ALEX

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Picturing Heaven in Early China

HARVARD EAST ASIAN MONOGRAPHS 336

Publication of this book was partially underwritten by the Mr. and Mrs.
Stephen C. M. King Publishing and Communications Fund, established by
Stephen C. M. King to further the cause of international understanding and
cooperation, especially between China and the United States, by enhancing
cross-cultural education and the exchange of ideas across national boundaries
through publications of the Harvard University Asia Center.
Picturing Heaven
in Early China
Lillian Lan-ying Tseng

PUBLISHED BY THE HARVARD UNIVERSITY ASIA CENTER

FOR THE HARVARD-YENCHING INSTITUTE
DISTRIBUTED BY HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS
CAMBRIDGE (MASSACHUSETTS) AND LONDON 2 0 11
© 20 ii by the President and Fellows of Harvard College

Printed in the United States of America

The Harvard University Asia Center publishes a monograph series and, in

coordination with the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, the Korea Institute,
the Reischauer Institute ofJapanese Studies, and other faculties and institutes,
administers research projects designed to further scholarly understanding of
ChinaJapan, Vietnam, Korea, and other Asian countries. The Center also
sponsors projects addressing multidisciplinary and regional issues in Asia.

This book was published with the assistance of the FrederickW. Hilles
Publication Fund ofYale University.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Tseng, Lillian Lan-ying.

Picturing heaven in early China / Lillian Lan-ying Tseng. — ist ed.
p. cm. _ (Harvard East Asian monographs ; 336)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978 -0 -674-06069-2
1. Cosmology in art. % • Astronomy in art. 3 . Mythology in art.
4 . Art, Chinese-—Qin-Han dynasties, 221 B .C .- 2 2 0 a . d .—Themes, motives.
I. Title.
N8217.C62T79 2011
704 .9 ,489951—dc22
2011003019

Index by the author

© Printed on acid-free paper

Last figure below indicates year of this printing

19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11
In memory o f my grandmother
1913-2004
 Contents

Acknowledgments
Tables and Figures
Chronologies

Introduction: Images and References

Chapter 1: Constructing the Cosmic View

Legitimacy and Politics 21

Form and Symbol 37

Ritual and Audience 70

Chapter 2: Engraving Auspicious Omens

Moralization 92

Canonization 101

Signification 116

Perpetuation 132

Chapter 3: Imagining Celestial Journeys

Morality and Immortality 152

The Journeys to Heaven 166

The Gate o f Heaven 205

 Chapter 4: Highlighting Celestial Markers
The Cardinal Emblems 23 6

The Millay Way 265

The Sun and the M oon 277

Chapter 5: Mapping Celestial Bodies 299

Sky Lore 305

Pictorial Elaboration 316

Popular Astronomy 33 6

Space or Place 344

Conclusion: Visibility and Visuality 359

Illustration Credits 369

Endnotes 379
Works Cited 41 1

Index 433
 Acknowledgments

This book addresses issues surrounding the visual representation of Heaven in Han
China based on an interdisciplinary analysis of sites and objects unearthed in the sec­
ond half of the twentieth century. M y gratitude goes first to the Chinese archaeologists
whose painstaking efforts in the field have made this project possible. I am also grateful
to scholars who have studied early Chinese art, thought, literature, history, science, and
religion. Their insights, which are acknowledged in the endnotes, laid the foundation for
this book.
M y research benefited from the opportunities I had to inspect archaeological finds
in person. I deeply appreciate the scholars and friends who facilitated my research trips
to both the interior and the coast of China: Xia Langyun in Gansu; H u Lingui, Zhang
Junmai, Wang Weilin, Cheng Linquan, and Jiao Nanfeng in Shaanxi; Li Chenguang in
Henan; Zheng Yan in Shandong; and W u Lihua in Jiangsu.
I am immensely grateful to the institutes and organizations that financially supported
my research and writing as well as the publication of this book: the Department ofHistory
of A rt and Architecture at Harvard University, the Institute ofHistory and Philology in
the Academia Sinica in Taiwan, and the Council on East Asian Studies at Yale University,
which provided travel grants; the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Schol­
arly Exchange, the J. Paul Getty Foundation, and the Morse Junior Faculty Fellowship
of Yale University, which provided fellowships that funded two leaves; the Frederick W.
Hilles Publication Fund of Yale University, the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for Inter­
national Scholarly Exchange, and the Department of the History of Art at Yale Univer­
sity, which provided publication subsidies.
The book is a complete revision of my dissertation, with a very different framework.
Still, I am greatly indebted to my mentors, Kwang-Chih Chang (1931-2 0 0 1 )， W u Hung,
and Irene J. Winter, who led me into the intricacies of the ancient world. I am much
obliged to Lothar von Falkenhausen and Eugene Wang for their lengthy and helpful
comments on the manuscript. I also benefited from the feedback given by M artin Powers,
Michael Puett, Jonathan Hay, M im i Yiengpruksawan, and Edward Cooke. I am espe­
cially appreciative of the generosity of Nathan Sivin, who carefully read through the
entire manuscript and offered frank suggestions and valuable corrections. The errors that
remain are, however, solely my own.
I would like to express my thanks to the staff of the East Asian Library at Yale Univer­
sity, particularly Sarah Elman, Chi-wah Chan, Tao Yang, and Tang Li, who never failed
to accommodate my many urgent requests. I also give heartfelt thanks to the staff of
the Publication Program of the Harvard University Asia Center: John Ziemer, W illiam
Hammell, and Kristen Wanner. Their help and encouragement at different stages made
the publication of the book possible. Mary Pastis editing and David Goodrichs typeset­
ting further enhanced the readability of the book.
Finally, I would like to thank my husband， Yonghong Zhao, whose unwavering sup­
port has granted me the freedom to explore the intellectual world.
L. L.T.
Spring 2011
 Tables and Figures

Tables
Chapter 1 Constructing the Cosmic View
1 .1 The Doctrine of the Five Virtues 25
1 .2 The Five Virtues and the Triple Concordance Compared 26
1.3 Sage Kings and Dynasties in the Doctrine of the Triple Concordance 30
Chapter 5 Mapping Celestial Bodies
5.1 Cardinal Emblems and Lunar Lodges 309

Figures
Introduction: Images and References
0.1 Inscription on Yu ding showing the graphs tian and da 2
0.2 Evolution of the graph tian 2
0.3 Northern Dipper on a stone carving in the Wu family shrines 4
0.4 Excursion of the Heavenly Lord on a mirror unearthed in Xinye, Henan 5
0.5 Celestial images on a wood carving unearthed in Xuyi, Jiangsu 6

0.6 Dragon and stars on a wood carving unearthed in Xuyi, Jiangsu 8

0.7 Lifting a tripod on a wood carving unearthed in Xuyi, Jiangsu 8

0.8 Performances on a wood carving unearthed in Xuyi, Jiangsu 9
0.9 Stele of Hammurabi 13
0.10 Induction of Vibia 14
Chapter 1 Constructing the Cosmic View
1.1 Bin Gong xu 19
1.2 He zun 19

1.3 Tian Wang gui 20

 2 2 3 3 3
4 4 5 8 9
Conquest cycle of the Five Virtues in the Qin
Conquest cycle of the Five Virtues in the Western Han
Generation cycle of the Five Virtues in the Xin
Layout of Han Chang’an

3
9
Floor plan of the Bright Hall complex in Chang'an

4
0
’

