of the space that Rome ruled.62 More elaborate displays of the selected highlights of the empire in the imperial capital itself were to be seen in the form of the triumph.63 Pompey the Great had set the model for how to celebrate conquest over the entire inhabited world with his triple triumph of 61 bc. As Plutarch’s Life of Pompey made clear, ‘Inscriptions borne in advance of the procession indicated the nations over which he had triumphed . . . The captives led in triumph were . . .’64 Pompey’s theatre, dedicated in 55 bc, would contain a statue of himself in naked, heroic pose, holding the globe in his hand, and the grounds contained images of fourteen subject nations. But Virgil too gives a vivid picture of how the empire could be brought to Rome and paraded through the capital in one of the scenes of the shield of Aeneas, the Wnal and therefore perhaps most memorable one, as it happens: Caesar, enthroned in the marble-white temple of dazzling Apollo, Inspects the gifts from the nations and hangs them up on the splendid Portals: subjected tribes pass by in a long procession— A diversity of tongues, of national dress, and equipment. Here Vulcan had represented the Nomads, the Xowing robes of Africans, here the Leleges, Carians, Gelonian bowmen; Some carry a picture of Euphrates, its waters paciWed; There go the Morini, furthest of men, the branching Rhine, The Scythians untamed, the Araxes, fretting about its bridge.65 60

See Schneider’s contribution on exotic polychrome marble as evocative of the extent and magniWcence of the empire. 61 Gowers 1993. 62 Edwards 2003, 44–70. 63 The whole phenomenon is well discussed by Beard 2003, 21–43. 64 Plutarch, Pompeius 45; see also Diodorus Siculus 40.4. 65 Virgil, Aeneid 8.720–8.

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The parade of subject nations and images of key rivers in the conceptual geography of the empire is strongly reminiscent here of the triumph as performed by Pompey.66 Rivers, mountains, and human beings—the components by which the extent of the world was articulated by Strabo and by the mapmakers appear in the triumph too.67 The world of the triumph and that of theatrical display were closely related, sometimes overlapping. As Suetonius says in his Life of Augustus: At one of the games, Augustus allowed the people a sight of the Wrst group of Parthian hostages ever sent to Rome by leading them down the middle of the arena and seating them two rows behind himself. And whenever a strange or remarkable animal was brought to the city, he used to exhibit it in some convenient place on days when no public shows were being given: for instance, a rhinoceros in the enclosure, a tiger on the stage of the theatre, and a serpent nearly ninety feet long in front of the comitium, where popular assemblies were held.68

Of course, the amphitheatre provided the most spectacular possible display of Roman power. As Edwards and Woolf say, ‘The spectacles produced in the vast arena paraded the city’s mastery of the world.’69 For yet another articulation of this imperial pageant, we may consider Servius’ note on Virgil, Aeneid 7.721, to the eVect that, ‘Augustus made a portico in which he assembled images representing the diVerent peoples, on which account it is called the Portico of the Nations’. Or we could go further in trying to locate this display. Nicolet suggests reading Velleius Paterculus’ reference to ‘the Spains and the other peoples (gentes) whose tituli adorn his [sc. Augustus’] forum’ as an indication that, while the lower porticoes of Augustus’ own forum offered a display of time, in the form of the selected highlights of Roman history—the great men of the mythological and historical periods, who were made to line up and converge on the figure of Augustus—so too in the upper storeys we should imagine a corresponding display of space. Here the space of the empire, carefully selected to represent the whole extent through the highlighted parts—the great nations of the Roman empire personified—was configured to focus on the statue of Augustus center-stage, not just pater patriae (‘father of his country’), but pater orbis terrarum (‘father of the world’). 66

For the whole tradition of the personiWcation of conquests, see Edwards 2003, 65, citing Cicero’s note that the simulacra oppidorum were carried in a general’s triumphal procession (In Pisonem 60). 67 See Tacitus, Annales 2.41 for the triumph of Germanicus over various German tribes in ad 17. The procession through Rome included ‘spoils, captives, images of mountains and of rivers and of battles’ (spolia, captivi, simulacra montium, Xuminum, proeliorum). 68 Suetonius, Divus Augustus 43. 69 Edwards and Woolf 2003, 1. As they note, following Martial, Spectacula 3, the audience too was a varied crowd, itself embodying the vastness and variety of Rome’s territory.

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The idea that the world could be captured and encapsulated within the city of Rome itself oVers a particular kind of response to the vastness of imperial space. To agree with Ovid’s claim that, ‘The world and the city of Rome occupy the same space’,70 would be to risk denying that the space of the vast Roman Empire could be enumerated in ways which gave a sense of its magniWcent scale—the voluminous Geography of Strabo required seventeen books to describe even just selected highlights; the commentarii of Agrippa were full of distances, leaving no room for doubt about the extent of Rome’s rule. However, this space could also be structured, conWgured, shaped into signiWcant and meaningful forms—be they geographical, or mythological, or historical, or recreational—and then wrapped up in miniature, and brought to the imperial capital itself. In this sense space could be, perhaps paradoxically, collapsed; there was no need to go anywhere at all to see the world in Rome’s possession. Indeed, Josephus comments on the works of art adorning the Temple of Peace which commemorated the Roman victory over Judaea that ‘in that sanctuary were gathered together and deposited all those works of art which before, if he wished to see them, a tourist had to visit each in a diVerent place’.71 Rome, as capital, could itself encompass the rest of the world. It was not so much that the empire contained the city, but that the city contained the empire. Ovid, imagining Rome wistfully from his Black Sea exile, sums up succinctly the fact that one could go to Rome and thereby see the world: So then the whole people will be able to view the triumph, reading the names of captured towns and the titles of leaders, beholding the kings with chains upon their captive throats marching before the garlanded horses, seeing some countenances turned to earth as becomes captives, others grim and forgetful of their lot. Some of the people will enquire the causes, the objects, the names, and others will answer, though they know all too little (quamvis noverit illa parum).72

The ignorance of the viewing Roman public is surely poignant—all this power in the hands of the populus Romanus and they struggle to grasp even who are these people, their subjects, where are the regions and cities they rule? It is all too vast to comprehend. For that, they needed the geographer, the mapmakers, the constant rearticulations in diVerent media of what it meant to rule the world. And, to return to my starting point, in all of these contexts we are not dealing with the world in miniature, any more than a map or a geographical work could encapsulate its entirety, simply scaled down to size; we are dealing with 70 71

Ovid, Fasti 2.684: Romanae spatium est urbis et orbis idem. 72 Josephus, Bellum Iudaicum 7.5.7. Ovid, Tristia 4.2.19–26.

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signiWcant representatives of what Rome controlled—the theatrical show, the dinner party, the triumph were all parades of the special and signiWcant features which would become crystallized on the map and in verbal descriptions, giving the vast scope of the Roman Empire meaning in both text and image. References Beard, Mary, ‘The Triumph of the Absurd: Roman Street Theatre’, in: Edwards and Woolf 2003, 21–43. Brodersen, Kai, Terra Cognita: Studien zur ro¨mischen Raumerfassung. Hildesheim (Olms) 1995. —— ‘The Presentation of Geographical Knowledge for Travel and Transport in the Roman World: ‘‘Itineraria non tantum adnotata sed etiam picta’’ ’, in: Colin Adams and Ray Lawrence (eds.), Travel and Geography in the Roman Empire. London (Routledge) 2001, 7–21. Clarke, Katherine, ‘In Search of the Author of Strabo’s ‘‘Geography’’ ’, Journal of Roman Studies, 87 (1997), 92–110. —— Between Geography and History: Hellenistic Constructions of the Roman World. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1999. —— ‘Ever-increasing Circles: Constructing the Roman Empire’, in: Takashi Minamikawa (ed.), Material Culture, Mentality and Historical Identity in the Ancient World: Understanding the Celts, Greeks, Romans and the Modern Europeans. Kyoto (Graduate School of Letters) 2004, 43–54. Dilke, Oswald, Greek and Roman Maps. Baltimore/London (John Hopkins University Press) 1985 [1998 paperback]. Dueck, Daniela, ‘The Date and Method of Composition of Strabo’s ‘‘Geography’’ ’, Hermes, 127 (1999), 467–78. Edwards, Catharine, ‘Incorporating the Alien: The Art of Conquest’, in: Edwards and Woolf 2003, 44–70. —— and Woolf, Greg, ‘Cosmopolis: Rome as World City’, in: Edwards and Woolf 2003, 1–20. —— and —— (eds.), Rome the Cosmopolis. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2003. Gowers, Emily, The Loaded Table: Representations of Food in Roman Literature. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1993. Nicolet, Claude, Space, Geography, and Politics in the Early Roman Empire. Ann Arbor (University of Michigan Press) 1991. Pothecary, Sarah, ‘Strabo, the Tiberian Author: Past, Present and Silence in Strabo’s ‘‘Geography’’ ’, Mnemosyne, 55 (2002), 387–438. Salway, Benet, ‘Travel, ‘‘Itineraria’’ and ‘‘Tabellaria’’ ’, in: Colin Adams and Ray Lawrence (eds.), Travel and Geography in the Roman Empire. London (Routledge) 2001, 22–66.

C. Self-Image and the Formation of Imperial Rhetorics

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Announcements from the Mountains The Stele Inscriptions of the Qin First Emperor Martin Kern (Princeton)

1. INTRODUCTION Shortly after completing his Wnal conquest and establishing the uniWed empire in 221 bc, the Qin First Emperor, accompanied by his court classicists, began to tour the newly conquered eastern regions. Here, he erected a series of stele inscriptions on the top of venerated mountains. The Shi ji, which preserves six of the altogether seven inscriptions,1 provides the following chronology for them: 219 bc on Mt. Yi,2 Mt. Tai, and Mt. Langye; 218 bc on Mt. Zhifu and on its ‘eastern vista’ (Zhifu dongguan); 215 bc at the ‘gate’ of Jieshi (Jieshi men); and December 211 or January 210 bc on Mt. Kuaiji. In the First Emperor’s ‘Basic Annals’ in the Shi ji, the brief entry on the Wrst inscription, placed on Mt. Yi in 219 bc, reads as follows: In his twenty-eighth year, the First August (Emperor) went eastward and proceeded through the commanderies and counties. He ascended Mt. Yi in Zou county and erected a stone. He conducted a discussion with the classicists (rusheng) from Lu and had them carve the stone to eulogize the virtuous power of Qin. They discussed the matters of the feng and shan sacriWces and of the wang sacriWces to the mountains and rivers.3

The related account in the ‘Fengshan shu’ (almost verbatim also in the Han shu ‘Jiaosi zhi’)4 diVers only slightly in mentioning ‘seventy classicists and 1

The six inscriptions are included in Shi ji, chap. 6, ‘Qin Shihuang benji’; the seventh (and chronologically Wrst) one that was erected on Mt. Yi, although well-known in Tang times, has been transmitted only in later (Yuan dynasty) inscription collections. 2 For all mentioned localities, which were identiWed according to Tan Qixiang 1982–7, see the accompanying map. 3 Shi ji 6/242. 4 See Shi ji 28/1366, Han shu 25A/1201.

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Fig. 8. The surviving fragment of the Langye inscription

erudites (boshi) from Qi and Lu’ accompanying the emperor on Mt. Tai. Following such brief remarks in the ‘Basic Annals’, invariably indicating the speciWc year of the First Emperor’s rule and the destination of his respective tour of inspection, the Shi ji presents the inscription texts. The inscription on Mt. Zhifu illustrates the diction of the entire series:5 It was in His twenty-ninth year, According to the season of mid-spring, The mildness of Yang had just arisen. The August Emperor travelled to the east,

維廿九年 時在中春 陽和方起 皇帝東游

5 For the full set of all seven texts, see Kern 2000a, 10–49. The text is in Shi ji 6/249 and Rong Geng 1935, 144. The thirty-six lines of the Mt. Zhifu inscription rhyme on every third verse and comprise two rhyme sequences, zhi (*-ð) and zhi (*-ðk), each of six rhymes. The space after line 18 indicates the rhyme change. For full annotation, see Kern 2000a, 35–7.

The Stele Inscriptions of the First Emperor

219 巡登之罘 臨照于海 從臣嘉觀 原念休烈

On His tour He ascended (Mt.) Zhifu, Looked down on and illuminated (the lands by) the sea. The attending oYcials gazed in admiration, Traced back and contemplated (His) excellence and brilliant accomplishments, Recalled and recited the fundamental beginning: The Great Sage created His order, Established and Wxed the rules and measures, Made manifest and visible the line and net (of order). Abroad He instructed the feudal lords; Brilliantly He spread culture and grace, Enlightening them through rightness and principle. The six kingdoms had been restive and perverse, Greedy and criminal, insatiable— Atrociously slaughtering endlessly.

追誦本始 大聖作治 建定法度 顯箸綱紀 外教諸侯 光施文惠 明以義理 六國回辟 貪戾無厭 虐殺不已

The August Emperor felt pity for the multitudes, And consequently sent out His punitive troops, Vehemently displaying His martial power. Just was He in punishment, trustworthy was He in acting, His awesome inXuence radiated to all directions, And there was none who was not respectful and submissive. He boiled alive and exterminated the violent and cruel, Succored and saved the black-haired people, And all around consolidated the four extremities. He universally promulgated the shining laws, Gave warp and woof to All-under-Heaven— Forever to serve as ritual norm and guideline. Great, indeed, was [ . . . ]! Within the universe and realm One followed receptively His sage intent. The multitude of oYcials recited His merits, Asked to carve (this text) into stone, To express and transmit the constant model.

皇帝哀眾 遂發討師 奮揚武德 義誅信行 威燀旁達 莫不賓服 烹滅彊暴 振救黔首 周定四極 普施明法 經緯天下 永為儀則 大矣□哉 宇縣之中 承順聖意 群臣誦功 請刻于石 表垂常式

As exempliWed in this text, the seven stele inscriptions are hymns in praise of the Qin uniWcation, created in thirty-six or seventy-two lines of tetrasyllabic meter and rhymed in rigorous adherence to traditional practice. Embedded into a setting of traditional rituals, they present the idealized version of a teleological Qin history, eulogizing the uniWed rule in juxtaposition to the preceding ages of warfare and chaos. The ideal of order and uniWcation— expressed in the famous measures of unifying the script, weights, and measures, etc.—appears emblematically also in the formal structure of the seven inscriptions. Their perfect composition betrays the involvement of experts in

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Fig. 9. Map showing the destinations of the First Emperor’s journeys, sacriWces, and inscribed stelae

traditional ritual and textual scholarship who served at the Qin imperial court. As registered in the Shi ji, the scholars in charge of composing, reciting, and inscribing these political eulogies into stone were the imperial erudites that the new empire had inherited from the former states of Qi and Lu, that is, the old eastern regions of traditional scholarship. As the sources inform us, these professionals held the remarkable specialization of ‘comprehending the past and present’ (tong gu jin). While later sources sometimes regard the Qin

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chancellor Li Si as the author of the texts or the writer of their calligraphy,6 the notion of an imperial institution in charge of the ritual and textual tradition, where the almost uniform inscriptional texts were most probably drafted well in advance, dissociates the text from its material carrier, from any speciWc event, and from the participants involved in the latter. The traditional idea of the imperial Qin state as a mere terror regime devoid of any cultural accomplishment has been discredited in more recent scholarship. SuYcient evidence testiWes to the promotion of traditional scholarship at the Qin imperial court—scholarship that certainly contributed to the stabilization of the venerated canon.7 The much-debated issue of the ‘burning of the books’ in 213 bc and the purported mass-execution of scholars in 212 bc has detracted from the fact that the early imperial erudites were professionals of the ritual and textual tradition operating beyond any issues of a speciWc ‘Confucian’ philosophy or morality, and that their texts, in particular the Songs (Shi) and Documents (Shu), were available to thinkers of various intellectual lineages.8 When Li Si proposed to ban and burn the Songs and Documents circulating outside the imperial court together with the apparently proliferating ‘speeches of the hundred lineages’ (baijia yu) and all historical archives except those of the Qin, he explicitly exempted the Shi and Shu studied and taught by the court-appointed erudites.9 The imperial stele inscriptions corroborate the presence of classical scholarship at the Qin imperial court by displaying an abundance of references to the written tradition. Moreover, with these texts, we not only see the learned erudites at work but also their canon in action, including the Songs and Documents that were used to learn and to speak about the past. Providing the paradigms for reading the past and discussing the present, these texts needed to be monopolized for the purpose of imperial representation and to be prevented from being exploited to ‘use the past to criticize the present’ (yi gu fei jin), as noted in Li Si’s memorial. A closer analysis of the inscriptions shows them as a coherent textual series: all seven inscriptions adhere to a clearly deWned compositional structure, with 6

The two earliest known writers ascribing the inscriptions to Li Si are Liu Xie (c.467–522) in Wenxin diaolong 21/803 and Li Daoyuan (469–527) in Shuijing zhu (see Wang Guowei 1984, 4/130, 25/810, 40/1256). Zhang Shoujie (X. 725–35) states that both the text and the calligraphy of the Wnal inscription on Mt. Kuaiji were by Li Si (see his commentary in Shi ji 6/261); according to Shi ji 6/260 and 87/2547, Li Si had accompanied the emperor on his Wnal tour to the southeast. Challenging the traditional view, Chen Zhiliang 1939 (B), 42–3, has argued that the eunuch and later chancellor Zhao Gao (d. 207 bc) is a more likely candidate as the imperial calligrapher. I consider both alternatives as equally Xawed. 7 See Kanaya 1992, 230–57; Eno 1999; and Kern 2000a, 183–96. 8 See Kern 2000a, 164–96. 9 Shi ji 6/255, 87/2546–7.

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particular topics arranged at speciWc positions of the texts.10 Their modular design allows portions of a text to be changed or replaced without aVecting the overall sequential structure. The individual inscriptions thus appear as variations of a single underlying prototext that most likely was kept in the Qin imperial archives, readily available when needed for any particular occasion. This phenomenon of a textual series can be explained as a traditional device in the context of ritualized political representation. As has been noted for preimperial bronze inscriptions, the notion of an ‘original’ text being attached in a one-to-one relation to a certain situation, place, or material carrier may be misleading in the ritual setting of ancient China.11 Consciously designed repetition and variation may have been a signiWcant part of the message, endowing the text with an aura of standardized, normative expression. On the material and representational level, the stele inscriptions were supported and perpetuated by the stone into which they were carved; yet their true basis and continuity lay in the archival records. Even if we did not know of the Qin archives from the Shi ji,12 we would be able to deduce their existence and function from the diction of the inscriptions themselves. The cultural memory enshrined in these archives preserved both historical memory and the models of verbal expression. Composing an inscription, the classicist scholars operated in the limited code of the ritual tradition and in this reaYrmed the legitimizing force of the ritual-historical continuum. Based on the blueprint that was maintained in the archives, the individual inscriptions were imposed upon, not developed out of, the concrete natural sites into which they were inscribed. Placing texts very similar to one another—now in the newly standardized script—in a number of localities all over the recently conquered eastern parts of the empire performed and expressed on the linguistic level what the accompanying wang sacriWces realized on the level of ritual action: the absorption of the individual natural and historical site into the common suprahistorical frame of the new empire, designed for eternity. In the texts on the stelae we can hardly detect any trace of a historical development that may have taken place between 219 and 210 bc. According to the uniform language of the imperial stelae, history, now inscribed into chosen sites of nature, had reached its Wnal petrifaction and standstill in 221 bc. The serial manifestations of the prototext as stationary inscriptions served the ritual order of imperial geography: with his inscriptions, the First Emperor recognized each of their locations in its own signiWcance and, by the 10

See Kern 2000a, 126–39. See Falkenhausen 1993b, 163–4. For Li Si’s request to burn all historical archives except those of the Qin, see Shi ji 6/255, 87/2546; for Sima Qian’s (c.145–c.90/85 bc) subsequent lament of having nothing but the Qin archives available, see 15/686. 11 12

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implied prototext, transformed all of them from mutually unrelated sites of formerly separate political entities into deWned places within the newly uniWed spatial organization of the empire.

2. WRITING AS REPRESENTAT ION It is clear from these observations that the seven stele inscriptions were not, or not primarily, textual media to circulate or store information. Nothing suggests that members of the political elite took to the mountains in order to read the imperial texts in situ and learn about history. Nothing even suggests that the inscriptions were ever intended to be visited for that purpose. So why were they placed there? Why not, for example, in the capital, visible for everyone to see, and for the educated elite to read? Why create monuments out of sight, far removed from the people? No early text provides a ready answer to these questions, but we may look to other instances of preimperial display writing for possible explanations. There is no question that at least since Western Zhou times (c.1046–771 bc), and arguably already during the late Shang dynasty (c.1200–c.1046 bc),13 writing, embedded in ritual contexts, was used for representational purposes.14 A prime example is the famous water-basin of Secretary Qiang of c.900 bc (or a generation later) where a royal dignitary espoused not only the royal genealogy but, in a neat parallel arrangement, also his own ancestral lineage of scribes. From the ninth-century bc ‘ritual reform’ onward, we see an increasingly uniform style not only of bronze vessels but also of their texts and calligraphy that must reXect some sort of centralized control over the production and design of such vessels and inscriptions.15 These artefacts were, Wrst and foremost, expressive of a mature ritual tradition that spoke to both the living and the dead. Their very appearance of regularity and measured beauty signaled the recourse to established authority and to an authoritative, non-negotiable style of representation. Following the ‘ritual reform’ that seems to have

13 This display nature manifests itself in some instances of unusually large graphs, in a sometimes careful pigmentation of the incised writing, and in the commonly observed approximate symmetry of the text; see Keightley 1978, 46, 54, 56, 76–7, 83–4, 89. 14 For an extensive discussion of early Chinese writing as representation see Kern 2007. 15 Rawson 1990, 93, 125; Rawson 1999, 438–9. As noted by Rawson, ‘a strong centralized control of ritual seems to have been in place’; for bronze design, a ‘static repertoire’ came into being, ‘limited and reiterated’, and of ‘persistent sameness’—expressing an aesthetic ideology that embraced the bronze object as well as the wording and calligraphy of the inscription.

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marked a shift in emphasis from communication with the ancestral spirits toward one with the living and future folk, bronze inscriptions of later centuries occasionally expose writing as conspicuous display, so as in the gold-inlaid inscriptions of the late Wfth century bc bells of the Marquis Yi of Zeng or in the late fourth century bc vessel inscriptions of King Cuo of Zhongshan. Ever since the mid-Western Zhou bronzes, inscriptions not only show an increasingly accentuated use of calligraphy. They also, in a way the Shang oracle carvings and the very early Western Zhou bronze inscriptions do not, mention certain oYcials in charge of formalized writing, and they give account of the presentation of written texts in contexts of social and political ritual. However, in referring to such writing as ‘public display’—to use Michael Nylan’s felicitous phrase16—we need to keep in mind the limited public sphere in which all these texts played their role. For one, the objects into which they were inscribed were relatively small, with their inscriptions legible only upon close and careful inspection. In fact, as has often been noted, bronze inscriptions were cast on the inside of vessels and thus, when covered with the sacriWcial oVerings, completely invisible during the ancestral sacriWces.17 (It is precisely in this feature that the Zhongshan inscriptions diVer radically from their predecessors.) Thus, in general, such inscriptions were not read during the sacriWces in which their carriers were used, and no traditional sources suggest that they were displayed or read on other occasions. Furthermore, there was no ‘public’ audience in early China as it existed, for example, in Athens or Rome. This, however, is not to say that objects and texts had no ‘public’ representation or were devoid of any display function. The—however limited—‘public’ was the high-ranking lineage group and its guests, in the case of the royal house also including court oYcials as well as diplomats from subordinate regions.18 This audience was an insider audience, but it comprised a cultural and political elite that did not need to inspect a bronze vessel and its inscription up close in order to know about its contents and comprehend its representational nature. What counted was the sheer existence of the artefact. In such contexts, writing transcended its functions of 16

Nylan 2005. See e.g. Kane 1982–3. In Western Zhou times, the major exception to this are inscriptions on bells, which are placed on the bells’ exterior. But even these inscriptions are too small to be visible from a distance, and their texts are often arranged in a rather irregular fashion—even running in diVerent directions wherever there is space not occupied by ornament—across the body of a bell, including its backside. 18 I leave aside here the complex question of whether the bronze inscriptions were primarily directed not at the living humans (including their descendants) but at the ancestral spirits; cf. Falkenhausen 1993b, 145–52, and Venture 2002. 17

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storing and circulating knowledge. Or more precisely, the knowledge that was stored in the public inscription and circulated to the community in the form of public display referred not merely to the meaning of its words—the knowledge of which was available otherwise—but to the cultural status and political authority of public calligraphy itself. Such public calligraphy was, and indeed remains to be even in contemporary China, an emblem of both culture and sovereignty. In the First Emperor’s seven stone stelae as well as in numerous later inscriptions placed on mountains, often inscribed into the natural rock itself, sovereignty even extended from the human sphere into the cosmic realm, transforming a natural site into a site of civilization and human history. When the First Emperor, now vested with his divine title ‘August Emperor’ (huangdi), initiated his series of inscriptions, he established a new form of political representation, announcing his historical achievements to the cosmic spirits. While the archaeological record, overwhelmingly rich on the side of inscribed ritual bronzes, does not provide a single direct precedent for these remarkably extensive stone carvings, they were inspired by at least three pre-imperial ritual activities: the performance of political eulogies, highly traditional in their diction, that were presented at banquets and ancestral sacriWces; the inscriptions in bronze; and the royal tour of inspection. Contrary to the still common view of the Qin as anti-traditional, both textual and archaeological evidence testify amply to the presence of traditional ritual at the Qin pre-imperial and imperial courts, including scholarship on the ancient Odes and the possession of ancient bronze vessels.19 One fascinating detail in particular testiWes to centuries of ritual continuity: on an inscribed gui vessel and its lid, discovered together in 1919 west of Tianshui (Gansu Province) and now dated into the reign of either Lord Gong (r. 609–605 bc) or Lord Huan (r. 605–577 bc), we Wnd engravings concerning the capacity of the vessel: short texts that were most probably carved no earlier than in imperial Qin or even in Han times.20 This means that the vessel had been kept at the Qin pre-imperial and imperial courts for no less than 400 years. 19 Traditional Qin political ritualism can be traced back through excavated bronzes and chime-stones to around 700 bc, in particular to the set of eight yongzhong bells from the reign of Lord Wu (r. 697–678 bc); for a full discussion of these and later pre-imperial Qin bronzes and chime-stones see Kern 2000a, 59–105. Not only is the wording of these inscriptions particularly conservative in their own times, representing Western Zhou rather than Spring and Autumn forms of ritual expression; the yongzhong bells are also almost atavistic in their material form, their textual arrangement, and their tone distribution pattern. See So 1982; Falkenhausen 1993a, 167, 236. 20 See Shirakawa vol. xxxiv (1971), 21–2; Wang Hui 1990, 19, 26.

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Their diVerent historical and ritual settings notwithstanding, some considerations on the nature of Zhou bronze writings may illuminate the nature of the Qin imperial stele inscriptions as texts that embodied a sacralized representation of history. The bronze inscriptions exhibit a precarious relation to their actual history: by explicitly naming their donor and frequently including a date, they were apparently meant to appear as historical artefacts, made at an important moment in time to commemorate, Wx, and Wnally communicate a speciWc historical event to the spirits. Yet these texts never developed continuous historical narratives; they were commemorative monuments that captured and deWned moments of highest signiWcance, artefacts of history that were true in the sense that myth is true: ‘Through remembrance, history turns into myth. By this, it does not become unreal but, on the contrary, and only then, reality in the sense of a continual normative and formative force.’21 As Shaughnessy has pointed out, ‘more than Wfty Western Zhou bronze inscriptions refer, in greater or lesser detail, to military activity . . . Not one of the inscriptions commemorates a defeat.’22 In short, pre-imperial bronze inscriptions commemorated and preserved but the sacralized distillate of history, creating a representation of the past that was as radically abbreviated as it was profoundly ideological. Perhaps the early Zhou archives were obliged to keep a more comprehensive, less partial record of history; but this record was not passed on to the ancestors. Not ‘What has happened?’ was the question answered in the ancestral temple, but ‘What do we want to remember?’, ‘How do we want to remember?’, and, implicitly, ‘What do we want to forget?’ Ideally, the sacralized version of history as it was communicated to the spirits left no options for a second truth and hence no doubts about the Wrst. Bronze inscriptions oVered little to ruminate on. The same is true of the imperial stelae. One aspect that distinguished them from all earlier inscribed artefacts was the plain fact that they no longer competed with other texts. The act of uniWcation, conducted on all levels of the imperial administration and repeatedly praised in these inscriptions by terms like yi, bing, and tong (all meaning ‘to unify’), became manifest in the very existence of these stone monuments. The rhetoric of the inscriptions annihilated the multi-perspective records of all the former states and replaced them with the single and central perspective of the universal ruler. They silenced the many voices of history and monopolized memory; now, the normative version of history as promulgated from the sacred mountains of the former independent states was a single and uniWed one. What the 21 22

Assmann 1992, 52. Shaughnessy 1991, 176–7; cf. also the whole paragraph, 175–82.

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chancellor Li Si proposed in administrative terms—to burn all historical records except those of Qin and thus wipe out all competing memories— the stele inscriptions made manifest on the level of ritual representation. The claim to monopolize memory was expressed in the normative idiom of ritual language. To preclude the potential for negotiation and ambiguity, linguistic propositions were tightly Wxed, clear enough to need no explanation, hieratic enough to allow no discussion. The formulaic and tightly intertextual nature of the imperial stone carvings manifests itself both lexically and in the standardized sequence of topics, revealing a modular compositional process: for each part of a text there is a deWned and hence restricted repertoire of basically interchangeable expressions at hand. In its totality, the vocabulary used comes from a distinct lexical inventory of traditional political language that fuses the seven inscriptions into a single coherent expression of rulership that was Wrmly rooted in the ritual tradition. In addition to the repeated use of words like yong (‘forever’) and xiu (‘superb’) that are almost exclusively reserved for texts used in ritual settings, the inscriptions weave a close rhetorical texture of lexical and syntactical elements that both express and embody the message of normativity and uniWcation. Beyond the above-noted words denoting ‘to unify’, the terminology of total identity pervades the texts in a way both restricted and redundant. This is indicated, for instance, by the repeated use of words expressing comprehensive inclusion, such as wang (or mo, mi, wu) bu (‘none who does/is not’), or of terms denoting universal rulership through expressions of spatial extension, such as tianxia (‘All-under-Heaven’). A speciWc ‘ritualized’ and ‘ritualizing’ mode of speech, however, is ultimately not to be traced to the lexical level. What distinguishes a text as ritualized is the linguistic structure above the level of the word that comprises patterns of restriction and redundancy in the choice and arrangement of words, together with the coercive force of stock phrases that govern the syntactic structure proper. The rhetoric of ritual presents an extreme case of paradigmatic and syntagmatic choice. In the case of the stele inscriptions, one registers not only a redundant use of near synonyms from a very limited set of propositions but also particular combinations of words and syntactical patterns that create an idiom where normative ideology is given the form of Wxed rhythmic and syntactic form. The most prominent rhetorical pattern, governing at least one-third of all lines of the inscription series, is the hendiadys, or what one may call ‘categorical accumulation’: a mode of speech where two semantically closely related—if not synonymous—nouns or verbs are joined together to intensify their common semantic value. These terms are virtually interchangeable

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(and thus modular) because they belong to the same set of a semantic category. Moreover, they all belong to the standardized repertoire of political rhetoric that furnishes a limited range of closely guarded expressions. They appear in ‘accumulation’ Wrst on the level of the word, that is, when two related terms are joined together in a compound; second on the level of the compound when related compounds are arranged to textual sequences; third on the level of the single text which is in large part governed by compounds and sequences of compounds enhancing and complementing each other; and Wnally on the intertextual level of the whole series of inscriptions where we encounter additional variations and recombinations of the compounds and sequences. Of all the semantic and syntactic features of which the inscriptions are composed, categorical accumulation is the most forceful in creating a normative language that embodies the sense of uniWed order. The penultimate rhyme of the Mt. Yi inscription may serve to illustrate the eVect of this mode of composition: Disaster and harm are exterminated and erased, the black-haired people live in peace and stability, beneWts and blessings are long and enduring.

Ten of the twelve characters—the only exception being the term ‘the blackhaired people’ (qianshou)—follow the principle of categorical accumulation. In addition, these ten characters embody a complete chronological sequence (past–present–future); and Wnally, the Wrst and the third line represent a clear antithetical structure. In these three lines, which are entirely composed of stock vocabulary, we see the distillate of what the seven inscriptions are all about: the single and normative version of history in which everybody receives his proper name—hence the oYcially commanded designation ‘the black-haired people’—and proper treatment.

3 . H I S TO R I C IZ I N G A N D R I T UA L I Z I N G P O L I T I C A L S PACE The seven stele inscriptions were erected only at sites in the eastern new territories of the Qin empire. From the capital Xianyang, the nearest of these places—all of them mountains, probably with the exception of Jieshi—was Mt. Yi some 800 km linear distance away; Mt. Tai was another 100 km north of this. Mt. Langye was at a distance of more than 1,000 km from Xianyang, Mt. Zhifu about 1,100 km, and both Jieshi and Mt. Kuaiji some 1,200 km. With the exception of Jieshi when the emperor continued his tour for some distance further to the northern borders, the mountains at the

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seashore (Langye, Zhifu, Kuaiji) were his Wnal destinations in each region and the outermost points—relative to Xianyang—for him to visit. On separate travels, the emperor also went west and south, albeit without setting up stone inscriptions. His initial tour, which dates from the Wrst year after uniWcation (220 bc), led him from Xianyang some 470 km northwest to the border commandery Longxi, then back east to Beidi (180 km northwest of Xianyang) before he Wnally—on the same tour (?)—moved westwards to climb Mt. Jitou (270 km northwest of Xianyang); the whole tour was thus kept within the borders of the old state of Qin.23 To the south, probably down to the area of Lake Dongting (nearly 700 km southeast from Xianyang), the emperor went at least once in 211 bc; from here he proceeded east to Mt. Kuaiji. Both the Wrst circuit within the old Qin territory and the journey to the south were probably diVerent in purpose from the progress through the newly conquered eastern regions, which may explain why the inscriptions were conWned to the latter locations. The tour around the northwest might have served as the initial thanksgiving and announcement of the uniWcation to the people and—more importantly—the cosmic spirits of the old Qin state. The much later tour to the south was of a diVerent character. In 211 bc, the emperor and his entourage traveled to Yunmeng, north of Lake Dongting, where he oVered a wang (‘viewing from the distance’) sacriWce to the legendary universal ruler Shun whose spirit was believed to reside at Mt. Jiuyi. He then sailed down the Yangtze River, which he crossed at Danyang. At Qiantang, the famous tidal bore forced him again back west before he could cross the Zhe River (Zhejiang) and Wnally—after another turn east—reach Mt. Kuaiji.24 The monumental and subtly menacing inscriptions erected in the east were part of a diVerent ritual agenda: the proclamation of the conquest issued towards the conquered people and their spirits. By the sum of his tours, all of them Wnally directed to mountains, the First Emperor measured out his new empire. In the literal as in the symbolic sense, he went to his limits; any substantial move further would have led him straight into the dangerous terra incognita of non-Chinese lands. Especially Mt. Kuaiji, where the capital of the old state of Yue had been located, appears to have been recognized as the borderline between northern Chinese civilization and the unrestrained and uncontrollable world of barbarian people, as the uniquely strict and exhortative inscription of this site betrays: no other text in the series expresses a comparable concern with the social behavior of 23

Shi ji 6/241. See Shi ji 28/1370 (cf. also Han shu 25A/1205) and 6/260. According to Shi ji 6/248, there was another trip to the south as early as 219 bc. However, the itinerary given in Shi ji, when placed together with the other tours of 219/218 bc, seems unrealistic, if not indeed impossible. 24

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the common people or imposes similar threats on them. What at Wrst glance appears as ‘legalist’ (fa) harshness was likely the attempt to subjugate the border population of the southeast under the rule of northern Chinese civilization. This kind of ‘legalism’ was not at all paraded from the northeastern peaks located in the venerated homelands of ‘propriety’ (li). To the First Emperor, the sites of his stele inscriptions were both old and new: old in the cultural sense that they belonged either to the northeastern areas of the former Zhou oikumene where the ritualist ru tradition was at home or, in the case of Kuaiji, represented an important symbol of political mythology (see below); new in the political sense that these territories were now, for the Wrst time in history, conquered by Qin. With their continuous references to both the Zhou tradition and the military success of Qin, the inscriptions conveyed a powerful message: the First Emperor did not put an end to the tradition of the sage kings but, on the contrary, established himself as their true successor. When the ‘August Emperor’ conducted his progress through the east, he was aware of the traditions attached to his various destinations and to the political act proper of ‘touring’ newly conquered regions. The inscriptions were performances of political rhetoric not only through their contents, that is, their emphasis on the overall conquest, the foundation of the state, and the enforcement of social order. They also claimed to be the ultimate expression of a well-established demonstration of sovereignty, the tour of inspection.25 In the early empire, the venerated model of a cosmic ruler who had mounted the peaks of the four directions, measured out the empire, and set up an all-embracing order was the cultural hero Shun as he is described in the ‘Yao dian’ chapter of the Shangshu. The signiWcance of this famous passage can be grasped from its inclusion in the monographs on imperial sacriWces in both Shi ji and Han shu.26 The record of Shun’s initial tours of inspection matches all too perfectly what we are told about the First Emperor: In the second month of the year,27 (Shun) went east to visit (for inspection) those under his protection and arrived at (Mt.) Venerable Tai.28 He made a burnt oVering (to Heaven) and performed wang sacriWces in the correct sequence to the mountains and streams. Then he gave audience to the lords of the east, regulated the (calendar

25

On the political implications of the imperial tour of inspection, see Wechsler 1985, 161–9. For the whole passage, see Shangshu, ‘Shun dian’ 3/126b–127c; the text is also in Shi ji 28/ 1355–56 and Han shu 25A/1191, with some explanatory phrases inserted. 27 Compare the second line of the Mt. Zhifu inscription: ‘the season of middle spring’. 28 Daizong is another name for Mt. Tai. The formulation ‘to visit [for inspection] those under his protection’ reXects a traditional understanding of the term xunshou, usually translated as ‘tour of inspection’. 26

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of the) seasons and months, rectiWed the (designations of the) days, and made uniform the pitchpipes and the measures of length, capacity, and weight.29

After perfecting the diVerent rites according to the ranks of nobility and hence establishing the correct social order, Shun went home. In the same year he performed the identical set of rites and regulations during subsequent tours to the south, the west, and the north;30 each time, his destination proper was the main peak of the respective direction. Prominent features in the Shangshu account are the recurring initial sacriWces to Heaven and to the important mountains and streams of the region. As a prerogative of the universal ruler, the ordered, and ordering, sequence of sacriWces formally structured and demarcated the world under control: The Son of Heaven sacriWces to the famous mountains and great streams All-underHeaven, regarding the Wve peaks as his three high ministers, regarding the four streams as his feudal lords. The feudal lords sacriWce to the famous mountains and great streams within the borders of their territory.31

Modern scholarship on the Shangshu has established that an originally earlier ‘Yao dian’ chapter evidently underwent a redaction in Qin imperial times, leading to signiWcant textual changes and additions, among the latter including the account of Shun’s tour of inspection. The transmitted Han version of the Shangshu—the ‘New Text’ version provided by the former Qin erudite Fu Sheng (born 260 bc)—was most likely the Qin version of the text, prepared by the oYcially appointed erudites at the imperial court.32 It is indeed distinctly possible that the First Emperor in both his most solemn representation of political sovereignty, the feng and shan sacriWces,33 and in 29

Shangshu, ‘Shun dian’, 3/127b. Shun made his four tours of inspection all in the second month of the respective season: in the second month (spring) of the year to the east, in the Wfth month (summer) to the south, in the eighth month (autumn) to the west, and in the eleventh month (winter) to the north. Baihu tong 6/290 notes that the second and the eighth months are those of the equinoxes, while the Wfth and the eleventh months are those of the solstices; therefore, the ruler undertakes his tours of inspection always during these second months of the respective season. The sequence of Shun’s tours also reXects the systematic pairing of seasons and directions according to the cosmology of the Five Phases (wuxing), suggesting a late Warring States or early imperial date of composition of this portion of text. 31 Shi ji 28/1357. The parallel Han shu passage (25A/1193–4) extends the enumeration down to the common people who only sacriWce to their ancestors. 32 See Chen Mengjia 1985, 135–46; Jiang 1988, 140–68; for the role of the erudites and their scholarship at the Qin imperial court, see Kanaya 1992, 230–57. 33 For doubts on the antiquity of the feng and shan rituals, see Wechsler 1985, 171–2. Although the emperor may have developed his most ambitious ritual out of pre-existing local cults at Mt. Tai, there is no evidence that these had any connection with political representation. I am unable to trace the peak’s later political signiWcance to any text substantially predating the uniWcation of the empire. The earliest passage where Mt. Tai appears in a truly exalted position is Han Feizi 3/44, that is, in a Qin text almost contemporary with the inscriptions: here, we are 30

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the design of his tours of inspection might have created the very tradition that he purported to revive. Thus, the textual scholarship that furnished references to Shun as well as to the feng and shan sacriWces of high antiquity may have served to produce an imperial memory in order to traditionalize what was actually without precedent. Nothing would demonstrate more clearly the First Emperor’s quest for the sagely tradition than the Qin imperial invention of it. As is related in the Shi ji ‘Basic Annals’ and ‘Book on the feng and shan Rituals’ (‘Fengshan shu’) for the emperor’s visits to Mt. Tai and Mt. Yi,34 the First Emperor, on arrival at a mountain, faithfully emulated the allegedly old pattern and presented sacriWces before the oYcials inscribed the stele. Although the act of erecting a stele and inscribing it with a eulogy appears to be embedded in a ritual context designed after the model received from (or invented for) Shun, there remains a diVerence: unlike Shun, the Qin emperor did not transform chaos into cosmos but obtained control over already ordered regions which only had to be reordered to constitute the uniWed world under heaven. Thus, in choosing the places for the stele inscriptions, the emperor did not attempt to deWne a whole new set of sacred locations; instead, he purported to revive the sacriWces of old at established sites and to attach himself to the culture heroes of antiquity. Yet this posed a problem: after centuries of political disunion, there was little ritual practice to represent universal rulership. The rhetorical solution to this problem was a simple claim, based on the assumption that the inherent meaning of the rites did not reside in their outward shape: although the forms of the ancient rites had dimmed and faded, their names and supposed meanings were still clear and comprehensible and could be revived by a new or even improvised set of formal devices.35 This was true for the feng and shan rituals as well as for the sacriWces at Mt. Zhifu and Mt. Langye, the next two localities favored with stele inscriptions: these sites were regarded as links in a chain of eight peaks told that the legendary Yellow Emperor (Huangdi) once assembled the spirits on the top of Mt. Tai. It seems that the cosmic signiWcance of the mountain developed parallel to, or maybe even together with, the equally recent myth of the Yellow Emperor as a cosmic ruler. The Guanzi quotation in Shi ji 28/136—likely the source of the corresponding passage in the received Guanzi—is anachronistic and must be considered spurious. 34 Shi ji 6/242, 28/1366–7, cf. Han shu 25A/1201. Disregarding all later deWnitions of the term feng (cf. Wechsler 1985, 170–94), the passage might oVer the earliest explanation of what the feng ritual meant, at least to the First Emperor: the formula de feng used here may be understood literally as ‘to receive the Wef ’—not, of course, a small allotment from the King of Zhou but rather the world, presented by Heaven. 35 It is this image of rough improvisation that the historical records attach to the feng and shan rituals of both the First Emperor and Emperor Wu of the Han (r. 141–87 bc). See Shi ji 28/1366–7, 1397–8, Han shu 25A/1201–2, 1233–5.

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located in the former state of Qi where the ‘eight [cosmic] spirits’ (ba shen) received their oVerings. According to Shi ji and Han shu, the ‘eight spirits’ existed of old, but the remote origins of their cults, purportedly dating from the founding of the Zhou dynasty, lay in obscurity after the sacriWces had been discontinued at some point in the past. Allegedly reviving lost tradition, the Qin emperor sacriWced to the spirit of the Yang cosmic force at Mt. Zhifu and to the spirit of the four seasons at Mt. Langye,36 integrating the two places into his overall system of cosmic ritual. In sum, of the four mountains on former Qi territory to bear an inscribed stele, it is only Mt. Yi—located in the home county of Mencius and not far from Confucius’ birthplace—for which the sources fail to provide us with a signiWcant real or Wctive ritual tradition. But they do not fail to note that the emperor actually sacriWced to Mt. Yi, thereby endowing the place with a superior status in the ritual geography of the empire. A location for an inscription was never just somewhere. The eastern state of Qi had been subjugated in 221 bc as the last of the former six states conquered by Qin. This may explain why the First Emperor concentrated his Wrst series of inscriptions of 219 and 218 bc precisely in this area; in conjunction, he performed a series of diVerent sacriWces to all four mountains and presented additional wang oVerings to the other ‘famous mountains and great streams’ (mingshan dachuan) of the realm.37 These wang sacriWces served to manifest the spatial extension of legitimate sovereignty. They were by deWnition directed not to outlying regions in general but to the demarcated space under control, and only a universal ruler like Shun enjoyed the prerogative and actual power to perform them during his farXung tours of inspection.38 That the First Emperor recognized this model, furnished by his own oYcial erudites, appears from the fact that he honored the legendary sage ruler Shun himself with a wang sacriWce.39 Against this background, the concentration of stele inscriptions and related sacriWces in the most recently conquered territories must have been self-evident: presenting his oVerings to the mountains and rivers of the east and incorporating the former sacriWcial sites of Qi into his own cosmic ritual system, the First Emperor integrated the former territories of Qi into the empire. Qi was thus ritually transformed from a subject of its own history into an object of Qin history—which was the fundamental message to be deciphered from the

36

Shi ji 28/1367, Han shu 25A/1202. Shi ji 28/1367–8, Han shu 25A/1202. For the changing signiWcance of the wang sacriWce, see Bilsky 1975, i. 143–5, ii. 248, passim; Zhang Hequan 1989, 40–2. 39 Shun was obviously regarded as a mountain spirit, residing at his supposed burial place on Mt. Jiuyi. 37 38

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stelae, written in Qin script.40 In Lewis’s words: ‘In placing these inscriptions on peaks in the newly-conquered Eastern states, the First Emperor completed his conquest by inscribing the reality of his power, in the newly created imperial script, into the sacred landscape of his new subjects.’41 To understand the signiWcance of Jieshi and Mt. Kuaiji as natural sites to inscribe with Qin history, we must turn to a rather late layer of political mythology that we Wnd in the ‘Yu gong’ chapter of the Shangshu. Although under some suspicion of deriving from Qin imperial times, this chapter, which relates the merits of the sagely Yu the Great, might date from the mid-third century bc, that is, some decades before the imperial uniWcation.42 It is to Yu’s idealized geography of the world that some of the lines of the Langye inscription (61–6) refer, denoting the western and eastern limits of the empire. Mt. Jieshi is part of Yu’s geography where it marks the outermost point of the central province Jizhou, apparently the easternmost part of a mountain range that was leading to the sea.43 In the two Shangshu passages that refer to Jieshi, its mention closes the initial section of Yu’s geographical order. Mt. Kuaiji, on the other hand, denotes an ultimate border of a diVerent kind: ‘In the tenth year, Emperor Yu conducted a tour of inspection in the east. He reached Kuaiji and passed away.’44 The mythological signiWcance of Mt. Kuaiji in relation to Yu, another legendary sage ruler, is illustrated through a whole string of early references.45 Such references were known to the First Emperor and his court erudites. When after a long journey through the south he reached his Wnal destination, he 40 On the Qin script, see Qiu Xigui 2000, 89–112; Tsuruta 1989; Narita 1989. Chen Zhaorong 1997 has argued that the uniWcation of the script, initiated by the First Emperor and accomplished through the early decades of the Western Han, was highly eVective, rapidly eliminating regional writing styles and character variants. 41 Lewis 1999, 339. 42 See Jiang 1988, 173–99. Jiang argues for a date between 289 bc (the year of Mencius’ death) and 239 bc (the year when the Lu¨shi chunqiu was completed). One signiWcant diVerence between the ‘Yu gong’ and the ‘Yao dian’ chapters is the number of provinces into which the realm is divided: nine in ‘Yu gong’ but twelve in ‘Yao dian’. The number twelve may be related to the Qin imperial order. 43 See Shangshu, ‘Yu gong’, 6/147a, 151a, Shi ji 2/52, 67. Yu’s geography must have troubled the Shi ji author: where the Shangshu has Jieshi in the Wrst passage leading to the ‘[Yellow] River’ and in the second leading to the ‘[Eastern] Sea’, the Shi ji parallel text has in both places ‘Sea’, relating the location to the one the First Emperor had visited. 44 Shi ji 2/83. 45 In Guoyu 5/14a Confucius notes that ‘in times of old, Yu summoned the multitude of spirits on Mt. Kuaiji’. According to Han Feizi 5/91, Yu held audience with the nobles of the feudal lords on Mt. Kuaiji. According to a spurious Guanzi passage of unknown origins that is included in Shi ji 28/1361, Yu performed the feng sacriWce at Mt. Tai and the shan sacriWce at Mt. Kuaiji. Both Mozi 6/113 and Huainanzi 11/176 mention that Yu was buried here; the Yue jue shu 8/1b–2a and especially the Wu Yue chunqiu 6/8a–10b, claiming that it was Yu who initially had named Mt. Kuaiji, again elaborate extensively on the circumstances of the grave’s location.

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‘climbed Mount Kuaiji, sacriWced to Yu the Great, gazed over [the land by] the southern sea, and erected an inscribed stone to eulogize the virtuous power of Qin’.46 Thus, here again the act of erecting the stele is embedded in a broader religious tradition. Yu the Great, like Shun at Mt. Jiuyi, was as much a part of the cosmos as he was part of history. Sage rulers transformed into nature spirits, Shun and Yu were political ancestors of old who now resided on mountain peaks. In pre-imperial times, ancestral and cosmic sacriWces alike were governed by rules of prerogative: as the ancestral spirits would accept oVerings only from their legitimate descendant, a ruler could also address only the spirits of the mountains and rivers of his own domain. In sacriWcing to Yu and Shun, the First Emperor, being the one living human endowed with the prerogative to address these legendary rulers as both political ancestors and cosmic powers, expressed and enacted his own universal sovereignty. As human spirits, Yu and Shun represented the political model to emulate; as mountain spirits, they were approachable by the wang sacriWce. Thus, through his oVerings the First Emperor linked the historical to the cosmic dimension of imperial representation—displaying his accomplishments to the cosmic powers whom at the same time he appropriated as political ancestors. When the emperor connected himself to the mythical heroes of the past and had his merits recited and inscribed on mountain peaks, he simultaneously historicized his own ritual performance. Here, we turn back to the inscriptions proper as they routinely relate their own situational context. The Mt. Zhifu inscription translated above displays the standard textual structure: in its Wrst nine lines, it mentions the date, the designation of the emperor’s tour, his gazing over the new territory, and the oYcials’ recollection of the emperor’s achievements. This Wxed set of topoi self-referentially presents the situational context of the ritual performance—the very performance that culminated in the carving of the inscription. The following main portion of the inscription relates the actual contents of what the oYcials are pondering: the previous times of chaos and warfare, the First Emperor’s resolute and just elimination of the six former states, the consolidation of the new empire, and the prospect of eternal peace. Then, with its Wnal lines, the text steps again out of this narrative to return, in a closing self-referential gesture, to the situational context: The multitude of oYcials recited His merits, Asked to carve (this text) into stone, To express and transmit the constant model. 46

Shi ji 6/260.

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Thus, the text frames the historical narrative—the topic proper of the inscriptions—with two self-referential statements that are concerned not with the narrative of the uniWcation but with the appropriate ritual representation of this narrative. Through its Wnal gesture, the ritual act of commemoration itself turns into the closing moment of a sacred history that has reached its ultimate fulWllment. Again, the stele inscriptions operate fully within the ritual tradition: the same kind of self-reference is known as the ‘statement of dedication’ (‘So-and-so has made this vessel’) that Falkenhausen has identiWed as the core of pre-imperial bronze inscriptions, and it is typical of Shijing and early imperial ritual hymns that praise precisely the ritual eVorts to which their own performances actually belong.47 In this context, it is necessary to pay attention to the performative nature of the seven stele inscriptions. The verb song (‘to recite’) employed in the stele inscriptions is perfectly homophonous and therefore likely interchangeable with song * (‘to eulogize’). The latter is employed several times within the historical narrative of the Shi ji when introducing the process of making an inscription; according to these remarks, the oYcials carved the stones in order ‘to eulogize’ the virtuous power of Qin.48 In short, the two characters were perfectly interchangeable for denoting ‘to eulogize by means of recitation’. Considering the inscriptions’ strictly observed formal features of rhyme and meter, there is little doubt that the texts engraved on the stones were actually recited and not just silently carved.49 As noted at the beginning of this paper, the panegyrical or commemorative ‘stele inscription’ (bei) was most probably unknown as a discrete genre of literary expression in the days of the First Emperor; apparently this series of seven texts became the progenitor and model for the respective genre that began to Xourish only in Han times. It is therefore anachronistic to perceive of this set of Qin texts within the later notion of a literary genre called ‘stele inscription’; in the Wrst instance, they were poetic eulogies which then were carved and hence turned into ‘inscriptions’.50 To inscribe the eulogy into stone enforced its eYcacy but did not abandon its original performative nature. What is achieved by the rhetoric of integrating the situational context of the eulogy—its recitation and carving—into the ritual text itself, which hence 47

Falkenhausen 1993b, 152–5; Kern 2000a, 140–7; Kern 2000b, 58–66. Zhou li 23/158a. Tsuruma 1996, 4, even goes so far to speak of the ‘originally musical nature’ of the engraved imperial eulogies. 50 This basic character of the Qin stele inscription texts as eulogies was still recognized by Liu Xie who in Wenxin diaolong 9/322 and 11/401 discusses these writings under both categories ming (‘inscription’) and song* (‘enlogy’). 48 49

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becomes self-referential? I would suggest that ritual self-reference is based on the traditional Zhou ideological notion of ritual activity being as much an expression as an instrument of rulership. In other words, to display one’s merits—or those of one’s ancestors—in the appropriate way is itself meritorious and should therefore be included in one’s record of merits. In this sense, the inscription text by its concluding self-referential shift dramatizes and historicizes itself, integrating the ritual act of reciting merit and inscribing the stele into the purview of the foregoing historical narrative and at the same time bringing the narrative to its logical conclusion. At the very moment the inscription is carved it is already turned into a part of its own history— a history to be received by the spirits of the past, the living of the present, and the inWnite posterity of those to come. The concern with permanence and posterity that the stele inscriptions betray in their closing formulae is another feature that places them Wrmly in the tradition of Zhou bronze texts.51 In Zhou ancestral sacriWce, governed by the principle of reciprocity, exalting the model ancestors in the appropriate manner was to present oneself as their virtuous and worthy successor. By venerating his ancestors, the pious descendant, speaking simultaneously to the past, present, and future, made himself visible as a model for his own descendants, the future ancestor to be served with the same Wlial piety. ReXecting on this tradition, the Li ji provides an explicit account of the multidirectional purpose of an inscription.52 In short, the First Emperor, by inscribing not only his accomplishments but also the proper way of praising them, had his cake and ate it, too.

CODA According to the Shi ji, the First Emperor’s son, known as the ‘Second Generation [Emperor]’ (Ershi, r. 210–207 bc), also toured the empire in 209 bc to revisit the stelae set up by his father and to add secondary inscriptions to commemorate the original event of erecting the stones.53 The surviving inscription fragment from Mt. Langye indeed contains parts of only this secondary text. However, some modern scholars have argued that at least one or two of the original inscriptions attributed to the First Emperor 51 Xu Zhongshu 1936, 43, has noted that 70–80 per cent of Zhou bronze inscriptions included the Wnal prayer for longevity and permanence. 52 Li ji 49/378c. 53 Shi ji 6/267.

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were altogether retrospective creations by his son to begin with.54 The speciWc evidence for this argument seems inconclusive to me—and yet one might contemplate an even more radical proposal, namely, to consider all seven inscriptions as retrospectively and posthumously commemorating the late First Emperor’s uniWcation of the realm. In this scenario, the First Emperor of the inscriptions is no longer a historical actor singing his own praise but a ‘Wgure of memory’.55 There is nothing in our sources to support this idea with direct evidence; but reading the inscriptions from such a perspective provides another fascinating, and profoundly diVerent, understanding: of the Second Generation [Emperor] shaping the image of his father, of a consciousness of the uniWcation that developed only in retrospect and at a time of imminent dynastic crisis, and of the inscriptions themselves, in particular of their intrinsic textual frame that celebrates the creation of the stele texts just as much as the historical feats they are singing about. References Assmann, Jan, Das kulturelle Geda¨chtnis: Schrift, Erinnerung und politische Identita¨t in fru¨hen Hochkulturen. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1992. —— Moses the Egyptian: The Memory of Egypt in Western Monotheism. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 1997. Baihu tong 白虎通. Baihu tong shuzheng 白虎通疏證, by Chen Li 陳立. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1994. Bilsky, Lester James, The State Religion of Ancient China, 2 vols. Taipei (Chinese Association for Folklore) 1975. Chen Mengjia 陳夢家, Shangshu tonglun 尚書通論. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1985. Chen Zhaorong 陳昭容, ‘Qin ‘‘shu tong wenzi’’ xin tan 秦「書同文字」新探’, Bulletin of the Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica, 68: 3 (1997), 589–641. Chen Zhiliang 陳志良, ‘Taishan keshi kao (shang, xia) 泰山刻石考 (上,下)’, Shuowen yuekan 說文月刊 1: 2 (1939), 55–61; 1: 3 (1939), 31–43. Eno, Robert, ‘From Teachers to Texts: Confucian Collaborationism and Qin Encyclopaedism’, paper circulated in August 1999 on the Warring States Working Group e-mail list. Falkenhausen, Lothar von, Suspended Music: Chime-Bells in the Culture of Bronze Age China. Berkeley/Los Angeles (University of California Press) 1993 [¼ Falkenhausen 1993a].

54 See Chen Zhiliang 1939 and Tsuruma 1996 with regard to the inscription on Mt. Tai, and Tsuruma also with regard to the one on Mt. Yi. 55 For the concept of a ‘Wgure of memory’, developed with regard to Moses, see Assmann 1997, esp. chap. 1.

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—— ‘Issues in Western Zhou Studies: A Review Article’, Early China, 18 (1993), 139– 226 [¼ Falkenhausen 1993b]. Fayan 法言. Fayan yishu 法言義疏, by Wang Rongbao 汪榮寶. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1987. Guoyu 國語. Sibu congkan 四部叢刊 edn. Inaba Ichiro¯ 稻葉一郎, ‘Shin Shiko¯ no junshu to kokuseki 秦始皇の巡狩と刻石’, Shoron 書論, 25 (1989), 73–100. Jiang Shanguo 蔣善國, Shangshu zongshu 尚書綜述. Shanghai (Shanghai guji) 1988. Kanaya Osamu 金谷治, Shin Kan shiso¯ shi kenkyu¯ 秦漢思想史研究. 2nd rev. edn. Kyo¯to (Heirakuji shoten) 1992. Kane, Virginia C., ‘Aspects of Western Chou Appointment Inscriptions: The Charge, the Gifts, and the Response’, Early China, 8 (1982–3), 14–28. Keightley, David N., Sources of Shang History: The Oracle-Bone Inscriptions of Bronze Age China. Berkeley (University of California Press) 1978. Kern, Martin, The Stele Inscriptions of Ch’in Shih-huang: Text and Ritual in Early Chinese Imperial Representation. New Haven (American Oriental Society) 2000 [¼ Kern 2000a]. —— ‘Shi jing Songs as Performance Texts: A Case Study of ‘‘Chu ci’’ (‘‘Thorny Caltrop’’)’, Early China, 25 (2000), 49–111 [¼ Kern 2000a]. —— ‘The Performance of Writing in Western Zhou China’, in: Sergio La Porta and David Shulman (eds.), The Poetics of Grammar and the Metaphysics of Sound and Sign, Leiden (Brile) 2007, 109–76. Knechtges, David R., Wen xuan or Selections of ReWned Literature, vol. ii: Rhapsodies on SacriWces, Hunting, Travel, Sightseeing, Palaces and Halls, Rivers and Seas. Princeton (Princeton University Press) 1987. Lewis, Mark Edward, Writing and Authority in Early China. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1999. Mizusawa Toshitada 水澤利忠, Shiki kaichu¯ ko¯ sho¯ ko¯ ho 史記會注考證校補. 1st edn. 1957–70; repr. Shi ji huizhu kaozheng fu jiaobu 史記會注考證附校補. Shanghai (Shanghai guji), 1986. Narita Toshiki 成田年樹, ‘Shindai no moji shiryo¯: Kokuseki o chu¯shin toshite 秦代の 文字資料: 刻石を中心として’, Shoron 書論, 25 (1989), 114–22. Nylan, Michael. ‘Toward an Archaeology of Writing: Text, Ritual, and the Culture of Public Display in the Classical Period (475 B.C.E–220 C.E.)’, in: Martin Kern (ed.), Text and Ritual in Early China, Seattle (University of Washington Press) 2005, 3–49. Petersen, Jens Østerga˚rd, ‘Which Books Did the First Emperor of Ch’in Burn? On the Meaning of Pai Chia in Early Chinese Sources’, Monumenta Serica, 43 (1995), 1–52. Qiu Xigui, Chinese Writing. Berkeley (Society for the Study of Early China and The Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California) 2000. Rawson, Jessica, Western Zhou Ritual Bronzes in the Arthur M. Sackler Collections. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 1990. —— ‘Western Zhou Archaeology’, in: Michael Loewe and Edward L. Shaughnessy (eds.), The Cambridge History of Ancient China: From the Origins of Civilization to 221 B.C., Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1999, 352–449.

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Rong Geng 容庚, ‘Qin Shihuang keshi kao 秦始皇刻石考’, Yanjing xuebao 燕京學報, 17 (1935), 125–171. Shaughnessy, Edward L., Sources of Western Zhou History: Inscribed Bronze Vessels. Berkeley (University of California Press) 1991. Shirakawa Shizuka 白川静, Kinbun tsu¯shaku 金文通釋, 54 vols. Ko¯be (Hakutsuru bijutsukan) 1962–84. So, Jenny F. S., ‘Early Eastern Chou Bronze Vessels from Ch’in Territory’, in: Chan Ping-leung et al. (eds.), Essays in Commemoration of the Golden Jubilee of the Fung Ping Shan Library, Hong Kong (Fung Ping Shan Library) 1982, 415–21. Takigawa Kametaro瀧川龜太郎, Shiki kaichu¯ ko¯ sho 史記會注考證. 1st edn. 1934; repr. Shi ji huizhu kaozheng fu jiaobu 史記會注考證附校補. Shanghai (Shanghai guji) 1986. Tan Qixiang 譚其驤, Zhongguo lishi dituji 中國歷史地圖集, 8 vols. Shanghai (Ditu chubanshe) 1982–7. Tsuruma Kazuyuki 鶴間和幸, ‘Shin Shiko¯tei no to¯ho¯ junshu kokuseki ni miru kyoko¯sei 秦始皇帝の東方巡狩刻石に見る虛構性’, Ibaragi daigaku kyo¯ yo¯ bu kiyo¯ 茨城大學教養部紀要, 30 (1996), 1–33. Tsuruta Kazuo 鶴田一雄, ‘Shunju¯, Sengoku jidao no Shin no moji ni tsuite 春秋、戰 國時代の秦の文字について’, Shoron 書論, 25 (1989), 101–13. Venture, Olivier, ‘L’e´criture et la communication avec les esprits en Chine ancienne’, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, 74 (2002), 34–65. Wang Guowei 王國維, Shuijing zhu jiao 水經注校. Shanghai (Shanghai renmin) 1984. Wang Hui 王輝, Qin tongqi mingwen biannian jishi 秦銅器銘文編年集釋. Xi’an (San Qin) 1990. Wang Jingyang 王京陽, ‘Guanyu Qin Shihuang jici chuxun luxian di tantao 關於秦 始皇幾次出巡路線的探討’, Renwen zazhi 人文雜誌, 1980: 3, 70–6. Wechsler, Howard J., OVerings of Jade and Silk: Ritual and Symbol in the Legitimation of the T’ang Dynasty. New Haven (Yale University Press) 1985. Wenxin diaolong 文心雕龍. Wenxin diaolong yizheng 文心雕龍義證, by Zhan Ying 詹 詹. Shanghai (Shanghai guji), 1989. Wu Yue chunqiu 吳越春秋. Sibu congkan 四部叢刊 edn. Xu Zhongshu 徐中舒, ‘Qin wen guci shili 金文嘏辭釋例’, Academia Sinica, Bulletin of the Institute of History and Philology, 6: 1 (1936), 1–44. Yue jue shu 越絕書. Sibu congkan 四部叢刊 edn. Zhang Hequan 張鶴泉, Zhoudai jisi yanjiu 周代祭祀研究. Taipei (Wenjin), 1989.

The Res Gestae Divi Augusti and the Roman Empire Christian Witschel (Heidelberg)

1. INTRODUCTION The Wrst Roman emperor, Augustus, died on the 19th of August ad 14 in the Campanian town of Nola. Once his body had been brought back to Rome, his successor, Tiberius, convened the senate to discuss the honors to be bestowed on the deceased emperor. In the course of this session, four volumes were brought to the senate house and read aloud to the senators. They contained texts written in Augustus’ own hand that he had deposited with the Vestal Virgins before his death. One of them was a ‘catalogue of his deeds’ (Suetonius, Divus Augustus 101.4). In his will, Augustus had indicated that he wished this text to be inscribed on bronze tablets, which were to be displayed publicly in front of his mausoleum on the northern edge of the Campus Martius in Rome (Suetonius, loc. cit.; Cassius Dio 51.33.1). Tiberius dutifully fulWlled this task, and the text must have remained visible there throughout antiquity. But later on it was melted down, and no trace of it has been found in modern excavations around the mausoleum. Thus all knowledge of contents of this unique document was lost until a group of western diplomats visited the Ottoman Empire in 1555 and came to the town of Ankara. On a building that served as an annex to a mosque, but which had originally been a Roman temple and later a Christian church, they observed a long inscription in both Latin and Greek, which they soon realized was a copy of the lost index rerum gestarum of Augustus. The situation improved further when early in the twentieth century two more copies of the same text were found in other towns of the same region of Central Turkey. Although both their texts are very This paper is dedicated to Prof. Dr. Dr. h. c. Mult. Ge´xa Alfo¨ldy on the occasion of his 70th birthday. I would like to thank Achim Mittag and Fritz-Heiner Mutschler for inviting me to the highly stimulating Essen conference. My special thanks go to John Dillon (Yale University) who has carefully corrected my English text.

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fragmentary, they were nevertheless useful in reconstructing the original as it had been written by Augustus himself. With the help of all copies, the archetype has been established in such a way that few doubts concerning the wording of the original can remain.1 We are thus able to study the Res Gestae (as they are commonly called by modern scholars) in two ways: as a literary text of the Augustan age written by the emperor himself, and as an epigraphic monument of the Tiberian period. The present paper will explore the Res Gestae using this twofold approach.

2 . T H E RES GESTAE A S A L I T E R A RY T E XT OF THE AUGUSTAN AGE For reasons outlined below, I only use the (reconstructed) Latin version of the Res Gestae (RG) without the later additions for elucidating what Augustus himself might have intended when he Wrst wrote this text.2

(a) Date of composition There are two explicit hints in the text itself regarding the date of its composition: In chapter 4 Augustus indicates that he had written the text in the summer of ad 14; and in chapter 35, at the end of the text, he says that he was in his seventy-sixth year of life at the time of the writing (i.e. after the 23rd of September in ad 13). There is no evidence whatsoever that these two passages were only added later, and we thus learn from them that Augustus worked on the RG during the last year of his life. Although this fact seems unassailable, it certainly remains possible that he had already started to draft the text of the RG, which was clearly of the greatest importance to him, earlier in his life. It is indeed remarkable that there are only a few allusions to events in the last third of his reign, and the climax he himself had chosen for the Wnal chapter of the RG belongs to the year 2 bc. It might therefore be postulated that Augustus began to compose the RG in that very year, reworking the text until the summer of ad 14. But this remains pure speculation, and I Wnd it 1

For the text of the Res Gestae, see the editions of Volkmann 1969 and Gage´ 1977. The modern literature on the RG is of enormous extent and cannot be cited in detail here. With regard to the following discussion, the reader is generally asked to look to Gage´ 1977 and Ramage 1987 for more information and a review of previous scholarship. For the more recent literature, cf. also Ridley 2003. 2

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diYcult to detect clearly deWned chronological ‘layers’ in a text we know was quite carefully redrafted by the emperor only weeks before his death. For our purposes, it is probably enough to say that the text as we have it was certainly written by Augustus in the last period of his life, after he had achieved his unique position within the Roman society and state of his day.

(b) Literary genre Much modern discussion has centered on the question of which literary genre the RG might have belonged to. Some have maintained that as it contains long lists of things Augustus had done, it should indeed primarily be seen as a catalogue of his most important achievements, a sort of Rechenschaftsbericht from the emperor to the senate and the people of Rome. But the text is obviously much more than that. Other scholars have highlighted the relationship of the RG to texts connected to the funeral of an important person, such as the laudatio funebris, which was delivered in the forum and listed the main achievements of the dead man; or to epigraphic texts (elogia) written on grave monuments that again contained a summary of the most important deeds of the deceased. The fact that the RG were displayed before Augustus’ mausoleum where other such elogia for members of the imperial family were to be seen in some numbers could also point in this direction. But there are severe obstacles to this theory: The text is far longer and much more elaborate than a normal elogium, and the persistent use of the Wrst person throughout the document (whereas the elogia are usually written in the third person) also tells against the notion of seeing the RG as a sort of drawn-out elogium. Other theories are even less convincing, and it seems therefore best not to indulge in a rigid classiWcation of a text which is, after all, unique in Roman literary history, but rather to study it in its own right.

(c) Organization of the text and content The text is divided into 35 chapters of unequal length. There is no continuous ‘history’ and also no strict chronological order in the presentation of the— numerous—facts.3 The narrative structure of the document is paratactic; often one piece of information is added to another without any interconnecting 3 There is, however, a sort of very abridged biography spread out over the whole document in chaps. 1–2, 25, and 34–5 which present the most important steps in Augustus’ career from his Wrst appearance on the political scene in 44 bc to the memorable year 2 bc when he received the title of pater patriae.

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phrase, and it is sometimes diYcult to follow the text’s line of argument.4 But some larger thematic sections can readily be made out: A short introduction is followed by a list of the honors which were given to Augustus during his lifetime. Next comes an enumeration of the amounts of money spent by Augustus on various projects. The third section deals with the main (military) deeds of Augustus. The last two chapters (34–5) present a sort of summary, pointing to the central achievements of Augustus in establishing peace and restoring the Roman res publica and again to some of the major honores bestowed upon him. The text is written in a crisp prose style that avoids rhetorical extravagancies. Augustus nevertheless did not miss the opportunity to stress the uniqueness of what he had done for the Roman people. Two recurring phenomena in the text underline this: On the one hand, his insistence that he had been the Wrst of all Romans to do a given thing; on the other hand, his love for numbers and statistics, which crop up throughout the text. These sections can be rather boring, but they give the text an appearance of the utmost exactitude and correctness, which the reader then automatically transfers to the other statements contained in it. Of course nearly everything that might be seen as negative for Augustus’ image is omitted, so that many important events during his reign do not appear in the text.

