Themiclesian Antiquity
Themiclesian Antiquity (古代, ka′-legh) was a period in Themiclesian history following the Dark Ages and followed by the Tsjinh period, precise dates bound by the opening of the Springs and Autumns of Six States in 385 BCE and the establishment of Tsjinh hegemony in 256 CE. This era saw the earliest centralization of political power in Themiclesia, and, borrowing extensively from Menghe, the introduction of many later institutions; it is often thought of as an experimental and formative period of Themiclesian politics. Internally, it is subdivided into the Archaic and Classical periods; the latter starting with the Stories of States around 107 CE.
Etymology
In medieval writings, Antiquity was frequently called the Hexarchy (六邦之治, rjuk-prong-tje-lrjegh) because the chronology of the period was formulated on those of six states in the Springs and Autumns of Six States. However, since the late 18th century, that term has been falling out of favour, since there were far more than six states in Themiclesia, and the name was regarded as somewhat meaningless. The term "antiquity" in Shinasthana literally means the "ancient generation", with "generation" being the term assigned to the successive hegemonic powers or dynasties that dominated Themiclesia-proper; as there was no hegemonic power during Antiquity, it was named the "ancient generation" that came before all others.
Periodization
The Archaic Period is often divided into three segments based on widespread phenomena or literary themes. In one schema, the first two centuries of the Archaic Period was called the Patriarchal Period, the two following the Colonial Period, and the final century the Transitional Period; this is based on the observation that certain forms of political organization, such as a stronger monarchy and the degredation of clan-based power, probably transpired during the Transitional Period.
History
Archaic Period
The Antiquities of Themiclesia provides a narrative that Tsjinh was a powerful city that exercised suzerainty over virtually all other cities, complete with a standing army of considerable size. The Archaic Period, up to the war against Kem in 101, was described as peaceful, prosperous, and politically unified for all classes of peoples. Most scholars consider this narrative basically fictional since the start of the 19th century. Instead, the beginning of the Archaic Period was characterized by a strong conservation—in Charles McMaster's words, "basic continuation—of Dark Ages forms of kinship-based political organization; few princes ruling multiple clans existed, and a distinct royalty was archaeologically difficult to discern from the wealthy. This description is based on the Book of Charges and the decentralized rule that it implied.
The city of Sjin was the first to enter the historical record in 385 BCE, joined by Pjang in 372, N′arh in 353, Tsjinh in 302, Ngak in 257, and Kem in 122. During the entire Archaic Period, 92 settlements are known from the Six States, and a further 70 have been identified archaeologically. The cryptic nature of Six States can perhaps be glimpsed from this statistic: Sjin received 129 and sent 110 envoys between 385 and 47 BCE, but the purposes of their missions are all but lost; over the same period, people from Sjin founded at least 15 settlements.
The Book of Documents provides that several peoples arrived "from the east" and received lands or protection from rulers, leading some scholars to argue that these are clans that have migrated from Menghe; however, others believe the evidence does not support such a characterization. The Book of Documents is a collection of short texts of uncertain date, though linguistic evidence assign it to the middle Archaic (c. 2nd c. BCE).
In 295, P.rjang the Sixth came to power after a dispute of some kind. P.rjang is one of the most influential figures in his time period, as he apparently reformed the succession laws in Tsjinh, transforming the city from an oligarchy organized into six aristocratic tribes to something more similar to a monarchy. Documents appear to be critical of this change, accusing P.rjang of abandoning "the accustomed ways", though Antiquities makes no similar comment. P.rjang sent out agents to find materials and allies that bolstered his somewhat dubious position in Tsjinh, acts that appear to be represented, at least in spirit, in the Book of Charges. After P.rjang died around 265, politics in Tsjinh once again fell into disarray, with stability not restored until 240; the lack of a recognized ruler once again created chaos between 221 and 199.
During this period, colonists were frequently called upon to relieve the metropole in both foreign and civil war scenarios; historians believe that the colonial system created a more distinct ruling class over the wealthy.
In later histories, the Archaic Period was usually glossed over as a peaceful period contrasted to the more bellicose Classical Period. From extant materials, which is a very incomplete view of Archaic history, there were indeed fewer wars between Meng cities, and the wars were probably of vanishingly small scale. Excavated battlefields dating to the archaic period suggests that very little armour was used except by a select few, and most battles may have involved no more than dozens of soldiers armed with farming implements.