4
1
Floor plan and cross-section of the main building in the Bright Hall

4
2
complex in Chang’an

4
4
10 Layout of Han Luoyang

4
5
Floor plan of the Bright Hall complex in Luoyang

4
5
11

4
6
12 Floor plan of the main building in the Bright Hall complex in Luoyang

4
8
13 Cong tube and bi disc from the Liangzhu culture

4
9
14 Jade plaque unearthed at Lingjiatan, Anhui

5
2
5
2
15 Jade turtle unearthed at Lingjiatan, Anhui

5
3
16 Burial Site 2 at Niuheliang, Liaoning

5
4
17 Chariot unearthed from the mausoleum of the First Emperor

5
5
5
6
,18 Shi device

5
7
,19 Circles and squares in The 7J)ou Gnomon

5
8
,20 Try squares in a ring in The Xhou Gnomon
.21 Making circles and squares in The TLhou Gnomon
.22 Try square and compasses on a stone carving in the Wu family shrines
,23 Schemes of the Han Bright Halls
.24 TLV mirror unearthed at Yinwan, Jiangsu
■25 Liubo game set unearthed from Tomb 3 at Mawangdui, Hunan
‘26 Immortals playing the liubo game on a mirror from Shaoxing, Zhejiang
.27 Immortals playing the liubo game on a sarcophagus unearthed
at Jianyang, Sichuan 59
■28 TLV mirror unearthed in Luoyang 60
.29 TLV mirror in the Shanghai Museum 60
.30 Wang Shirens reconstruction of the Bright Hall in Chang’an 62-63
.31 Yang Hongxuns reconstruction of the Bright Hall in Changan 64-65
•32 Wu Hungs reconstruction of the Bright Hall in Chang’an 65
.33 Yang Hongxuns reconstruction of the Bright Hall in Luoyang 68-69
.34 Floor plan and cross-section of the tomb of King Cuo 72
.35 Design of the royal necropolis on a bronze plaque from the tomb of
King Cuo in Pingshan, Hebei 73
•36 Reconstruction of the mortuary hall for King Cuo 74
•37 Reconstruction of the Xianyang Palace of the Qin 75-76
•38 Yang Hongxuns reconstruction of the main building in the Bright Hall
complex in Chang’an 77
Wang Shirens reconstruction of the main building in the Bright Hall
complex in Chang’an 78
1.40 Monthly observances in the Bright Hall 79
1.41 Integration ofyin-yang, the four seasons, and the Five Phases 81
1.42 Integration of the four seasons, the Five Phases，and the Five Thearchs 82
Chapter 2 Engraving Auspicious Omens

9
0
2.1 Qh.ng pan

8
9 0
2.2 Structure of the Han government

0
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2.3

3
Hymn of the Western Passage

4
1
0
2.4 Five omens at the Western Passage

1
Ioi 1
7 8 8
2.5 Cliff carvings in honor of Li Xi at the Western Passage

o
2.6 Omens in the Wu Liang shrine

_
o
1X
2.7 Bi disc of colored glass in the Wu Liang shrine

o
2.8 Chart of clouds for divination from Tomb 3 at Mawangdui, Hunan
2.9 Omens in a Wu family shrine
2 .1 0 Layout of Tomb 1 at Wangdu， Hebei
2.11 Murals in Tomb 1 at Wangdu, Hebei
2.12 Floor plan and cross-sections of the Miu Yu tomb
2.13 Stone carving in the Miu Yu tomb
2.14 Yellow dragon on the cliff of the Western Passage
2.15 Five omens at the Western Passage published by Hong Gua
2.16 Five omens at the Western Passage published by Otto Fischer
2.17 White deer on the cliff of the Western Passage 123
2.18 Qusou offering furs in the Wu Liang shrine 124
2.19 Interconnecting trees on the cliff of the Western Passage 125
2.20 Interconnecting trees on a stone carving unearthed from Liangchengzhen’

2
6
Shandong

2
7
2.21 Interconnecting trees on a stone carving discovered in Suining, Jiangsu
2
9
2.22 Auspicious grain on the cliff of the Western Passage 3
1
3
3
2.23 Sweet dew on the cliff of the Western Passage
3
5

2.24 Hymn of the Fu Passage

3
6

2.25 Transportation between the Han capitals and the Hanzhong Basin
3
9
3
9

2.26 Opening the Bao-Xie Route

4
1

2.27 Reconstruction of plank footways along the Bao-Xie Route

4
2

2.28 View of the Western Passage

4
3
4
4

2.29 Inscription on the stele erected by the First Emperor in Langye, Shandong
4
4

2.30 Eulogy of the Stone Gate

4
6

2.31 Marker Recordfor Yang Huai and Yang Bi

2.32 Recordfor Li Yus Building Plank Footways
2.33 Inscription in memory of Geng Xun at the Western Passage
2.34 Inscription on Mr. Jings memorial stele
 Chapter 3 Imagining Celestial Journeys

5555SS55S666
3.1 Mirror unearthed in Guangzhou, Guangdong
3.2 TLV mirror in the collection of Moriya Kozo in the Kyoto National Museum
3.3 TLV mirror recorded in Jin shi suo
3.4 Inscribed brick unearthed from Yibin， Sichuan 2
3.5 Architectural remains of the Ganquan Palace
3.6 Roofing tiles for the Tower of Longevity in the Ganquan Palace
3.7 Views of Mounds 1 and 2 at the site of the Ganquan Palace
3.8 Beacon terrace 17 in Dunhuang, Gansu
3.9 Watchtower in the painted tomb at Anping, Hebei
3.10 Multi-story building on decorated brick unearthed in Chengdu， Sichuan
3.11 Model architecture showing multi-story buildings from Jiaozuo, Henan
3.12 Model architecture showing thejinggan structure from Shizhaishan， Yunnan
3.13 Jinggan structure depicted on a bronze drum unearthed from Shizhaishan,
Yunnan 164
3.14 Reconstruction of the Yongning Pagoda 16i
3.15 Cross-section of Tomb 1 at Mawangdui, Hunan 17(
3.16 Cross-section of the wooden structure of Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 17(
3.17 View of the painted banner atop the innermost coffin in Tomb 1
at Mawangdui 171
3.18 Painted banner in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 17：
3.19 Name banner unearthed from Mozuizi, Gansu 17：
3.20 Final departure on the painted banner in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 17：
3.21 Seals unearthed from Tomb 2 at Mawangdui Vh
3.22 Inscribed objects in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 17i
3.23 Location of Tombs 1， 2, and 3 at Mawangdui 17(
3.24 Wooden board from Tomb 3 at Mawangdui 17(
3.25 Painted banner in Tomb 3 at Mawangdui 17：
3.26 Final departure on the painted banner in Tomb 3 at Mawangdui 17i
3.27 Cross-section and floor plan of the tomb at Zidanku, Hunan 17(
3.28 Painted banner in the tomb at Zidanku, Hunan 18(
3.29 Silk painting in the tomb at Chenjiadashan, Hunan 18：
3.30 Celestial field on the painted banner in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 184
3.31 Yong bell in the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng in Suixian, Hubei 185
3.32 Striking bells on a lacquer container in the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng 18*
3.33 Bi disc atop the innermost coffin in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 18!
3.34 Bi disc in the tomb at Zidanku, Hunan 181
3.35 View of three decorated coffins in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 18(
3.36 Two dragons coming through a bi disc on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1
at Mawangdui
3.37 Two deer climbing a mountain on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 190
3.38 Animals and a figure on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 191
3.39 Figure on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 192
3.40 Dragon and tiger on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 193
3.41 Cloud pattern on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 193
3.42 View of Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 194
3.43 Owl and tiger on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 195
3.44 Animal with four tails on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 195
3.45 Chasing a hare on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 195
3.46 Shooting on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 196
3.47 Combat on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 196
3.48 Devouring a snake on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 196
3.49 Taming a leopard on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 196
3.50 Dancers and musicians on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 196
3.51 Immortal in contemplation on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 197
3.52 Immortal riding on a deer on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 197
3.53 Coffin 1 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 198
3.54 Decoration on Coffin 1 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 199
Floral canopy and cardinal emblems on a Han brick 200
3.56 Bronze plaque discovered in Wushan， Sichuan 201
3.57 North panel of Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 202
3.58 Funeral service on the painted banner in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 203
3.59 Structure of Tomb 61 in Luoyang 206
3.60 Painted gable in Tomb 61 in Luoyang 207
Painted ceiling in Tomb 61 in Luoyang 208
3.62 Gate of Heaven on a decorated brick discovered in Xinzheng, Henan 209
3.63 Gate of Heaven on a decorated brick unearthed in Xihua, Henan 209
3.64 Gate of Heaven on a sarcophagus unearthed at Jianyang, Sichuan 209
3.65 Gate-pillars with a phoenix on a decorated brick discovered in Dayi, Sichuan 210
3.66 Gate of Heaven on a bronze plaque discovered at Wushan, Sichuan 211
3.67 Money tree discovered at Maowen， Sichuan 212
3.68 Gate of Heaven and the Mother Queen of the West on a bronze plaque
discovered at Wushan, Sichuan 212
石
9
0^ 0 ^

Mother Queen of the West on a decorated brick unearthed at Fanji， Henan 213
0

.7
Mother Queen of the West in the painted tomb of Bu Qianqiu in Luoyang 215
.7 Sheng headgear on a stone carving in the Wu Liang shrine 216
1 2