(d) Purpose of the text and intended audience The question of the ‘message’ Augustus actually wanted to convey—and to whom—by writing the RG has aroused a considerable debate in classical scholarship.5 Quite predictably with such a complex text full of information and allusions, no consensus has been reached, which probably also reXects the fact that there is no single, all-embracing message that can be detected throughout the text. Obviously, Augustus had diVerent aims in mind when he wrote the RG. One of these was certainly to justify what he had done and to explain his deeds to posterity, especially to the Roman youth who could learn from such an exemplum. Augustus was very much concerned about the memory people would keep of him after his death, and his insistence that the text be engraved in bronze and thus remain visible to future generations illustrates his desire for a—favorable—memoria that ought to last for centuries to come. But there is much more in the text. Augustus had established a 4 For one of the best discussions of the organization and narrative structure of the RG, see Heuß 1975. 5 Cf., for example, Ramage 1987, esp. 111–16 and Yavetz 1990.

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new form of government, which was de facto a monarchy but could by no means be called one. It was of the greatest importance for him to show that his power had been achieved in a way acceptable according to the traditions of Roman society. A recurring theme in the RG is therefore the legitimacy of Augustus’ rule, which is stressed again and again: He had laid down his extraordinary powers, and had then received only such honors which Wtted into the established framework of the res publica. In this context, it was also very important for Augustus to highlight those powers which he had not received or had deliberately rejected as incompatible with the tradition. Augustus further indicates almost obsessively that, in each case an honor was given to him, it was done in a legal way. So we read in nearly every chapter that either the senate or the people of Rome or both together decided this or that in honor of Augustus. This whole process was deeply embedded in with the strict hierarchical order of Roman society: It was usually accepted that the state was governed by only a small group of leading citizens, but everyone expected these men to use all their energy to serve the state and also to spend large amounts of their wealth on their compatriots. In return, the leading citizens could expect to be honored by the people in various ways, especially those which would bring them a long-lasting memoria embodied in inscriptions, statues, or even entire buildings. This kind of reciprocity in the relationship of leading men and Roman people is one of the main underlying themes of the RG. It is summed up in a famous sentence in chapter 34: Here it is claimed that Augustus did not have more power (potestas) than any other magistrate who was his colleague (surely an understatement, but one very much in line with the ‘legalistic’ approach of the whole document), but that he surpassed all other men in auctoritas. This immensely loaded word is diYcult to translate with one single modern term, but it ought to mean that Augustus had—through his remarkable deeds and the honors he had been awarded for them—attained such a high social standing and such fame that there was no one comparable to him. And there is even more to be found in the RG about his position in society: Also in chapter 34 we learn about the clupeus virtutis which had been oVered to Augustus in (probably) 27 bc when he had ‘restored’ the res publica to its former constitution. The shield contained a brief inscription which listed the four main virtues of Augustus, namely his (military) prowess, his clemency, his justice, and his piety. This was a kind of standard catalogue, but Augustus was very careful to show that he had lived up to these moral expectations. So throughout the text we can see a ruler in action who indeed incorporated all the virtues named on the shield. This is at some points made explicit, but more often the reader must gather the relevant information from the context.

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On an even broader level, the RG try to construct an image of a sole ruler, which was a novelty in the Roman world. As Roman society consisted of quite divergent groups—the most important ones being the upper class of senators and knights, the urban lower classes of Rome, the soldiers, and the provincials—there was a variety of expectations of how an emperor should behave. The senators were the ones most interested in maintaining the traditions of the republican state; they were therefore keen to see the ruler as one of their own, who treated them as equals and did not show any monarchical behavior, but acted like a fellow citizen. The plebs urbana saw the emperor as a kind of super-patronus and benefactor of the whole city and expected above all ‘bread and games’ from him. The soldiers wanted a victorious general as their commander-in-chief. And, Wnally, many people throughout the empire did not at all regard the emperor as a fellow citizen, but as a superhuman being who could be treated adequately only in the form of cultic worship. An emperor who wished to be accepted by a broad spectrum of the population and thus give his reign stability had to address all of these expectations and act accordingly—he thus had to ‘play’ a number of divergent ‘roles’. Augustus was a master of this ‘game’, as is shown in the RG, where all of these roles crop up in diVerent contexts, although the last one—the godlike emperor—is only very cautiously and indirectly hinted at, because it was not as acceptable in Rome itself. This brings us back to the question of the audience Augustus had in mind when he wrote the RG. Again, there has been much scholarly debate on which group of the population might have been his primary target. From what I have said above, it should be quite clear that I believe that this question is misconceived: The RG were not designed to please one special group in Roman society, but, on the contrary, were carefully drafted in such a way that everyone could Wnd ‘his’ emperor represented in the text. There is perhaps only one exception: As noted above, the superhuman nature of Augustus, which was recognized throughout the empire already during his lifetime by the establishment of a host of cults to him as a God, does not feature prominently in the text. And it is further remarkable that events outside Rome and Italy play only a very minor role in the RG, except for the military actions of Augustus and his diplomatic successes. It thus seems quite clear that the text as Augustus wrote it was Wrst of all directed to an audience—consisting of all social groups—in the capital of the empire; and Augustus himself seems only to have cared for the publication of the text in Rome. It is therefore all the more remarkable that we know the RG through copies that have surfaced not in Rome, but in one of the remoter parts of the empire, namely in the interior of Anatolia, and it is this problem that we turn to next.

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3. THE RES GESTAE A S A N E P I G R A P H I C M ON U M E N T OF THE TIBERIAN P ERIOD

(a) The monument in Rome in its original setting But Wrst of all we have to cast a brief glance at the display of the RG in Rome. As no trace of it has survived, we must rely on literary sources and surviving monuments to reconstruct the original setting of the RG in the capital. We know the following facts: .

Augustus wished the text of the RG to be inscribed in bronze (presumably bronze tablets). 6 . These bronze tablets were to be attached to two pillars. . The two pillars stood in front of Augustus’ mausoleum, probably isolated from the monument itself, at both sides of the passage which led to the monumental entrance of the tomb (Fig. 10).7 Two important questions remain: Why were the RG displayed at exactly this point of the city? And what was the signiWcance of an epigraphic monument like this for the broader public in Rome? Concerning the Wrst point, it has to be remarked that the mausoleum was certainly not the only choice one could think of as the setting for the RG.8 Another public space which encapsulated the Augustan ideology to a high degree would have been the forum of Augustus in the center of the city. Why then the mausoleum? The question is not easy to answer, but we can draw attention to a few facts that might be of some importance: The mausoleum was the Wrst of Augustus’ great building projects in Rome, as work on the monument had already started in the later 30s bc. And it was certainly the most grandiose building scheme he had ever devised, dominating the whole northern part of the Campus Martius. The building had originally been planned in a very diVerent political atmosphere: as a propaganda tool to counter the aspirations of Augustus’ enemy Marcus Antonius, but also as a means of claiming absolute power for the ruler himself. But when the building was inaugurated in 28 bc circumstances had changed greatly, and the surrounding parks were opened for the populace of Rome to become an attractive place for recreation. In the following years, the mausoleum was integrated into a completely new design for the northern half 6

Cf. Premerstein 1932. Hesberg and Panciera 1994, 31 f. For the wider context of the following discussion, cf. the paper by Rolf Schneider in this volume. 7 8

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of the Campus Martius, which included two highly signiWcant monuments: the ‘Altar of Peace’ (Ara Pacis) and the sundial of Augustus which was a symbol for the new cosmological order. Finally, by ad 14 the mausoleum had seen frequent use as the burial place of members of the imperial family who had died before Augustus. These dead men were commemorated by a variety of monuments in the area around the mausoleum, including elogia inscribed on to the fac¸ade of the building and decrees of the senate in their honor engraved in bronze and set up in front of the mausoleum.9 The RG were thus seen not in isolation but in surroundings already full of inscriptions of a broadly similar kind, although they certainly surpassed all others. This brings us to the second question: What did this monument mean to the ordinary citizen in Rome? It is all too easy to forget that the Roman world was not one in which everyone could read a long and complicated text like that of the RG. Although no scholarly consensus has been reached on the question of ancient literacy, it seems to me quite certain that even in a place like Rome far more than half of the inhabitants were not literate enough to understand the RG, especially if we bear in mind that the lettering of the inscription must have been rather small. One is led to suspect that the readability of the text was perhaps not the prime concern after all. This phenomenon turns up again and again with other Roman texts which were inscribed in a similar way on bronze tablets for public display. It certainly mattered that theoretically they could be read by everyone who passed by, but for most people it was probably enough to know that the text was there and that it was Wxed in a durable material. The last point is a very important one:

Fig. 10. Reconstruction of the mausoleum Augusti in Rome 9

See Hesberg and Panciera 1994, esp. 52, 66, 112, 174 f.

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Everyone could see this shining monument of bronze and thus be reassured that the text would last forever, as in the Roman world ‘inscribing in bronze’ was a metaphor for ‘preserving a text for eternity’. Texts inscribed in bronze therefore had a quasi-magical aura which went far beyond the mere words which could be read on the monument. For most people it was thus suYcient to realize that these were the words of Augustus himself and that by inscribing them on bronze he had assured that they would not be forgotten by posterity.

(b) The copies of the Res Gestae in Galatia As mentioned in the introduction, we possess three copies of the RG, all of which were found in the interior of Asia Minor in the Roman province of Galatia. These are the following: The Monumentum Ancyranum (MonAnc): In the town of Ancyra (Ankara) a large Roman temple still exists of which only the cella is preserved (Fig. 11).10 In front of the cella is an ante-room (pronaos); and the lower parts of the side walls of this pronaos were used to inscribe the Latin text of the RG, whereas the Greek text was engraved on one of the outer walls of the cella.11 The temple was almost certainly dedicated to the cult of the Dea Roma and Augustus himself, thus functioning as the provincial center of the imperial cult (see below). The date of the temple has been extensively debated in recent years.12 There is now a growing consensus that work on it had already begun in the middle years of Augustus’ reign, but that it took rather a long time to Wnish the building which was probably inaugurated in ad 19/20. It was deWnitely not envisaged to engrave the RG on the walls of the building from the outset. This must have been an afterthought, which quite reasonably occurred at a point when construction work was nearing completion, i.e. in the period shortly before ad 20. The Monumentum Antiochenum (MonAnt): The Roman colony of Antiochia ad Pisidiam was dominated by a huge building complex consisting of a central temple, surrounding porticoes, a lavishly decorated entrance gate (propylon), and a large square in front of it.13 In the latter place, hundreds of often tiny fragments of a long Latin inscription were found, which turned out to be the remains of another copy of the RG.14 We do not know exactly where 10 The fundamental study of the temple is Krencker and Schede 1936. Cf. also Ha¨nleinScha¨fer 1985, 185–90 cat. A 43; Su¨ß 1999, 64–8, 91 f., 120–4, 215–18, 272. 11 Krencker and Schede 1936, 51 f. The standard edition of the text is still Mommsen 1883. 12 Cf. Halfmann 1986; Mitchell 1986; Leschhorn 1992. 13 A detailed description of the complex is now to be found in Mitchell and Waelkens 1998, 113–73. Cf. also Ha¨nlein-Scha¨fer 1985, 191–6 cat. A 43; Su¨ß 1999, 68–73, 150–4, 175–8, 240–6. 14 The basic edition of this text is Ramsay and Premerstein 1927.

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Fig. 11. The cella of the temple of Roma and Augustus in Ancyra

this text was originally set up, but it has been proposed that it was Wxed to the interior side walls of the propylon.15 The propylon would have been a signiWcant place: Everyone had to pass by it, and its sculptural decoration included numerous allusions to the Augustan ideology. It is not absolutely certain to whom the temple was dedicated, but the evidence is again very much in favor of the imperial cult.16 As far as chronology is concerned, the propylon can now be dated with certainty to the year 2/1 bc.17 The temple is probably slightly later, i.e. late Augustan. In this case, we have no idea when exactly within the early Tiberian period the copy of the RG was published in Antiochia. The Monumentum Apolloniense (MonApoll): In the town of Apollonia six fragments18 of a larger monument have been found, containing only the 15 This reconstruction was Wrst proposed by Ramsay and Premerstein 1927, 4, 13–16; it has been repeated by Mitchell and Waelkens 1998, 146, 164. A new architectural study of the propylon by Ingeborg Kader has, however, raised serious doubts concerning this hypothesis (Kader, personal communication). 16 Cf. Mitchell and Waelkens 1998, 157–67. 17 Mitchell and Waelkens 1998, 146 f. 18 Le Bas and Waddington 1972, no. 1194 A–C; Inscriptiones Graecae ad res Romanas pertinentes III 323; Buckler, Calder, and Guthrie 1933, no. 143 A–C (A ¼ Le Bas/Waddington C).

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Fig. 12. Reconstruction of the statue-base in Apollonia

Greek text of the RG. At the top of the text there was an inscription not belonging to the RG, and from this we learn that the inhabitants of Apollonia had dedicated the whole monument to the deiWed Augustus and some members of his family (Fig. 12). It is very likely that the monument was a large statue base on top of which stood images of Augustus and his relatives.19 It can be dated to the years between ad 14 and 19,20 and it seems likely that the plan to engrave the RG on the front side of the monument was contemporary with the erection of the statues. The date of the monument can perhaps be narrowed down even further, as we know from another inscription that a leading citizen of Apollonia put up three statues in an imperial sanctuary around ad 20.21 It is tempting to think that the MonApoll also belonged to this spatial and chronological context and should therefore be dated to roughly the same period as the MonAnc. When the RG were published, the province of Galatia was a rather recent addition to the Imperium Romanum.22 It had only been annexed to the empire in 25 bc. In the period immediately following the annexation, the Romans installed a new administrative structure in this region. This was accomplished not only by sending a governor to the province, but above all 19

See Buckler, Calder, and Guthrie 1933, 49–56 no. 143 with Wg. 17. Ibid. 53 f. 21 Ibid. no. 142. For the temenos, see Ha¨nlein-Scha¨fer 1985, 270 cat. I 5; Su¨ß 1999, 286. 22 For the history of the province of Galatia in the early imperial period, cf. Leschhorn 1992 and Mitchell 1993. 20

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by creating a network of self-governing cities in a region which had been largely under-urbanized up to that time. In order to achieve this goal, the Roman government relied on diVerent mechanisms:23 In the northern part of the province, the old Celtic tribes were turned into Greco-Roman poleis with an urban center for each of them, namely Pessinous, Tavium, and especially Ancyra, which also became the capital of the new province. This meant that the governor regularly resided there and that the provincial assembly of the Galatians (the koinon to¯n Galato¯n) met once a year in Ancyra. In the southern part of the province other devices were used. This area had been more civilized before the arrival of the Romans, but it was also notorious for its warlike inhabitants who were not easy to control. Augustus therefore installed a number of Roman colonies in the region, the most important of which was Antiochia ad Pisidiam, where some hundred colonists from Italy were settled. Other towns already established were not completely re-founded, but their interior structure was changed to a considerable degree by the arrival of a number of colonists there. One such city was Apollonia. Another phenomenon that particularly helped to foster a new provincial identity in Galatia and to accelerate the process of urbanization was the imperial cult.24 As mentioned above, it was quite natural for many inhabitants of the Roman Empire to see the emperor as a sort of godlike ruler; and it was the easiest way to confront such a superhuman being by oVering it cultic worship. Right from the beginning of Augustus’ sole rule, numerous cults for him sprang up throughout Asia Minor both on a provincial and on a municipal level. We can see this Wrst in the provinces of Asia and Bithynia, where a provincial cult was already installed in 29 bc,25 but the regions of the interior were soon to follow. It is important to note that wherever we have suYciently detailed evidence for the development of these cults we learn that the initiative came from below, i.e. from the subjects, who would then ask the emperor for permission to found a new cult in his honor.26 It is thus crucial to stress that the imperial cult was not a scheme devised to control the loyalty of the provincials from above, but that in most cases it reXected a real desire on the part of the subjects to integrate the emperor into their local world. The imperial cult was therefore an ideal way for communication between the provincials and the emperor. This also seems to have happened in Galatia. It is quite reasonable to suppose that a koinon was established soon after the creation of the province 23

Cf. Mitchell 1993, 70–91. Cf. ibid. 100–17; Su¨ß 1999. Cassius Dio 51.20.7; cf. Deininger 1965, 16–19. 26 This is clearly seen in Cassius Dio’s report on the installation of the provincial cult in the province of Asia; see n. 25. 24 25

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in the late 20s bc;27 and one of the main tasks of the koinon was precisely the administration of the provincial cult of the emperor. We have seen that the temple in Ancyra on which the RG were inscribed was in all probability the center of this provincial cult. Already under construction in the later years of Augustus, it was probably brought to completion in the earlier part of Tiberius’ reign. At roughly the same period, we can also see the development of municipal cults dedicated to Augustus—as in Antiochia or in Apollonia. It thus becomes clear that the late Augustan/early Tiberian phase was a decisive period for the formation of the imperial cult in Galatia,28 and it is surely no coincidence that all the copies of the RG belong to this very context. The local publication of the RG was thus an integral part of the process of communication between emperor and subjects. We have no ‘hard’ evidence to answer the question of how the inhabitants of the Galatian towns reacted to the text of the RG. Many passages which dealt with constitutional details, republican traditions, or Augustus’ spending on the city of Rome can hardly have meant anything to them. But I believe that a close reading or correct understanding of the text was even less important for the provincials than for the ordinary citizens of Rome, especially if we consider the contexts in which the RG were displayed in Galatia. Integrated into the ‘landscape’ of the imperial cult, the copies of the RG resided in a highly signiWcant place: Everyone knew that these were the words of the emperor himself who was worshiped as a god in the same environment. And everyone could see that Augustus had listed and explained his achievements in a long and elaborate text which matched the greatness of his deeds. This was indeed a Wtting tribute to the ‘conqueror of the world’ and ‘godlike savior’ as he was experienced by many people in the Greek world.

(c) The transmission of the text from Rome to Galatia One further question remains to be answered: How was the text transferred from Rome to Galatia, and why is it that copies of the RG have only been found in this single province? There are a number of uncertainties surrounding the problem. First of all we have to stress that we are only speaking about the publication of the RG in some durable material like bronze or stone—there could have been many more ‘copies’ of the text on papyrus or wooden tablets which have vanished without trace. But, as we have outlined above that the publication of the text in a form that was to last for centuries 27 28

Deininger 1965, 20 f. Cf. Mitchell 1986; but see also Mitchell 1993, 102 f.

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had a value in itself, it is surely important to ask why copies of this kind have only been detected in such a limited and remote area. If there had been more copies, especially in stone, in other regions of the empire, there should remain some traces of them—an inscription of such length is not normally altogether lost, if many versions of it existed in antiquity. The preservation of copies of the RG only in Galatia thus seems to be more than a mere accident, and we have to consider this problem with care. The Galatian copies of the RG consist of the following elements: MonAnc: The Latin text including a title which was perhaps modeled after the Roman original but which was clearly adapted to the provincial setting: it states that the text is a copy of the text in Rome and that this copy had been attached to another document that is not named explicitly. At the end of the text there is an appendix containing a summary of Augustus’ expenses, building projects, and games, clearly not written by Augustus himself, as it is composed in the third person. Finally the Greek text with a title that states that it is a translation; and a Greek version of the appendix that diVers considerably from the Latin text. MonAnt: Only the Latin text with title and appendix (both being more or less identical with the MonAnc as far as can be guessed from the fragments).29 MonApoll: Only the Greek text, as far as we can see without the title and the appendix. The Latin text of the MonAnc and the MonAnt and the Greek text of the MonAnc and the MonApoll show some minor variations but obviously both go back to a common source:30 The Latin text derives ultimately from the archetype in Rome which was later ‘enriched’ by the addition of the title and the appendix; the Greek version from a translation of the Latin original. Concerning the latter, there has been much discussion on the question of who could have been responsible for it:31 Someone in Rome working in the direct vicinity of the imperial court, or a provincial in the East, perhaps in Galatia itself? This question cannot be answered from the text itself, but only by studying the whole context of the transmission of the RG from center to periphery. The written sources are absolutely silent with regard to this process. We therefore do not know whether it was planned from the outset to publish the text outside Rome. There is nothing on the subject in Augustus’ orders concerning the RG, and we have no evidence for Tiberius’ attitude regarding this question. But given the fact that the text of the RG is so strongly focused 29 30 31

See Ramsay and Premerstein 1927, 23 f. Cf. the good discussion in Gage´ 1977, 47–51. Cf. Wigtil 1982 as well as the skeptical position advanced by Ramage 1987, 126–31.

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on matters in Rome, I consider it unlikely that either Augustus or Tiberius had elaborate plans for the distribution of the text throughout the whole empire. So how did the RG reach Galatia? It is possible that the senators who decreed numerous honors for the dead Augustus also passed a senatus consultum on the question of the RG. As in similar cases, this might have contained rather detailed instructions concerning the publication of the document. It was normally envisaged that texts like this should be put on public display in the capital cities of the provinces and sometimes also in other important towns. To this end, copies must have been sent from Rome to the provinces. But besides the fact that we know nothing of this sort concerning the RG, it remains strange that copies of it have been only found in the restricted area of Galatia. This phenomenon, however, is not unique to the RG, but can be seen in the case of at least two other important documents: In ad 20 the senate passed a decree condemning one Cn. Calpurnius Piso while at the same time celebrating the reigning Emperor Tiberius. This senatus consultum was to be published (in bronze) in every provincial capital of the empire.32 But the copies of the text we have are all from only one province, namely Baetica in southern Spain. And these are not from the provincial capital Co´rdoba, but from much smaller towns.33 On one of these copies, a title precedes the actual document which indicates that the governor of the province had apparently been responsible for the fact that the text was to be inscribed.34 He had presumably published the text of the senatus consultum in Co´rdoba together with an edict of his own in which he indicated that he ‘wished’ the text to be multiplied. This was then duly taken up by the towns of his province who copied the text, but unfortunately not the edict, so that we cannot be sure about the details. We are better informed with regard to another, much later document, i.e. Diocletian’s edict on maximum prices of ad 301. Again the copies of this text inscribed in stone are restricted to a very few provinces, although the regulations were valid in the whole empire. One of these copies actually contains in addition to the text an edict of the provincial governor which makes clear that he wanted the document to be published throughout the district under his control.35 Something similar might have happened in Galatia: A governor eager to impress the emperor by a demonstration of loyalty published the text of the RG, which he had presumably received directly from Rome, in his capital Ancyra. In front of the copy he placed his own edict in which he explained the 32 33 34 35

For the following discussion, cf. Eck, Caballos, and Ferna´ndez 1996, 279–87. Ibid. 1–37. Cf. ibid. 126–30. Crawford and Reynolds 1975.

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importance of the text which followed and probably urged his subjects to produce publications of their own.36 He may also have added the appendix; and I consider it quite likely that the Greek translation was done in the same context in order to facilitate the dissemination of the text in the Greekspeaking province of Galatia.37 The governor may even have sent further copies together with a cover letter to the most important towns of his district. But the whole process could not have worked without the consent of the provincials who, after all, were ultimately charged with the task of engraving the text on the spot. There must have been some sort of collaboration, which is easy to imagine in a situation as the one we have outlined above, i.e. in a period when the imperial cult just began to reach its highest degree of popularity. A natural partner for the governor would have been the provincial koinon38—especially as we know from the neighboring province of Asia that governor and koinon indeed collaborated to spread the new image of Augustus.39 It therefore comes as no surprise that we Wnd the most elaborate copy of the RG precisely on the walls of the provincial center of the imperial cult administered by the koinon. The koinon may then have encouraged its members to follow suit—perhaps even indicating that the local sanctuaries for Augustus would be an ideal place for engraving the text of the RG. But in the end it was up to the local magistrates to decide in which exact form they wanted the text to be displayed. It therefore seems important to stress that the dissemination of the RG was not a unilateral process dictated from above, but that diVerent institutions—mostly provincial and local ones—worked together to create the pattern of the text’s distribution as we have it. This in turn raises the problem of the relationship between the Res Gestae and the wider context of the Roman Empire.

4 . T H E RE S GE STAE AND T HE RO MAN E MPIRE

(a) The empire in the Res Gestae The empire as a functioning body and its numerous inhabitants were of no real interest to the author of the RG. Instead, Augustus presented a very 36

Another case where we can see a Roman oYcial urging his subjects to join him in celebrating the emperor and his family is presented by an inscription from Messene: Supplementum epigraphicum Graecum, 23 (1968) no. 206. 37 Cf. Premerstein 1932, 199 f. 38 Cf. Deininger 1965, 66–9; Mitchell 1986, 31. 39 See Orientis Graeci inscriptiones selectae 458 with the commentary by LaY 1967.

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traditional picture of Roman imperialism which was based on victory and conquest. In this scenario there was no doubt that Rome was the center of the orbis terrarum and nearly the only place a good emperor had to care for intensively. Rome was also the scene for the most important political rituals, as well as for the communication between the emperor, the senate, and the plebs urbana. At some points, Italy as the core region of the empire also plays a certain role within the RG, whereas the outlying parts of the Roman world only come into focus as an area where the Roman army under the high command of the victorious emperor could show its military prowess. The mentality of Roman geographers and mapmakers of the early imperial period was broadly comparable to the outlook of the RG in that they presented the expansive nature of Roman rule, the vastness of the empire achieved through military deeds, and the central role played therein by the city of Rome.40 But on the other hand these authors showed more interest in the universe of the Roman world, in rather remote regions and in the way alien people were integrated into the empire. This attitude might partly be explained by looking to the way the Imperium Romanum functioned in practice. Here we notice that in this very period the empire started to become much more integrated than it had been during the time of the republic. This was realized not only by the establishment of a new administrative framework, but also by oVering chances for social advancement to local elites who began to identify themselves with the Imperium. Nothing of this kind of interaction is to be found in the RG: Augustus does not even mention that he created numerous new provinces, but simply states that he had enlarged the existing ones and had sent his troops to the remotest regions of the known world.41 And although he had been very active in fostering building projects in many provinces of the Roman Empire, nearly none of these is mentioned in the RG. So how could the Res Gestae leave any impression on the inhabitants of the Imperium Romanum and on the way they envisaged the empire?

(b) The Res Gestae (and similar monuments) in the empire Inscriptions played an important part in the ‘cultural revolution’ that reshaped the image of Rome during the reign of Augustus. For the Wrst time in Roman history, monumental inscriptions were put on public display in huge numbers to convey a positive image of the new ruler as well as ideological

40 41

Cf. Nicolet 1991, 95–122 and especially the paper by Katherine Clarke in this volume. See Heuß 1975, 70 f.

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messages which seemed central to him. These consisted both of shorter texts like the many building inscriptions which eternalized Augustus’ program of restructuring Rome, and of more complex ones like the Res Gestae. And there was much more to it: As mentioned above, the Augustan inscriptions were not just ‘texts’ in the strict sense of the word, but they also had a visual component that was strikingly ‘modern’. They were carefully carved, often of impressive size, with large letters sometimes even made of gilded bronze. Perhaps even more important is the fact that these inscriptions were never to be seen in isolation—they were always part of a larger monument, such as a temple, an arch, or a statue. The overall appearance and the sculptural decor of these monuments usually repeated or complemented the message of the inscription. Texts and monuments of this kind were numerous in Augustan Rome but were not conWned to the capital itself. We know of many similar structures from the early imperial period which were to be seen in diVerent parts of the Imperium Romanum. So another very important aspect of the Augustan age was the spreading of the new ideology to the provinces via inscriptions and buildings, and this is a point we have to turn to now. There are two interrelated questions to be raised. First: Did the ‘imperial’ monuments erected outside of Rome create something like a new conception of ‘empire’ aiming at the inhabitants of this huge realm? And second: How did this dissemination of new ideas work? Was it the result of centrally planned ‘propaganda’ imposed upon the subjects? And was it accepted by them? First of all, I will try to present a short review of some of the most important monuments. I shall concentrate on the period from the reign of Augustus to the mid-Wrst century ad. There were two main motives for erecting such buildings: victory and death. Two victory monuments for Augustus stand out: the campsite memorial built at the place where his tent had stood during the decisive battle against Marcus Antonius at Actium in 31 bc, and the so-called Tropaeum Alpium commemorating the defeat of the Alpine region by Augustus’ generals in the years up to 15 bc. The ‘campsite memorial’ was a huge podium with an impressive fac¸ade showing a long row of warship rams taken from the defeated Xeet of Antonius. An inscription covering the whole front stated that Augustus himself had dedicated the monument after he had gained the victory on behalf of the republic and restored peace on land and sea.42 The Tropaeum Alpium, dedicated in 7/6 bc, was an even larger monument which was not erected at the place of an actual battle but on a scenic as well as meaningful place: at the point where the main 42

Murray and Petzas 1989.

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coastal road from Italy to Gaul reached the border between the two regions, high above the Mediterranean sea and visible from far away.43 There can be no doubt that the spot had been carefully chosen to impress every visitor of the region and to demonstrate the power of the emperor. The purpose of this monument was again ‘explained’ by an inscription.44 It proclaimed that the Tropaeum had been built by the senate and people of Rome for Augustus, because under his command all the peoples living in the Alps had been brought under the dominion of the Roman Empire. There followed a long list of the defeated peoples without any further commentary. Sculptures and reliefs on the building depicted defeated barbarians and symbols of victory. One of the more distressing phenomena of Augustus’ long rule was that most of the men he had designated as successors to the throne died before him—something that was to happen again under the second Emperor Tiberius: The elder Drusus died in 9 bc, to be followed by Lucius Caesar in ad 2, Caius Caesar in ad 4, Germanicus in ad 19, and the younger Drusus in ad 23. The death of these young ‘princes’ aroused considerable interest among the Roman public, both because they had been popular Wgures and because their deaths were a blow to the aspirations of the reigning emperor. In each case, an impressive array of posthumous honors were decreed for the dead about which we are quite well informed both by ancient authors and by inscriptions.45 These honors included many memorials and rituals in Rome itself, but also monuments in the provinces which are of interest here. Drusus the Elder had died while campaigning in Germany, and his army spontaneously built a burial mound near its main winter camp in Mainz. This was later oYcially sanctioned by Augustus, and it was additionally decreed that an elaborate ritual should take place there every year in honor of the deceased. Not only soldiers were to participate in it, but also the native inhabitants of Gaul, represented by their provincial assembly.46 After Caius Caesar had died in the small town of Limyra on the southern coast of Asia Minor, another kenotaphion was built for him at the place of his death, probably initiated by the Roman senate and approved by Augustus. Only small pieces of the dedicatory inscription are preserved. From these, we can estimate that the monumental inscription of about 30 m length gave an abridged version of Caius’ most memorable deeds while Wghting for the empire on its eastern frontier. Some important points in his life were 43

Formige´ 1949. Corpus inscriptionum Latinarum V 7817; Pliny, Naturalis historia 3.136. 45 For an overview, see the papers in Fraschetti 2000 as well as Rowe 2002. 46 Suetonius, Divus Claudius 1.3; Eutropius 7.13.1. Cf. also Cassius Dio 55.2.3; for an interpretation of these sources, see Bellen 1984. 44

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apparently also depicted in a marvelous relief frieze of which some fragments have been excavated.47 The honors for the dead Germanicus were especially abundant. We know them both from Tacitus48 and from an inscribed version of the relevant senatus consulta found in Spain, the Tabula Siarensis.49 Among many other honores, the senate decreed to build three arches to commemorate the remarkable deeds of the dead prince.50 The arches were to be placed at signiWcant locations connected with Germanicus’ career as politician and victorious general:51 one in Rome, a second one on the bank of the Rhine, and the third on the heights of Mount Amanus in Syria. None of these monuments has been preserved, but the detailed description in the Tabula Siarensis gives us at least a rough idea of their appearance. The arch in Rome contained reliefs of the nations defeated by Germanicus, as well as an inscription recording that the senate and people of Rome had dedicated the monument to his memory and then listing his most important deeds in an abridged form of res gestae. The arch was to be crowned by a statue group depicting Germanicus in a triumphal chariot surrounded by members of his family. The descriptions of the arches in Syria and near the Rhine are much shorter, but we can at least be certain that they must have looked rather similar: The arch on the Mount Amanus was to celebrate Germanicus’ successes in the East; and the arch near the Rhine probably included a relief or statue depicting him receiving the military standards back from the Germans. At this point, we may review some of the more general aspects of these monuments. Typically, they were not erected by the emperor himself, but ‘given’ to him by other institutions, usually the senate and people of Rome, but also the army. We can be sure, however, that the emperor was closely involved in the planning of the monuments. The placing of monuments outside the capital was sometimes dictated by the circumstances, but was sometimes also chosen with an eye to an impressive setting high up on a mountain, at a riverside, or at the border between two regions. At some of these monuments, elaborate rituals took place in commemoration of speciWc days important to the imperial family. The monuments spoke a clear ‘language’ both visually (through their architecture and sculptural decor) and literally (through the texts of their inscriptions). The inscriptions were always in prose, quite short, 47 Ganzert 1984 (with the comments of P. Herz on the inscription and its historical signiWcance: 118–27, 178–92); Borchhardt 2002. 48 Tacitus, Annales 2.83. 49 I cite the edition of the Tabula Siarensis in Crawford 1996, 507–43 no. 37. 50 A similar arch—also showing symbols of victory—had been built for the Elder Drusus in Italy after his death; see Suetonius, Divus Claudius 1.3. 51 Summed up in Tacitus, Annales 2.83.2.

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and without elaborate literary pretensions, and presented the name of the emperor or ‘prince’ and the motive for erecting the building, usually in form of a short catalogue of his main deeds. The message these monuments conveyed was thus thoroughly Roman and ‘imperialistic’ in glorifying victories and conquests made to enlarge the empire. The inhabitants of the provinces were not included in these messages except for being named in a list of defeated peoples. And the buildings themselves remained rather isolated in their local contexts. In this respect these monuments are very much comparable to the general outlook of the Res Gestae. There is little in them that could be understood as conveying a larger concept of ‘empire’ aimed at integrating the subject peoples. But such a process of integration nevertheless took place during the early imperial period, despite some temporary setbacks. Surprisingly (to us), the messages of imperial victory and virtues were for the most part accepted and even copied by locals all around the Roman Empire. We have an enormous amount of evidence for this which cannot be presented here in any detail. A few examples will suYce for our discussion. One of the most striking aspects is the way in which even the most blatantly ‘imperialistic’ ideas of Roman conquest were repeated by the provincials on monuments which they erected on their own initiative to show their allegiance to the empire. This is clearly to be seen, for instance, on early imperial arches in southern Gaul which imitate the decor of Roman triumphal arches but also that of victory monuments like the Tropaeum Alpium. For a long time, it was assumed in modern scholarship that these arches must have been erected by the central power to celebrate the conquest of Gaul. But more recently it has rightly been stressed that most of these monuments probably originated in local initiative and should therefore be interpreted as representing an attempt of municipal elites to share in the language of victory and to demonstrate that they also took part in the Wght of the Imperium Romanum against the ‘barbarians’.52 Perhaps the most extraordinary monument to combine Roman ‘imperialistic’ themes with a local vision of the emperor is a huge complex in the town of Aphrodisias in Asia Minor. Aphrodisias was a ‘free city’ which meant that de iure the Roman provincial government was not allowed to interfere in local aVairs. The municipal elite was very eager to preserve these privileges and have them conWrmed by diVerent emperors from Augustus onwards. At the same time, however, and on the initiative of the same local elite, the town was totally remodeled to give it the appearance of a ‘modern’ GrecoRoman city. One of the most important aspects in this process was the integration of the emperor into town life by introducing his cult and erecting 52

For this interpretation, see Ku¨pper-Bo¨hm 1996.

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numerous monuments in his honor. The most remarkable of these was a temple dedicated to the patron-goddess Aphrodite as well as to the deiWed emperors. We know from inscriptions that the whole complex was Wnanced by the members of two local families between the reigns of Tiberius and Nero. In front of the temple a long forecourt and a propylon were built. The forecourt was Xanked by two halls with three storeys, each of these richly decorated with relief plates. The reliefs in sum gave a visual representation of the Imperium Romanum as seen by the local elite of Aphrodisias, including gods and allegories, Greek mythology, but also the emperor and his deeds in war and peace, and even the conquered nations of the empire. With respect to the latter, there was a remarkable series of reliefs showing female Wgures that represented regions and peoples of the Imperium Romanum.53 This was a distinctively Roman (and ‘imperialistic’) way of representing the empire visually, belonging to the sphere of victory or triumphal art, and it therefore comes as no surprise that the model for this series is probably to be sought in Rome itself, in a complex built by Augustus and named porticus ad nationes. The people in Aphrodisias do not seem to have copied the Roman model slavishly, however, but chose only those representations which suited them best, mostly personiWcations of outlying and ‘strange’ nations which could symbolize the enormous extent and power of the Roman world. Although most of the peoples represented in Aphrodisias had indeed been conquered by Augustus, it is important to note that the Wgures were not shown in the posture of defeated peoples, but as ‘normal’ standing statues. The whole series thus created a vision of an Imperium Romanum uniWed by the pax Augusta, to which the inhabitants of Aphrodisias proudly belonged, identifying themselves with the Roman government’s view of its empire. The death of the young princes also aroused a strong reaction in many parts of the empire. Numerous cities decided to honor them with inscriptions, statues, and monuments. In the case of Lucius and Caius Caesar, we are exceptionally well informed with regard to one Italian town, Pisa, because we possess two long inscriptions which give details about the honors established for them by the local authorities.54 After the death of Lucius Caesar, the magistrates in Pisa closely followed the precedent set by the decisions of the Roman senate, imitating most of the measures which had been devised in Rome. But this was not a strict rule, as was to be seen after the death of Caius Caesar: In this case, the inhabitants of Pisa apparently had no knowledge of what the senate in Rome would decide. Instead, they acted more or less 53

Cf. Smith 1988. Corpus inscriptionum Latinarum XI 1420/21¼Inscriptiones Latinae selectae 139/40; cf. Galsterer 2000; Rowe 2002, 102–23. 54

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spontaneously, in particular in resolving to erect a monument for Caius Caesar which was something of a novelty at the time: an arch with ornamenta showing the nations defeated by Caius and crowned by statues of him and his brother Lucius. Other towns further away opted for even more individualistic structures to commemorate the young princes. After the deaths of Germanicus and the younger Drusus, again many cities throughout the empire decided to erect honoriWc monuments.55 Some of these were rather closely modeled on the honors which the senate had vowed for them. Thus in certain cities, arches were built to commemorate Germanicus and Drusus II.56 But it was not compulsory for the municipal authorities to follow the Roman model so closely; and other cities chose diVerent solutions, such as copying only the statue group on top of the arches that had been erected by the senate.57 The complex of local honors for Lucius and Caius Caesar as well as for Germanicus and Drusus II again vividly demonstrates that the whole process of disseminating imperial ideology and the new image of the emperor throughout the Imperium Romanum was for the most part not planned from above and then imposed from the center on the periphery. On the contrary, it seems to have been a more or less spontaneous development which was certainly encouraged by Roman authorities, as we have seen in the case of the Res Gestae, but which depended to a high degree on the collaboration or even the individual initiative of the subjects, who imitated the Roman models but also created their own visions of a good emperor and a successful empire.

5 . C O N C LUS I O N : A N EW WAY O F ‘C O N C E I V I N G THE EMPIRE’ The Res Gestae were certainly the most powerful vision ever created by Augustus to present his new position as sole ruler to a broader public. The audience he had in mind when writing this document consisted primarily of the inhabitants of the city of Rome. The way in which Augustus envisaged the empire in the RG was therefore a very traditional one, stressing his military deeds in expanding Roman rule to the most outlying parts of the known 55

Tacitus, Annales 2.83.2. Arches for Germanicus and Drusus II were, for example, erected in Spoleto (Corpus inscriptionum Latinarum XI 4776/77) and in Saintes (Inscriptions latines d’Aquitaine: Santons 7). 57 This was done in Lepcis magna in front of the temple of Roma and Augustus: Trillmich 1988. 56

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world, but also in adorning the capital city in accordance with its role as center of the Imperium Romanum. The subjects living in the provinces of the empire were of little interest in this vision, and it is doubtful whether Augustus had ever planned that the RG should be published outside of Rome. And yet this nevertheless happened. It is a process that is diYcult for us to study in detail, but was probably made possible by a close collaboration between institutions in Rome such as the senate, provincial governors, and representatives of the local elite. In the end, the message of the RG seems to have been accepted in one way or another by the provincials, who incorporated the document into their local world by putting it on display at the places where they worshipped the emperor. This spontaneous or encouraged reception of messages coming from Rome—even blatantly ‘imperialistic’ ones like that of the RG—thus played a vital role in the creation of a new concept of ‘empire’: a concept that also involved the peoples who had been conquered by Rome, who now began to identify themselves with the Imperium Romanum. References Bellen, Heinz, ‘Das Drususdenkmal ‘‘apud Mogontiacum’’ und die ‘‘Galliarum civitates’’ ’, Jahrbuch des Ro¨misch-Germanischen Zentralmuseums Mainz, 31 (1984), 385–96. Borchhardt, Ju¨rgen, Der Fries vom Kenotaph fu¨r Gaius Caesar in Limyra. Wien (Phoibos) 2002. Buckler, William H., Calder, William M., and Guthrie, William K. C. (eds.), Monumenta Asiae minoris antiqua IV: Monuments and Documents from Eastern Asia and Western Galatia. Manchester (Manchester University Press) 1933. Crawford, Michael H. (ed.), Roman Statutes, vol. i. London (Institute of Classical Studies, University of London) 1996. —— and Reynolds, Joyce, ‘The Publication of the Prices Edict: A New Copy from Aezani’, Journal of Roman Studies, 65 (1975), 160–3. Deininger, Ju¨rgen, Die Provinziallandtage der ro¨mischen Kaiserzeit von Augustus bis zum Ende des 3. Jhs. n. Chr. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1965. Eck, Werner, Caballos, Antonio, and Ferna´ndez, Fernando (eds.), Das ‘senatus consultum de Cn. Pisone patre’. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1996. Formige´, Jules, Le Trophe´e des Alpes (La Turbie). Paris (Centre Nat. de la Recherche) 1949. Fraschetti, Augusto (ed.), La commemorazione di Germanico nella documentazione epigraWca. Roma (Bretschneider) 2000. Gage´, Jean (ed.), Res gestae divi Augusti ex monumentis Ancyrano et Antiocheno Latinis; Ancyrano et Apolloniensi Graecis, texte e´tabli et comm. avec un append. par J. G. 3rd edn. Paris (Les Belles Lettres) 1977. Galsterer, Hartmut, ‘Die Trauer der Sta¨dte um verstorbene Prinzen in der fru¨hen Kaiserzeit’, in: Fraschetti 2000, 173–87.

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Ganzert, Joachim, Das Kenotaph fu¨r Gaius Caesar in Limyra. Tu¨bingen (Wasmuth) 1984. Halfmann, Hartmut, ‘Zur Datierung und Deutung der Priesterliste am AugustusRoma-Tempel in Ankara’, Chiron, 16 (1986), 35–42. Ha¨nlein-Scha¨fer, Heidi, ‘Veneratio Augusti’: Eine Studie zu den Tempeln des ersten ro¨mischen Kaisers. Roma (Bretschneider) 1985. Hesberg, Henner von, and Panciera, Silvio, Das Mausoleum des Augustus: Der Bau und seine Inschriften. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1994. Heuß, Alfred, ‘Zeitgeschichte als Ideologie: Bemerkungen zu Komposition und Gedankenfu¨hrung der ‘‘Res Gestae Divi Augusti’’ ’, in: Eckard Lefe`vre (ed.), Monumentum Chiloniense: Studien zur augusteischen Zeit. Kieler Festschrift fu¨r E. Burck. Amsterdam (Hakkert) 1975, 55–95. Inscriptiones Graecae ad res Romanas pertinentes, ed. Rene´ Cagnat. 4 vols. Paris 1906–27. Inscriptiones Latinae selectae, ed. Hermann Dessau. 3 vols. in 5 parts. Berlin 1892–1916. Inscriptions latines d’Aquitaine: Santons, ed. Louis Maurin. Bordeaux (Centre Pierre Paris) 1994. Krencker, Daniel, and Schede, Martin, Der Tempel in Ankara. Berlin (de Gruyter) 1936. Ku¨pper-Bo¨hm, Annette, Die ro¨mischen Bogenmonumente der Gallia Narbonensis in ihrem urbanen Kontext. Espelkamp (Leidorf) 1996. LaY, Umberto, ‘Le iscrizioni relative all’introduzione nel 9 a. C. del nuovo calendario della provincia d’Asia’, Studi Classici e Orientali, 16 (1967), 5–98. Le Bas, Philippe, and Waddington, William H. (eds.), Inscriptions grecques et latines recueillies en Asie Mineure, vol. ii. Paris 1870; repr. Hildesheim (Olms) 1972. Leschhorn, Wolfgang, ‘Die Anfa¨nge der Provinz Galatien’, Chiron, 22 (1992), 315–36. Mitchell, Stephen, ‘Galatia under Tiberius’, Chiron, 16 (1986), 17–33. —— Anatolia: Land, Men and Gods in Asia Minor, vol. i: The Celts in Anatolia and the Impact of Roman Rule. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1993. —— and Waelkens, Marc, Pisidian Antioch: The Site and its Monuments. London (Duckworth) 1998. Mommsen, Theodor (ed.), Res gestae Divi Augusti ex monumentis Ancyrano et Apolloniensi. 2nd edn. Berlin (Weidmann) 1883. Murray, William M., and Petzas, Photios M., Octavian’s Campsite Memorial for the Actian War. Philadelphia (American Philosophical Society) 1989. Nicolet, Claude, Space, Geography and Politics in the Early Roman Empire. Ann Arbor (University of Michigan Press) 1991. Orientis Graeci Inscriptiones Selectae, ed. Wilhelm Dittenberger. 2 vols. Leipzig 1903–5; repr. 1960. Premerstein, Anton von, ‘Gliederung und Aufstellung der ‘‘Res gestae divi Augusti’’ in Rom und im pisidischen Antiochia’, Klio, 25 (1932), 197–225. Ramage, Edwin S., The Nature and Purpose of Augustus’ ‘Res Gestae’. Stuttgart (Steiner) 1987.

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Ramsay, William M., and Premerstein, Anton von (ed.), Monumentum Antiochenum: Die neugefundene Aufzeichnung der ‘Res gestae divi Augusti’ im pisidischen Antiochia. Leipzig (Dieterich) 1927. Ridley, Ronald T., The Emperor’s Retrospect: Augustus’ ‘Res Gestae’ in Epigraphy, Historiography and Commentary. Leuven/Dudley (Peeters) 2003. Rowe, Greg, Princes and Political Cultures: The New Tiberian Senatorial Decrees. Ann Arbor (University of Michigan Press) 2002. Smith, Roland R. R., ‘ ‘‘Simulacra gentium’’: The ‘‘ethne’’ from the Sebasteion at Aphrodisias’, Journal of Roman Studies, 78 (1988), 50–77. Su¨ß, Ju¨rgen, Kaiserkult und Stadt: Kultsta¨tten fu¨r ro¨mische Kaiser in Asia und Galatia. Mannheim (MicroWche) 1999. Trillmich, Walter, ‘Der Germanicus-Bogen in Rom und das Monument fu¨r Germanicus und Drusus in Leptis Magna: Archa¨ologisches zur ‘‘Tabula Siarensis’’ (I 9–21)’, in: Julia´n Gonza´lez and Javier Arce (eds.), Estudios sobre la ‘Tabula Siarensis’, Actas de las jornadas celebradas en Sevilla 1986. Madrid (Centro de estud. Histo´ricos) 1988, 51–60. Volkmann, Hans (ed.), Res gestae divi Augusti, hrsg. u. erkl. von H. V. 3rd edn. Berlin (de Gruyter) 1969. Wigtil, David N., ‘The Translator of the Greek ‘‘Res Gestae’’ of Augustus’, American Journal of Philology, 103 (1982), 189–94. Yavetz, Zvi, ‘The ‘‘Res Gestae’’ and Augustus’ Public Image’, in: Fergus Millar and Erich Segal (eds.), Caesar Augustus: Seven Aspects. 2nd edn. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1990, 1–36.

D. The Power of Images Imperial Order and Imperial Aura as Represented in Art and Architecture

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Image and Empire The Shaping of Augustan Rome Rolf Michael Schneider (Munich)

Imperial Rome is an archetype of empire—and this for many reasons.1 The shaping of imperial Rome owes a considerable debt to cultures which achieved exceptional standards in political and intellectual life as well as in the visual, written, and technical domain. This is particularly manifest in the Roman reception of non-Italian cultures, such as Classical Greece, the kingdoms of the Hellenistic East, and the realm of Carthage in the West. Equally, Rome’s multi-ethnic empire was based on a variety of ‘Roman’ factors such as a dominant military, a worldwide economy, and a Xexible religious, cultural, and social policy combined with eYcient infrastructure and global imagery. I focus on the imagery, which I regard as one of Rome’s most inXuential instruments for consolidating her empire.2 Concentrating on the relation of image and empire I am interested in the making, function, and perception of Rome’s imperial imagery—and its role in social communication. The best documented starting point for such an analysis is the reign of Augustus, Rome’s Wrst emperor (27 bc–ad 14). During his regime Rome and her empire were fundamentally remodeled.3 In and for the process of this remodeling images of all kinds and in all contexts played a crucial part. I start with the new images of Rome’s Augustan landscape, continue with the new images of Augustus, and Wnish with the new images of the oriental as Rome’s most important cultural Other. I warmly thank Fritz-Heiner Mutschler and Achim Mittag for their invitation to the Essen Conference on China and Rome, the participants for inspiring discussion, and Michael Alram, Katherine Clarke, Janet Eck von Schanzenbach, Hans van Ess, Reinhard Fo¨rtsch, Susanne Muth, Miche`le Pirazzoli, and Gertrud Platz for further discussion and support. Photographs for this article were generously provided by: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Antikensammlung, Berlin; Archa¨ologisches Institut der Universita¨t Ko¨ln, Forschungsarchiv fu¨r Antike Plastik (online photo service Arachne), Ko¨ln; Museum fu¨r Abgu¨sse Klassischer Bildwerke, Mu¨nchen. 1 Blois et al. 2003. 2 In contrast to Hingley 2005 who widely excludes imagery in his stimulating book dealing with the complex issues of globalizing Roman culture; see below, however, n. 34. 3 In this paper I take advantage of the ambivalent meaning of ‘imperial’ pertaining to both empire and emperor.

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The shaping of Rome with prestigious imagery, architecture, and infrastructure had been a competitive process for several centuries.4 This process was fundamentally redeWned under the new conditions of the monarchic rule of Augustus. His adoptive father, Julius Caesar (murdered in 44 bc and deiWed in 42 bc) had already set the course.5 However, it was mainly his adopted son, the Caesar Divi Wlius, under whom the new imagery for imperial Rome was actually created.6 After the victories over his political rivals Sextus Pompeius (36 bc) and Marcus Antonius (31 bc) the later Augustus and his followers started building projects on an exceptional scale (Fig. 13). A principal focus of these activities was the very heart of Rome, the Forum Romanum.7 Continuing the pioneering changes commenced by Caesar, Augustus and his followers had the Forum Romanum totally rebuilt: the Basilica Aemilia, the Basilica Iulia, and Curia Iulia (both distinguished by the name of his family), the old Republican temples of Saturnus, the Dioscuri, and Concordia as well as the new temple of his adoptive father, Divus Iulius (Figs. 14–15).8 A change in such a short time and to such a radical extent was unique. This is even more relevant as the Forum Romanum was one of the oldest public places of Rome, and the center of her political and social identity. The ideology attached to the new imagery of the Forum Romanum is exemplarily reXected in a seemingly small act, the removal of the speaker’s platform, the public place for political communication between the people and the magistrates of Rome.9 The speaker’s platform, however, was called rostra, meaning front prows of battleships. The prows, which gave the platform its name, had been captured in 338 bc from the rival navy of the seaport of Antium about 55 km south of Rome, and had then been Wxed to the speaker’s platform of the Forum (Fig. 14). Consequently rostra has interconnected the meaning of the prows of battleships as symbols of Rome’s military

4

Stambaugh 1988; Patterson 1992; Claridge 1998; Coarelli 2000; Coulston and Dodge 2000; Kolb 2002. 5 Favro 1996, 60–78. 6 Coarelli 1988; Hesberg 1988; Zanker 1988; Wallace-Hadrill 1993; Favro 1996; Zanker 2000; Haselberger 2002; Wallace-Hadrill 2003, 189–94 (with further thoughts on Rome as image); Galinsky 2005. 7 Steinby ii (1995), 325–42 s.v. Forum Romanum (Nicolas Purcell); Haselberger 2002, 129– 30 s.v. Forum Romanum. 8 Comprehensive summary of the individual buildings of ancient Rome, Steinby i–iv (1993– 2000); Haselberger 2002. 9 Ho¨lscher 1978, 318–20; Steinby iv. 212–14 s.v. Rostra eta` repubblicana (Filippo Coarelli).

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Fig. 13. Rome, model of the Augustan city (detail). Berlin, Abguss-Sammlung antiker Plastik

supremacy and the speaker’s platform as a landmark of her political identity.10 The removal of the rostra from the northern corner of the Forum Romanum to its center was initiated by Caesar and completed by Augustus (Fig. 15). Thus father and son broke with the political culture of the past: they changed the Republican platform of competitive politics into a monument of Augustan consensus. Like no other monument in Rome the removal of the rostra and its substantial reshaping marked the end of Republican Rome and 10

In contemporary English the Latin term rostrum is still used to name the speaker’s stand.

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Fig. 14. Rome, Forum Romanum. Second century bc. Reconstruction

the beginning of the Roman Empire. This new, mainly metaphorical function of the ‘old’ rostra was endorsed by the introduction of a second Augustan rostra. The second rostra was signiWcantly placed, opposite the old one and in front of the new temple of Divus Iulius.11 The new platform was now decorated with the prows captured at the sea battle of Actium (31 bc) which marked the decisive victory of the later Augustus on his way to imperial rule in Rome. Two other large public projects were closely linked to the Forum Romanum: the completion of Caesar’s Forum Iulium and the construction of the Forum

11 Steinby iv (1999), 214–17 s.v. Rostra Augusti (Patrizia Verduchi); Haselberger 2002, 216 s.v. Rostra: Augustus.

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Fig. 15. Rome, Forum Romanum. Early Wrst century ad. Reconstruction

Augustum, the latter dedicated in 2 bc.12 The Forum Augustum was a space which transmitted the ideology of the imperial regime in outstanding complexity, workmanship, and material: the architecture and its decor were entirely made of prestigious mono- and polychrome marble (Fig. 17).13 The Forum’s temple was dedicated to Mars Ultor, both the new father god of the Romans and the old war god of revenge (ultor). The cognomen ultor refers to 12

Steinby ii (1995), 299–306 s.v. Forum Iulium (Chiara Morselli); Haselberger 2002, 134–5 s.v. Forum Iulium. 13 Steinby ii. 289–95 s.v. Forum Augustum (Valentin Kockel); La Rocca 2001; Haselberger 2002, 130–1 s.v. Forum Augusti; Ungaro 2002.

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Fig. 16. Rome, Circus Maximus. Imperial times. Reconstruction

the enemies plotting against Rome and her new emperor. The Forum itself was extremely rich in imagery.14 Marble portrayals of the most noble Romans, both historical and mythic, were selected to celebrate the new rule of Augustus and to single him out as the embodiment of Rome’s newly construed past. A project of gigantic dimensions was the reshaping of the Circus Maximus (Fig. 16).15 Initiated by Caesar it was again left to Augustus to complete the work and provide the Roman public with the biggest arena in the ancient world. The Circus Maximus measured about 620 m in length and 120 m in width, and oVered a capacity for about 150,000 spectators. The close relationship between the emperor and the arena was evident to every visitor as it was dominated by the residence of Augustus on the Palatine hill (Fig. 13). In this commanding position his residence was not only situated in the very heart of the city but also next to the oldest settlement of Rome, the mythic urbs quadrata.16 The residence itself was a loose complex of several (partly older) houses lavishly redecorated in the style of the day and perhaps connected by a kind of garden.17 The proximity of the residence to two temples was eye-catching: on the one side the temple of Apollo Palatinus dedicated in 28 bc to the patron god of Augustus and attached to his house;18 on the other 14

Spannagel 1999. Steinby i. 272–7 s.v. Circus Maximus (Paola Ciancio Rossetto); Haselberger 2002, 87–9 Wg. 9 s.v. Circus Maximus. 16 Steinby iv. 207–9 s.v. Roma Quadrata (Filippo Coarelli); Krause 2004, 46–8. 17 Nuccio and Ungaro 2002, 437–45; Tomei 2004. 18 Steinby i. 54–7 s.v. Apollo Palatinus (Pierre Gros); Haselberger 2002, 46–7 s.v. Apollo, Templum (Palatium). 15

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Fig. 17. Rome, Forum Augustum with temple of Mars Ultor. 2 bc. Reconstruction

side the restored temple of Mater Deum Magna Idea, the Wrst foreign (oriental) patron goddess worshipped within Rome’s sacred boundaries, and linked, like Augustus, to the Trojan descent of the Romans.19 Another monument of national importance was also situated next to his house: a (re-)construction of the legendary hut of Romulus, the mythic founder of the city and the Wrst Roman to celebrate a triumphal procession.20 Another focus of Augustan building policy was the large area of the Campus Martius north of the inner city (Fig. 13).21 On this prestigious land Augustus carried out urban projects again of the highest caliber. Several years before he had gained sole rule Augustus had already started to lay the foundations of his mausoleum, a colossal circular building measuring nearly 90 m in diameter and 50 m in height, in size and structure a ‘forerunner’ of the Colosseum (Fig. 18).22 The mausoleum’s entrance was framed by two obelisks from Egypt, each about 15 m high, and two marble pillars with bronze tablets on which the Res Gestae Divi Augusti were inscribed (cf. above p. 248, Fig. 10). Extraordinary in size and decor, the mausoleum

19

Wiseman 1984; Pensabene 2004. Steinby i. 241–2 s.v. Casa Romuli (Filippo Coarelli); Haselberger 2002, 83 s.v. Casa Romuli. 21 Steinby i. 220–4 s.v. Campus Martius (Timothy Peter Wiseman); Favro 1996, 206–8, 257 Wg. 103; Haselberger 2002, 74–7 s.v. Campus Martius. 22 Steinby iii (1996), 234–7 s.v. Mausoleum Augusti: Das Monument (Henner von Hesberg); Haselberger 2002, 166–7 s.v. Mausoleum: Augustus; Schneider 2004, 166–7 Wgs. 17–19. 20

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Fig. 18. Rome, Campus Martius: Mausoleum Augusti, Solarium Augusti, obelisk, and Ara Pacis Augustae. After 9 bc. Reconstruction

marked at the brink of the Augustan age the monopoly of the later emperor as the only ruler of Rome. This powerful self-representation of Augustus was pushed even further when his mausoleum became related to two further imperial monuments, the Solarium Augusti and the Ara Pacis Augustae, both completed in 9 bc (Figs. 13, 18). The Ara Pacis was commissioned by the Roman senate in 13 bc to mark the victorious return of Augustus to Rome from military campaigns in Spain and Gaul (Fig. 13).23 Outstanding in the richness and subtlety of its sculpted decor, the Ara Pacis portrays the chief concerns of the Augustan order: Roman gods, depictions of sacriWcial rituals, public processions, representations of religious symbols and the fecundity of nature as a metaphor of the new era of the Golden Age.24 Never before in the history of Rome’s imagery was military victory so distinctly related to the ideology of peace.25 The entire decor of the monument addresses the political rite de passage brought to the city by Augustus and inXuential members of the Roman elite. The Solarium Augusti, laid out in front of the Ara Pacis Augustae (Figs. 13, 18), was huge: in size comparable with St Peter’s Square today.26 The center of the sundial was marked by an Egyptian obelisk, a unique booty made of pink granite from Aswan. Augustus was the Wrst ruler in antiquity to order such obelisks from Egypt and to have them transported to Rome. This was an amazing feat, technically, aesthetically, and ideologically. Besides the two obelisks for his mausoleum, Augustus brought two Pharaonic obelisks to Rome each measuring nearly 22 m in height and weighing about 230 tons. Both were placed to attract the most public attention: one of them was erected as the gnomon of the new sundial (Fig. 18), the other as the landmark of the renewed Circus Maximus (Fig. 16). Two identical Latin inscriptions highlight the Roman signiWcance of the Egyptian spoils: ‘Imperator Caesar Augustus, 23 Steinby iv. 70–4 s.v. Pax Augusta, Ara (Mario Torelli); Haselberger 2002, 189 s.v. Pax Augusta, Ara. 24 Wallace-Hadrill 2004. 25 For Augustan perceptions and policies of war and peace: Rich 2003. 26 Buchner 1982; Steinby iii. 35–7 s.v. Horologium Augusti (Edmund Buchner); Schneider 2004, 163–4.

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son of the Divus, . . . has dedicated [the obelisk] to the God of the Sun after Egypt was brought into the power of the people of Rome.’27 The cosmic dimension of the sundial linked Rome’s victory over Egypt to the ideology of cosmic order and cosmic time. As a result the experience of (civil) war was followed by a concept relating the new patterns of imperial rule with the old patterns of cosmic regularity. In the rhetoric of ideology this interconnection was praised as both an accomplishment of Augustus and as a beneWt to the people of Rome. Augustus transformed Rome’s imagery with countless further measures, of which I name three, all linked to the (imperial) power of color: water, greenery, and marble. The volume of water nearly doubled under Augustus after repairs to existing channels and the addition of two new waterways, the Aqua Iulia and the Aqua Virgo.28 This had far reaching eVects on the perception of the city’s greenery (and water). Not only private but more and more public greenery lent the landscape of Augustan Rome a newly colored image and created a kind of greenbelt around the inner city. Even more radical was the imagery of the new marble. Marble was now regularly imported to Rome in quantities and qualities unheard of before. This was particularly true of the abundant use of the polychromes.29 The Augustan marble revolution far outstripped anything seen in the Classical world before. In contrast to the rare display of polychromes in late republican Rome colored marble was now widely used, especially for major public buildings, such as the new temples of Apollo Palatinus, Apollo in circo, Bellona, Mars Ultor, and Concordia, the Basilica Aemilia, and the new Forum of Augustus—all placed in the very heart of Rome.30 The exotic polychromes transformed the old Republican city into the new imperial Rome. This change is addressed in a famous statement handed down by Suetonius (Divus Augustus 28): ‘Rome, originally not decorated pro maiestate imperii, was improved by Augustus so fundamentally that he could rightly praise himself: he found her brick but left her marble’. The new display and systematic employment of the exotic polychromes became one of the most explicit symbols of imperial power and cultural supremacy Rome claimed to have achieved. The radical changes in Rome’s imagery are also manifest in the reorganization of the city’s inner grid. In 7 bc Augustus invented the tradition of fourteen regions which were in turn divided into local wards or vici; today we

27

Corpus inscriptionum Latinarum VI, 701 and 702. Aqueducts and gardens: Favro 1996, 101, 111, 134–5, 176–80 Wg. 81; Haselberger 2002, 49–51 s.v. Aqueducts, Water Supply and Population Density; 141–7 s.v. Horti. 29 Gnoli 1971; Nuccio and Ungaro 2002. 30 Schneider 2001; Schneider 2002; Ungaro 2002; Nuccio 2002. 28

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know of 320 of them, but the number is dubious.31 The size of Rome was now doubled: the Republican urbs of seven hills became the Augustan city of fourteen regions. The spatial reorganization of Rome was connected with the transformation of a popular cult. From 7 bc onwards the old cult of the Lares compitales was equated with the new cult of the Lares Augusti. The Lares compitales were protective spirits of the crossroads (compita) within the diVerent wards in Rome, whereas the Lares Augusti personiWed the Genius Augusti, the divine spirit of Augustus worshiped within the new framework of the imperial cult.32 From now on the Genius Augusti embodied the protection of and care for the public infrastructure of Rome. The cult of the Lares Augusti aimed at wide sections of the population; this cult was performed by freedmen and slaves who would have been excluded from public oYce. These people were now allowed to commission (quite) elaborate altars. Their reliefs demonstrate a surprising diversity of sacriWcial images which testify to a lively reception of the established imperial models and the new imperial cult. The coordinated approach of the imagery of the Lares Augusti and the spatial reorganization of the city opened up new political pathways with which to integrate people of low social status into Rome’s new imperial order. This stimulated new bonds between the people and the emperor. In a wider perspective this process was embedded in a radical reshaping of the city’s sacred imagery; in 28 bc alone Augustus ordered the restoration of no fewer than eighty-two temples.33 Rome’s new imagery altered the life in and the perception of the city in almost every aspect. Extraordinary measures of imperial architecture and infrastructure served not only the self-representation of the new emperor but created also a new cultural identity for the people of Rome. Presented with a refurbished capital members of all social classes were oVered exceptional facilities of urban life, and Rome became the model for cities throughout the empire.34 Augustan Rome was, however, not the picture book city as shown in modern reconstructions but an extremely dirty and busy building site. This was probably tolerated if not accepted by most. The reshaping of Augustan Rome must have involved more or less everybody in and around the city as it created work and income, and identity for all. In this respect the reshaping of the city’s imagery was probably seen as a deed accomplished not only by the emperor but also by the collective eVort of (and for) the people of Rome. 31 Favro 1996, 135–8 Wg. 59; Steinby iv. 199–204 s.v. Regiones Quattuordecim (Domenico Palombi); Haselberger 2002, 215 s.v. Regiones Quattuordecim; Wallace-Hadrill 2003, 194–206. 32 Ho¨lscher 1984, 27–30; Zanker 1988, 129–35; Wallace-Hadrill 2003, 197–206. 33 Res Gestae 20; cf. Favro 1996, 105–10. 34 On the ‘empire imagery’ of Augustan Rome: Hingley 2005, 77–87.

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2 . T H E N EW I M AG E S O F AU G U S T U S For centuries meritorious Romans were honored by portraits displayed in public contexts such as the forum, the sanctuary, and the necropolis. In the Wrst century ad most Roman portraits were characterized by faces wrinkled with age. A radical change in the appearance, distribution, and perception of Roman portraits was brought about by the images of Augustus (Fig. 20).35 He was the Wrst to make youthful agelessness a visual standard in Roman portraiture. He was the Wrst to show himself to the public in at least three diVerent portrait types. He was the Wrst whose portraits were replicated in exceptional quantity and quality throughout the Roman Empire. He was the Wrst whose portraits were combined with almost every public body. And he was the Wrst whose portraits were present in every kind of medium and every context of life. At present we can identify more than 220 copies of portraits of Augustus, most of them in marble.36 The vast majority of these portraits copy three diVerent prototypes (Fig. 20). These prototypes are now lost. As we have no written information about the process of their shaping I will brieXy outline what we can extract from the archaeological evidence.37 At the beginning the emperor and/or his advisors composed general parameters of the appearance and the message of a new imperial portrait. These parameters were probably given to competing workshops that were to design a new image of the emperor. The proposed designs were then either rejected or accepted and perhaps further reWned. Finally an imperial prototype made either in gold or silver emerged, which was replicated in plaster and made available for interested workshops inside and outside of Rome. In consequence, these plaster casts initiated a chain of further replications which spread from Rome into all of her provinces. The hairstyle of each prototype, especially the patterns of the single locks over the forehead, was the most characteristic and coherent typological feature copied in the portraits of Augustus. This focus became the standard for the portraiture of all subsequent emperors. The distinctive hairstyle helped modern scholars to establish the formal typology, the chronological order, and the individual identity of the imperial portraits. Today we also identify people very much by their hairstyle. Revealing is the clever advertisement on the Xyer of a Munich bank circulated a few weeks before the general 35

Vierneisel and Zanker 1979; Boschung 1993; Smith 1996; Fejfer 1998; Schneider 2003,

60–3. 36 37

List of surviving portraits: Boschung 1993. Schneider 2003, 74–5.

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Fig. 19. Wigs of Wve German party leaders. General election of 2002. Flyer, Hypovereinsbank Munich

election in Germany in September 2002 (Fig. 19).38 Five faceless heads individualized by Wve diVerent wigs are (hierarchically) placed on two shelves. The heads are inspected by a male viewer who, in turn, is shown from the back and is distinguished by an almost bald head. The stand of each head is marked by a diVerent color referring to the six main political parties. The diVerent style and color of the hair makes it easy to identify the Wve faceless party leaders. From left to right are portrayed: on the upper shelf Gerhard Schro¨der (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands), Edmund Stoiber (representing both Christliche Soziale Union and Christliche Demokratische Union), and 38 Flyer of the Hypo-Vereinsbank Mu¨nchen; slogan: ‘Jetzt Rendite wa¨hlen: die HVB 13/3 Anleihe.’

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Fig. 20. The main portrait types of Augustus, each with a drawing of the front-lock pattern Left: first type. From about 40 bc. La Alcudia Middle: main type. From about 30 bc. Vatican, Musei Vaticani Right: third type. Possibly from about 30 bc. Rome, Museo Capitolino

Guido Westerwelle (Freie Demokratische Partei); on the lower shelf Joschka Fischer (Die Gru¨nen/Bu¨ndnis 90) and Gregor Gysi (Partei des Demokratischen Sozialismus). The images of Augustus might have been perceived in a similar way: in the Wrst instance, identiWed by inscription and/or context, and then, over time, probably more and more also by the distinctive hairstyle. Today, however, the vital evidence of the inscription and the context is gone. How can a modern viewer identify a portrait as one depicting Augustus? For this he needs the help of Rome’s imperial coins. Under Augustus the emperor’s portrait and his oYcial name became the standard of the obverse. Depending on quality, intention, and mint the portraits of Augustus engraved on the imperial coins copy more or less precisely the hairstyle of the three prototypes.39 The hairstyle as shown on silver coins (denarii) struck in Rome around 40 bc corresponds closely with the hairstyle of the Wrst popular portrait type of the Imperator Caesar or Caesar Divi Wlius, as Augustus was called before 27 bc. A Wne marble copy of this type is a replica found in Alcudia (ancient Pollentia) on the Mediterranean island of Mallorca (Fig. 20, left).40 An 39 40

Boschung 1993, 59–61 pls. 238–9. Ibid. 110 no. 6 pls. 7, 8, 28.3; Smith 1996, 37.