The "radiation question" of how many settlements during the Archaic Period exhibited affinities towards Meng culture remains controversial; some scholars believed that up to half of all people living in Themiclesia were Meng people at this point, while others put the figure as low as 10%. Later histories like Antiquities usually put a greater emphasis on the distinction between the "civilized" Meng cities and the "barbaric" natives, but this binary opposition is not well-evidenced in the Dark Ages or in the early Archaic Period. Some argue it seems to be an invention no earlier than the 1st c. BCE or even into the Classical Period. Even in Heoric narratives conventionally dated to the Archaic Period, heroes could be of many or even composite cultural background.
A cultural shift was observed around the middle of the 3rd c., when human sacrifices, once infrequent, became commonplace. In Tsjinh, the earliest sacrifices were typically fish, but in the later Dark Ages ruminants were also evidenced; this is thought to represent the development of animal husbandry.
Classical Period
An important feature of the Classical Period was the expanded role of the mrang (氓) in politics. mrang literally means "vagrant" and are described in Classical literature mostly as a class of unruly, unpredictable people who dwelled in cities but were not affiliated with its major clans; they were most frequently recorded for starting riots, ousting rulers, and attacking aristocrats in "fits of outrage". Despite dismissive assessment by ancient and medieval historians, since the 19th century they have been more sympathetically described as free residents. In most cities, they had few political rights but were allowed to own property and defend them against incursions. Rulers in the Classical period who appealed to the mrang at the expense of the aristocracy, such as by redistributing farmland near the city, are almost always given negative epithets; however, rulers do the opposite could garner reputations for cruelty.
Sources
There is a range of surviving writings that deal with histories of the Antiquity. Some of them, the better-studied, are considered part of a standardized historical and literary canon, written down by the noted educator Pjang Ljok in 1244, who believed that an accomplished historian should know his way through the Six Archaic Histories and Six Modern Histories. The Six Archaic Histories (古六史) are mostly compilations of non-historiographical documents and have little apparent editorial content:
- Springs and Autumns of Six States—compiled in 260 – 280 CE but mainly composed of divination materials between 385 BCE to 200 CE.
- Elder Testaments (上顧命)—compiled around 100 BCE, a collection of testaments composed between 345 and 182 BCE.
- Younger Testaments (下顧命)—compiled around the same time, consisting of testaments and judicial decisions between c. 352 and 160 BCE.
- Book of Charges (誥命)—compiled around the start of the Common Era, items composed between the late 4th c. to the early 2nd c.
- Book of Documents (書)—compiled around 100 CE, items between the late 3rd c. and early 1st c.
- Annals of Sin (辛記年)—compiled at an unknown date, consisting of the reigns and cultic events of Sjin princes from 322 BCE to 70 BCE.
All six of the Archaic Histories were known to authors of the Modern Histories. The older documents were extensively quoted, but the Modern authors' understandings of the Archaic text are variable. Pjam often used Archaic texts to show that ancient figures were no less susceptible to corrupt influences, while the declinist Snga used the very same passages to show that ancient rulers were much more inclined to generosity and kindness. The author of the Histories by Rjang called the Archaic Period "the distant antiquity" and commented on the "innocence" of Archaic historians for writing in such a "incorrigible manner".
The Six Modern Histories (今六史) are historiographic and written in a much more familiar form and language and all within a short period before and after the Treaty of Five Kings and establishment of Tsjinh hegemony:
- Histories by Snga (蘇史)—written in 245 CE, a biographic history of Themiclesian kings and heroes, covering 201 BCE to the author's time. This work is noted for its declinism, portraying the Archaic Period as one of happiness and justice. The author argues that greed is the motivation behind most events and responsible for most human suffering.
- Histories by L′ji (夷史)—written about 260 or 261, a biographic history of Themiclesia without mythology.
- Histories by Rjang (量史)—written around 280, a biographic history of Themiclesia.
- Histories by Kjeh (幾史)—written around 280, containing 200 biographies mostly dedicated to the Classical Period.
- Histories by Pjam (盤史)—written in 297, containing 240 biographies and 12 treatises on geography and politics.
- Histories by Ntrjeng (澂史)—written in 303, comprising 124 biographies of the Classical Period.
In addition to them, the following books were also extensive quoted as works that address a narrower subject matter.