.7
0^

Mother Queen of the West decorated on a pottery house unearthed at

Fanji, Henan 217
Mother Queen of the West on a painted plate unearthed in Lolang,
North Korea 219
3 .7 4 Mother Queen of the West on a money tree unearthed in Xichang, Sichuan 220
3.75 “Bronze pillar” decorated on a mirror discovered in Shaoxing, Zhejiang 221
3.76 Carvings on a sarcophagus unearthed in Nanxi, Sichuan 222
3.77 Carvings on a sarcophagus unearthed in Xingjing, Sichuan 223
3.78 Gate-pillars with bi discs on a sarcophagus unearthed in Yibin，Sichuan 224
3.79 Stone carvings on the f^ade of a tomb in Suide, Shaanxi 226
3.80 Bronze knocker unearthed at the site of the Weiyang Palace 227
3.81 Mother Queen of the West on a stone carving discovered in Suide, Shaanxi 227
3.82 Gate of Heaven on decorated bricks unearthed from Xihua, Henan 227
3.83 Stone carvings on the facade of a tomb at Dangjiagou in Mizhi, Shaanxi 229
3.84 Stone carvings on the fafade of a tomb in Sheamu, Shaanxi 230
3.85 Stone carvings on the facade of a tomb at Guanzhuang in Mizhi, Shaanxi 231
3.86 Stone carvings in a tomb at Guanzhuang in Mizhi, Shaanxi 232
Chapter 4 Highlighting Celestial Markers
4.1 Stars around the North Pole 237
4.2 Reconstruction of Structure 3 in the Nine Temples 238
4.3 Roofing tiles unearthed from Structure 2 in the Nine Temples 239
4.4 Lunar lodges in the south 240
4.5 Celestial bird in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xian 241
4.6 Lunar lodges in the east 242
4.7 Celestial dragon in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xian 243
4.8 Celestial dragon on a stone carving unearthed in Chengdu, Sichuan 244
4.9 Celestial dragon on a stone carving unearthed in Nanyang, Henan 244
4.10 Celestial dragon on a stone carving unearthed in Nanyang, Henan 244
4.11 Dragons described in the Book of Changes 245-46
4.12 Graphs of dragons in Shang oracle bone inscriptions 247
4.13 Lunar lodges Tuft and Triad 248
4.14 Celestial tiger on a stone carving unearthed in Nanyang, Henan 249
4.15 Dragon and tiger formed by clamshells unearthed from Puyang, Henan 250
4.16 Cardinal emblems on a mirror unearthed from Sanmenxia, Henan 251
4.17 Cardinal emblems on a lacquer chest from the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng 252
4.18 Cardinal emblems on an incense burner from the Dou Wan tomb at
Mancheng, Hebei 253
4.19 Cardinal emblems in the painted tomb of the king of the Liang Kingdom at
Shiyuan, Henan 254
4.20 Dark Warrior on a decorated brick unearthed from Xingping, Shaanxi 255
4.21 Cardinal emblems on a decorated brick unearthed from Jiayuguan, Gansu 256
4.22 Cardinal emblems on a TLV mirror unearthed from Luoyang 257
4.23 Cardinal emblems in the Shiqi Yao tomb at Qianyang, Shaanxi 258
4.24 Cardinal emblems in a painted tomb in Pinglu, Shanxi 259
4.25 Celestial images in a painted tomb in Pinglu, Shanxi 260
4.26 Cardinal emblems on a jade object unearthed from Xingping, Shaanxi 262
4.27 Fafade of a tomb in Suide, Shaanxi 262
4.28 Carvings on the sarcophagus of Wang Hui unearthed in Lushan, Sichuan 264
4.29 Milky Way in the painted tomb of Yuan Yi in Luoyang 267
4.30 River Lord on a mirror unearthed from Xinye, Henan 267
4.31 River Lord on a stone carving unearthed from Xuzhou, Jiangsu 268
4.32 Stars along the M ill^ Way 269
4.33 Oxherd and Weaving Maid in a painted tomb in Taesongri, North Korea 271
4.34 Celestial images in a carved shrine in Changqing, Shandong 272
4.35 Celestial images on a stone carving unearthed from Nanyang, Henan 272
4.36 Dragon, an immortal, and a gatekeeper in a carved shrine in
Changqing, Shandong 273
4S Carvings on a sarcophagus unearthed in Pixian, Sichuan 274
4.3! Celestial Palace on a sarcophagus unearthed in Pixian, Sichuan 275
4.3( World of the immortals on a sarcophagus unearthed in Pixian, Sichuan 276
4.4( Sun and moon on the painted banner from Tomb 1 at Mawangdui 278
4.4： Sun and moon on a stone carving unearthed from Suide, Shaanxi 278
4.4： Sun and moon on a stone carving unearthed from Anqiu, Shandong 279
Solar myth painted on a lacquer chest from the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng 280
4.4^ Solar myth on a sarcophagus unearthed from Xinjin， Sichuan 281
4At Sunbirds on an ivory carving discovered at Hemudu, Zhejiang 282
Sunbirds on ajade plaque unearthed from Yaoshan, Zhejiang 283
4.4： Sunbird on a stone carving unearthed from Yingzhuang, Henan 284
4.4S Sun and moon on a sarcophagus unearthed in Jianyang, Sichuan 284
4.49 Sun and moon on decorated bricks unearthed from Xinfan, Sichuan 285
4.50 Sun and moon on a stone carving unearthed from Nanyang, Henan 286
4.51 Sun and moon on stone carvings unearthed from Qilingang, Henan 286
4.52 Fu Xi and Nii Wa on a sarcophagus unearthed in Jianyang, Sichuan 287
4.53 Sun and moon on stone carvings unearthed from Bixian, Shandong 288
4.54 Entertainment on a stone carving unearthed from Bixian, Shandong 289
4.55 Celestial images on stone carvings unearthed from Shenmu, Shaanxi 290
4.56 Sun and moon on a sarcophagus unearthed in Pixian, Sichuan 291
4.57 Fu Xi and Nii Wa on a stone carving in the Wu Liang shrine 291
4.58 Sun and moon on a sarcophagus discovered in Jiang an, Sichuan 292
4.59 Brick tomb at Xinfan, Sichuan , 294
4.60 Celestial ascent in the painted tomb of Bu Qianqiu in Luoyang 295
4.61 Sun and moon in the painted tomb of Bu Qianqiu in Luoyang 295
4.62 Auspicious animals in the painted tomb of Bu Qianqiu in Luoyang 296
4.63 Immortal guide in the painted tomb of Bu Qianqiu in Luoyang 297
 Chapter 5 Mapping Celestial Bodies

o
3 3 3 3 3 3

0 1 2
5.1 Constellations in Rhapsody on Contemplating the Mysterious

o
5.2 Constellations in Rhapsody on Contemplating the Mysterious

3 4 6
5.3 Constellations in Rhapsody on Contemplating the Mysterious

o
5.4 Constellations in Rhapsody on Contemplating the Mysterious

o
3
5.5 Constellations in Rhapsody on Contemplating the Mysterious

7
5.6 Twenty-eight lunar lodges

o
5.7 Twenty-eight lunar lodges on a lacquer chest in the tomb of Marquis Yi of

o
Zeng in Suixian, Hubei
5.8 “Dipper”written on a lacquer chest in the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng in
Suixian, Hubei 307

o
5.9 Northern Dipper and lunar lodges 308
5.10 Yellow chart, or chart of the seven orbits
5.11 Concept of the Canopy Heaven in the Zhou Gnomon
5.12 Celestial chart carved in the tomb of the King of the Wuyue Kingdom
5.13 Celestial chart on a stele in SuzhouJiangsu
5.14 View of the main chamber of the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi’an
5.15 Restoration of the celestial images in the painted tomb at Jiaotong
University in X i’an

12 222
3 3 3 3 3

9 0 1 1 2
5.16 Twenty-eight lunar lodges in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an
5.17 Lodges Triad and Tuft in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xian
5.18 Lodge Swine in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi’an
5.19 Lodge Tumulus in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi’an

3
2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
4
5.20 Gao Lu， s reconstruction of the cardinal emblems

5
3
5.21 Extensions of the four celestial palaces in the painted tomb at Jiaotong

