Sealed letters
Sealed letters (璽書) in Themiclesia are documents issued by the monarch, public officials, or individuals to exercise authority. In the documentarian administration of Themiclesia, the letter is the primary vehicle by which authority is exercised; if one was unable to issue valid letters, one was left unable to exercise most, if not all, of one's powers. In order for a citizen to interact with the government, it was usually necessary for the transaction to be on a letter. There was an increasingly-elaborate body of rules that governed the issuance of letters by public authorities, often to the end of authentication and elimination of errors.
Depending on the issuing authority, sealed letters have varying degrees of competences. Traditionally, the monarch's sealed letters are considered to have unrestricted competence, while a public official's sealed letters were considered to have the competence of that public official. A royal letter must have unrestricted competence since it is the way by which parliamentary statutes are made, under the doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty.
Etymology
The word sealed corresponds to the Shinasthana word sniq (璽), which is usually considered a causative reading of niq, meaning "wrap, bundle". A niq was used to keep long threads and yarns tidy, amongst other things. Ancient Themiclesians, like Mengheans, wrote on long strips of bamboo or wood, which were strung together and kept as a bundle with a string. Additionally, the word sniq could also have the meaning of "tie", which was accomplished by knotting the remaining string, thus closing the document.
History
General format
The general format of a sealed letter is highly stereotyped, but various details are altered to reflect the character of the message and the relative status of the sender and receiver.
Incipit
The incipit consists two parts:
- Sender's titulary, and
- Authority.
After the advent of printed letter paper in the 1500s, the titulary of the sender is usually printed. The authority includes (at least formally) the legal motivation for the letter is sent. This section is important because, as a legal instrument, the letter must state why it is to be followed, regardless of the status of the sender. If the letter is a brief, then generally laws are quoted between the form "for the purpose of the edict issued by ruler on date, which states [...]; for the stated edict, ..." (以某公某年日令曰 以為). If the letter is a rescript (response to another letter), then the incoming letter is quoted. In the latter case, the letter should be interpreted in light of the quoted text and will be circumscribed by it. It is considered a breach of administrative rules to misquote the incoming text.
Opinion
After the incipit, which provides the context and basis of the letter, the writer then gives their opinion of the situation in an objective tone.
To begin the body, an introductory phrase like "it is meet" (合) or "it is correct" (當) is used to introduce the writer's request as an objective necessity. Words of sentimentality or discretion are to be avoided in this section, and the assertion should be, as much as possible, based on the authority cited immediately before. The writer's request should read like a necessity compelled by the authority cited, even if the matter is of a completely discretionary nature. Larter has stated that this section needs to achieve two objectives:
- The recipient has no legal choice but to follow what the sender says, and
- The sender has no fault in the action narrated.
It is of the utmost importance that the body should be free of defect. A major defect is any word or phrase that might imply the action narrated is not legally necessary or at least permissible, while a minor defect is any other word or phrase that puts the sender in a legally weaker position than is necessary or gives the recipient any excuse not to follow the sender's action.
Explicit
The explicit consisted of two parts:
- Closing, where the sender outlined their request, and
- Eschatocol, where the sender repeats their titulary, the date, and the titulary of the recipient.
Closing
Because in the body section information has already been provided or the action sought been justified, the exhortation more frequently outlines the manner in which the request is to be followed rather than the exact request itself. For particularly complex requests, a summary might be provided here. Common terms appearing here are "without delay" and "without error". A common exhortation might read:
As for the causes that have now been stated, we rely upon and respectfully pray execution at your convenience, for which we shall indeed be most thankful. (眔既故率者 可仰請便照請施行 實德感者最也)
The first phrase is almost invariant; only royal letters promulgating statutes omit it as a rule.
The second phrase addresses the recipient directly and will vary according to the specific request and status of the parties.
The third phrase is a note of gratitude for the recipient. Again, this varies according to the nature of the request and relative status of the parties.
Eschatocol
The eschatocol takes this form:
Secretary to the Exchequer for the Colonel Division, Lord Byim, for the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Ker-mat MP, on [July 10, 1947] has given this letter for the execution of the Envoy to Menghe. (內丞行中尉曹駸君奉內吏慨以今廿又五年丙申惟在後六月十日付使東大邦孟者)
First, the sender's titulary is recapitulated. In this example above, this was Secretary to the Exchequer for the Colonel Division Lord Byim, a junior minister in the National Government. As the Exchequer forms one department in the legal sense even though it works as several in practice, the name of the Chancellor of the Exchequer is given. Then, the date is given in regnal years and sexagenary date and then month and count date. The titulary of the recipient is given last.
Endorsement
It is in order for public authorities to endorse all letters they receive.
- If the letter received was from a superior, the endorsement would be found under the explicit, stating the date the letter was "received and opened" (以日奉發).
- If from a peer or subordinate, the endorsement was found to the left of the explicit, stating the date it "arrived and was opened" (以日到發).
The term "received" was considered more respectful, as it portrayed the recipient actively receiving the letter, rather than its mere arrival.