- Book of Epics (見風書)—compiled around 185 CE by a travelling historian, who wrote down "epics" or stories, in prose or verse, relating to the past from the places he visited over a 20-year period. Many of the Archaic Heroes are from this work.
- Genealogies (世書)—written around 250, accounting for the the histories of 167 "notable" houses in Themiclesia.
- The States (徹邦書)—written in 265, focused on interstate politics.
- Stories of Tsjinh (晉故事)—written around 305, focused on the rise of the Tsjinh hegemony.
During the Sungh period, another set of works were written addressing the Classical Period and Tsjinh hegemony together:
- Antiquities of Themiclesia (震旦故事記)—written in 432, covering Themiclesia's mythological founding, the Archaic Heroes, down to the end of the Tsjinh hegemony in 420 CE.
The beginning of Antiquity is defined by the opening of the Springs and Autumns of Six States in 385 BCE, which was a list of cultic sacrifices preserved on oracular inscription collated in between 260 and 280 CE. This is a somewhat arbitrary definition as it does not correspond to any significant political or social change in Themiclesia, and many features of the Dark Ages persist through the Archaic Period. In particular, only the oracular records of one state—Sjin—extend to 385 BCE; other major states remained "dark" until as late as 122 BCE. Some scholars argue that the Dark Ages should be extended to end at 295 BCE, or the ascension of P.rjang the Sixth in Tsjinh, which signified the beginning of a period of colonization, interstate warfare, and roughly co-incided with the appearance of iron metallurgy; however, others believe that because the Six States provide credible records up to 385, that should be the end of the "dark" ages.
Compared to the later Classical Period, relatively little is known about the Archaic Period. The contemporary sources of information about the period, other than the Six States, are the Book of Charges (命, m.ringh) and the Book of Documents (書). Charges and Documents appear to be compiled in the final century of the Archaic Period, or slightly before; they are accounts of "feudal" political activities, between a lord and vassal. In later works, mythical or heroic figures frequently appear with the Archaic backdrop, though most authorities consider these stories unreliable as history. In addition to these, bronze epigraphy became more common and elaborate, recording some political and military events. The abundance of ostraca, which appeared during the Dark Ages, appears to suggest that literacy had spread beyond a priestly or mercantile caste. However, on the whole, there are few historical documents per se, and the sources available provide only a microscopic view of Archaic history, which is only subject to rigorous reconstruction after the Historical Revolution of the late 18th century.
The Archaic Period was described as an "age of heroes" by the 17th-century historian Lord Prjêng, characterized by interactions between heroes, legendary kings, and "glorious fighting". However, Prjêng also notes that these stories were written down centuries after they were purported to have happened, and many tales were contradictory or illogical when compared to each other. In the 1700s, the Archaic Hero was often dismissed as figments of later writers' imagination. In the 19th century, the archetype of the Archaic Hero was identified as leaders of colonial parties that founded new settlements, often in hostile regions, recorded in the Book of Charges. In such new settlements, warriors providing protection were sometimes mythologized in later generations as heroes. After identification with the archaeologically-attested Colonial movement, which began in earnest after the introduction of iron around the turn of the 3rd c. BCE, the Archaic Hero was resurrected from imaginary figures to heavily mythologized but semi-historical figures based on unrecorded real events. The 20th-century historian A. Gro said that the heroic age, while only some 400 years apart from the end of the Classical period, was already considered the "distant antiquity", attesting to the poverty of written history from this era; he makes the conclusion that Themiclesian history "begins around 100 CE".
In fashion somewhat similar to the Archaic Period, the Classical Period begins at 107 CE, which is the opening year of the The States (徹邦), written in 295 CE. The States is concerned about the interactions between states in the Classical Period, but it also discussed the roles of individuals and their actions. Ancient commentators have observed that states are sometimes portrayed as actors in The States, apart from their nobles, officials, and subjects; this practice contrasts with older works that usually portray actions exclusively as the result of individuals, while the names of states only function as the names of places. While the work is chronological, its narratives are much longer and complicated than the older, annalistic form of writing. More often than not, stories extend beyond a single year. The author sometimes distributes events and their consequences into different calendar years' headings, or chooses to describe them together, under a single year's heading, even though the events being described are not in that year. Historiographically, scholars have interpreted this phenomenon to evidence the developing art of historical writing and a struggle between the traditional, annalistic form and the demands of historical narration.