6
3
University in Xi’an

6
3

6
5.22 Lodge Dipper in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi’an 3

7
3

5.23 Oracle bone inscription showing the graph bi 7

3

5.24 Lodge Net in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi'an

8

5.25 Hunting scene on a decorated brick unearthed from Fangcheng, Henan

3 3 3 3 3 3
2222 33
8 9 9 9 0 1

5.26 Oracle bone inscription showing the graphj i

5.27 Lodge Basket in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi'an
5.28 Harvest scene on a stone carving unearthed from Yinan, Shandong
5.29 Collecting animal manure on a stone carving unearthed from
Guanzhuang, Shaanxi
5.30 Figurine holding a basket unearthed from Pengshan, Sichuan
5.31 Dining scene on a painted brick unearthed from Jiayuguan, Gansu
5.32 Wind Lord on a stone carving unearthed from Anqiu, Shandong
5.33 Lodge Maid in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an
5.34 Bronze lamp in Dou Wans tomb at Mancheng, Hebei
5.35 Lodge Ox in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an 331
5.36 Lodge Ghost in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi'an 332
5.37 Fetching water on a painted brick unearthed from Jiayuguan, Gansu 333
5.38 Abandoning the elder father on a sarcophagus discovered in Luoyang 333

5.39 Butchering a pig on a painted brick unearthed from Jiayuguan, Gansu 335
5.40 Drawing of the celestial images in the painted tomb at Fenghuangshan,
Inner Mongolia 337
5.41 Drawing of the celestial images in painted Tomb M61 in Luoyang 337
5.42 Celestial charts in Essentials of the Methodfor the New Armillary Sphere
and Celestial Globe 339
5.43 Chart of comets for divination in Tomb 3 at Mawangdui 340
5.44 Celestial chart for divination discovered in Dunhuang 342
5.45 Structure of the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an 345
5.46 Sun and moon in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi’an 346
5.47 Cranes in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi'an 347
5.48 Toad in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi'an 348
5.49 Three-legged crow in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi an 348
5.50 Animals roaming among clouds in the painted tomb at Jiaotong
University in Xi'an 350
5.51 Celestial ascent in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi’an 351
5.52 Immortal holding a fungus in the painted tomb at Jiaotong
University in X i’an 352
5.53 Immortal in the painted tomb at Qianjingtou in Luoyang 352
5.54 Immortal in the painted tomb at Technical University in Xi'an 353
5.55 Deer-drawn cart on a stone carving unearthed from Nanyang, Henan 353
5.56 Pure Land painted in Cave 320, Mogao Grottoes, Dunhuang 355
Conclusion: Visibility and Visuality
C .l Celestial images from Qilingang in Nanyang, Henan 360
C.2 Inscription on a pottery jar unearthed from Chang’an， Shaanxi 361
C.3 Layout of the tomb at Zhenzhichang in Nanyang, Henan 364
C.4 Moon on a stone carving from the tomb at Zhenzhichang in Nanyang, Henan 364
C.5 Sun and the celestial tiger on a stone carving from the tomb at
Zhenzhichang in Nanyang, Henan 365
C .6 River Lord on a stone carving from the tomb at Zhenzhichang in
Nanyang, Henan 365
C.7 Cardinal emblems on a stone carving from the tomb at Zhenzhichang in
Nanyang, Henan 366
C .8 Rainbow on a stone carving from the tomb at Zhenzhichang in
Nanyang, Henan 366
C.9 Rainbow on a stone carving in the Wu family shrines 367
 Chronologies

LATE NEOLITHIC CULTURES

Yangshao culture ca. 5 0 0 0 —2 7 5 0 BCE

Hemudu culture ca. 5 0 0 0 - 3 3 0 0 BCE
Hongshan culture ca. 4 7 0 0 - 2 9 0 0 BCE
Dawenkou culture ca. 4 1 0 0 - 2 6 0 0 BCE
Liangzhu culture ca. 3 4 0 0 - 2 2 5 0 BCE

HISTORIC PERIODS

Shang dynasty ca. 1 6 0 0 - 1 0 5 0 BCE

Zhou dynasty ca. 1 0 5 0 - 2 5 6 BCE
Western Zhou ca. 1 0 5 0 - 7 7 1 BCE
Eastern Zhou 7 7 0 - 2 5 6 BCE

Spring and Autumn period 7 7 0 - 4 7 6 BCE

Warring States period 475-222 BCE

Q in dynasty 222-207 BCE

Han dynasty 207 BCE-220 CE*
Western Han period 207 BCE—8 CE
X in dynasty 9-23 CE
Eastern Han period 25-220 CE

*According to Ban Gus Standard History of the Former Han, the Han reign began in the tenth month of
207 b c e . The early Han followed the Qin convention and began a year with the tenth month until the Grand Incep­
tion system, which started a year with the first month, was in use in 104 b ce.
 Emperors of the Western Han,
X in，
and Eastern Dynasties

WESTERN HAN DYNASTY 207 BCE—8 CE

G ao高祖 207-196 BCE
H u i惠帝 196-188 BCE
Empress Dowager Lti 呂后 188-180 BCE
W e n 文帝 180-157 BCE
Jin g 景帝 157-141 BCE
W u 武帝 141—87 BCE
Z h a o 昭帝 86-74 BCE
X u a n 宣帝 73—49 BCE
Y uan兀帝 48-33 BCE
C heng成帝 32-7 BCE
A i哀帝 6-1 BCE

P in g 平帝 I-5 CE
Ruzi Y in g 孺 子 嬰 6-8 CE

XIN DYNASTY 9-23 CE

Wang Mang 王 莽 9-23 CE

EASTERN HAN DYNASTY 25-220 CE

G uangw u光武帝 25-57 CE
M in g 明帝 58-75 CE
Z h a n g 章帝 76—88 CE
H e 和帝 89—IO5 CE
Shang瘍帝 106 CE
A n 安帝 _ IO7-I25 CE
Shao少帝 126 CE
Shun順帝 1 2 6 - 1 4 4 CE

C ho ng 沖帝 145 CE
Z h i質帝 146 CE
H u a n 桓帝 147-167 CE
L in g 靈帝 168-188 CE
Shao少帝 189 CE
X ia n 獻帝 190-220 CE
Picturing Heaven in Early Chin
 IN TR O D U C TIO N

Images and References

W hat are the most difficult things to paint? W hat are the easiest? An ancient Chinese
king once raised these questions with Han Fei 韓 (2 8 0 ? —233 bce)?a leading scholar of
legalism. Han picked dogs and horses as the most difficult to paint because people know
them well and see them often. He considered ghosts and goblins as the easiest because
they have no definite form .1 Zhang Heng 張 衡 (7 8 - 1 3 9 ce)，a distinguished writer and
astronomer, followed Hans rationale in explaining why the artisans in his time pre­
ferred to depict ghosts and goblins over dogs and horses: “Truly, this is because substan­
tial entities are difficult to shape, whereas insubstantial counterfeits are inexhaustible in
shape/ ' 2 Both Han’s and Zhangs arguments touched upon the nature of representation.
Hie depiction of the invisible calls for imagination, not imitation, making any images
produced hard to judge. Zhangs criticism also indicates the contemporary enthusiasm
for creating images of invisible things. Heaven, the main focus of this book, was more
obscure than ghosts and goblins, so it was probably the most challenging subject matter
for artisans in the Han dynasty ( 2 0 7 BCE-220 ce), the historical period in which Zhang
lived and the time frame of this book.
“Heaven” is a convenient but inadequate translation of the Chinese character tian
天 . Tian is derived from another character, da Jv, a graph depicting the frontal view of
a person standing firm with legs apart and arms stretched out. The graph da, invented
to distinguish an adult from a child, means, by extension, a big size. To create the writ­
ten sign for Heaven from da, they added a solid circle atop da、as we can see in bronze
inscriptions of the eleventh and tenth centuries bce (Figure o.i).The circle was simpli­
fied, becoming a horizontal line, around the ninth century bce (Figure 0 .2 ). Placing a
horizontal line atop da became the standard way to write tian before the Han dynasty.
The emphasis on the top indicates that the ancient Chinese regarded tian as high above
human beings.3
 n t h century bce

9th century b c e

156 CE

天 Modern

0 .2 . Evolution o f the graph tian. (a) Detail from Yu ding

in the Shanghai Museum, (b) Detail from Shi Song ding
0 .1. Graphs tian and da. Detail from Yu ding. Eleventh in the Shanghai Museum, (c) Detail from the stele for
century b c e. Collection o f the Shanghai Museum. Han Chi in the Confucian Temple in Qufii, Shandong.