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imperial silver coin (cistophorus) struck in Pergamon in or just after 27 bc hands down a detailed representation of the hairstyle of Augustus’ main portrait type, known to us by roughly 150 replicas.41 One of the best marble copies is the portrait of the Prima Porta statue of Augustus named after its provenance just north of Rome in the villa of the emperor’s wife Livia (Fig. 20, middle and Fig. 21).42 The third portrait type of Augustus was perhaps made around the same time as the Prima Porta type.43 The third type was selected to portray Augustus on the south frieze of the Ara Pacis, and is well represented by a replica in Rome (Fig. 20, right).44 The three portrait types were later neither replaced nor altered. On the contrary, they depicted the emperor up to and beyond his death in ad 14 when he was about 78 years old. The notable diVerence in the conception and the message of the three youthful portrait types allows important historical conclusions. The Wrst portrait type of the later Augustus, which was commissioned around 40 bc, shows Caesar Divi Wlius both in the expressive fashion of a portrait of a Hellenistic ruler and within the established tradition of Roman style (Fig. 20, left). The central front locks are somehow tossed over the forehead. The forehead itself is wrinkled, the root of the nose is contracted, the lachrymal sacks are shown, and the epidermis on the surface emphatically nuanced. In allusion to the portraits of a Hellenistic ruler Caesar Divi Wlius is depicted as a charismatic Roman leader who personalizes political qualities such as dynamism and power. The Prima Porta type propagates an entirely diVerent image of Augustus (Fig. 20, middle). Now all forms of dynamism and age are avoided. The emperor is shown in a habitus which is entirely new to Roman portraiture. His hairstyle is calm and designed to form a balanced but decorative system of locks. To achieve this new image a stylistic vocabulary was used which seems to echo forms of the Classical Greek past.45 Augustus is now represented as a ruler of unique authority who is not aVected by age and is in constant control of his expression: he is portrayed in youthful agelessness and divine timelessness. A similar message seems to be conveyed by the third portrait type (Fig. 20, right). The importance of the new portraits of Augustus for the imagery, ideology, and identity of the Roman Empire was evident in at least four ways: its systematic replication in diVerent media, sizes, and materials; its diVerent modes of depiction; its diVerent contexts of display; and its diVusion throughout the empire. The portraits of Augustus were replicated in all kinds of visual media such as sculptures, reliefs, paintings, coins, military 41 42 43 44 45

Boschung 1993, 60–1 Beilage 8 Skizze 80 (detailed drawing of the hairstyle lock by lock). Ibid. 179–81 no. 171 pls. 69, 70, 82.1. Pfanner 1989, 208–13; Smith 1996, 37–8. Boschung 1993, 129 no. 44 pls. 36, 37, 51.1. Smith 1996, 41–5.

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Fig. 21. Cuirass statue of Augustus, from the Augustan villa at Prima Porta. Detail of the Roman and the Parthian. About 17 bc. Vatican, Musei Vaticani

equipment, cameos, gems, rings, tableware, etc.46 His portraits covered every known size from extremely small to colossal. The portraits of Augustus were produced in all kinds of materials such as gold, silver, bronze, marble, stone, precious stone, glass, bone, terracotta, wood, plaster, wax, etc. And the portraits of Augustus included every public image of the body, such as equestrian statues, cuirass statues, toga statues, statues in the look of mythic heroes and Roman gods, and portrait busts. In other words, the portraits of Augustus not only took on all kinds of social roles, civic and military, mythic and divine, but also became their (visual) model. 46

This and the following is well documented by Vierneisel and Zanker 1979.

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Images of Augustus were displayed in every context of Roman life, both public and domestic, urban and rural. The images of Augustus populated not only the fora, basilicas, sanctuaries, honorary and triumphal arches, city gates, theaters, baths, and circuses but also shops, houses, and villas. The image of Augustus was omnipresent—and as such, unavoidable to the eye. This imperial omnipresence throughout the empire was intensiWed by a fascinating diversity of local styles and techniques.47 Although a more or less accurate model of the centrally deWned prototype must have been available everywhere, each context adjusted this model to speciWc local needs and styles, and available craftsmanship. This made the perception of each imperial portrait even more powerful as it was normally not only shaped in accordance with one of the three oYcial models but was also adapted to the local requirements of the visual narratives and their social perceptions. Where the portrait was displayed gains further in importance when we estimate Wgures. We know that each Roman town housed numerous sculpted images of Augustus in a variety of public and domestic settings, not to mention rural sanctuaries and villas, and other places in the countryside. In his Res Gestae (24) Augustus gives an interesting hint regarding the number of his portrait statues. Alone the ones made in silver and erected in Rome probably before 28 bc numbered eighty! On the basis of this and other evidence Michael Pfanner has convincingly argued that we can easily assume the distribution of 50,000 images of Augustus in sculpture only.48 Although this Wgure is hypothetical it gives an initial idea about scale. Similar was the omnipresence of the new imperial image on coins. In the time of Augustus more than 200 cities throughout the Roman empire suddenly started to strike coins with his image.49 If we add to these Wgures the countless reproductions of the imperial portrait in other media such as non-imperial paintings and the depictions on objects of daily life we face a visual phenomenon unrivaled in history. No other civilization or empire up to the nineteenth century made such excessive use of the image of an emperor or ruler like imperial Rome.

3. THE NEW IMAGERY OF ORIENTALISM The culture of imperial Rome was essentially related to non-Roman cultures. Roman politics used victories over non-Romans to legitimize imperial power. Rome claimed to rule the world. Rome integrated a wide range of diVerent 47 48 49

Zanker 1983; Smith 1996, 34–5, 40–1. Pfanner 1989, 178–9. Howgego 1995, 84.

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civilizations and ethnicities. And Rome communicated with people beyond the orbis Romanus.50 An empire of this diversity could in the long term only survive if it oVered both discourses of cultural Xexibility and symbols of cultural identity capable of being widely adopted. One way to stimulate cultural identity was to establish images of the cultural Other. A model case of the cultural Other was the visual representation of non-Romans, stereotyped images of people living outside the Roman Empire. The majority of these images portrayed the cultural Other in the form of two Romanized ‘ethnic’ costumes, representing the peoples either of the ‘North’ or the ‘East’. Images of non-Romans were present in all visual media, every social context, and throughout the principate. In Rome the cultural Other was an inXuential and ambiguous reXection of the self-representation of Rome, or in other words: in contrast to the contemporary non-Roman civilizations the image of the cultural Other was an essential constituent of Rome’s cultural identity. Depending on time, place, and function the image of the cultural Other oscillated in Rome between concepts such as fascination and demarcation, acceptance and contempt, friend and foe. I discuss two diVerent but interrelated Roman images of the oriental: the ‘ethnic’ image of the Parthian as the representative of the most powerful culture next to Augustan Rome, and the idealized image of the beautiful oriental used from Augustan times to represent all Wgures of the East, mythic and historical alike. OYcial relations between Romans and Parthians started late, with a treaty of Roman amicitia in 96 bc.51 This situation changed when the Roman general Marcus Licinius Crassus attacked the Parthians in the winter of 55/ 54 bc without Wrst declaring war. After the defeat of Crassus and the loss of his entire army in 53 bc, Caesar propagated the ideology of revenge on the Parthians, but did not initiate war. In 20 bc, by exerting diplomatic and military pressure on Parthia, Augustus succeeded in recovering well over 100 Roman standards and thousands of captive Romans. Although it had been achieved through diplomacy, the so-called settlement of the Parthian question was interpreted in Rome’s public media as Augustus’ greatest victory, as the Wnal legitimization of his new imperial rule. Images and texts throughout the Roman Empire propagated the Parthian settlement as the ultimate triumph of the Roman West over the East, and as one of the greatest achievements of Augustan foreign policy. Augustan poets even introduced a cosmic dimension to the Parthian settlement: they construed it as the political 50

The Augustan writer Strabo outlines a spatial model which emphasizes the geographical (implicitly imperial) centrality of Rome: Clarke 1999, 210–28. 51 Schneider 1998, 97.

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prerequisite for the beginning of the Golden Age oYcially ‘heralded’ by Augustus in 17 bc.52 As part of this (imperial) self-congratulation the Wrst Roman images of the Parthian were launched. A famous example is the Prima Porta statue of Augustus sculpted in marble around 17 bc (Fig. 20, middle and Fig. 21).53 In the center of the statue’s richly decorated cuirass the two main Wgures are depicted: a Parthian is presenting to a military representative of Rome a standard adorned with a legionary eagle and three phalerae. Surrounded by non-interacting Wgures of geographic, cosmic, and divine nature, the Parthian and Rome’s representative are the only two who stand and interact with each other. Both are, however, portrayed in signiWcant asymmetry: on the left, and larger in size, we see the cuirassed representative of Rome from a side view, who extends his right hand as if to demand or receive the standard; on the right, the Parthian, smaller in size and mainly viewed from the front, gazes up towards the legionary eagle. This depiction is the most detailed portrayal of a Parthian in Roman art. Originally he would have been even more conspicuous as he would have been distinctively colored. The head of the Parthian is characterized by irregular curly hair, held in place with a Xat ribbon or a diadem, a non-Classical nose, pronounced cheekbones, a moustache, and a long beard. He is dressed in long trousers, a belted V-neck tunic with long sleeves, and soft shoes. He is shown armed with a bow kept in a combination quiver and bow case (gorytus), which was attached to a belt running over his left shoulder. The dress and physiognomy (but rarely the weapons) of the Parthian became stereotypes deployed by Roman workshops to portray generically the people of the East. Distinctively Parthian is the V-neck tunic, which is widely attested in Parthian art.54 Roman portrayals of Parthians raise the question of what is known about actual contacts between the Parthians and the people of Rome. Under Augustus at least Wve Parthian legations are reported to have come to Rome. Eastern kings as well as hostages from the royal family of Parthia living with their oriental entourages in Rome were regularly paraded in front of the Roman public. Suetonius reports on a visit by Augustus to the Circus Maximus (Divus Augustus 43.4): ‘On the day of one of the shows Augustus made a display of the Wrst Parthian hostages that had ever been sent to Rome, by leading them through the middle of the arena and placing them in the second row above his own seat.’ It is more than likely that such events encouraged

52 53 54

Schneider 1986, 32–6, 63, 71, 74; Wallace-Hadrill 2004. Schneider 1998, 97–9 pls. 3.1–2; Rose 2005, 24–6 Wg. 4; see above n. 42. Schneider 1998, 98 (ample evidence is given in n. 25).

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other forms of interactions between Romans and Parthians besides the readings promoted by Rome’s imperial imagery and ideology. Such events reveal a further diVerence in the perception of the Parthian in Rome. Although the general appearance of a Parthian was well known at Rome, the city’s workshops and their patrons were not interested in reproducing Parthian dress in authentic or ethnographic detail. Rather, when portraying the cultural from the Orient, Roman workshops followed established Greek models. The result was a conventionalized image of the Parthian adaptable to both the ideological needs of the imperial regime and the cultural preconceptions of the Roman elite. In general, we can say that little reliable information about Parthia was available in Rome. The Romans for the most part viewed the Parthians as once the Greeks had viewed the Persians.55 The Achaemenid Empire, Alexander the Great, and the Seleucid kings provided the Romans with appropriate stereotypes with which they could imagine Parthia. Prominent among these were the lurid details of the Perso-Parthians’ brutal despotism, legendary wealth, fantastic luxury, eVeminate lifestyle, and excessive sexuality. After the return of the standards in 20 bc, the Roman idea of the PersoParthian ‘other world’ acquired its Wxed form. It was a world at a vast distance from Rome, beyond the frontier of the Roman Empire. Early imperial writers such as Pompeius Trogus, Manilius, and Tacitus represented the PersoParthian ‘other world’ as alius orbis and orbis alter.56 The orbis alter existed outside the orbis Romanus and did not impinge upon Rome’s claim to supremacy. The concept of two opposing worlds reXects two apparently incongruent but interconnected issues of Roman imperial ideology, namely the propagated asymmetry between Rome and the East, and Rome’s interest in the Orient as her prime cultural Other. The most suggestive visual manifestation of the eastern orbis alter was the image of the handsome oriental.57 This image was introduced into Roman art around the time of the return of the standards and the Wrst depictions of the Parthian. In contrast to the ‘ethnic’ stereotype of the Parthian (Fig. 21), the handsome oriental has a clean-shaven face framed by long coiVured hair, crowned by the Phrygian cap. He wears a double-belted tunic, a Xowing mantle, long trousers, and soft shoes. In short, he is distinguished by youthful beauty, rich dress, and intensive color (Figs. 22, 25–6). The historical or rather

55

Ibid. 103. Pompeius Trogus, Historiae Philippicae 41.1.1: divisione orbis; Manilius, Astronomica 4.674–5: orbis alter; Tacitus, Annales 2.2.2: alio ex orbe. 57 Schneider 1986; Schneider 1998, 104–10. 56

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mythic identity of the oriental is indicated by his attributes, habitus, and/or context. The ambiguity of the handsome oriental is especially clear in Roman images of oriental cup-bearers, which commonly served as table-legs in Roman villas. A Wne example is the marble Wgure found in the Casa del Camillo in Pompeii, and thus made before ad 79 (Fig. 22).58 The Wgure portrays a luxury-class slave from the East: young, beautiful, clean shaven, and in oriental dress. The wine ladle in his left hand denotes him as a cupbearer, who is depicted in the act of waiting. In an ode dedicated to Agrippa’s steward Iccius in 25 bc, the Augustan poet Horace conWrms the desirability of such handsome oriental cup-bearers. The poet refers to the alluring prospect of great wealth and a luxurious lifestyle when Iccius returns home after his victories over the Arabs, the Parthians—perhaps even over the Chinese (Odes 1.29.7–8): ‘What page from (oriental) court with scented locks will be set to hand your wine-cup?’ At Rome, the image of the oriental cup-bearer was closely related to the image of the Trojan prince Ganymede, the most beautiful cup-bearer from the (Phrygian) East. To show the beauty of his body Ganymede was conventionally portrayed naked except for a mantle and the Phrygian cap.59 Just like the Wgures of oriental cup-bearers, sculptures of Ganymede often served in Roman villas as table-legs. Ganymede is usually accompanied by an eagle, which recalls his abduction to Olympus by Zeus and his fate to serve wine eternally to the gods. The Trojan cup-bearer was the mythic prototype of the historical slave cup-bearer from the East. Both cup-bearers betoken the ability of the Roman elite to command all the resources of the empire in the endlessly enjoyable task of projecting and maintaining their rank. The Augustan statue of Ganymede at the stately villa at Sperlonga, on the coast about 110 km south of Rome, sheds further light on the relations between imperial Rome and the Orient (Fig. 23): for it is not only the earliest known Roman representation of the handsome Trojan prince but it is also the only one wearing oriental dress.60 The statue was spectacularly set up above the entrance to a cavern, which served as the large villa’s dining room: Ganymede here is not small but larger than life, he is displayed not indoors but as a landmark outside, he appears not naked but in rich oriental dress, and he is made not of monochrome stone but polychrome marble from his Phrygian homeland (in contrast to the head and the lost hands of white marble). As a Trojan, Ganymede was a mythic ancestor of Rome; however, as 58 59 60

Schneider 1998, 107–8 pl. 14.2. Ibid. 102 n. 50. Ibid. 108 pl. 15.1.

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Fig. 22. Oriental cup-bearer with wine ladle as table-leg, from Pompeii (Casa del Camillo). Before ad 79. Naples, Museo Archeologico Nazionale Fig. 23. Statue of Ganymede made of marmor Phrygium, from the stately villa at Sperlonga. About 10 bc–ad 10. Sperlonga, Museo Archeologico

an oriental servant on Olympus he embodied the service ‘owed’ by the East to the Roman elite. Consequently, the statue at Sperlonga neatly merges the paradoxical themes of amity and enmity, friend and stranger, Roman and oriental. This makes the Sperlonga statue of Ganymede a case in point regarding the ambivalent aspects of orientalism in Augustan Rome. Two further motifs of the handsome oriental were introduced into the imagery of Augustan Rome: standing (Figs. 24–5) or kneeling (Figs. 26 and 28) sculptures in the gesture of support.61 Both statue types are over-life-size and mostly made of colored marble. In the Renaissance, however, the hands 61

Schneider 1986; Schneider 2002, 84–8, 433–6 nos. 136–8.

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and face(s) of the kneeling oriental(s) were restored suggestively but wrongly in black marble (Fig. 26). Originally these parts of the body were carved separately in white marble as shown in the statue of Ganymede in Sperlonga (Fig. 23). In the Augustan period these ‘support’ Wgures were related to both the Parthians and the Persians. Following a standard set by Cicero, Augustan poets such as Virgil, Propertius, Horace, and Ovid usually refer to the Parthians by the name of their famous historical ancestors, Medes, Persians, or Achaemenians.62 This was a clear allusion to the Persian Wars of the early Wfth century bc: after the return of the standards in 20 bc the equation of the Parthians with the Persians became a focal point of Rome’s imperial ideology.63 A visual highlight of this ideology was a grand sea battle, the naumachia Augusti, to celebrate the dedication of the Forum Augustum in 2 bc. The staged battle took place in a specially excavated basin measuring 540  360 m (approximately 48 acres!) and was fed by a purpose-built aqueduct (Fig. 13). In addition to an unknown number of oarsmen roughly 3,000 Wghters were forced to re-enact the victory of the Athenian navy over the Persian (in reality largely the Phoenician) Xeet at Salamis in 480 bc.64 A victory monument, now lost, was erected shortly after the return of the standards in 20 bc. It can be reconstructed on the basis of two diVerent sources: a brief phrase by the imperial Greek writer Pausanias, and three statues of kneeling orientals. They form one set as they share not only the same size, motif, Phrygian marble, and Augustan workmanship but also the same origin, Rome (Figs. 26 and 28).65 The precise location of this monument is unknown. Pausanias (Periegeta, 1.18.8) describes an analogous monument placed in the sacred precinct of Zeus Olympios at Athens and probably erected around the same time as the monument in Rome: ‘There are also statues of Persians made of Phrygian marble supporting a bronze tripod; both the Wgures and the tripod are worth seeing.’ The three Persians in Athens and the three kneeling Wgures from Rome correspond so closely to each other that we are able to deWne their function. They must have served to support a large bronze tripod, at least three to four meters high (Fig. 28).66 Historically, this tripod referred to the famous tripod dedicated in the sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi by those Greek cities that defeated the Persians at Plataea in 479 bc (Fig. 27).67 Politically, however, it referred to two central claims of the Augustan regime: to have ‘defeated’ Parthia and to have restored pietas.68

62 63 64 65 68

Schneider 1998, 111. Schneider 1986, 58–67; Schneider 1998, 110–13; Spannagel 1999, 75–7, 206–23, 226–30. Res Gestae 23; Schneider 1998, 112–13; Spannagel 1999, 15. 66 67 Schneider 1986, 18–97. Schneider 1986, 50–7 pl. 9. Ibid. 58. Augustan tripods and pietas, ibid. 67–72; Schneider 1998, 112 with n. 129.

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Fig. 24. Torso of a standing oriental made of marmor Phrygium, from the Basilica Aemilia in Rome. After 14 bc. Rome, Antiquario Forense Fig. 25. Reconstruction of the oriental torso

More complex is the discourse which stimulated the shaping of the standing oriental in Rome.69 In the Augustan period the nave of the Basilica Aemila on the northeast side of the Forum Romanum (Fig. 15), opposite the Basilica Iulia, was decorated with a gallery of ‘telamons’ all showing standing orientals; their original location in the nave is unknown.70 Fragments (none of them published) of about twenty or more over-life-size statues of orientals in colored marble have survived (Fig. 24).71 Their style links them to the restoration of the Basilica Aemilia after 14 bc. Since this restoration was 69

Schneider 1986, 98–125; Schneider 1998, 108–10. Steinby i. 183–7 s.v. Basilica Paul(l)i (Heinrich Bauer); Haselberger 2002, 66 s.v. Basilica Paulli. 71 These Wgures will now be jointly published by Tobias Bitterer and the author. 70

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Fig. 26. Statue of a kneeling oriental made of marmor Phrygium, from Rome. After 20 bc. Naples, Museo Archeologico Nazionale

paid for by Augustus and the ‘friends’ of Lucius Aemilius Paullus, we may suspect an allusion to the return of the standards in 20 bc.72 The standing orientals are shown in the same weighted stance and are worked to an exceptional Wnish. As the ancient arms of the sculptures are lost we need to 72

Dio Cassius 54.24.3.

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Fig. 27. The Delphic tripod. After 479 bc. Reconstruction Fig. 28. Three kneeling orientals carrying a tripod, originally set up in Rome and Athens. After 20 bc. Reconstruction

reconstruct their original pose. The evidence suggests that they were ‘telamons’ showing one arm in the gesture of support: the upper arm was outstretched roughly sideways, the lower arm raised upwards, and the hand again outstretched to the side (Fig. 25). The weighted stand and the position of the arm highlight the semantic construction of this pose: the standing oriental embodies the tectonic counter-model of any telamon used to support architecture. The result is a powerful image showing both a supporting

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servant and a handsome oriental, perhaps related to the ideology of Parthia’s ‘defeat’ in 20 bc. A complementary reading is suggested by their Latin name: Pliny the Elder calls the orientals of the Basilica Aemilia Phryges.73 Although imperial texts use Phryx occasionally as a synonym for an oriental slave, it is tempting to understand Pliny’s Phryges also as a synonym for the Trojan ancestors of the Romans—a synonym especially popular and signiWcant in early imperial Rome. From the Augustan period onwards ‘ethnic’ Parthians and handsome orientals became a distinctive element of Roman imagery. They were widely adopted throughout the Roman Empire and not restricted to the periods of actual war between Rome and Parthia. The image of the handsome oriental was continuously popular not only with Roman emperors and members of the Roman and non-Roman elite, but also with worshipers of eastern deities like Attis and Mithras. In contrast to images of other non-Romans the handsome oriental combines an allusion to servitude with desirable beauty and all the connotations of colored marble (see below). In Augustan Rome these features were brought together for the Wrst time and set up as a standard for future generations. In the context of Augustan orientalism the new staging of colored marble acquired speciWc readings. The over-life-size statues of the oriental were worked in colored marble for the Wrst time, and only the most expensive and exclusive qualities were used: the whitish marmor Phrygium, and the yellowish marmor Numidicum. Though they derive from diVerent parts of the Mediterranean, both appear similar as they are reticulated with veins, crimson to violet in color. Their exotic color and high polish gave the oriental body an intensity and meaning unprecedented in ancient art. The polychrome orientals gave the East a new presence at Rome as ‘colored’ embodiments of eastern dress, attitude, and luxury. This was complemented by the reading of colored marble as a symbol of Rome’s imperial power over virtually everything, even the most inaccessible resources of the world. Most of the polychrome quarries were situated at the edges of the Roman world and became imperial property under Augustus. Regardless of diYculty, cost, and distance, a complex infrastructure was put in place for the delivery of colored marble from the quarries to Rome. Finished to a state of uniform perfection colored marble constituted not only a singular treasure of the Roman emperor but also a unique map of the Roman Empire. Thus, the polychromes stimulated a more advanced perception of specialization of workmanship and engineering, measures of infrastructure, patterns of distribution and trade, the marking of social and economic status, the shaping of new architectural landscapes, and the (ideologized) discourse of 73 Pliny, Naturalis historia 36.102: basilicam Pauli columnis et Phrygibus mirabilem [est]. For this reading of the text, Schneider 1986, 120–5; Schneider 1998, 109–10.

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marble, color, and power.74 As a result, the polychrome orientals represented ‘spoils’ never seen at Rome before. In short, the visual preoccupation of Augustan (and later) Rome with the Orient was obsessive. Apart from the Greeks (who themselves had been deeply inXuenced by oriental cultures since the Archaic period) no other people contributed so profoundly to the shaping of Rome’s imperial identity as the civilizations of the East. The strong focus on selected eastern civilizations in Rome’s imperial imagery lent the images of the oriental new signiWcance. Here, the image of the handsome oriental turned out to be a particularly successful icon as it became loaded with a set of diVerent and inconsistent meanings. Under Augustus this image oscillated between Trojan friend and Parthian enemy, and embodied a strange conceptual overlap between the categories of friend and foe. The discourse around the oriental as friend and the oriental as foe was one of the contexts in which Roman identity was deWned. For imperial Rome, ‘Roman’ was synonymous with the world: a nonRoman could well become ‘Roman’, but keep, at the same time, his own cultural identity. In this constantly shifting debate on the ‘Roman’ and the ‘foreign’ the diVerent constructions of the role of the ‘orient(al)’ in imperial Rome—ranging from the legitimization of the city’s eastern origins at Troy to the condemnation of Rome’s most dangerous enemy, the Parthian— amounted to diVerent claims and conXicting counterclaims on how ‘Roman’ was to be deWned: everybody who lived in accordance with the political, religious, and social interests of imperial Rome was potentially a ‘Roman’. This practice was also inscribed in the nature of the Roman citizenship which did not mark a speciWc ethnic or national distinction but a speciWc legal status. The image of the handsome oriental is perhaps the most explicit and complex manifestation of what ‘Romanism’ was about. This image shows more than any other medium, that the story of Augustan Rome and her empire was as much the story of the Orient as it was the story of the Occident.

4. FURTHER THOUGHTS AND QUESTIONS Augustus, the Roman senate, and numerous Romans used the entire range of imagery to make the emperor omnipresent throughout the empire of Rome. The imagery of the cities reshaped in the Augustan period functioned as a kind of stage on which images of all kinds were set up to praise the unique qualities and collective virtues of the new emperor. According to the ideology 74

Marble and color: Bradley 2004.

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of the time Augustus claimed to have paciWed and reunited the world not only by exercising paramount power but also by bringing to the Roman Empire new imagery and identity, new prosperity and infrastructure. Thus the Augustan images of the city of Rome, the Wrst Roman emperor, and the ‘oriental other’ reveal a fundamental contrast to the practice of (correspondent) images of the Han Dynasty, a contrast which is more than striking. This contrast highlights questions which are at the core of the intercultural approach of this book. Why is public space made so abundantly available in the cities of the Roman Empire and so obviously avoided in the cities of Han China? What do we know about ritual and visual interaction between the emperor and the people in Han China—and how does this aVect our understanding of social and visual communication of both cultures? What (inter) cultural conclusions emerge from the omnipresence of images of the Roman emperor and the radical absence of images of a Qin or Han emperor? Why did the Chinese need depictions of the cultural Other but no portrayal of their emperor? What new prospects can be opened up for both civilizations by analyzing the diVerent shaping and function of the imagery of the cultural Other? And last but not least, how can the visual discrepancies between imperial Rome and Han China contribute to a broader understanding of our perceptions of empire? References Blois, Lukas de, Erdkamp, Paul, Hekster, Olivier, Kleijn, Gerda de, and Mols, Stephan (eds.), The Representation and Perception of Roman Imperial Power. Amsterdam (Gieben) 2003. Boschung, Dietrich, Das ro¨mische Herrscherbild, vol. i.2: Die Bildnisse des Augustus. Berlin (Mann) 1993. Bradley, Mark, Colouring in: Concepts of Colour in Ancient Rome. (Ph.D. Cambridge 2004), forthcoming at Cambridge University Press. Buchner, Edmund, Die Sonnenuhr des Augustus. Mainz (Zabern) 1982 [Wrst publ. 1976 and 1980]. Claridge, Amanda, Rome: An Archaeological Guide. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1998. Clarke, Katherine, Between Geography and History: Hellenistic Constructions of the Roman World. Oxford/New York (Oxford University Press) 1999. Coarelli, Filippo, ‘Die Stadtplanung von Caesar bis Augustus’, in: Kaiser Augustus 1988, 68–80. —— Roma (Guide archeologiche Laterza 6). 5th edn. Roma (Laterza) 2000. Coulston, Jon, and Dodge, Hazel (eds.), Ancient Rome: The Archaeology of the Eternal City. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2000. Favro, Diane, The Urban Image of Augustan Rome. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1996.

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Fejfer, Jane, ‘The Roman Emperor Portrait: Some Problems in Methodology’, Ostraka, 5 (1988), 45–56. Galinsky, Karl, The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Augustus. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2005. Gnoli, Raniero, Marmora Romana. Roma (Ed. dell’Elefante) 1971. Haselberger, Lothar et al., Mapping Augustan Rome (Journal of Roman Archaeology, Suppl. Ser., 50). Portsmouth (Humphrey) 2002. Hesberg, Henner von, ‘Die Vera¨nderung des Erscheinungsbildes der Stadt Rom unter Augustus’, in: Kaiser Augustus 1988, 93–115. Hingley, Richard, Globalizing Roman Culture: Unity, Diversity and Empire. London/ New York (Routledge) 2005. HoVmann, Adolf, and Wulf, Ulrike (eds.), Die Kaiserpala¨ste auf dem Palatin in Rom: Das Zentrum der ro¨mischen Welt und seine Bauten. Mainz (Zabern) 2004. Ho¨lscher, Tonio, ‘Die Anfa¨nge ro¨mischer Repra¨sentationskunst’, Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archa¨ologischen Instituts, Ro¨mische Abteilung, 85 (1978), 315–57. —— Staatsdenkmal und Publikum: Vom Untergang der Republik bis zur Festigung des Kaisertums in Rom (Xenia 9). Konstanz (Universita¨tsverlag Konstanz) 1984. Howgego, Christopher, Ancient History from Coins. London/New York (Routledge) 1995. —— Kaiser Augustus und die verlorene Republik: Eine Ausstellung im Martin-GropiusBau, Berlin, 7. Juni–14. August 1988. Mainz (Zabern) 1988. Kolb, Frank, Rom: Geschichte der Stadt in der Antike. 2nd edn. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 2002. Krause, Clemens, ‘Die Domus Tiberiana: Vom Wohnquartier zum Kaiserpalast’, in: HoVmann and Wulf 2004, 32–58. La Rocca, Eugenio, ‘La nuova immagine dei fori Imperiali’, Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archa¨ologischen Instituts, Ro¨mische Abteilung, 108 (2001), 171–213. Nuccio, Marilda de, ‘Marmi colorati nell’arca del Teatro di Marcello: Tempio di Apollo Sosiano e Tempio di Bellona’, in: Nuccio and Ungaro 2002, 147–57. —— and Ungaro, Lucrezia (eds.), I marmi colorati della Roma imperiale, Roma, Mercati di Traiano, 28 settembre 2002–19 gennaio 2003. Venezia (Marsilio) 2002. Patterson, John R., ‘The City of Rome: From Republic to Empire’, Journal of Roman Studies, 82 (1992), 186–215. Pensabene, Patrizio, ‘Das Heiligtum der Kybele und die Untergeschossbauten im Su¨dwesten des Palatin’, in: HoVmann and Wulf 2004, 18–31. ¨ ber das Herstellen von Portra¨ts: Ein Beitrag zu RationalisierungsPfanner, Michael, ‘U maßnahmen und Produktionsmechanismen von Massenware im spa¨ten Hellenismus und in der ro¨mischen Kaiserzeit’, Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archa¨ologischen Instituts, 104 (1989), 157–257. Rich, John W., ‘Augustus: War and Peace’, in: Blois et al. 2003, 329–57. Rose, Charles Brian, ‘The Parthians in Augustan Rome’, American Journal of Archaeology, 109 (2005), 21–75. Schneider, Rolf Michael, Bunte Barbaren: Orientalenstatuen aus farbigem Marmor in der ro¨mischen Repra¨sentationskunst. Worms (Werner) 1986. —— ‘Die Faszination des Feindes: Bilder der Parther und des Orients in Rom’, in: Josef Wieseho¨fer (ed.), Das Partherreich und seine Zeugnisse: Beitra¨ge des

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internationalen Colloquiums, Eutin 27.–30. Juni 1996 (Historia Einzelschriften 122). Stuttgart (Steiner) 1998, 95–146. Schneider, Rolf Michael, ‘Coloured Marble: The Splendour and Power of Imperial Rome’, Apollo, The International Magazine of the Arts (July 2001), 3–10. —— ‘Nuove immagini del potere romano: sculture in marmo colorato nell’impero romano’, in: Nuccio and Ungaro 2002, 82–105. —— ‘Gegenbilder im ro¨mischen Kaiserportra¨t: Die neuen Gesichter Neros und Vespasians’, in: Martin Bu¨chsel and Peter Schmidt (eds.), Das Portra¨t vor der ErWndung des Portra¨ts. Mainz (Zabern) 2003, 59–76. ¨ gypten, sondern Rom: Der neue Lebensraum der Obelisken’, —— ‘Nicht mehr A Sta¨del Jahrbuch (N.F.), 19 (2004), 155–79. Smith, Roland R. R., ‘Typology and Diversity in the Portraits of Augustus’, Journal of Roman Archaeology, 9 (1996), 30–47 [review of Boschung 1993]. Spannagel, Martin, Exemplaria Principis: Untersuchungen zu Entstehung und Ausstattung des Augustusforums. Heidelberg (Archa¨ologie und Geschichte) 1999. Stambaugh, John E., The Ancient Roman City. Baltimore (Johns Hopkins University Press) 1988. Steinby, Eva Margareta (ed.), Lexicon Topographicum Urbis Romae. 6 vols. Roma (Quasar) 1993–2000. Tomei, Maria Antonietta, ‘Die Residenz der ersten Kaiser: Der Palatin in augusteischer Zeit’, in: HoVmann and Wulf 2004, 6–17. Ungaro, Lucrezia, ‘Il Foro di Augusto’, in: Nuccio and Ungaro 2002, 109–21. Vierneisel, Klaus, and Zanker, Paul (eds.), Die Bildnisse des Augustus: Sonderausstellung der Glyptothek und des Museums fu¨r Abgu¨sse Klassischer Bildwerke Mu¨nchen. Mu¨nchen (Glyptothek Mu¨nchen) 1979. Wallace-Hadrill, Andrew, Augustan Rome. Bristol (Bristol Classical Press) 1993. —— ‘The Streets of Rome as a Representation of Imperial Power’, in: Blois et al. 2003, 189–206. —— ‘The Golden Age and Sin in Augustan Ideology’, in: Robin Osborne (ed.), Studies in Ancient Greek and Roman Society. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2004, 159–76. Wiseman, Timothy Peter, ‘Cybele, Vergil and Augustus’, in: Tony Woodman and David West (eds.), Poetry and Politics in the Age of Augustus. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1984, 117–28. Zanker, Paul, Provinzielle Kaiserportra¨ts: Zur Rezeption der Selbstdarstellungen des Princeps (Abh. Bayer. Akad. Wiss., phil.-hist. Klasse 90). Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1983. —— The Power of Images in the Age of Augustus. Ann Arbor (The University of Michigan Press) 1988. —— ‘The City as Symbol: Rome and the Creation of an Urban Image’, in: Elizabeth Fentress (ed.), Romanization and the City: Creation, Transformations and Failures, Proceedings of a conference held at the American Academy in Rome to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the excavations at Cosa, 14–16 May 1998 (Journal of Roman Archaeology, Suppl. Ser. 38). Portsmouth (Humphrey) 2000, 25–41.

Imperial Aura and the Image of the Other in Han Art Miche`le Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens (Paris)

Before trying to explore how notions such as the imperial aura and the image of the Other are expressed in Han art, I would like to recall the limits of our documentation, which explain the diYculty I often have had in illustrating my subject. The cities and palaces of the Qin and the Han, built mostly of earth (mainly rammed earth), sometimes faced with decorated bricks, and of wood, have left few evocative vestiges. We possess fragments of city walls and gates, foundations and Xoors, of decorated partition walls, eaves tile ends, drainage elements, models of houses destined to accompany the dead, representations on the walls of tombs, and Wnally, descriptions, sometimes extravagant but often imprecise, found in the texts of this period. The situation is therefore totally diVerent from that of the urbanism of the Roman Empire. In fact, the main Han monuments which remain are funerary. It is therefore normal that Chinese archeology, for this period, is essentially an archeology of tombs. Thus myriads of graves dating to the Qin/Han period have been discovered during the last Wfty years. Another characteristic is that this archeology has long since privileged the tombs of the rich, containing precious objects or inscriptions, to the detriment of tombs of people from the lower classes; nevertheless, no imperial tomb has yet been opened. Finally, Chinese archeological policy, in giving priority to the funerary data and, more generally, to salvage excavations, has set aside the excavation of settlements or ateliers until recent years. The present wild development of urbanism in China means that extensive excavations are practically impossible now in the urban centers. I would like to thank Fritz-Heiner Mutschler and Achim Mittag for inviting me to participate in the Essen Conference and my ‘co-e´quipier’ on the Roman side, Rolf Michael Schneider, for his inspiring paper.

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Bearing these reservations in mind, we will now take a look at how the idea of ‘empire’ was expressed in Han art, attempting to answer Rolf Michael Schneider’s three questions concerning Rome.

1 . T H E IM P E R I A L I M AG E Let me begin with the remark that we possess no image of a Qin or Han emperor, neither carved nor painted representations, and that the texts from this period do not mention any sort of eYgy of an emperor or a member of the imperial family. This fact is not easily explained. It is not the case that human representations are absent in the art of that time. That carved or painted human Wgures are not lacking in Qin or Han art is evident from numerous examples, from the terracotta warriors in the pits of the mausoleum of the First Emperor (Qin Shihuangdi, r. 246–210 bc), to the soldiers of the tomb of Jingdi (r. 157–142 bc), to the ‘portraits’ of the defunct in their tombs, the pictorial scenes, not to mention the innumerable tomb Wgures or images of servants, soldiers, oYcials, musicians, dancers, etc. We further know that portraits existed in the palaces. The historian Sima Qian (c.145–c.90/85 bc), having seen a portrait (tu) of Zhang Liang (d. 185 bc), counselor, negotiator, and faithful partisan of the Han dynasty’s founder, Liu Bang, comments that he was astonished that this eminent strategist, whom he had imagined to be of imposing and extraordinary stature, had the appearance of a pretty woman in this portrait.1 Moreover, if Wang Yanshou’s (X. ad 163) descriptions can be believed, imaginary portraits of the rulers of antiquity decorated the princes’ palaces, since the beginning of the Han.2 This tradition continued, at least in Shandong, as shown by the oVering shrines of the Wu family at Jiaxiang, from the mid-second century ad.3 However, it is not impossible that Wang’s description is a re-creation in the palace’s taste of the second century ad. In any case, the portrait, at least generic if not realistic portraiture, existed from the beginning of the Han, as shown, for example, in the representation of the

1

Shi ji 55/2049. Wang Yanshou in his ‘Lu Lingguang dian fu’ (‘Rhapsody of the Hall of Numinous Brilliance in Lu’) describes a mural painting on this theme in the palace of the Prince of Lu, Liu Yu (r. 154– 128 bc), constructed southeast of the Confucius temple in Qufu (Shandong), which still existed in the 2nd cent. ad (Knechtges 1987, ii. 275). 3 See Liu, Nylan, and Barbieri-Low 2005. 2

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Fig. 29. Portrait of the defunct, the wife of the Noble of Da, detail of the silk banner from Tomb No. 1 at Mawangdui, Changsha (Hunan), soon after 168 bc.

widow of the Noble of Da (buried soon after 168 bc), which was painted on the banner found in her tomb (Fig. 29).4 How then can we explain the preference for not representing the emperor or at least not exhibiting or circulating the imperial image in public? Let us straightforwardly remark that in antiquity the Chinese of the Central Plains were not very interested in picturing human beings. It is possible that this indiVerence was to a large extent due to the very nature of the religious conceptions in ancient China, centered around the worship of ancestor spirits and nature deities, with no emphasis on priests as obligatory intermediaries between men and the divine, and, in addition, without an impermeable frontier between the human and the divine, the living and the dead.5 Thus the Chinese of the Bronze Age did not aspire to illustrate their myths. They did not feel the need to give a visible form to their divinities, nor to commemorate their heroes in images. 4 Mawangdui Tomb No. 1, Changsha (Hunan), see Changsha Mawangdui yi hao Han mu 1973; Loewe 1979. 5 Cheng 1997, 46. On the interconnectedness of the living and the dead in the Western Zhou period, see Falkenhausen 1994, 4. On the role of the ‘invocators’ (zhu), the ‘spirit mediums’ (wu), and the ‘impersonators’ (shi) in the Zhou ritual, see Falkenhausen 1995.

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The human Wgure began to be more present at the beginning of the Wfth century bc, in the pictorial scenes of some bronzes,6 then during the fourth and third centuries bc on banners placed in the coYns, on lacquer ware,7 and above all in the sculptures made for the tombs. In these beginnings of Chinese portraiture, it seems that attention was not focused on the body but on the face, even if it remained extremely idealized, evoking human types rather than certain individuals.8 Therefore, at the end of the third century bc, in China there has not been a long tradition of representing the human Wgure. Nonetheless, the Qin and Han emperors could have chosen to construct around their person a culture of visual representation, either in a concern to their rule or in order to assert the authority and greatness of the empire. They also could have minted coins with their eYgy and by some means or other propagated their image. Yet they did none of these.9 It is beyond doubt, as Michael Loewe has shown,10 that the concept of imperial sovereignty evolved during the last centuries bc and that the notion of the Mandate of Heaven (tianming) became increasingly important in the second half of the Wrst century bc; nevertheless, I think that even if the doctrine of the Mandate of Heaven and the cycle of the Five Phases have not been taken into account openly and oYcially by an emperor before Chengdi (r. 33–7 bc) or, as a full-fledged theory, before Wang Mang (r. ad 9–23), these ideas have been operative even before the Wrst century bc. Within this conceptual framework, the Han emperor held his mandate from Heaven. He was the Son and the emanation of Heaven, who was conceived as an impersonal power. Basically, the emperor’s ‘main duties were those of a religious, ceremonial and constitutional Wgurehead’.11 Therefore he belonged to a theological reality which perhaps made unnecessary any representation of his earthly appearance. He did not need ‘visibility’. In the same way, the emperor had no need of direct propaganda, since he had no need to ask for the vote of his people to continue to reign or to transmit his power. Nevertheless, the problem of legitimacy existed. EVectively, his mandate, which conferred his divine status, could be taken away by 6

Weber 1968; Thote 1999. Lai 2002. 8 Pirazzoli 2002, 29. 9 This absence of a culture of portrayal of the person of the emperor was maintained in China until the beginning of the Qing dynasty in the second half of the 17th cent. Until that date, the imperial portrait did not circulate and was not exposed publicly; see Stuart and Rawski 2001; Pirazzoli 2004; Stuart 2005. 10 Loewe 2004, 8, 421–56. 11 Loewe 2004, 9. On the sacerdotal connotation of rulership in ancient China, see also Levi 1989, 219. 7

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the same Heaven, should Heaven consider that the ruler of men did not possess the virtue required to govern, or if he committed mistakes. Heaven could then demonstrate its anger via catastrophes and deprive the monarch or his dynasty of their mandate to rule. Therefore, the First Emperor of Qin and the Wrst Han emperors relied upon diVerent ideological procedures, besides their military power, to establish their legitimacy. The Wrst Han emperors established a cult to Gaozu, the founder of the dynasty; later on they bestowed themselves with a divine ancestor, Yao. Qin Shihuangdi and Han Wudi (r. 141–87 bc) tried as well to appropriate for themselves divine powers and ultimately transform themselves into gods.12 The attempt of self-divinization was Wnally rejected by the court at the end of the Former Han, but from that time on all emperors aYrmed their right to reign and attempted to prove that they had Heavenly protection by manipulating prophetic texts (chenwei), natural phenomena, objects of good omen, all texts and objects which were legitimizing documents, certiWcates of the favor their owner had received from Heaven.13 The ideological struggles around the imperial cults took place within this context of legitimation, between an emperor such as Wudi, who relied on the fangshi (‘masters of techniques’) and traveled to the holy sites of the country, which he thereby placed under his control and integrated into the imperial cult, and the scholar-oYcials who wanted to conWne the emperor to the interior of his palace and to the holy sites disposed nearby the imperial residence.14 The scholars, who saw themselves as the intermediaries between Heaven and the monarch, Wnally succeeded and imposed an imperial cult reserved for the sovereign only and practiced under their control in the capital. This reclusion of the emperor’s person continued in varied degrees throughout Chinese history. Studying what has survived of Han art, it is diYcult to Wnd tangible traces of these ideological choices, of the religious dimension of political legitimacy, and even of the oYcial religion. We possess no representation of the state cults or rituals. The emperors erected no architectural monument which, like the Septizodium of Severus, could be the visual commemoration of a sign of divine favor. The twelve colossal bronze statues, which had been produced by Qin Shihuangdi’s order between 221 and 212 bc, by using the bronze obtained from melting all the weapons seized throughout the country, were destroyed by the warlord Dong Zhuo in ad 190.15 Despite all, these sculptures 12 13 14 15

Puett 2002, 223–6, 258, 289. Seidel 1983, 303–13. Bujard 2000, 162. See also Bujard 1997. Shi ji 6/239; Chavannes, ii. 134; Hou 1977, 136–42.

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Fig. 30. Jade bi disc from the tomb of Prince Liu Sheng at Mancheng (Hebei), second century bc. The bi has been found between the double nested coffins containing the defunct.

deserve our attention. Commemorating the apparition of barbarian giants in 221 bc—no doubt an auspicious omen—and celebrating the Wnal victory of the First Emperor, they were erected in the palace’s courtyard at Xianyang. After the fall of the Qin dynasty, these colossuses were placed before the Daxia Hall of the Palace of Eternal Joy (Changle gong) at Chang’an, from where they

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Fig. 31. Drawing of the paintings in the antechamber of Tomb 1 at Wangdu (Hebei); on the lower register, good omens; second half of the second century ad.

were not moved again until their destruction. They represented one of the most prestigious monuments of the capital, even though the Han most often reinterpreted the apparition of these giants under Qin Shihuangdi as an evil portent.16 This is a good example, not only of the diVering interpretations of the same heavenly sign according to the political environment, but also of the commemoration of the founding of the empire and of the ever negative status of the barbarian’s image. Other Qin and Han works which have not been transmitted, include objects serving as regalia and talismans; they were kept hidden and apparently have not survived the destructions at the end of the Han dynasty. Only certain jades, exhumed from princely tombs, can give us an idea of what were once tablets, seals, and bi discs (Fig. 30) used during the ceremonies or as palladia and dynastic treasures.17 However, the vogue of good omens, which are represented in a number of rich tombs or oVering shrines of members of the establishment in the second century ad (Fig. 31), is certainly the most visible sign how Han society from the end of the Former Han dynasty onwards became impregnated with the theory of the Heavenly Mandate. Some of these signs may be linked to the constant reconWrmation of the reigning family’s mandate;18 others were a reminder of the role of counselors to the monarch, whom to serve the Confucian scholars considered their prerogative, and may be interpreted as an indirect criticism addressed to a negligent ruler by these same scholars in case of their being kept away from power;19 others again may be understood 16

Han shu 27/1472. See e.g. the jades in the tomb of Liu Sheng, son of the emperor Jingdi and Prince of Zhongshan (r. 154–112 bc), at Mancheng (Hebei), Mancheng Han mu fajue baogao 1980. 18 Wu 1989, 90–6. 19 Ibid. 102–7. 17

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Fig. 32. Map of Chang’an in the Former Han dynasty; (1) Changle gong, (2) Weiyang gong, (3) Arsenal, (4) Guigong, (5) Beigong, (6) Mingguang gong, (7) Western market, (8) Eastern market, (9) Jianzhang gong.

as a kind of mimicry of the heavenly omens destined for the monarch. In that case, these omens would be a response of the Supreme Deity to the virtue or the meritorious actions of the oYcials who were the representatives of the monarch at the local level, in some way a hypostasis of the imperial power.20 Functioning in the same way as the prophetic texts and auspicious objects in the hands of the reigning family or any pretenders to the throne, these signs became a propaganda weapon in the hands of lineages or individuals building a career. They clearly show the conception that the social elites held of the sovereignty. 20

Levi 1989, 268.

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2 . I M AG E S O F T H E I M P E R I A L P OW E R From the emergence of the Chinese empire, an essential task of the successive rulers was the political, ideological, and cultural uniWcation of the realm. The First Emperor undertook several tours throughout his empire, personally performed sacriWces to the most important local spirits, and erected stelae to commemorate his achievements. Likewise, Emperor Wudi carried out a host of tours to communicate with the spirits of each region, hoping thus to obtain immortality for himself and to control these regions.21 The will to unify is further manifested by the enormous population resettlements which took place at that time, not only to improve the management of the host region’s local resources and to avoid the original region’s overpopulation, but also, in many cases, to control certain social groups, to reduce separatist tendencies and to promote cultural uniformization. The ultimate aim of uniWcation was the creation of a uniWed state, centralized, and absolutist. Plunging its roots in the political culture of Qin,22 uniWcation worked against the nobility and against the barbarians. How was this aYrmation of imperial power translated visually? In the Wrst place perhaps, through the city space (Fig. 32). Chang’an (36 square km intra-muros), capital of the Former Han, had been chosen for its strategic value. The city, which served as a model for the provincial metropolis, was constructed according to the points of the compass and closed in by walls.23 It was an essentially palatial city, administrative and cultic, the seat of authority and the almost divine presence of the emperor. The Wve palaces, including the government oYces, with the Weiyang gong complex as a center, occupied two-thirds of the agglomeration and it was from here, without a predetermined plan, that the city developed. Between the two main palatial complexes, the Weiyang gong on the west and the Changle gong on the east, the arsenal (720  322 m) occupied a space nearly three times as large as the Place de la Concorde in Paris. Outside the city, in the western suburbs, pleasure palaces were built for Wudi, some of which were connected to the Weiyang gong by raised, roofed passageways. The cemeteries and the cultic centers were also located outside the walls. The capital was protected, specially on the north side, by a belt of satellite towns, the mausoleum prefectures (lingxian), whose population consisted mainly of nobles, oYcials, rich and inXuent families resettled there by the government, and, of course, of troops. 21 23

22 Puett 2002, 313. Falkenhausen 2004, 152, 155–6. 25,700 m in circumference.

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The rounded-up Wgure of 80,800 is given for the number of registered households of the prefecture of Chang’an during the later part of the Western Han, perhaps amounting to between 350,000 and 400,000 individuals; the majority of this population lived outside the ramparts, while only 20–30 percent of the inhabitants lived intra-muros in wards enclosed by walls essentially in the northeast of the city.24 The walls of Chang’an, built of rammed earth, were imposing; they played a role of social control and, regarding the palace walls, strict separation between the areas where the population lived and the monarch resided; the latter area being conceived as a reproduction of the heavenly world.25 Imposing too, by their width (45–56 m), were the main arteries of the city. They had three lanes; the largest one in the center being reserved for the emperor. However, the public spaces and monuments were extremely limited in the capital of the Han empire: Chang’an had nothing equivalent to a forum, to an amphitheater or a theater, a circus or a hippodrome, a gymnasium or public baths. Only the two markets, in the northwest part of the city, could be considered as a possible gathering place for the public; but their public character was relative, not only because each market was surrounded by an enclosure and thus very controlled, but also because a part of the western market was occupied by a government industrial complex including ironworks, twentyone pottery kilns, and an atelier for minting bronze coins. Thus it is evident that in this political and administrative capital of the empire, the people mattered little; it was not built for them. We must not forget that even the idea of citizenship is absent from Han urban life; China having known, before the empire, neither republic nor democracy; hence the emperor did not have to spare those who were only his subjects. Another expression of imperial power: ostentation. We know little of imperial ostentation, only through the poetic descriptions of that time and through the spatial organization and burial goods of some princely tombs. What is striking, despite all, is the taste for excess, the megalomania, in the construction and decoration of the buildings designated for the emperor, be it his palaces or his mausoleum. This taste is constantly evoked by the Han authors and their descriptions are conWrmed by the vestiges which remain. The palace courtyards were enormous; they were conceived to welcome the crowds of princes and oYcials during the audiences and the spectacles. As to the mausoleums, the one built for the First Qin Emperor is the most eloquent example, with its peripheral pits containing a life-size terracotta army and two half life-size bronze chariots, complete with their charioteers; 24

Zhou 2001.

25

Liu 2000, 101.

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the mausoleum’s overall concept perhaps being ‘a symbolic depiction of the Emperor’s realm’.26 More modest, but still impressive, is the Yangling funerary complex (12 square km) of Emperor Jingdi (r. 157–141 bc). In a more general way, as Alain Testart points out, the sumptuous funerary furnishings, such as one Wnds in China in tombs of the nobility from the beginning of the empire, are symptomatic of despotic societies, in contrast to a policy of funerary distribution which would be an indication of a ‘society where the great are great because they are, in one way or another, at the service of the community’.27

3. THE I MAGE OF THE OTHER Here, again, it seems useful to note certain speciWc characteristics of Qin and Han imperialism. Han territorial expansion was more limited than that of Rome, and diVerent too, in three respects: Wrstly, Han conquests were lost time and again, mostly owed to the strength of the Xiongnu; secondly, the conquered regions, with the exception of Sichuan, had not witnessed a substantial economic development; hence conquerors and colonizers were confronted with an immense task; thirdly, Qin and Han China lacked a cultural interlocutor of equivalent weight.28 No civilization comparable to that of the Chinese states belonging to the Zhou cultural sphere existed at its margins. In other words, there was no equivalent to the inXuences of the Greek, Egyptian, and Syrian civilizations upon Rome. While Roman imperialism introduced prestigious cultures to Rome, Han imperialism merely exported and imposed its civilization everywhere it installed itself. In contrast to the Roman Empire which was far from being culturally uniWed, there did not exist a real cultural plurality in the orbis sinicus. By this I do not want to imply that the local cultures disappeared, but that they subsisted only in a marginal or subterranean way, outside the culture imposed from above. I want to add that this assimilation, even if occurring only on a surface level, was enough to satisfy the imperial Han government.29

26

Falkenhausen 2004, 123. Testart 2004, 312. A diVerent opinion is expressed by Sophia-Karin Psarras (2003, 60, 70), who sees the Xiongnu, politically and culturally, as equal to China. 29 On the Sino-Xiongnu relations and a comparison with the Roman world, see also Psarras 2003. 27 28

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Fig. 33. Bronze lamp supported by a Xiongnu, from the tomb of Prince Liu Sheng at Mancheng (Hebei); the bowl is inscribed ‘lamp with a danghu’; danghu being an official title used by the Xiongnu.

As a result of these characteristics, foreign inXuences on the Han civilization, even if they existed and were numerous, have never been emphasized and often remained almost invisible. Han exoticism is therefore much more hidden than Roman exoticism, much more modest in appearance, and more diYcult to detect also because it was not valorized as such and was quickly sinicized, to the point of becoming unrecognizable. Han exoticism touched several themes and artistic conventions,30 but also a number of products, techniques, ways of being, and cultural practices, mainly originating from Inner Asia. The borrowings seem to have been specially important in the high society. One may ask if this promotion of exoticism inXected the Han image of the ‘barbarians’ of the northern and western borders. It seems not; the passion, or at least curiosity, of an emperor such as Lingdi (r. ad 168–89) for everything barbarian (Hu) did not have much eVect.31 30

See Pirazzoli, 2008.

31

Hou-Han shu, zhi 13, 3272.

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Fig. 34. Head of a Hu barbarian; glazed earthenware; height 19.7 cm; Later Han; Shangyu Cultural Relics Bureau, Zhejiang Province.

There are few representations of barbarians from the northwest, and even fewer from the south, in what remains of Han art before the Wrst century ad (Fig. 33).32 I shall concentrate here on the barbarians from the northwest. 32 They come mostly from princely tombs, see for example the lamp (see Fig. 33) from the tomb of Prince Liu Sheng (Mancheng M1) or the frontal piece from the tomb of his wife (Mancheng M2, Mancheng Han mu fajue baogao 1980, ii, Fig. 223/2). Another example, the gilt

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Fig. 35. Battle between Chinese and Xiongnu; engraved stone slab No. 2 from a que gate-pillar dated ad 178, reused later on to decorate a tomb; Dongguanzhen, Juxian (Shandong).

They appear much more frequently after the Wrst century, particularly on the walls of the tombs and shrines; at times they are accompanied by an identifying inscription. Barbarians are recognizable by their pointed caps, the summit of which often curves forward (Fig. 34),33 their beards, large noses, and deep-set eyes. They wear long trousers and a short coat folded to the left and closed with a belt. They intervene in hunting scenes, or as foot soldiers or cavalry in battles against the Han (Fig. 35),34 as prisoners of war, as grooms or guards at the bronze chariot Wtting from the funerary pit No. 1 of the tomb (Baoshan M2) of Princess Li, wife of Prince Xiao of Liang, could also represent Xiongnu; see Mangdangshan Xi-Han Liang wang mudi 2001, 48 (Wg. 21) and Color Plate VII/2. Wang Yanshou evokes huren painted on the upper part of the columns in the Hall of Numinous Brilliance in Qufu (see above n. 2), see Wenxuan 11/170–1; see also Knechtges, ii. 273. Although the ‘Lingguang dian fu’ dates from the 2nd cent. ad, we nevertheless have no proof that the painting described by Wang Yanshou dates to the 2nd cent. bc. Another example is the so-called ‘barbarian’ trampled under a standing horse. This stone sculpture is part of the sixteen sculptures, mainly stone animals, discovered around the tomb of the general Huo Qubing (140–117 bc), in Xingping County (Shaanxi). However, the association of the sculptures with the tomb and their dating are not proved. See He Hannan 1988. 33 Sometimes, as in Fig. 34, two ribbons are hanging from the back of the pointed cap. 34 The Hu cavalrymen are handling bows. The one on the right (upper part) is wearing a pointed cap with two ribbons Xoating in the back. Other Hu barbarians are shown beheaded, still others as prisoners with hands tied. The Han cavalrymen are handling spear and shield. On the Wrst Xoor of the building on the right, an inscription is engraved that reads ‘dai Hu’ (‘pursue and arrest the Hu’).

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gates, but also, most often capless, in various spectacles.35 Finally, they are supporting Wgures, atlantes,36 the legs of vessels or supports of lamps (Fig. 33). Certain roles associate the Hu barbarians with the otherworld, linked as they were to the north, and made of them the guardians of the world of shadows. Other roles, more status enhancing, illustrated the only values of excellence the Han recognized in the populations of the north and west: for the Xiongnu, valor in war and competence in cavalry and archery, for the people of the Western regions, their gifts as jugglers. Nevertheless, these representations reveal, also and above all, that in spite of several centuries of incessant contacts and multiple testimonies—those of the military, travelers, or merchants—and despite the often precise descriptions which circulated about Xiongnu society, the populations of the north and the west were always considered as culturally little diVerentiated, inferiors, conWned socially to a subordinate position by the majority of second-century Chinese. The increased control exerted by the Chinese government on the Xiongnu during the Later Han, and the resulting loss of independence, may have contributed to this depreciated image of the Hu barbarians. Above all, as Robin Yates noted, the people of the frontiers, in not accepting the way of life and thought ruling the Chinese world, could not be considered completely human by the Han; they fell in the same category as the slaves: beings in some way socially dead.37 Returning to the image of the barbarian, as it was expressed in Han art during the Wrst two centuries ad, and to the ignorance of the Other which this indicates, I shall take the example of the pointed cap which, in the majority of cases, allowed the northwestern barbarians to be recognized. Characteristic of the Scythians and their eastern neighbors, the Sakas, the pointed caps of the nomads fascinated all the sedentary peoples who came into contact with them, Greeks as well as Romans, Persians, and Chinese. However, as Hsing I-t’ien showed, this cap did not seem to be worn by the immediate neighbors of the Chinese, except in Xinjiang.38 The Wgures represented on the bronzes of the Ordos or from the northeast during the fourth to second centuries bc 35 Han dynasty music, as well as the art of jugglers and illusionists, was enriched, especially in the 1st and 2nd cents. ad, by many borrowings from the Xiongnu and Central Asia. 36 See Zheng 1998. 37 Yates 2001, 318. 38 Felt caps were found in Bronze Age tombs: one in Tomb 5 of Zaghunluk, Qiemo County (cf. Silu kaogu zhenpin 1998, No. 11); another one in a woman’s tomb of Kongquehe (Kum darya); cf. Roˆran oˆkoku to yuˆkyuˆ no bijo 1992, No. 180. Several felt caps were found in tombs of Shanpula, which could possibly date from the Han period; cf. Zhongguo Xinjiang Shanpula 2001, Nos. 439–41.

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wear their hair long and loose or in braids; most often they have no caps, and this pointed cap, as portrayed in Han tombs, appear in no known Xiongnu tomb.39 What the Han artists had portrayed is, therefore, not the ethnic nor clothing diversity of the border populations,40 but the stereotype of the ‘barbarian’ transmitted by tradition, often caricatured and always in a subaltern role. This evocation of the typical barbarian, although diVering from the equally simpliWed description given by scholars since Confucius, would be, according to Hsing I-t’ien,41 the sign of an indiVerence, not to say a basic contempt towards foreigners, even though some productions and creations of these foreigners were so attractive as to be integrated in Chinese culture. This contradiction between cultural mingling and ignorance of the Other is far from exceptional and occurs also in other civilizations. The Chinese imagery of the barbarian was not in complete opposition to the Roman imagery of the oriental; it just corresponded to its negative, depreciative face, to the despised barbarian, and showed, regarding the Han elite, a sense of cultural superiority maybe more clearly asserted. Let us conclude that the images of the barbarian were not, as were the images of the oriental in Rome, of great importance for the cultural self-deWnition of the Han empire. On the other hand, the image of the empire followed completely diVerent ideological choices. As we have seen, the emperor was not represented in Han China and the visual promotion of the imperial power was not only following diVerent criteria but was further intended for a much more limited and selected segment of the society. In the same way, even if Chang’an was a much less open city than Rome, it would have been no less splendid, no less well planned, but wealth and reWnement would have been expressed in Chang’an using other materials than stone, and were more hidden from sight. References Bujard, Marianne, ‘Le ‘‘Traite´ des SacriWces’’ du Hanshu et la mise en place de la religion d’E´tat des Han’, Bulletin de l’E´cole franc¸aise d’Extreˆme-Orient, 84 (1997), 111–27. —— Le sacriWce au ciel dans la Chine ancienne: the´orie et pratique sous les Han occidentaux. Paris (E´cole franc¸aise d’Extreˆme-Orient) 2000.

39 Xing 2000, 66–8. On the caps represented or found in Xiongnu tombs, and on the inXuence of the barbarian caps on the Han military cap, see Ma 2003, 63–5. 40 It is well known that the Xiongnu, like other tribal confederations in the steppes, as well as the populations of Central Asia, were not racially or culturally uniWed, see Lebedynsky 2003. 41 Xing 2000, 28, 65, 70–1.

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Changsha Mawangdui yi hao Han mu 長沙馬王堆一號漢墓. Beijing (Wenwu) 1973. Chavannes, E´douard, Les me´moires historiques de Se-Ma Ts’ien, 5 vols. Paris (Ernest Leroux) 1895–1905. Cheng, Anne, Histoire de la pense´e chinoise. Paris (E´ditions du Seuil) 1997. Falkenhausen, Lothar von, ‘Sources of Taoism: ReXections on Archaeological Indicators of Religious Change in Eastern Zhou China’, Taoist Resources, 5: 2 (1994), 1–12. —— ‘ReXections on the Political Role of Spirit Mediums in Early China: The Wu OYcials in the Zhouli’, Early China, 20 (1995), 279–300. —— ‘Mortuary Behavior in Pre-Imperial Qin: A Religious Interpretation’, in: John Lagerwey (ed.), Religion and Chinese Society, vol. i: Ancient and Medieval China, Hong Kong (The Chinese University of Hong Kong)/Paris (E´cole franc¸aise d’Extreˆme-Orient) 2004, 109–72. He Hannan 河漢南, ‘Huo Qubing zhong ji shike 霍去病冢及石刻’, Wenbo, 1988: 2, 20–4. He Yun’ao 賀雲翱 et al., Fojiao chuchuan nanfang zhi lu 佛教初傳南方之路. Beijing (Wenwu), 1993. Hou Ching-lang, ‘La Sculpture des Ts’in’, Arts asiatiques, 33 (1977), 133–81. Knechtges, R., Wen xuan or Selections of ReWned Literature, vol. ii: Rhapsodies on SacriWces, Hunting, Travel, Sightseeing, Palaces and Halls, Rivers and Seas. Princeton (Princeton University Press) 1987. Lai Guolong, ‘The Baoshan Tomb: Religious Transitions in Art, Ritual, and Text During the Warring States Period (480–220 BCE)’, Ph.D. thesis (University of California, Los Angeles) 2002. Lebedynsky, Iaroslav, Les Nomades. Paris (Errance) 2003. Levi, Jean, Les fonctionnaires divins: politique, despotisme et mystique en Chine ancienne. Paris (Seuil) 1989. Liu, Cary C., Nylan, Michael, and Barbieri-Low, Anthony, Recarving China’s Past: Art, Archaeology, and Architecture of the ‘Wu Family Shrines’. New Haven/London (Princeton University Art Museum, Yale University Press) 2005. Liu Yuntao 劉雲濤, ‘Shandong Juxian Dongguan chutu Han huaxiangshi 山東莒縣 東莞出土漢畫像石’, Wenwu, 2005: 3, 81–7. Liu Zenggui 劉增貴, ‘Handai huaxiang que de xiangzheng yiyi 漢代畫象闕的象徵意 義’, Zhongguo shixue 中國史學, 10 (2000), 97–127. Loewe, Michael, Ways to Paradise: The Chinese Quest for Immortality. London (George Allen & Unwin) 1979. —— The Men who Governed Han China: Companion to a Biographical Dictionary of the Qin, Former Han and Xin Periods. Leiden/Boston (Brill) 2004. Ma Liqing 馬利清, ‘Neimenggu Fenghuangshan Han mu bihua er ti 內蒙古鳳凰山漢 墓壁畫二題’, Kaogu yu wenwu 考古與文物, 2003: 2, 60–9. Mancheng Han mu fajue baogao 滿城漢墓發掘報告, 2 vols. Beijing (Wenwu) 1980. Mangdangshan Xi-Han Liang wang mudi 芒碭山西漢梁王墓地. Beijing (Wenwu) 2001.

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Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, Miche`le, L’arte per la vita nell’Aldila`: Capolavori di arte antica cinese della collezione Meidaozhai (La dinastia Han, vol. ii). Turin (Edizioni Fondazione Giovanni Agnelli) 2002. —— Miche`le (Bi Meixue 畢梅雪), ‘Lang Shining yu Zhongguo shiba shiji diwang xiaoxianghua de fuxing 郎世寧與中國十八世紀帝王肖像畫的复興’, Gugong bowuyuan yuankan 故宮博物院院刊, 2004: 3, 92–104 [French version: ‘Giuseppe Castiglione et le renouveau du portrait impe´rial au XVIIIe sie`cle’, Arts asiatiques, 60 (2005)]. —— Miche`le, ‘Inner Asia and Han China: Borrowings and Representations’, in: Thomas Lawton (ed.), Proceedings of the Symposium New Frontiers in Global Archaeology: DeWning China’s Ancient Traditions, Arthur M. Sackler Museum of Art and Archaeology at Peking University, Tokyo (Toppan) 2008. Psarras, Sophia-Karin, ‘Han and Xiongnu: A Reexamination of Cultural and Political Relations (I)’, Monumenta Serica, 51 (2003), 55–236. Puett, Michael J., To Become a God: Cosmology, SacriWce, and Self-Divinization in Early China. Cambridge, Mass./London (Harvard University Press) 2002. Roˆran oˆkoku to yuˆkyuˆ no bijo 樓蘭王國と悠久の美女. To¯kyo¯ (Asahi shimbunsha) 1992. Seidel, Anna, ‘Imperial Treasures and Taoist Sacraments: Taoist Roots in the Apocrypha’, in: Michael Strickmann (ed.), Tantric and Taoist Studies in Honour of R. A. Stein, vol. ii, Bruxelles (Me´langes Chinois et Bouddhiques, 21) 1983, 291–371. Silu kaogu zhenpin 絲路考古珍品. Shanghai (Shanghai yiwen) 1998. Stuart, Jan, ‘Images of Imperial Grandeur’, in: Evelyn S. Rawski and Jessica Rawson (eds.), China: The Three Emperors 1662–1795. London (Royal Academy of Arts) 2005, 66–8. —— and Rawski, Evelyn S., Worshiping the Ancestors: Chinese Commemorative Portraits. Washington (The Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution) 2001. Testart, Alain, ‘Deux politiques fune´raires: de´poˆt ou distribution’, in: Luc Baray (comp.), Arche´ologie des pratiques fune´raires: approches critiques, Bibracte n89, Glux-en-Glenne (Centre arche´ologique europe´en) 2004, 303–16. Thote, Alain, ‘Intercultural Relations as Seen from Chinese Pictorial Bronzes of the Fifth Century B.C.E.’, Res, 35 (1999), 10–41. Wangdu Han mu bihua 望都漢壁墓畫. Beijing (Zhongguo gudian yishu chubanshe) 1955. Weber, Charles D., Chinese Pictorial Bronze Vessels of the Late Chou Period. Ascona (Artibus Asiae) 1968 [repr. from Artibus Asiae, 28: 2/3, 4 (1966), 29: 2/3 (1967), 30: 1 (1968)]. Wenxuan 文選, 3 vols. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1983. Wu, Hung, The Wu Liang Shrine: The Ideology of Early Chinese Pictorial Art. Stanford (Stanford University Press) 1989. Xi-Han bo hua 西漢帛畫. Beijing (Wenwu) 1972. Xing Yitian (Hsing I-t’ien) 邢義田, ‘Gudai Zhongguo ji Ou-Ya wenxian, tuxiang yu kaogu ziliao zhong de ‘‘huren’’ waimao 古代中國及歐亞文獻, 圖 像 與 考 古 資

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料 中 的 「胡人」外貌’, Guoli Taiwan daxue meishushi yanjiu jikan 國立台灣大學 美術史研究集刊, 9 (2000), 15–99. Yates, Robin D. S., ‘Slavery in Early China: A Socio-Cultural Approach’, Journal of East Asian Archaeology, 3: 1–2 (2001), 283–331. Zheng, Yan, ‘Barbarian Images in Han Period Art’, Orientations, 29: 6 (1998), 50–9. Zhongguo meishu quanji: Gongyi meishu bian, 9: Yuqi 中國美術全集, 工藝美術編, 9: 玉器, Beijing (Wenwu), 1986. Zhongguo Xinjiang Shanpula 中國新疆山普拉. Urumqi (Xinjiang renmin) 2001. Zhou Changshan 周長山, Handai chengshi yanjiu 漢代城市研究. Peking (Renmin) 2001.