Another important work describing the Classical Period is the Stories of Tsjinh (晉故事), which gives the history of Tsjinh from 129 to 256. Stories postdates The States by around 50 years but is nearly 10 times its length. The work seeks to account for Tsjinh's rise to hegemonic power and considers the history of the Classical Period as a "grand arena or game" in which all states compete for dominance and attempt to subjugate each other. Little attention is given to facts not related to Tsjinh's rise as regional hegemon. It opens with the phrase "In 89, Tsjinh reaped the south and first became powerful" (晉獲南茲始彊). Medieval historians sometimes held Stories of Tsjinh in lower regard due to its lack of character details. The author of Stories contrasts an early contrast of predestination and free will in his work, sometimes attributing Tsjinh's rise and Kem's fall to factors he attributed to these states, including geography, religion, and ethics and at others attributing outcomes to individual policies; however, he also frequently entertains stereotypes to justify his conclusions, castigating Kem as violent and capricious and praising Tsjinh leaders as moderate and logical.
The Antiquities of Themiclesia, the first state-sponsored history compiled in 432 for the Sungh court, primarily relies on Stories of Tsjinh but mixes with it other stories.
Archaeology
While human sacrifice was common, if not obligatory, in high-status burials, the number of victims and their entombed context varied "dramatically" according to period and the identity of the principal of the tomb.
In the 4th century BCE, the patriarchs of Sin and Tsins (two of the better-understood states) were buried with dozens or hundreds of victims, whose corpses lay beheaded or mutilated, typically scattered in the refill soil. Sometimes their heads were collected and buried together some distance away, leaving puzzling "headless burials". Victims with separate burials, i.e. coffins and own grave goods, were few and far between. Krap IV's burial (209 BCE) included 112 victims, some decapitated and other buried alive. With them there were 6 chariots, over 9,000 bronze arrowheads, and 145 bronze swords.
By the 2nd century CE, the number of human victims in royal burials decreased steadily, but they also came to possess, broadly speaking, a more customary burial. Most enjoyed their own coffins and a modest quantity of grave goods, some probably granted by their lords. This era coincided with the spreading of iron. In contrast to Krap IV's burial, Prang VIII's burial in 247 contained only five victims. They were buried with their own weapons and show no signs of external trauma, suggesting a more serene death, which could have been voluntary according to contemporary texts. At this point, rulers were no longer buried with large hoards of weapons as formerly was the case.
Much scholarly attention has been lavished on the material distributions in large Themiclesian burials. Archaeologists consider such quantities of weapons in Archaic burials to be an ostentation of wealth, reflective of royal control over bronze, its extraction, working, and usage.
Criticisms
Ever since the revolutionary monograph Studies on Themiclesian Antiquity, which discussed Maverican epic poetry that shed new light on Themiclesian protohistory, was published in 1798, historians have sought to recover external references to Themiclesia, particularly for the period prior to Antiquity. These sources generally reveal that Themiclesia, in its earliest centuries, was not mostly inhabited by Meng people. In 1800, the "radiation question" was posed, asking when and how did Meng culture come to dominate Themiclesia. A multitude of explanations have been published over the nearly-two centuries since the question's proposition.
On one hand, scholars of the "pacifist" school believed that the other cultures never disappeared from Themiclesia and that the prepondrance of Meng cultural was simply a bias of preservation—that Meng people preferred buildings that left archaeologically recoverable traces, that they wrote more and on non-perishable materials, that they tended to live in cities, etc., all of which meant their histories were better represented. These "other cultures" were connected with practices that differed from the Meng archetype. On the other hand, the nationalist N. Hrjat wrote in 1857 that early Meng settlers systematically reduced aboriginal populations for the prosperity of their progeny; Hrjat utilized the economic argument that early Meng settlers understood land to be the source of wealth and security and actively cleared the land for their own use. He further connected the newly-described practice of human sacrifice with the disappearance of other cultures from Themiclesia. Later historians have mostly rejected Hrjat, and even Hrjat himself has publicly recanted this theory in 1889.
Nevertheless, the radiation question continues to be a dominant theme in the study of the Dark Ages and Antiquity, and it has broadened to include the question about the distribution of Meng and other cultures in Themiclesia. The question itself has been criticized as a biased question, since early Meng settlers appeared to have very little desire to recognize each other over existing communities in Themiclesia.