Many things are both vast and higher than a standing person. To grasp the Chinese s
notion of Heaven, we must look at the contexts in which tian was used. Bronze in­
scriptions from the eleventh century bce onward portray tian as the supreme deity who
granted a king the right to rule and who made his judgments known by either bestowing
blessings on. or causing disasters in the human world. W ith the development of divine
kingship as a feature of government came compounds like tianming 天 命 （ mandate of
Heaven), tianzi 天 子 （ son of Heaven), and tiandi 天 帝 （ Heavenly Thearch) . 4 The Book
o f Changes (Yi jin g 易經 )，probably compiled in the ninth century bce based on earlier
sources, presents a second aspect of tian: the sky, where people saw the appearance and
disappearance of stars.5 The compound tianwen 天 文 （ patterns of Heaven) arose from
observations of the night sky. In the Book o f Odes (Shi jin g 詩 經 )，which includes poems
dated between the eleventh and seventh centuries bce, tian is a place where the Heav­
enly Thearch resides.6 This spatial denotation produced yet another group of compounds
like tianting 天 廷 （ heavenly court), tiangong 天 宫 （ heavenly palace), and tianmen 天門
(gate of Heaven).
 The ancient Chinese formed their basic ideas of Heaven— as the sky, the supreme
deity, and the residence of the deity~ in the Western Zhou period (ca. 1 0 5 0 - 7 7 1 bce).
Political, social, and religious changes modified those ideas. Although the Zhou king
was believed to be the sole mediator between Heaven and the human world, with the
decline of the Zhou ruling house his monopoly on mediation was inevitably ceded to
others. Hie First Emperor, whose great-grandfather vanquished the Zhou in 25 6 bce,
unified the warring states and established the Q in dynasty (2 2 2 - 2 0 7 bce), yet the tran­
sitoriness of the Q in bore witness to the caprices of Heaven. The Han rulers, having
overthrown the Qin, were eager to associate their reign with the mandate of Heaven
and strived to maintain its favor. Political disorder and social dislocation during the pro­
longed decline of the Zhou over the course of five centuries had prompted people to
ponder the connection between Heaven and their own world. 7 O n the one hand, celes­
tial signs, once thought to foretell national affairs, gradually came to be correlated with
the fate of individuals. The rising interest in celestial prognostication popularized sky
lore in the Han dynasty.8 Correlative thinking also generated discussion about the cor­
respondences between macrocosm and microcosm, starting sometime before the Qins
unification of China and gaining currency after the establishment of the Han. Cosmol-
ogists regarded Heaven as a force— composed of qi 氣 ，w hich was divided into yin 陰
and yang 陽 aspects— that kept the cosmos moving.9 O n the other hand, the Heavenly
Thearch, who had communicated only with the highest ruler in the past, now became a
mighty guardian for individuals. A Han inscription found on a stone inserted into the
ceiling of a tomb records the wish to enlist the power of the Heavenly Thearch to ward
off evil invasions in a private domain. 10 People even fancied that the Heavenly Thearch
would open his residence, where deities and auspicious animals gathered, to accommo­
date the deceased. The belief in ascending to Heaven after death became widespread in
the Han dynasty.
Early texts, both those unearthed and those transmitted, provide us with numerous
examples of how the ancient Chinese presented, elaborated, questioned, and debated
various ideas of Heaven, beginning in the eleventh century bce. Visual representations
of Heaven did not emerge in significant numbers, however, until the Han dynasty. The
sudden outpouring of depictions of Heaven then was due in part to artisans’ shift in fo­
cus from patterns on the surfaces of bronze vessels to pictures on the surfaces of wood,
lacquer, and stone. Changes in the political system, the social structure, and religious
practices made Heaven a leitmotif at the pictorial turn. The depictions of Heaven cast
light on at least two essential questions that I hope to answer in this book: Was Heaven
represented as it had been referred to in writing~as the sky, the supreme deity, a cosmic
 b
0 .3. Northern Dipper on a stone carving in the Wu family shrines. Mid-second century c e .
Discovered in 1786 in Jiaxiang, Shandong, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.

force, a pantheon of deities, and a land of immortals? And, how did the many meanings
of Heaven influence how it was represented?
References to Heaven in Han art were indeed manifold and matched the notion
of tian as it developed. Take, for example, the image of the Heavenly TKearch in a W u
武 family shrine erected in the second century in what is now Shandong (Figure 0 .3 ).
Though dressed like a Han official, the deity is distinguished by his larger size and his
position of authority~he is receiving figures who are either bowing or kneeling before
him. W hat truly makes him the Heavenly Thearch, however, is his seat in the scoop of
 5
0 .4 . Excursion o f the Heavenly Lord on a bronze mirror. First to second century c e .
Diameter 17.7 cm. Unearthed in Xinye, Henan, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Detail.

a dipper. The dipper, which is punctuated by seven big circles, represents the Northern
(Big) Dipper. The scene conveys a Han view of Heaven that conflated the sky and the
supreme deity, a conflation that a court historian, Sima Qian 司 馬 遷 (ca. 145-ca. 86 bce),
had articulated centuries earlier in his Book o f Celestial Offices {Tian guan shu 天 官 書 ).
According to Sima Qian, the brightest star in the constellation of the Celestial Pole was
the permanent abode of the supreme deity, whom he called Grand Unity {taiyi 太 一 )•
And the Northern Dipper, composed of seven stars, was the vehicle of the supreme deity,
from which he was able to govern at the center while reaching out to the four quarters. 11
After the liberation of Heaven from its theocratic framework, the Han people welcomed
a Heavenly Thearch with less political clout than his predecessor. The design on a bronze
mirror discovered in Henan, probably created no later than the carving in the W u shrine,
captures the new view of the deity (Figure 0 .4 ) . 12 We see the deity in the outer circle of
the mirrors back, where he is seated in a vehicle pulled by two dragons, driven by two
charioteers, and about to pass through a pair of gate pillars. The two characters inscribed
between the dragons and a mass of clouds label the deity as tiangong 天 公 (Heavenly
Lord). The longer inscription along an inner circle identifies the scene as an excursion of
the Heavenly Lord [tiangong xingchu 天 公 行 出 ） • The gate pillars must therefore be the
entrance to his celestial palace. No doubt the design reminded viewers that Heaven was
 0 .5. Celestial images on a wood carving. First century b c e. 188 x 45.3 x 3.5 cm.
Unearthed in 1974 in Xuyi, Jiangsu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

