Early
China Seminar 2013-14:
Oct. 12:
David Pankenier and Li Feng
David Pankenier: “Wherefore* the Star-Crossed Lovers Weaving Maid and Ox-herd?” * “Why?” (PDF)
Department of Modern Languages and
Literatures, Lehigh University, PA; C. V.
Starr Member, School of Historical Studies, Institute for Advanced Study,
Princeton, NJ
The earliest textual reference to the
Weaving Maid and Ox-herd occurs in the Book of Odes (ca
800 BCE), where it is already clear that the reference is to two stars.
Throughout East Asia everyone is familiar with the story of the star-crossed
young lovers’ painful exile to opposite banks of the Sky River and their annual
conjugal visit on the night of the 7th day of the 7th month. There is no
controversy about the astral identities of the pair as our Vega (α Lyr) and Altair (α Aql).
After briefly highlighting the salient astral-temporal facts preserved in the
legend, and the pervasiveness worldwide of related master metaphors
drawn from weaving, this presentation will focus on explaining the
legend’s original significance in China as an ancient teaching story about the
seasonal stars, which will take us back to the dawn of East Asian civilization.
Li Feng: “A New Hypothesis on the
Techniques of Casting Western Zhou Bronze Inscriptions”
Department of East Asian Languages and
Cultures, Columbia University
In this talk I will discuss the difficult question about the method of casting
bronze vessels with long inscriptions. Considering a wide variety of actual
cases, particularly cases where inscriptions were cast into raised grids on the
bronze inner surface, and considering also the condition of molds we now have,
I will take you through the technical details that gave rise to these inscribed
bronzes. The talk should call for significant rethinking of the process of
bronze-casting in the Western Zhou. Inscribed bronzes were not cast in only one
way -- there were alternatives we need to consider.
Nov 16:
Cai Liang and David Branner
CAI Liang: “Witchcraft
and the Rise of the First Confucian Empire” (PDF)
Department
of History, University of Arkansas, AR
This paper
offers a new reading of the emergence of the first Confucian empire. It argues
that the eventual rise of Confucian officials and the emergence of Confucian
schools took place only after a witchcraft scandal reconfigured the political
power towards the end of Emperor Wu’s reign. Years of witch hunt wiped out the
established families in the court and gave birth to a new elite class, among whom was a group of Confucians. Providing a cosmological
theory to legitimate the dictator Huo Guang and the commoner emperor Liu Bingyi,
Confucians seized the right opportunity during the imperial crisis to realize
their political dream, a dream that had been envisioned and pursued by the
exemplary sage Confucius hundreds of years earlier.
David Prager
Branner: “Bān Gù’s Tetra-syllabic Verse and its Place in the Evolution of
the Form” (PDF)
Willis F. Doney Member, School of Historical Studies, Institute for
Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ
A
substantial but little-appreciated component of Bān
Gù’s 班固 poetic corpus
is the roughly six dozen four-syllable zàn 贊 [encomiums,
rhymed declarations of praise or judgment] of the Hàn shū. Zàn are a minor
genre, normally serving as colophon to another piece of writing — often to the
prose form of a historical narrative. Nevertheless, three of Bān Gù’s were considered
worthy of inclusion in the Wénxuǎn 文選, in Category
50 “史述贊” [colophons in
which the historian delivers his judgments]. In that it offers its summary
judgments in verse form, the Hàn shū is unlike the received Shǐ jì, where the colophons are composed in prose, with less
structure. The Hàn shū’s precedent became a fixture of official
histories written in the medieval era.
This paper reviews the systematic
characteristics of the zàn form in Bān Gù’s hands. Formally
speaking, in terms of style and prosody, zàn are not
distinct from sòng 頌 [eulogies], míng 銘
[inscriptions], lěi 誄 [dirges], and
various other tetra-syllabic rhymed compositions on serious subjects, despite
being classified traditionally into separate genres. Four-syllable forms are
typically very terse; appearing at the end of a history, the terseness of a zàn is made easy
to read by the immediate context of the foregoing narrative. That terseness
creates a technical challenge for later poets seeking to practice
“counterbalancing” (對稱/襯), in keeping with
the aesthetic that developed in the Six Dynasties period. Bān
Gù, in contrast, is still writing firmly in a style
characteristic of the late Classical period and serves a pivotal role in
preparation for the later development of the form.