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Part III The Waning of the Imperial Order

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A. History Writing in the Face of Crisis

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The Impact of the Empire’s Crises on Historiography and Historical Thinking in Late Antiquity Hans Armin Ga¨rtner (Heidelberg) and Ye Min (Tianjin)

1. TH E MEANING OF THE WORD ‘CRISIS’: FEARED CRISES AS ME TH ODIC AL P OINT O F D EPA RTURE Originally the Greek word Œæ Ø is to be understood in the terms of the Greek medical writers as the span of time, the critical days, in which serious diseases combined with high fever take a turn for the better or worse. The Latin word corresponding to Greek Œæ Ø is discrimen. We Wnd it used to describe the critical phase of a battle: in summo rem esse discrimine (Caesar, Bellum Gallicum 6.38.2), ‘The battle is at a most critical point’. In his description of the Second Punic War Livy1 (29.17.6) makes Greek messengers say in front of the Roman senate: In discrimine est nunc humanum omne genus, utrum vos an Carthaginienses principes orbis terrarum videat, ‘Now, the whole mankind is at the critical point, whether it will see you [sc. the Romans] or the Carthaginians as lords of the whole world.’ Roman historiographers knew the notion of a decisive hour.2 One speaks of crises of the Imperium Romanum—with a reduction of the meaning—as of periods, in which the decline, if not the downfall of the empire was to be feared. Our interest is directed to the interpretations of feared crises, real or not, in literature. These interpretations inform us about the thoughts of the authors, which values of the Roman Empire they saw endangered, which corrections they recommended, and which prognoses they made. It is a postulation of consequence to relate also the testimonies of political thoughts in times of the empire’s consolidation. There are correlations and alterations 1

He wrote his Roman history in Augustan times. Cf. Tsouyopoulos 1976; for the political, historical, and theological use of the notion ‘crisis’, cf. Koselleck 1976; Rubenbauer 1910. 2

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between the values feared for as endangered and those which were—the challenge overcome—again or newly raised on the shield. The question of consciousness of a crisis leads us into the realm of the research on mentality, which methodically is not without diYculties.3 For it is based on the same testimonies, which the factual research uses as well. Signs of consciousness of crisis are sought in literary texts, but also in inscriptions and in legends on coins. If we try to evaluate these ancient assertions as testimonies for the mentality of those times, speaking strictly as testimonies for the consciousness of political and social circumstances of those times, we must realize what possibilities of traditional interpretation were available for ancient authors.4 Corresponding to the complex structure of the Roman Empire in late antiquity we Wnd manifold and complex thoughts: For pagan5 thinkers there existed a cluster of traditional values which are combined in a sort of contexture:6 Rome is eternal. This is the idea of Roma aeterna, the rule of Rome, the end of which cannot be seen. By surmounting defeats Rome grows stronger.7 By her culture and erudition Rome is opposed to the barbarians on the borderlines of the empire; Rome is the stronghold of erudition. Very often Rome’s history is seen in comparison with the stages of human life, Rome is8 an old woman crowned with high dignity. There is no thought of death, which would have been consequent; on the contrary, Rome can become young again.9 Rome governs with justice and brings order into the world. Rome’s government is good for the conquered. This government means peace. The extension of the Roman Empire is equivalent to the world inhabited by men, NŒı 
Å, orbis terrarum. Authors can speak of the world growing older and older. Here it is surprising that the pagans of the fourth and Wfth centuries ad identify the existence of the world with the existence of the Roman Empire. By that we are reminded that Roman thinking politically identiWed the orbis terrarum with the territory of the Roman Empire, and consequently the history of the world with that of 3

Cf. Maier 1980, passim; Strobel 1993, 26–32; Inglebert 1996, 3–10. Cf. Maier 1980, passim, esp. 69–71: ‘Topik und geschichtliche Realita¨t’. 5 The term ‘pagan’ may be problematic, for Jews and Christians delimited themselves with this term against the manifold polytheistic world and there is no diVerentiation between polytheistic religions. Yet since in Roman politics Christianity became more and more the strong rival to other religious powers and overcame them in the end, the Christian-orientated term ‘pagan’ may be allowed here; cf. Walter 2006, 12–13 with n. 1. 6 We Wnd some of these values expressed already in Ciceronian and Augustan times; (cf. in this volume the paper by Huang and Mutschler p. 105–6, 108–9, and by Mutschler, p. 130–5); for contexture this specific see, also the Greek speech Aelius Aristides held in the praise of Rome in presence of the emperor Antoninus Pius; cf. Klein 1981, 77, 128–36. 7 Cf. Ga¨rtner 1996, passim, esp. 1157–93. 8 As we learn from Ammianus’ chapter on Rome (14.6); for Ammianus cf. sects. 4 and 5 of this paper. 9 This happens e.g. in the poem In Gildonem 201–12 of the pagan author Claudius Claudian (d. ad 404), where Jupiter inspires the decrepit Rome with new youth, whereafter her old strength comes back to her and her rusty weapons begin again to scintillate. 4

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Rome. In the series of empires (translatio imperii) the Roman is the best one.10 Naturally there are the gods giving reward and punishment for Roman conduct; the gods punish moral decay, as they honor virtues by victories.11 Some of the Christians, who thought of Rome in a positive way, could see the Roman Empire as a god-ordered salvation-bearing institution.12 With regard to the comparison of Rome’s history with the stages of human life a new youth could be given to decrepit Rome by Christ, for Rome was now a Christian city and the Roman Empire was an institution, a station in the salvation-bearing plan of God (cf. Prudentius ad 405, Contra Symmachum 2.634–768, esp. 654–9). Other Christians following originally Jewish valuing formed a quite opposite opinion to the above-mentioned cluster of traditional values. Naturally here, too, we Wnd divine reward and punishment of human conduct in the political sphere. But Jewish and Christian belief is that history has its end in the last judgment. This conception stands in direct opposition to the pagan idea of Roma aeterna. In regard to the comparison of Rome’s history with the stages of human life, which we read in Ammianus (14.6), Lactantius, the Christian rhetor (c.ad 250–325), in his Divinae institutiones (7.15.14–17) could consequently argue: If Rome is an old woman, it is natural that she will die. In the thinking of these Christians the translatio imperii is found in the form that the Roman Empire is the worst one (descending series of empires).

2. THE CRISIS OF THE THIRD CENTURY 13 In modern historical research there is no consensus about the real existence of this crisis. This question shall be hinted at,14 but cannot be dealt with at length in this paper. 10

In addition to these interpretations the doctrine of the four ages of the world coming down from Hesiod (c. 700 bc) still exists. Beginning with the Golden Age times have deteriorated over the silver age and the age of bronze to the iron age. This descendent cultural development could be reversed propagandistically, mostly by Greek and Latin panegyrists, who praised rulers for bringing back the Golden Age. 11 This we can clearly learn from the third decade of Livy. 12 So Eusebius (c. ad 264–340); cf. below sect. 3. Furthermore Christian Romans could understand a verse in the Bible (2 Thess. 2: 6), where we read the word ŒÆå
(‘holding back’) as referring to the Roman Empire as a power holding back, thus postponing the end of the world. 13 Commonly the beginning of late antiquity is seen as marked by Emperor Diocletian; politically the third century may be taken as an immediate antecedent, which provoked the measures of Diocletian. 14 Nowadays, we may see the third century (the epoch of the so-called soldier-emperors) from Maximinus Thrax ad 235 to Carinus ad 285 as a critical period in the history of the Roman

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We may Wnd the consciousness of the third-century crisis expressed by the church father Cyprian,15 who (Ad Demetrianum 3 f.)—in surprising contrast to his earlier and later teaching—saw the end of the world nearby, and in the thirteenth book of the Sibylline oracles which announces the end of Rome.16 An important point is that in these testimonies the end of Rome and the end of the world coincide, and a continuation of world history after the end of Rome is unimaginable. On the other hand a consciousness of a crisis in the third century is doubted.17

3 . C O N S O L I DAT I O N O F T H E E M P I R E UN D E R CONSTANTINE THE GREAT Those who look at a consolidation under Diocletian may cite the rhetor Eumenius of Autun (Panegyrici Latini 9.20–1); he on the occasion of the rebuilding of a school ad 298 relates of a porticus in which the pupils could regard a representation of the expansion of the Roman Empire and the victories of the Roman emperors in all places of the orbis terrarum, which was identiWed with the orbis Romanus. The new structure of the empire arranged by Diocletian with four regions, which were governed by two Augustuses and two Caesars, did not last a long time and Constantine succeeded in concentrating the power in his hands. There remained a part of Diocletian’s arrangement: the eastern, Greek part of the empire got Constantinople as the new governmental center, the second capital of the empire. Constantine tried to Wnd his main support in the Christian population and church, and the bishop Eusebius of Caesarea was his ideological supporter. He emphasized the parallel between the propagation of the Christian belief to all men and the spreading of peace all over the world under one ruler. He could establish a parallel between the rule of Constantine and the kingdom of God and describe this rule with formulations the Christians used for their eschatological kingdom of peace.18 Empire. The twenty-nine soldier-emperors and forty-one usurpers quite clearly demonstrate the crisis in regard to the ruling of the empire during these Wfty years. The menace from the east by the Persians under the Sassanid kings was added to it; indeed in ad 260 the emperor Valerianus was even captured by the Persians and died as a prisoner of war. On the other hand we can speak of a certain stabilization of the Roman Empire under the reforms of Diocletian (ad 284–305). 15 Bishop of Carthage 248/9–258. 16 Cf. Alfo¨ldy 1989; id. 1984, 133–53. 17 Cf. for instance Strobel 1993, passim. 18 The temporal coincidence of the reign of the emperor Augustus, who brought peace to the Roman world, and the coming of Christ into the world had already been exposed as the

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4 . TH E S E R I E S O F C R I S E S B E G I N N I N G W I T H T H E DEFEAT OF ADRIANOPLE There is a broad consensus, that the serious crises of the Roman Empire begin with the defeat of Emperor Valens in the battle against the Goths near Adrianople (ad 378); already RuWnus, the ecclesiastical historian (fourth/ Wfth century) wrote (Historia Ecclesiastica 11.13): ‘this battle was the beginning of the calamity for the Roman Empire now and in the following time’.19 In fact this battle is to be thought of as the Wnal penetration of Germanic tribes conjointly with other peoples into the territory of the Roman Empire. Later on this penetration resulted in the conquest of Rome by the Visigoths under their king Alaric (ad 410), which was a shocking proof of Rome’s weakness; thereafter the end of the West Roman emperorship was marked by the dethronement of the last emperor Romulus Augustulus (ad 476) by Odoacer, perhaps a Germanic Scirian; he himself, however, was compelled to hand over the rule of Italy to Theoderic (ad 493), king of the Ostrogoths. Nowadays we perceive this far-reaching historical development, with hindsight, quite clearly;20 but it was not so clear for the contemporaries, for there were from time to time partial restitutions of the Roman might, which were predominant in the eyes of the Romans of those days. Nevertheless, this Adrianople crisis came to its end with the downfall of the West Roman Empire. A consciousness of a crisis cannot be doubted with respect to the defeat of Adrianople (ad 378), whereby the thought of an end of the Roman Empire can be clearly recognized. Here the point of interest is the way in which this consciousness is manifested and whether and how clearly a Wnal decay of the Roman Empire is imagined.

beginning of a new era by Melito of Sardis (c. ad 170) and Origen (c. ad 185–253). Cf. Eusebius, Laus Constantini 16.4: ‘As the teaching of Christ, the knowledge of the one God and the one wholesome form of piety was given to all mankind, in this manner deep peace seized everything more and more; when there was one monarch in the entire Roman Empire at one and the same time; at the same time and at the same moment like at one divine sign there grew two blossoms of good plants: the empire of the Romans and the pious teaching.’ 19 Lenski 1997, 157–64, has shown that not only RuWnus, but also other Christian writers, such as Ambrose and Jerome, regarded Adrianople as a providential sign of the beginning of imperial decline. Lenski is right in observing that Ammianus modiWes these and similar opinions; he makes his audience hope that recovery from Adrianople could be possible. But Adrianople ‘remained a point beyond which attitudes about the empire and its expectations of world dominion were altered’ (loc. cit. 164). 20 Maier 1980, esp. 71.

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With these questions, now, we consult the Roman historiographer Ammianus Marcellinus. Here and in section 5 the interest is focused primarily on the author Ammianus and on what he says about the diVerent topics. As a representative for Latin historiography in late antiquity he is granted a broader and more detailed description: The books 14–31, which have survived, have the description of Roman history in the years ad 353–78 as their subject matter. Originally Ammianus intended to give an account of the rule of the emperors Constantius II and Julian, his beloved hero. Book 26 has its end with the death of Julian and his short-ruling successor Jovinian, i.e. the description reached the end of the year ad 363. When he resumed his narrative Ammianus carried on his writing and described the rule of the emperors Valentinian I in the west and Valens in the east, i.e. the years ad 364–78. The Wnal date of his historical work is the defeat and the death of the emperor Valens in the battle against the Goths near Adrianople ad 378. He quite clearly sees the dimensions of this defeat; he says ‘the losses were irreparable’ (numquam pensabilia damna, 31.13.11); only the battle of Cannae had brought comparable bloodshed (31.13.19). Very important is the following commentary: ‘The Romans more than once, deceived by trickery due to an adverse breeze of Fortune, yielded for a time (ad tempus) to ill success in their wars.’21 The words ad tempus, ‘for a time’, show that Ammianus did not give up the hope that the state of Roman aVairs could get better. At the beginning of his description of the wars against the Goths (31.5.11 and 14) he had already weakened the importance of the following bitter Roman defeats by remembering the many defeats which the Romans had suVered and yet come to terms with. The readers must not be deceived when looking at the present calamity with fascination (malorum recentium stupore conWxi), for ‘such dire disturbances have often happened; but in earlier times after calamitous losses the state was presently restored to its former condition, for the temperance of old times was not yet infected by the eVeminacy of a more licentious mode of life, . . . but in agreement the Romans hastened to a noble death for their country’. By that we are reminded of the words Livy makes his Scipio speak (26.41.9): ‘By a certain fate (fato quodam) this lot has been given to us [sc. the Romans], that we in all great wars conquered became the victors (victi vicerimus).’ We see: Ammianus did not forget his task as a rerum scriptor Romanus to give admonitions. Nevertheless, here Ammianus shows quite clearly a consciousness of a crisis, but not a consciousness without hope. Ammianus recited his historical work in Rome in the year ad 392, as we know from letter 398 of the rhetor Libanios addressed to Ammianus. i.e. he 21

English translations of Ammianus here and of the following cited texts by Rolfe.

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was at work on his history at least to that date. At the time of the catastrophe near Adrianople (ad 378) he still was living at Antioch;22 later on he settled in Rome. Therefore we can say, he wrote his history before the background of Adrianople but with a clear hortatory tendency, i.e. he was not at all without hope. This is shown by book 14, chapter 6, which he devotes to Roma aeterna, ‘everlasting Rome’. Rome is now in the last period of her life, she has given laws as ‘everlasting’ (sempiterna) foundations of liberty (14.6.5), is accepted throughout all regions and parts of the earth as ‘mistress and queen’ (domina et regina). No end of Rome’s rule is mentioned.23 But in the following sentences of this chapter he castigates the moral deviation of Roman senators, naturally in order to correct them. Vice versa, wherever Ammianus castigates moral decay in the Roman world, we—from our modern point of view—can Wnd a hint that there he felt a critical situation, where, today, we can speak of military, political, economical, or social diYculties, if not crises.

5. CRITICAL SITUAT IONS AND CRISES OF THE ROM A N EM P IR E A S PENNED BY A MMIA NUS M A RC E L L I N US , I N D E TA I L 2 4

(a) Moral crisis in Ammianus’ work Ammianus did not belong to the senatorial class, but he had a close connection with these circles, especially with the circle of Quintus Aurelius Symmachus (c. ad 340–402) when he stayed in Rome. Like the works of Sallust and Tacitus, his work was dedicated to this class. The historiographical method of these writers serves to stress values by moral criticism. Besides, Roman historiographers shared the common Roman view that moral steadfastness could overcome Roman crises. We should recognize that this concept of crisis always existed in the tradition of Roman historiographers. Already in his Origines Cato Censorius (second century bc) criticized corrupt Roman mores;25 in the Wrst century bc Sallust saw a close connection 22

Cf. Seyfarth 1970–1, 1.20–1. For the discussion about the question, if the Ammianus in Libanius’ letter is our historiographer or not, see Matthews 1994, who defends the traditional opinion, that the recipient of the letter is our historiographer, who came from Antioch. 23 The comparison of the development of a state with the stages of human life is used for the explanation of Roman history by Seneca rhetor, Florus, and Lactantius; cf. Ga¨rtner 1996, 1153, 1159, 1176 and sect. 5b in this paper. 24 The following sections 5a–g are the condensed and elaborated results of the dissertation of Ye Min 2000. Cf. also Demandt 1965; Rosen 1982; Kautt-Bender 1991; Matthews 1989; Brandt 1999. 25 Cf. also his speech De sumptu suo.

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between the decline of the republic and the decline of traditional morals.26 As in the case of Cicero, he originally belonged to the ordo equester; he became a member of the Roman senate, was rejected from the senate but reintroduced by Julius Caesar, after whose death in 44 bc he withdrew from politics and wrote his three historical works from a senatorial point of view for a senatorial public. Ammianus never became Roman senator, but he has in common with Sallust, that he was of non-senatorial origin and wrote for a senatorial public. We can Wnd the same concept of crisis in the work of Tacitus. He stresses that the crisis of the Roman Empire was due to the moral corruption of the senate. He thought, already in the reign of Tiberius, ‘at Rome, consuls, senators, and knights were rushing into slavery’.27 Ammianus shared the same critical method with Sallust and Tacitus. He thought, as Sallust suggested, that a crisis of the Roman Empire was due to a crisis of Roman morals. ‘The state was changed and a government second to none in equity and excellence became cruel and intolerable.’28 He hoped Roman emperors and the senate could revive these virtues. But the corruption of the senate and the ordinary people in Rome made him disappointed and what he saw in the reigns of Gallus and Constantius II was darkness. His only hope was directed to the emperor Julian, because for Ammianus Julian’s virtue stood for all the virtues of the Roman Empire. Ammianus saw the crisis of the Roman Empire, but he had not lost conWdence for the future development of this empire.29

(b) The Roman senate Literary material about the senatorial order of the later Roman Empire is not in short supply. Ausonius (fourth century ad)30 wrote in his poems about the daily life of senators. Symmachus (second half of the fourth century ad) recorded a large amount of aVairs in his circle. Rutilius Namatianus, who wrote his poem after having been praefectus urbi (ad 414), combined his senatorial friendship with nostalgia. Our Ammianus in his two digressions (14.6 and 28.4) brought forward criticism concerning the senator’s social life in Rome.

26

Sallust, De Catilinae coniuratione 5. Tacitus, Annales 1.7. 28 Sallust, De Catilinae coniuratione 10. 29 For the historical background of this time span, see Cameron 1993, 47–112; Jones 1964, 112–69; Alfo¨ldy 1989; Demandt 1984; id. 1989, 80–137. 30 Cf. Ga¨rtner 1988, 198–228. 27

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The history of the imperial Roman senatorial order during the third century seems to be heading in a direction whereby the senatorial order totally lost its leading position to the equestrian order, especially in military terms. The result was that the leading groups of the ordo equester entered the senatorial order, especially in the fourth century. Politically the senate in Rome had for a long time ceased to be an eVective council of state, since in the western empire the emperors resided elsewhere. In each of his two digressions31 Ammianus presents the faults of the senate or of the nobility (nobilitas), followed by those of the common people (plebs). These two digressions reveal the moral crisis of the later Roman society, especially the moral crisis of the Roman senate. A critical attitude toward Roman society is hereditary in Roman historiography. Therefore Ammianus’ work was destined to be a critical one, satirical, sometimes even rude, as is clearly shown by these two digressions, where especially the rude worthlessness of senators is blamed, who descend to sin and wantonness.32

(c) Roman monarchy The Wrst extant part of Ammianus’ history leads the reader into military and political diYculties of the reign of Constantius. It begins at the point, when the rebellion of Magnentius was suppressed, in the year 353 (book 14), and ends at the death of Emperor Constantius in Cilicia in 361 (book 21). According to Ammianus, Constantius was a suspicious man, who was always stirred to anger and open to bloody rule by the inXuence of his associates, and his vitia were much more than his virtutes. Constantius’ savagery easily surpassed Caligula, Domitianus, and Commodus33 and he was at the same time a deadly enemy to justice.34 Constantius’ suspicion of political dissenters and his dependence on supporters, who exploited his weakness to further their own ambitions are central themes in Ammianus’ judgment of this emperor. Because of that, Constantius’ two Caesars—Gallus and Julian—who descended from the same family blood, turned into his enemies; his magister equitum, Ursicinus, was several times forced to give up his military posts. Whatever the historical period of the later Roman Empire was named— dominatus or not—the feature of absolute monarchy was represented by the 31 For the Roma aeterna ideology in 14.6 see Kytzler 1972 and Ga¨rtner 1996, 1154–5; cf. the end of sect. 4 of this paper. 32 Cf. Rees 1999. 33 Ammianus 21.16.8. 34 Ibid. 21.16.11.

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Roman emperor.35 He controlled foreign policy, made peace and war at his will; he personally appointed to all civil and military oYces and had the power of life and death over all his subjects; he could raise whatever taxes he wished and spend the money at his pleasure. For Ammianus the imperial power is itself an extreme, a peak and a summit or top. So Ammianus used culmen or augustum culmen many times in connection with Augustus and Caesar, especially with the power of Julian.36 This suggests that for Ammianus the power of the emperor is absolute. No other Latin writer paid so much attention to the insignia of the emperor; these insignia are the purple and the diadem, which were not only the symbols of imperial power, but also instruments for usurpation and treason. We may Wnd that Ammianus’ criticism on the imperial vices is reXected in his work everywhere, especially in the political relationship between the emperor and his subjects; and for Ammianus these vices result from the bad side of absolute imperial rights. Both Constantius II and Valens became more wanton under the inXuence of their attendants. Constantius’ inexorable cruelty was sharpened by age, as a cohort of Xatterers fanned the Xames of his temper, while Valens’ savagery was exacerbated by a multitude of Xatterers, especially by Modestus, the praetorian prefect.37 Constantius’ arrogance oVered ample scope for adulation. The Xatterers even tried to deter Constantius from elevating Julian to the rank of Caesar, claiming that he had no need of an assistant, for his bravery and fortune were so great that he could cope with any burden alone.38 Ammianus’ thought of the function of emperors is concentrated on the political and military aspects. Large parts of his work are dedicated to the emperors Constantius and Julian. As for the bad emperors such as Constantius and the Caesar Gallus, their bad characters were the result of their nature and they could not be inXuenced by the virtues of Ursicinus and Julian and could be easily induced to even worse by their subjects. Thus when virtus was as a parameter added to the political function of this system, naturally Ammianus’ historical analysis is made in terms of moral qualities of the individual emperor. Ammianus not only proposed that the actions of the emperor should be guided by the possession of kingly virtues, but he also accepted the idea of an external limitation upon his power. It is taken for 35 About the diVerence between the principatus and the dominatus see Bury 1923, 1.5–66. The most frequently used terms here by Bury are ‘monarchy’ and ‘autocracy’; Blockley 1975, 30– 54: ‘The Bad Emperors’ and 73–103: ‘Julian: The Ideal Emperor’; Heuß 1986; Matthews 1989, 231–52: ‘XI. The OYce of Emperor’. 36 Ammianus 20.8.21, 21.5.5, 25.2.3. 37 Ibid. 14.5.5. 38 For Xatterers of Constantius see Ammianus 15.8.2, 16.12.67, 19.12.16, 20.8.11.

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granted that a legitimately installed emperor was necessary for the state, and the potentially unlimited power of the position was also recognized.39 Ammianus said:40 ‘But it is not seemly to rejoice beyond measure in such sorrowful events, lest his subjects should seem to be ruled by despotism (licentia) rather than by lawful power (potestas).’ Here licentia is identiWed as the unrestrained power of the absolute monarch and potestas as constitutionally limited power.

(d) Government and bureaucracy Where modern historians might speak of crisis Ammianus sees moral decadence. He expends considerable space and passion upon castigating the injustice, greed, and corruption in state and government.41 Since the analysis is moral, causation is expounded in terms of character, and the various ills are related to a falling away on the part of the oYcial and the ordinary men from the ideal which our historian has in mind. Thus corrupt individuals are blamed for the revolts of Silvanus and Procopius, and even the successes of the barbarians are the results of faults on the Roman side. The Persian invasion of ad 359 was crowned with the success of the capture of Amida because of the appointment of the incompetent Sabinianus over Ursicinus. The drain of the people’s wealth is a result of the greed of bad emperors and their servants. The main weight of charges against the courtiers and members of the bureaucracy is the same as against the emperors, with the extra accusation that they plotted for corrupt ends.42 We are reminded: strong moral criticism is the way Roman historians used to establish a better political morality in their readers since Sallust and Tacitus. Therefore the accusation of vice can be exaggerated to serve for moral exhortation. On the other hand, Ammianus’ ideal of a good oYcial is not as thoroughly worked out or as clearly deWned as that of a good ruler. It Wnds its most comprehensive expression in the sketch of Eutherius, a man suYciently well read, intelligent, loyal, discreet, kind, and temperate.43 But Eutherius was a eunuch and, in Ammianus’ eyes, of the lower class. The ideal of the great 39

Ibid. 21.16.6, 18.3.7, 22.10.4. Ibid. 19.12.18. Cf. Matthews 1989, 253–78: ‘XII. Character of Government’. 42 Ammianus 14.1.10, 15.2.2, 16.6.1–2, 30.1.2. 43 Ibid. 16.7.3–10, esp. 5 and 6; even if Woods 1998 is right in his far-fetched accusation against Eutherius (that he plotted to assassinate Julian), nevertheless in these lines we have the picture of a good oYcial drawn by Ammianus: Wdem continentiamque virtutes coluit amplas (16.7.6); cf. Tougher 1999. 40 41

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oYcial might diVer in some details. Many of these are characterized, but only in a word or two: Anatolius, who corrected abuses and reduced the tax;44 Lauricius, who set evils aright by threats rather than by punishment;45 Praetextatus, an honest and just man, who enacted salutary measures during his urban prefecture at Rome.46

(e) Processes of rebellion and trials In view of these political circumstances, it is not diYcult for the readers of Ammianus to understand why many ‘treasons’ were persecuted in this period. At the same time, we are surprised by the bloody aspect of execution of the ‘traitors’. Although criticism of the emperors is found throughout Ammianus’ narrative of the reign of Constantius, it becomes especially strident in a group of episodes which form a conspicuous part of Ammianus’ work, namely, the various trials and investigations of political crimes. These aVairs from our modern perspective may reveal a political crisis in the later Roman Empire. The victims of the inquisitions fell into two groups: on the one hand military men, on the other hand the civilian upper and middle classes—the senators, curials, and those associated with these people. Military men are usually involved in the reprisals which followed failed usurpation, and even in some of these Ammianus showed some sympathy, i.e. in the cases of Magnentius, Silvanus, and Procopius.47 And we have noticed the fact that the number of military men among the victims is much smaller than the number of civilians. Many inquisitions about rebellions and treasons were classed with the civil wars as the scourges of the Roman people. Ammianus said that among these troubles, as if handed down by some custom from antiquity, to replace civil wars the blast of the trumpets announced some arranged charges of treason.48 In a number of places Ammianus inserts the following thought into his narrative in order to state clearly his own position to the emperors: the lawful emperor is the protector and defender of good men, on whom the safety of others depends.49 Nevertheless, the emperor must hesitate for a long time before condemning a man and above all must not allow rage to drive him to excess.

44 46 48

45 Ammianus 19.11.3. Ibid. 19.13.2. 47 Ibid. 27.9.8. Ibid. 14.5, 15.6, 26.9. 49 Ibid. 19.12.1. Ibid. 19.12.17.

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(f) Urban economy and decuriones Like his fellow historians of antiquity, Ammianus is not concerned with investigating the working of economic and social elements in the society. We may not ask or order him to have the interest of a modern observer. Nevertheless, in his indictment of the cruelty and greed of the emperors and their servants, incidentally, we can Wnd some important causes of the situation of the state, such as the deteriorating economic situation, the bureaucracy, the ever growing corruption among the oYcials, the high costs of the court, and the huge expenditure on defense. Ammianus thought that apart from the political motives of trials on rebellions and treasons, there were also economic motives behind many of the accusations. Ammianus suggested that widespread conWscations took place because those condemned were attacked primarily for their wealth, although in his work, this point is not so clear. The cities were the productive cells of which the empire was composed. The civitas, the city in the crisis of the third century ad was aVected particularly severely: craft production suVered decline; trade was repeatedly interrupted and inXation could not be checked; population decreased. But the part that suVered severely in the social structure of the civitas were the curiales and decuriones. Speaking in political terms curiales or decuriones50 are the organization of the local civic elite, which was organized according to the model of the Roman senate. Their political role made them the backbone of the system of Roman rule. No less important was the economic role of the decuriones in the community. The decurio was expected to pay the community a price for his position or to bear the costs of the construction of public buildings. The important function of the decuriones is their paying of the tax to the empire for their cities at the cost of their own properties at Wrst hand and collecting the tax afterwards for themselves. After the crisis of the third century, because of the general economic weakness of the cities, most decuriones were far less prosperous. Since the wealth of many decuriones depended not only on the ownership of land but also on crafts and trade, it was the decline of these sectors of the economy in particular that hit them hard. The shortage of manpower and devastations caused by barbarian invasions and civil wars had a serious eVect on agricultural production and on municipal estates. The ever increasing burden of the state was still more serious for the decuriones. The shouldering of these burdens was no longer a matter of free choice and these burdens were 50

Cf. Demandt 1989, 405–6, 408–10; Alfo¨ldy 1984.

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distributed in accordance with Wxed regulations by the governors of the provinces. The conXict between the imperial Wnancial management and the ordo decurionum was an important topic in the late Roman Empire, according to the suggestion of Demandt. In the laws of the Codex Theodosianus (12.1) from 313 to 436, there were 193 laws about the problems of the decuriones.

(g) Barbarians For modern historians, the most evident feature of the crisis of the later Roman Empire is the prevalence of barbarian powers51 around the borders of the Roman Empire and the invasions of barbarians into the Roman Empire. Especially here, the Roman Self is opposed to barbarian Others and it is interesting to see what diVerences are described; Ammianus uses traditional material. In the fourth and Wfth centuries, one of the most serious barbarian menaces came from the Persian Empire in the east. Germanic tribes, especially Goths, and Huns were also threatening the Roman Empire. From the time of Herodotus onwards, Persians had conXicts with the classical world. In the third century ad a reformation had led to the fall of the Parthian Empire and a more aggressive Sassanid dynasty came to power. Ammianus seems to know of this change, because in his work he emphasized the function of the ‘Persian’ king Arsaces, describing the signiWcance of his conquest and founding of a new dynasty.52 Shapur I, the powerful Persian king, captured the emperor Valerian in a battle in ad 260; Shapur’s son Nerseh defeated Galerius in ad 297 and invaded Armenia and Mesopotamia. Shapur II in ad 359 conquered the Roman military bridgehead of Amida and the other cities in Mesopotamia. Later on, in these conXicts the most crucial point was the failure of the expedition undertaken by the emperor Julian and his death, which is the main theme Ammianus’ work is concerned with. On the one hand, Ammianus thought the Persians were grotesque: ‘Most of them are extravagantly given to venery and hardly contented with a multitude of concubines; they are free from immoral relations with boys.’53 On the other hand, Ammianus made a profound exposure of Persian ethos. Sometimes Persians were immensely moderate and cautious; sometimes they were free and easy and strolled about with a loose and unsteady gait.54 Ammianus had found that the Persians were always the most serious threat to the Classical 51

Cf. generally: Speyer and Opelt 1992; Matthews 1989, 304–82: ‘XIV. Barbarians and Bandits’. 52 Ammianus 23.6.2. 53 54 Ibid. 23.6.76. Ibid. 23.6.78–9.

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world. They were most gallant warriors, though rather crafty than courageous; Persian leaders were of a haughty arrogance, lawlessly extending their raids to a great distance. From the times of Roman commonwealth to the period of the empire, this nation carried on wars with the Romans intermittently.55 Persian king Shapur II’s correspondences with Constantius in ad 358 completely revealed the unbridled greed and native arrogance of the Persian king.56 Shapur called himself ‘king of kings’, ‘brother of Sun and Moon’, and ‘partner of the stars’ and asked Constantius to give back the territory that was occupied by the Roman Empire. Another barbarian group which threatened the Roman Empire were the Goths. The Goths were a Germanic people, which at this time inhabited the northwest of the Black Sea. In late antiquity, the Goths usually had been viewed as two, Visigoths and Ostrogoths. Two separate Gothic groups crossed the Danube in ad 376 and—as we already said—their victory at Adrianople in ad 378 paved the way for the fall of the West Roman Empire. Ammianus gives a complete account of the battle of Adrianople in his book 31. From Ammianus’ narrative we may discover the following—historically correct—reasons for the Gothic attack and Roman failure at Adrianople: Firstly, it was the Hunnic attack upon the Goths that led to the Goths moving into Thrace. Ammianus describes the fearful Hunnic invasion. The Huns, as an unknown race to the Goths, suddenly arose as if from a hidden nook of the earth, like a tempest of snows from the high mountains, seizing and destroying everything in their way. The greater part of the Goths, because they were worn out by lack of the necessities of life, looked for a home removed from all knowledge of the savages.57 Secondly, Ammianus indicated that with Emperor Valens’ consent a great part of the Goths was transported to Thrace. Lupicinus and Maximus, the Roman generals in Thrace, incurred a Gothic revolt because of their greed and incompetence. As the barbarians were harassed by lack of food after their crossing of the Danube, these two generals exchanged dogs to be used as food for the slavery of Gothic children, even sons of chieftains. This handling outraged the Goths. Thirdly, Ammianus attributes the decision to accede to war to Valens’ jealousy of the successes of Gratian.58 In the bloody battle the Romans were defeated. From Ammianus’ record we observe that the Roman failure at Adrianople was to a certain extent due to personal immorality, even in the critical situation of a barbarian invasion. Several other barbarians are recorded in the historian’s work, such as Alamanni, Galli, Franci, Quadi, and Sarmates. According to Ammianus, 55 57

Ibid. 23.6.9. Ibid. 31.3.8.

56 58

Ibid. 17.5. Ibid. 31.12.

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these barbarians were wild and brutal, rushing about with drawn sword, gnashing their teeth and giving vent to boastful threats (Alamanni).59 They were terrible for the Werceness of their eyes, fond of quarrelling, and of overbearing insolence.60 A band of foreigners would be unable to cope with one of them in a Wght, if he called in his wife stronger than him by far and with Xashing eyes, swelling her neck and gnashing her teeth and poising her huge white arms, proceeding to rain punches mingled with kicks, like shots discharged by the twisted cords of a catapult (Galli).61 Roman soldiers facing barbarian invasion, however, were not scared away, but poured like a torrent upon the enemy and put down the barbarians neck under the yoke of the Roman dominion.62 In this rather extensive section 5 the Roman historiographer Ammianus was evaluated under two aspects: On the one hand we have seen that Ammianus represents the Roman historiographical tradition: he has found the reasons for critical situations or even crises of the Roman Empire in the moral deWciency, if not in the moral decay of the Romans. He hopes that by his criticism he can ameliorate Roman morals. So the Roman Empire will overcome all dangers; Roma is aeterna. On the other hand modern historians may be disappointed, if they seek in Ammianus analyses with respect to social and economic perspectives, although he delivers us a great number of facts which enable us to make such analyses. And naturally he could not possibly have had our ex post comprehensive understanding of the result the migration of nations has had.

6. A C ONSOLIDATION O F THE EMPIRE U NDER THEODOSIUS THE G REAT Theodosius, who ad 379 followed the eastern emperor Valens (d. ad 378 in the battle of Adrianople), endeavored to re-establish the Roman Empire. In the Danubian regions he made the Gothic intruders autonomous allies dwelling within the empire’s territory (foederati). In the west he defeated the usurpers Maximus and Eugenius. Although in the western part of the empire Valentinian II was enthroned, Theodosius held sway over Italy. Also meant as means of stabilization were his laws against pagan cults and against heresies among the Christians. So he had a relatively good reputation among 59 61

Ammianus 15.4.9. Ibid. 15.12.1–3.

60 62

Ibid. 15.12.1. Ibid. 17.10.10.

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Christian authors (Augustine, De civitate Dei), whereas Zosimus and Philostorgius condemned him. Under the rule of Theodosius Ambrose, bishop of Milan, could describe the might of Rome (caput gentium, magister gentium) as founded on the blood of the martyrs Peter and Paul (Hymni 12: Apostolorum passio). Rome is now a Christian city.63 Ambrose also resisted successfully to a restitution of privileges to the pagan cults and to the reintroduction of the goddess Victoria into the Roman senate.64 In ad 395, with the death of Theodosius, the empire was divided and given to his sons, the western part to Honorius, the eastern to Arcadius. Under the reign of Honorius the poet Prudentius unfolded fully positive Christian thinking about the Roman Empire: According to the will of God Rome’s Empire is a salvation-bearing institution; Rome has brought peace into the world by her military victories, so that Christ could come into this peaceful world. The emperor ruling the world in union with Christ and guided by him moves the Roman reign to heaven (Contra Symmachum 2.634–768). In this poem Prudentius praised the victories of Stilicho, Honorius’ commander-inchief, over Alaric at Pollentia and Verona (ad 402). Stilicho of Vandalic, i.e. of barbarian origin, was intimately connected with the emperor Honorius, who was married to Stilicho’s daughter. However, in ad 408 an anti-barbarian group caused his murder (Zosimus 5.30–5). The problem of barbarians in high positions in the Roman state was virulent in the eastern empire also; conservative Roman circles rejected this political development as we learn through a speech which Synesius, bishop of Cyrene, gave to Arcadius.65

7. ad 410: ALARIC CONQUERS AND SACKS ROME The shock was enormous: Rome, the symbol of Roman might, had fallen. Jerome, known by his new translations of biblical texts into Latin, which are now in the Vulgata, lived as an ascetic in his monastery in Palestine, when he heard of the conquest of Rome. One could expect, that he, being an ascetic, 63 For pagan Romans the gods, esp. Vesta, venerated on the Capitol, had been the guarantors of the Roman Empire’s eternity, cf. Horace, Odes 3.5.11, 3.30.9–10. 64 From a political perspective the cult of this goddess supported the reputation of the Roman emperor, for the emperor defended the Roman state by his victories. Therefore the young emperor Valentinianus was inclined to yield to the demands of the pagan group represented by the rhetor Symmachus; cf. Klein 1986. 65 Cf. Ga¨rtner 1993, 119–21.

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was not touched by this, but on the contrary he reacted as any Roman would do: ‘With one city the whole world perished!’66 He had seen the Roman Empire, instituted by God as a guardian of peace, so that the gospel could spread everywhere unhindered, but he accepted a destruction of the empire in a Wnal judgment of God.67 Augustine (ad 354–430) lessened the terror of the conquest of Rome: Rome has undergone a moderate judgment of God, but there is no eschatological ponderation, no thought of an end to the world.68 In Augustine’s thinking Rome is not eternal (Sermo 81.8, 105.9–10). Decisively Augustine keeps distance from the Rome belief.69 The starting point of his thoughts is that the aim of Christian belief is not the fulWllment of life in this world, in the civitas terrena, but in the civitas Dei, in God’s eternal world. By this valuation all order given by a state of this world—necessary as it might be—even by the Roman state, is relativized. Augustine deprives the Roman state of its being unparalleled. Rome can perish, as he said in a sermon (Sermo 81.8); on the other hand he can say (De civitate Dei 4.7): Rome can be saved now, as in earlier times it had also been saved from hard blows; but Augustine so to speak Christianizes this traditional hope of pagan Romans by adding ‘But who knows in these aVairs the will of God!’ So for Augustine the Roman state is no religious salvation-bearing institution, no station in the divine plan to save the pious, even the pax Romana is no such element in God’s plan, as the Christian Prudentius (see above) had taught; it is only the peace every conqueror imposes on the conquered; nay, the Roman state is a ‘state of impious men’ (civitas impiorum) as every other state, which is not based on justice, which is the veneration of the one God (De civitate Dei 19.12 and 24). This is a hard blow against the justiWcation of the Roman Empire, the Roman Self is deprived of the righteousness of its ruling over others. On the other hand Orosius of Braga, a contemporary of Augustine, brought forward a new variant of Christian Rome belief.70 He followed Augustine in lessening the terror of the conquest of Rome by declaring it as a restricted judgment of God; but by doing so he does not follow Augustine, but rather Ambrose of Milan and Prudentius in another point: For him again the Roman state is a salvation-bearing institution and the worldwide extension of the Roman Empire is a likeness of the heavenly patria. He regards the menace of the downfall of the Roman Empire as being caused by the invasions of the barbarian tribes—thus he is fully conscious of the Roman crisis, but he 66 67 68 69 70

In Ezechielem comm. 1 praef.: In una urbe totus orbis periit! Cf. Sugano 1983, 97–101. Cf. Dihle 1978, 357 f. Cf. Ga¨rtner 1996, 1189–90. Cf. Herzog 1980.

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interprets it positively: The barbarian tribes are unable to build up an empire, but step by step they will be Christianized. Later on this last aspect will be fully developed by the pope Leo the Great on a clearly ecclesiastical level (ad 440–61): Rome, the residence of Saint Peter, i.e. the organized catholic church, as a salvation-bearing institution holds sway over the orbis terrarum by the pax Christiana in a wider extension than the Roman Empire did before. If we look at the pagan side, it is quite astonishing that even after the conquest of Rome by the Visigothic king Alaric (ad 410), nevertheless, the hope of a Roman Empire without end is expressed again by the pagan Rutilius Namatianus; in his poem De reditu suo (ad 417) he praises Roma aeterna (1.47–164) and with steadfastness he holds upright central maxims of the Rome belief, as uninterrupted Roman rule, the identity of orbis terrarum and Roman Empire, Rome by her virtue as the best empire in comparison to her predecessors, and especially the maxim (verses 139–40) that we know already from Livy, that Rome can grow by the calamities which have destroyed other empires.71

8. THE DOWNFAL L OF THE WE ST ROMAN EMPIRE This downfall after the loss of the north- and west-European, Spanish, and African territories conquered by Germanic tribes is marked by the dethronement of the last Roman emperor Romulus Augustulus by Odoacer, of Germanic origin, i.e. a barbarian, in ad 476. In spite of this dethronement Theoderic, king of the Goths, who held sway over Italy ad 493–526 wrote a letter to the eastern emperor Anastasius, in which he describes the kingdom of the Goths in Italy as a part of the one Roman Empire.72 Under the rule of Theoderic Cassiodorus founded the monastery of Vivarium, where the monks copied pagan and Christian texts. By this we can see, that, at least for the western part, it was no longer the empire which was the stronghold of erudition and humanity, but the Christian churches and monasteries.73 Zosimus (c. ad 500) in his ƒ æÆ
Æ saw the decline of the Roman Empire with a pagan evaluation. Reasons for this decline are the aversion from the cult of the old Roman gods and the intruding of barbarians into the Roman Empire; outside and inside the borders of the empire they are regarded as a great danger. 71 73

Cf. Ga¨rtner 1998. Cf. Ga¨rtner 1996, 1193.

72

Cf. Cassiodorus, Variae 1.1.3.

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As someone who is more on a line with Augustine (see above), we Wnd Salvianus of Marseilles (c. ad 440–80). He believes the decline of the Roman Empire to be the punishment of God for moral decay. This is no new interpretation. New is that for him the barbarian tribes are the representatives of the humanitas (De gubernatione Dei 5.5.19–23), a moral quality, which traditionally the Roman Empire, the Roman Self, claimed as its own: another hard blow against traditional justiWcation of Roman rule over others. Thus, for Salvianus the downfall of Roman power is Wnal.

9. THE EMPIRE UNDER JUSTINIAN, ad 5 2 7– 5 6 5 Justinian succeeded in reconquering wide territories of the former western Roman Empire. Thus, looking at the re-established Roman power, he quite consequently could see Roman values revived, which belonged traditionally to the empire, as e.g. the eternity of the empire (cf. Novellae 47 praef.). At the same time the historiographer Procopius of Caesarea keeps the higher valuation of the old Roman state; but he Wnds Roman values dying and regards the eastern parts as the real Roman Empire, which is no longer identical with the NŒı 
Å. For John the Lydian the Roman Empire is in its essence Greek, his Rome is Constantinople; therewith in literature the Byzantine Empire begins.74

1 0 . VA LUE S O R I G I NA L LY A S S O C I AT E D W I T H T H E RO MA N EM PI R E SU RVI V IN G T HE C ATA ST RO PHE OF THE WESTERN EMPIRE There are two diVerent ideas, which survived the catastrophe of the western Roman state: Orosius (see above sect. 7) had interpreted the intrusion of barbarian tribes into the empire in a positive way: These barbarians could be expected to become Christianized and so the spatial extension of the Christian faith would surpass the extension of the Roman Empire. Later on Pope Leo the Great (ad 440–61) contended that Rome, the place of residence of the pope, ruled over the orbis terrarum farther than Rome had prior by military victories. Here Rome is prepared as the center of Catholicism. This idea has its roots already in the thoughts of Melito of Sardis, Origen, Eusebius, Ambrose, 74

For Procopius and Lydus cf. Palm 1959, 109–13.

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and Prudentius, who thought of the Roman Empire as a salvation-bearing institution,75 which is now replaced by the Catholic Church. On the other hand the old idea of the translatio imperii, in which the Roman Empire took the last and best place, was in its essence a comparison; in the Middle Ages after the Germanic emperor Otto I we Wnd the translatio imperii transferred into the notion of the Holy Roman Empire, a political notion, which served to corroborate the authority of this empire as the successor of the old Roman Empire.76

1 1 . RE´ S U M E´ As a re´sume´ we can state: The impact of Roman critical situations on late Latin literature has generated quite diVerent reactions, interpretations, and hopes, which have in common that they depend on the traditions in which the authors lived. Manifold are these thoughts of fear and hope uttered in crises and after them. It would not be correct to reduce this variety for simpliWcation and to draw conclusions from that. Nevertheless, we can stress some main observations: The historiographer Ammianus and the poet Rutilius Namatianus for instance can represent the traditional thinking of the pagan senatorial group: Rome is eternal. The Christians coming from quite another starting point had two possibilities: They could either arrange themselves with the traditional Roman ideas and see in the Roman Empire a salvation-bearing institution, as for instance Prudentius did. Or they refuted the high estimation of the Roman Empire, while attributing to Rome the low rank, which other empires had, i.e. Rome can perish as a political or moral institution, as we found Augustine and Salvianus had thought for instance. So in late antiquity menaced by the barbarian Others the mentality of the Roman Self was cleft into many very diVerent ways of thinking. References Alfo¨ldy, Ge´za, Ro¨mische Sozialgeschichte. 3rd edn. Wiesbaden (Steiner) 1984. —— Die Krise des ro¨mischen Reiches: Geschichte, Geschichtsschreibung und Geschichtsbetrachtung (HABES 5). Stuttgart (Steiner) 1989. Blockley, Roger C., Ammianus Marcellinus: A Study of his Historiography and Political Thought. Bruxelles (Latomus) 1975. Brandt, Axel, Moralische Werte in den ‘Res gestae’ des Ammianus Marcellinus. Go¨ttingen (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht) 1999. 75

See above sects. 3, 6, and 7.

76

Cf. Ga¨rtner 1996, 1157–8.

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Bury, John B., History of the Later Roman Empire. 2 vols. London (Macmillan) 1923; repr. London (Dover) 1958. Cameron, Averil, The Later Roman Empire, AD 284–430. London (Fontana) 1993. Demandt, Alexander, Zeitkritik und Geschichtsbild im Werk Ammians. Bonn (Habelt) 1965. —— Der Fall Roms: Die AuXo¨sung des ro¨mischen Reiches im Urteil der Nachwelt. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1984. —— Die Spa¨tantike. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1989. Den Boeft, Jan, Den Hengst, Daniel, and Teitler, Hans (eds.), Cognitio Gestorum: The Historiographic Art of Ammianus Marcellinus. Amsterdam (North-Holland) 1992. Dihle, Albrecht, ‘Gerechtigkeit’, Reallexikon fu¨r Antike und Christentum, 10 (1978), 233–360. Drijvers, Jan Willem, and Hunt, David (ed.), The Late Roman World and its Historian: Interpreting Ammianus Marcellinus. London/New York (Routledge) 1999. Ga¨rtner, Hans Armin, Die ro¨mische Literatur in Text und Darstellung, vol. v: Kaiserzeit II. Stuttgart (Reclam) 1988. —— ‘Des Synesios Rede u¨ber das Ko¨nigtum: Tradition und Aktualita¨t’, in: Glenn A. Most, Hubert Petersmann, and Adolf M. Ritter (eds.), Philanthropia kai Eusebeia: Festschrift fu¨r Albrecht Dihle zum 70. Geburtstag. Go¨ttingen (Vandenhoek & Ruprecht) 1993, 105–21. —— ‘Imperium Romanum’, Reallexikon fu¨r Antike und Christentum, 17 (1996), 1142– 98. —— ‘Der Fall Roms’, in: Johannes van Oort and Dietmar Wyrwa (eds.), Heiden und Christen im 5. Jh. Leuven (Peeters) 1998, 160–79. Herzog, Reinhart, ‘Orosius oder: Die Formulierung eines Fortschrittskonzepts aus der Erfahrung des Niedergangs’, in: Koselleck and Widmer 1980, 79–102. Heuß, Alfred, ‘Das spa¨tantike ro¨mische Reich kein ‘‘Zwangsstaat’’? Von der Herkunft eines historischen BegriVs’, Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht, 27 (1986), 603–18. Inglebert, Herve´, Les Romains chre´tiens face a` l’histoire de Rome. Paris (Institut d’E´tudes Augustiniennes) 1996. Jones, Arnott H. M., The Later Roman Empire 284–602: A Social, Economic, and Administrative Survey. 3 vols. Oxford (Blackwell) 1964. Kautt-Bender, Martina, ‘Vielfalt und Funktion der Darstellungselemente in den Res gestae des Ammianus Marcellinus’. Diss. Heidelberg 1991. Klein, Richard, Der Streit um den Victoriaaltar: Die dritte Relatio des Symmachus und die Briefe 17, 18 und 57 des Maila¨nder Bischofs Ambrosius. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 1972. —— Die Romrede des Aelius Aristides: Einfu¨hrung. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 1981. —— Symmachus: Eine tragische Gestalt des ausgehenden Heidentums (Impulse der Forschung 2). 2nd edn. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 1986. Koselleck, Reinhart, ‘Krise I’, Historisches Wo¨rterbuch der Philosophie, 4 (1976), 1235–40.

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—— and Widmer, Paul (eds.), Niedergang: Studien zu einem geschichtlichen Thema. Stuttgart (Klett-Cotta) 1980. Kytzler, Bernhard, Roma aeterna: Lateinische und griechische Romdichtung von der Antike bis in die Gegenwart. Zu¨rich/Mu¨nchen (Artemis) 1972. Lenski, Noel E., ‘ ‘‘Initium mali Romano imperio’’: Contemporary Reactions to the Battle of Adrianople’, Transactions of the American Philological Association, 127 (1997), 129–68. Maier, Franz Georg, ‘Niedergang als Erfahrung und BegriV: Die Zeitgenossen und die Krise Westroms 370–470’, in: Koselleck and Widmer 1980, 59–78. Matthews, John F., The Roman Empire of Ammianus. London (Duckworth) 1989. —— ‘The Origin of Ammianus’, Classical Quarterly, 44 (1994), 252–69. Palm, Jonas, Rom, Ro¨mertum und Imperium in der griechischen Literatur der Kaiserzeit. Lund (Gleerup) 1959. Rees, Roger, ‘Ammianus Satiricus’, in: Drijvers and Hunt 1999, 141–55. Rolfe, John C. (ed.), Sallust, with an English translation. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 1921; reprints. —— (ed.), Ammianus Marcellinus, with an English translation. 3 vols. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 1935, 1940, 1939; reprints. Rosen, Klaus, Ammianus Marcellinus. Darmstadt (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft) 1982. Rubenbauer, Hans, ‘Discrimen C, D’, Thesaurus Linguae Latinae, 5.1 (1910), 1358–60. Seyfarth, Wolfgang (ed.), Ammianus Marcellinus: Ro¨mische Geschichte, lat. und dt. und mit Komm. vers. von W. S. Berlin (Akademie-Verlag) 1970–1. Speyer, Wolfgang, and Opelt, Ilona, ‘Barbar’, Jahrbuch fu¨r Antike und Christentum, 10 (1967), 251–90; repr. Reallexikon fu¨r Antike und Christentum, Suppl. 1 (1992), 811–95. Strobel, Karl, Das Imperium Romanum im ‘3. Jahrhundert’: Modell einer historischen Krise ? Stuttgart (Steiner) 1993. Sugano, Karin, Das Rombild des Hieronymus. Frankfurt (Lang) 1983. Tougher, Shaun, ‘Ammianus and the Eunuchs’, in: Drijvers and Hunt 1999, 64–73. Tsouyopoulos, Nelly, ‘Krise II’, Historisches Wo¨rterbuch der Philosophie, 4 (1976), 1240–2. Walter, Jochen, Pagane Texte und Wertvorstellungen bei Lactanz. Go¨ttingen (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht) 2006. Woods, David, ‘Ammianus and Eutherius’, Acta Classica, 41 (1998), 105–17. Ye, Min, Ammianus Marcellinus, Rutilius Namatianus: Later Roman Empire under their Pens. Diss. Changchun (Northeast Normal University, PR China) 2000 [in Chinese]. —— The Last Classical Genre: Ammianus Marcellinus and his Res Gestae. Tianjin (Renmin chubanshe) 2004 [in Chinese].

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Empire on the Brink Chinese Historiography in the Post-Han-Period Achim Mittag (Tu¨bingen) and Ye Min (Tianjin)

The imperial park of Cassia Forest was laid waste, j And deers grazed in that on Long Isle. Calamities overXowed the city walls in torrents, j Creating one vast site of rubble and ruins. Heaven and earth were cut oV from us, j Spirits and men were equally grieved in heart.1

With these words, taken from his famous rhapsody ‘Lament for the South’ (‘Ai Jiangnan fu’) and ever since repeated in manifold variations,2 Yu Xin (513–81), poet and diplomat under the Liang dynasty (502–57), deplores the 549 fall of the Liang dynasty’s capital at Jiankang (modern Nanjing) into the hands of the rebellious general Hou Jing (503–52). In the course of the ensuing events, Hou Jing established a short-lived dynasty named ‘Han’, one of the numerous states in the post-Han period that evoked the glorious Han empire (206/202 bc–ad 220). At the same time, Hou Jing’s dynasty was the last dynasty carrying the name of Han for nearly 400 years to come.3 The sacking of Jiankang, which by then had served as the capital of the kingdom of Wu (222–80), the Eastern Jin (317–420), and the three successive dynasties Song (420–79), Qi (479–502), and Liang marked the end of the speciWc e´migre´ elite society which had developed in the south over almost two

1

From Yu Xin’s ‘Ai Jiangnan fu’; translation, with slight changes, adopted from Graham 1980, 75, lines 215–20. For commentarial notes on these lines, see ibid., 129–30. 2 See Owen 1990. 3 Mansvelt Beck 1986, 372.

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and a half centuries.4 Although the Liang was succeeded by the Chen dynasty (557–89) as the fourth and last of the Southern Dynasties, the center of gravity of political developments had deWnitely shifted to the north and the northwest, out of the shadow of the Han, as one can put it in reference to Charles Holcombe’s acclaimed book on that particular society and its literati culture.5 Yet in the 400 years period between Han and Tang, which is often referred to as China’s Middle Ages, the fall of Jiankang in 549 was not the only catastrophic event with far-reaching repercussions; it immediately brings to mind the thrice repeated devastation of Luoyang, in 190, 311, and 534.6 Similarly, Hou Jing’s rebellion brings to mind another rebellion one and a half centuries earlier, that of the magician Sun En (d. 402) from 399 to 402, which marked the beginning of the end of the Eastern Jin dynasty. These cataclysms, Wve in all (of which only four, however, will interest us here, cf. n. 5), may serve to divide the Wei-Jin-Nanbeichao era (220–589) into three periods as in Table 1. In the following, discussion proceeds along these three periods; each of the three sections beginning with brieXy looking at the historical background, with two closely related questions in mind: How were the crises and breakdowns of imperial order experienced? And to what extent did these experiences nourish hopes towards restoring imperial rule? Turning then to historiography, our leading questions are, how were these crises dealt with in historical writing? And how far did the notion of ‘empire’ change over time in historical thinking? Discussion of the latter two questions is limited to one text each for the Wrst two periods and to two works for the third period. The overview in Table 2 gives the names of its authors, the places where they worked, and the dynasties under which they lived. We will conclude with some random remarks on the development of Chinese historiography in the Wei-Jin-Nanbeichao era in general.

1 . F RO M PART I T I O N TO R E U N I F I C AT I O N ( C. 1 9 0– 3 16 ) : CHEN SHOU AND HIS S A N G U O Z H I 7 For this period one can say dogmatically that the dictum attributed to Confucius that ‘there are not two suns in the sky, nor two sovereigns over the 4 The character of this e´migre´ elite society has become a much-debated topic; see Chennault 1999; Jansen 2000, 19–25. 5 Holcombe 1994. 6 On the devastations of Luoyang in 190 and 311, see below; on the successive disasters which struck the city at the end of the Tuoba-Wei dynasty from 528–34, see Jenner 1981, 154–6. 7 For a useful overview of the political history, see de Crespigny 1991.

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Table 1. Overview: Periodization of the Wei-Jin-Nanbeichao Era (220–589) First period: c.190–316

Second period: 317–420

Third period: 420–589

190 devastation of Luoyang 399–402 Sun En’s rebellion 311 fall of Luoyang

548–52 Hou Jing’s rebellion 549 fall of Jiankang

Later Han (25–220)

south:

north:

south:

north:

Three Kingdoms (220–65): Wei (220–65), Shu-Han (221–63), Wu (222–80)

Eastern Jin (317–420)

Sixteen Kingdoms of Five Barbarian Peoples (304–439)

Southern Dynasties (Song, Qi, Liang, Chen; 420–589)

Tuoba-Wei (386–534)

Western Jin (265–316)

Table 2. Overview: Selected texts and their authors First period: c.190–316

Second period: 317–420

Third period: 420–589

Chen Shou (233–97) Luoyang; Western Jin

Xi Zuochi (c.318–84) Xiangyang; Eastern Jin

(a) Fan Ye (398–446) Jiankang; Song (b) Wei Shou (506–72) Ye; Northern Qi

Sanguo zhi (Records of the Three Kingdoms)

Treatise on ‘legitimate succession’

(a) Hou-Han shu (History of the Later Han Dynasty) (b) Wei shu (History of the Tuoba-Wei Dynasty)

people’ (Mengzi 4A.4) was still ubiquitously endorsed.8 Vis-a`-vis the prolonged incompetence of Han rulers from the late second century onwards, the one and only question was, who could inherit the house of Han? As Han emperorship was closely interwoven with ‘a cosmic-religious system far more complex than any that had obtained in the Chou [Zhou] period’,9 this question implied a wide spectrum of issues ranging from supernatural signs testifying to the bestowal of the Heavenly Mandate to the topic of legitimate succession—a question that lay at the core of the political discourse throughout the Wei-JinNanbeichao period. Historiography was part and parcel of this discourse, regardless of whether those issues were addressed explicitly or not. Up to present-day China, the political events of the three last decades of the Han empire, vividly narrated in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguo yanyi), known as China’s most popular historical novel, occupy an exalted 8 Holcombe 1994, 135, asserts that ‘[t]he memory of the Ch’in [Qin] and Han imperial tradition was sustained throughout the period of division’. 9 Mansvelt Beck 1986, 350.

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place in her cultural memory. They also gave substance to the political discussions that shaped post-Han historical thinking. It all began with the warlord Dong Zhuo, who, in 190, strove to maintain his hold over the court by moving the boy emperor and his entourage to the western located city of Chang’an. To forestall a return, Dong burnt the city to the ground, which also left the imperial library and the archives reduced to ashes.10 For the next three decades the Han emperor played the role of a mere puppet, from 196 being in the hands of Cao Cao (155–220), the de facto ruler of northern China. In 220, Cao Cao’s son Cao Pi (187–226), after acquiring imperial prerogatives, built up his image and solicited support, forced the emperor to abdicate in his favor, and mounted the throne himself. Known as shanrang, this abdication ritual became a well-established pattern of engineering dynastic change in China’s Middle Ages.11 In the following year (221), Liu Bei (161–223), who claimed to have descended from the Han imperial family, proclaimed himself emperor in the southwestern region of Shu (modern Sichuan). Again in the next year (222), the warlord in command of southeastern China took on the title of king of Wu, before declaring himself ‘emperor’ in 229. Clearly outweighing the two southern states of Shu-Han and Wu in terms of population and economic resources, Wei was likely to reunify the empire and to succeed to the Han. The trend towards restoration of the uniWed empire seemed irreversible after Liu Zhan (r. 223–63), Liu Bei’s incapable son and successor of the Shu-Han kingdom, complied to surrender and to live a cheerful life on the apanage granted him by the Wei court—a caricature of Liu Bei’s high-hearted proclamation that the house of Han will ‘forever hold sway over all within the Four Seas’ (yong sui sihai).12 ReuniWcation was eventually achieved in 280, not through the Wei but the Jin of the Sima family, who, in 265, had wrestled the throne from the Cao family. Prospects for the renewal of the Han empire’s splendor and glory were bright, were it not for the fratricidal war, known as the ‘Disturbances of the Eight Princes’, that broke out following the founding emperor’s death in 290. Raging between 291 and 305, this internecine war precipitated the empire’s disintegration at its periphery; new states were created, one in Sichuan,13 and one, under Xiongnu rule, in Shanxi, both taking on the mythical name of ‘Han’. By sacking the Western Jin capital at Luoyang in 311, the latter state caused the ‘Yongjia disaster’; a bloody massacre was inXicted on the city’s population, and once again the imperial library suVered total destruction. 10 11 12 13

Mansvelt Beck 1990, 46–8. Goodman 1998. Sanguo zhi 32/889. See also Declercq 1998, 120–1, n. 84. The kingdom of (Cheng-) Han (304–47); see Kleeman 1998.

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Five years later, in 316, the Western Jin dynasty came to an end with the sacking of Chang’an. The work chosen here as representative for the Wrst period, Chen Shou’s Sanguo zhi, ranks among the greatest works of early Chinese historiography, second only to Sima Qian’s (c.145–c.90/85 bc) Shi ji (The Records of the Grand Historian) and Ban Gu’s (ad 32–92) Han shu (History of the Former Han). Later recognized as the oYcial dynastic history for the period of the Three Kingdoms (Wei, Shu-Han, and Wu; 220–65), it actually covers the time from the Yellow Turbans uprising in 184 until the eve of reuniWcation in 280. A key to a better understanding of Chen Shou’s historical thinking lies in realizing the speciWc situation to which he was responding: Chen Shou was among a handful of literati from Shu-Han who, after that state’s surrender in 263–4, had gone into exile to make a living at the court at Luoyang. To use a term coined by the sociologist Robert E. Park, this situation turned Chen Shou into a ‘marginal man’.14 Characteristically for such individuals, Chen, as we may assume, was also passionately dedicated to a greater political vision— the vision of the restitution of order under the house of Jin after an age of chaos and confusion. The Sanguo zhi is written in the so-called jizhuan style, consisting of ‘Fundamental Chronicles’ (ji) and ‘Biographies’ (zhuan), including accounts of the ‘barbarian’ peoples, but lacking ‘Tables’ (biao) and ‘Treatises’ (zhi) as in Shi ji and Han shu. Historiographically, Chen Shou was confronted with two major problems; one being the writing of the history of three rivaling kingdoms within the framework basically devised for the historical account of one single dynasty (or, several non-coexisting dynasties which succeeded to one another). Chen Shou’s solution to this problem: He divided his records in three parts, one for each of the Three Kingdoms, but clearly privileged Wei, thereby acknowledging Wei’s claim to the Heavenly Mandate. Besides the sheer size of the records covering the history of Wei,15 Wei is given priority in three ways: Firstly, by referring only to the Wei monarchs as di, ‘emperors’; secondly, by reserving the category of ‘Fundamental Chronicles’ exclusively to Wei;16 and thirdly, by including accounts of the ‘barbarian’ peoples only in the Wei part. 14 For Chen Shou’s biography, see de Crespigny 1970, 2–4, and Hanke 2002, 87–111 (with a parallel translation of the two main biographies in Huayang guozhi and Jin shu, 88–100). 15 There is about twice as much space dedicated to Wei as to Wu, and almost four times as much as to Shu. It should be noted, however, that these proportions by and large reXect the diVerent sizes of the population in the three states; see Hanke 2002, 112–13. 16 In contrast, the rulers of Shu and Wu are addressed as zhu, ‘lords’, and treated under the category of ‘biographies’. Yet these ‘biographies’ have two features which are characteristic of ‘Fundamental Chronicles’: (1) the use of the individual calendars of Shu and Wu, and (2) records of supernatural signs; Fan 1998, 168–71.

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The second problem which Chen Shou as a member of the Jin court faced was that, over a period of twenty-Wve years, the ruling Sima family had overthrown the house of Cao to eventually found their own dynasty—the Jin. As Sima Yan’s (236–90; r. 265/266–90) ascension to the throne in 266 followed the same manner of ‘abdication’ (shanrang) as the Wei founding emperor’s ascension forty-Wve years before, the Jin dynasty’s legitimation was built upon Wei’s claim of having legitimately succeeded to the house of Han. By acknowledging this latter claim in the way as pointed out above, Chen Shou accounted for this speciWc ideological need. But there were more intricate problems arising from the historian’s allegiance to the Sima ruling house, notably that of the oYcial beginning of the Jin dynasty—either Sima Yan’s enthronement in 265, or the military coup of Sima Yan’s grandfather Sima Yi (179–251) in 249, by which the Sima clan had gained actual control over the government, or the latter’s nomination to a joint regency for a boy emperor in 240. Because of its troublesome implications for those who had thrown in their lot with the Cao camp, this issue stirred a heated debate in the 270s.17 Chen Shou dealt with this issue by opting for the latest date (i.e. 265/266), but denied full acknowledgment of the three boy emperors of the house of Cao during the regency from 240 to 265 by treating them as ‘lesser emperors’. By so doing, Chen Shou provided for the possibility of a future history to start with the ‘Fundamental Chronicles’ of Sima Yan’s three forebears who had acted as the towering Wgures of the interim period from 240 to 265. In fact, the Jin shu, compiled in the early Tang dynasty, proceeds just in this way. We do not know whether Chen Shou began working on a history of the Jin dynasty, but we do know that he, after a draft of his Sanguo zhi had been greeted with applause, was recommended for this job.18 This biographical detail helps us to understand that, in Chen Shou’s mind, the period of the Three Kingdoms was only a transitional period which would inexorably end with the restoration of the uniWed empire. In short, the Sanguo zhi was only a prelude to a grand history a` la Han shu. Two points can be added to corroborate this observation. Firstly, Chen Shou’s sense of the empire’s unity as a premise of peace and order is manifested by the fact that he sided with the court faction which vehemently advocated the reconquest of Wu in order to achieve reuniWcation.19 17

Declercq 1998, 124–5. According to Chen Shou’s biography in Huayang guozhi; see Hanke 2002, 95. 19 Throughout his oYcial career, Chen Shou was a prote´ge´ of Zhang Hua (232–300) and Du Yu (222–84), who both were among the most vigorous proponents of the campaign against Wu. Moreover, in 279, ostensibly anticipating the conquest of Wu, Chen Shou submitted a ‘Treatise on the Enlargement of the State Territory’ (‘Guangguo lun’); see Hanke 2002, 89, 95, esp. nn. 258–60, 102–6, 110, 146. 18

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Secondly, as noted above, in the Sanguo zhi Wei is treated as the legitimate successor of the house of Han. This does not mean, however, that the two opponents, Shu-Han and Wu, are treated as illegitimate regimes.20 On the contrary, Chen Shou indicates support of their claims to rule over All-underHeaven by using diVerent means; in the case of Shu-Han by giving prominence to a literary piece propagating Liu Bei’s claim to the Heavenly Mandate, with which the Sanguo zhi concludes,21 and in the case of Wu by recording celestial omens and miraculous occurrences such as the repeated appearance of a yellow dragon, which supposedly signaled the ‘revolving’ of imperial power onto Wu in the southeast (yun zai dongnan).22 Moreover, for both imperial houses, there are records of prodigious cloud formations indicating their being blessed with ‘kingly energy’ (wangzheqi).23 To summarize, the estimation in which Chen Shou’s Sanguo zhi has traditionally been held is due to its various narratives of outstanding Wgures and events such as the battle at the Red CliVs, which became constituents of the Chinese cultural memory. Important in our context is that the Sanguo zhi extended the dynastic history model to cover several dynasties coexisting in the realm in one certain time span. Yet in so doing, it held assurance to the idea of a uniWed empire, privileging that dynasty which laid the foundation for a future reuniWcation (i.e. Cao-Wei). Although the Sanguo zhi contains several major elements at issue in the later debates over the question of ‘legitimate succession’ such as e.g. the shanrang ritual, observations of celestial omens and portents, the inclusion of embellished literary writings, etc., Chen Shou did not develop a consistent conception of ‘legitimate succession’. The Wrst to do so was Xi Zuochi, to whom we will turn in the next section.