both the supreme deity and his residence. Since the First Emperor had appropriated the
character di 帝 (thearch) to refer to his emperorship, using gong 公 (lord) to denote the
supreme deity made it clear that the deity was expected to bestow his favors not only on
monarchs but also on all human beings. Other representations show that the Han peo­
ple even accepted a kind of Heaven without any anthropomorphic dominator. A wood
carving, excavated in a late-first-century bce tomb in Jiangsu, portrays Heaven as an array
of the sun, the moon, the M ilky Way, and stars (Figure 0.5). I f the carving depicts the
sky, then the celestial bodies are complete with mythological elaboration: the sun is car­
ried by a bird, the moon contains a toad, and the M ilky Way is embodied by three fish. A
celestial being flying over the sun adds a non-astronomical touch to the imaginary sky.
Picturing Heaven clearly requires a significative rather than an imitative view of rep­
resentation. In language, the relation between a name and what it names (for example,
“tree” and a tree) is arbitrary, based on or set by convention. 13 In pictorial art, the relation
between a picture and what it depicts (for example, a portrait of Henry and Henry him ­
self) is less arbitrary because picture and subject trigger cognition through similarities. If
we recognize similarities, we can interpret a portrait of Henry as a depiction of Henry.
Nevertheless, the three Han images just introduced— a man with a constellation, a man
about to pass through gate pillars, and three fish between two circles_ may not be depic­
tions of Heaven. Only if we know of conventions that allow them to refer to Heaven can
we identify them in that way. Picturing Heaven is thus an act of signification determined
by convention.
Artisans must have borrowed tacit knowledge from convention to make Heaven vis­
ible and accessible. The artisan who decorated the W u family shrine did not invent the
idea of positioning the supreme deity in his celestial vehicle, the Northern Dipper. The
imagery came from the court experts who explained heavenly bodies in terms of a human
bureaucracy. Likewise, the artisan who designed the bronze mirror was not the first to
associate the supreme deity with gate pillars. In Elegies o f the Chu {Chu ci 楚 辭 )，an
anthology of verse by Q u Yuan 屈 原 （ 34工?一2 8 3 ? bce) and his followers, poets described
how gatekeepers controlled the entrance to the heavenly palace or the heavenly capital. 15
The artisan who made the wood carving would not have populated the M ilky Way with
fish were there no folktales portraying it as a celestial river that separated the Weaving
M aid (three stars in Lyra) and the Oxherd (three stars in Aquila) . 16 As I will demon­
strate, the tacit knowledge that the Han artisans borrowed to represent Heaven ranged
widely from cosmology to mythology to astronomy.
That picturing Heaven is an act of appropriation does not diminish the value of the
artisans，contribution to its representation. Artisans exhibited their talent in how they
transformed knowledge into image. Although the court experts envisioned the supreme
deity dwelling at the Pole Star and riding on the Northern Dipper as he presided over
the celestial realm, it was an artisan who gave supremacy and transportation their pic­
torial forms by creating a gigantic, kingly figure receiving homage, by rendering the
Northern Dipper as a chariot in profile, and by installing scrolls of clouds beneath the
scoop of the dipper as if they were wheels. Likewise, it was an artisan who fleshed out
the Heavenly Lords excursion on the bronze mirror from a theme summarized by only
four inscribed characters. To distinguish the anthropomorphic deity from human beings,
the artisan added wings to his shoulders. To indicate the outing, the artisan placed the
deity in a dragon-drawn cart and captured the moment when he departed from his pal­
ace. And to show the deitys magnificence, the artisan created an impressive entourage
that included the sun, the moon, the River Lord in charge of the M ilky Way, and various
auspicious animals.
Artisans also played an active role in deciding how pictures of Heaven should be used.
The Jiangsu wood carving, for instance, helped furnish a deceased couple’s tomb. Their
double coffins, both made of wood, were located in a pit. The outer coffin, rectangular in
 0 .6. Dragons and stars on a wood carving. First century b c e. 188 x 28.2 x 3.5 cm.
Unearthed in 1974 in Xuyi, Jiangsu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

0 .7. Lifting a tripod on a wood carving. First century b ce. 45 x 40 x 3 cm.

Unearthed in 1974 in Xuyi, Jiangsu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

shape, is divided into two units: the larger one houses two inner coffins, and the smaller
one stores funerary goods. Only the interior of the larger unit is decorated, with two
carvings on the ceiling and three on the partition wall. The carving introduced earlier
is on the ceiling, juxtaposed with a carving that features dragons and stars (Figure 0 .6 ).
One wall carving depicts the retrieval of a lost tripod from a river (Figure 0 .7 ), and an­
other depicts a musical performance, dancing, acrobatics, and an animal act (Figure 0 .8 );
the third carving is damaged. 17 I f the tomb is a microcosm, then the wood carving on
 0 .8. Performances on a wood carving. First century b c e. 45 x 40 x 2.5 cm.
Unearthed in 1974 in Xuyi, Jiangsu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

the wall represents the human world, and those on the ceiling the celestial realm. I f the
tomb served as a site of transition because dragons were said to assist people in reach­
ing Heaven, then the decoration on the ceiling signifies the supreme deity’s dwelling, to
which the deceased hoped to climb. In this case, the carvings on the ceiling, though de­
noting the imaginary sky, connote the celestial ascent and paradise after death. The pa­
trons who commissioned the funerary project may have expressed their wish to make the
tomb more like a microcosm, a transitional site, or both. But none could have dictated
the complicated visual signification~borrowing from mythology to create the sky and
using the mythical sky to stand for the celestial paradise— except for the artisan himself.
To make the invisible visible, both artisans and viewers relied on tacit knowledge for
coding and decoding, which made picturing Heaven an act of social communication.
There were bound to be social and regional distinctions in approaching and represent­
ing Heaven in the Han, since the empire lasted for four centuries and encompassed an
enormous territory, stretching from present-day North Korea in the east to Vietnam in
the south, the Pamir Plateau in the west, and the Great W all in the north. Nevertheless,
received texts and archaeological finds offer us mostly information about social elites in
urban areas. How images of Heaven functioned in the life of commoners is unclear. The
scant, scattered, and unevenly distributed data likewise make it difficult to distinguish
regional preferences. Still, we do know that different elite groups in the Han evinced dif­
ferent attitudes toward Heaven and its visualization. In this book, we will see the fierce
competition between Confucian scholars {rushi 儒 士 ）and masters of methods {fangshi
方 士 ) at the Han court. Confucian scholars, who interpreted Confucius^ (551-479 BCE)
teachings within a framework of cosmological synthesis, emphasized the mandate of
Heaven and urged benevolent rule. The masters of methods, in contrast, pushed their
view of Heaven as a land of immortals and advocated ways to achieve immortality. The
contests between the two groups yielded two types of architecture in the capitals. Hie
ruler who listened to masters of methods had the celestial paradise re-created in the im ­
perial park, whereas the rulers who listened to Confucian scholars ordered the construc­
tion of Bright Halls in which the son of Heaven received his subjects while claiming his
heavenly mandate. We will also see the tension between rulers and Confucian scholars.
Both believed that good omens would appear if Heaven approved a reign, but for op­
posite reasons: the rulers sought to reaffirm their legitimacy, and the Confucian scholars
tried to prevent rulers from becoming despots. The discourse of omens came into play
not only at court but also in local politics. Han emperors often granted tax relief to the
districts whose administrators reported the emergence of good omens. Over time the
Han people came to believe that the head of the local government, like the emperor,
could be graced by omens if his governance proved to be benevolent. Local officials thus
regarded omens as a means to gain social benefit or individual promotion; some went so
far as to falsify omens， appearance. Under the circumstances, illustrated catalogues were
produced and circulated to meet the need to correctly identify omens.
The significant weight of Heaven in ancient China has drawn the attention of modern
scholars. Intellectual historians are intrigued by how the ancient Chinese elites pondered
their association with Heaven. A. C. Graham and Michael Puett offer their macroscopic
views, sketching the transformative dynamics from the pre-Han to the Han eras'. Robert
Eno, Edward Machle，and John Major present case studies on the notions of Heaven
seen in the writings of pre-Han Confucians and Han cosmologists.18 Historians of sci­
ence are naturally enthusiastic about the astronomical aspect of Heaven. Nathan Sivin
articulates the way scientific knowledge— astronomy, mathematics, medicine, and chem­
istry~emerged in early China and identifies the people who sponsored, possessed, and
transmitted these branches of knowledge. Xiaochun Sun and Jacob Kistemaker exam­
ine three major conventions used to map the sky in the Han period. Christopher Cullen
scrutinizes an early text on astronomy and mathematics that was probably compiled by
Han experts.19 Historians who are interested in politics cannot ignore the impact of
Heavens mandate. Both Cho-yun Hsii and Edward Shaughnessy touch upon the issue
in their Western Zhou histories, and Aihe Wang gives the topic a book-length analy­
sis and extends the discussion to the Han dynasty.20 These scholarly works, admirable
 though they are, reflect the concerns of modern disciplines more than they do the com­
plexity of Heaven in early China. The interdisciplinary approach that I favor in this book
acknowledges the need to treat the complexity of Heaven as a whole, which is how it
had evolved since the height of the Chinese Bronze Age.
Despite abundant modern literature, scholars have not studied how the Han Chinese
pictured Heaven. The dearth of scholarship has many causes. Some are rooted in circum­
stances and academic tradition. The closed-door policy adopted by Communist China
after 1 9 4 9 confined art historians to portable objects already in public or private collec­
tions overseas. Ancient bronze vessels，medieval Buddhist sculpture, and later paintings
became three dominant areas of research. To establish or present collections, art histori­
ans devoted themselves to connoisseurship， employing typology, iconography, and formal
analysis for dating and authentication.21 Seldom did they take into consideration the so­
cial context in which objects were produced, distributed, and received. Nor did they pay
much attention to the physical context in which objects were discovered or may have been
displayed. In such a scholarly environment, Han art was at a disadvantage because Han
artisans preferred to engrave stones, paint on walls, and decorate lacquerware. These me­
dia一 difficult to remove or preservewere not among the favorites of early tomb looters.
The limited access to Han art inevitably made it a marginalized field, dismissed as work
done during either the twilight of the Bronze Age or the dawn of the Buddhist era.
Other reasons for the lack of scholarly attention to the Han depiction of Heaven have
to do with the development of Chinese archaeology. Even though avid antiquarians and
collectors have encouraged tomb looting in China for centuries, scholars did not begin
to experiment with scientific excavation in north China until the early twentieth century.
Li Chi, a Harvard-trained anthropologist, was the first to garner governmental support
for a large-scale project in Anyang 安 陽 ，a capital of the Shang dynasty (ca. 1 6 0 0 - 1 0 5 0
bce). Work on the project, initiated in 1 9 2 8 ，continues to this day. Li and other experts
who explored the field of archaeology mainly sought evidence of civilizations from the
prehistoric period to the Shang. They cared little about later dynasties like the H an .22
The situation changed after the establishment of the Peoples Republic of China, when
archaeology became a national enterprise. More than 1 0 0 , 0 0 0 Han tombs have been
discovered all over the country since then.23 The 'material that Wang Zhongshu intro­
duced in Han Civilization in 1 9 8 2 , with K. C. Chang’s assistance and translation，has
been vastly augmented. The constant unearthing of new caches has turned the landscape
of Han art from bleak to blooming.
W hen China reopened its doors to the world in the 1 9 7 0 s，
scholars in the West could
put Han art into better perspective. Michael Loewe，a textual historian, took advantage
of the archaeological breakthroughs in his Ways to Paradise in 1 9 7 9 . He boldly relied
on images to illustrate the Han quest for immortality, using, for example, a decorated
brick found in 1965 to articulate the popular cult of a goddess in charge of the land of
immortals and a silk painting discovered in 1972 to explain the belief in ascending to
Heaven. Because of his rigid iconographical approach, the book, albeit insightful, drew
criticism.24 It was W u Hung and Martin Powers who secured the place of Han art
in Western scholarship. In The Wu Liang Shrine (1 9 8 9 )，W u bridged the gap between
iconography and iconology by restoring the visual program for an otherwise scattered
group of Han carved stones, reconstructing the sociopolitical context in which the group
was situated, and analyzing the ideology that it represented. Powers sought to associate
style with society. In his A rt and Political Expression in Early China (1 9 9 1 ), he inves­
tigated how various social groups, owing to different tastes and concerns, developed
their distinct stylistic preferences in the Han period. Both W u and Powers drew upon
many archaeological finds available only in the second half of the twentieth century to
substantiate their arguments. I am greatly indebted to Chinese archaeologists for their
painstaking fieldwork and to the pioneering scholars for their intellectual endeavors. In
particular, Loewe introduced the imagined celestial field, whereas W u and Powers dis­
cussed issues concerning images of omens. None of them, however, addressed the sud­
den outburst of visual materials about Heaven in the Han. Nor did any of them consider
omens or the imagined celestial field as part of a multifaceted, sophisticated discourse
on Heaven.
M y curiosity about Heaven in Han art parallels my interest in the study of symbols
and signs. To begin with, I was intrigued by Ernst Cassirers philosophical contempla­
tions on symbolic forms and by Erwin Panofskys demonstration of perspective as a
symbolic form in European pictorial art.25 Maurice Merleau-Pontys thoughts on the
visible and the invisible fascinated me later, as did Hubert Damischs illustration of the
way clouds are used in Correggio’s (1 4 8 9 —1534 ce) paintings, as both a signifier and the
signified, to de-compose and yet complete the system of perspective.26 E. H . Gombrichs
meditations on a hobby horse remain inspiring, especially his use of the psychological
concept of symbolization to consider a broomstick more a substitute for a horse (func­
tion) than a portrayal of a horse (form ) . 27 Unsatisfied with the semiotic approach, David
Summers has called for a post-formalist art history based more on real spaces than on
planar surfaces.28 M uch though I benefited from all these and many other stimulating
discussions and debates, the purpose of my book is not to fill Western theoretical frame­
works with Chinese data but to exploit whatever approaches facilitate our understanding
of the visual representation of Heaven in Han China.
 0 .9. Stele o f the Law Code o f Hammurabi, ca. 1792-1750 b c e. Basalt. W. 65 cm .
Collection o f the musee du Louvre, Paris, France.