Symbols
Royal letters
Royal letters (公璽書) have the highest legal authority in Themiclesia and are considered to embody the monarch's unlimited, sovereign authority completely. The monarch's oral expressions, however they are worded, are considered to have no legal effect by the early 18th century, since they are open to doubt by individuals who did not hear the monarch.
In the early Medieval period (mid-3rd to mid-6th centuries), the monarch had a rather fluid function and sometimes concerned himself sometimes with minor tasks, issuing commands, for instance, to regulate the seasonal contents of his flowerbeds, while significant authority was sometimes delegated away with little apparent oversight. As government became more complex and expansive in Themiclesia, particularly after the Mreng Restoration in 542, the monarch needed to rely on the ideas and efforts of others but retain systematic control over them. These parallel and somewhat contradictory demands meant monarch rarely initiated letters but mostly responded to letters sent by officials; that is, most of the monarch's letters were rescripts rather than proclamations. Even in cases when no official would have a genuine initiative, for instance to grant money to an unimportant person who found royal favour in some way, such letters were still framed as rescripts.
The legal maxim "follow the words in the palace; follow the seal outside" (中聽言 外聽璽) was developed in the 7th century to regulate the manner in which royal commands are conveyed; it was hoped that by this way, even if a royal command by word were counterfeited, its effect would be restricted to the palace.
It seems, in most reigns, it was not typical for monarchs to respond by personally making an entry on a letter. This might be done occasionally for a particularly favoured sender or a royal relative, but such private letters were considered more personal than official, and so their contents may not be deemed enforceable if brought before an official. Instead, most of the time administrative letters were read or summarized by his barons-in-waiting (侍中徹矦), and his responses were also recorded by them. The task of sorting, drafting, and safekeeping the physical letters, was done separately by the secretaries (尚書), while the proofreading, opening, affixation of the monarch's seal and wrapping of the letters was done at yet another department, that of the royal tribune. There was thus need for a system of authentication that faithfully conserves the verbal remarks of the monarch as well as the context in which that remark was given.
The lengthy eschatocol of royal letters usually records the way a document was transmitted within the various offices in the palace and contains several features that permit authentication. Starting at least from 549, the normal arrangement for baron-attendants waiting on the monarch is for four of them to be present at the same time. One read the letter, one asked for his remark, and two recorded his responses simultaneously. After the day's business has been dispatched by the monarch, the two who recorded the responses reported them to the secretaries, who examined if the responses were the same and, if so, set them down on the letters' originals. The barons-in-waiting who recorded the responses then signed the originals; the two other barons-in-waiting subscribed their signatures, certifying that the response was accurately recorded.
The originals were then released to the tribunes, who, checking the barons' signatures against those on file, further endorsed the barons' signatures by printing their names next to the signatures. The original letter was checked against forgery by examining it against a copy of the original made when it was first opened by the tribunes; if the check was true, the response was set down on the copy as well.
The tribunes' endorsement was deemed necessary because they kept records of who entered and left the royal presence and were thus able to understand who actually saw the monarch on a given day. If a letter was forged by an individual who was not privy to the inner court, it would very likely have an incorrect list of barons-in-waiting, which could be checked against the record kept by the tribunes. The barons-in-waiting who waited upon the monarch were also chosen for the day by the Chancellor from the barons who were living in the capital city, since they were usually required to spend at least a few months there every year.
Unsealed letters
During the Pan-Septentrion War, the government passed a special law Act enabling the Sovereign to sign letters to divers persons (122, Qin 18) in 1942 to permit the emperor to send signed letters to the front lines. These letters, which numbered some 2,000 by the end of the war, did not pass the great seal and thus were not legally binding instruments. The idea to issue them is due to Major Pat Smer, Principal Secretary for Hygiene and Welfare to the Consolidated Board, who became concerned that troops may become disaffected when relevant royal letters were read to them as a routine. Such letters were, more often than not, unpopular, as they imposed more duties or restrictions, and they always terminated with the phrase "the Sovereign said, 'Approved' " (公曰可). There was an institutional reason for this bias—officers needed authority to impose restrictions and happily attributed such measures to others, often citing the Sovereign's ordinances rigorously and repeatedly even when not required.
Pat Smer therefore advised the Consolidated Board that, to avoid placing the Crown in a negative light, the Emperor might also send more expressive, compassionate letters to the front lines, especially following an official visit. The Borad inquired what exactly should such letters state, and Smer suggested that a few questions might be planted discretely, so that the Crown could be seen to intervene in a positive way. That way, the Sovereign would not be exclusively associated with unpopular measures.
The unsealed letters of the PSW were drafted by the Chancery Office with assistance from the Smer, who was posted there on October 1, 1939. Smer took care to portray the Emperor in a frugal and modest way, stating that he avoided visiting the front lines to conserve fuel, given the size of the retinue, and because he understood officers and men had practical work to do aside from receiving dignitaries. To close the letter, Smer also took the trouble to repeat the promotions and awards recently given to members of the recipient unit and the circumstances that merited them. The phrase, "the Sovereign said, 'Approved'" was avoided, and instead readers were instructed to say "by the lord the emperor himself, signed by his own hand".