20

See Fan 1998, 172, 179; Hanke 2002, 115–27. Yang Xi’s ‘Ji-Han fuchen zan’ (‘Eulogy of the OYcials of the Third Han Dynasty’); Sanguo zhi 45/1080–90. See Hanke 2002, 120. Traditionally, Chen Shou has been accused of attempted bribery in one case and of biased portrayals of Zhuge Liang (181–234), under whom his father had suVered from mistreatment, and of Liu Zhan, the second ruler of Shu-Han, who had treated Chen Shou with contempt. On these accusations and the long-standing debate entailed by them, see de Crespigny 1970, 11–13; Hanke 2002, 92–3, n. 252. Contradicting these allegations, it has early been pointed out that Chen Shou in fact was biased in favor of Shu; see Fan 1998, 170–1. 22 The ‘dragon’ symbolizes the emperor; ‘yellow’ is the color related to the element ‘earth’, which, according to the then applied theory of the Five Elements’ succession, was to replace ‘Wre’ under which the Han had ruled. There are four records of the appearance of a yellow dragon in Wu; the Wrst one being deemed so important that the reign period was retrospectively renamed ‘Yellow Dragon’; see Fan 1998, 150. 23 Fan 1998, 140–3. 21

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2. IN THE WAKE OF THE ‘YONGJIA DISASTER’ ( 317–420): XI ZUOCHI AND HIS TREATISE ON ‘LEGITIMATE SUCCESSION’ In the year after the fall of Chang’an (317), a prince of the Sima ruling house, seeking to restore the Jin dynasty, mounted the throne in Jiankang (Nanjing). Thus began the period of division between northern and southern China. While the north came under the rule of a number of non-Chinese dynasties, the south saw the succession of Wve Chinese ruling houses. From the beginning stability of the ‘restored’ Jin regime was precarious.24 Nonetheless, as early as in 318 the ‘restoration’ emperor took the posture of Son of Heaven in charge of preserving the imperial legacy and commissioned the compilation of a chronicle of the Western Jin.25 Apart from the dynasty’s own history, the Later Han dynasty in particular attracted a vivid interest among the Eastern Jin’s educated elite since it had set the model of a successful ‘restoration’. It cannot be overlooked, however, that the Jin dynasty’s ‘restoration’ in the south was fundamentally diVerent from its Han precedent; not only had the territory shrunk to less than a half, but also a speciWc e´migre´ elite had emerged which dictated the current beliefs during the Southern Dynasties. Marriage regulations, tax exemptions, and privileged career chances in the state’s bureaucracy tied to pedigree account for the oligarchic character of this group who had Xed from the occupied north in huge numbers. To further its accommodation, 81 new commanderies with 236 districts, named after those in the north, were created, thereby considerably expanding the chances of oYce holding.26 During the Wrst six decades of the Eastern Jin, hopes to regain the northern heartland did not subside. These hopes settled mostly with Huan Wen (312–73), who had Wrst reconquered Sichuan in 347, before retaking Luoyang in 356. However, distrustful of his political ambitions, the court declined Huan Wen’s requests of moving the capital back to Luoyang.27 Too weak to hold the old capital for long, the Eastern Jin nevertheless was still strong enough to inXict a decisive defeat on the invading armies of the ‘barbarian’ enemy at the famous battle of Feishui in 383. The germs of the Eastern Jin dynasty’s deterioration originated from within the regime. Between 399 and 402, state and society were rocked by the 24

Holcombe 1994, 29–30. Hanke 2002, 74–6. Holcombe 1994, 27. 27 The decisive memorial which argued against moving the capital to Luoyang was drafted by Sun Chuo (X. 330–65); see Jin shu 56/1545–7. 25 26

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rebellion of the magician Sun En. With enormous bloodshed it could Wnally be suppressed, but Huan Xuan (369–404), son of Huan Wen, seized the opportunity to depose the boy emperor and found his own short-lived dynasty. Yet in 404, the house of Jin was restored once again, owing to the military astuteness of the general Liu Yu (356–422). Just as Huan Wen before, Liu was also able to retake Luoyang and Chang’an, but instead of pressing the court to pursue a grand strategy of reconquest, he used his great military success as a springboard for his own ambitions to eventually ascend to the throne himself and found the Song dynasty. The Eastern Jin dynasty shows characteristic traits of a period which cannot boast of such great historical works as Chen Shou’s Sanguo zhi or Fan Ye’s Hou-Han shu. Yet its achievements in historical writing, in particular in the Welds of biography, genealogy, family histories, and local or regional historiography (fangzhi), deserves no less attention than those in our Wrst and third periods. Special mention must be made of the Huayang guozhi (Account of the Land South of the Hua Mountain) by Chang Qu (c.291–361), which is commonly seen as the Wrst work of the genre known as ‘local gazetteers’ (fangzhi),28 and the rise of Buddhist and Daoist hagiography; however, the foremost representative works of this Xourishing subgenre of biographical writing, the Gaoseng zhuan (Biographies of Eminent Monks) by Huijiao (497– 554) and the Daoxue zhuan (Biographies of Students of the Dao; late 6th cent.), respectively, date to our third period.29 The same is the case with the Shishuo xinyu (New Accounts of our Age’s Informal Conversations) by Liu Yiqing (403– 44), which is a formidable expression of the growing artistry in portraying and evaluating a person’s character.30 The text chosen here as representative of this period is Xi Zuochi’s essay on the question of ‘legitimate succession’. Dating from 384, presumably just shortly before Xi Zuochi passed away, this essay forms the main part of a memorial to the throne, with which Xi responded to his nomination to supervise the writing of the Jin history. It elaborates on the key issue that lay at the core of Xi’s earlier chronicle entitled Han Jin chunqiu (Annals of Han and Jin). Covering the period from the ‘restoration’ of the house of Han in ad 25 to the demise of the Western Jin in 316, this chronicle has long been lost apart from some citation fragments. The key issue readdressed in Xi’s essay 28

Kleeman 1998, 85, 108–12; Hanke 2002, 312–25; 2006, 443–6. For an excellent case study of biographical writing in the Gaoseng zhuan, see Lu Yang 2004. Note that the Daoxue zhuan has come down to us only in fragments; see Bumbacher 2000. Mention should here also be made of the Shenxian zhuan (Biographies of Spirit Immortals), an earlier hagiographical compilation traditionally attributed to Ge Hong (283–343), which, however, is surrounded by a score of problematic questions concerning its transmission and textual history. 30 For this characteristic trait of Wei-Jin historiography, with special attention paid to the Shishuo xinyu, see Lu Yaodong 1998, 8–10; 2000, 139–51. 29

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under discussion concerns his bold proposal to disacknowledge Cao-Wei as the legitimate successor dynasty of Han and to recognize instead Shu-Han as the legitimate link between Han and Jin.31 In his essay, the ‘unifying of the whole universe’ (hunyi yuzhou) serves as Xi’s ultimate criterion for ‘legitimate succession’. Yet this is not suYcient if the monarch or the royal house, under whom uniWcation was achieved, cannot gain support among the ruling elite and the people so that the realm is bound to fall into chaos before long. For Xi Zuochi, legitimacy thus has an ‘outer’ and an ‘inner’ aspect: one being the uniWed empire and the other a righteous and benign rule which is likely to gain general assent and broad support. At Wrst sight, this is not much diVerent from Chen Shou’s point of view with regard to the issue of legitimate dynastic succession. Yet Xi goes one decisive step further in that his argumentation is essentially a historical one, paying no attention to the Five Elements theory, nor to the pervasive belief in omens and portents. At its core lies a critique of the shanrang ritual as a major element in the prevailing theory of ‘legitimate succession’. Xi argues that the ‘abdication’ of the last Han emperor and the transfer of imperial power from Han to Cao-Wei cannot possibly be compared to the classical shanrang model set by the legendary sage rulers Yao and Shun, who both chose their own successors among virtuous ministers instead of following a hereditary succession. According to Xi Zuochi, an analogy must rather be drawn to the case of King Kuai of Yan (r. 320–318 bc), whose high-minded abdication had only brought the state to ruins. Similarly, Cao-Wei had proven unable to secure stability in the long run. ‘Why then’, asks Xi rhetorically, ‘should we for empty reverence of unrighteous [Cao-] Wei, degrade our righteous Way universally enforced (kui wo dao yu datong)?’32 According to Xi, the Heavenly Mandate fell onto the Sima family because of their ‘merits and accomplishments’ (gong shi): ‘those who did away with the calamities of the three states and tranquilized the strife of the end of Han . . . were all of the house of Sima’.33 Their succession to Shu-Han was analogous to that of the house of Han to Zhou, which had set the precedent of an indirect succession. And in this case, says Xi, no one would seriously argue that Han succeeded to Qin, not to speak of Chu, the short-lived dynasty established by Xiang Yu (d. 202). Extending the analogy to Liu Bang, the founder of the Han dynasty (r. 206/202–196 bc), who had previously served under his later enemy, Xiang Yu, Xi Zuochi essentially argues that the house of Sima’s 31

Hence, to chronicle the period from 221 to 264, the Han Jin chunqiu used Shu-Han’s calendar. See Chittick 1998, 40–1; Hanke 2002, 168–9. 32 Jin shu 82/2157; translation, with some changes, adopted from Chittick 1998, 44. 33 Jin shu 82/2155; translated in Chittick 1998, 42.

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legitimacy does not derive from the fact that the three forebears of Sima Yan had served in high positions under Wei. Emphasizing the usefulness of the lessons taught by history in general—‘All worldly aVairs can be made understandable for the present by making recourse to the past’34—Xi Zuochi certainly wrote his essay with a speciWc aim in mind; the question only is, what aim? A clue to answering this question is found in Xi’s oYcial biography, where it is pointed out that Xi compiled the Annals of Han and Jin to reprimand Huan Wen. Having begun his oYcial career under Huan Wen, he later, i.e. in the early 370s, turned against him, after Huan Wen had abandoned his plans to reconquer the north in the wake of a fatal defeat against the ‘barbarians’ in 369, had changed the focus of his ambitions to court politics, and, in 371, had already gone so far as to replace the boy emperor by a Sima prince of his liking. By ‘making recourse to the past’, Xi thus expressed his outrage about his former superior’s coup d’e´tat and his ambitions to ascend the throne himself and, in a more general sense, his message was that only if any pretender to the throne could successfully regain the north and reunify the empire, could he attain the stature to remove the Jin and establish his own dynasty.35 If we limit ourselves to early imperial times, then Xi Zuochi’s essay certainly ranks among the most important writings in the Weld that transgresses political ethics and historical thought, perhaps comparable to the famous essay by Ban Gu’s father Ban Biao (3–54), ‘On the Kingly Mandate’ (‘Wang ming lun’).36 DiVerent from Ban Biao’s argumentation, Xi Zuochi discusses the issue of ‘legitimate succession’ under the circumstances of rivaling imperial states. Yet the real signiWcance of Xi Zuochi’s essay lies in his conWning himself to a thoroughly historical argumentation, completely avoiding any explanation of dynastic change in terms of the Five Elements theory and references to auspicious omens and miraculous signs, in sharp contrast to Ban Biao’s earlier essay.

3 . T H E W I D E N I N G O F T H E C U LTU R A L D IV I D E B E TW E E N T H E SO U T H A N D TH E N ORT H ( 4 20 – 58 9 ) Under the Song founding emperor’s son and successor the eVorts were renewed to regain the north. However, a campaign in 430–1, during which the troops advanced as far as to the southern banks of the Yellow River, ended 34

Jin shu 82/2156. Our analysis of Xi’s essay is largely owed to the discussions by Chittick 1998 and Hanke 2002, 165–78. 36 Cf. Achim Mittag’s paper in this volume. 35

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in defeat against the Tuoba armies. It was around this time, within a decade (i.e. 429–39), that the Tuoba-Wei, under the able councillorship of the Daoist scholar and statesman Cui Hao (381–450), subjugated one enemy after the other, eventually succeeding in Wrmly establishing control over north China in its entirety. From then onward until the Tuoba-Wei dynasty’s downfall in 534, the relationship between the northern empire and its southern counterpart developed into a stalemate, with minor gains and losses on both sides. As to the ruling elite of the Southern Dynasties, the blocking of all wistful longings to recapture the northern heartland had a tremendous inXuence on its self-pride and self-understanding. Thus, in the course of the hundred years from the mid-Wfth to mid-sixth century, the southern elite increasingly deWned its role, and with it the state of man in the world, in terms of literary achievements and cultural reWnement. This reorientation crystallized in the copious activities centered around the Western Salon in Jilong Mountain northwest of Jiankang, a literary salon sponsored by the Prince of Qi, Xiao Ziliang (460–94).37 The accommodation process that the former e´migre´ elite underwent need not be depicted here in greater detail; suYce it to say that Buddhism, practiced among scholarly circles as an ‘erudite religion’, and, albeit to a lesser extent, Daoism played a deWnite role in this process.38 Both the Daoist and Buddhist religions also exerted a formative inXuence on the Wfth and sixth centuries state and society in the north. After an abortive experiment in creating a Daoist theocratic state, it was especially Buddhism that was instrumental in the Tuoba elite’s adoption of Chinese habits and manners.39 This process of ‘sinicization’—a recently much criticized term which should be used with reluctance—culminated in 493–4 when Emperor Xiaowen shifted the capital from Pingcheng (present-day Datong, Shanxi) to Luoyang, over which hung the halo of imperial glory. The magniWcent construction of the city according to a new plan,40 in conjunction with the mandatory adoption of Chinese family names and prohibitions of wearing customary clothing and against speaking the Xianbei language at court, shows to what extent the ‘barbarians’ had inserted themselves into the constitution of the Chinese imperial world order. If it were to be preserved, it had to be by their vigor. As this period saw the development of two rivaling empires of about equal strength, one in the south and one in the north, we have accordingly chosen two representative works, Fan Ye’s Hou-Han shu and Wei Shou’s Wei shu. Discussion of the two works proceeds in chronological order.

37 39

38 Jansen 2000. Demie´ville 1986, 847–50, 857–9, 864–7. 40 Ibid. 853–7, 861–6. Steinhardt 1990, 83–7.

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(a) Fan Ye and his Hou-Han Shu Fan Ye, scion of a renowned e´migre´ scholar family,41 witnessed the transition from the Eastern Jin to the Liu-Song dynasty; his father having even been instrumental in Liu Yu’s rise to imperial power in 420. Having started his oYcial career under the patronage of the Prince of Pengcheng, Liu Yu’s fourth son, Fan Ye, punished for impropriety while drunk, was demoted to serve in an administrative post in the province. It was during the Wve or six years of his service there that he compiled his Hou-Han shu. In the late 430s, Fan was recalled to serve at court, but was put on trial in 445 for his involvement in a plot to install his former patron on the throne. In the following year (446), he was Wnally publicly executed, together with his three sons and other conspirators. Considering the number of the then already existing historical works on the Later Han,42 the question arises, what motivated Fan Ye to his undertaking? Some clues to answering this question are found in Fan Ye’s famous and often anthologized letter written in prison and addressed to his nephews: My ‘disquisitions’ [lun] in the chapters of various biographies embody my painstaking thought and deep purport. I made the language terse because I wanted to restrict the Xavor in each of them. But as for the ‘introductions’ and ‘disquisitions’ in the chapters from the one on ‘Scrupulous OYcials’ down to those on the six barbarian tribes, in those my brush gallops away unbridled. They are the most original writings in this world . . . In the ‘Annals’, my plan was simply to give a general sketch of events. Still, they fully evidence my painstaking eVort. Never since antiquity has there been such a grand plan matched with such artful deliberation as in this work of mine. I only fear that contemporaries will not do justice to my book. Many of them venerate ancient writings while belittling modern ones . . . In music I am better at playing than at listening, but I regret to say that what I excel at is not the classically correct style. However, once one reaches mastery what is the diVerence?43

Although Fan Ye has often been criticized for his overbearing tone—with regard to his ‘eulogies’, he even declares that ‘I myself hardly know how to praise them’44—a number of his ‘disquisitions’ and ‘introductions’ to chapters of grouped biographies are indeed considered masterpieces of Chinese historical prose. As Ronald Egan has demonstrated, Fan Ye must moreover be 41 There are divergent references concerning Fan Ye’s place of origin; see Zhao and Lin 1985, 207, n. 1. 42 See Bielenstein 1956, 10–13; Mansvelt Beck 1990, 17–19 and 19–27 (on the Dongguan Hanji [Records of Han from the Eastern Pavilion], the single most important source used by Fan Ye). 43 Song shu 69/1830–1; with slight changes adopted from Egan 1979, 341–2. 44 Song shu 69/1831; translated by Egan 1979, 342.

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credited with the development of a new narrative style, which has two characteristic features: Wrst, creativeness on the semantic level, and second, making full use of the wide spectrum of expressive means provided by the ‘parallel style’ (pianti wen), yet without overindulging in ornamental embellishments and allusions to classical texts. As hinted at in his ‘Letter’, Fan Ye was opposed to the antiquarian and highly embellished style in contemporary prose writing as had been given prestige e.g. by Yan Yanzhi (384–456).45 Behind Fan Ye’s extravagant claims we can thus discern his intention to inaugurate a novel approach to dealing with the historical past, yet not only in terms of style, but also in terms of historical criticism. Once again this becomes clear from the ‘Letter’, cited above, where Fan, regretting several drawbacks from his original plan, reveals that ‘I also wanted to write critiques on the successive historical events within each chapter so as to put right the merits and demerits of each era’.46 This is a hint at Fan’s discontent with the historical comments and judgments in existing works, including, as we may assume, Yuan Hong’s (328–76) Hou-Han ji (Chronicle of the Later Han Dynasty), which is commonly assumed to have served as a chief source for Fan.47 An essential divergence of opinion is manifest from the very beginning of their histories: Whereas Yuan Hong emphasizes the legitimacy of Liu Xuan, who ruled as the Gengshi emperor (r. 23–5) and thereby challenges the legitimacy of the Guangwu emperor (r. 25–57), Fan Ye, however, leaves no doubt of the latter’s legitimate seizure of power. Thus, the Gengshi reign is incorporated in the ‘Fundamental Chronicle’ of Guangwu’s reign, and while the latter’s ascension of the throne is depicted as solemn and majestic, the account of Liu Xuan’s enthronement ceremony comments laconically that Liu Xuan ‘felt ashamed, dripped with perspiration, lifted his hands and could not speak’.48 For Fan Ye, the ultimate testimony of Guangwu’s legitimacy is evidenced by a host of fortunate omens, on which he elaborates in his ‘disquisition’ at the end of the ‘Fundamental Chronicle’ of Guangwu’s reign. The rhetorical question that concludes his ‘disquisition’—‘Is it not that when a true king receives the Mandate there certainly will be supernatural signs (fu)?’—underlines the enduring signiWcance of the doctrine of celestial correspondences. Yet more importantly, Fan Ye implicitly endorses the legitimacy of Liu Yu’s,

45

In a congratulatory poem on the occasion of Liu Yu’s enthronement, Yan Yanzhi likened the (Liu-) Song dynasty’s founding to that of the Zhou dynasty; see Egan 1979, 366–7. 46 Song shu 69/1831; adopted, with slight changes, from Egan 1979, 341. 47 Yuan Hong was a prominent literatus among Huan Wen’s coterie. For a brief biography and an introduction to his Hou-Han ji, see Hanke 2002, 178–91. 48 Quoted from Bielenstein 1956, 43.

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the Song founding emperor’s, rise to power, which was explained and justiWed mainly in terms of the Five Elements theory.49 Clearly, Fan Ye was favorably inclined toward the Guangwu emperor whose reign takes up a disproportionately large space throughout the Hou-Han shu.50 Yet in what respect could the Guangwu emperor serve as a model of rulership for an age 400 years later? To sum up Fan Ye’s answer by one single word: ‘expediency’. In Fan Ye’s view, it was the Guangwu emperor’s ‘wise policy of meeting the needs of the moment’ (quanyi zhi lu¨e),51 by which the Later Han dynasty was brought to its zenith; once this exquisite policy was abandoned, the house of Han was doomed. This view is developed in Fan Ye’s discussion of Later Han’s dealing with the Xiongnu,52 yet is to be understood in a more general way. This becomes especially manifest with regard to Fan Ye’s ‘disquisition’ concluding a biographical chapter which contains, among others, the biography of Zhongchang Tong (c.180–220), one of the foremost thinkers from the Wnal years of the Han dynasty. Apparently, Fan’s ‘disquisition’ relates to one of Zhongchang Tong’s essays,53 which examines the causes of disorder and chaos (‘Li huo pian’). The outstanding feature of this essay is Zhongchang’s disillusionment about the promise of a paciWed and forever peaceful world, which had erstwhile driven the imperial project. Thus, Zhongchang grimly depicts the history of the last 500 years, i.e. c.300 bc–ad 200, as having moved in three vicious cycles, each of which eventually ushered in an everincreasingly ghastly state of chaos. Distrustful of the optimistic belief in the ‘governmental system’ (fazhi) as a universal remedy for the miseries of mankind, Zhongchang emphasizes that good government can only be achieved by recruiting the right men who put expedient policies into practice (xing), without making a fuss over the standards of antiquity since ‘our days are not like those in the ancient past’ (ri bu ru gu).54 In the aforementioned ‘disquisition’, Fan Ye expands on this theme, arguing that in times when major changes are to be eVected, one must be mindful of any futile attempt of ‘pushing a boat on land’ (tui chuan yu lu)—a metaphor attributed to a legendary Daoist who satirized Confucius for attempting to 49

Song shu 2/46, 48. Thus, over one-fourth of all biographies fall in the time span of the thirty-two years of Guangwu’s reign; see Bielenstein 1956, 25. 51 Hou-Han shu 89/2967, adopting Ronald Egan’s apt translation; cf. Egan 1979, 397. 52 Hou-Han shu 89/2966–7; Egan 1979, 393–8. 53 Many valuable materials for the study of the early Chinese history of political thought have been preserved by inclusion of such writings in the biographies of their authors, which is acknowledged as a hallmark of Fan Ye’s Hou-Han shu. 54 Hou-Han shu 49/1654, 1648. 50

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implement the ancient Zhou rituals and institutions in the state of Lu.55 Hence, in Fan Ye’s view, the ancient sage rulers cannot simply be emulated in the present world: Now someone might advocate that the former kings’ ways of handling the aVairs of government can be put into practice in our present world and he might propose that their methods of putting right certain malpractices are apt to be handed down to all future generations. Yet adhering to such a position inXexibly will eventually cause harm.56

Historiographically, Fan Ye’s skepticism against taking the ancient past as a normative guideline of the present translates into sharp criticism of Ban Gu. Although acknowledging the latter as ‘the most renowned historian’, Fan criticizes in particular Ban Gu’s ‘eulogies’ as being ‘not acceptable to our common sense’.57 Behind such criticism lies Fan’s disapproval of judging historical Wgures and events of the recent past on the basis of a rigid value standard as had been prominently applied in Ban Gu’s infamous ‘Table of subjects from the ancient past to the present’ (‘Gujin ren biao’, chap. 20).58 To summarize: Fan Ye’s Hou-Han shu exhibits a novel approach to writing history, which is characterized by the development of a new style of historical narrative prose, the advocacy of ‘expedient’ policies, and the adoption of a ‘historicist’ attitude in the historian’s evaluations and judgments. This novel approach must be seen in the context of the growth of a new attitude toward the past, a heightened sense that ‘our times are quite another’. Indicative of which is, for example, a so-called ‘hypothetical discourse’ (shelun) by Wang Chen (3rd cent.) entitled ‘An Explanation of the Times’ (‘Shishi lun’).59 This new sense of temporal and historical change, reXected in the often expressed maxim that one ought to ‘go with the times’ (qu shi), was not restricted to the political arena, but encompassed many other Welds such as phonology and poetry. As, for instance, for the writing of poetry, it was none other than Liu Xie (c.465–522), China’s Wrst great literary critic, who articulated that ‘success will be his who follows the changing times’.60

(b) Wei Shou and his Wei Shu We conclude with taking a look at Wei Shou’s Wei shu, which, in spite of much criticism later on, came to be ranked among the oYcial dynastic histories. 55 56 57 58 59 60

See Hou-Han shu 49/1660 and Zhuangzi 14, 227. Hou-Han shu 49/1660. See in his ‘Letter’ to his nephews, Song shu 69/1830; Egan 1979, 341. For a magisterial study of this ‘Table’, see Unger 1969. For an introduction and translation, see Declercq 1998, 151–8; the quotation is ibid. 153. Wenxin diaolong 29/199; translated by Shih 1983, 325.

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The Wei shu records the history of the Tuoba-Wei (also called Northern Wei or Yuan-Wei) dynasty (386–534), in fact the longest-lasting dynasty in the 400 years period between Han and Tang and the Wrst of China’s ‘conquest dynasties’. The Wei shu is valued as a rich repository of historical information, which Wei Shou in twenty years of service in the palace library at the Eastern Wei (534–50) court at Ye (present Linzhang, Henan province) was able to put together. From a historiographical point of view, there is, however, more to the Wei shu than merely its being a record of major events, institutions, and historical Wgures that dominated the political aVairs in the north for over one and a half centuries. To start with, some remarks should be made on the criticism that has ever since been directed against the Wei shu and its author, Wei Shou. Dubbed the ‘Wlthy history’ (huishi)—a pun on its title as well as its author’s surname (huiwei)—the Wei shu became known as the most inglorious among the TwentyWve Dynastic Histories. Accordingly, Wei Shou was not only accused of prejudice and bias in general, but also indicted of having given or denied biographies for strictly private reasons in at least three cases and, additionally, of even having accepted bribes for covering up the atrocities committed by the Erzhu clan, especially by Erzhu Rong (493–530), who is held responsible for the massacre on the outskirts of Luoyang in 528 which heralded the TuobaWei’s demise.61 As has been shown, however, the Wei shu’s ill-reputation has much to do with the issue of legitimate dynastic succession.62 Here it is necessary to insert a brief note concerning the historical situation. After the fall of Luoyang in 534, the Tuoba-Wei empire split into two states, the Western Wei (535–56) and the Eastern Wei, which, in turn, were succeeded by the Northern Zhou (557–81) and the Northern Qi (550–77), respectively. As Wei Shou had been commissioned to write the Wei shu under the Northern Qi dynasty (in 551), his work, naturally, presented the history of Tuoba-Wei, notably its chaotic end, from the viewpoint of the Northern Qi and its predecessor, the Eastern Wei. However, reuniWcation in 589 was achieved by the Sui who saw themselves in a line of succession from Cao-Wei and Western Jin to Tuoba-Wei, and thence to Western Wei and Northern Zhou. As a consequence, the Wei shu came under attack from two sides: Firstly, from the followers of the prevailing view of ‘legitimate succession’, who favored the dynasties in the north (Cao-Wei–Western Jin–Tuoba-Wei), but vehemently disagreed with Wei Shou’s pro-Eastern Wei and pro-Northern Qi stance. Secondly, from the sizeable group of scholars and literati coming from the south who principally took the ‘legitimate succession’ of the southern 61

See Holmgren 1989, 3–5.

62

Ibid. 3–8.

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dynasties for granted. These men felt indignant against the Wei shu’s practice of vilifying the Eastern Jin as ‘usurper regime’ (jian) and the southern ruling houses of Song, Qi, and Liang as ‘island barbarians’ (daoyi; sometimes also man or manyi, ‘southern barbarians’).63 China’s Wrst and foremost critic of history writing, Liu Zhiji (661–721), can, with some reservations, be counted among the latter group that felt antagonized by Wei Shou’s work, and it is Liu’s harsh criticism which sealed the Wei shu’s ignominy until modern times.64 What is of primary interest for us here is the way in which historiography contributed powerfully to the Tuoba regime’s drive towards wholeheartedly embracing the Chinese model of imperial rule. A decisive step into this direction was taken in 398 when Tuoba Gui (371–409), after his sweeping conquest of the northern plains, shifted the capital to Pingcheng, adopted the Chinese calendar, and chose ‘earth’ as the patron element of the Wei dynasty, which he had founded twelve years earlier.65 Not long afterwards the earliest oYcial history was commissioned. After that the archival and historiographical activities at the Tuoba court did not cease. These activities revolved in particular around two works, one being the ‘State History’ (Guoshi), which was successively compiled and revised, and the other the Annals of the Sixteen States (Shiliuguo chunqiu), a composite history of those kingdoms that arose in Northern China in the fourth century.66 For his compilation of the Wei shu, Wei Shou could thus rely on an array of source materials and several earlier works, which, however, are not all extant anymore today. Thrusting himself onto his task, Wei Shou formed of these materials a history which purported to conWrm the Tuoba rulers’ claim of ruling over Allunder-Heaven in the succession of the Han, Cao-Wei, and Western Jin dynasties. This is achieved by using various means: Firstly, reminiscent of the Shi ji’s Wrst Wve chapters, the Wei shu begins with a chronological account of the mythical origins of the Tuoba people and their early history up to Tuoba Gui’s ascension to the throne.67 Again as in the Shi ji, the ultimate origin of all history is the Yellow Emperor, the alleged progenitor of the Tuoba people. The assumed descent from the Yellow Emperor, associated with ‘yellow’ and ‘earth’, corroborated Tuoba-Wei’s adoption of the patron element ‘earth’. Also the Wrst syllable of ‘Tuoba’, ‘tuo’, is allegedly derived from ‘earth’ (tu).68 63

64 Wei shu, chaps. 96–8. Holmgren 1989, 6–7. Wei shu 2/33–4. Before, in 386, Tuoba Gui had already adopted the title of King of Wei. 66 Holmgren 1982, 14–18; Chen 1998.—The original version of the Shiliuguo chunqiu by Cui Hong (d. 525) is no longer extant, but it is assumed that large parts of it were fully integrated into the Wei shu; see Chen 1998, 247. 67 Holmgren 1982. 68 Wei shu 1/1; Holmgren 1982, 51. For the importance of the patron element ‘earth’ for the Tuoba-Wei’s legitimation, see also Fan 2003. 65

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Secondly, similar to the Han shu, the Wei shu gives prominence to the idea of ubiquitous correspondences between the cosmos, natural phenomena, and human conduct, and to the Five Elements theory. Thus, the treatise recording heavenly phenomena (chaps. 105A–D) occupies a central place in the entire Wei shu. The Five Elements theory provides the basis for Wei shu’s guiding assumption that the Tuoba-Wei dynasty rules under the patron element ‘earth’. As such, the Tuoba-Wei is the true successor of the house of Han associated with ‘Wre’.69 Vehemently disputing the Eastern Jin’s claim and, consequently, the three successive southern dynasties’ claim of legitimate succession, the Wei shu also treats as illegitimate the various states and kingdoms which had arisen in the north.70 Thirdly, the Wei shu follows the Shi ji’s and Han shu’s precedent of dividing the records of the main historical events in twelve chapters. Another feature in which the Wei shu resembles the Han shu is that these ‘imperial chronicles’ (di ji), and in particular the ‘eulogies’ appended to each of them, make use of an embellished, majestic language reverberating with imperial lore; certain notions such as e.g. ‘holy vessels’ (shen qi) and references to imperial rituals and institutions such as e.g. the Luminant Hall (mingtang) abound. Fourthly, by making deliberate use of historical analogies, the impression is created that the Tuobei-Wei can indeed compare with the great dynasties, notably the Zhou and Han dynasties. Additionally, much space is devoted to treating the various states and tribes peoples with which the Tuoba court entertained diplomatic relations, or against whom the Tuoba undertook military campaigns. Fifthly, the imperial Tuoba-Wei history is treated along the ‘dynastic cycle’: there is a strong beginning, a rapid decline in the wake of an empress dowager’s regency ‘behind the curtains’, disturbances caused by ‘barbarians’ (here referring to Erzhu Rong and his hordes), and Wnally the dynasty’s deterioration in confusion and chaos. The disorder at the end of Tuoba rule is depicted with intensity so as to elevate the hero who would eventually bring order out of chaos. For Wei Shou, this revered hero was Gao Huan (d. 547), the strongman who dominated the political aVairs of the Eastern Wei state for sixteen years and whose son later ascended the throne to found the Northern Qi dynasty. By these various means taken all together, Wei Shou’s Wei shu achieved ‘sinicization’ of the alien Tuoba-Wei in the realm of history. It does so with 69

Another important element of the Wei shu’s legitimation doctrine is the presumed ‘translatio imperii’ by the last Western Jin emperor’s enfeoVment of the Tuoba chief as King of Dai. On receiving the message of this emperor’s assassination, the King of Dai is recorded to have exclaimed, ‘Is it not that now Heaven relies upon us?’ Cf. Wei shu 1/9; Holmgren 1982, 64–5, has completely misunderstood this phrase. 70 Wei shu 95/2041–2; 2087.

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accomplished skill, by emulating Sima Qian’s Shi ji and, above all, Ban Gu’s Han shu. That it later came under attack had of course much to do with the question whether or not the noble form of dynastic history may be used to record the history of a ‘conquest dynasty’.

CONCLUDING REMARKS From the late second century onward, the worldly outlook of the educated nucleus was shaped by ‘[t]he prevailing belief . . . that the Han dynasty could never really die’: once it did die ‘[it] left people scrambling for explanations’.71 Still, throughout the third century, hopes of a restoration of the Han empire in all its glory and splendor ran high, but were eventually shattered by the ‘Yongjia disaster’ in 311. As a result, the entire coordinate system built on the ‘space of experiences’ and the ‘horizon of expectations’—to use the late Reinhart Koselleck’s notions—changed. In historiography, this becomes manifest by juxtaposing Chen Shou’s Sanguo zhi and Xi Zuochi’s essay on ‘legitimate succession’. Whereas the former work was written in the spirit of a self-fulWlling prophecy of the reuniWed empire, the latter, while still holding to the goal of reuniWcation, made an explicit attempt to rethink the post-Han history along untrodden paths. Written at a time when a restoration of the uniWed empire had become an even more elusive goal, Fan Ye’s Hou-Han shu can be seen as following up on Xi Zuochi’s attempt. Using a novel literary style and advocating a ‘historicist’ attitude to evaluating historical Wgures and events, Fan Ye rewrites the history of the Later Han dynasty with consummate force and freshness. However, in one crucial aspect Xi Zuochi’s and Fan Ye’s historical thinking diVered markedly, that is in the role attributed to heavenly phenomena and the Five Elements theory. Xi Zuochi is negligent of it, whereas in Fan Ye’s Hou-Han shu as well as in Chen Shou’s Sanguo zhi the conception of an immense net of correspondences connecting various planes—the heavenly sphere, nature, and the body politic—was immensely powerful in its imaginative appeal. Hence, the monographic treatises on astronomy, the Five Elements, and miraculous occurrences, aimed at ‘lay[ing] bare the inner workings of history’,72 occupy a central place in Wei-Jin-Nanbeichao historiography.73 71

Declercq 1998, 122. Mansvelt Beck 1990, 269. 73 The foremost examples are the Hou-Han shu’s treatises on the Heavens and on the Five Elements (zhi chaps. 10–12, 13–18; cf. Mansvelt Beck 1990, 111–55) by Sima Biao (c.240–c.306) and Shen Yue’s (441–512) ‘Treatise on Auspicious Omens as Tokens’ (‘Furui zhi’, chaps. 27–9) in Song shu (cf. Lippiello 2001). 72

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In this respect, Wei Shou’s Wei shu is akin to Fan Ye’s Hou-Han shu, although it greatly diVers from the latter in that it was devoted to emulate the dynastic history model basically set by Ban Gu’s Han shu. The importance of the Five Elements theory for Tuoba-Wei historiography can be seen from the fact that Cui Hao (see above), under whom the compilation of the ‘State History’ made a decisive step forward, was tried and decapitated, ostensibly because he failed to conWrm the Tuoba tribe’s descent from the Yellow Emperor.74 Underlying the persistent conception of ubiquitous correspondences was the theory of Heaven’s Mandate. It has rightly been observed that in the course of the Wei-Jin-Nanbeichao period it degenerated to the point that it ‘operated simply as a formula invoked to conWrm authority that was time and again wrested by military strength’.75 Nevertheless, in history writing, in the south as well as in the north, the Han dynasty’s theory of Heaven’s Mandate was still indispensable in making sense and meaning of the historical past. References Bielenstein, Hans, ‘The Restoration of the Han-Dynasty. With a Prolegomena on the Historiography of the Hou Han shu’, in: Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, 26 (1956), 1–209. Bumbacher, Stephan Peter, The Fragments of the Daoxue zhuan. Frankfurt a.M.: Peter Lang, 2000. Chennault, Cynthia L., ‘Lofty Gates or Solitary Impoverishment? Xie Family Members of the Southern Dynasties’, T’oung Pao, 85 (1999), 249–327. Chen Shiren 陳識仁, ‘Bei-Wei xiushi lu¨elun 北魏修史略論’, in: Huang Qinglian 黃清 連 (ed.), Jie gang bian 結綱編, Taipei (Dongda) 1998, 233–73. Chittick, Andrew, ‘Dynasty Legitimacy during the Eastern Chin: Hsi Tso-ch’ih and the Problem of Huan Wen’, Asia Major, 3rd ser., 11: 1 (1998), 21–52. Declercq, Dominique, Writing against the State: Political Rhetorics in Third and Fourth Century China. Leiden (Brill) 1998. de Crespigny, Rafe, The Records of the Three Kingdoms: A Study in the Historiography of San-kuo chih. Canberra (Centre of Oriental Studies, The Australian National University) 1970. —— ‘The Three Kingdoms and Western Jin: A History of China in the 3rd Century AD’, 2 parts, East Asian History, 1 (1991), 1–36, and 2 (1991), 143–65. Demie´ville, Paul, ‘Philosophy and Religion from Han to Sui’, in: Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe (eds.), The Cambridge History of China, vol. i: The Ch’in and Han Empires, 221 B.C.–A.D. 220, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1986, 808–72.

74

See Fan 2003.

75

Chennault 1999, 260.

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Egan, Ronald C., ‘The Prose Style of Fan Yeh’, in: Harvard Journal of Asiatic Society, 39 (1979), 339–401. Fan Jiawei 范大衛, ‘Sanguo zhengtonglun yu Chen Shou dui tianwen xingzhan cailiao de chuli—jian lun Shou shu wu ‘‘zhi’’ 三國正統論與陳壽對天文星占材料的處理 ―兼論壽書無〈志〉’, in: Huang Qinglian 黃清連 (ed.), Jie gang bian 結綱編, Taipei (Dongda), 1998, 131–80. Fan Jiawei 范大衛, ‘Bei-Wei zhengshuo yu Cui Hao guoshi zhi yu 北魏正朔與崔浩國 史之獄’, in: Zhou Liangkai 周梁楷 (ed.), Jie gang er bian 結綱二編, Taipei (Dongda) 2003, 181–219. Goodman, Howard L., Ts’ao P’i Transcendent: The Political Culture of DynastyFounding in China at the End of the Han. Seattle (Scripta Serica) 1998. Graham, W. T., Jr., The Lament for the South: Yu¨ Hsin’s ‘Ai Chiang-nan fu’. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1980. Hanke, Martin, Geschichtsschreibung im Spannungsfeld zwischen Zentrale und Region am Beispiel der Jin-Dynastie (265–420). Hamburg (Hamburger Sinologische Gesellschaft) 2002. —— ‘Lokale Helden als Medien moralischer Instruktion: Zur Rolle von Ehrenmalen im Huayang guozhi’, in: Michael Friedrich (ed., with the assistance of Reinhard Emmerich and Hans van Ess), Han-Zeit: Festschrift fu¨r Hans Stumpfeldt aus Anlaß seines 65. Geburtstages, Wiesbaden (Harrassowitz) 2006, 443–64. Holcombe, Charles, In the Shadow of the Han: Literati Thought and Society at the Beginning of the Southern Dynasties. Honolulu (University of Hawai’i Press) 1994. Holmgren, Jennifer, Annals of Tai: Early T’o-pa History According to the Wrst Chapter of the Wei-shu. Canberra (Faculty of Asian Studies, Australian National University Press) 1982. —— ‘Northern Wei as a Conquest Dynasty: Current Perceptions; Past Scholarship’, Papers of Far Eastern History, 40 (1989), 1–50. ¨ Ventlichkeit im fru¨hmittelalterlichen China: Debatten im Jansen, Thomas, Ho¨Wsche O Salon des Prinzen Xiao Ziliang. Freiburg i.Br. (Rombach) 2000. Jenner, W. J. F., ‘Northern Wei Loyang: An Unnecessary Capital?’, in: Papers of Far Eastern History, 23 (1981), 147–63. Kleeman, Terry, Great Perfection: Religion and Ethnicity in a Chinese Millenial Kingdom. Honolulu (University of Hawai’i Press) 1998. Lippiello, Tiziana, Auspicious Omens and Miracles in Ancient China: Han, Three Kingdoms and Six Dynasties. Nettetal (Steyler Verlag) 2001. Lu, Yang, ‘Narrative, Spirituality, and Representation of Foreign Monks in Early Medieval China: The Case of Huijiao’s Biography of Kuma˜raj
iva’, Paper presented to the International Conference ‘Chinese and Comparative Historical Thinking in the 21st Century’, Fudan University, Shanghai, 8–10 April 2004. Lu Yaodong 逯耀東, Wei Jin shixue ji qita 魏晉史學及其他. Taipei (Dongda) 1998. Lu Yaodong 逯耀東, Wei Jin shixue de sixiang yu shehui jichu 魏晉史學的思想與社會 基礎. Taipei (Dongda) 2000.

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Mansvelt Beck, B. J., ‘The Fall of Han’, in: Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe (eds.), The Cambridge History of China, vol. i: The Ch’in and Han Empires, 221 B.C.–A.D. 220, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1986, 317–76. Mansvelt Beck, B. J., The Treatises of Later Han: Their Author, Sources, Contents and Place in Chinese Historiography. Leiden (Brill) 1990. Owen, Stephen, ‘Place: Meditation on the Past at Chin-ling’, Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 50 (1990), 417–57. Shih, Vincent Yu-chung, The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons: A Study of Thought and Pattern in Chinese Literature. Hong Kong (The Chinese University Press) 1983. Steinhardt, Nancy Shatzman, Chinese Imperial City Planning. Honolulu (University of Hawai’i Press) 1990. Unger, Ulrich, ‘Das konfuzianische Weltgericht’, Jahresschrift der Gesellschaft zur Fo¨rderung der Westfa¨lischen Wilhems-Universita¨t zu Mu¨nster (1969), 64–77. Wenxin diaolong 文心雕龍. Wenxin diaolong jiaozheng 文心雕龍校證, by Wang Liqi 王利器. Shanghai (Shanghai guji) 1980. Zhao Zhihan 趙志漢 and Lin Jianming 林箭鳴, ‘Fan Ye 范曄’, in: Chen Qingquan 陳 清泉 et al. (eds.), Zhongguo shixuejia pingzhuan 中國史學家評傳, 3 vols., Zhengzhou (Zhongzhou guji) 1985, i. 184–209.

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B. When the Imperial Order Disintegrates Rethinking the ‘Empire’ under Religious Auspices

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New Tendencies, Religious and Philosophical, in the Roman Empire of the Third to Early Fifth Centuries Gerard O’Daly (London)

1 . F ROM ROM E TO C O N S TA N T I N OP L E I begin with two dates. The Wrst—ad 248—saw the celebration of Rome’s millennium (the traditional date of the foundation of the city was 753 bc), with three days and nights of celebrations that included gladiatorial combats and displays of exotic animals. The second date—ad 330—marked the dedication of Constantinople as the new imperial capital, with forty days of celebrations, including chariot racing. One focus of the celebrations was the porphyry column in the city’s forum, topped by a gold statue of the emperor Constantine portrayed as Apollo and with a diadem representing the sun’s rays.1 In 248 the Roman emperor was Philip, an Arab from near Damascus: the tradition that he was a Christian is untrustworthy. He had been a powerful minister of his predecessor Gordian III, who had been killed in 244 while on campaign against Persia—an expedition that the leading philosopher of the period, the Neoplatonist Plotinus, had joined in the hope, as his biographer tells us, of ‘making acquaintance with Persian philosophy and that prevailing among the Indians’ (Porphyry, Vita Plotini 3). Plotinus (of whom more later) subsequently settled and taught in Rome. By 249 Philip the Arab was gone, murdered by the troops of his successor Decius, his short career as emperor typical of what has become known as the ‘third century crisis’, a period of 1

Rome’s millennium: Eutropius, Breviarium 9.3; Aurelius Victor, Caesares 28.2; Aurelius Victor, Epitome 28.3; Scriptores Historiae Augustae, Gordianus 33.1–2; Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos 7.20; Demandt 1989, 44. Constantine’s inauguration of Constantinople: Chronicon Paschale for 328 and 330; John Malalas, Chronographia 13.7–8; Barnes 1981, 222–3; Kelly 1999, 170–1.

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some Wfty years in which there were some twenty legitimate emperors and numerous usurpers, most of whom died violent deaths. Decius in his turn reigned for only two years, falling in battle with the Germanic Goths. He is associated with one of the periodic third-century persecutions of Christians: his most famous victim was the great Alexandrian theologian Origen, one of whose teachers, Ammonius Saccas, was also the teacher of Plotinus. By 330 Constantine had been emperor for twenty-four years, and sole ruler for six. Since 312 he had promoted Christianity. His column and statue in his new capital were said, in later tradition, to contain, among other objects, part of one of Noah’s instruments used in building the Ark, the stone that Moses struck to provide water for the Israelites in the desert, pieces of the nails used to crucify Christ and a splinter of the cross, and the Palladium, the statue of Athena brought from Troy to Italy by Aeneas after the fall of Troy.2 These events and images encapsulate many of the themes that form the background of this paper: the anarchy of third-century Roman politics; the military threat to the empire from Persia and the Goths; the changing fortunes of Christians, from persecuted sect to imperially favored religion; the renaissance of Platonism, inXuencing pagan and Christian thinkers alike; and the desire by pagan and Christian emperors to preserve a sense of the value of Rome’s traditions (a motive both for the millennial celebrations and for the persecution of Christians) at a time when the city of Rome was no longer the capital of the empire, not even the most important western political center of an increasingly divided empire, a division cemented by the foundation of Constantine’s ‘new Rome’, Constantinople.3

2. THE ‘ THIRD-CENTURY CRISIS’ Let me begin by saying something more about the so-called third-century crisis of the empire.4 Recent scholarship has modiWed our sense of the limits of the crisis. The extreme political instability at the top and the increased militarization of the emperor’s role, together with monetary inXation, the collapse of the silver coinage, increasing taxation, and the growth of a natural 2 John Malalas and the Chronicon Paschale (n. 1 above), dating respectively from the later sixth and early seventh centuries, undoubtedly mix fact and Wction, but the symbolic juxtaposition of Christian and traditional Roman elements rings true (see, however, Barnes 1981, 222). 3 Political and social histories of the period include Demandt 1989; Cameron 1993. Valuable essays on late antiquity in Bowersock, Brown, and Grabar 1999 and Swain and Edwards 2004. Late imperial government: Kelly 2004. 4 Cameron 1993, 1–12; OCD, 1331–2 (John F. Matthews).

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economy, all suggest a society in fragmentation. In addition, from Edward Gibbon in the eighteenth century onwards, historians have often seen the political crisis of the third century as the symbol of the irrevocable decline of the Roman Empire. But the interpretative model of decline is now seriously in question. The empire’s resilience was remarkable. Despite internal instability and military defeats, especially in wars with the Goths,5 the empire maintained its territorial integrity. The years of crisis led to the division of the oYce of emperor into eastern and western rulers, an administrative and military division that was formalized by Diocletian in the 280s and that remained the norm thereafter, ultimately guaranteeing the survival of the eastern Byzantine Empire until the Wfteenth century. There are signs of urban decline in the third century, but many cities Xourished, including those of North Africa and cities favored by emperors, such as Trier and Thessalonica.6 In the frontier regions of the empire, where emperors inevitably spent much of their time, there was a thriving economy. Diocletian and Constantine restored a stable gold currency that had lasting eVects. Even military disaster could be absorbed: after the Goths annihilated the Roman army and killed the emperor Valens at Adrianople in 378, they were settled as a federated people between the Danube and the Balkan mountains, a state within a state, but whose leaders were also integrated into the Roman political system, supported by imperial tax revenues and in turn providing military support under their own commanders. This arrangement may have been a factor making the collapse of the western empire in the late Wfth century all the more likely, but it allowed the eastern empire to survive.

3 . R E L I G I O U S M OV E M E N T S I N T H E TH IR D- CE NTURY EMP IR E Thus one favorite theory of earlier scholarship, that the Roman Empire of the third century was in terminal decline and that individuals turned away from its horrors to alternative worlds of supernatural beliefs and metaphysical speculation—to Christianity, or Manichaeism, or Mithraism, or Isis worship, or Neoplatonism—seems no longer tenable, at least not in its extreme form.7 Yet it is undoubtedly the case that there was a hardening of social divisions in 5

Goths and other barbarians: Geary 1999. Roman cities in the late imperial period: Liebeschuetz 2001. 7 Religious movements in the third-century empire: Dodds 1965, arguing that Christianity was one of a number of expressions of late antique anxiety; contrast Beard, North, and Price 1998, 1.245–312. 6

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the later empire, that the Roman citizenship granted by the emperor Caracalla in 212 to the entire free population of the empire was increasingly a devalued privilege for all but the very powerful and the wealthiest, and that the government of the later empire was increasingly centralized and bureaucratic. There are elements in late Roman society that may provide an explanation, however partial, for the attractions of Christianity in particular. But let me Wrst say something about other religious movements of the period. The earlier view that there was something inherently new in the mystery cults of the later Roman Empire, and that their novelty was due to an orientalizing fashion, is now largely discredited.8 Membership of an elective private cult with secret rites that were revealed only to the initiated—the essential characteristic of the mystery cults—had been a feature of Greek religious life (the mystery cult of Eleusis, the Phrygian Mother Goddess cult) since the sixth century bc. Isis cult had been imported from Egypt to Rome in the Wrst century ad, and Mithraism (whose origins may have been Iranian) was spreading in the second century. There is no evidence that the appeal of any of these cults was principally due to exotic origins, real or embellished, even if the exotic was often an attractive feature. They were integrated into Roman society, in some cases, such as Isis worship, enjoying imperial support. Nor do they provide any evidence for a new desire for spiritual experience, or for salvation. What their members enjoyed was a sense of belonging to a distinctive group (in the case of Mithraism, women were excluded), often dependent on private wealth, with—in some cases—a prescribed lifestyle. Membership was not exclusive of other religious aYliations (in this respect, Judaism and Christianity were diVerent). Initiation, and what has been called ‘the extraordinary experience’9 induced by secret rites, reinforced the sense of identity with fellow initiates. The mystery cults often appear to promise members a better lot in the afterlife, but there is no evidence that salvation and blissful immortality were the primary attractions: the cult beneWts are located in this life. We are left with the overall impression that the mystery cults are an epiphenomenon of traditional Greek and Roman social and religious life. With Manichaeism the case is diVerent.10 Here is a self-proclaimed universal religion, originating, like its founder Mani, in a Judaizing Christian community in Mesopotamia in the mid-third century, with a strong missionary motivation that accounts for its extraordinary spread, not merely in the Roman Empire, but through the Far East and Asia (it survived in China until 8 9 10

Burkert 1987 provides a modern reassessment. Ibid. 89–114. Lieu 1985; texts translated in Gardner and Lieu 2003.

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the seventeenth century). Though exclusive in its membership conditions, it embraced ideologically all religious movements known to it. In the Roman west it surfaces on the margins of Christian groups: Augustine’s membership in late fourth-century North Africa is one such instance. Seen, as it were, from the outside, its system is dualistic, presupposing a cosmic battle between forces of good and evil that are also found in the individual. For its members, the experience of being a Manichee seems to have been related to a drive to identify and isolate a pure core of selfhood. Its hymns and sacred books, the latter rich in art and calligraphy, are strikingly beautiful. The sect was suppressed by an edict of the emperor Diocletian in 302 as part of his policy of enforcing Roman traditions, including religious practices (Christians were targeted by similar decrees in 303). But Manichaeism survived, beneWting from Constantine’s edict of toleration in 313. In due course it caused concern to Christians (when Augustine’s mother Monica learnt that her son was associating with Manichees, she wanted to shut him out of the family home11), who, pointing to Mani’s use of Christian elements in his teaching, could argue that it was a heresy; and it was as a heresy that it was persecuted and its adherents martyred by Christians in the Wfth and sixth centuries. Its sense of community, its sacred books, its asceticism, and its doctrine of salvation make it much closer than any of the mystery cults to Judaism and Christianity, and similar factors may account for its success. Like Christians, but initially in a much more elaborate form, Manichees had an elaborate ecclesiastical hierarchy, which reinforced their sense of being a separate community within the societies in which they lived.12 This sense of being an alternative society within the dominant political system is typical of all the inXuential religions of this period. When Diocletian decreed the suppression of Manichaeism in 302 he emphasized its Persian origins and suggested that its members were acting as political agents of Persia in the Roman Empire. The accusation was undoubtedly unfounded, but it reminds us that the usually tolerant Romans would not hesitate to suppress a religious group for political reasons, and it may also suggest why Manichaeism did not enjoy greater success in the empire. Another accusation against Manichees, that they practiced black magic, may have been an unreasonable interpretation of their concern with astrology. Anti-magical legislation—always a sure-Wre way of targeting political opponents in Roman imperial society—increased in the later empire.13 In addition, the religion may have been felt, with its elaborate doctrines and

11 13

12 Augustine, Confessions 3.11.19. Tardieu 1997, 72–92. Matthews 1989, 204–28 is a case study of such legislation and ensuing trials in the 370s.

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practices (which included a strict form of vegetarianism), to be too esoteric, and to oVer true salvation only to the select few—the Elect—among its members. It was a form of what has been called—not always helpfully, for there was no speciWc movement of that name—Gnosticism, one of a diverse number of Christian religious movements of the second century that oVered a special saving knowledge (gno¯sis), not merely to account, in dualist terms, for the presence of good and evil in the universe, but also to liberate the good element in humans. Their apparent devaluation of the universe and of human reason led to attacks on Gnostics from philosophers.14 The increasing Christian insistence on orthodoxy in the third century put pressure on the Gnostic movements, and hence on Manichees as well: the additional pressure of its perceived foreignness may have combined with these orthodox Christian tendencies to limit its success.

4 . T H E S P R E A D OF C HR ISTIANITY: COUNTIN G HEA DS When we try to account for the spread of Christianity in the Roman Empire, or even to assess its extent, caution is urged. The evidence is unclear, the sources are not always reliable.15 The Christian historians of the fourth and Wfth centuries, from Eusebius onwards, portray a spectacular victory of monotheism and the end of paganism in the period between Constantine’s conversion in 312 and 450. This tidy and persuasive narrative construction, with its concomitant representation of conXict between paganism and Christianity as the dominant feature of the fourth century, is seriously challenged by modern research, which is inclined to see the period in a more complex light.16 Yet our understanding of the period from Constantine to Theodosius I at the end of the fourth century is hampered by a lack of hard evidence of the extent of Christianization in the mid- to later third century. We have, exceptionally, precise Wgures for some categories of the Christian community in Rome in the mid-third century: it numbered 154 ministers of various ranks, and 1,500 widows and poor members (Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica 6.43.11). This has led historians to conclude that there were tens of thousands

14

Notably Plotinus, Enneades 2.9. Chadwick 2001; Lane Fox 1986, 265–335; Clark 2004 emphasizes the problematic nature of the evidence. 16 Clark 2004 provides an illuminating introduction to the issues. Markus 1990 is fundamental on the question of what ‘pagan’ and ‘Christian’ really meant in late antiquity. 15

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of Christians in the city at the time. But how typical was Rome? One modern scholar estimates that the Christians in the empire before Constantine numbered no more than 2 percent of the population, and argues that we can say more about the scatter than about the density of Christian membership in the third century.17 We know that there were Christian communities in the great cities of the empire, but also in smaller towns (the evidence for rural communities is meager outside of North Africa and Egypt). The core membership was from the lower free classes, but women of all social ranks were members (the elite, male and female, joined in increasing numbers in the later years of the century), and it is likely that women were a clear majority, even if they played no formal role in church government.18 There were Christians in the army. Christians generally beneWted from the emperor Gallienus’ edicts of toleration in 260, and may have become more visible in society through an increase in church buildings, but there is no evidence of an irresistible rise in Christian numbers, and older theories of Constantine’s adoption of Christianity—that he was impressed by the growth of Christianity and saw it as a potentially cohesive force in the empire—are no longer persuasive. It is undoubtedly true that Christianity Xourished on account of Constantine’s patronage. The edict of toleration of all religions (but singling out Christianity) proclaimed by Constantine and his imperial colleague Licinius in 313 (the socalled Edict of Milan) made good the attack on Christianity that had occurred during the persecution of the previous decade. It led to the restoration of church property and the rebuilding of churches. But restoration of property had happened after previous persecutions. What was new were the huge grants from the imperial treasury to the Church, and the exemption of the clergy from compulsory civic duties (this last a traditional privilege of those— like doctors and top athletes—who were assumed to be of beneWt to the state), as well as state salaries and travel concessions for bishops. It is easy to understand how this support determined the ultimate triumph of Christianity in the Roman world. After Constantine all emperors, with the exception of Julian from 361 to 363, were Christian, and the ideology of the state took on a gradual and increasingly Christian coloring. But Constantine’s reasons for promoting Christianity remain elusive. It may have been a matter of family or personal belief, perhaps reinforced by a sense of divine protection in his political and military undertakings (the latter was the oYcial view propounded by his ideologists Eusebius and Lactantius).19 Constantine almost certainly learnt more about the implications of Christianity after his adoption 17 18 19

Lane Fox 1986, 317, 272. Clark 2004, 28–9. Eusebius, Vita Constantini 1.27–32; Lactantius, De mortibus persecutorum 44.

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of it, as his understanding of it evolved, not least through contact with its often quarrelsome bishops. But his early links with the religion remain obscure.

5 . W H Y WA S C H R I ST I A NI T Y SU C C E S S F U L ? What were the attractions of Christianity?20 Traditional reasons given by historians, though plausible, have been found to be inadequate. These traditional reasons stress that membership of a Christian church provided a sense of community that was more intense than existing social forms, that Christian concern for the welfare of church members was an important factor (this remains among the more likely reasons for its success), that the religion appealed to diVerent social classes, that its vision of rewards in a heavenly afterlife, together with bodily immortality, was unique and appealing. It is undoubtedly true that Christianity gave its members a strong religious identity, clear rules of behavior, laws of purity, and a lifestyle model. But it shared many of these characteristics with the other new cults of the period, such as Mithraism and Manichaeism. However, only Judaism and Christianity had an all-embracing organization, which maintained a self-producing community, usually through family induction and membership. Membership of other cults was for the most part an individual matter. Traditional state priesthoods might be the privilege of certain families, but they usually involved nothing more than the performance of certain regular duties that did not aVect the individual’s lifestyle. It is signiWcant that the mystery cults disappeared for the most part as a consequence of the imperial decrees of 391–2, although they enjoyed powerful patronage: there is evidence that an increasing number of members of senatorial families became priests of Isis and Mithras in the fourth century, a sign that these cults were increasingly perceived as part of traditional paganism, and an expansion of ancestral heritage.21 But they were too closely bound to a socio-religious system that was itself gradually disappearing, and they had no organization that could maintain them as underground movements. By contrast, Jewish and Christian communities had structures that could withstand hostility and the threat or reality of persecution. Members of these groups, even when not under threat, found themselves bound by strong ties, cemented by the novel ideals, alien to the hitherto dominant ethic, of selXessness and humility: ‘see how they love one another’

20 21

Burkert 1987, 51–3; Clark 2004, 1–37; Beard, North, and Price 1998, 1.295–6. Beard, North, and Price 1998, 1.383–4.

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(Tertullian, Apologeticum 39.7) was the bemused reaction of pagan observers. These very ideals, even if not always realized in practice, may have provided an alternative sense of community, attractive for the very reason that it ran counter to traditional Greek and Roman values.22 The Christian claim to sidestep status and power, and to proclaim a spiritual equality of its members, may have reinforced these alternative values. Yet at the same time Christianity did not threaten social barriers of class (or the existence of slavery): that too may have been comforting. It also addressed traditional concerns. In a world inhabited by benevolent and malevolent forces, the discernment of evil and its avoidance was crucial. Christian exorcists acquired a reputation for success. It is no accident that, of the 154 ministers in the third-century Roman Church, no less than Wfty-two were exorcists.

6 . A N EW ME N TA LI T E´ ? Some modern scholars, not satisWed that the above reasons can account fully for the success of Christianity, have argued that there was a fundamental change in the understanding of religious experience in our period, in its religious mentalite´.23 A new locus of divine power was identiWed, and its source was outside the human community and its institutions. Access to this power was mediated, not simply through religious rites, but through exceptional human agents with a special relationship to the supernatural. The recognition that there were individuals with supernormal powers had been a traditional feature of religion in the Greek and Roman world, but late antiquity saw the rise of a new kind of ‘holy man’.24 The ability to discern true, or beneWcial, supernatural power, and to distinguish it from false or malevolent versions, was part of the mentality of the age. The Christian Church has been called in this respect ‘the impresario of a wider change’.25 For the Church cooperated with Christian holy men, and they in turn facilitated the transition from paganism to Christianity. Holy men were healers, they could work miracles, but they could also settle mundane disputes. The bearers of acknowledged religious authority, they could rush in

22

Lane Fox 1986, 323–35. Brown 1978, 11–26. 24 Brown 1982, 103–52 (Wrst published in Journal of Roman Studies, 61 [1971]) started a discussion that is still active. For self-criticism of his earlier position see Brown 1995, 57–78; and for a reassessment by others see the papers in Journal of Early Christian Studies, 6 (1998). 25 Brown 1978, 12. 23

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where bishops feared to tread. In many respects they were the precursors of the Church’s claim that it was the sole source and channel of supernatural power. Access to that power became increasingly complex in the course of the fourth century: even in Christianity there is a perceptible shift between the positions of Origen and Augustine on the individual’s ability to enter into contact with the divine. The Neoplatonists who succeeded Plotinus were divided on the same issue of divine accessibility.26 For traditional paganism, the world was full of gods, the divine was embedded in the cosmos. Now the earth, for Christians and some pagans, was emptied of gods, heaven was remote, and mediators—and above all mediating institutions—were needed, and invented. Mediation was often felt to depend on the holy man’s or philosopher’s ascetic lifestyle: renunciation, sexual and otherwise, was a prerequisite of spiritual power and authority.27 But not all Christian leaders were ascetics. The importance of the bishop’s role in the consolidation of Christian authority should not be underestimated. Rooted in his local community, and uniquely combining the functions of teacher, social counselor, and administrator, the bishop could provide a dynamic focus for the promotion of his community’s religion, even before Constantine’s support for Christianity. The power and inXuence of individual bishops, before and after Constantine, depended on local conditions and personal ambition and skills. Historians have inevitably focused on the major Wgures like Ambrose in Milan and Augustine in North Africa. A recent study of the Christianization of Northern Italy has provided a much more diVerentiated picture of a particular region, even if it is the case that there, as elsewhere, there is increasing interaction, not always amicable, between civic and episcopal authority.28 The traditional Christian sense of being an alternative society within society at large was subtly modiWed after Constantine, when the bishop could become a policy maker or breaker (as in the case of Ambrose’s opposition to the interventionism of Constantine’s son Constantius II in the 350s), and an increasingly important patronus. One could modify the theory of a shift in the religious mentality of late antiquity by arguing that the traditional questions remained, but that the answers were new. The questions were: What was the nature of the universe and the place of religion in people’s lives? Where was religious authority located? What constituted correct ritual? What texts were sacred? But ‘the new answers were thought to deserve the label ‘‘Christian’’; . . . what had happened was that the controlling element in society had changed its mind about the meaning of history and experience’.29 This ‘change of mind’ was part of 26 28

Brown 1978, 98–101. Humphries 1999, 109–71.

27

Clark 2004, 60–77. 29 OCD, 328 (Philip Rousseau).

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the process of Christian self-deWnition, the culmination of a long development, at the start of which Christianity was a Jewish sect. But it had become identiWable in its own right by the early second century at the latest, although the precise nature of its relation to Judaism remained problematic for many Christians.30 Christian hostility to Judaism intensiWed in the postConstantinian empire: the intensity of anti-Jewish polemic suggests that Christian attempts to separate their religion radically from Judaism ran counter to what many Christians accepted. Jews were, for the most part, tolerated in the pagan Roman Empire, so long as they were not seen as, or constituted, a political threat. The antiquity of their religion was respected, and it was attractive to non-Jews, even if some Jewish practices were found to be odd. The acceptability of Judaism undoubtedly helped the advance of Christianity. The Jewish Diaspora, with its increasing emphasis on prayer and non-sacriWcial ritual rather than blood sacriWce, its interiorization of religious experience, and its insistence on the power of the sacred book, paved the way for the Christian advance.31 No less important was the fact that in the imperial period, monotheism (or at least resistance to open-ended polytheism) had become a respectable tenet for philosophers and intellectuals generally, and the issues of the status of canonical texts (Pythagorean writings, Plato’s dialogues), of the sources of religious and moral authority, and of the individual’s afterlife, played an increasingly important cultural role. In these areas, Christianity, no less than Judaism or new forms of later Platonism, addressed matters of wider concern, at least for the educated minority.32

7. MARTYRS, HERETICS, AND THE INVENTION O F O RTH O DOXY Christianity, with no large church buildings or other forms of public display before the mid-fourth century, was perhaps most visible to non-Christians before Constantine in the occasional public martyrdom of its members. Christian writers described martyrdom as the seed of their Church’s growth.33 Accounts of martyrdom present an intensiWed form of the notion of Christianity as an alternative society. The martyr, in reply to standard law-court requests to identify herself or himself, states ‘I am (a) Christian’ rather than 30

Lieu 2004. Stroumsa 2005 develops this thesis. 32 Clark 2004, 35, 113–14; Athanassiadi and Frede 1999. 33 Martyrs’ blood as seed: Tertullian, Apologeticum 50.13; Augustine, De civitate Dei 22.7. On martyrs see Lane Fox 1986, 419–92; Bowersock 1995; Clark 2004, 38–59. 31

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give a name or place of origin (Martyrs of Lyon 20). Tertullian develops the metaphor of the Christian community as a city in the context of martyrdom: Christians have their own senate house, their church, they have their citizenmembership lists, their endowments and rites, their crimson blood-soaked robes (De corona 13). In Prudentius’ poem on the Roman martyr Lawrence, he becomes the citizen of heaven, a ‘perpetual consul’ in an eternal senate house (Peristephanon 2.553–60). The cohesive power of martyrdom within a persecuted group, and the ways in which it can advance a cause, is a familiar phenomenon of our day. But the eVect on non-believers may also have been considerable. Martyrdom was essentially an urban event, drawing on Roman fascination with violent spectacle. Its dramatic value was exploited by Christians in simple literary accounts of the trials and suVerings of the martyrs. Even after Constantine, the martyrs made their presence felt, through shrines dedicated to them, which became the focus of cult, and through relics.34 At the end of the fourth century, the greatest Latin Christian poet Prudentius gave dramatic literary expression in his Peristephanon, with an artistry alluding to the poets of Augustan Rome, Virgil, Horace, and Ovid, to the courage of the Christian martyrs of the early Church. Pre-Constantinian Christian communities were often fragmented and divided, internally and against one another. It would be correct to speak of a plurality of Christianities rather than a single Christianity following one doctrinal system.35 Heresy, a term increasingly used in the third century, was often no more than a term used by some Christians for the beliefs of other Christians in a situation where there was no dogmatic conformity, and no teaching authority with the power to impose orthodoxy. One modern scholar speaks of ‘a dynamic climate of claims and counterclaims’.36 In this climate, persuasive teachers like Origen might reconcile conXicting views as much by diplomacy and tact as by theological argument. Diversity of belief, indeterminate authority, a wide variety of tendencies, local attempts—through synods of bishops or the persuasiveness of prestigious individuals—to solve disputes: these were the features of the sect adopted by Constantine. Born administrator that he was, he was irritated by untidy theological disputes, even if he was never the interventionist that his son Constantius II became. Addressing the assembled bishops at the church council of Nicaea in 325, he urged them to resolve their diVerences over the precise nature and relationship of God the father and God the son, and his authority in such ecclesiastical matters seemed greater than that of any individual bishop or group of bishops (Eusebius, Vita Constantini 3.4–24).37 But even a council convened under his 34 36

Markus 1990 analyzes this process. 37 Ibid. 199. Barnes 1981, 208–23.

35

Lim 1999, 199–201.

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authority could not command universal acceptance. And the longest-lived of Constantine’s sons, his successor Constantius II, sympathized with and favored the views of Arius, which Nicaea had condemned.

8 . T H E S U RV I VA L OF PAG A N T R A D I TI O N If the politics of orthodoxy led to factionalism in the Church, there was no attempt under Constantine and his immediate successors to suppress paganism. The temples remained open, sacriWces and other cult acts were performed (despite laws prohibiting them: but implementation of laws depended on local initiative), the priestly colleges continued to function. It was not until later in the fourth century, and especially during the reign of Theodosius I (379–95) that sacriWce and other pagan cults were formally and comprehensively banned, and religious use of temples prohibited: but the ban may not have been entirely eVective. A country festival of Osiris was still being celebrated in rural Italy in the early Wfth century, and at the end of the same century Christians and pagans were still observing the Lupercalia, at which scantily dressed youths ran through the streets of Rome, touching women with their whips and thereby, it was believed, making the childless fertile: Bishop Gelasius had to ban Christians from taking part.38 There are instances of violence against pagan temples and priests. But at the same time, Theodosius was concerned to preserve the art and monuments of paganism in a desacralized form, as emblems of civic pride, and because, in celebrating Rome’s grandeur, they celebrated the power and authority of its emperors.39 The attitude of the Christian emperors towards the pagan past was ambivalent. In an address possibly delivered to the bishops at the Council of Antioch, which preceded that of Nicaea in 325, Constantine read and expounded a Greek translation of a poem by Virgil—the great poet of the Rome of Augustus: admittedly, the poem was the Fourth Eclogue, which could, with a suYcient dose of imagination, be interpreted as a prophecy of the birth of Christ (and was so by Constantine), and in any case spoke about the dawn of a new age.40 But Constantine would also collect pagan statues and works of art for display in public places in his new eastern capital. At the same time, he was concerned to overlay his authority with Christian elements. In Eusebius’ 38

Osiris festival: Rutilius Namatianus, De reditu suo 1.373–6 (written 416–17). Lupercalia: Markus 1990, 131–5. 39 Caseau 1999, 34–5. 40 Constantine, Oration to the Saints; Lane Fox 1986, 643–53; Barnes 1981, 73–6.

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biography of Constantine, the emperor is repeatedly presented as a modern Noah, a reinvention of the great Jewish leader whose symbolic value for Christian readers of the scriptures was paramount. And Constantine harnessed archeology to his purpose, instigating searches in Palestine for Christian sites and relics—Christ’s tomb, the cave at Bethlehem where he was born, the cross on which he was cruciWed—and invariably Wnding what he sought.41 A pagan temple was demolished to uncover the site of the cruciWxion and tomb of Christ, and churches were built there and on the other sites. When Egeria, who wrote an account of her travels, went on pilgrimage to the holy sites of Palestine in the late fourth century, she was not disappointed: ‘the Bible provided the text and the guidebook’.42 Yet the strength of the pagan past lay in its culture. There was, as yet, no Christian literature to compare with the Greek and Latin classics. Rhetorical training, the ability to argue and persuade, to analyze and inXuence, was the great legacy that no thoughtful, educated Christian could ignore.43 The fourth century was a key period in the edition of classical texts in the Latin west. But far from being an activity of pagan traditionalists engaged in some revival of their culture, it was as much, if not more, the avocation of Christian scholars and dilettanti, conscious of the value of what they were preserving. Oratorical and administrative ability, rather than adherence to Christianity, determined the choice of advisors and ministers made by Constantine and his immediate successors. The pagan orator Themistius was in the service of Constantius II and a number of later Christian emperors, though he was not favored by the pagan revivalist emperor Julian. The cultural movement of the mid-Wrst to mid-third centuries known as the Second Sophistic, though primarily concerned with the revival of rhetoric, had wider ramiWcations in literature and the arts: it was arguably the completion of the Hellenization of Rome. One could now speak of a truly Greco-Roman imperial culture.44 Christianity was not immune to this inXuential and lasting reinvention of classical culture. Educated Christians were not inclined to abandon this culture, nor, for the most part, did their Church require them to. An illustrated calendar for the year 354, made for a rich Christian, juxtaposes pagan and Christian festivals, dates, and images: the feasts of Isis and the Great Mother goddess, and of the Saturnalia, are found side by side with the feast of the martyrdom of Peter and Paul, and the dates of Easter.45 This need not mean that the Christianity of such individuals was nominal. More likely, it is a sample of Christian belief that does not entirely jettison tradition, but still reveres it. 41 43 44 45

42 Cameron 1999, 10; Caseau 1999, 31. Cameron 1999, 9–10. Kaster 1988. Swain 1996. See Elsner 1998, 170–97 on classicism in art. Salzman 1990; Beard, North, and Price 1998, 1.378–83.

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Others will have felt that Rome’s traditions could only be maintained by adherence to traditional beliefs and values: after all, it was Christianity that had invented paganism, helping by opposition to deWne Roman traditionalism, even for the traditionalists themselves.

9 . T H E TH EM E OF DE CLI N E AN D TH E EN D O F T H IN GS The theme of Rome’s decline had been a moralizing topic in historiography and poetry since at least the Wrst century bc: the political problems and civil war of the late republic were, it was argued, a consequence of the loss of traditional values. As Christianity became established, Christian writers adapted the theme as a form of Zeitkritik. Jerome in the later fourth or early Wfth century planned to write, but never did, a history of the Church, showing how under the Christian emperors it had become more powerful and wealthy, but poorer in virtue.46 Sometimes this theme was combined with a distinctively Christian one. The references in Book of Revelation 20 to a future thousand-year reign of Christ with his saints led to the development in the early Church of so-called millennialist or chiliastic views, which foresaw the imminent end of the world.47 Sometimes, as in the Christian poet Commodian (probably writing in the third century) these views were combined with anticipation—in Commodian’s case, through the agency of the Goths—of the end of the Roman Empire.48 ‘But the end of the world does not happen every time people expect it,’ as Alessandro Momigliano once wisely said. Millennialist views were criticized as early as the late Wrst century, by Clement of Rome, and Origen’s exegesis of Revelation 20 in the third century made him perhaps the most inXuential of all antimillennialists. The matter remained an open question until the early fourth century at least: Lactantius, who was to enjoy close links with Constantine and become the tutor to his son, wrote an uncompromisingly millennialist conclusion to his major work the Divine Institutes. When Rome fell temporarily to the Goths in 410, even sophisticated scholars like Jerome felt that their world was disintegrating.49 Augustine took a more realistic, long-term view of this moment in history, arguing in his City of God for the separation of the fate of Christianity from that of Rome. Augustine’s authority made his anti-millennialist views inXuential.50 But there is no real link between the 46 48 50

47 Jerome, Vita Malchi 1 (Patrologia Latina 23.55). Hill 1992. 49 Commodian, De duobus populis 805–22. Jerome, Epistulae 123, 125, 128. O’Daly 1999, 211–13.

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Christianization of the empire and the abandonment or maintenance of millennialist views: the latter continued to surface as late as the medieval and post-Reformation periods.

