Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Figures
- List of Maps
- Preface
- Chronology of Early China
- Map
- 1 Introduction: Early China and its natural and cultural demarcations
- 2 The development of complex society in China
- 3 Erlitou and Erligang: early state expansion
- 4 Anyang and beyond: Shang and contemporary Bronze Age cultures
- 5 Cracking the secret bones: literacy and society in late Shang
- 6 The inscribed history: the Western Zhou state and its bronze vessels
- 7 The creation of paradigm: Zhou bureaucracy and social institutions
- 8 Hegemons and warriors: social transformation of the Spring and Autumn period (770–481 BC)
- 9 The age of territorial states: Warring States politics and institutions (480–221 BC)
- 10 Philosophers as statesmen: in the light of recently discovered texts
- 11 The Qin unification and Qin Empire: who were the terracotta warriors?
- 12 Expansion and political transition of the Han Empire
- 13 State and society: bureaucracy and social orders under the Han Empire
- 14 Ideological changes and their reflections in Han culture and Han art
- Index
- References
5 - Cracking the secret bones: literacy and society in late Shang
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2014
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Figures
- List of Maps
- Preface
- Chronology of Early China
- Map
- 1 Introduction: Early China and its natural and cultural demarcations
- 2 The development of complex society in China
- 3 Erlitou and Erligang: early state expansion
- 4 Anyang and beyond: Shang and contemporary Bronze Age cultures
- 5 Cracking the secret bones: literacy and society in late Shang
- 6 The inscribed history: the Western Zhou state and its bronze vessels
- 7 The creation of paradigm: Zhou bureaucracy and social institutions
- 8 Hegemons and warriors: social transformation of the Spring and Autumn period (770–481 BC)
- 9 The age of territorial states: Warring States politics and institutions (480–221 BC)
- 10 Philosophers as statesmen: in the light of recently discovered texts
- 11 The Qin unification and Qin Empire: who were the terracotta warriors?
- 12 Expansion and political transition of the Han Empire
- 13 State and society: bureaucracy and social orders under the Han Empire
- 14 Ideological changes and their reflections in Han culture and Han art
- Index
- References
Summary
With the arrival of the late Shang with its political center relocated to the south of the Huan River in Anyang, the study of Early China has gained another footing – contemporary written evidence. We are now able to understand the past not only through the material remains it has left behind and to a limited degree through the retrospective documentation produced by later generations, but also through the eyes of the protagonists of history. The perspectives offered by such written evidence, though not without bias (as is true for all records which are the products of the human mind), are unparalleled in the sense that they are both the eyewitness record of the time they speak about, and also the least ambiguous presentation of events and institutions that are usually not directly evident in the material remains. In the case of the Shang oracle-bone inscriptions, particularly because they were the divination records of the Shang kings, they offer especially rich information about the concerns and activities of the king and the operation of the Shang royal court. But there are other areas in which we can only expect that they remain silent.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Early ChinaA Social and Cultural History, pp. 90 - 111Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2013
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