Although this book does not go beyond Han China in scope, I hope it helps shed
light on similar visual materials from other cultural areas. The Chinese, for instance, were
not the only people in the ancient world to ascribe divinity to kings. The Mesopotamians
developed the idea as early as the third millennium bce. They transformed the idea into
images, of which the stele of Hammurabi (r. 17 9 2 - 1 7 5 0 bce) was a famous example (Fig­
ure 0 .9 ). Hammurabi, the sixth king of the Amorite dynasty of Babylon, erected the stele
to promulgate his laws. To emphasize the authority of his codes, Hammurabi had a relief
added to the top of the stele, right above the columns of legal texts. The relief shows
two figures: the standing one is a king, presumably Hammurabi himself, who wears a
 0 .10. Induction ofV ibia and banquet ofVibia. Probably second half o f fourth century c e .
Mural. Unearthed from the hypogeum o fV ibia in Rome, Italy.

royal polos headdress and a simple robe; the seated one is the sun god Shamash, who
has rays of sun radiating from his shoulders, wears a divine headdress with four horns
over a voluminous bun, and sits on a throne decorated with lintels evoking a city gate or
a temple portal. The scene captures the moment when the sun god is giving a ring and
a staff, emblems of authority, to the king.29 The ancient Mesopotamians depicted divine
kingship in figurative art, whereas the Han Chinese preferred to show it in architecture.
As we will see in this book, Han emperors claimed their mandate as the sons of Heaven
at the center of Bright Halls, structures intended to manifest the cosmos in miniature.
Heavenly ascent is another idea shared by many people in the ancient world. A fresco
from the hypogeum ofV ibia provides an interesting example that dates to mid-fourth-
century Rome (Figure o.io). The inscriptions in the painting inform us that the Good
Angel {Angelus Bonus) is leading the deceased woman ( Vibiu) through a gate. Inside the
gate, as we also read, Vibia reappears. Now she is seated at a. table with five others, who,
like her, were approved by the judgment of the righteous [Bonorum ludicio ludicati). The
scene, which combines induction and dining, not only suggests Heaven as a destination
for the deceased but also attests to the fusion of pagan customs and Christian beliefs
in Late Antiquity. The added gate and angel distinguish the scene from the depictions
of other Roman banquets, which were often held at graves or in churches.30 The Han
Chinese, too, viewed Heaven as a desirable place to spend one s afterlife. The gate of
Heaven and a guide to Heaven— a winged immortal, not an angelw ere popular motifs
in Han funerary art. Instead of focusing on life in Heaven, such as the promise of a ban­
 1
5

quet, the Han artisans and their clients were obsessed with the passage to Heaven. We
will thus learn much more about what took place before the gate to the Han Heaven
than about what supposedly happened beyond it.
I organize the book around different references to Heaven that the Han artisans took
into their visual productions. Chapter i is an examination of the architectural manifes­
tation of Heavens mandate. By looking at the Bright Halls erected by three Han rulers,
I investigate how and why architecture became a convergence of cosmology, history,
and legitimacy during their reigns. I also discuss how the Bright Halls came to repre­
sent Heaven to both rulers and the ruled by the manipulation of architecture in terms
of locality, symbolic form, and ritual imagination. Chapter 2 deals with how the Han
people viewed omens as tangible evidence of Heavens mandate and how the Han arti­
sans depicted those omens. Focusing on the cliff engraving made to honor a governors
meritorious services in what is now Gansu, I explore the way mountains were employed
to forge the monumentality of Heavens mandate. Chapter 3 introduces fantastic jour­
neys from the Earth to Heaven. I analyze the shift from morality to immortality as seen
in the Changan architectural complex, the wish to ascend to Heaven evident in the
visual program of Lady Dais tomb at Mawangdui, and the question of whether the gate
of Heaven, a prevalent icon in Han funerary art, defined the destination of the celestial
ascent. In chapter 4 , 1 look into the celestial markers in Han art and explain how the
presence of the cardinal deities, the M ilky Way, and the sun and the moon sufficed to
stand for Heaven. In chapter 5 ， I tackle the Chinese zodiac一 specifically, how the system
of twenty-eight lunar lodges was established and how the knowledge of the lodges was
transmitted from experts to the general public. A painted tomb in X i， an provides a basis
for a discussion of the way the Han artisans transformed a celestial map into an uani-
mated” sky~one with anthropomorphic and zoomorphic elaborations— and then used
the animated sky in the funerary context to refer to Heaven, the eventual home of the
deceased.
 CHAPTER I