1 0. N EW F OR M S O F D I SC OU R S E There is, strictly speaking, no new genre in the Greek and Latin literature of the third and fourth centuries, with the sole exception of the acts of the Christian martyrs.51 These accounts of spectacular suVering varied in tone and purpose. They were ostensibly simple narratives of the transcripts of the judicial trials and punishment of the martyrs, and of their deWance and heroism when subjected to humiliation and torture, sometimes incorporating texts written by the martyrs themselves. These accounts, preserved by the church, were subject to re-edition and embellishment in successive versions. Sometimes the narrative is stylized, with allusions to the Roman tradition of public spectacles and presentation of the martyr as an athlete in a supreme contest. Sometimes they present the martyr as teacher and sophist, the latter role being that of an austere critic of social behavior. Crowd scenes were skillfully incorporated for dramatic eVect. The civic setting highlights the martyr’s deWance of traditional values and imperial power and its local representatives. This is literature that is at once edifying and subversive. But older literary forms enjoyed a renaissance in our period. This is particularly the case with biography.52 We possess a remarkable series of lives of great men of the period. Eusebius wrote a life of Constantine, the most informative document which we possess about the emperor. In his Ecclesiastical History, Eusebius incorporated biographies, most spectacularly one of Origen in book 6. Porphyry wrote a life of his Neoplatonist master Plotinus. Sages of the past enjoyed a biographical rebirth: we have lives of Pythagoras from Porphyry and the later Neoplatonist Iamblichus. Religious conversion engendered conversion narratives such as those of the thirdcentury bishop of Carthage and martyr Cyprian and an earlier secondcentury martyr, Justin. In the second century Apuleius concluded his novel Metamorphoses with an account of the conversion to Isis worship of his hero Lucius. Eusebius, but also Lactantius, wrote about the conversion of Constantine. The fourth-century life of the desert hermit Antony by Athanasius 51 Dihle 1989 is a history of Greek and Latin literature of the Wrst to sixth centuries. Martyr acts: Bowersock 1995, 23–57. 52 Cameron 1991.

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became a textbook of monasticism in the Greek eastern empire, but also, in Latin translation, in the west. No less successful was the life of Martin of Tours by Sulpicius Severus at the end of the fourth century. But the greatest of all conversion accounts was the highlight of an autobiography written at the end of the fourth century, the Confessions of Augustine. These biographies inform, but they also edify. They can be works of subtle ‘image construction’, as with Eusebius’ presentation of Constantine. They served a need, as attempts to deWne and give life to concepts of holiness and wisdom, of divine favor and human striving after perfection. Their frequency and popularity may be related to the sense, discussed above, that supernatural power resided in, and radiated from, special individuals who were in contact with it. Apuleius was not the only writer of novels in the imperial period. The genre was a popular one, and produced at least one Christian novel, now known as the Clementine Romance, or Clementine Recognitions, in which the hero, Clement, the late Wrst-century bishop of Rome, experiences trials and discoveries typical of the hero of the (usually erotic) novel genre.53 These too are lives, if in a diVerent category from those mentioned in the previous paragraph, or from later lives of the saints, though there are related elements in these various forms. There was one great historian of the period, Ammianus Marcellinus, the critical pagan analyst of the mid-fourth century, writing in a style and applying a method that Tacitus would have recognized.54 But Christian historiography developed its own styles, sometimes taking the form of universal history (usually with an ideological purpose, to present the providential rise of the Christian faith), sometimes that of Eusebius (in the Ecclesiastical History, a work of the greatest importance for the early history of the Church) and his successors, who incorporated earlier documents into their annalistic accounts of the progress of the faith. There was a new interest in chronology, and especially in determining the relative dates of biblical and ‘secular’ events, culminating in the synchronizing Chronicle of Eusebius and its Latin continuation by Jerome and others. Christianity, a faith revealed in the person of the historical Jesus, Wrst acquired its historical sense in this period.55 Last but not least, the gospel narratives of the Christian bible themselves provided models of simple but eVective narrative. Their construction of history in ‘Wctionalized’ form inXuenced the works, especially the biographies, referred to above. But there may also have been interaction between the gospel stories and the widespread and pagan Wctional writing of later antiquity. Their common themes of suVering and resurrection or rebirth may not be coincidental.56 53 55

Bowersock 1994, 139–43. Barnes 1981, 121–43.

56

54 Matthews 1989; Barnes 1998. Bowersock 1994, 121–43.

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Is there a new subjectivity in the philosophical and meditative literature of the third and fourth centuries? Michel Foucault, in his inXuential study of sexuality and the cultivation of the self in the Wrst and second centuries, spoke of a souci de soi, a ‘care for the self ’, in writers like the Stoics Seneca and Epictetus, and medical authors like Galen. This ‘care’ was not absent from earlier Greek thought, Foucault argued, but now it played a greater role in determining the perception and formulation of lifestyles, as philosophers became more concerned with practical self-improvement and medical writers reXected on the individual’s sexuality and its relation to his health. Foucault owed much to the French classical scholar Pierre Hadot in his development of these ideas.57 He himself looked only tangentially and brieXy at later Christian developments, characterizing them as radically diVerent in tone and scope from those he treated, and leading, particularly in Christian sexual attitudes, to a repressive and limited concept of care for the self.58 The writings of Plotinus in the mid to late third century stress the importance of ethical and spiritual self-improvement through philosophy, which is perceived as a realization of the Delphic oracle’s injunction ‘Know Thyself ’ (on which there was a Platonic treatise—probably but not certainly by Plato—the First Alcibiades: it became an introductory text in later Neoplatonist schools). Moreover, Plotinus develops a concept of the subconscious that is novel in ancient philosophy and plays a key role in his psychological thought. And Plotinus is the Wrst ancient thinker to investigate systematically what it entails to talk of the ‘I’ or ego, as opposed to talking of the mind or the soul, or deWning human identity in the traditional form of a particular relationship between a mind/soul and a body. This amounts to a concept of the self, a shifting sense of identity related to the mental activity in which I am engaged at any particular instant: ‘the ego-consciousness . . . Xuctuates like a spotlight’.59 But if the ego Xuctuates, it is not free-Xoating: Plotinus is determined to relate it to his metaphysical ‘divinities’, the One, Intellect, and Soul. One could argue that for him the concept of the self is a heuristic tool, developed in order to clarify our relationship to the divine. According to his biographer Porphyry (and there is no need to doubt that scrupulous scholar-philosopher), Plotinus’ last words were ‘Try to bring back the god 57 Foucault 1984; Hadot 2002, where Hadot (305–11) compares and contrasts his and Foucault’s views. 58 For a stimulating critique of Foucault’s views on Christian care for the self see Stroumsa 2005. 59 Dodds 1973, 135, and in general 135–7.

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in us to the divine in the All!’ (Vita Plotini 2). No later ancient Neoplatonist developed a concept of the self as extensively as Plotinus did. Does Augustine have a concept of the self? Despite the fact that he knew at least some of Plotinus’ writings—and that he was steeped in the theology of Paul’s letters, which identify diVerent kinds of ‘I’, Xeshly and spiritual, in Romans 7–8 and elsewhere—I am not certain that he does, if by having a concept of the self we mean more than discourse about ‘I’ in diVerent contexts. Augustine talks critically about self-love that excludes love of God, but defends a correct form of self-love that is benevolent rather than selWsh. He often stresses our lack of self-knowledge, the absence of transparency to ourselves and to others. We are a mass of contradictions and a constant surprise to ourselves, and we need self-scrutiny as a discipline in order to make moral progress. At one stage of his self-analysis in the Confessions (book 10), Augustine appears to say that I am my memory. On examination, this appears to be, not an identity statement, but an assertion that our memories are essential to our moral self-knowledge: we are temporal beings with a history, and it is better to be aware of this history—of past failings, for instance—than to be ignorant of it. Augustine also identiWes what we might call a divided self, a lack of congruity between our outward behavior and our inner feelings. This division causes tensions, is problematic, and has to be resolved in order for us to function as normal human beings. Augustine explores the idea most fully in his account of his reaction to his mother’s death in book 9 of the Confessions. His determination not to grieve (which he understands to be the appropriate Christian reaction to death) runs counter to his emotions, causing a kind of paralysis in his behavior. In the end the emotions seem to win, but only when grief is transformed and becomes, not self-absorbed, but inclusive, an emotion embracing all imperfect humans, who are mortal, and need divine mercy. To summarize these pages is to run the risk of making them sound trite. Augustine’s skill is to make the process that he is describing both dramatic and psychologically plausible. It is an exercise in introspection that is, in the Wnal analysis, more fruitful, maybe, than a theory of the self.

1 2 . T H E C H R I S T I A N E M P I R E A N D TH E CITY OF GOD It is appropriate to end with Augustine, but not with his views on the self, so much as his attitude to the political and religious implications of Christian imperial rule. In a panegyric of 336 to celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of Constantine’s accession as emperor, Eusebius interpreted Constantine’s role

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as, by analogy, that of a second Christ. His empire reXects the heavenly kingdom, his monarchy reXects monotheism, his role is that of a savior, to prepare humanity for the kingdom of God.60 Even allowing for the exaggerated rhetoric of panegyric, Eusebius here puts forward views, such as that of the link between the emperor’s monarchy and monotheism, which are found in other writers.61 Augustine toyed with these ideas in the 390s, feeling that the ‘Christian period’ (tempora Christiana) had come in the reign of the aggressively Christianizing Theodosius. But in his more mature thought he distanced himself from this ideology. In the City of God, begun in the aftermath of the Gothic sack of Rome in 410 and completed only a few years before his death in 430, Augustine developed his distinctive views on the Christian Church and the Roman Empire, on history and the ordering of political society.62 The title given by Augustine—De civitate Dei—to his work exploits the polyvalence of the Latin word civitas, which can refer to a speciWc physical city or geographical or political entity, but also to the citizen body or the concept of citizenship. The group membership implied in these last two meanings is central to Augustine’s understanding of civitas in the work: he is writing about communities rather than ‘cities’. At the same time, the source of the term civitas dei is biblical. In Greek versions of the Psalms the term ºØ ~ı Ł~ı occurs, and Latin versions translate this as civitas dei. Jerusalem, the city of God of the Psalms, acquires symbolic associations in the Christian New Testament, and by Augustine’s day there is a tradition of understanding it as a prophetic symbol of the Christian Church. In a parallel development Babylon becomes the symbol and type of the antithesis of Jerusalem. The motif of the two contrasted cities is found in Christian literature from the New Testament onwards. One important development in Augustine is the interiorization, not merely of the symbols of Jerusalem and Babylon, but also of what they represent. Thus the Christian Church is a visible, physical entity, a community with its leaders and people, its buildings and its functions. But at the same time, and in a truer sense, the Christian Church is for Augustine an invisible entity, based on the relationship of its members’ spiritual and moral condition to God. The visible Church is a mixed body, and no external signs can identify who is a true Christian and who is not. The Church may be the one genuine sacred society, but its sacredness is not institutional, and its deWnitive membership is not Wxed until the end of history. Given this viewpoint, Augustine could not accept that any secular, time-bound society was sacred, not even a Christian empire. 60 62

61 Barnes 1981, 253–5. Fowden 1993. For the following see O’Daly 1999.

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The radical imperfection of all societies aVects Augustine’s views on the nature of secular justice and the success of political systems. In one sense, all historical kingdoms, the Roman Empire included, are instances of Babylon, the antithesis of the divine city. But, just as the city of God is a community of imperfect beings, earthly societies are likewise mixed. The good citizen is also a good person. Peace, justice, and stability are the proper aims of human societies. In practice, these aims are often achieved only by coercion, punitive policies, harsh authority, or even war (Augustine follows Cicero in setting out the principles which make a war just). This is a consequence, Augustine maintains, of the corruption of our human nature by the Fall of Adam and Eve. Thus features of society such as slavery and private property are not natural to our pristine created nature, but are consequences of the Fall. Yet there may be traces of authentic justice in the laws that control human greed, pride, and ambition. Augustine proVers no critique of the economic or social institutions of Roman society. But he applies moral principles to social behavior. In doing so, he follows Plato and Cicero in seeing the ethics of political societies as analogous to the ethics of the individual. What counts is the proper use of wealth and power: what is immoral is the desire for unnecessary wealth, not its possession. Likewise, the good ruler is not good by the mere fact of being Christian, but by the practice of virtue in a political context. Augustine argues in book 5 of the City of God that Roman desire for glory cultivated the virtues of valor and self-sacriWce: Roman historical examples of courage and uprightness, like that of Regulus, can be stimuli to excellence for Christians during the time in which they are citizens of a temporal state. Roman virtue helped to build the Roman Empire, which was god given. This does not prevent Augustine from engaging in extensive polemic against pagan polytheism, as Christian apologists (but also pagan philosophers and other monotheists, such as Jewish thinkers) before him had done. The temporal–eternal contrast should not be underemphasized. Curbing desires is a function of temporal political authority, but in the ideal paradise state there will be no government. There the tranquility of order that is realized only Wtfully and incompletely in earthly societies will be achieved spontaneously by the heavenly community of God and the saints. The Christian—whose earthly existence Augustine often compares to that of a peregrinus, the Roman legal term for an alien or non-Roman—is nevertheless a member of a temporal society, and must sustain its stability and obey its laws, where these do not conXict with religious principles. In the City of God and his other writings on political themes, Augustine develops perspectives that permit the committed Christian to be politically and economically active. He maintains the traditional sense of separateness, of belonging to a society within a society, which, as we saw, characterizes early Christian and other

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contemporary religious movements (he had himself been a Manichee for several years prior to his Christian conversion). But at the same time he develops religious and ethical positions that are adapted to the realities of an increasingly Christianized empire. Cicero’s Republic is a major source of political theory for Augustine. From it he takes the deWnition of a state as ‘an association of a large number brought together by a common sense of what is right (iuris consensu) and by shared utility’ (Cicero, De republica 1.25.39). Augustine discusses this deWnition in De civitate Dei 19.20, taking into account the Republic’s claim that the best state cannot exist without the strictest justice, and that Roman imperialism is not so much an instance of injustice as something in the best interest of its conquered or assimilated peoples. The defense of imperialism in Cicero uses what Augustine calls a ‘striking example’ drawn from nature. God rules the soul and the soul the body, with reason ruling desires: by analogy servitude is beneWcial to some people. But Augustine is concerned not just to reiterate Cicero’s argument. He wants to reinforce the case for the necessary conditions of justice adumbrated in Cicero by adding a speciWcally Christian dimension: true justice entails serving the true God (De civitate Dei 19.20–1). Augustine goes on to provide an alternative deWnition of the state: ‘A people is an association of a large number of rational beings brought together by a common agreement about what they love’ (De civitate Dei 19.24). The characteristically Augustinian concept of ‘love’ is used here to deWne a state by its perceived interests and goals, which determine whether it is a better or worse community, but never deprive it of its communal nature. Augustine intends this value-free deWnition to cover all historical states, and to point to the role of virtue in determining the excellence of individual states. Augustine would not have been impressed by the millennial celebrations at Rome in 248, but neither, we suspect, would he have regretted being born too late for Constantine’s inauguration of Constantinople in 330. He was fated to witness the disintegration of the world in which he had lived, but he was also prepared to cope with radical change. As the invading Vandals began to lay siege to the city of his bishopric, North African Hippo, in 430, Augustine lay dying. But he too had last words to say. They took the form of a citation of Plotinus (Enneades 1.4.7): ‘he will not be great who thinks it is a great matter that wood and stones collapse, and that mortals die’ (Possidius, Life of Augustine 28). The ability to use, and, at the same time, elsewhere to criticize a master of the Greco-Roman tradition, to reXect traditional philosophical and political wisdom in the context of a religion that, if one were honest, could bring no easily-won certainties or consolation—this epitomizes the way in which the new was slowly emerging from the old in the last century of the western Roman Empire.

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References Athanassiadi, Polymnia, and Frede, Michael (eds.), Pagan Monotheism in Late Antiquity. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1999. Barnes, Timothy D., Constantine and Eusebius. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 1981. —— Ammianus Marcellinus and the Representation of Historical Reality. Ithaca (Cornell University Press) 1998. Beard, Mary, North, John, and Price, Simon, Religions of Rome. 2 vols. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1998. Bowersock, Glenn W., Fiction as History: Nero to Julian. Berkeley/Los Angeles/London (University of California Press) 1994. —— Martyrdom and Rome. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1995. —— Brown, Peter, and Grabar, Oleg (eds.), Late Antiquity: A Guide to the Postclassical World. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 1999. Brown, Peter, The Making of Late Antiquity. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 1978. —— Society and the Holy in Late Antiquity. London (Faber & Faber) 1982. —— Authority and the Sacred: Aspects of the Christianisation of the Roman World. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1995. Burkert, Walter, Ancient Mystery Cults. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 1987. Cameron, Averil, Christianity and the Rhetoric of Empire: The Development of Christian Discourse. Berkeley/Los Angeles/London (University of California Press) 1991. —— The Later Roman Empire, AD 284–430. London (Fontana) 1993. —— ‘Remaking the Past’, in: Bowersock, Brown, and Grabar 1999, 1–20. Caseau, Be´atrice, ‘Sacred Landscapes’, in: Bowersock, Brown, and Grabar 1999, 21–59. Chadwick, Henry, The Church in Ancient Society: From Galilee to Gregory the Great. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2001. Clark, Gillian, Christianity and Roman Society. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2004. Demandt, Alexander, Die Spa¨tantike: Ro¨mische Geschichte von Diocletian bis Justinian, 284–565 n. Chr. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1989. Dihle, Albrecht, Die griechische und lateinische Literatur der Kaiserzeit: Von Augustus bis Justinian. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 1989 [Engl. trans.: Greek and Latin Literature of the Roman Empire. London (Routledge) 1994]. Dodds, Eric R., Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety: Some Aspects of Religious Experience from Marcus Aurelius to Constantine. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1965. —— The Ancient Concept of Progress and other Essays on Greek Literature and Belief. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1973. Elsner, Jas´, Imperial Rome and Christian Triumph: The Art of the Roman Empire AD 100–450. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1998. Foucault, Michel, Histoire de la sexualite´, vol. iii: Le souci de soi. Paris (Gallimard) 1984.

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Fowden, Garth, Empire to Commonwealth: Consequences of Monotheism in Late Antiquity. Princeton (Princeton University Press) 1993. Gardner, Iain, and Lieu, Samuel N. C. (ed.), Manichaean Texts from the Roman Empire. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2003. Geary, Patrick J., ‘Barbarians and Ethnicity’, in: Bowersock, Brown, and Grabar 1999, 107–29. Hadot, Pierre, Exercices spirituels et philosophie antique. Paris (E´tudes Augustiniennes) 1981 [new edn., rev. and extended. Paris (Albin Michel) 2002]. Hill, Charles E., Regnum Caelorum: Patterns of Future Hope in Early Christianity. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1992. Humphries, Mark, Communities of the Blessed: Social Environment and Religious Change in Northern Italy, AD 200–400. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1999. Kaster, Robert A., Guardians of Language: The Grammarian and Society in Late Antiquity. Berkeley/Los Angeles/London (University of California Press) 1988. Kelly, Christopher, ‘Empire Building’, in: Bowersock, Brown, and Grabar 1999, 171–95. —— Ruling the Later Roman Empire. Cambridge, Mass. (Harvard University Press) 2004. Lane Fox, Robin, Pagans and Christians in the Mediterranean World from the Second Century to the Conversion of Constantine. London (Viking) 1986. Liebeschuetz, J. Wolfgang H. G., The Decline and Fall of the Roman City. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2001. Lieu, Judith, Christian Identity in the Jewish and Graeco-Roman World. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2004. Lieu, Samuel N. C., Manichaeism in the Later Roman Empire and Medieval China: A Historical Survey. Manchester (Manchester University Press) 1985. Lim, Richard, ‘Christian Triumph and Controversy’, in: Bowersock, Brown, and Grabar 1999, 196–218. Markus, Robert, The End of Ancient Christianity. Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1990. Matthews, John, The Roman Empire of Ammianus. London (Duckworth) 1989. O’Daly, Gerard, Augustine’s City of God: A Reader’s Guide. Oxford (Clarendon Press) 1999; repr. with minor changes 2004. Salzman, Michele R., On Roman Time: The Codex-Calendar of 354 and the Rhythms of Urban Life in Late Antiquity. Berkeley/Los Angeles/London (University of California Press) 1990. Stroumsa, Guy G., La Wn du sacriWce: les mutations religieuses de l’Antiquite´ tardive. Paris (Odile Jacob) 2005. Swain, Simon, Hellenism and Empire: Language, Classicism, and Power in the Greek World. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1996. Swain, Simon, and Edwards, Mark (eds.), Approaching Late Antiquity: The Transformation from Early to Late Empire. Oxford (Oxford University Press) 2004. Tardieu, Michel, Le Maniche´isme. Paris (Presses Universitaires de France) 1981 [2nd rev. edn. ibid. 1997].

New Tendencies, Religious and Philosophical, in the Chinese World of the Third through Sixth Centuries Thomas Jansen (Cambridge)

1 . F RO M LUOYA N G TO J IA N KA NG The fall of the uniWed empire of the Han (206/202 bc–ad 220) was one of the most momentous events in Chinese history. Its origins go back to the Wrst half of the second century ad, while its repercussions were being felt during the entire Six Dynasties period (220–589) and even beyond. If I had to choose just three events to highlight the main themes and images inXuential in the intellectual and religious developments in the centuries after the breakdown of the imperial order, I would suggest the following dates: The Wrst is ad 190, the year the Han capital Luoyang was devastated by the warlord Dong Zhuo (d. 192), an event that included the complete destruction of the Han imperial library and archives. The History of the Later Han Dynasty (Hou-Han shu) relates that the books and documents of these two institutions were torn apart and scattered; the silken scrolls were cut up and used as bags or canopies when the emperor was forcibly moved to Chang’an. What had been saved was either lost en route or destroyed during the ensuing Wghting in Chang’an.1 The second date—ad 306—saw the inauguration of the religious state of ‘Great Perfection’ (Da-Cheng; 306–47) by the rebel leader Li Xiong (274–334) on the territory of modern Sichuan Province. This political community, which emerged out of a popular uprising fuelled by Daoist messianism, is depicted in the historical sources as a utopia where ‘the village gates were not closed and no one picked up lost articles on the highways. There was no one who rotted in prison and punishments were not employed indiscriminately.’2 1 2

Hou-Han shu 79A/2548. Huayang guozhi 9; quoted from Kleeman 1998, 84–5.

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The last date—ad 311—witnessed the second sacking of Luoyang, when an army of the nomadic Xiongnu, who had established themselves on Chinese territory, attacked the city, looting and burning the palaces and temples, and killing more than 30,000 people. The invaders took Emperor Huai (r. 306–11) as a prisoner and caused hundreds of thousands of families to Xee the area around the old capitals for the safety of the regions south of the Yangtze river, thereby triggering one of the great domestic migrations of Chinese history. Why did I choose these three dates? The fall of the Han was more than simply the destruction of one of the longest-lasting of China’s imperial dynasties. It signaled the collapse of a world-view that ‘had put the exploration of a uniWed system of the world onto the agenda, which would explain the operations of nature and society through one common mechanism’.3 Since the beginning of state sponsorship of classical learning in the mid-Western Han, legions of scholars educated in the Wve ‘Confucian’ Classics had devoted their lifetime ‘to thoroughly explore the interchanges between Heaven and man, completely trace the changes from ancient times to the present, and thus complete the words of a single school’, as Sima Qian (c.145–c.90/85 bc) described his own mission as a historian.4 We see the same principle of comprehensiveness and synthesis operating in the works of Zheng Xuan (127–200), the most important Han commentator of the classical tradition who thus summarized his scholarly objective: ‘By raising one principle, to open up ten thousand items; by explaining one chapter, to clarify many sections, so as to reduce eVort and minimize [the need for prolonged] consideration.’5 Such a deWned scholarly agenda implied that students under the Han would often study only one book, relying for their understanding on one authoritative commentary to the neglect of many earlier scholarly traditions.6 The physical destruction of the entire imperial library and archives just at a time when classical scholarship showed a tendency of ossiWcation and intellectual impoverishment led many classicists to conclude ‘that further developments based in authentic Confucian traditions were unlikely’.7 Moreover, most Han thinkers had so closely identiWed absolute moral principle with the Han dynastic order on which they depended both as moral beings and as state-sponsored scholars that the breakdown of the dynasty called into question not only the validity of 3

Wagner 2003, 43. Han shu 62/2735; Lewis 1999, 309. 5 Quoted from Nylan 2001, 53. I have so far been unable to locate the original source of this quote. 6 See for instance Wang Chong’s (27–c.100) acrimonious remarks on those Han scholars who specialized in the study of just one classic. Lunheng 13/592–3. 7 Nylan 2001, 53. 4

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the moral order, but also the loyalties which had supported the imperial state. This ‘double crisis’ formed the background for the philosophical reorientation in the third century. The founding of the state of ‘Great Perfection’ in 306 and the rebellion that preceded it were anything but singular events. A keen awareness of worldly disorder in the second half of the Later Han precipitated the materialization of new popular religious cults or sects out of a broad stream of Daoist traditions. Some of these groups took the road to political action. Popular uprisings usually subsumed under the Taiping (‘Great Peace’) movement— although the precise connections are not always clear—erupted fairly regularly during the Later Han, the largest being the Yellow Turban uprising in ad 184.8 From the reign of Emperor Huan (r. 146–68) onwards these uprisings show a new quality. Instead of setting their hopes on a renewal of the existing government, leaders of rebel movements now often claimed a dual authority of a charismatic religious leader and saintly teacher as well as emperor. The institutions of the state of ‘Great Perfection’ embodied the temporarily successful fusion of a sectarian religious organization with an imperial administration into one ‘millenarian kingdom’.9 The case of the Da-Cheng state as well as subsequent politico-religious movements during the Six Dynasties raise the important question of the relationship between worldly ruler and religious sage in a period when popular religious ideals increasingly found political expression. It is worth emphasizing that the nostalgia for the golden years of the Han, which characterized most religious utopian ideologies in the centuries following its demise, certainly helped to keep alive the idea of a uniWed empire in an age of political division. The religious teachings that provided the spiritual background to the founders of the Da-Cheng state and other religious leaders of the third and fourth centuries were part of a diVused religious tradition, which, despite certain commonalities, had not yet been integrated into the systematized religion we refer to as the Daoist Church. The transformation of the teachings of largely independent religious groups—the Wudoumidao (Way of Five Pecks of Rice), Taipingdao (Way of Great Peace), Ganjundao (Way of Lord Gan), or Lishidao (Way of the Li family), to name but a few—into a uniWed state-sponsored Daoist religion with its own canon of scriptures, a distinct self-identity, and thus capable of competing with Buddhism took place only 8

An exception are the years between ad 167 and 183 for which no major rebellion has been recorded. Anna Seidel (1969/70, 220) has suggested that the relative calm during those years might be due to the fact that major religious leaders were preparing themselves for the one decisive rebellion of the Yellow Turbans in ad 184. The designation ‘Yellow Turbans’ refers to the headdress of the rebels who wrapped yellow cloth around their heads. 9 Kleeman 1998.

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in the post-Han period. An important event that signaled the successful creation of a state-sponsored Daoist orthodoxy is Lu Xiujing’s (406–77) collection and catalogue of the then scattered Daoist scriptures, undertaken in response to an imperial order in ad 471.10 ad 311, Wnally, marks the loss of the northern half of the Chinese empire— roughly comparable to the size of the territory north of the Yangtze River—to neighboring non-Chinese peoples. The event triggered the second great wave of domestic migrations after 298–307, when an estimated two million people had been on the move. The majority of refugees turned towards the south and immigrated to the region of the former state Wu, during the time of the Three Kingdoms (220–80). There, Sima Rui (276–322), a prince of the Jin dynasty, founded the Eastern Jin dynasty (317–420) and made Jiankang, today’s Nanjing, his capital. The inXow of the north continued with interruptions until the late reign of Emperor Wen (r. 423–53) of the Liu-Song dynasty (420–79) and just gradually ceased from there. This enormous migration encouraged settlement and administrative development to the ‘regions south of the Yangtze’ (Jiangnan). The exodus of the north to Jiangnan marked the relocation of the demographic focus for the beneWt of the south and must be regarded as one of the principal reasons for the later economical and cultural primacy of this region. Just as momentous for the historical development was the fact that the original structures of the north could not simply be replicated in the truncated society in the south. Political and social conditions had substantially changed due to the immigration from all parts of the northern half of the empire. From now on, the south went also culturally its own way, despite all the similarities with the development in the north. In the beginning of the fourth century, the south was anything but a homogeneous entity. In the eyes of the northern inhabitants, the area still remained a remote border region, despite its long settlement history, which reached back to the Eastern Han dynasty.11 The society of the south was a tension-loaded conglomerate of diVerent ethnic groups, local cultures, and social levels. The internal political aVairs of the Southern Dynasties were some of the most unstable of the entire Chinese history. Those benchmarks, at which collective cultural identity usually forms, were either not at all or just in very reduced forms available: an established political structure; the consciousness of a common origin; a common historical tradition, or just a common native language, since one can no longer speak 10

Seiwert 2003, 52–3. Tan Qixiang estimated that almost half of all Chinese households, respectively 4.30 of altogether 9.33 million, lived already south of the Yangtze in the Eastern Han dynasty. See Holcombe 1994, 26. 11

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of just dialectical diVerences in view of the mutual unawareness of the idioms spoken in the south.12 The emigration to the south was for the large majority of the noble families from the north an escape from political changes due to the invasion of foreign people. Therefore, the great challenge to the royal household and the exiled individuals consisted in reviving the idea of the ‘uniWed Chinese empire’ under radically changing conditions of the south, preserving at least the appearance of continuity in a situation, which is interpreted by most modern historians as having brought China perilously close to a loss of her cultural identity.13

2. WAS T HERE A THIRD- AND FOURTH-CENTURY ‘C ULTU R A L C R I SI S ’ ? Before I go on to discuss the main intellectual and religious developments in the period under consideration, I would like to pause for a moment to reXect on the question of whether we can meaningfully apply the label ‘cultural crisis’ or ‘identity crisis’ to characterize the situation in the third and especially the early fourth century ad. Traditionally the period of the division between north and south has been identiWed with political chaos, and the Southern Dynasties, in particular, have been equated with cultural decline, eVeminacy, and decadence.14 The three events I have selected as an introduction to the themes of this article seem to conWrm such an assessment. There are, to be sure, numerous contemporary voices to be found that bemoan the loss of political unity and vividly describe the suVering caused by military invasion, political feuds as well as the uncertain living conditions resulting from life as a refugee. Shu Xi’s (262– 300) feelings were not singular in the stressful post-Han era: ‘In the morning you wander towering palaces, and in the evening you plunge into a deep abyss. During the day you laugh, and at night you sigh. At dawn you bloom,

12 See Holcombe 1995, 2, who transfers Rupert Emerson’s observations about modern African and Asiatic societies to medieval China. 13 Amongst western Sinologists, Charles Holcombe stressed strongest China’s crisis in the beginning of the fourth century. He designates this ‘identity crisis’ as ‘its most serious national crisis, prior to the onslaught of the industrialized West in modern times’. Holcombe cites the Chinese historian Li Yuan, who interprets the fall of the Western Jin dynasty as the second of three large culture crises of his country, besides the feudal state order of the Zhou dynasty (11th cent.–256 bc) and China’s clash with the west in the 19th cent. See Holcombe 1995, 1, n. 1. 14 A book on the poetry of this period (Wu Fusheng 1998) has the telling title The Poetics of Decadence: Chinese Poetry of the Southern Dynasties and the Late Tang Periods.

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and at dusk you fall.’15 And yet, despite such acute awareness of the changeability of one’s fortunes and an unprecedented readiness to withdraw from society, nowhere do we Wnd in the post-Han period the kind of pervasive and sincere self-doubt and culture criticism we encounter in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. Lament for cultural decay in the period of division was voiced retrospectively, from the point of view of the re-uniWed empire of the Sui (589–618) and Tang (618–907), and formed part of a recurrent rhetoric of decline, the primary concern of which is to mark a new beginning by dissociating the speaker’s own present from a supposedly decadent past. The negative evaluation of Southern Dynasties literature, for instance, Wrst put into concrete measures in a prohibition against the ornate southern literary style in ad 584 and later taken up by Tang court scholars has to be seen in this light.16 The idea of a deep and pervasive cultural crisis at the start of the third and fourth centuries assumes a rather radical and all-encompassing rupture between the early empire and the period of division. It therefore overlooks the important fact that the intellectual and religious movements regarded as characteristic of the post-Han period have, without exception, their origins in the Later Han, rather than being the result of the political and social breakdown. Certainly, the dissolution of the Han order had the eVect of a catalyst in bringing latent ideas and attitudes to the forefront. However, recent scholarship has begun to put a stronger emphasis on the historical continuities between the late Han and post-Han periods. While we do see, for instance, a resurgence of Daoist thought in the third century, Confucian inXuence remained strong and many thinkers would still have identiWed themselves Wrst and foremost as Confucians. Moreover, while one cannot deny the fact that oYcial study of the Five Classics declined after the fall of Han, it is nevertheless true that the Wei (220–65) court in Luoyang conducted a seminar on the Confucian Analects (Lunyu) in ad 241, thereby showing a sustained interest in the study of the Classics.17 Consequently, instead of analyzing the collapse of Han in terms of a complete failure of Confucian ethics, which were then replaced by the growth of what is misleadingly referred to as ‘NeoDaoism’, some scholars have stressed that Confucianism was not only successful during the Eastern Han, but also ‘achieved its Wrst overwhelming political and social signiWcance during the early medieval period’.18 15

Jin shu 51/1429. Translated slightly diVerently in Holcombe 1994, 94. For Tang court scholars’ criticism of the literature of the Period of Division, see Bol 1992, 90–1, 101, 110–16. 17 Nylan 2001, 52–3. 18 Knapp 2005, 188. Nylan (1996, 1), turning the traditional view upside down, even argues that ‘the collapse of Eastern Han government may just as plausibly be ascribed to the overwhelming success of the Confucian ethic, rather than to its failure’, for this ethic created 16

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To sum up, in spite of the perceived dangers or uncertainties of the external world there seems to be not suYcient evidence to conclude that the political breakdown of the Han and the onslaught of non-Chinese peoples had created a situation which was broadly perceived as being radically diVerent in quality from what has been remembered about the rise and fall of dynasties in the past. Rather than shaking the foundations of empire, the dissolution of the uniWed world of the Han oVered new options, of which I will speak next.

3 . N EW I NTE L L EC TUAL TR E ND S IN TH E W E I - J IN ER A ( 2 2 0 – 4 2 0 ) The Wei-Jin era, which immediately followed the Han empire and owes its name to two important dynasties, has been disdained by later periods, grossly simplistically, as an age of religious escapism, metaphysical speculation, and uninhibited eccentricity. Traditionally expected to assume public responsibility in exposed positions, the third-century intellectual elite has been severely censured for having shunned government oYce and, to the neglect of Confucian values, given themselves over to wine drinking, drug taking, and ‘pure conversation’ (qingtan), a witty and highly polished conversational style focusing on non-political topics. A group of writers, poets, musicians, and philosophers known as the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove (Zhulin qixian) has ever since been regarded as the perfect embodiment of the unconventional lifestyle and intellectual pursuits of the Wei-Jin period. The name of the group refers to its meeting place on the country estate of one of its leaders, Ji Kang (223–62), northwest of the capital city Luoyang. Ruan Ji (210–63), the most illustrious poet among the group, in abundance of his indiVerence to contemporary moral norms, is reported to have exclaimed: ‘How could the rites (li) have been created for people like me?’19 Members of this circle repeatedly shocked their environment by walking about completely nude and urinating in public.20 Modern scholars, while using slightly pejorative adjectives such as ‘libertarian’, ‘individualistic’, ‘escapist’, ‘nihilist’, ‘anti-ritualist’, ‘iconoclastic’, or ‘anarchistic’ to characterize the Wei-Jin spirit,21 have generally been positive confused deWnitions of social duty which threatened both social conventions and the bureaucratic machinery of state. 19 Shishuo xinyu 23.7. 20 Cheng 1997, 327. On the Seven Sages see Holzmann 1956; 1957. 21 See e.g. the works of Bala´zs 1948; Holcombe 1994; Nylan 1996; Cheng 1997; Bauer 2001; Qian 2001.

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in their assessment of the third-century intellectual world. Despaired at the collapse of the Han and rightly fearful of political engagement in a time of internecine wars between contending court factions, the intellectuals of the Wei-Jin era are credited with having abandoned Han oYcial scholasticism to the beneWt of independent philosophical inquiry based on the rationality of the philosophically autonomous subject.22 Wei-Jin thought is lauded for having developed a concept of ‘freedom’ and ‘individualism’ hitherto unknown in China.23 Both assessments, the disdainful traditional one and the positive modern one, contain a grain of truth. It needs to be emphasized, however, that despite their iconoclastic behavior and a tendency to move away from the traditional commitment to public service, Wei-Jin literati broke completely neither with Confucian values nor with public involvement. The small minority of gentlemen, who went so far as to repudiate a career under a government they considered to be corrupt or illegitimate, had to build up an ‘untouchable aura of being ‘‘saintly’’, exemplary Wgures’ by following the principles of Confucianism ‘more strictly than those in power, whose own moral authority was rooted in Confucian teachings’.24 In many contemporary writings we thus Wnd an attitude of complicity with the state based on strong Confucian convictions that was nevertheless paired with political subversion. By the same token, ‘individualism’ in the modern sense of a person operating in a self-directed, self-contained fashion relatively untrammeled by government interference or institutional control is utterly misleading when applied to the behavior of Wei-Jin literati.25 The Wei-Jin self always stressed its relationship with others and with nature, not its separation from a world regarded as exterior and objective. Even those literati who withdrew from the world to the solitude of a mountain retreat were eager to justify their actions with recourse to established models of reclusion, while those who Wnally accepted a call to oYce were expected to do so reluctantly and decline Wrst.26 A vast biographical literature of exemplars, religious and secular, emerged at the time whose function it was to provide models that could be emulated and were thereby meant to help educated adolescents and adults in morally perfecting themselves. Ji Kang, famous eccentric and epitome of antiritualism during the Wei-Jin period, compiled Accounts of Sagely and Worthy Lofty Gentlemen (Shengxian gaoshi zhuan), a collection of reports about recluses from high antiquity down to the present, according to his biographer 22 24 26

23 Wagner 2003, 78. Bauer 2001, 142–56. 25 Declercq 1998, 12. Cf. Nylan 1996. For patterns of disengagement in early medieval China, see Berkowitz 2002.

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‘with a desire to befriend those men for a thousand years’.27 ‘Every time I read the biographies of [the recluses] Shang Ziping and Tai Xiaowei’, Ji Kang admits, ‘I yearn for them, sighing with emotion, and remember what kind of men they were.’28 Ji Kang’s desire to model himself on the examples set by past recluses, rather than elevating his own decisions and preferences to the status of exclusive moral guideline, reveals the inappropriateness of the Western term ‘individualism’. ‘Self-fashioning’ is a term that captures much better what Wei-Jin literati sought to achieve.29 I will come back to this later. It goes without saying that it is impossible to give an account of all the religious and philosophical tendencies emerging during the three centuries after the demise of the Han. In the following I will mainly look from diVerent angles—philosophical, religious, and political—at some examples that show how people in the post-Han period interpreted the position of the individual within the larger world, thereby trying to restore some of the order that seemed to have been lost.

4 . X UA N X U E, T HE ‘S T U DY O F T HE DA RK ’ The end of the Han had discredited the attempts at a uniWed explanation of the transmitted Classics and the world undertaken by Han scholasticism. It had not led, however, to the abandonment of the quest for a permanent principle underlying the world of change. New in the Wei-Jin period was the unprecedented level of theoretical abstraction and systematic philosophical inquiry into the problems of language, ontology, and political philosophy. The philosophical movement that prompted this search for new foundations in philosophy based on ‘the rationality of the philosophically autonomous subject as the only real touchstone for the validity of the thinking of the Sages’ is called xuanxue, ‘the study of the Dark’.30 Its most important representatives are Wang Bi (226–49), Xiang Xiu (c.221–c.300) and Guo Xiang (around 252–312). The term xuan (‘the Dark’) designates the object of the xuanxue-thinker’s philosophical explorations. The central proposition of Wang Bi’s philosophy is that the ‘ancestor of the ten thousand kinds of entities’ (wanwu zhi zong) in the world must itself be inWnite, indeWnable, and imperceptible to the senses. The most radically unspeciWc notion for the ‘featureless’ (wu xing) and ‘nameless’ (wu ming) that generates the innumerable entities is thus ‘nonbeing’ or ‘negativity’ (wu). The ‘Dark’ (xuan) refers to a necessary and 27 29

Jin shu 49/1374. Cf. Qian 2001, 44.

28

Wen xuan 43/3b. Wagner 2003, 78.

30

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constitutive feature of the wu, namely the fact that, while it is the basis of the myriad things, it remains itself in the dark. It cannot have any features that can become the object of human cognition and language. Wang Bi’s principal philosophical interest is Wnding the rules that govern the relationship between this unfathomable ‘One’ and the ten thousand things in the world, the ‘Many’ that it brings forth. While Wang Bi stressed the inability of deWning language to grasp the indeWnable non-being, he did not generally reject language as a means to arrive at philosophical truth. Nor did he, in contrast to some of his contemporaries, think of the Classics as being unable to express the thinking of the Sage (i.e. Confucius). For Wang Bi, the unspeakability of the ‘ancestor’ of all things is not due to a fundamental insuYciency of language, but results from the ontological diVerence between the things and that which brings them forth—non-being. A good deal of his philosophical originality lies precisely in the fact that he sets out to create, or rather discover, a viable philosophical language that is able to ‘point’ (zhi) to the Unnamable without falling into the pitfall of trying to use deWning language. Wang Bi is convinced to have discovered such a language in the two works which he wrote commentaries for, the Laozi and the Lunyu (Analects). According to Wang Bi’s interpretation, the language and the comparisons of these two texts seek to replicate the structures that govern the relationship of wu, ‘non-being’, interpreted as the One from which everything comes forth, and the Many, the ten thousand kinds of entities. By demonstrating the possibility of a reading that is cognizant of these structures embedded not just in the Laozi and the Lunyu, but in the other Classics as well, Wang Bi rescued the viability of the Classics as a proper representation of the thinking of the Sage. Wang Bi’s ultimate aim, however, was not purely philosophical. It was the translation of the discovered relationship between the One and the Many into a normative guideline for the management of the body politic, which could equally be construed as a relationship between the One, the ruler, and his many subjects. To preserve social order, which constantly has the tendency to deteriorate into chaos, Wang promoted the ideal of a non-interventionist ruler, a ruler who responds rather than acts, adapts rather than initiates, thereby bringing his subjects to rest. The driving force behind Wang’s explorations is to create nothing less than an ontologically grounded practical philosophy of politics. The enormous innovative potential of this philosophy lies in the fact that it is exclusively based on philosophical reason and not on cosmological assumptions about correspondences between Heaven, Earth, and Man current during the Han. Once established, this connection between ontology and political philosophy was never completely lost and became again prominent during the Song (960–1279).

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The second generation of xuanxue-scholars, Xourishing around the turn from the third to the fourth century and represented by Xiang Xiu and his younger friend Guo Xiang, emphatically refuted the hitherto common assumption that all diversity in the world emerges from a ‘One’, variously called wu (non-being) or Dao. In their collective Zhuangzi Commentary (Zhuangzi zhu) Xiang and Guo radically assert that all things are born spontaneously and have no source from which they come. Thus, before we can talk about the creation of things we must be clear about the fact that all forms exist as things by themselves. If we therefore go through the entire realm of existence, (we will Wnd that) there has never been anything, not even the penumbra that has not transformed itself independently in a mysterious darkness. Hence in the creation of things there is no master, and each thing creates itself independently. That each thing creates itself independently and there is nothing on which it depends, this is the correct norm of Heaven and Earth.31

Two things are important here: First, wu (non-being) is completely stripped of its role as the source of everything. Instead, Xiang and Guo exalt ‘being’ (you) to the position of the absolute reality. Secondly, every being is noncontingent, it is ‘of itself such as it is’ (ziran) and ‘without master’ (wuzhu), an insight that provided the groundwork for the great emphasis on spontaneity and naturalness as a gentlemanly ideal in the Wei-Jin period. The ideal life is a life in accordance with one’s true self, a life in perfect harmony with one’s natural ‘allotment’ (fen). The term ‘allotment’ occupied a central position not just in the thinking of the second generation of xuanxue scholars, but in medieval Chinese thinking in general.32 Xiang and Guo held that every being had its own inborn share of capacities, skills, preferences which predestined it for a certain well-deWned task and position in life. Consequently, order in society is maintained just by every being adhering to its proper, i.e. natural, position, while the perfect ruler, the Sage, ‘stands above all judgments, opinions, emotions and moral standards, for all these are limited notions, only valid for certain individuals in certain situations’.33 The idea that each being had its natural share provided the link to another stream of thought contemporaneous to xuanxue, but more closely related to the practical problems of government. The ‘teaching of names’ (mingjiao) stressed the importance of social duties, ritual, law, and especially characterology. As a tool of government the ‘teaching of names’ was employed to ensure that certain moral categories (ming, ‘name’, ‘reputation’) used as the basis for assessing human talent and for selecting oYcials and the underlying reality 31 32

Zhuangzi zhu 2, 1/25a. Cf. Cheng 1997, 338–9. 33 Campany 2005. Zu¨rcher 1959, 91.

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(shi, ‘actuality’) of a man’s behavior or his political functions actually corresponded, thereby enabling the eVective ‘allotment’ of functions to the right persons.

5. SELF-AWARENESS AND SELF-FASHIONING It is not diYcult to see the connection between the xuanxue’s philosophical focus on a person’s ‘natural self-so-being’ (ziran) and the sustained and at times even stubborn eVorts of Wei-Jin literati to manifest and realize their true selves. A keen self-awareness and fascination of human character types lay at the heart of the contemporary discourse concerning the expression and judgment of human personality. Xuanxue philosophy was but one source of the interest in human character that pervaded the entire period. Character appraisal goes back to the Later Han, precisely the year ad 76, when Han Emperor Zhang (r. 76–88) decreed that the selection of potential candidates for oYce should be based on assessments of their accumulated merits and deeds provided by local village leaders. The categories under which the evaluatees were subsumed rapidly multiplied—including such rubrics as ‘Wlial and incorrupt’ (xiaolian), ‘honest and ingenuous’ (dunpu), ‘worthy and talented’ (xianneng)34 and so forth— while the ability to formulate succinct judgments on a person’s inner qualities on the basis of its outward behavior was a praised ability in itself and carried high social prestige for the evaluator. The focus of character appraisal shifted from primarily moral concerns to ability-oriented appraisals during the Later Han to purely aesthetic concerns from about ad 240 onwards, when character appraisal was entirely discharged of its immediate political responsibilities. The main reason for this shift may have been the rigid status hierarchy of aristocratic families in medieval China that eVectively prevented the advancement of a person merely on the positive appraisal of his abilities or moral qualities. Paradoxically, the dynamic of character appraisal anything but lost its momentum as a result of this change. On the contrary, self-expression and the evaluation of others became a highly competitive social pastime that often included direct comparison of two people. An example from the Wrst collection of anecdotes concerning elite life, the New Account of Tales of the World (Shishuo xinyu) reads: Emperor Ming [r. 323–6] once asked Xie Kun [280–322], ‘How would you rate yourself in comparison with Yu Liang?’ Xie replied, ‘As for ‘‘sitting in ceremonial attire’’ in temple or hall, and making the hundred oYcials keep to the rules, I’m no 34

Hou-Han shu 61/2042.

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match for Liang. But when it comes to ‘‘(living in seclusion on) a single hill, or (Wshing in) a single stream,’’ I consider myself superior to him.’35

In spite of a desire to express uniqueness and notwithstanding a steadily growing repertoire of personal standards and values revealed in the anecdotes, one important truth about the constitution of the self went unchallenged: No matter how much the protagonists try to deWne themselves through separation from others, ‘the ‘‘self ’’ cannot be cultivated in isolation’.36

6 . I N D I V I DUAL , M OR AL ITY, AND C OMMUNITY Since the beginning of the great exodus in the fourth century, the dissolution of local communities, loosening of clan structures, and a high social mobility belonged to the basic experiences of most inhabitants of the divided empire. Parallel to the decay of traditional life-worlds, the ways in which the individual construed his relation to group or community as well as to the cosmos underwent signiWcant transformations.37 By the late Wfth century ad the imperial court in Jiankang as well as the various princely courts had fully emerged as centers of religious and literary patronage. The imperial patrons, in constant need of suitable talents to staV their administrations, had a high appreciation for the individual talent of a person and no longer exclusively for their family origin. Yet, for the majority of the aristocracy, collectively referred to as the shi, the rise of talented individuals from humble social backgrounds was certainly a source of concern, as was, at least for some people, the increasing cultural centralism of the court. This centralism, they believed, would oust the local village communities from any participation in the selection of oYcials, thereby spurring a merciless competition for reward and honor to the detriment of social responsibility and care for one’s family on the local level.38 In the religious realm, proof of the growing autonomy of the individual can be found in the treatment of the problems revolving around the computation of the individual human fate. Native tradition, of which the Taiping jing (Scripture of Great Peace) and the Daoist alchemist Ge Hong (c.282–343) may be named as representatives here, proceeded upon the conception that 35

Shishuo xinyu 9.17; trans. Mather 1976, 253–4. Qian 2001, 48. 37 Jansen 2000, 167–95. I use ‘individual’ here merely in its colloquial sense, not implying any notion of ‘individualism’. 38 An example of this view can be found in the writings of the literatus Pei Ziye (469–530). Jansen 2000, 153–60. 36

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the fate of an individual is already assigned to him at birth, which Ge Hong tried to prove amongst others with recourse to astrological speculations. Accordingly, an individual has an allocated life span that he could hope to exhaust with good deeds, and even prolong now and then through longevity techniques designed to maintain and replenish the vital forces of one’s body, while risking a shortened life span through bad deeds. In any case, the consequences of his activities did not only aVect the individual but extended also to his children and grandchildren. In other words, the religious subject was conceived not just as individual but as member of a kinship group. Numerous narrations of spirits of deceased ancestors and revenants in people’s literature of that time eloquently certify hereto. The fact that the liability of a family for the crimes of one member had been transferred to the religious realm is thus also the reason why the individual could inXuence his individual fate, but could not extract himself from an overriding ‘supraindividual guilt connection’.39 He remains in the last instance subjected to the ‘Administrator of Allotted Life Spans’ (si ming), the very oYcial in the spiritual bureaucracy who is responsible for enforcing a human’s predestined life span. In the third century Buddhism had gained access to the ruling elites in the south as well as in the north.40 The Buddhists, too, held the view that life does not end with death and adhered to a connection of activities with the fate of a person. However, this was now an individual fate, as also the ‘guilt connection’, as publicized by the Buddhists, was no longer larger than the individual and inclusive of ancestors and descendants, but was exclusively related to the individual. From now on, more was possible than just ‘playing out one’s life’, as the individual was put in a position to transcend the karma-producing principle of ‘cause and eVect’ and leave the cycle of birth and rebirth altogether. One of the problems Chinese thinkers repeatedly had to grapple with in their attempts to understand the Buddhist teaching of karma was the question who exactly was the mediator who carried the karmic burden of a person through all her existences within the cycle of reincarnation. The answer to this problem has caused bewilderment among modern scholars, due to the remarkable fact that the Chinese Buddhists insisted on the existence of an imperishable individual spirit (shen) and therewith represented a position, which contradicted completely the teaching of the historical Buddha. In contrast, critics of Buddhism repeatedly denied the existence of a spirit after 39

The possibility of transcending the ‘guilt connection’ is implied in Taiping jing. However, this required that the individual earns great merit. Cf. also Seiwert 1998, 262–4. 40 The tremendous consequences of China’s encounter with the Indian religion on all aspects of Chinese life are far too complex to be summarized here. The reader is therefore referred to Erik Zu¨rcher’s classic study The Buddhist Conquest of China.

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the death of the body, an argument that forced them to explain whom exactly they were oVering to when worshiping the ancestors. On the one hand, the immortality of the spirit was fundamental for the Chinese understanding of karmic retribution after which all activities of human beings during earlier existences would be repaid at a later time. On the other hand, immortality of the spirit was also the guarantor for a possible redemption from exactly this cycle. The spirit, through its role as ‘karma carrier’, was involved in the passing world of desirers. However, since it was thought of as being ‘without form’ (wu xing), it also came to be regarded as being independent from the transient world and thus as a promise of Nirva-na. The question of the immortal spirit led to a series of heated debates during the fourth and sixth centuries. The polemical nature of these controversies, the fact that they went on over extended periods of time, without any conceivable improvement of the arguments brought forward, as well as the fact that only a few monks participated in them suggests that the issues at stake were not narrowly conWned to a religious or philosophical context. Indeed, the emancipation of the individual from the cosmic-political system of the Han, the individualizing of the calculation of the human fate, as well as the possibility of escaping from the this-worldly context had altogether profound consequences for both the relationship of the individual to community and state and for the understanding of morality. The determination of the individual rested no longer in his function for the state. His direct relationship with that law of retribution contained hope for redemption, since it could be subjected to transcendence. Morality was now reduced to an almost mathematical formula, for ‘it became quantitative and was placed in the calculation of the individual’.41 There was no other reason for a person to act morally, but his own desire for salvation. Morality became thereby individualized. Against this background some contemporaries critical of Buddhism raised questions such as: to what extent could a morality that was exclusively based on the mechanical principle of retribution keep up with the interests of the community and the state? It was clear to these critics that a moral, robbed of its inner substance was bound to fail and was just a tool for the interests of the individual. They were fearful of a situation, in which moral integrity did no longer command success, but success celebrates itself only as superior morality. A dialogue between Xiao Ziliang (464–90), an imperial prince of the Southern Qi dynasty (479–502), and Fan Zhen (c.450–c.515), a member of the southern elite who had lost out to the northern e´migre´ aristocracy, reveals

41

Friedrich 1984, 97.

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what at least some contemporaries saw as the political implications of Buddhist doctrine: (Xiao) Ziliang believed Wrmly in the (teaching of the) Buddha while (Fan) Zhen unmistakably announced that there would be no Buddha. ‘If you do not believe in cause and eVect [i.e. the law of karmic retribution]’, asked him Ziliang, ‘how come that that there are rich and noble, humble and poor people in this world?’ (Fan) Zhen replied: ‘Life of people is like the blossoms at a tree. They sprout from a common branch and unfold in a cup of blossoms. Then, the wind causes them to fall oV. Some scrub wall shielding and curtains and fall on soft carpets and seat pads, others are held back from fences and walls and fall beside a dung pit. Those who fall on soft carpets and seat pads are (sophisticated aristocrats) as you, Majesty; those who fall in a dung pit are people like your low servant [Fan Zhen]. Noble and humble people have diVerent ways but what has this to do with cause and eVect?’42

Seemingly, everyday experience conWrmed this skeptical analysis. Obviously, there were people who lived under diYcult external conditions, although they attempted the good of the community and thus were qualiWed for a public position while others led a life of prestige and wealth and were probably exclusively interested in their own advantage. Even if a certain reversal might have appeared bearable in view of a future retribution restoring justice, it nevertheless ran counter to the present-day interests of the state, namely the search for qualiWed oYcials as well as the justiWcation of the existing social hierarchy.

7 . E M P E RO R S H I P A N D S AG E H O O D The fall of the Han dynasty and the contemporary upsurge in the establishment of new religious communities are closely related events. The organization and priesthood of Daoism, for instance, has been interpreted as ‘a recreation, on a spiritual level, of the lost cosmic unity of the Han’.43 Daoist bestowals of religious titles and regalia were modeled on the investiture of a king, while Daoist priests relied on the theory of the Heavenly Mandate in its classical, i.e. Zhou-Han formulation, for justiWcation of their role as preservers and, if necessary, restorers of cosmic order through Daoist rituals. In other words: the Daoist priest fulWlled the same functions as the emperor in his state rituals and he could, in case the emperor failed to live up to the ideal, act as a spiritual substitute for an imperial power that had grown weak. To avoid a misunderstanding: Daoism in the sense the term is understood by most scholars, namely the organized religion that sprung from the Celestial 42

Liang shu 48/665.

43

Seidel 1983, 291.

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Master (tianshi) sect and its founder Zhang Daoling (X. 142), never became a subversive rebel religion itself. In a period of chaos, the role of the Daoist sage was to restore the lost cosmic unity by establishing a new covenant between Lord Lao the Most High (Taishang laojun), the personiWed Dao, and the faithful among human beings. The head of the Daoist Church, the Celestial Master was the representative of the Lord Lao, the secular custodian of a theocracy. His task was to advise and guide the emperor to a future utopia of Great Peace. This is the reason why Daoists had no problems submitting to a charismatic ruler of a new dynasty. A good example for this separation between the images of worldly ruler and religious sage/teacher is the case of Celestial Master Kou Qianzhi (365–448), who established a short-lived Daoist theocracy at the court of the Tuoba-Wei (386–534) dynasty in northern China between 425 and 451. Kou Qianzhi was able to persuade the emperor to accept the role of ‘Perfect Ruler of Great Peace’ (Taiping zhenjun) and also adopt the same title for the reign period of 440–451. This was a ‘win-win’ situation for all participants. The emperor, on one hand, could claim his ultimate authority from a supernatural power and authenticate his rule by employing an external religious hierarchy of priests to provide direct access to this source of power. Moreover, it was the emperor’s wish to integrate the powerful Chinese gentry families as well as the scattered communities of refugee population faithful to Daoism that partially prompted the adoption of Daoism by the Tuoba-Wei. The Celestial Masters, on the other hand, gained the beneWts of imperial patronage, recognition of their hereditary traditions, and, last but not least, support in their Wght against unorthodox and potentially rebellious religious groups that threatened Celestial Master dominance at the local community level. The same close interrelation between the spread of Daoist traditions and sociopolitical interests can be observed in the southern part of the empire. Here it was above all the conXict between autonomous local religious traditions, on one hand, and forced political subordination of the leading southern families under the dominance of the e´migre´ aristocracy, on the other hand, that provided the background to the appearance of a new corpus of revelatory scriptures in the fourth century. The essential feature of these revelations, called Maoshan revelations after the mountain on which they were kept by a southern family of court oYcials named Xu, was their promise of access to higher celestial regions and to more powerful heavenly intermediaries than had hitherto been available. The southern origin of the texts was reassurance for the southern elite that their lack of temporal political power was outweighed by their privileged access to spiritual riches.44 44

Strickmann 1977.

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A model for the relationship between worldly ruler and religious teacher quite diVerent from the one just mentioned was developed in the southern dynasties, under the rulership of Liang Emperor Wu (r. 502–49), reportedly one of the greatest patrons Buddhism ever saw in China. This was a model which combined the roles of both secular ruler and religious sage/teacher in one person, the emperor. Since the Eastern Jin ruler Xiaowudi (r. 372–96) had received as the Wrst Chinese emperor in the year 381 the lay precepts,45 the inXuence of Buddhism had grown constantly at the court. Most emperors showed themselves at least interested in the Indian religion and were willing to provide imperial support. Yet, the Wrst and only monarch in the south who raised Buddhism to the state religion, who assigned the Buddhist rituals an oYcial status, and who allowed himself to be addressed in throne submissions as ‘imperial Bodhisattva’ (huangdi pusa), was Liang Wudi.46 In his more than forty-year-long reign Buddhism in the south experienced its largest bloom. After the example of famous Indian king As´oka, Wudi build numerous temples, erected stupas, held Su¯tra-lectures, and joined altogether four times a monastery as simple servant (527, 529, 546, and 547), a duty from which his oYcials had to redeem him each time with tremendous sums.47 On 7 May 504, the emperor issued an edict, in which he renounced Daoism, the favored religion within his family since generations, and avowed himself to Buddhism.

45

Zu¨rcher 1959, 151. Jansen 2000, 211–22. The Northern Wei continued to see the emperor himself as a Tatha-gata (i.e. Buddha), while the southern ruler understood himself as the worldly patron of Buddhism and as cakravartin (zhuanlun wang), a ‘king who lets the wheels [of his chariot] roll [everywhere without obstruction]’. Southern Buddhists considered the northern teaching heterodox. Wright 1957, 99. 47 The statement that Wudi compared himself to As´oka can be found—mostly without source references—in diVerent summary representations, e.g. Chen 1964, 125. However, I have no knowledge of any text, in which the emperor refers directly and explicitly to As´oka. Nevertheless, several implicit references to the model of the Indian king support such an interpretation: (1) Wudi’s ‘Duan jiurou wen’ (‘Abandonment of the consumption of wine and meat’), in which the emperor presents himself as worldly protector of the teaching and simultaneously provides a personal testimony of his own religiosity; (2) the fact that As´oka’s relics were worshipped in the Liang; (3) the development of the King As´oka Temple through Wudi in the year of 522. See Nan shi 78/1954–6; Liang shu 54/790. However, archeology delivers a strong piece of evidence for As´oka’s function as a model in China. Liang Wudi had columns erected at the graveside of his father, of which there were no models in China but they point towards an apparent similarity with the As´oka-columns, as the Chinese archeologist Zhu Xizu already determined in 1935. Buddhist pilgrim monk Faxian (d. 422) could be the possible intermediator for this foreign column form into China. He reports in his Foguo ji (Report about the Buddhist Countries) about the As´oka-columns and possibly drew them. Kieser 2002, 147–8. 46

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The picture that Liang Wudi sketches of himself in this document is that of a future world ruler (falun wang) and large patron of the teachings. This ruler ideal diVered in substantial points from that of the traditional Confucian monarch. In Confucian understanding, the ruler was the exclusive center of the cosmos, the indispensable intermediary between Heaven, Earth, and Man. Beyond that, he was the instructor of the people, who ‘transformed by instruction’ (jiaohua) his subjects, if possible with benignity but also with great severity. In contrast, Wudi presented himself in the light of the compassionate rescuer, who stood protectively at the side of countless beings in his realm and accompanied them on their way to salvation. Their way to salvation was also his own way, whereby the monarch became the ally on the search for enlightenment and quasi-assumed the warranty for reaching it. The formerly ‘lonely’ ruler whose isolation (and inaccessibility) is linguistically expressed in the choice of the ruler’s self-designations—guaren, literally ‘the bereft one’, or gu, ‘the orphaned’—as also in the address by his subjects—bixia, ‘the one who is addressed via an intermediary standing on the lowest step of the stairs’—becomes through Liang Wudi an approachable ruler. This becomes further apparent with regard to the emperor’s conscious violation of an otherwise sanctiWed taboo: the public announcement of the personal name of the monarch. One of the most eVective means of public propaganda of the new imperial self-image was the orientation of religious mass events at which the believers, clerics as well as laity, gathered to confess their sins, to make solemn Buddhist promises, as well as to ask blessings for their deceased family members or themselves. The most signiWcant event of this kind happened on 22 May 519. On this day, Buddha’s birthday, Wudi received the ordination as Bodhisattva (shou pusa jie). Beyond that, altogether 48,000 men and women ought to have vowed solemnly to Buddhism, among them the entire imperial family ‘from the crown prince to the concubine of the princes, as well as clerics, literati and common people’.48 Wudi’s Bodhisattva-ordination was essentially a political act, through which the emperor united the secular as well as the sacred realm symbolically under his all-encompassing rule. At the same time, he broke the power of the Sangha, the Buddhist clergy, his biggest rival as far as spiritual authority was concerned, by opposing the inXuence of the religious specialists with the Maha-ya-nistic promise of a fast and universal salvation of all beings through the assistance of a Bodhisattva emperor.49 48 Xu Gaoseng zhuan 6/469b. With exception of a laconic remark in Nan shi (6/197), there are no hints in the oYcial dynastic histories to this important event. 49 See Janousch 1999, 133–40.

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Two aspects deserve special attention here. The Wrst concerns the open character of the meeting, which is described already by its name: ‘large unlimited gathering’ (wuzhe dahui). Liang Wudi held large gatherings with similar designations in regular intervals up to three times a year. They were truly cosmic gatherings, which included even the most hidden angle of the universe, as well as those people who lived under foreign leadership in the north. Long before the realm was actually reunited Wudi had already established an eVective spiritual rule over all of China. The second aspect concerns the fact of the abolition of all traditional hierarchies and/or taboos in at least the wuzhe dahui of 519. This involved, Wrstly, the seating order during these assemblies, in which no privilege was granted to the emperor, but every participant took the seat he or she deemed appropriate, and, secondly, the temporary suspension of the name taboo to the eVect that the emperor referred to himself by his personal name, a practice unthinkable outside a Buddhist context. What appears at Wrst sight as a reduction of the imperial authority proves, after careful consideration, the stabilization of the direct rule of the monarch over each of his individual subjects. A rule that was mediated neither by the members of the aristocracy, nor by the Buddhist clergy or by the oYcials. The immediate relationship between the ruler and each of his subjects was further intensiWed by the transfer of the ‘merit’ (gongde) the emperor had earned through good deeds to his subjects. The individual subject thus stood not only in a personal relationship with the monarch but this relationship resembles that of a creditor to a debtor. ‘[T]he greatest responsibility lies with the one who has the most merit and to whom the greatest debt is owed, that is to the Emperor. Thus, a social hierarchy can be palpably represented in the assembly ritual as a spiritual hierarchy, elevating the emperor to the highest position.’50

C ON C LU D I N G T H OU G H T S In the preceding pages I have hinted at some of the major religious and philosophical developments and themes I consider inXuential in the reconstitution of the Chinese realm between ad 200 and 600. It is beyond the scope of this paper to summarize the long-term eVects these developments had. Nevertheless, it seems worthwhile to repeat a few points which help us to direct our view away from the losses that resulted from the disintegration of 50

Janousch 1999, 144.

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the Han to the innovations that fundamentally shaped the history of the later Chinese empires. To be sure, the religious and philosophical developments I have outlined were initially born out of the chaos and the struggles caused by the disintegration of the Han order and it is certainly correct that the ‘shadow of the Han’ loomed large over both parts of the divided realm. However, in spite of all detectable continuities the intellectual trends discussed above were more than simply an attempt to re-create the empire of the Han. In the four centuries that constitute the temporal frame of this paper we see the formation of a Chinese culture vastly enriched through hitherto unknown regional cultures drawn into the Chinese cultural orbit as a result of the realm’s southward expansion. The impact of the arrival of Buddhism in China on all areas of Chinese intellectual and material life is so tremendous that it cannot be overestimated. The challenge of the foreign religion stimulated Chinese explorations into the nature of the native Chinese language and script without which neither the development of Tang poetry nor the modern Chinese vernacular are imaginable. The existence of a fully developed Buddhist canon of religious scriptures provided the model for the collection and canonization of Daoist texts and was thus instrumental for the development of Daoist institutional structures and self-identity, thereby laying the basis for the continued rivalry between these two religions and Confucianism for imperial patronage and support. Finally, the extension of indigenous Chinese notions of emperorship through the introduction of the concept of the bodhisattva-emperor oVered an additional source of imperial legitimation and self-representation that later rulers did draw upon.51 As a result, the history of the third to sixth centuries provides an important example of both an empire’s resilience in dealing with collapse and its ability to rethink itself. References Bala´zs, E´tienne, ‘Entre re´volte nihiliste et e´vasion mystique: les courant intellectuels en Chine au IIIe sie`cle de notre e`re’, Asiatische Studien, 2 (1948), 27–55. Bauer, Wolfgang, Geschichte der chinesischen Philosophie: Konfuzianismus, Daoismus, Buddhismus. Mu¨nchen (Beck) 2001. Berkowitz, Alan J., Patterns of Disengagement: The Practice and Portrayal of Reclusion in Early Medieval China. Stanford (Stanford University Press) 2002. Bol, Peter K., ‘This Culture of Ours’: Intellectual Transition in T’ang and Sung China. Stanford (Stanford University Press) 1992. Campany, Robert F., ‘Living OV the Books: Fifty Ways to Dodge Ming in Early Medieval China’, in: Christopher Lupke (ed.), The Magnitude of Ming: Command,

51

Farquhar 1978.

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Allotment, and Fate in Chinese Culture, Honolulu (University of Hawai’i Press) 2005, 129–50. Chen, Kenneth, Buddhism in China. Princeton (Princeton University Press) 1964. Cheng, Anne, Histoire de la pense´e chinoise. Paris (E´ditions du Seuil) 1997. Declercq, Dominique, Writing against the State: Political Rhetorics in Third and Fourth Century China. Leiden (Brill) 1998. Farquhar, David M., ‘Emperor as Bodhisattva in the Governance of the Ch’ing Empire’, Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 38 (1978), 5–34. Friedrich, Michael, ‘Hsu¨an-hsu¨eh: Studien zur spekulativen Richtung in der Geistesgeschichte der Wei-Chin-Zeit (3.-4. Jahrhundert)’, Ph.D. thesis (Ludwig Maximilians Universita¨t Mu¨nchen) 1984. Holcombe, Charles, In the Shadow of the Han: Literati Thought and Society at the Beginning of the Southern Dynasties. Honolulu (University of Hawai’i Press) 1994. —— ‘Re-imagining China: The Chinese Identity Crisis at the Start of the Southern Dynasties Period’, Journal of the American Oriental Society, 115: 1 (1995), 1–14. Holzman, Donald, ‘Les Sept Sages de la Foreˆt des Bambous et la socie´te´ de leur temps’, T’oung Pao, 44 (1956), 317–46. Holzman, Donald, La Vie et pense´e de Hsi K’ang. Leiden (Brill) 1957. Janousch, Andreas, ‘The Emperor as Bodhisattva: The Bodhisattva Ordination and Ritual Assemblies of Emperor Wu of the Liang Dynasty’, in: Joseph P. McDermott (ed.), State and Court Ritual in China, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1999, 112–49. ¨ Ventlichkeit im fru¨hmittelalterlichen China: Debatten im Jansen, Thomas, Ho¨Wsche O Salon des Prinzen Xiao Ziliang. Freiburg i.Br. (Rombach) 2000. Kieser, Annette, Landadel—Emigranten—Emporko¨mmlinge: Familienfriedho¨fe des 3.-6. Jahrhunderts n.Chr. in Su¨dchina. Wiesbaden (Harrassowitz) 2002. Kleeman, Terry, Great Perfection: Religion and Ethnicity in a Chinese Millennial Kingdom. Honolulu (University of Hawai’i Press) 1998. Knapp, Keith N., SelXess OVspring: Filial Children and Social Order in Medieval China. Honolulu (University of Hawai’i Press) 2005. Lewis, Mark E., Writing and Authority in Early China. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1999. Lunheng 論衡. Lunheng jiaoshi 論衡校釋, 4 vols., by Huang Hui 黃暉. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1990. Mather, Richard B. (trans.), Shih-shuo Hsin-yu¨: A New Account of Tales of the World. Minneapolis (University of Minnesota Press) 1976. —— ‘K’ou Ch’ien-chih and the Taoist Theocracy at the Northern Wei Court, 425– 451’, in: Holmes Welch and Anna Seidel (eds.), Facets of Taoism: Essays in Chinese Religion, New Haven (Yale University Press) 1979, 103–22. Nylan, Michael, ‘Confucian Piety and Individualism in Han China’, Journal of the American Oriental Society, 116: 1 (1996), 1–27. —— The Five ‘Confucian’ Classics. New Haven/London (Yale University Press) 2001.