March 22 Paul Nicholas Vogt and Adam
Schwartz
Paul Nicholas Vogt: “Ritual Assemblies and the Geopolitics of
Zhou Expansion” (PDF)
University of Heidelberg,
Germany
During the early and middle Western Zhou periods, the Zhou
kings conducted a number of major state-level ritual events that combined the
techniques described in previous chapters into ritual narratives depicting
various potential relationships to the Zhou state project. Based on a close analysis of the
inscriptional records of these events – in particular, of the Mai fangzun and Xiao Yu ding inscriptions – this
chapter shows how the Zhou royal house pursued an integrative strategy of
ritual well suited to the geopolitical environment of the early Zhou state, in
contrast to the exclusive strategy of ritual followed by its late Shang
predecessors. Along the way, I propose
the model of “ritual techniques” and “ritual assemblies” as a solution to the
ongoing problem of the “offering name” (jiming
祭名)
as an analytical framework; these categories, I argue, support a better
understanding of the approach to ritual and its relationship to the state
followed by the Zhou themselves.
Adam Schwartz: “Prayer in the Huayuanzhuang
Oracle Bone Inscriptions, with an Annotated Translation of China’s Earliest
Prayer Text” (PDF)
ISAW, New York University, NY
Spirit
communication was a major facet of daily life in all ancient societies. While
the earliest Chinese documents contain many words signifying modes for
communicating with ancestral spirits during ritual worship events there is an extremely
limited account of direct dialogue. My paper introduces the earliest prayer
text in both China and greater East Asia found within the newest collection of
late Shang (early 12th c BCE)
oracle bone inscriptions discovered at Huayuanzhuang
East 花園莊東地 (1991; published 2003). In what is
arguably the most important amongst the approximately 2500 individual
divination records, a turtle shell numbered HYZ 161 contains excerpts of a
prayer to be uttered by a grandson to his deceased grandfather. After providing
an overview of the role and function of prayer within the Huayuanzhuang
ancestral cult, I will present a new reading of the inscription. The conclusion will not only support the view
that the recipient is the 20th Shang king, Xiao Yi (小乙), but also finally identify the personal
name of the invocator, whose diviners and scribes as a rule call by the
honorific “our lord (子).”
Apr 12:
Enno Giele and Minna Wu
Enno Giele: "The Language of
Letters. Terminology in Private Letters From the Qin
and Han Periods" (PDF)
University of Heidelberg,
Germany
Among the many
manuscripts from the Qin and Han periods that have been found to date, there is
a considerable number that can be grouped together on account of conspicuous
and rather ornate terminology, such as zuxia 足 下,
"under (your) feet," wuyang 毋恙, "(may you) be without harm," fudi
伏地, "(I) prostrate (before you)," or xingshen 幸甚,
"(I would be) tremendously happy!" As an analysis of their contents
show, these texts, almost without exception, deal with matters that are not
related to official businesses, and they represent communications between
persons who only rarely refer to each other by way of official titles. As such,
they are in stark contrast to the vast majority of early Chinese historical
sources, that are state-related and the language of which is consequently
teeming with references to the state and its representatives in one way or
another. My presentation will introduce a number of these texts by way of
in-depth reading and discuss them from three different angles: philologically,
literary, and socio-historically. This touches upon the interplay between a highly
formalized terminology that nevertheless purports to transport strong emotions;
upon the concepts of "letter" and "private" in our as well
as in ancient societies; and upon social relationships and everyday life
situations that are largely concealed in the traditional sources at our
disposal.
Minna
Wu: "Conquest
and Concord: the Transformation of Ji 紀from a Pro-Shang Polity to
Zhou Regional State" (PDF)
Richard Stockton College,
NJ
The state of Ji 紀was an
important regional power in Northern Shandong during the Zhou period. According to the Ancient and Current Bamboo Annals, it was due
to Jihou’s report that Duke
Ai of Qi was boiled to death in a huge cauldron by the order of King Yi. The
rulers of Qi felt great animosity toward Ji and this
incident became the excuse for Qi’s annexation of Ji
during the early Spring and Autumn period. This paper
examines the developmental trajectory of the state of Ji
in the broader historical context of the Zhou expansion into the peripheral
area in the “Far East,” as a way to understand the process of the
social-cultural transformation in northern Shandong. This paper mainly focuses
on the following issues: 1) the origin of the Ji
polity during the Late Shang period; 2) the clarification of the relationship
between the Ji polities represented by different
graphs within the different spatial and chronological framework; 3) integration
of Ji into the Zhou political system and its
relations with the Zhou court and other polities; and 4) cultural connection
manifested by the material remains of Ji.
May 17:
Guo Jue
Guo
Jue: TBA
Columbia University, NY