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Qian, Nanxiu, Spirit and Self in Medieval China: The ‘Shishuo xinyu’ and Its Legacy. Honolulu (University of Hawai’i Press) 2001. Seidel, Anna, ‘The Image of the Perfect Ruler in Early Taoist Messianism: Lao-tzu and Li Hung’, History of Religions, 9: 2/3 (1969/70), 216–47. —— ‘Imperial Treasures and Taoist Sacraments: Taoist Roots in the Apocrypha’, in: Michael Strickmann (ed.), Tantric and Taoist Studies in Honour of R. A. Stein, vol. ii, Bruxelles (Me´langes Chinois et Bouddhiques, 21) 1983, 291–371. Seiwert, Hubert, ‘Health and Salvation in Early Daoism: On the Anthropology and Cosmology of the Taiping Jing’, in: A. I. Baumgarten, J. Assmann, and G. G. Stroumsa (eds.), Self, Soul and Body in Religious Experience, Leiden (Brill) 1998, 256–75. —— Popular Religious Movements and Heterodox Sects in Chinese History. Leiden (Brill) 2003. Shishuo xinyu 世說新語. Shishuo xinyu jiaojian 世說新語校箋, 2 vols., by Xu Zhen’e 徐震堮. Beijing (Zhonghua) 1984. Strickmann, Michel, ‘The Mao Shan Revelations: Taoism and the Aristocracy’, T’oung Pao, 63 (1977), 1–64. Wagner, Rudolf G., Language, Ontology, and Political Philosophy in China: Wang Bi’s Scholarly Exploration of the Dark (Xuanxue). Albany (State University of New York Press) 2003. Wenxuan 文 選. Repr. Taibei (Zhengzhong) 1971. Wright, Arthur F., ‘The Formation of Sui Ideology, 581–604’, in: John K. Fairbank (ed.), Chinese Thought and Institutions, Chicago (University of Chicago Press) 1957, 71–104. Wu, Fusheng, The Poetics of Decadence: Chinese Poetry of the Southern Dynasties and Late Tang Periods. Albany (State University of New York Press) 1998. Xu Gaoseng zhuan 續高僧傳. Edn. Taisho¯ shinshu¯ daizo¯ kyo¯ 大正新修大藏經, vol. 50. Zhuangzi zhu 莊子注. Sibu beiyao 四部備要 edn. Zu¨rcher, Erik, The Buddhist Conquest of China: The Spread and Adaptation of Buddhism in Early Medieval China, 2 vols. Leiden (Brill) 1959.

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Epilogue Achim Mittag (Tu¨bingen) and Fritz-Heiner Mutschler (Dresden)

As indicated in the Preface, our volume was laid out in such a way that the comparative aspect has already been addressed, if only indirectly, in the pairing of the papers for each topic, thus freeing contributors from drawing explicit comparisons, and hence from making forays into unfamiliar Welds of specialized knowledge. Accordingly, there have been only occasional directly comparative remarks. Readers themselves must, however, have noticed many parallels and diVerences; and in the following we want brieXy to indicate particular avenues of comparison. We will start by surveying the eight pairs of papers grouped according to certain thematic criteria. Then we will discuss our Wndings with regard to the periodization scheme underlying the organization of the volume. We will conclude with some thoughts on possible topics of further research.

1. THEMATIC REVIEW OF THE EIGHT PA IRS OF PAPERS Here we will consider three areas of comparison. First, we will look at the development of the idea of ‘empire’ both in the period prior to the formation of empire and in the period of its decline—where the scope of the two papers concerned goes far beyond political thought. Second, we turn to the central focus of our research interests—historiography—to discuss how the imperial order and its historical development were viewed and conceptualized in works of history writing as symbolizations of reality that are for generic reasons particularly close to the factual history they describe. Finally, for the period of the empires’ heyday, we will review the representation and reXection of the imperial order in other media of symbolization. References are kept to a minimum throughout the following remarks; references to papers in this volume are given by the author’s (authors’) name(s) and page numbers only.

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Theoretical as these distinctions may appear to the outsider, the reader of this volume will already have recognized how they relate to the eight pairs of papers: the Wrst to the opening triad (Dihle 1 Zhu–Nylan) and the closing pair (O’Daly 1 Jansen), the second to the three pairs on historiography (Pines 1 Huang/Mutschler; Mutschler 1 Mittag; Ga¨rtner/Ye 1 Mittag/Ye), and, Wnally, the third to the pairs on geography and cartography, inscriptions, and art and architecture from the middle section of the volume (SchmidtGlintzer 1 Clarke; Kern 1 Witschel; Schneider 1 Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens).

(a) ‘Empire’ in political thought and social negotiations (Dihle 1 Zhu–Nylan; O’Daly 1 Jansen) The temporal scope of the opening triplet of papers is striking in its congruity: Albrecht Dihle starts out with the Persian Wars in 490 and 480/79 bc and ends with the two most renowned teachers of Greek and Latin rhetoric holding the consulate together in ad 143. On the Chinese side, Zhu Weizheng begins with the turbulent years before Confucius’ death in 479 bc and Michael Nylan ends by referring to a ‘rhapsody’ (fu) by the poet Zhang Heng (ad 78–139) in which competing images of an ideal ruler are incorporated into one ritual performance. Given this, can we conclude that the unfolding of the idea of empire and its materialization proceeded in Rome and ancient China along similar trajectories? From war and chaos to unity and harmony? Nothing could be further from the truth. To begin with the West, there are two quintessential principles of organizing the body politic spelled out in Dihle’s paper: ‘city’ and ‘empire’. ‘City’ refers to the Greek Polis, the selfgoverning community of free citizens; ‘empire’ denotes the early oriental empires, in particular the rule of the Persian Great Kings and, closer in time to Rome, the realm of Alexander. The Roman Empire combined and integrated these two principles. Next there is the fact that the Roman Empire was preceded by the highly developed Greek culture, which the Romans gradually absorbed, transformed, and variously merged with their own tradition. Finally, there were mighty foes in Italy and beyond, whom Rome had to confront and conquer one by one, before she was able to establish her supremacy in the Mediterranean world. In ancient China, by contrast, there was only one principle of rulership: monarchy.1 Further, there was no rivaling cultural tradition. Within the Zhou realm and following the so-called late Western Zhou ‘ritual reform’ (c. mid-10th–mid-9th cents. bc) a remarkable uniformity with respect to social patterns and the code of social communication developed over more or 1

Zhu, esp. 33–5.

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less the entire Zhou cultural sphere,2 which reached further than the commonwealth of loosely allied states of the Central Plains (Zhongyuan). Finally, in the period which is at issue here, i.e. the Warring States period (c.480–221 bc), there was no foreign power able to pose a signiWcant threat to the Zhou ecumene and the emerging empire. The implications of these fundamental diVerences are so vast that all subsequent diVerences, observed in the course of reviewing the following seven pairs of papers, can be related to them. To focus our discussions, we want to single out three such implications, of crucial importance in the overall context of this volume: First, as Dihle reminds us, a major constituent element of the self-governing Greek communities were the—written—laws. Laws induced self-pride among the citizens of the Poleis.3 They further eVected a ‘democratization’, in the sense that citizens were made equal before the law, an idea which, in the second century ad, Aelius Aristides took up to claim that the Roman Empire was a democracy.4 As to the philosophical discourse in ancient China, Nylan discusses the ideal of an eVective working of laws, whose execution, once promulgated, lay in the hands of oYcials and clerks, thereby allowing the ruler to detach himself from the routine aVairs of government. However, this ideal carried the stain of ‘Legalist’ thought and, hence, was later denounced.5 What prevailed was the conception of the ruler, the Son of Heaven (tianzi), holding the Mandate of Heaven (tianming) and thus occupying the nodal point between Heaven and Earth, from where he was to bring natural processes and worldly aVairs into harmony with the cosmic order. Essential for upholding this key position for the king and the ruling house were not laws but rituals and sacriWcial oVerings. Secondly, in both the Greco-Roman and the ancient Chinese world, debates revolving around the best form of government played a great role, with a paramount and long-lasting eVect on Western and Chinese political ethics in general. Yet two major diVerences cannot be overlooked: One is that in ancient Greece and Rome the alternative models discussed included wholly diVerent constitutions such as monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy, while 2 Falkenhausen characterizes the ‘dual expansion’ of the Zhou ritual system, i.e. a horizontal expansion to encompass an ever vaster territory paired with a vertical expansion to encompass ever more segments of the social hierarchy, as ‘the most signiWcant long-term development in the social history of China during the Wrst millennium bc’; Falkenhausen, Lothar von, Chinese Society in the Age of Confucius (1000–250 bc): The Archaeological Evidence. Los Angeles (Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California) 2006, 402. 3 Dihle, 6–8. 4 Dihle, 23–5. 5 The traditional classiWcation of ‘schools’ of thought in ancient China has variously been subjected to criticism in recent scholarship.

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in ancient China, as Zhu and Nylan show, only problematic issues inherent to monarchical rule were debated, never its existence per se. Another equally important issue concerns the environment in which these debates took place: in ancient Greece and in the Roman Republic in the market-place and the Senate respectively, that is in competition with other voices and attended by an interested and critical public. The location of these debates in ancient China was, by contrast, the royal court, among a small circle of ministers and political advisors and adventurers, addressing the king and deferring to his rulings.6 We see a third crucial diVerence in the role of conquest and expansion in the self-perception of the ruling elites. In Rome, just as earlier in the ancient Near East and for Alexander, the subjugation of peoples and nations was a fundamental factor in legitimizing rule.7 Phenomenal Roman expansion, from a paltry settlement on the banks of the Tiber to an imperial power that eventually surpassed the empire of Alexander, powered by the esteem of ‘prowess’ (virtus) and a keen desire for glory and booty, generated among Romans a steadfast feeling of identity. This contrasts starkly with the conception of Zhou kingship, with its Wxation upon the Zhou royal house’s receiving of the Heavenly Mandate to overthrow, not to conquer, the preceding Shang dynasty (16th–11th cents. bc).8 Expansion did take place under the Western Zhou—primarily directed south toward the Yangtze valley. Ending in a unique military and political disaster, this movement was later tabooed and subsequently reinterpreted as a ‘moral transformation’ (jiaohua).9 Thereafter, the symbol of ruling All-under-Heaven (tianxia) was, characteristically, not the sword, but the zither (qin). As is said of the sage emperor Shun, ‘Shun played the zither and All-under-Heaven was brought to harmony’.10 The Gerard O’Daly and Thomas Jansen papers convey an impression quite the reverse of the opening triplet of papers—of intriguing parallels between the Roman and Han and post-Han China empires against the background of the severe crises with which both were confronted: the former in the third century (although to a far lesser degree than has previously been assumed) and then from the last quarter of the fourth century down to the deposing of the last emperor in ad 476; the latter in several phases covering the 400 years of early medieval China (c.200–600).

6

This is an aspect to which G. E. R. Llyod has rightly given special emphasis throughout his stimulating studies (cf. Preface, xv n. 14). 7 Dihle, 12 and 19. 8 Zhu, 30. 9 Mittag, 452–3. For the concept of ‘moral transformation’ in Han thought, see Nylan, 47. 10 Shi ji 24/1197.

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In both cases ‘barbarian’ tribes at the fringes of the empire caused serious trouble; yet in both cases these troubles could temporarily be overcome by allowing tribes willing to cooperate to settle within imperial borders. However, this could not prevent other ‘barbarian’ tribes from sacking the capitals: Luoyang in ad 311, Rome in ad 410. Both empires moreover suVered division: in post-Han China into the Northern and Southern Dynasties, in Rome into the western and eastern parts of the empire. However, as O’Daly and Jansen remind us, in both cases there were periods which witnessed relative stability and restoration of former vigor: in Rome under Diocletian and Constantine (284–337); in post-Han China in the Wrst decades of the Western Jin dynasty after the empire’s successful reuniWcation in 265. In addition, it must be remembered that the Eastern Roman Empire continued until 1453, while in China the empire was reunited in the late sixth century, under the Sui dynasty (581–618), and, apart from a short interruption between 907 and 960, continued down to 1911. Yet beneath the surface of these evident parallels in terms of factual history there lie more signiWcant similarities relating to social patterns and mentalities. Among the members of the upper echelons of both Roman and Chinese societies there developed a discourse deploring decadence and the loss of traditional values which served as an interpretational framework to explain the experiences of crisis. However, as O’Daly shows, in Rome this was a part of a moralizing discourse, already pervasive since the Wrst century bc.11 In China, as Jansen argues, such criticism was mostly voiced retrospectively, after the successful reuniWcation of the empire under the Sui and Tang (618–907) dynasties.12 Another parallel one can observe is the tendency to withdraw from society and retreat into alternative worlds, be these private cults or elitist circles engaging in philosophical debates. In both cases such turning inward witnessed a greater emphasis on ‘care for the self ’—Foucault speaks of ‘souci de soi’—and the emergence of new lifestyle models which favored individualistic, libertarian, and hedonistic behavior.13 On the other hand, the hour of ‘holy men’ had come in both societies. Everywhere rose charismatic religious leaders, magicians, healers, and diviners: ‘masters of techniques’ (fangshi), men with supernatural powers who could work miracles.14 As a consequence,

11

O’Daly, 387–8. Jansen, 401–2. 13 However, both authors, O’Daly, 390–1, and Jansen, 403–5, caution that these tendencies were less pronounced than is asserted in traditional research literature. 14 The phenomenon is, of course, older, but it intensiWes in this period. 12

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biographical and hagiographical writings Xourished in late Roman antiquity and post-Han China alike.15 At the same time, in both empires, with doom predicted or imminent, religious groups and esoteric cults began to mushroom and to play an increasingly important role. Religious movements eventually received imperial sponsorship: Christianity under Constantine; Daoism in the Da-Cheng kingdom in Sichuan (306–47) and temporarily under the Tuoba-Wei (between 425 and 451); Buddhism under Liang Wudi (r. 502–49) and also under the Tuoba-Wei before and after their experiment with a Daoist theocracy. Yet there is at least one decisive diVerence which needs to be noted in the present context. In China, the Daoist Church, which emerged in post-Han China, sought to Wll the vacuum left after the demise of the house of Han by recreating, on the spiritual level and in the organization of the Daoist pantheon and the Daoist priesthood, the Han imperial system. A step further in the direction of transforming this imperial system was undertaken by Liang Wudi, who made Buddhism the state religion in the south, in adopting the Buddhist idea of the ‘wheel-turning king’ (cakravartin)—the idea of an approachable ruler in the role of the compassionate rescuer of a people seeking salvation. Combining the roles of the secular ruler and the religious sage in his own person, Liang Wudi thus projected himself as an ‘imperial Bodhisattva’ (huangdi pusa).16 This contrasts with the West, where Christian communities grew from the bottom up, providing an alternative sense of community that even superseded the traditional Greek and Roman attachment to Polis and res publica. The emerging Christian Church, built around the bishops who combined the functions of teacher, social counselor, and administrator, thus developed a structure that could withstand its absorption into the imperial system. Apart from this organizational aspect, there is another equally important aspect: the rise of Judaeo-Christian monotheism. Monotheism contributed to developing a culture in which the ‘orthopraxy’ that for so long had held sway in the Roman Empire was gradually transformed into ‘orthodoxy’. Above all, this meant that opinions which did not conform with the one truth promulgated by the church were persecuted as ‘heretical’.17 With this monotheistic ‘fundamentalism’ and the radical ‘otherworldliness’ of Christian religion, the rise of the Church posed a profound challenge to the Roman state, with far-reaching consequences for the occidental idea of ‘empire’ and ‘emperor’ in the long run. In the vanguard were the Christian martyrs. As O’Daly points out, martyrdom was a speciWc phenomenon of 15

O’Daly, 388–9; Mittag and Ye, 355.

16

Jansen, 414–6.

17

O’Daly, 384–5.

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Greco-Roman urban culture.18 Small wonder that martyrdom in this form was completely unknown to post-Han China. Long-term change in the concept of emperorship is also clearly preWgured in Augustine, who radically separated the transient worldly empire from the eternal City of God. In his Confessions we have, moreover, a unique literary work revealing the author’s intensive quest for redemption of sins and salvation. Although the question of how to transcend the ‘supra-individual guilt connection’ was also addressed in Daoism and Buddhism,19 the Confessions, in its radical departure from established patterns, goes further than any ego-document in early medieval China.

(b) Historiography (Pines 1 Huang/Mutschler; Mutschler 1 Mittag; Mittag/Ye 1 Ga¨rtner/Ye) Recent research in various Welds of study has revealed the central importance of historical consciousness to any polity’s inner coherence and stability. This certainly holds true for the two empires under discussion. Hence, three of our pairs are dedicated to historiography and other history-oriented narratives. In spite of an array of other forms and practices of collective memory, such works still constitute the most signiWcant sources for the historical consciousness of ancient Chinese and Roman society. From early, i.e. pre-imperial, times, both societies produced a number of works which, by recording the course of events and oVering reXections upon it, helped shape the collective mind and enhance the durability of the political order. Some of these works are discussed in the three pairs of papers, which relate to each of our three periods. To highlight the major results of these papers, we will (1) look at the social contexts of the works concerned, (2) comment on the historical outlook of their authors, and (3) examine the extent to which they contributed to the stability of their respective polities. (1) The social context in which the Chinese works of history writing were produced shows an amazing homogeneity over time. The context is always a political one—with ‘political’ to be understood, in the formative age of Chinese scriptural culture, as relating to the sphere of ritual communication with the ruling house’s ancestral deities in form of liturgy, sacriWcial oVerings, and divination. In this sphere political decision making took place, at Wrst at the royal court of the Western Zhou, and later also at the princely courts of the territorial states of the Spring and Autumn period (722–481 bc). The earliest texts referred to by Yuri Pines in his paper—bronze 18

O’Daly, 384.

19

Jansen, 410.

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inscriptions from the second half of the Western Zhou period (mid-10th–8th cents. bc)—clearly belong to this sphere.20 From there rose in the Spring and Autumn Period a caste of scribes and court oYcials with expert knowledge in rituals and liturgy. From this caste, in turn, came Wrst the ‘wandering gentlemen’ (youshi) and ‘traveling counselors’ (jichen) of the Warring States period (c.480–221 bc) such as Confucius and Mencius and second those experts in ritual and textual scholarship who were sometimes aYliated to statesponsored ‘academies’ and who can be regarded as the forerunners of the ‘classicists’ (Ru) of imperial times.21 Practically all texts which have come down to us from the pre-Qin period—most going through many hands, although eventually being attributed to a single ‘author’—originated in this milieu. So does the Shi ji (The Records of the Grand Historian) by Sima Qian, who succeeded to his father’s position of ‘Grand Historian’ (taishi), an oYce that encompassed a wide range of obligations at the imperial court, such as calendar making and the organization of important rituals and cults. Specialization in record keeping and history writing developed under the Han dynasty, a process epitomized by Ban Gu, whose Han shu became the model of dynastic history. Coming to the third period of early medieval China, we can observe that all the works treated here were written by historians who either held an oYcial position at court and thus had access to the imperial library cum archives (Chen Shou; Wei Shou),22 or who were intent on submitting their works to the throne, be it to interfere in an ongoing political debate (Xi Zuochi), or in the hope of advancing their careers (Fan Ye). In Rome, too, the authors of historiographical works and historical narratives of other genres were connected with the political sphere, but the relationship was diVerent from that in China and, in the course of time, did not become closer, but on the contrary, with other constellations gaining importance, more remote. The Wrst historical records, of which we know, the Annals of the Pontifex Maximus, belonged to the politico-religious sphere.23 However, unlike in China, this did not lead to history writing as a governmental task. Instead, historiography in the proper sense of the word came into being as and remained a private aVair. Though it is true that the Wrst Roman historians came from the senatorial class, i.e. were men who had held oYce and knew the business of politics Wrst hand, they wrote history on their own initiative, in their otium, often the otium of retirement at old age. The case of 20

Pines, 69–71. Pines, 74; for the ‘classicists’ in Qin and Han times, see also Kern, 217 and 219–21, and Nylan, 41. 22 It should be noted that Wei Shou was even oYcially appointed to write the dynastic history of the Tuoba-Wei dynasty; see Mittag and Ye, 363. 23 Huang and Mutschler, 95. In the course of the second half of the 2nd cent. bc the Annals of the Pontifex were discontinued. 21

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the authors of the Wrst historical epics, was diVerent again. They were of much lower social standing than the contemporary historians, the Wrst not even Roman by birth. But through their aristocratic patrons—all important politicians—they too were connected to the res publica, at least indirectly. At the end of the republic and in the early principate things became even more diversiWed.24 Sallust gave up politics and pursued historiography as his main business. Livy had never sought public oYce, but later became connected to the imperial household. The leading poets of the time were prote´ge´s of Augustus’ conWdant Maecenas, but men of intellectual stature and independence. Velleius, a follower of Tiberius, was a former professional soldier, whereas Tacitus, living two generations later, still represented the old type of independent senatorial historian. The picture in late antiquity is still more varied.25 Ammianus Marcellinus, a former army oYcer of Greek birth, preferred to write in Latin in the vein of traditional Roman historiography. Then there were provincial rhetors and imperial oYcials, both pagan and Christians, and, Wnally, the Christian clergy: presbyters and bishops. These social contexts were much more heterogeneous than the Chinese,26 which had consequences for the contents of the historical works. (2) What, then, can be said about the historical outlook of these authors? How do they reXect upon the course of events and, in particular, how do they view and evaluate emperors and empire? Concerning the Chinese side, evidence of the origin and early usage of the notion of tianxia, ‘All-under-Heaven’, is scant.27 However, at least from the Warring States period onward, long before the actual uniWcation under Qin Shihuangdi in 221 bc, this notion stands out clearly against the great variety of terms and notions in vogue in the manifold discourses of the ‘Hundred Schools’ (baijia).28 Being closely connected with the Zhou kingship model, according to which the Heavenly Mandate (tianming) was given to the king, the Son of Heaven (tianzi), to rule over the ‘Four Directions’ (sifang) and ‘Ten-thousand States’ (wanbang),29 it reverberates with the ideal of a uniWed, ordered world, in which peace and harmony prevail because ‘rites, music, and military command in punitive expeditions proceed from the Son of Heaven’ 24

Huang and Mutschler, 106–9, and Mutschler, 138–40. Cf. the paper by Ga¨rtner and Ye. 26 There were a Xourishing Buddhist and Daoist historiography and hagiography in early medieval China (cf. Mittag and Ye, 355); however, the concept of history underlying this kind of history writing was oriented toward the state-oYcial historiography. 27 Pines, 70–1, points out that there is no unquestionable evidence of the idea of All-underHeaven from Western Zhou bronze inscriptions. 28 Nylan, 44–8. 29 These notions already occur on Western Zhou bronze inscriptions; see Pines, 70. 25

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(Lunyu 16.2). The First Emperor’s inscriptions, in opposing tianxia in this sense of the well-ordered world under a uniWed rule to the disorder and chaos caused by the endless warfare among the ‘Six Kingdoms’, attest to this emphatic understanding of ‘All-under-Heaven’. The idea of All-under-Heaven has provided a conceptual framework of historiography from Sima Qian and Ban Gu onwards.30 Its main theme, as Mencius put it, was the constant alternation of ‘order’ (zhi) and ‘chaos’ (luan).31 Accordingly, both historians, Sima Qian and Ban Gu, show a genuine interest in governance and the proper administration of the realm under normal conditions. Since the history of the turbulent Warring States period and the civil war in the wake of the Qin dynasty’s collapse takes up a large part of Sima Qian’s accounts, it is not surprising that warfare is a theme that is given more weight in Shi ji than in Han shu. Nevertheless, even in Shi ji the primary focus is on ‘warfare of the mind’, not on actual Wghting in battles. Moreover, Sima Qian is strongly opposed to Han Wudi’s (r. 141–87 bc) expansionist policies, being even more pronounced in his criticism than Ban Gu. Both historians give equal praise to the policy of rapprochement inaugurated by Emperor Wendi (r. 180–157 bc ),32 seeing his reign as coming close to achieving the supreme ideal of ‘Great Peace’, taiping, an ideal which in the ‘Prefaces’ to the Odes was closely associated with the Zhou rule in the era of the Zhou dynasty’s founding. Even after the fall of the Han, the idea of the uniWed empire was never abandoned.33 For Chen Shou, writing the history of the Three Kingdoms (220–65), this period of division was only an intermezzo before the empire’s reuniWcation, which actually occurred in his lifetime. Xi Zuochi, discussing the problematic issue of legitimate dynastic succession, declared the realization of the uniWed empire to be the ultimate criterion of a dynasty’s legitimacy. Fan Ye, advocating a pragmatic approach to current aVairs and cautioning against military action, held to reuniWcation as a long-term project. Finally, Wei Shou, denigrating the Southern dynasties as ‘island barbarians’, treated the Tuoba-Wei dynasty as the true successor of the Han house’s rule over All-under-Heaven. Turning to Rome, we see more diVerences than similarities vis-a`-vis the Chinese case, despite the obvious convergences in the central period. Whereas in China the idea of tianxia was intensively discussed long before the uniWcation of the empire, in Rome ideas of empire and imperial rule developed only 30

See the paper by Mittag. ‘It has been a long time since the realm (tianxia) came into being; (since then) there has been order and then chaos.’ (Mengzi 3B.9.) 32 33 Mutschler, 127–8. Mittag and Ye, esp. 348–9. 31

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with the emergence of the historical phenomenon itself.34 From early on, successful wars and the ensuing increase of power played an important role in Rome’s collective memory. Consequently, these themes received full attention in the Wrst historical narratives in prose and poetry. As can be observed by scrutinizing the fragments of these texts, in the course of time the Romans became increasingly aware of the mounting scale of their military undertakings. But it was the Greek historian Polybius who, shortly before the middle of the second century bc, for the Wrst time (as far as we know) stated explicitly that the Romans had conquered and were ruling ‘almost all the inhabited world’.35 Before long the Romans got accustomed to this idea, so that in the Wrst century bc everyone considered it as self-evident. Most took pride in Rome’s worldwide power, which was considered the proper reward of Roman virtus. However, there were at least some individual Romans who had already given thought to the consequences for the ruled, and who recognized the possible threat posed by the abuse of power to Roman rule in the long run. Not unrelated to such concerns, a new or subsidiary imperial ideology developed in the course of the Wrst century bc.36 It propounded the idea that the empire, by guaranteeing peace and justice and by spreading civilization and prosperity, contributed to the well-being not only of the rulers but also the ruled. Here the convergence with Chinese imperial thought is obvious, but it should not be overlooked that the traditional view, which considered the continuing expansion of the imperium through military virtus a value in itself, continued to be shared by many. For part of the Romans the real problem did not consist in a possible ethical deWciency of the empire, but in the monarchical form it had taken on.37 In late antiquity the last point was no longer an issue; in focus were now the empire’s crises and the danger of its disintegration and fall.38 Reaction to this situation was much more diverse than in China.39 Broadly, we can distinguish four groups of authors. First, there were the pagan writers who, despite the Wrst catastrophes they witnessed (defeat of Adrianople in ad 378: Ammianus; sack of Rome in ad 410: Namatianus), still believed in the resilience of Roma aeterna. Second, there were those Christians who considered the Roman Empire an instrument of divine providence, preparing the way for Christianity (Prudentius, Jerome, Orosius et al.). Third, there were other Christian 34

Huang and Mutschler, 95–104 and 110–1. Huang and Mutschler, 102–4. 36 Huang and Mutschler, 105–9, and summarising Mutschler, 137. 37 Huang and Mutschler, 112; Mutschler, 121–3 and 139–40; Witschel, 245–6. 38 Cf. the paper by Ge`rtnus and Ye. 39 This is at least the case on the level of general historiography exclusively dealt with in Mittag and Ye’s paper. 35

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authors who, from a strictly otherworldly standpoint, perceived the empire as just another human, morally deWcient, and transient phenomenon in opposition to the true and eternal realm of God (Augustine et al.). Fourth, there were historians in the Greek east who, after the deposition of the last western emperor, saw in the eastern part a new Roman Empire, that was not taken, however, as the whole of the oikumene (Procopius, John the Lydian). (3) Regarding the question as to what extent the historical narratives discussed actually contributed to the stability of their polities, it is clear that we can do no more than speculate, in the hope that this will encourage further discussion. On the Chinese side, we can safely say that by the Eastern Han dynasty historiography had concluded a ‘pact’ with the imperial state.40 This implies two aspects. First, since the Wrst century ad, from the time when in the Eastern Pavilion work on the dynastic history of the Western Han began, and so long before 629 when the Bureau of Historiography (shiguan) was set up as a permanent oYce of the central government, dynastic history writing was largely a state-sponsored undertaking. Second and more important in the present context, dynastic history writing itself became part of imperial ideology, which centered on the doctrine of ubiquitous correspondences.41 Hence the various monographic treatises on astronomy, the Five Elements, and portents and omens occupied an eminent place in historiography throughout medieval China. Moreover, through historiography the concept of the cosmic order of tianxia was buttressed by the construct of the imagined continuity from the pristine age of the Yellow Emperor down to the present. Here was a powerful pattern with great imaginative appeal to the ruling elites. By historiography the idea of ‘empire’ was transmitted beyond the demise of the Qin/Han empire, not only to following generations of Chinese, but also to non-Chinese peoples in northern China. The most successful among the ‘conquest dynasties’, the Tuoba-Wei, created a uniWed state after the Chinese imperial model, which became the longest-lasting dynasty in the period from Han to Tang. It seems no coincidence that dynastic historiography at the Tuoba-Wei court was taken a decisive step further along the road of institutionalization. The relationship between Roman historical narrative and the Roman state cannot be described as a ‘pact’ in any period. However, though all works were products of private initiative, there was nevertheless a close relationship between history and state, as at least some of the texts undoubtedly strengthened Roman identity and contributed to citizens’ identiWcation with the res 40 41

Summarizing Mittag, 163. Mittag and Ye, esp. 366.

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publica. This applies notably to the earliest historical narratives: the Roman history of Fabius Pictor and the historical epics of Cn. Naevius and Q. Ennius.42 These works, for diVerent reasons, were free from domestic partisanship and concentrated on the common cause.43 Enjoying high prestige (with the epics even becoming ‘school textbooks’) they reached many of the well-to-do, imbuing them with a sense of a common past and with pride in the collective achievements of the Roman state. However, this was certainly not the case with all historical narratives produced in the republican period. Many of them were inXuenced too much by contemporary politics to oVer a ‘national’ discourse. Instead they presented history from a factional standpoint, or with a bias in favor of a certain family or individual. Yet, at the beginning of the principate, Livy and Virgil, both originally outside the political sphere but later on good terms with the princeps, again presented non-partisan and therefore generally compelling accounts of Rome’s history and mission.44 Being widely read, these works soon gained the status of ‘master-narratives’, which they retained, more or less, down to late antiquity. The same cannot be said of any of the ensuing works of historical narrative. One problem was the change from republic to monarchy, which weighed heavily on the minds of many and hindered identiWcation with the state and the simple updating of Rome’s success story.45 Thus the historiographical works of the period were, according to Tacitus, marred either by exaggerated adulation or by exaggerated hatred of individual emperors.46 The diYculties Tacitus himself had with ‘imperial historiography’ are dealt with in Mutschler’s paper. In the last period of the western Roman Empire the traditional view of Roman history still found expression in the work of Ammianus; but there were now others presenting history from very diVerent perspectives.47 That is to say, during the Wnal crises of the imperium Romanum historical narrative had found too many voices to exert binding force and to become a truly stabilizing factor in the unsteadiness of the time.

42

Huang and Mutschler, 96–100. Fabius wrote in Greek and at least in part for a Greek audience to which he wanted to present the Roman cause in a positive light. Thus, there was not too much room for the representation of political inWghting. As to Naevius and Ennius, the epic tradition prevented an intensive description of domestic aVairs, whereas wars were the favorite subject matter of epical poetry—a subject matter which again brought it naturally about to write from a ‘national’ point of view. 44 Huang and Mutschler, 108–9; Mutschler, 130–3 and 138. 45 At least in a footnote it should be pointed out that the most important historical epic of the Wrst century ad, Lucan’s Pharsalia, made the problem of the lost liberty its main topic. 46 Annales 1.1.2. 47 Ga¨rtner and Ye, 338–43. 43

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(c) Symbolic representations in diVerent media: the middle period (Schmidt-Glintzer 1 Clarke; Kern 1 Witschel; Schneider 1 Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens) Historiography is a form of symbolical representation of the world, helping us to understand it by (re-)constructing it. There are other forms of symbolic representation, which played an important role in the implementation and consolidation of the Chinese and the Roman Empires. For the core period of the Qin/Han era in China and of the principate in Rome three such forms were suggested for investigation: geography and cartography, i.e. the construction of imperial space in text and maps; grand inscriptions on stelae, set up in the open air and announcing the achievements of the two founders, Qin Shihuangdi and Augustus; and visualization of emperors and empire in art and architecture. Our discussion will touch on (1) the communication framework and (2) the ideological content of these representations. (1) Looking at the three pairs of papers, one is struck by one particular diVerence between the Chinese and the Roman side evident in all three cases. It concerns the communicative space in which the various representations appear. In China this space is always closely related to the state apparatus, and the representations serve the mostly ‘liturgical’ communication with selected members of this apparatus and/or with Heaven. In Rome, too, this space is often (though not always) related to the center of power, but the representations are mainly concerned with communication with the human world, i.e. with the citizen body and the general public. SpeciWcally, in China the two foundational geographical descriptions of the empire, the ‘Yu gong’ chapter of the Shangshu (Book of Documents) and the ‘Geographical Treatise’ in Ban Gu’s Han shu, both belong to the sphere of state government; relating to the ‘nine provincial areas’ (jiuzhou) and the administrative units established under the Han dynasty respectively. They provide not only basic geographical facts but also information on population, administrative changes, local products, etc.48 Moreover, from references concerning the making, storage, and use of maps, we can safely conclude that in early imperial China maps were predominantly produced for administrative or military purposes.49 Finally, mention should be made of the third great geographical compendium of early China, the Book of Mountains and Seas (Shanhai jing), which may be categorized as ‘mythography’ but nevertheless purports to have been recorded by the Great Yu on his tours throughout the realm to regulate streams and rivers.50 48 50

Schmidt-Glintzer, 171 and 187. Schmidt-Glintzer, 179.

49

Schmidt-Glintzer, 179–82.

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In contrast, the great geographical work of the Augustan period has no governmental aYliation. Its author was the Greek Strabo, who wrote his work as a private scholar for the general public. Nevertheless, he presented the world as ‘an entity constructed by the imperial power of Rome’.51 In this way he interwove, so to speak, Greek scholarship with Rome’s imperial agenda. The case of Agrippa’s map is particularly conspicuous.52 It is unquestionable that the Romans, too, made maps for military and administrative use. But the map of Agrippa served a diVerent purpose. It was put up in public by the second man of the state to make the people of Rome see that they had conquered most of the world and to suggest to them that they could be proud of this achievement. That is to say, the map was part of an ongoing communication between the princeps and the public. The locations of the inscriptions of Qin Shihuangdi and Augustus tell a similar story. Provided we can trust the Shi ji ’s account, the stelae bearing the First Emperor’s inscriptions were erected on top of remote mountains throughout the newly uniWed empire, which the First Emperor symbolically took possession of through several ‘inspection tours’.53 Purportedly addressed to the legendary sage rulers as both political ancestors and cosmic powers, the inscriptions were embedded into the setting of solemn rituals conducted by the emperor and attended by oYcials of his entourage and members of the local elites. There is no evidence that anyone ever later traveled to the mountains to read the texts in situ. Augustus’ Res Gestae were, according to his will, set up in front of his mausoleum.54 As a burial place this monument also had a sacral aura. But at the same time it was in the middle of Rome and the area surrounding it had been turned into a public park. Thus communication was not with the gods in order to secure their blessing, but with the whole people of Rome in order to gain their appreciation of the princeps and his political achievements. The story repeats itself with the second generation. Emulating the ritualized ‘inspection tour’ of his father, Ershihuangdi (r. 210–207 bc), is recorded to have erected at least one more stele commemorating Qin’s uniWcation of the empire.55 On the Roman side, we are told that under Tiberius, as a result of concerted action between Rome and local authorities, copies of Augustus’ Res Gestae were put up in provincial cities.56 Concerning art and architecture we restrict ourselves to two observations. One relates to the layouts of the two capitals, of which Chang’an represented the paradigm of a ‘palatial’ city, Rome that of a ‘civic’ city. In Chang’an Wve 51 54 55

Clarke, 205. Witschel, 247–9. Kern, 237–8.

52 56

Clarke, esp. 198–200. Witschel, 249–56.

53

Kern, 217 and 228–34.

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palaces and a huge arsenal occupied a large part of the area intra muros.57 There was strict separation between the space where the population lived and that where the monarch resided. Walls surrounded every precinct within the city and ensured tight control. Even the two markets were publicly accessible only in a limited sense, since they too were surrounded by an enclosure. In this capital, where ‘the people mattered little’,58 the aim of visual communication, if any communication was intended at all, was inspiration of awe and ostentation of power. Rome, as it developed during the reign of Augustus, was to be sure also becoming more and more ‘emperor oriented’.59 Projects of the princeps were pursued and completed all over the city. However, all of these projects created or were integrated into public spaces. Augustan architecture was architecture for the people. In this context empire played an important role. It was evoked by marble from diVerent parts of the world, by objects captured in war, and by statues of subdued nations. Thus the people of Rome were invited to join the princeps in satisfaction and pride about what had been achieved, i.e. the empire which had been established. The other observation concerns the image of the emperor, the signiWcance of which is strikingly diVerent in China and in Rome. In China, there are snippets of evidence testifying to the existence of images of venerated, sagelike emperors inside the palaces,60 but there seems to have been no display of emperors’ images in public. In Rome the portrait of Octavian served from the beginning as a tool in internal wars of propaganda, and after the consolidation of his rule the image of Augustus became omnipresent in Rome and was distributed throughout the empire.61 It seems clear to us that here, as in the other cases discussed, the basis of such tension is the diVerence between a concept of rulership which conceived of the emperor in cosmic-political terms as Son of Heaven and a concept according to which the head of the state was no more than the ‘Wrst citizen’ whose position rested upon his achievements for the community. (2) The second topic we would like to treat in this section is that of the representations’ ideological content: the way in which they pictured empire and emperor. As to the latter, most important are, of course, the inscriptions in which the two emperors presented their achievements. The Chinese inscriptions throughout remain on a level of abstract generality. They are devoid of 57 58 59 60

Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, 307. Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, 308. Schneider, 270–8. Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, 300.

61

Schneider, 279–84.

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concrete historical information. The emperor appears in the third person, a persona rather than a concrete individual. Stressed is the re-establishment of unity and order after a period of partition and chaos. The ‘Six Kingdoms’, whose conquest was the prerequisite for uniWcation, are branded as ‘criminal’ and ‘perverse’, and their conquest is described as ‘punishment’ rather than ‘conquest’. The august emperor’s ‘merits’ are that he gave ‘warp and woof to All-under-Heaven’, i.e. he reuniWed the realm and re-established the harmony between Heaven and Earth.62 In Augustus’ account, written by himself in the Wrst person, there is, Wrst of all, a defensive line of argument. The princeps is at pains to document the legitimacy of his position, i.e. its conformity with the traditions of the libera res publica, an issue of no concern whatsoever for Qin Shihuangdi or any other Chinese emperor. Then come his positive achievements: the re-establishment of peace and order after years of internal turmoil; multiple measures for diVerent segments of the populace, but in particular for the people of Rome; and, above all, uniquely successful eVorts in expanding the empire through military conquest.63 It seems that the diVerences between the contents of the two inscriptions underline many of the diVerences observed before. As to the representation of empire and world, one should Wrst note a parallel which has already been touched upon above. Though the literary descriptions of the world in China and Rome belong to diVerent communicative contexts, they nevertheless agree in viewing the regions described in relation to the imperial court or the capital. The world in each case has a center, and the center is that of imperial power. To judge from the Tabula Peutingeriana, the map of Agrippa was structured in the same way;64 and though no world map is preserved from ancient China, if one existed, which is quite probable, it can hardly have been diVerent from this.65 On the other hand, one diVerence has to be noted, which might seem banal but which was probably not without consequences. Whereas in Chinese thinking China and its surroundings were envisaged as one big land mass embraced by the four seas, in the West there was from an early date the clear view that there are three continents: Europe (containing Greece and Rome), Africa, and Asia.66

62

Citations are taken from Kern’s translation of one of the inscriptions; cf. Kern, 219. Witschel, 243–6. 64 Clarke, 208. 65 A powerful image of the centrality of the imperial power was created by Ban Gu with the topos of the capital where the spokes of the wheel converge; see Schmidt-Glintzer, 188. 66 Clarke, 203; Huang and Mutschler, 100 and 110. 63

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In a general way this diVerence seems to be related to artistic representations of the Self and the Other, discussed by Rolf Schneider and Miche`le Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens. In spite of the fact that both in the East and in the West the Wgure with the pointed cap became a prototype of the ‘barbarian’, coming from the West or the East respectively,67 diVerences are once again more marked than correspondences. In the Han empire, self-contained as it was, the representation of the barbarian was not of decisive importance for political or cultural self-deWnition.68 This was diVerent in Rome. Surrounded in the early part of their history by peoples and polities of equal strength and, in some cases, superior culture, the Romans deWned themselves very much in contrast with these Others. Thus in the Augustan period there was a fascination with images of the Others, in particular with the image of the oriental. Through this ambivalence, the images conveyed a plurality of feelings and contributed to the changing deWnition of ‘what ‘‘Romanism’’ was about’. 69 A Wnal remark concerning the view of empire and world: as we learn from Schneider and Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, both in Chang’an and in Rome the architecture of the capital contained elements whose design was related to the cosmos. In Chang’an there was, on one hand, the palace, which was conceived as a reproduction of the heavenly world. Secondly, the cosmos was recreated inside the mausoleum of the First Emperor. Both pointed to the fact that there was an all-embracing order in which the correspondence between Heaven and Earth constituted a decisive element.70 In Rome something comparable came into being with the complex on the Campus Martius, including the mausoleum of Augustus, the huge horologium with an obelisk from Egypt as gnomon and the Ara Pacis as the terminal point of the path of the shadow of the ball on top of the obelisk on Augustus’ birthday.71 Thus the cosmological dimension of Augustus’ mission was evoked, and the peaceful order of the world was presented as its goal. What has to be noted, however, is the fact that this design was displayed not behind closed doors but in public, and that the obelisk, as one of the biggest and certainly the tallest piece of booty ever brought to Rome, made clear that the prerequisite of the new order was the strength of Roman arms.

67

Schneider, 287–9 and Figs. 23, 25, 26, 28; Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, 312–4 and Fig. 34. Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, 314. 69 Schneider, 295. 70 Schmidt-Glintzer, 180 and Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, 308. 71 This is the widely, though not universally, accepted thesis of Edmund Buchner (Die Sonnenuhr des Augustus. Mainz [Zabern] 1982). 68

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2 . S IM I L A R I T I E S A N D D I F F E R E N C E S F RO M A C HRONOLOG ICAL PERSPECTIVE Let us now try to summarize the most important results of our survey of the eight pairs of papers by relating the similarities and diVerences observed to the periodization, which we suggested at the outset as giving structure to our experiment in comparison. The framework of pre-imperial period, period of the established empire, and period of the empire in crisis may, simplistic as it is, help to elucidate essential features of the historical development.

(a) The pre-imperial period In the pre-imperial period it is the diVerences which are prominent. There are three aspects that merit particular attention here. (1) We start with perception of the course of history in China and Rome. In the Chinese view, the beginning of human civilization coincides with the emergence of the body politic, i.e. tianxia, ‘All-under-Heaven’. Thus already the Yellow Emperor is said to have received and ‘possessed’ (you) tianxia, followed by the sage emperor Yao, who chose his successor Shun to ‘confer’ (shou) tianxia upon him.72 From Shun, tianxia was transmitted to the Great Yu, the founder of the semi-legendary Xia dynasty, and thence down to the Shang and Zhou dynasties. To be sure, the political and cultural elites of early imperial China were well aware that tianxia did not yet cover all the known ‘world’.73 But the key point is their overriding conception that from the very beginning there was a ‘universal’ order which had been established by the Five Emperors (wudi) and handed down the ages. This is signiWcantly diVerent from the Roman case. For Romans, the essential historical experience was Rome’s phenomenal rise from a small village at the bank of the Tiber to the dominant power in the Mediterranean. In other words: the Romans of the period of expansion experienced history as a progressive movement in time, and over the decades it became clear to them that this movement was in one direction: towards their domination of the inhabited world. As such this development became a constitutive part of Rome’s collective memory. (2) Connected with this diVerence is another, concerning the views and attitudes towards the spheres of politics. As the notion of tianxia already 72

Shi ji 1/10, 30, 38.

73

Pines, 70–2.

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indicates, in China politics were always in some sense internal politics, comprising, to be sure, the preservation or restoration of peace and order, if necessary, by force, but with a stress on the administrative tasks of governance. As stated above, this attitude was conWrmed, if not provoked, by the fact that a great expansionist endeavor under the Western Zhou had ended in disaster. From this time onwards, even through periods of wars, the ideal of creating and preserving harmony in All-under-Heaven through peaceful means remained intact. In Rome, on the other hand, virtus in the form of soldierly valor and strategic competence was an indispensable quality of a political leader. Sapientia in domestic politics was also important, but it was military success, i.e. battles won, towns taken, enemies defeated, which brought real prestige and glory. In the same vein—just as had been the case in the ancient Near East and under Alexander—victory in war was seen as the legitimation of rule—under one condition: that the war was a just one. Thus, since in general the Romans succeeded in convincing themselves that their wars were bella iusta, they thought of their ever-expanding imperium as the legitimate result of their virtus and of the concomitant support of the gods.74 (3) The third fundamental diVerence concerns the form of state. In ancient China the monarchical form of government was the only one within the intellectual horizon of both the political agents and the theorists, be it with respect to tianxia or to the feudal states.75 In the West, by contrast, the Greeks, close neighbors of the oriental monarchies, had developed the model of the self-governing community of free citizens, the Polis. The Romans, too, in the period in which they expanded their power over Italy and the Mediterranean, i.e. when they established their imperium, conceived of their commonwealth along similar lines, as a res publica libera, with the expulsion of the kings and the establishment of a republican regime constituting decisive elements in their self-understanding.

(b) The period of the Wrmly established empire Coming to our second period, we can state that by the time of the early principate the Roman Empire bore many more resemblances to the Chinese empire of the same period than the expanding republican state. The convergences comprised Wrst of all that which can be categorized as the political and socio-economical ‘hardware’ of the empire: Rome had changed from republic to monarchy, which meant that both empires were now headed by an emperor. 74

Dihle, 19; Huang and Mutschler, passion.

75

Zhu, 33–4.

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After Rome’s successful conquests, both empires ruled over territories of comparable magnitude as well as over large populations very diVerent in ethnicity, language, religion, customs, and manners. To control their territory, both empires had to maintain large armies. And both empires took measures to improve the infrastructure and to promote trade and economical growth by standardizing weights and coinage. It has not been possible to examine any of these topics in depth in this volume. However, there are also convergences in the spheres of ideology and symbolical representation, to which our contributors have paid particular attention. This can be seen with respect to all three points discussed—the perception of the course of history, the attitude towards war and peace, and the view concerning the ideal form of government. At the same time, however, one observes that the degree of convergence varies, since beneath the surface the original diVerences continue to be eVective. It seems reasonable to begin by remarking brieXy on the Chinese experience in order to point up development on the Roman side. We concentrate on the period of roughly 200 years, from 141 bc (accession of Wudi) to ad 57 (death of Emperor Guangwu). In this period the Han empire not only reached its zenith, with its awe-inspiring prestige spreading far into central Asia, but also witnessed a profound reorientation and shift in its policies and political attitudes.76 Here we must limit ourselves to highlighting the far-reaching consequences of this change with regard to the three points mentioned above.77 First, as can be clearly seen from Ban Gu’s Han shu, which became the model of later dynastic histories, ‘imperial’, i.e. cosmic-political, time was conceptualized as running in cycles determined by the succession of the Five Elements (wuxing). Yet of even greater importance for history writing was the so-called ‘dynastic cycle’ which provided an interpretative scheme to describe and explain the rise and fall of any dynastic house. Second, following the Han expansionist drive into central Asia under Wudi, foreign policy toward the Xiongnu and other ‘barbarian’ tribes at the northern and northwestern borders favored ‘settled colonialism’, disentanglement, and diplomacy to minimize future involvement. Against this background, the utopian ideal of ‘Great Peace’ (taiping) took Wrm root in contemporary political debates. Third, profound as these changes of policies and political attitudes were, at the same time they showed the limits of political reform and restructuring in ancient China: the monarchical order as such was never at issue. Neither the ‘usurper’ Wang Mang (r. ad 9–23), who brought the Western Han dynasty 76 77

Nylan, esp. 53–5; Mittag, 144 and 152. Discussion of the following is largely based on Mittag’s paper.

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to an end, nor the Yellow Turbans and other rebel groups toward the end of the Eastern Han dynasty, aimed at replacing the imperial system with any fundamentally diVerent form of government. On the contrary, Wang Mang must be credited with having substantially contributed to the brand of imperial ideology which was to become paramount throughout early medieval China. Along with this specific imperial ideology, the class of ‘classicists’ or ‘Confucian scholars’ (Ru) rose greatly in importance. Henceforth, this class dominated the imperial space and largely constituted the somewhat expanded, yet still very limited audience of imperial activities. Turning to Rome, we Wnd that the clearest convergence might be the one concerning the conceptions of time.78 Here it is quite striking that in the works from the early principate discussed above, as far as the present and the future are concerned the course of history is seen no more as a directional movement in time, but rather as a state to be preserved for all future ages, or as a steady Xow in repetitive time patterns. This observation allows for an intriguing hypothesis, namely that an empire tends to espouse cyclical time patterns and to perceive the ‘end of history as movement’ in the moment when it appears to have succeeded in establishing worldwide dominion. Apart from the texts, Augustus’ celebration of the secular games and the second type of his portrait, which depicts him in youthful agelessness,79 point most clearly in this direction. The situation is similar in respect of attitudes towards war and peace. Whereas in republican times peace was not in the foreground of the political discourse, in Augustan literature as in the representative art (Repra¨sentationskunst) of the period, peace, order, prosperity, the administration of justice, and the spread of civilization were presented as achievements by the eVorts of the princeps. Given the fact that once the world is conquered expansion cannot remain the main goal of political strategy, this change of emphasis is only natural. Once again we can state that internal logic demands that the ideologies of world empires move in the same direction. Nevertheless, one has to remind oneself that military victory, conquest, and expansion were not by any means forgotten. It suYces to look at the role which war and conquest still play in Augustan literature and art, and above all in the princeps’ Res Gestae. It is, however, with regard to the third point—the form of state—that underlying diVerence is most clearly discernible within the convergence. With the principate, Rome became what China had always been—a monarchy. From now on Rome not only had an empire, but also an emperor at the head 78 79

Mutschler, 132–7. Schneider, 282.

Epilogue

443

of the body politic. But the Roman emperor was diVerent from the Chinese. Emperorship in Rome was characterized by the fact that it had to be hidden, i.e. disguised in republican forms. Secondly, even when the extraordinary position of the princeps was brought into relief, this was done mostly in connection with demonstrations of the achievements which justiWed the institution of the principate to the general public. The way in which the map of Agrippa, the Res Gestae of Augustus, and Augustus’ architectural projects aimed at catering for the people of Rome, distinguish them clearly from corresponding phenomena in China.80 They reveal that the princeps was indeed in a certain sense not more than Wrst among the citizens of Rome, who still had to be—and who was—concerned to win the approval of his ‘equals’.

(c) The period of decline and division At Wrst sight, the evident parallels between the historical experience of the two empires continue well into the third period. In both cases we can observe internal crises, mounting external threats, the sacking of the capital, and, in the Wrst decades of the fourth century, the transfer of the empire’s center of gravity: from Luoyang to Nanjing in the lower Yangtze valley and from Rome to Constantinople, respectively. Yet even more signiWcant is the fact that following these shifts the two empires continued to exist. Their territories had shrunk, but their basic institutional structures were intact, and both continued to hold with assurance to claims of universal sovereignty. An even more striking parallel is that religion is the hallmark of both early medieval China and Roman late antiquity. In both cases the religious dimension manifests itself in many diVerent ways, such as in the appearances of ‘holy men’ and miracle workers, the spread of esoteric cults, and the rise of religious movements—to all of which imperial reaction was a mixture of tolerance, persecution, and patronage. It is not easy to access the feelings of the common people, but we may safely assume that, on both sides, they lived with uncommon intensity. Yet in the context of religion we also encounter an all-decisive diVerence, slight to begin with but in the long run at the root of the parting of the ways. This was the diVerent belief systems of the two most successful religious movements in early medieval China and late antique Rome, Buddhism and Christianity, as well as the diVerent social and cultural dynamics of their spread and adaptation. 80

This is one of the results of the three papers by Clarke, Witschel, and Schneider.

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On the cultural level, it is undoubtedly true that the introduction of Buddhism immensely enriched Chinese thought and imagination, thereby greatly expanding the range of experiences of the cultural Other, and laying the foundation of the formidably cosmopolitan atmosphere of the Wrst half of the Tang dynasty. Yet Buddhism also contributed to the strengthening of imperial authority. Further, due to its adoption as a state religion by successive dynasties in the north and the south, Buddhism helped to prepare the ground for the empire’s reuniWcation in ad 589.81 However, its absorption into the imperial system, which in essence persisted throughout early medieval China, was almost complete. A striking example is provided by the Tuoba-Wei dynasty, under the patronage of which Buddhism reached a peak of splendor, but which at the same time wholeheartedly embraced the Chinese model of imperial rule. It is thus small wonder that historiography, being part and parcel of this imperial system, was Wrmly tradition bound: the great model of Wei Shou’s dynastic history of the Tuoba-Wei was Ban Gu’s Han shu.82 The case of the Christian Church and its relationship toward the imperial system was quite diVerent. Although in the beginning similar to other sects or religious groups (in fact occasionally being mistaken as a subgroup of Judaism), the Christian movement soon outrivaled most of them on account of its organizational structure and its missionary zeal.83 Moreover, as much as Buddhism added a new dimension to the experience of the cultural Other in early medieval China, so did Christian monotheism through its concept of God which made God into a radically diVerent Other. This transcended the ambiguity inherent in the Roman perception of the Other, torn between fascination in and repulsion of the outlandish, barbaric outre´. Yet the strictly ‘otherworldly’ orientation of Christian belief made the Church resistant to absorption into the imperial system. This had vast implications. Ultimately, Rome, the city of Romulus and Remus, was transformed into the city of Peter and Paul. This transformative process was accompanied by a revitalization of the master-topos of Rome’s rise from village to superpower, which anticipated the Christian concept of history as a history of salvation (Heilsgeschichte).84 In contrast to the Chinese case, we thus Wnd in Christian historiography the formation of a new mode of history writing which adopted but essentially transformed ‘imperial’ historiography.

81 83

Jansen, 416. O’Daly, 378–81.

82

Mittag and Ye, 365–6. 84 Ga¨rtner and Ye, 325–6.

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3 . S U G G E S T I O N S F O R F U T UR E R E S E A RC H Our contributors have exposed a wide range of fascinating facets concerning the emergence and development of ideas and conceptions revolving around empire in Rome and ancient China. In so doing, they have set us diYcult task in summarizing their Wnds and drawing comparisons, which must necessarily abstract from the concrete phenomena to reach a suYcient height that allows for meaningful generalizations, yet must not rise so high that these phenomena get out of sight or become undistinguishable. Having tried to Wnd the proper altitude, we hasten to point out that our observations are not meant as conclusive results, but rather as inspirations for further research. This is all the more true as the major similarities and diVerences which we observed in the preceding section apply mostly to one or two of our three periods. It must be left to future research to Wll out the picture by extending discussion to those periods not otherwise considered. Moreover, it must again be emphasized that our periodization scheme was proposed only for heuristic purposes. It could well be that it does not do justice to the inner development of ancient China or Rome or, even worse, that it obscures interesting aspects of comparison. We welcome comment and criticism in this respect. It goes without saying that we also welcome further comparative studies of the political, social, and economic institutions—referred to above as the empires’ ‘hardware’—and their development, since these have not been in our focus. In addition, we would draw attention to six topics within our main area of interest—the mental images of empire and their associated political and social dynamics—which have only been touched upon by contributors and deWnitely need further study.85 .

Religion has come into focus only with the last two pairs of papers relating to the third period. Yet religion clearly deserves to be examined for the two earlier periods, especially since traditional Chinese and Roman religion seem to be comparable in their predisposition to innerworldliness and their valorization of rites and ritual behavior, i.e. orthopraxy as opposed to orthodoxy. . Partly overlapping with religion and no less important is the topic of rituals in general and their role in ancient Chinese and Roman societies. An intriguing question is whether or not the pattern of ‘non-public vs. public’ or ‘cosmic vs. political’, which we have discussed above with regard to the various symbolizations of ‘empire’, can also be observed here. 85

In the following remarks we will dispense with any references to research literature, which for all topics mentioned is more than abundant in each of the two Welds.

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.

Another important issue concerns the role attributed to law and legislation, to which Dihle and Nylan have drawn our attention.86 On the Chinese side, the recent archaeological Wnds of legal documents written on bamboo and wooden slips would have to be taken into account here, since these documents have drastically changed our views of the early Chinese legal system. On the Roman side, the development of jurisdiction and jurisprudence, especially during the ‘Classical’ period of the second and third centuries ad, needs further comparative research. . Connected with the topic of law is the question of the sources of moral and political authority. In this respect, the establishment of ‘chairs’ for each of the Classics under Han Wudi and the accompanying canonization process are of great importance on the Chinese side.87 Here an interesting comparative aspect lies in studying the role of the mos maiorum and its treatment in literature in Rome, where a canonization process concerning literary works can be observed as well, though of a diVerent, non-stateregulated, kind. . This brings us to poetry. There are two interesting questions related to this topic, which are parallel to those we addressed in respect of historiography. In what way was the ‘empire’ thematized in poetry? And to what extent did poetry contribute to taking the empire’s measure, demarcating the limits of imperial power, and stabilizing the imperial order? From Qin Shihuangdi’s stele inscriptions, on the Chinese side, and epic poetry, on the Roman, it has become obvious that these questions need to be discussed in a larger context. . Finally, because of its relevancy for contemporary discussion, we want to mention the topic of ancient Chinese and Roman discourse on ‘humankind’ and universal norms and values. This raises the questions as to the ways in which the two empires exploited universalist conceptions in their own political interests. In the year ad 60 there occurred an eclipse of the sun, which was observed and registered both in China and in Rome. Interestingly, the reactions to this single phenomenon were very diVerent.88 Yet important is that both empires already shared a common cosmos even though they did not know much about each other. 86 Legal institutions were treated at the Wrst conference of the Stanford comparative project ACME (see Preface, n. 12). In the forthcoming volume there will be an article on ‘Laws and rulers’ by Karen Turner. 87 On issues connected with the establishment of the ‘chairs’ for each of the Classics in c.135 bc, see Nylan, 41. 88 See B. J. Mansvelt Beck, The Treatises of Later Han: Their Author, Sources, Contents and Place in Chinese Historiography. Leiden (Brill) 1990, 173–4.

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Roughly 2,000 years later the situation has changed fundamentally. East and West have come together in a globalized world and see each other under the intense but culturally narrow beams of highly developed communication systems and multiple media. In these circumstances it is not only desirable that more light is shed on the ancient history of both the East and the West, but also that the eclipse of comparative studies comes to an end.

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Chronological Table Pre-imperial Period Huangdi (Yellow Emperor) Yao Shun Three Dynasties (Sandai: Xia, Shang, Zhou) Xia Shang Zhou Western Zhou Eastern Zhou Spring and Autumn Period (Chunqiu Period) Confucius Warring States Period (Zhanguo Period) The rulers of the larger feudal states all adopt the title of ‘king’ (wang)

trad. 2697–2598 bc trad. 2356–2256 bc trad. 2255–2206 bc trad. 2205–1766 bc c.16th–11th cents. bc; trad. 1766–1122 bc 1045? bc–256 bc 1045? –771 bc 770–256 bc 722–481 bc 551–473 bc 480 (453/403)–221 bc 323 bc

Period of the Firmly Established Empire Unification of the Empire by Qin Shihuangdi Qin Civil War between Xiang Yu and Liu Bang Han Former (Western) Han Wudi Establishment of ‘chairs’ for each of the Classics

753 bc 753–509 bc 509 bc 450 bc 340–265 bc

Traditional date of foundation of Rome Period of kings Expulsion of the last king Tarquinius Superbus Foundation of republic Publication of Law of Twelve Tables Expansion of Rome to control over Italy

264–146 bc

Punic Wars, Wars in the Eastern Mediterranean Expansion of Rome to control over the Mediterranean

146 bc

Destruction of Carthage and Corinth

221 bc 221–207 bc 206–202 bc 206 (202) bc–ad 220 206 (202) bc–ad 8 141–87 bc c.135 bc

(Continued)

Chronological Table (Continued) Internal crisis

92–90 bc

88–63 bc

Shiqu Pavilion discussions on Classics

51 bc

Reform of religious practices

31 bc

58–50 bc 49–45 bc 47–44 bc 33/32 bc 31 bc

Wars against Mithridates of Pontos resulting in the reorganization of the East through Pompey Caesar conquers Gaul Civil War Dictatorship of Caesar Break between Antony and Octavian Battle of Actium Period of the Firmly Established Empire

Wang Mang’s rise to power begins Xin Dynasty (Wang Mang) Later (Eastern) Han White Tiger Hall discussions on Classics Devastation of Luoyang

1 bc ad 9–23 25–220 79 190

27 bc 27 bc–ad 14 14–68 69–96 97–193 193–235

‘The Republic Restored’ Augustus The Julio-Claudian Dynasty The Flavian Dynasty Age of the Antonines The Severan Dynasty

Period of Decline and Disunity Six Dynasties (Liuchao Period; Wei-Jin Nanbeichao Period) Three Kingdoms (Sanguo Period) Wei (Cao-Wei) (220–265) Shu (Shu-Han) (221–63) Wu (222–80)

220–589 220–80

235–84

Military anarchy

(Western) Jin Sack of Luoyang Eastern Jin (317–420)

265–316

284–306

311

306–17 312

16 States of Five Barbarian Peoples (304–439)

378–95 395 410

Southern and Northern Dynasties (Nanbeichao 420–589 Period) Southern Dynasties: Northern Dynasties: (Liu-) Song (420–79) Northern (Tuoba) Wei Southern Qi (479–502) (386–534) Liang (502–57) W. Wei E. Wei (535–56) (534–50) Chen (557–89) N. Zhou N. Qi (557–81) (550–77) Reunification under the Sui dynasty 589

439 476 527–65 529

Deocletian re-establishes central power and founds the Tetrarchy Career of Constantine the Great Constantine wins the battle of the Milvian Bridge Christianity declared official state religion Theodosius the Great Division of the Empire between the sons of Theodosius Sack of Rome by Alaric the Visigoth

The Vandals conquer Carthage and Africa End of the Roman Empire in the West Justinian, eastern emperor, seeks to reconquer Italy and Africa Closure of the Academy at Athens

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Glossary of Chinese Characters ai 愛 ‘Ai Jiangnan fu’ 哀江南賦 Aidi 哀帝 ba 霸 ba shen 八神 Bai Qi 白起 baijia 百家 baijia yu 百家語 Ban Biao 班彪 Ban Chao 班超 Ban Gu 班固 bang shu 謗書 Baoji 寳雞 Baoshan 寶山 bei 碑 Beidi 北地 Beigong 北宮 beiji 北極 benji 本紀 bi 璧 biao 表 Bin gong xu X公盨 ‘Bin’ 豳 bing 並 bixia 陛下 Bo 亳 boshi 博士 Cao 曹 Cao Cao 曹操 Cao Pi 曹丕 Cao-Wei 曹魏 Chang Qu 常璩 Chang’an 長安 Changle gong 長樂宮 Changsha (guo) 長沙（國） Chen 陳 chen 臣 Chen Shou 陳壽 chen wang ye 陳王業

Chengdi 成帝 Chengpu 城濮 Chengwang 成王 Chengzhou 成周 chenwei 讖緯 Chong 崇 Chu 楚 Chunqiu 春秋 Chunqiu fanlu 春秋繁露 ci 刺 Cui Hao 崔浩 Cui Hong 崔鴻 王 Cuo(wang) Da 軑 ‘Da gao’ 大誥 Da Ya 大雅 Da-Cheng 大成 Dai 代 dai Hu 逮胡 Daizong 岱宗 Dan(zi) 丹子 danghu 當戶 Danyang 丹陽 Dao, dao 道 Daode jing 道德經 Daoxue zhuan 道學傳 daoyi 島夷 Datong 大同 Daxia 大夏 Dayuan 大宛 de 德 de* 得 de feng 得封 de tianxia 得天下 Di 狄 di 帝 di ji 帝紀 ding 鼎 ‘Ditu pian’ 地圖篇

456

Glossary of Chinese Characters

‘Dixing tu’ 地形圖 Dong Zhongshu 董仲舒 Dong Zhuo 董卓 ‘Dongdu fu’ 東都賦 Dongguan Hanji 東觀漢記 Dongguanzhen 東莞鎮, Juxian 莒縣 Dongting (hu) 洞庭（湖） Du Yu 杜佑 ‘Duan jiurou wen’ 斷酒肉文 Dukang 杜康 dunpu 敦朴 Ershiwushi 二十五史 Erzhu 爾朱 Erzhu Rong 爾朱榮 fa 法 falun wang 法輪王 Fan Ye 范曄 Fan Zhen 范鎮 Fangmatan 放馬灘, Tianshui 天水 fangshi 方士 ‘Fangzhang tu’ 方丈圖 fangzhi 方志 Faxian 法顯 fazhi 法制 Feishui 肥水 fen 分 Feng 風 feng (‘remonstrance’) 諷 feng (feng sacrifice) 封 ‘Fengshan shu’ 封禪書 Foguo ji 佛國記 fu (‘supernatural sign’) 符 fu (‘rhapsody’) 賦 fu min 附民 Fu ming 符命 Fu Sheng 伏勝 ‘Furui zhi’ 符瑞志 Gaixia 垓下 Ganjundao 干君道 Gansu 甘肅 Gao Huan 高歡 Gaoseng zhuan 高僧傳 Gaozu 高祖

Ge Hong 葛洪 Gengshi 更始 gong (‘merit’) 功 gong (‘public interest’, ‘public benefit’) 公 Gong(gong) 共公 Gong(wang) 共王 gong shi 功實 gongde 功德 Gongyang zhuan 公羊傳 gu (‘the past’) 古 gu (‘the orphaned’) 孤 Gu Jiegang 顧頡剛 Guan Zhong 管仲 Guangdong 廣東 ‘Guangguo lun’ 廣國論 Guangwu(di) 光武帝 Guannei 關内 Guanzi 管子 guaren 寡人 gui 簋 Guigong 桂宮 ‘Gujin ren biao’ 古今人表 ‘Guo Qin lun’ 過秦論 Guo Xiang 郭象 Guofeng 國風 guojia 國家 Guoshi 國史 ‘Hainei Hua yi tu’ 海内華夷圖 Han 漢 Han (Han Shi) 韓 （韓詩） Han (shui) 漢（水） Han Fei(zi), Han Feizi 韓非（子） Han Jin chunqiu 漢晉春秋 Han shu 漢書 Han Xin 韓信 Hao 鎬 hao li 好利 He chu tu, Luo chu wen 河出圖洛出文 He Xiu 何休 He zun 何尊 Hebei 河北 Henan 河南 heping 和平

Glossary of Chinese Characters Hongmen 鴻門 Hou Jing 侯景 Hou-Han ji 後漢紀 Hsing I-t’ien 邢義田 Hu 胡 Hua 華 Huai(di) 懷帝 Huainan(wang) 淮南王 Huaiyi 淮夷 Huan(di) 桓帝 Huan(gong) 桓公 Huan Wen 桓溫 Huan Xuan 桓玄 Huangdi 黃帝 huangdi 皇帝 huangdi pusa 皇帝菩薩 Huang-Lao 黃老 Huang-Qing zhigong tu 皇清職貢圖 Huayang guozhi 華陽國志 hui – wei 穢 – 魏 Huidi 惠帝 Huijiao 慧皎 huishi 穢史 Hunan 湖南 hunyi yuzhou 混一宇宙 Huo Qubing 霍去病 huren 胡人 ji 紀 Ji(zi) 箕子 Ji Kang 嵇康 Jia Dan 賈耽 Jia Yi 賈誼 Jiangnan 江南 Jiankang 建康 Jianzhang gong 建章宮 jiao yi wende 教以文德 jiaohua 教化 ‘Jiaosi zhi’ 郊祀志 Jiaxiang 嘉祥 Jieshi men 碣石門 ‘Ji-Han fuchen zan’ 季漢輔臣贊 Jilong (shan) 雞籠（山） Jin 晉 Jin shu 晉書

jing 敬 Jing(di) 景帝 Jing(gong) 景公 Jing Ke 荊軻 Jingong-dian 晉公奠 Jinhou Su-bianzhong 晉侯蘇編鐘 Jitou (shan) 雞頭（山） jiu 救 jiu zhou 九州 jiuxi 九錫 Jiuyi (shan) 九嶷(山) Jizhou 冀州 jizhuan 記傳 jue 爵 ‘Jun Shi’ 君奭 junxian 郡縣 junzi 君子 Kangxi 康熙 Kongquehe 孔雀河 kongyan 空言 Kou Qianzhi 寇謙之 Kuai(wang) 噲王 Kuaiji (shan) 會稽（山） Kuang Heng 匡衡 kui wo dao yu datong 虧我道於大通 Kun 昆 Kunlun 昆侖 Langye 琅邪 Langye (shan) 琅邪（山） Laozi, Laozi 老子 Li (wife of Prince Xiao) 李 (太后) li (‘propriety’) 禮 li (‘mile’) 里 li – hai 利 – 害 Li(wang) 厲王 Li Daoyuan 酈道元 Li Guang 李廣 Li Guangli 李廣利 ‘Li huo pian’ 理惑篇 Li ji 禮記 Li Ling 李陵 ‘Li lun’ 禮論 ‘Li sao’ 離騷 Li Si 李斯

457

458

Glossary of Chinese Characters

Li Xiong 李雄 Li Xun 李恂 Liang 梁 Lidai dili zhizhang tu 歷代地理指掌圖 Lienu¨ zhuan 烈女傳 liezhuan 列傳 lin 麟 ling 令 Ling(wang) 靈王 lingde 靈德 Lingdi 靈帝 lingxian 陵縣 Linzhang 臨漳 Lishidao 李氏道 Liu 劉 Liu An 劉安 Liu Bang 劉邦 Liu Bei 劉備 Liu He 劉賀 Liu Lei 劉累 Liu Sheng 劉勝 Liu Xiang 劉向 Liu Xie 劉勰 Liu Xuan 劉玄 Liu Yiqing 劉義慶 Liu Yu (founder of the Song dynasty) 劉裕 Liu Yu (Prince of Lu) 劉餘 Liu Zhan 劉瞻 Liu Zhiji 劉知幾 liujia 六家 Liu-Song 劉宋 Liyang 櫟陽 Longxi 隴西 Lu 魯 Lu¨ 呂 Lu (Lu Shi) 魯 （魯詩） Lu Ban 魯班 Lu Jia 陸賈 ‘Lu Lingguang dian fu’ 魯靈光殿賦 Lu Xiujing 陸修靜 Lu¨(hou) 呂后 lun 論 Lunyu 論語

Luo 洛 ‘Luo gao’ 洛誥 Luoyang 洛陽 Lu¨shi chunqiu 呂氏春秋 Ma Yuan 馬援 Man, man 蠻 Mancheng 滿城 manyi 蠻夷 Mao 毛 Mao Shi 毛詩 Maodun 冒頓 Maoshan 茅山 Mawangdui 馬王堆, Changsha 長沙 mei 美 Meng Tian 蒙恬 Mengzi, Mengzi 孟子 Mi 密 ming (‘name’) 名 ming (‘mandate’) 命 ming (‘inscription’) 銘 Ming(di) 明帝 mingde 明德 Mingguang gong 明光宮 mingjiao 名教 mingshan dachuan 名山大川 mingtang 明堂 mo bu 莫不 Mozi, Mozi 墨子 Muye 牧野 nan 南 Nanjing 南京 Nanyue 南越 Pei Xiu 裴秀 Pei Ziye 裴子野 Pengcheng 彭城 pianti wen 駢體文 Ping(di) 平帝 Ping(wang) 平王 Pingcheng 平城 Pingshan (xian) 平山（縣） Pingyang 平陽 Qi 齊 qi 氣

Glossary of Chinese Characters Qi (Nan-Qi) 齊 （南齊） qian 僭 Qian 汧 Qiang (shi Qiang) 墻（史墻） Qianlong 乾隆 qianshou 黔首 Qiantang 錢塘 Qin 秦 Qin ji 秦紀 ‘Qin Shihuang benji’ 秦始皇本紀 qingtan 清談 Qinling 秦嶺 Qiu-pan 逑盤 ‘Qu li’ 曲禮 qu shi 趨時 Qu Yuan 屈原 quan 權 Quanrong 犬戎 quanyi zhi lu¨e 權宜之略 que 闕 Qufu 曲阜 rang 攘 Ren Fang 任昉 ri bu ru gu 日不如古 Rong 戎 Rong Cheng shi 容成氏 Ru, ru 儒 Ruan Ji 阮籍 rusheng 儒生 san shi 三史 Sancai tuhui 三才圖會 Sanguo yanyi 三國演義 Sanguo zhi 三國志 Shaanxi 陝西 shan (‘goodness’) 善 shan (shan sacrifice) 禪 Shandong 山東 Shang 商 shang 上 shang wu tianzi 上無天子 Shang Yang 商鞅 Shang Ziping 尚子平 Shangqiu 商丘

459

Shangshu 尚書 Shangshu dazhuan 尚書大傳 Shanhai jing 山海經 Shanpula 山普拉 shanrang 禪讓 Shanxi 山西 ‘Shao gao’ 召誥 ‘Shaonan’ 召南 she zheng 攝政 shelun 設論 shen 神 shen qi 神器 Shen Wuyu 申無宇 Shen Yue 沈約 sheng 聖 shengde 聖德 shengwang 聖王 Shengxian gaoshi zhuan 聖賢高士傳 Shenxian zhuan 神仙傳 Shi 詩 shi (members of the lower nobility, aristocracy) 士 shi (‘actuality’) 實 shi (‘impersonator’) 尸 shi da jing 十大經 Shi ji 史記 Shi Qiang-pan 史墻盤 shiguan 史官 Shihuangdi 始皇帝 shijia 世家 Shijing 詩經 cited Odes: 1 ‘Guan ju’ 関雎; 7 ‘Tu ju’ 兔罝; 8 ‘Fouyi’ 芣苢; 9 ‘Han guang’ 漢廣; 11 ‘Lin zhi zhi’ 麟之趾; 18 ‘Gao yang’ 羔羊; 20 ‘Biao you mei’ 標有梅; 23 ‘Ye you si jun’ 野 有死麕; 25 ‘Zou yu’ 騶虞; 33 ‘Xiong zhi’ 雄 雉; 50 ‘Ding zhi fang zhong’ 定之方中; 62 ‘Bo xi’ 伯兮; 64 ‘Mugua’ 木瓜; 65 ‘Shu li’ 黍 離; 66 ‘Junzi yu yi’君子于役; 68 ‘Yang zhi shui’ 揚之水; 73 ‘Da che’ 大車; 74 ‘Qiu zhong you ma’ 丘中有麻; 79 ‘Qing ren’ 清 人; 80 ‘Gao qiu’ 羔裘; 93 ‘Chu qi dong men’ 出其東門; 94 ‘Ye you mancao’ 野有蔓草; 95 ‘Zhen Wei’ 溱洧; 103 ‘Lu ling’ 盧令; 110 ‘Zhi hu’ 陟岵; 121 ‘Bao yu’ 鴇羽; 124 ‘Ge sheng’ 葛生; 128 ‘Xiao rong’ 小戎; 133 ‘Wu yi’ 無衣; 154 ‘Qi yue’ 七月; 156 ‘Dong shan’

460

Glossary of Chinese Characters

東山; 160 ‘Lang ba’ 狼跋; 161 ‘Lu ming’ 鹿 鳴; 167 ‘Cai wei’ 菜薇; 169 ‘Di du’ 杕杜; 171 ‘Nan you jiayu’ 南有嘉魚; 176 ‘Jingjing zhe e’ 菁菁者莪; 177 ‘Liu yue’ 六月; 178 ‘Cai qi’ 菜芑; 190 ‘Wu yang’ 無羊; 191 ‘Jie nan shan’ 節南山; 205 ‘Bei shan’ 北山; 210 ‘Xin nan shan’ 信南山; 211 ‘Fu tian’ 甫田; 213 ‘Zhan bi luo yi’ 瞻彼洛矣; 216 ‘Yuanyang’ 鴛鴦; 221 ‘Yu zao’ 魚藻; 222 ‘Cai shu’ 菜菽; 224 ‘Wan liu’ 菀柳; 231 ‘Hu ye’ 瓠葉; 232 ‘Jianjian zhi shi’ 漸漸之石; 234 ‘He cao bu huang’ 何草不黃; 235 ‘Wenwang’ 文王; 236 ‘Da ming’ 大明; 237 ‘Mian’ 綿; 239 ‘Han lu’ 旱麓; 241 ‘Huang yi’ 皇矣; 243 ‘Xia wu’ 下 武; 244 ‘Wenwang you sheng’ 文王有聲; 247 ‘Ji zui’ 既醉; 248 ‘Fu yi’ 鳧鷖; 250 ‘Gong Liu’公劉; 252 ‘Quan a’ 卷阿; 253 ‘Min lao’ 民勞; 257 ‘Sang rou’ 桑柔 ; 258 ‘Yun Han’ 雲漢; 263 ‘Chang wu’ 常武; 264 ‘Zhan yang’ 瞻卬; 265 ‘Shao min’ 召旻; 267 ‘Wei tian zhi ming’ 維天之命.

Shiliuguo chunqiu 十六國春秋 Shiqu (ge) 石渠閣 shishi 史詩 ‘Shishi lun’ 釋時論 Shishuo xinyu 世說新語 shou pusa jie 受菩薩節 Shu 蜀 Shu 書 shu 書 Shu Xi 束晳 Shu-Han 蜀漢 Shui Anli 稅安禮 Shuihudi 睡虎地 Shuijing zhu 水經注 Shujing 書經 Shun 舜 si 私 si gu 思古 si ming 司命 Sichuan 四川 sifang 四方 sihai zhi nei 四海之内 Sima 司馬 Sima Biao 司馬彪 Sima Qian 司馬遷 Sima Rui 司馬叡 Sima Tan 司馬談

Sima Xiangru 司馬相如 Sima Yan 司馬炎 Sima Yi 司馬懿 siwen 斯文 sixian 司險 Song 宋 song 誦 song* 頌 Song shu 宋書 Su Dongpo 蘇東坡 Su Qin 蘇秦 Sui 隨 Sui Hong 睢弘 Sun Chuo 孫綽 Sun En 孫恩 Tai (shan) 泰（山） Tai Xiaowei 臺孝威 Taigongmiao 太公廟 Taiping, taiping 太平 Taiping huangdi 太平皇帝 Taiping jing 太平經 Taiping zhenjun 太平真君 Taipingdao 太平道 Taishang laojun 太上老君 Taiyi 泰一 Tan Qixiang 譚其驤 Tang (dynasty) 唐 Tang (founder of the Shang dynasty) 湯 Tangshu 唐叔 tao 討 Tian 田 Tian, tian 天 Tian Fen 田蚡 tianming 天命 tianshi 天師 Tianshui 天水 tianwang 天王 tianxia 天下 tianxia fei yi renzhi tianxia ye; tianxia zhi tianxia ye 天下非一人之天下也；天 下之天下也 tianzi 天子 tong 同

Glossary of Chinese Characters tong gu jin 通古今 tong gujin zhi bian 通古今之變 tu (‘map’) 圖 tu (‘earth’) 土 Tuan 彖 tui chuan yu lu 推船於陸 tuo 拓 Tuoba (-Wei), Tuoba-Wei 拓跋（魏） Tuoba Gui 拓跋珪 tushu 圖書 waiqi 外氣 wanbang 萬邦 wang (sacrifice) 望 wang (‘king’) 王 wang 罔 (mo 莫, mi 糜, wu 無 ) bu 不 Wang Bi 王弼 Wang Chen 王沈 Wang Chong 王充 Wang Mang 王莽 ‘Wang ming lun’ 王命論 Wang Tong 王通 Wang Yanshou 王延壽 Wangdu 望都 wangzhe 王者 wangzheqi 望者氣 wanwu zhi zong 萬物之宗 Wei (river) 渭 Wei (dynasty) 魏 Wei Hong 魏宏 Wei Shou 魏收 Wei shu 魏書 Wei-Jin 魏晉 Wei-Jin-Nanbeichao 魏晉南北朝 Weiyang (gong) 未央（宮） wen 文 Wen(di) 文帝 Wen(wang) 文王 Wenwang zhi hua 文王之化 Wenzhongzi 文中子 Wu 吳 wu (‘military’) 武 wu (‘spirit medium’) 巫 wu (‘non-being’) 無 wu di 五帝

wu ming 無名 wu xing 無形 Wu(di), Wudi 武帝 Wu(gong) 武公 Wu(wang) 武王 Wudoumidao 五斗米道 wuwei 無爲 wuxing 五行 ‘Wuxing zhi’ 五行志 wuzhe dahui 無遮大會 wuzhu 吳主 Xi Jia-pan 兮甲盤 Xi Zuochi 習鑿齒 Xia 夏 Xi’an 西安 xian 賢 Xianbi (Xianbei) 鮮卑 Xiang Xiu 向秀 Xiang Yu 項羽 Xiangjiang 湘江 xiangsheng xu 相生序 xiangsheng* xu 相勝序 Xiangyang 襄陽 xianneng 賢能 Xianyang 咸陽 Xianyun 玁狁 Xiao He 蕭何 Xiao Ya 小雅 Xiao Ziliang 蕭子良 Xiao(wang) 孝王 xiaolian 孝廉 Xiaoshui 瀟水 Xiaowen(di) 孝文帝 Xiaowudi 孝武帝 Xie Kun 謝琨 Xihe 羲和 Xin 新 Xindu 新都 xing 行 Xing Yitian, see under Hsing I-t’ien ‘Xingfa zhi’ 刑法志 Xingping (xian) 邢平縣 Xing-zhong 邢鐘 Xinjiang 新疆

461

462

Glossary of Chinese Characters

Xinling (gong) 信陵公 Xiongnu 匈奴 xiu 休 ‘Xiyu zhuan’ 西域傳 Xu 許 ‘Xu’ 序 xuan 玄 Xuan(wang) 宣王 Xuandi 宣帝 xuanxue 玄學 xunshou 巡守 Xunzi, Xunzi 荀子 Ya 雅 Ya’an (xian) 雅安（縣） Yan 燕 Yan Yanzhi 顏延之 Yan Ying 晏嬰 Yang (qi) 陽（氣） Yang Xi 楊戲 Yangling 陽陵 Yangzi(jiang) 揚子（江） Yao 堯 ‘Yao dian’ 堯典 yaotiao zhi rong 窈窕之容 Ye 鄴 Yi, see under Zeng(hou) Yi (assistant of the Great Yu) 益 Yi (river) 伊 Yi (Zhou Scribe) 佚 Yi, yi (‘barbarians’) 夷 yi (‘unify’) 一 yi (‘aim in life’) 意 yi (‘justice’) 義 Yi (shan) 嶧（山） yi gu fei jin 以古非今 yi gu shi jin 以古事今 yi jia 一家 Yi Zhoushu 遺周書 Yijing 易經 Yin (qi) 陰（氣） ying 應 Yinwan 尹灣 yitong 一統 Yong 雍

yong 永 yong sui sihai 永綏四海 Yongjia 永嘉 yongzhong 甬鐘 you 有 You(wang) 幽王 Yu 禹 Yu (Shun) 虞（舜） yu 輿 ‘Yu gong’ 禹貢 ‘Yu gong diyu tu’ 禹貢地域圖 Yu Liang 庾亮 Yu Xin 庾信 Yuan 元 Yuan Hong 袁宏 Yuandi 袁帝 Yuan-Wei 元魏 Yu-ding 盂鼎 yuditu 輿地圖 Yue 越 yun zai dongnan 隕在東南 Yunmeng 雲夢 Zaghunluk 扎洪魯克, Qiemo 且末（縣） (xian) Zeng(hou) Yi 曾侯乙 zhang 丈 Zhang(di) 章帝 Zhang Daoling 張道陵 Zhang Heng 張衡 Zhang Hua 張華 Zhang Liang 張良 Zhang Shoujie 張守節 Zhangjiashan 張家山 Zhao Chongguo 趙充國 Zhao Gao 趙高 Zhaoxiang(wang) 昭襄王 Zhejiang 浙江 Zheng 鄭 zheng (‘punish’) 征 zheng (‘right and proper’) 正 Zheng Qiao 鄭樵 Zheng Xuan 鄭玄 zhengjing 正經 zhengshi 正史

Glossary of Chinese Characters zhenren 真人 zhi (‘aim in life’) 志 zhi (‘to point’) 指 zhi min 治民 Zhifu (shan) 之罘（山） Zhifu dongguan 之罘東觀 zhigong tu 職貢圖 zhong 忠 Zhongchang Tong 仲長統 Zhongguo 中國 Zhongshan 中山 zhongxing 中興 Zhou 周 Zhou-Han 周漢 Zhou li 周禮 Zhougong, Zhou(gong) 周公 ‘Zhounan’ 周南 zhu (‘lord’) 主 zhu (‘invocator’) 祝 zhu Xia 諸夏

Zhu Xizu 朱希祖 zhuan 傳 Zhuang(gong) 莊公 Zhuangzi 莊子 Zhuangzi zhu 莊子注 zhuanlun wang 轉輪王 Zhuge Liang 諸葛亮 zhuhou 諸侯 ‘Zhujun tu’ 駐軍圖 Zhulin qixian 竹林七賢 zhushang 主上 zi 子 ziran 自然 ziwu dao 子午道 Ziying 子嬰 Zou 鄒 Zou Yan 騶衍 zouyu 騶虞 Zuo Si 左思 Zuo zhuan 左傳

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Index of Names Well known Greek and Roman names are given in their usual English form, whether anglicized (‘Aristotle’, ‘Augustine’), latinized (‘Aeschylus’), or simply abbreviated (‘Agrippa’). Names of lesser known Romans are given in full, starting with the nomen gentile (‘Aemilius Paullus, L.’). Alternative forms used in the papers are added after /. Aelius Aristides 23–5, 205n, 324n, 423 Aemilius Paullus, L. 292 Aeneas 92, 96, 98, 108–9, 111, 131–2, 132n, 133, 133n, 211, 374 Aeschylus 5 Agrippa 196, 198–200, 200n, 202–4, 207–8, 209n, 210n, 211, 213, 288, 435, 443 Aidi (emperor of Former Han) 155, 162 Alaric 327, 339, 341, 451 Alcibiades 94n Alexander the Great 11–14, 16, 202, 206, 209n, 287, 422, 424 Ambrose 327n, 339–40, 342, 382 Ammianus Marcellinus 325, 327n, 328–38, 343, 389, 429, 431 Ammonius Saccas 374 Anastasius 341 Anatolius 334 Anchises 98n, 109, 111 Anna (sister of Dido) 98 Antisthenes 10 Antoninus Pius (emperor) 324n Antony (opponent of Octavian) / M. Antonius 131, 133–4, 247, 258, 270, 450 Antony (hermit) 388 Aphrodite 262 Apollo 373, 131–2, 211, 274, 277, 290 Apuleius 388–9 Arcadius (emperor) 339 Aristagoras of Miletus 197–8 Aristophanes 198 Aristotle 6, 8–12, 14, 16, 18, 24–5, 62, 62n Arius 385 Arnobius 97 Arsaces 106, 336 Artemidorus 200 Ascanius 132n Asclepius 13 Asoka (Indian king) 414, 414n Athanasius 388 Athena 374

Attis 294 Augustine 339–40, 342–3, 377, 382, 387, 389, 391–4, 427, 432 Augustus (emperor) / Caesar Divi Filius / Octavian 20, 58, 91f., 104, 108, 110–12, 119, 119n, 120–1, 126, 130–3, 133n, 134–5, 135n, 138, 198, 203, 205, 208–10, 210n, 212, 241–3, 243n, 244–9, 249 Fig., 250, 250 Fig., 251, 251 Fig., 252–9, 261–4, 269–72, 274–6, 276 Fig., 277–9, 281, 282 Fig., 282–3, 283 Fig., 284–6, 292, 294–6, 326n, 332, 385, 429, 434–8, 442–3, 450 Ausonius 330 Bai Qi 148n Ban Biao 55–7, 158, 160, 357 Ban Chao 160 Ban Gu xv, 60n, 61n, 144, 146–7, 158–63, 181, 187–8, 351, 362, 366–7, 428, 430, 434, 437n, 441, 444 Bellona 277 Brutus 93 Bu Shi 52 Buddha see Tatha
gata Cacus 133 Caesar see Julius Caesar Caesar Divi Filius see Augustus Caesar, C. (grandson of Augustus) 259, 262–3 Caesar, L. (grandson of Augustus) 259, 262–3 Calgacus 122 Caligula (emperor) 331 Calpurnius Piso, Cn. 255 Cambyses 12 Cao Cao 350 Cao Pi 350 Caracalla (emperor) 376 Carinus (emperor) 325n Carneades 105–6

466

Index of Names

Carvilius, Sp. 94 Cassiodorus 341 Cassius Dio 241 Catiline 106 Cato the Elder / Cato Censorius / M. Porcius Cato 99–102, 110, 329 Chang Qu 355 Chen Shou 349, 351, 351n, 352, 352n, 353, 353n, 355–6, 428, 430 Chengdi (emperor of Former Han) 55, 59n, 162, 302 Cheng(wang) / King Cheng (of Zhou) 30, 30n Christ see Jesus Cicero 18–20, 95, 101, 105, 105n, 106–7, 110–11, 119n, 212n, 290, 330, 393–4 Claudian 324n Claudius (emperor) 121n, 122, 203n Claudius Marcellus, C. / Marcellus 132n Clement of Rome 387, 389 Cleomenes 195 Cleopatra 131, 134 Commodian 387 Commodus (emperor) 331 Confucius 29, 31–2, 34, 50, 57, 73, 78–9, 86, 144n, 146–7, 151–2, 188, 233, 234n, 300n, 314, 348, 406, 428, 449 Constantine the Great (emperor) 326, 373, 373n, 374–5, 377–9, 382–9, 391, 394, 425–6, 451 Constantius II (emperor) 328, 330–2, 334–7, 382, 384–6 Crassus 285 Cromwell, Oliver 196 Cui Hao 358, 367 Cui Hong 364n Cuo(wang) / King Cuo (of Zhongshan) 174, 181n, 224 Cyprian 326, 388 Cyrus 10 Da / Noble of Da 301, 301 Fig. Dan(zi) / Prince Dan (of Yan) 182 Decius (emperor) 373–4 Demetrius Poliorcetes 14 Demosthenes 206 Dido 98 Dio Cassius see Cassius Dio Dio Chrysostom 24 Diocletian (emperor) 255, 325n, 326, 326n, 375, 377, 425 Dionysus 13 Divus Iulius see Julius Caesar

Domitianus (emperor) 22, 121, 331 Dong Zhongshu 41n, 50, 50n, 51–2, 149, 153, 158n, 159, 159n Dong Zhuo 303, 350, 397 Drusus the Elder (son of Livia) 251 Fig., 259, 260n Drusus the Younger (son of Tiberius) 259, 263, 263n Du Yu 352n Duke of Zhou see Zhou(gong). Egeria 386 Ennius, Q. 99–100, 110, 138, 433, 433n Epictetus 390 Eratosthenes 13, 203 Ershi(huangdi) / Second Emperor / Second Generation 150n, 237–8, 435 Erzhu (clan) 363 Erzhu Rong 363, 365 Euander 133 Eugenius 338 Eumenius 210, 210n, 326 Eusebius 325n, 326, 342, 378–9, 384–5, 388–9, 391–2 Eutherius 333, 333n Fabius Pictor, Q. / Pictor 96–9, 433 Fan Ye 349, 358–9, 359n, 360–1, 361n, 362, 366, 367, 428, 430 Fan Zhen 411–12 Faxian 414n First Emperor (of Qin), First August see Shihuangdi Flavius Josephus see Josephus Florus 329n Foucault, Michel 390 Fu Sheng 44, 44n, 231 Furius Philus, L. / Philus 105–6 Galen 390 Galerius (emperor) 336 Gallienus (emperor) 379 Gallus (emperor) 330–2 Ganymede 288–9, 289 Fig., 290 Gao Huan 365 Gaodi, Gaozu see Liu Bang Ge Hong 355n, 409 Gelasius 385 Germanicus (son of Drusus the Elder) 123, 128, 212n, 251 Fig., 259–60, 263, 263n Gong(gong) / Lord Gong (of Qin) 225 Gong(wang) / King Gong (of Zhou) 71n Gordian III (emperor) 373

Index of Names Gratian (emperor) 337 Great Yu see Yu Guan Zhong 32, 34 Guangwu(di) / Emperor Guangwu (of Later Han) 55, 180, 361, 361n, 441 Guo Xiang 405, 407 Han Fei(zi) 34, 44, 44n, 45–6, 85, 148n He Xiu 149 Heracles / Hercules 13, 133, 202, 207 Heraclitus 6 Hercules see Heracles Herodotus xv, 5–6, 8, 197, 200n, 336 Hesiod 325n Homer 7 Honorius (emperor) 339 Horace 135n, 173, 130, 133, 135, 137–8, 288, 290, 384 Horatius Cocles 92–3 Hou Jing 347–9 Huai(di) / Emperor Huai (of Western Jin) 398 Huainan(wang) / King of Huainan see Liu An Huan Wen 354–5, 357 Huan Xuan 355 Huan(di) / Emperor Huan (of Later Han) 399 Huan(gong) / Duke Huan (of Qi) 32 Huan(gong) / Lord Huan (of Qin) 225 Huangdi / Yellow Emperor / Yellow Lord 83, 83n, 128, 145–9, 232, 364, 432, 439, 449 Huidi (emperor of Former Han) 159n, 162 Huijiao 355 Huo Qubing 312n Iamblichus 388 Iccius 288 Isis 375–6, 380, 386, 388 Isocrates 10, 12–13 Jerome 327n, 339, 387, 389, 431 Jesus Christ 325, 339, 374, 389, 392 Ji Kang 403–5 Ji(zi) / Viscomte Ji 158n Jia Dan 184 Jia Yi 44, 83n, 160–1, 161n Jing Ke 182 Jingdi / Emperor Jing (of Former Han) 49, 127n, 162, 300, 305n, 309 Jing(gong) / Lord Jing (of Qi) 76 John the Lydian 342, 432 Josephus 213 Jovian 328

467

Jugurtha 106–7 Julian (emperor) 328, 330–2, 333n, 336, 379, 386 Julius Caesar / Caesar / Divus Iulius 20, 104, 106, 108, 119n, 124n, 132n, 138, 189, 211, 270–2, 274, 285, 323, 330, 332, 450 Juno 108 Jupiter 93–4, 97, 108, 108n, 109, 131–2, 132n, 133, 209, 324n Justin (martyr) 388 Justinian (emperor) 342, 451 Kangxi (Manchu emperor) 189 Kou Qianzhi 413 Kuai(wang) / King Kuai (of Yan) 34, 356 Kuang Heng 152, 152n, 154 Lactantius 325, 329n, 379, 387–8 Laelius, C. 105 Laozi 34 Lawrence (martyr) 384 Lauricius 334 Leo the Great 341–2 Li (Princess Li) 312n Li Daoyuan 221n Li Guang 148n Li Guangli 157 Li Ling 148, 182n Li Si 36, 84, 85, 221, 221n, 222n, 227 Li(wang) / King Li (of Zhou) 154, 157 Li Xiong 397 Li Xun 182n Libanius 328 Licinius (emperor) 379 Licinius Crassus, M. see Crassus Lingdi (emperor of Later Han) 310 Ling(wang) / King Ling (of Chu) 74n, 76 Liu An / King of Huainan 49, 53, 162, 180 Liu Bang / Emperor Gaozu / Gaodi / King of Han (founder of Han dynasty) 41, 44n, 55–7, 126, 147, 150, 150n, 159, 159n, 160, 162, 180, 303, 356, 449 Liu Bei 350, 353 Liu He 159 Liu Lei 159 Liu Sheng / Prince of Zhongshan 305n, 310 Fig., 311n Liu Xiang 41, 41n, 59n Liu Xie 221n, 236n, 362 Liu Xuan (the Gengshi emperor) 360 Liu Yiqing 355 Liu Yu (founder of the Liu-Song dynasty) 355, 359–60, 360n

468

Index of Names

Liu Yu / Prince of Lu 300n Liu Zhan 350 Liu Zhiji 364 Livia (wife of Augustus) 282, 251 Fig. Livius Andronicus 138 Livy xv, 97, 106, 108–9, 111, 120, 124, 323, 325n, 328, 341, 429, 433 Lu Ban 178 Lu Jia 45n, 83n Lu Xiujing 400 Lu¨ (clan) 162 Lu¨ (hou) / Empress Lu¨ 59n, 159, 159n, 160n Lucan 433n Lupicinus 337 Ma Yuan 174 Maecenas 130, 138, 429 Magnentius (emperor) 331, 334 Mani 376–7 Manilius 287 Maodun 44n Marcellus see Claudius Marcellus, C. Mars 251 Fig., 273, 277 Martin of Tours 389 Maximinus Thrax (emperor) 325n Maximus (emperor) 337–8 Melito of Sardis 327n, 342 Mencius / Mengzi 33–4, 61, 86, 151, 233, 234n, 428 Meng Tian 148n, 173 Mengzi see Mencius Mingdi (emperor of Later Han) 55 Ming(di) / Emperor Ming (of Western Jin) 408 Mithras 294, 380 Mithridates 106, 209n Modestus 332 Monica (mother of Augustine) 377 Moses 238n, 374 Mozi 78–9, 79n, 86 Naevius, Cn 98, 108, 433, 433n Namatianus 431 Nero (emperor) 21, 121n, 122, 262 Nerseh 336 Noah 374, 386 Octavian see Augustus Odoacer 327, 341 Origen 327n, 342, 374, 382, 384, 387–8 Orosius 340, 342, 431 Osiris 385 Otto I 343

Ovid 188, 213, 290, 384 Qiang / (Shi) Qiang / Secretary Qiang 223 Paul / St Paul 23, 339, 386, 391, 444 Pausanias 290 Pei Xiu 183, 183n, 184 Pei Ziye 409n, 410 Pericles 15 Perseus 101 Peter / St Peter 276, 339, 341, 386, 444 Philip (king of Macedonia) 11–12 Philip the Arab 373 Philostorgius 339 Philus see Furius, Philus, L. Phocylides 6 Pictor see Fabius Pictor, Q. Ping(di) / Emperor Ping (of Former Han) 153n, 154, 162 Ping(wang) / King Ping (of Zhou) 156–7 Plato 8–11, 13, 18, 24, 383, 390, 393 Pliny the Elder 198, 199n, 200, 210n, 294 Pliny the Younger 22–3 Plotinus 373–4, 382, 388, 390–1, 394 Plutarch 16, 24, 211 Polybius 16–19, 68n, 94, 102–4, 107, 110–11, 209n, 431 Pompeius Pius, Sex. (son of Pompey the Great) 270 Pompeius Trogus 287 Pompey the Great 104, 108, 138, 211–12 Porcius Cato Censorius, M. see Cato the Elder Porphyry 373, 388, 390 Possidius 394 Praetextatus 336 Procopius of Caesarea 333–4, 342, 432 Propertius 290 Prudentius 325, 339–40, 343, 384, 431 Pyrrhus 100 Pythagoras 94n, 388 Qianlong (Manchu emperor) 189 Qin First Emperor / Qin Shihuangdi see Shihuangdi Qu Yuan 188 Queen Mathilda 195 Quinctius Flamininus, T. 109 Quirinus 132 Regulus 393 Remus 93, 99n, 132, 444 Ren Fang 178n Romulus 92–3, 96, 99n, 134, 275, 444

Index of Names Romulus Augustulus (emperor) 327, 341 Ruan Ji 403 Rufinus 327, 327n Rutilius Namatianus 330, 341, 343 Sabinianus 333 Sallust 106–7, 110–11, 119n, 124, 124n, 202, 202n, 329–30, 333, 429 Salvianus of Marseilles 342–3 Sargon I 12 Saturnus 270 Scipio the Elder 100, 132n, 328 Scipio the Younger 17, 105, 132n Sempronius Gracchus, Ti. 203n Seneca the Elder / Seneca rhetor 329n Seneca the Younger / Seneca philosophus 10, 21, 390 Sergius Catilina, L. see Catiline Servius 95, 212 Shang Yang 82, 85 Shang Ziping 405 Shapur I 336 Shapur II 336–7 Shen Wuyu 76 Shen Yue 366n Shihuangdi / King of Qin / First August / First Emperor (of Qin) / Qin First Emperor 35, 36, 48–9, 67–8, 78n, 83, 85n, 144, 146n, 150, 173, 180, 182, 185–6, 188, 217–19, 224–5, 228–32, 232n, 233–8, 300, 303–5, 307–8, 429–30, 434–5, 437–8, 446 Shu Xi 401 Shui Anli 186 Shun (i.e. Yu) 34, 78, 82, 128, 128n, 147, 149, 153, 155, 159, 162, 171, 229–31, 231n, 232–3, 356, 424, 439, 449 Silvanus 333–4 Sima Biao 366n Sima Qian (the Grand Historian) xv, 49–50, 52–3, 126n, 127n, 128, 128n, 129–30, 137, 144–6, 146n, 147–51, 158, 163, 180, 222n, 300, 351, 366, 398, 428, 430 Sima Rui 400 Sima Tan 145 Sima Xiangru 50n Sima Yan 352, 357 Sima Yi 352 Socrates 10 Solon 7 Ssu-ma Ch’ien see Sima Qian Stilicho 339 Strabo 197, 203–6, 206n, 207–13, 435 Su Dongpo 182, 182n

469

Su Qin 179 Suetonius 121, 212, 241, 277, 286 Sui Hong 56n Sulla 106 Sulpicius Galba, C. 102 Sulpicius Severus 389 Sun Chuo 354n Sun En 348–9, 355 Symmachus 329–30, 339n Synesius 339 Tacitus xv, 21–2, 106, 120–1, 121n, 122, 122n, 123–6, 126n, 128, 128n, 135, 137, 139–40, 260, 287, 329–30, 333, 389, 429, 433 Tai Xiaowei 405 Tang (founder of Shang) 82–3 Tang / Tangshu / Lord Tang (of Jin) 77–8 Tangshu see Tang Tatha
gata (i.e. Buddha) 414n Terminus 109 Tertullian 381, 384 Themistius 386 Themistocles 15 Theoderic 327, 341 Theodosius I / Theodosius the Great (emperor) 338–9, 378, 385, 392, 451 Thucydides xv, 8 Tian Fen 59 Tiberius (emperor) 112, 122–3, 126, 128, 135–6, 203, 241, 251 Fig., 253–5, 259, 262, 330, 429, 435 Trajan (emperor) 22 Tuoba Gui / King of Wei (founder of the Tuoba-Wei dynasty) 364, 364n Turnus 133 Ursicinus 331–3 Valens (emperor) 327–8, 332, 337–8, 375 Valentinian I (emperor) 328 Valentinian II (emperor) 338, 339n Valerian (emperor) 336 Varus (P. Quinctilius Varus) 136 Vegetius 199 Velleius Paterculus xv, 120, 130, 135–9, 212, 429 Vespasian 121n Vesta 132, 339n Victoria 339 Virgil 20, 108, 111, 120, 130–2, 133n, 135n, 137, 209, 211–12, 290, 384–5, 433 Vitruvius 208–9

470

Index of Names

Wang Bi 405–6 Wang Chen 362 Wang Chong 398n Wang Mang (the ‘usurper’) 34, 55–6, 144, 150, 152–3, 153n, 154–5, 158–60, 162, 183, 302, 441–2, 450 Wang Tong 152n Wang Yanshou 300, 300n, 312n Wei Hong 144 Wei Shou 349, 358, 362–7, 428, 428n, 444 Wen(di) / Han Wendi / Emperor Wen (of Former Han) 126–7, 127n, 128, 151, 162, 175, 430 Wen(di) / Emperor Wen (of Liu-Song) 400 Wen(wang) / King Wen (of Zhou) 30, 80, 84, 152, 154, 156–7 William the Conqueror 195 Wu (family with shrines at Jiaxiang) 300 Wu(di) / Han Wudi / Emperor Wu (of Han) 41, 49–50, 50n, 51–5, 58–9, 59n, 144, 146, 148–9, 151, 156–7, 161–2, 180, 182, 232n, 303, 307, 430, 441, 446, 449 Wu(di) / Liang Wudi / Emperor Wu (of Liang) 414, 414n, 415–16, 413 Wu(gong) / Lord Wu (of Qin) 225n Wu(wang) / King Wu (of Zhou) 30, 69, 77, 82–4, 147, 154, 155n, 156–7 Xenophon 10 Xi Zuochi 349, 353–7, 357n, 366, 428, 430 Xiang Xiu 405, 407, 449 Xiang Yu 56, 147–8, 148n, 150n, 356 Xianyuan see Huangdi Xiao He 180 Xiao Ziliang 358, 411–12 Xiao(wang) / Prince Xiao of Liang 312n Xiaowen(di) / Emperor Xiaowen (of TuobaWei) 358 Xiaowudi (emperor of Eastern Jin) 414 Xie Kun 408 Xinling(gong) / Prince of Xinling 148n Xu (family which kept the Maoshan revelations) 413 Xuan(wang) / King Xuan (of Qi) 33 Xuan(wang) / King Xuan (of Zhou) 151, 157 Xuandi (emperor of Former Han) 162

Xunzi 34, 44, 44n, 51, 55, 61–2, 62n, 83–4, 150 Yan Yanzhi 360, 360n Yan Ying 75–6 Yang Xi 353n Yao 34, 56, 56n, 128n, 147, 149, 153, 159, 162, 356, 439, 449 Yellow Emperor see Huangdi Yi: see Zeng(hou) Yi / Marquis Yi of Zeng Yi (assistant of Yu) 179 Yi (the Zhou Scribe Yi) 145 You(wang) / King You (of Zhou) 72, 154, 156–7 Yu (i.e. Shun) see Shun Yu / the Great Yu / Yu the Great / Emperor Yu 71, 71n, 78, 83, 83n, 128, 147, 171, 178–9, 234, 234n, 235, 434, 439 Yu Liang 408 Yu Xin 347, 347n Yuan Hong 360, 360n Yuandi (emperor of Former Han) 144, 162 Zeng(hou) Yi (Marquis Yi of Zeng) 224 Zeus 13, 288, 290 Zhang Daoling 413 Zhang Heng 60n, 61, 422 Zhang Hua 352n Zhang Liang 300 Zhang Shoujie 221n Zhang(di) / Emperor Zhang (of Later Han) 408 Zhao Chongguo 182n Zhao Gao 221n Zhaoxiang(wang) / King Zhaoxiang (of Qin) 35 Zheng Qiao 158n, 187 Zheng Xuan 181n, 398 Zhongchang Tong 361 Zhou(gong) / Duke of Zhou 30–1, 34, 69, 144, 152, 152n, 156–7 Zhuang(gong) / Lord Zhuang (of Zheng) 72 Zhuge Liang 353n Ziying (nephew of Ershihuangdi) 150n Zosimus 339, 341 Zou Yan 150n Zuo Si 57n

Index of Subjects All-under-Heaven (tianxia) xvi, 36, 42–3, 51, 56, 68–9, 71, 75–9, 81, 81n., 82–4, 129–30, 143, 171, 178, 185, 187, 190, 219, 227, 231, 353, 364, 424, 429, 429n, 430, 432, 437, 439–40 Han emperorship / idea of ‘empire’ 349, 432 imperial rhetoric 71 potency 49 self-containing empire 190, 438 ‘weak’ empire 36 see also empire; historiography (and empire); realm; world architecture / art see imperial buildings, structures, etc.; imperial imagery asceticism 339–40, 377, 382 aristocracy see constitution / forms of government; elite(s) auctoritas / authority auctoritas vs. potestas 112, 245 moral dimension of 43 religious / spiritual authority 382, 399 see also ideals of rulership; legitimation autobiography 389, 427 see also biography barbarian(s) 5–6, 8–12, 25, 127, 130, 186, 205, 259, 261, 304, 324, 327–9, 333, 335–43, 351, 365, 427, 430 characteristics 312–14, 335–7 conquest dynasty 363, 366, 432 exoticism 310 image of the cultural Other 284–95 passim, 299, 305, 310–14 passim, 438 invasion by 70, 327, 335–8, 340, 354, 398, 400–1 origins of Tuoba people 364, 367 Phrygian / pointed cap 287–8, 311 Fig., 312–14 potential Romans 205 representatives of humanitas 342 bellum iustum 19, 97, 105–6, 110–12, 440 biography / hagiography 10, 355, 388–9, 404, 426 see also autobiography border / border regions 22, 52, 112, 136, 169, 182, 185–6, 190, 287, 324, 336, 341, 375, 400, 425

Great Wall 186 monuments at the border 259–60 people of frontiers 313 see also barbarian(s) Buddhism 358, 399, 410, 414–17, 443 Bodhisattva emperor / imperial Bodhisattva (huangdi pusa) 414–15, 417, 426 Bodhisattva-ordination of emperor (shou pusa jie) 415 Buddhist mass events 415–16 Buddhist scriptures, Buddhist canon 417 future world ruler (falun wang) 415 Sangha, Buddhist clergy 415–16 wheel-turning king (cakravartin) 426 see also communication; religion capital center of realm / (inhabited) world 70, 187–8, 205, 208, 257, 264, 437 center of rituals 169 conquest 339–41, 387 debate on the location 187–8 devastation 339–41, 347–8, 397–8, 425, 443 embellishment 270–8 establishing 400 making and shifting 30, 32, 35, 72, 443 model for Chinese cities 190 moving 350, 354, 358, 364, 373–4 cartography see map(s) Christianity 373–94 passim, 443–4 all-embracing organization 380 alternative society / world 375, 382–4, 425 attitude toward pagan tradition 385–7 aversion from traditional gods 341 beginnings 375–81 bishops 373, 379–80, 382, 384–5, 426 Christian empire 340–3, 374, 378–80, 391–4 Christian world rule 341 cohesive force in empire 379 community in Rome 378–9 conversion 378–9, 389 council of Nicaea 384–5 edict of Diocletian 377

472

Index of Subjects

Christianity (cont.) edict of tolerance 377 exorcism 381 gospel 389 heresy 338, 377, 383–5, 426 humility 380–1 imperial patronage 374, 379–80 love as central value 380, 394 monotheism 378, 383, 426, 444 otherworldliness 444 orthodoxy 378, 383–5, 426 persecutions 374, 379 plurality of Christianities 384 reasons for success 380–1 relation to Judaism 383–4 relics 374, 386 Rome a Christian city 325, 339 salvation 325, 376–8, 427, 444 self-definition 382–5 selflessness 380–1 sense of community 380–1, 426 spiritual equality 381 spread 378–81 state religion 374, 379–80 subjectivity 390–1 Zeitkritik 387 see also martyrdom; religion; self citizenship
and military service 7 Roman 23–4, 295, 308, 376 city, cities / polis, poleis 5–26 passim, 422–3, 440 city of God 392–4 decuriones 335–6 face to face society 8 home of intellectual life 205 layout 270–8, 307, 314, 435 municipal elites and center 261–4 self-governing cities (in Galatia) 252 self-government 15–16, 22, 25, 440 urban crisis 335–6 urban culture / urbanism / urban life 14, 22, 190, 299, 308 see also capital; law(s); Rome civil administration / administrative tasks of government 42, 126–9, 430, 440 flood control and irrigation works 71, 128, 171, 179, 185, 434 see also minister(s); war civilization civilized world vs. ‘barbarians’ 186, 312 Fig., 324 civilizing ‘rites, music, and education’ / ‘transformative influence’ / ‘moral

transformation’ (jiaohua) 47, 152, 161, 163, 424 see also barbarian(s); culture; legitimation Classics, classical China: classical learning (Ru) 41, 54, 398, 428, 446 classicists (rusheng) / erudites (boshi) / Confucian scholars 217–18, 220–2, 233–4, 305, 442 commentarial literature 80, 171 Confucian canon (Five ‘Confucian’ Classics) 31, 221, 398, 406 editorial activities 41, 428 Han (official) scholasticism 54, 404–5 ritual and textual scholarship 219–22, 227–8, 232, 428 (offical) study of the Five Classics 41, 402, 405 see also Confucianism Rome: canonical texts in late antiquity 383 classical studies / edition of classics 386 classicism 15, 282 sacred books 377 communication / communicative (public) space center—periphery / capital— provinces 254–64, 435 differences between China and Rome 58, 296, 434–6, 438 emperor—court audience 224–5, 424, 434, 436 emperor—subjects 253 immediate
ruler—subjects 416 magistrates—people 270–3 princeps—people of Rome 244–6, 248, 435 princeps—provinces 252–3, 255, 435 public announcement of monarch’s personal name 415 public (direct) propaganda / propaganda weapon 302, 306, 415 public representation in sacrifices / (semi-) public rituals 60–1 public spectacles / games 274, 274 Fig., 384, 388 rostra (speaker’s platform) 270–2, 272 Fig., 273 Fig. ruler—ancestral (cosmic) spirits / deities 169, 224–5, 229, 427, 434 senate—provinces 255–6 transfer of emperor’s ‘merit’ (gong) to his subjects 416

Index of Subjects communication / communicative (cont.) see also imperial imagery; inscriptions; religion (state cult); rites (li) Confucianism Confucian teachings / convictions / values 402, 404 Confucius as patron saint of Great Han 57 see also Classics, classical (China) constitution / forms of government aristocracy 125, 138–9 constitution as source of success 17, 103 democracy 8, 23, 26 ‘mixed constitution’ 17–18, 20 republic vs. monarchy 16–21, 24, 112, 121–6, 129, 131, 133–4, 137–40, 244–6, 437, 440 ‘rotation of constitutions’ 11, 18 see also ideals of rulership; monarchy correlative thinking 57, 159, 162–3 astral-terrestrial correspondences 51–2, 173, 360, 365–7, 406, 432 computation of fate 409–11 Heavenly ‘response’ (ying) 153, 303, 306 Yin and Yang energies 170–1 cosmos cosmic battle 377 cosmic cycles 55, 57 cosmic dimension of imperial rule / cosmic-political system 12–14, 277, 285–6, 411, 436, 438, 441 cosmic order 12–14, 51, 169, 248, 423, 432 cosmic powers 235, 435 cosmic-religious / cosmic ritual system 233, 349 cosmic unity (of Dao, of Han) 86, 412 cosmogonic myths 170–1 divine embedded in 382 cosmopolitism 21, 25 crisis, crises 323–5, 424–5, 431–3, 443–4 consciousness of crisis 238, 324–8, 399 crisis of third century 325–6, 335, 373–5, 424 crises of fourth and fifth centuries 327–9, 336, 424 cultural crisis 401–2 moral crisis 329–30 see also disorder culture acculturation 209 cultural identity (Greek) 5 cultural identity (Roman) 20, 278, 284–95 cultural identity (Southern Dynasties) 400–1 cultural mingling 314

473

cultural plurality 269, 309 cultural self-definition 314, 438 (of Han elite), 358 (of Southern Dynasties’ elite) cultural superiority 324 (of Rome), 35, 52 (of Zhou kings) foundation of European culture 9 Greeks and other cultures 6, 9 literati culture 348 Roman reception of Classical Greek culture / art 269, 282 Rome and other cultures 269, 284–95, 438 relationship / unity of Greek and Roman culture 3, 20, 24–5, 86, 92, 94, 97, 422 ‘sinicization’ 358, 365 see also barbarian(s); civilization Daoism 358, 397, 399, 402, 412–14, 417, 426 Celestial Master (tianshi), Celestial Master sect 412–13 Daoist canon, canonization of Daoist texts 399, 417 Daoist Church 179, 399, 413, 426 Daoist state of ‘Great Perfection’ (Da-Cheng) 397, 399, 426 Daoist messianism 397 Daoist priest(s), priesthood 412, 426 Daoist scriptures, revelatory scriptures 400, 413 Daoist theocracy 358, 413, 426 fusion of religious organization with imperial administration 399 Neo-Daoism 402 spiritual bureaucracy 410 spread of Daoist traditions 399 Taiping (‘Great Peace’) movement 399 see also religion debate(s) 423–4
at royal court / Qin/Han court 49–50, 54, 60, 67, 424
in market place 424
on forms of government 423–4 ‘indirect remonstrance’ (feng) 40 intellectual
in Greece 9–10 philosophical
425 theological
383–5 see also communication decadence / decline / degeneration cultural decline 387, 401, 409 discourse of moral decline 102, 106, 111, 124, 329–31, 333, 387, 401–2, 425 lament for decadent past / cultural decay 402

474

Index of Subjects

decadence / decline / degeneration (cont.) moral decay as reason for political crisis 329–34, 338 despotism 22, 287, 331–3 see also ‘monarchy’ democracy see constitution diplomacy
vs. military 127–8 diplomatic exchanges 77 foreign policy 156 disorder / desintegration 425 awareness of worldly disorder 399 breakdown of imperial order 347–8, 397–403 passim chaos / confusion 351, 401, 430 desintegration of a world 29, 73, 77, 350, 354, 394, 416–17 see also crisis, crises dynasty see Heavenly Mandate; history (dynastic cycle[s]); succession (zhengtong) elite(s) aristocracy (shi) 409
and patronage 138 e´migre´ aristocracy 347, 354, 358–9, 411, 413 interest in Christianity 379 literati / intellectuals 366, 403–5 municipal elites and emperor 261–4 provincial 22, 257, 261–2, 264, 335 Roman
and art 287–9, 294 senatorial aristocracy and literary patronage 138, 429 social elites 306 (of Han), 425 (of postHan and late antiquity) southern elite (Southern Dynasties) 358, 411 see also city, cities (‘decuriones’); senate emigration
to the south (post-Han) 398, 400–1, 408 life in exile 103 (Polybius), 351 (Chen Shou), 401 emperor cult of
/ imperial cult 20–1, 246, 249–53, 256, 261–2, 278, 303
and god(s) 274–5
and people 244–5, 278 god-like ruler / savior 252–3 huangdi (‘august emperor’) 35, 225, 351, 437 living god 43 secular (worldly) ruler and religious sage (religious teacher) 399, 414, 426

universal / (future) world ruler 226, 229, 230–1, 415 see also All-under-Heaven; communication; ideals of rulership; imperial . . . ; monarchy; princeps; Son of Heaven empire centeredness of the empire 189–90, 205, 208, 437 doubly imperial nature of ‘empire’ 35, 119, 119n, 120–1 ‘empire’ studies xiii–xvii imperial thinking 120, 130–7, 431, 442 Macedonian Empire / empire of Alexander 11–13, 424 Parthian Empire 21, 24, 283–95 passim, 336 Persian Empire 5, 9–12, 335–7, 373–4, 377 see also All-under-Heaven; historiography (
and empire); imperial building; imperial imagery; imperium; realm; Roman Empire eremitism / hermits 185, 388, 404–5 withdrawal from society 402–4, 425 exempla / exemplary mode of historical thinking Augustus as exemplum 244 exempla tradition 92–3, 99, 393 usefulness of lessons taught by history 357 ‘using the past to criticize the present’ (yi gu fei jin) 221 ‘using the past to serve the present’ (yi gu shi jin) 68, 85–6 see also history expansion
and aristocracy in Rome 17, 122–5
in early Zhou 70, 155
not the agenda of Classical Greece 9 Persian 5, 9–10 Roman 11–12, 91, 95–6, 104–8, 111–12, 122–5, 210, 257, 261–3, 424, 437 southward
of Chinese culture 417, 424 under Alexander 11–13 under Han, esp. Wudi 156, 161, 309, 430, 441 see also Roman Empire Five Elements 57, 150, 159, 161–3, 302, 356–7, 361–7, 432, 437 patron element / patron Phase 179, 187, 364–5

Index of Subjects Five Elements (cont.) qi (energy) / wangzheqi (‘kingly energy’) 173, 353 see also correlative thinking; historical thinking freedom see liberty geography dual depiction, verbal and visual 196–7, 199–200, 207 geographical description of empire / world 171, 178–9, 187, 203–4, 234, 435 geographical knowledge 182
and chorography 204
and concern for the home of man 204–5
and history 196, 206–8 imperial construction of space 178–89 passim, 196–7, 201–2, 208, 435 local and regional gazeteers (fangzhi) 190, 355 ritual / idealized 171, 234, 434 sacred landscape 234 see also map(s) Gnosticism 378 Golden Age 325n
of Augustus 20, 131, 208, 276, 286 yearning for 77–9, 157, 399 Great Wall see border Heavenly Mandate (tianming) 30–2, 35, 56–7, 154, 158, 162, 302–3, 305, 349, 351, 360, 367, 412, 423–4 see also correlative thinking; Five Elements; omens and portents history / historical consciousness / historical thinking alternation order—chaos 129, 430 aristocratic memorial culture 94–5 commemoration of the founding of the empire / founding emperor 305, 307, 435 ‘comprehending the past and the present’ (tong gu jin zhi bian) 150, 220 concepts of the course of history 124–5, 129–30, 132–7, 148–51, 157–8, 161–3, 361, 439 concern with permanence and posterity 237 constructions of the past / rejection of past models 71, 84–5 cyclical patterns / patterns of repetition 133, 441–2 directional development of Roman history 97, 124–5, 129–30, 132–3, 439

475

dynastic cycle(s) 157, 161–2, 365, 441 eschatological kingdom of peace 326 ‘figure of memory’ 238 Heaven’s will 150 historical criticism 360, 362, 364 historical argumentation 357 historical (collective / cultural) memory 190, 226–7, 350, 353, 427, 433 history and transcendental powers 103, 110–11 history as movement vs. state / change vs. steady flow 123–5, 132–5, 442 juxtaposition of past and present 34, 40, 361–2 ‘laws of change’ 53 myth and history 98, 108, 131–3 nostalgia 72, 399 oral tradition 92–3 republican vs. imperial historical consciousness 120–5, 130–40, 442–3 Rome compared to woman 325 Ruinenmelancholy 157–8 sacred history 236 temporality of human societies and states 393–4, 432 Tyche / Fortuna 103, 110–11 unification (monopolization) of memory 226–7 universal history 103, 145 see also exempla; Golden Age; historiography historiography / historical narrative admonitory function of 101, 328–30, 333, 338, 432–3 annales maximi 95, 428 Bureau of Historiography (shiguan) 143, 432 Chunqiu (Spring and Autumn Annals) 29, 50, 73–7 passim, 80–1, 146, 152–3 dynastic (standard) history, histories (zhengshi) 143, 351, 364–5, 367, 428, 441 forms of 95–6, 100–1, 104, 120–1 historical epics 98–100, 108–9, 130–3, 433 historical essay(s) / historical prose 359, 361–2 historical novel 349 historiographic traditions 74, 124–5
and empire xv–xvii, 102–4, 121–5, 143, 163–4, 323–43 passim, 432
and res publica 432–3 master narrative 96, 99, 433

476

Index of Subjects

historiography / historical narrative (cont.) narrative style 360, 362 official historiographic activities 354, 364 ritualistic mode of 80–2 social context of historiography / social background of historians 96, 101, 106, 108, 138–40, 329–30, 427–9, 432–3 subject matter of 121–30, 431 writing of universal history 103, 145, 158, 389 see also biography; history holy men / exemplary figures 381–2, 404, 425, 443 see also martyrs ideals of rulership adoption of Chinese emperorship 358, 364, 444 ‘appropriateness’ of policies, ‘expediency’ 55, 360 arguments (theory) of Realpolitik (‘might makes right’) 44–6 books on kingship 14 ‘lonely’ vs. approachable ruler 415 moralistic ruler 46–48, 51 ‘non-interventionist’ (wuwei) government / ruler 52, 406 practice of virtue 393 ruler and virtue(s) 245–6 ruler as intermediary between Heaven, Earth, and Man 415, 423 ruler as moral example for all subjects, instructor of the people 51, 415 ruler as primus inter pares among scholars and officials 54 ruler as ritual master 54 ruler as student / teacher of Classics 54 self-mastery of ruler 48 tradition of the ‘Princes’ Mirrors’ 9–10 traditional Confucian monarch 415 ‘true king’ (wang), ‘One Man’, sage-king(s), saint-ruler(s) (sheng, shengwang) 29, 33, 52, 73, 78, 83, 151, 188, 407, 435, 439 Zhou kingship (model) 29–30, 32, 34, 52, 146, 424, 429 see also constitution; emperor; monarchy; princeps; Son of Heaven identity Greek 5, 8 national 5 provincial 252 religious 380 Roman 20, 92, 205

sense of belonging to an imagined community (Han) 58, 62 imperial buildings, structures, etc. China: imperial hunting park(s) 49 mausoleum(s) / tomb(s) 299, 308–9 palaces 299, 307–8, 423 stelae 307 Rome: Ara Pacis 276, 276 Fig., 438 Campus Martius 248, 275–6, 276 Fig., 438 Circus maximus 274, 274 Fig. Forum Augustum 273–4, 275 Fig. Forum Romanum (rebuilt under Augustus) 270–2, 272 Fig., 273 Fig. imperial monuments outside Rome 258–63 Mausoleum Augustum 241, 247–8, 248 Fig., 249, 275–6, 276 Fig. Millarium Aureum 208 Palatine 274–5 victory monuments 33–4, 110, 258 imperial imagery / imperial representation 58–62 passim, 269–96 passim, 299–314 passim art and monuments as symbols of tradition 60, 303–5 ceremonial events / ritual performances 60–1, 224–37 passim colored marble as symbol of empire 277, 294, 436 display of wealth, material splendor 61, 277 evocation of empire in Rome 211–13, 436
as means of consolidating the empire 269, 287, 296 invisible / ‘hidden’ ruler motif 59, 302–3 mapping as imperial project 209–10 public display of Res Gestae 244–9, 250–3, 435–7 rulers’ portraits, efficacies, etc. 60, 246, 279–81, 281 Fig., 282–4, 295–6, 300–1, 436 visual representation of empire in provinces 257–64 visualized quality of Augustus 282–4 see also communication; inscriptions; map(s); rites (li); religion (state cult) imperium xvi, 17–19, 42, 107, 119n see also empire; Roman Empire inscription(s) 217–38 passim, 241–64 passim, 435–7 as parts of monuments 258 bronze
241, 225–6, 247–9, 428

Index of Subjects inscription(s) (cont.) dissemination of imperial ideology via inscriptions and monuments 224–5, 258–64
and integration of empire 257–8, 261 language of 222, 225–8, 236–7, 244, 260–1 performative nature of 236–7 public calligraphy 224–5 visual component of 248–9, 258 inspection tours 50, 128, 189, 217, 220 Fig., 228–31, 233–5, 237, 307, 434–5 roaming the universe / heavenly journey 188–9 justice administration of
by experts 17 administration of
by imperial administration 25 Constantius enemy of justice 331 impact on life and politics 19 in Mozi’s ideal monarchy 79
and empire 105–7 quality of legal system or politicians 11 Roman rule based / not based on justice 105–7, 340 traditional administration of 7 see also law(s); legitimation Judaism see Christianity (relation to Judaism) law(s) 423, 445 concern for the interpretation of 18, 23 emperor’s ordinances equivalent to 22 good
create virtuous citizens 10 interpretation of
by experts 17
and justice 393
‘of the spear’ 12
of purity 380
of worldly state 393 lawyers as members of government 23 monarchs placing themselves above the law 21 new legislation 7 ruler ‘living
’ 23, 25 rule of
/ legal system essence of polis 6–11 passim, 24–6, 423 written
/ equality before the
factor of democratization 7, 423 see also city, cities; justice legitimation by Heaven / Heavenly Mandate see Heavenly Mandate by heavenly signs see omens and portents

477

civilization / culture as
of rule 10, 12, 14, 20, 431, 442 conquest / victory as
of rule 12, 19, 100, 257, 259, 261–2, 284, 424, 440, 442 descent as
of rule 56, 159, 360 divine sanction / divinely authorized rulership 12–14, 16, 20, 25, 47 justice as
of rule 12, 19, 105, 107, 109, 111, 136, 324, 356, 431, 442 merits and accomplishments for the people as
of rule 356 order / stability / harmony as
of rule 12–13, 20, 109, 111, 132–4, 136–7, 324, 437 peace as
of rule 12, 19, 132–3, 136–7, 276, 324, 431, 442 unified empire as
of rule 356, 430 well-being of the ruled as
of rule 12, 103–7, 109, 111, 136–7, 356, 431; see authority; debate(s); Heavenly Mandate; ideals of rulership; omens and portents liberty civic freedom 6, 16, 20, 22, 25, 440
and empire 109 see also city, cities library / archives 41, 180, 183n, 221–2, 226, 350, 397, 428 longevity pursuit of longevity / immortality 49, 51 see also self (longevity) Manicheism 375–8, 380, 394 map(s) 169–87 passim, 195–214 passim, 434–7 city map 177 diagram(s) 172 function of maps 174, 176, 179–82, 195, 434 historically layered maps 196, 201–3, 206–8 ‘illustrated works of tribute-bearing peoples’ (zhigong tu) 181 interrelation between text (wen) and image (tu) 172 itineraria picta 199–201, 203 mapping as imperial project 209–10 map of Agrippa 196, 198–200, 200n, 202–4, 207–8, 209n, 210n, 211, 213, 288, 435, 437, 443 map of Aristagoras 197 military
/
of strategic purpose 174–6, 181, 434 reflections on mapmaking 182–3

478

Index of Subjects

map(s) (cont.) scale maps 175, 183, 196, 199–200 significant depictions / strategies of mapping 195–7, 199, 200–2, 206–7 symbolic significance of 181–3 tabula Peutingeriana 199–201, 201 Fig., 202, 205–9, 211 ‘universal’ (topographical) maps (yuditu) 179–81, 183–7 passim, 437 see also geography martyr(s) / martyrdom 339, 383–5, 426–7 acts of martyrs 388 Roman fascination with violent spectacle 384 see also holy men mentality / mentalite´ 324, 377, 381–2 world-view 178–9, 187, 398 see also self metaphors of ruler boss of mirror 58 north-polar star 173 military see war Millennianism 387–8 minister(s) / official(s) 305, 423 able and loyal official (xian) 34 acting as regent (Duke of Zhou) 30 attitudes towards 127–8 Confucian role model 305 ideal of official 333–4 see also civil administration Mithraism 375–7, 380 monarchy / monarchical system 9–11, 15–16, 20–2, 25–6, 33, 35, 112, 119, 121, 131, 245–6, 270, 331–3, 422, 440–1 absolute 22, 331–3 attitude towards
/ problem of
in Rome 21, 112, 121–6, 129, 131, 133–4, 137–40, 245–6, 431, 433, 440, 442–3 in historiography 121–7, 135, 139, 146–7, 153–5, 159–60;
and municipal self-government 15–16, 22, 25–6 natural in mythical times 131 only principle of rulership in China 422 see also constitution; emperor; empire (doubly imperial nature of
); ideals of rulership moral(s) / morality / moral behavior monarchy and political morals 122, 332 moral corruption of senate 122, 330–1 moral order (of Han) 398–9 morality of Roman conduct / Roman moral superiority 97–101, 107, 110

quantification (computarization) of morality 411 see also decadence; ideals of rulership (moralistic ruler) multi-state system appropriation of Zhou king’s designation ‘wang’ 33, 74 interstate alliances 73 interstate conferences 32–3 ‘lords’, ‘princes’ (zhuhou) 72–3, 76 multi-centricity of Greek world 9
in Chunqiu period 74–5, 77 ‘overlord’, ‘hegemon’ (ba) 33, 42, 161 omens and portents 29, 50, 56, 159–60, 162–3, 304–6, 349, 353, 357, 360, 366, 432 chenwei (prophetic texts) 57, 303 physiognomic traits 56, 160n suprahuman precedents and ‘proofs’ 39 see also correlative thinking; Five Elements; religion Oriental see barbarian(s) (image of the cultural Other) orthodoxy see Christianity paganism 324n pagan and Christian ethics 393–4 pagan cults 380 pagan culture 385–7 patronage centers of religious and literary
409 imperial
of Buddhism / Christianity / Daoism / Indian religion [Jansen] 374, 379–80, 399–400, 413–14, 414n, 426 literary 99, 138 peace coexistence of monarchy and municipal self-government source for peace in the Greco-Roman world 25 Great Peace (taiping) / universal (eternal)
77, 155, 235, 413, 430, 441 pax Augusta 136, 262, 276 pax Christiana 341 pax Romana /
under Roman rule 19–20, 340 provided by ruler 12, 14–15, 25 restoration of 138, 258 way to achieve 44, 47 Zhou kings as pacifiers 70 see also legitimation (peace as
); war philosophy Hundred Schools (baijia yu) 33–4, 221, 429

Index of Subjects philosophy (cont.) interest in Persian and Indian philosophy 373 Neoplatonism 372–3, 375, 382, 388, 390–1 political theory 9–11, 16–17, 105–6 Pythagoreism 14, 383 Stoicism 13, 21, 25, 390 ‘teaching of names’ (mingjiao) 407 wu (‘non-being’, ‘negativity’) 405–7 xuanxue (‘the study of the Dark’) 405–8 pilgrims / pilgrimage 386 princeps / principate 20–1, 112, 123, 125, 130, 134, 245, 270, 436–7, 442–3 see also emperor; monarchy province(s) see communication; identity; realm public good gong (‘public interest, benefit’, ‘common good’) 43, 178 gong vs. si (‘family, personal, or selfish matters’) 43 sense of mutual obligation and commonweal 51 ‘weal and woe’ (li - hai) 181 qingtan (‘pure conversation’) 403 realm / administrative division colony 24, 249, 252 junxian system 36, 42–3 ‘nine provincial areas’, Nine Regions (jiuzhou) 35, 171, 178–9, 184, 434 province(s) 19–20, 22, 102, 107, 249, 251–3, 255–64 provincial assembly / koinon 252, 256, 259 Yu’s division of 171 Zhongguo (Central States, China) 39, 190 Zhongyuan (Central Plains) 423 see also empire; world reform(s) Han ‘Reformist’ thought / ideology / policies 51, 54–8 passim, 60, 144, 152, 156, 158–9, 442 (late Western Zhou) ritual reform(s) 31, 69, 223–4, 422 religion / religious cults 424–7, 445 ancestral sacrifices / ancestral worship / communication with ancestral spirits 188, 224, 235, 301 cult of city god 190 cult of emperor see emperor (cult of
) cult of hero 13

479

cult of ruler 15, 20 divination 109 esoteric cults 426, 443 Heaven’s highest deity Tian; Taiqi (‘the Grand Unity’) / Supreme Deity 57, 306 household / private cults 58, 425 mystery cults 376–7, 380 new cults / sects / religious communities 376–8, 380, 444 priest(s) / priesthood(s) 20, 95, 370, 385 redemption 411 religious escapism 403 religious experience 381–3 religious experts / ‘master of techniques’ (fangshi) 188, 303, 425 state cult / state rituals / feng and shan (wang) sacrifices / upkeep of imperial ancestral shrines 60, 93, 217, 227, 232–3, 303, 307, 414 see also Buddhism; Christianity; Confucianism; Daoism; Manicheism; Mithraism; paganism; rites (li) restoration idea of (zhongxing) 162
of Jin dynasty 354
of Han empire 347, 349–50, 353, 355–6, 366, 401
of lost cosmic unity 412–13
of peace 138, 258, 437
of res publica 20, 112, 244–5
revival of unity / unified rule 76–9, 82–3, 348–66 passim, 397–403 passim, 425, 430, 437, 444 rites (li) / ritual(s) / ritual system 423, 445 annual parade in the capital district 61 anti-ritualism 404 monuments and rituals 60–1, 259–60 non-sacrificial ritual 383 political ritualism (in China) 225n political rituals (in Rome) 257 pompa funebris 94–5 ritual agenda 229 ritual declaration of war 105, 110 ritual hunts 61 ritual norms 72–82 passim ritual performance(s) 60–1, 235–7, 422, 435 ritual self-sacrifice 92 ritual superiority (of Zhou) 73, 76, 84 rituals re-enacting the past 93 triumph 93, 212 see also inspection tours

480

Index of Subjects

Rome caput mundi 97–8, 109, 125 center of catholicism 342 center of empire / world 205, 208, 257, 264, 437 foundation myth 92, 98 political system of 16–21, 24, 102, 112, 119–26, 129, 131, 133–4, 137–40, 244–6 Roma aeterna 108, 136, 324–5, 328–9, 431
and Italy 101, 208–9, 257
not eternal 18, 104, 325, 327, 340 ‘sack of Rome’ 339–41, 387 social structure of 245–6, 278; see capital; constitution (republic vs. monarchy); Roman Empire Roman Empire coming into being of 16 consolidation 326, 338–9 decline 375, 387 destruction / end 104, 326, 340–2; 387–8 guardian of peace 339 historical consequences of 22–3 integration 257–8, 261 lawful 23 longevity 18, 136 military conquest as basis of rule 17, 100, 111–12, 257–8, 261–2 mission 109, 131–5, 209 multi-ethnic 195, 269, 441 not based on justice 340 problems of imperial rule 18, 101–4, 110, 431
and Christian Empire 391–4
and orbis terrarum 110, 324
and Parthians 21, 24, 283–95 passim Roman rule willed by fate / gods 103, 108–10, 131–3, 209, 328 Roman rule worldwide 21, 98, 100, 102–3, 108–12, 119, 129, 132, 210–14, 257, 324, 326, 431 salvation-bearing institution 325, 339–41, 343, 431 state of impious men 340 see also empire; imperium; Rome rule see empire; ideals of rulership; legitimation; Roman Empire

life in perfect harmony with one’s true self / one’s natural ‘allotment’ (fen) 407 longevity techniques 410 self-fashioning 408–9 self-improvement 390 Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove 403 ‘souci de soi’ 390–1, 425 unconventional lifestyle / iconoclastic / eccentric behavior 403–5, 425 see also autobiography; mentality senate / senators decrees 255–64 passim dignity 136 historiography as ‘senatorial’ genre 96, 101, 106, 108, 138–40, 329–30, 428–9 in late antiquity 323–43 passim in republican system 17–20 moral decline 122, 329–31
and Res Gestae 241–8 passim
and monarchy 21–2, 122–3, 126 traditional orientation 22, 246, 343 Son of Heaven (tianzi) 43, 49, 51, 54, 57–8, 69, 72, 75–6, 78–81, 81n, 84–5, 128, 181, 183, 231, 354, 423, 429, 436 see also emperor succession hereditary
vs. adoption (selection) 21, 34, 128, 356 shanrang (‘ceding the throne’; abdication ritual) 34, 155
from Augustus to Tiberius / Empress Lu¨ to Wendi 121–3, 126–7, 241–2
of empires / translatio imperii 110, 325, 343 within a dynasty 34, 55 zhengtong (‘legitimate dynastic succession’) 34, 350, 352–3, 355–7, 360, 363–6, 430 see also legitimation symbols of power bronze tripod 61 ‘charts’ (tu) 183 diadem and purple 332, 373 ‘nine cauldrons’ 35, 171 see also imperial imagery treason and treason trials 122, 334–5

Second Sophistic 23, 386 self character appraisal 407–9 concept of 390–1 individualism / new subjectivity 390–1, 404–5

unity / unified rule / unification 35–6, 39, 48, 67–8, 178, 217, 219, 223, 226–7, 234, 238, 307, 352–3, 356, 429 ambivalence toward / counter-current against 58, 178

Index of Subjects unity / unified rule / unification (cont.) benefits of 39, 52–3 debate on (c.100 bc) 49 desillusion about 361 ‘Great Unity’ paradigm 77 idea / conception / vision of 33, 72, 75, 77–9, 80, 83, 87, 352, 429–30 inadequacy of past 83, 85 inescapability of imperial realm 189 loss of 398, 401 praise of 67, 219 pursuit of 44–6, 74–5, 178 rhetoric of 40, 58 unity of secular and sacred realm / universal salvation / spiritual rule over all of China 415–16 yi jia (‘one family’) 43 yitong (‘unified rule’, ‘realm’) 42, 178–9, 232, 235 see also empire; restoration values abolition of traditional hierarchies and taboos 416 alternative 381 clementia 101 de (‘moral-spiritual power’, ‘virtue’) 33, 154, 217, 303, 306 defiance / loss of traditional values 387–8, 425 failure / neglect of Confucian values 402–3 fides 98, 112 norms of civilized behavior (laid down in the Five Classics) 55 pietas / religio 95, 98, 245, 290, 290n, 327n Roman
92, 98–9, 107, 136, 323–4, 324n, 325, 342, 374, 377, 381, 393 universal norms and
446 valor / military virtus 44, 71, 92, 97–8, 107, 111, 125, 134–6, 139, 245, 313, 393, 424, 431, 440

481


of civic life 136 value of Roman tradition 374, 381 virtus discourse 99 see also moral(s) war / warfare civil (internecine) war 19–20, 119, 133, 277, 334–5, 350, 387 military capacity / superiority (of Rome) 17, 93–5, 98–9, 101, 107, 110–12, 125, 132n, 257, 269–71 ‘military’ (wu) vs. ‘civil’ (wen) 31 Persian Wars 5–6, 290, 422 Punic Wars 91, 96–103 passim, 108, 110–11, 125, 323 punitive campaigns vs. wars 128–30, 134, 161 Trojan War 96, 131, 135, 207
and conquest as basis of rule 12–13, 17, 19, 100, 112, 210, 257, 259, 261–2, 284, 339, 342, 424, 431, 440
and peace in historiography 122–30, 147–8, 155–7, 160–1, 430, 440, 442 see also values (valor) world ecumene, oecumene / inhabited
102–4, 110, 119, 125, 136, 178, 200, 204, 211, 324, 431 division of
into continents 100, 203–5, 437 ‘Four Directions’ (sifang) 33, 70, 72, 429 images of ‘world’ 180, 189, 213, 308, 438 orbis alter 287 orbis terrarum 136, 212, 257, 324, 326, 341–2 ‘within the Four Seas’ (sihai zhi nei) 187, 350
domination /
coextensive with empire 12–14, 100, 108–10, 324, 326, 341 Zhou ecumene 32, 230, 423 see also empire; realm; Roman Empire (Roman rule worldwide)