Constructing the Cosmic View

The ancient Chinese conceived of Heaven as the mighty force that established the polit­
ical order of the human world. They believed that only with the mandate of Heaven
could a feudal lord rise to be the sole ruler of China, the Middle Kingdom. The political
discourse of Heaven first emerged from the Zhou conquest of the Shang in 1 0 4 5 bce，
when an insignificant state in the peripheral west took control of the center. A song,
likely produced at the Zhou court and still preserved in the Book o f Odes, articulates the
discourse while eulogizing King Wen (r. 1 0 9 9 - 1 0 5 0 bce), who laid the foundation for the
conquest:

King Wen is on high;

Oh, he shines in Heaven!
Zhou is an old state,
But its mandate is new.
The house of Zhou became illustrious,
Blessed by the mandate of the Thearch \dt\.
King Wen ascends and descends,
On the Thearchs left hand, on His right.

August is Wen the King;

Oh, to be reverenced in his glittering light!
Mighty the mandate that Heaven gave him.
The grandsons and sons of the Shang,
Shangs grandsons and sons,
Their multitudes were innumerable.
But the Thearch on High \shangdi 上帝] gave his mandate,
And by Zhou they were subdued.
 The mandate is not easy to keep.
Do not bring ruin on yourselves.
Send forth everywhere the light of your good fame;
Consider what Heaven did to the Shang.
High Heaven does its business
W ithout sound, without smell.
Make King Wen your example,
In whom all the peoples put their trust .1

The mandate of Heaven as presented in the song has two meanings. O n the one hand,
it justifies the new sovereignty gained by armed force; on the other, it requires that the
new rulers be cautious and responsible.2 The profile of a commendable ruler is more
clearly described in the inscription on a Zhou bronze vessel commissioned by Bin Gong
縣 公 (Figure 1.1).The text first affirms that Heaven gave birth to “our king” to serve as its
minister. It then declares that what the king bathes in is virtue and that what the people
love in him is his radiant virtue. The inscription expounds the virtues of the king: he is
filial and friendly, bright and expansive, even and constant, and he loves sacrifices with­
out lim it.3
Sacrificing to Heaven was one of the most important rituals conducted by a Zhou
king. It was practiced very early according to the inscription on a Zhou bronze vessel
commissioned by He 无可(Figure 1.2 ) .4 We learn from the context that King Cheng (r.
1042/1035-1006 bce) offered a sacrifice to Heaven upon moving the capital eastward to
Luo 洛 ipresent-day Luoyang 洛 陽 )• He intended to carry out the unfulfilled wish of
his father King W u (r. 1 0 4 9 / 1 0 4 5 - 1 0 4 3 bce), who had fought the decisive battle against
the Shang. King W u, in a sacrifice performed to ask Heaven to bless the victory over the
Shang, had promised to reside at the center of the territory to govern the people. W ith ­
out doubt, both kings'ritual performances were to secure the mandate of Heaven through
tangible and explicable communications between Heaven and the highest rulers.5
Where did a Zhou king worship Heaven? The inscription on another Zhou ves­
sel, this one commissioned by Tian Wang 天TT，says that he performed the ritual in
an architectural space called the “Heavenly Chamber” [tianshi 天 室 ；Figure 1.3 ) . 6 No
archaeological information is available for a further inquiry into this chamber. The term
appears only once in the received texts. In Sima Qians Records o f the Grand Historian
(Shiji 史記i King W u is said to have emphasized that he relied on the Heavenly Cham­
ber to perpetuate the blessing of Heaven.7 In contrast to the bronze inscription, texts
received much later favor another ritual structure, called “the Bright H all” [mingtang
明堂） .8 Confucius once proclaimed that the Duke of Zhou, who was regent while his
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nephew King Cheng was too young to assume the duties of a ruler, worshiped his father,
King Wen, in the Bright Hall to share the sacrifices offered to the Thearch on H igh .9
The Duke of Zhou is also said to have received the feudal lords in the Bright Hall before
he returned power to King Cheng. 10 There are even various accounts of the exterior ap­
pearance and interior partitions of the Bright H all. 11
It is unclear whether the Heavenly Chamber in the bronze inscription and the Bright
H all in the received texts are the same ritual building where the Zhou kings sacrificed
to Heaven or to the Thearch on High. Literary sources maintained the memory of the
Bright Hall after the fall of the Zhou. The rulers of the Han dynasty thus sought to en­
sure their mandate in the Bright Hall. Since the building had not existed for centuries,
they had to erect a new one, but reconstructing the Bright Hall was not an easy task.
The cultural interruption between the Han and the Zhou was severe, even though only
the fifteen-year Q in reign separated the two. To prevent the dissenters from growing in
number, the First Emperor (r. 2 2 2 - 2 1 0 bce) of the Q in issued the notorious edict to bum
 all the books that had nothing to do with such pragmatic needs as medicine, agricul­
ture, and divination. Historical documents that might have contained crucial informa­
tion about the Bright Hall were undoubtedly destroyed. In the wake of the disaster, Han
scholars had to piece the past together from fragmentary survivals and inadequate recita­
tions, which often led to irresolvable confusion and contradiction. Given that the textual
base was both insufficient and unreliable, the greatest challenge for those who wanted to
reconstruct the Bright Hall in the Han period was to demonstrate the abstract notion of
Heavens mandate in architectural form.
The importance of the Bright Hall has not escaped the attention of modern scholars.
Before archaeological evidence was available, scholars strived to clarify what the Bright
Hall was from a large corpus of texts produced in the pre-Han, Han, and post-Han eras. 12
After the first Han Bright Hall was discovered in 1 9 5 6 ，scholars attempted to restore its
above-ground structure by consulting without much discrimination the same corpus of
texts. 13 The excavation of the second Han Bright Hall from 19 78 to 1 9 7 9 , however, called
for different approaches. 14 First of all, the Bright Hall is not a timeless structure. His­
torical situations affected why, when, where, and how each Bright Hall was erected. 15 In
addition, the Bright Hall is neither an abstract scheme nor an empty building. People
who entered and used the space defined the nature of the Bright Hall through the rituals
they performed and the activities they conducted.16 Moreover, the extant texts may be
controversial for the purpose of architectural reconstruction, but they do inform us of
how people in different periods perceived and imagined the Bright H all. 17 This chapter
thus presents the Han Bright Halls in their particular historical contexts, with special
emphasis on the significative and performative aspects of architecture.

Legitimacy and Politics

There were three Bright Halls in the Han dynasty. Tlie first was built in Fenggao 奉高
at the foot of M ount Tai 泰 in the fall of 1 0 9 bce.18 The construction of the first Bright
Hall was closely related to the feng-shan 封禪 ceremony just restored by Emperor W u
(r. 14 1 - 8 7 bce) the previous year. As his court historian Sima Qian recorded, many be­
lieved that the ancient sage kings performed a twofold ceremony at M ount Tai— offer­
ing sacrifices to Heaven in the feng rite and to Earth in the shan rite— after Heaven
had granted them its mandate to govern and after their reigns had proved benevolent. 19
Emperor W u, dutifully holding the feng-shan ceremony at M ount Tai, was to claim the
mandate and the virtue of his own reign by evoking a historical analogue. After the
ceremony, the emperor visited the site of an old Bright H all at the northeastern foot of
M ount Tai, where the Zhou kings were said to have received their feudal lords on their
inspection tour of the east. The emperor saw the potential for drawing another historical
analogue to enhance his legitimacy, but he did not appreciate the narrow and precipitous
terrain there. He ordered the construction of a brand-new Bright Hall in Fenggao at the
eastern foot of M ount Tai.20
Emperor W u first used the newly built Bright H all in the spring of 1 0 6 bce, when
he traveled to M ount Tai for his second performance of the feng-shan ceremony. In the
Bright Hall, Emperor W u offered sacrifices to the Tliearch on High and to Emperor
Gao (r. 2 0 7 - 1 9 6 bce), the founder of the Han dynasty.21 Next, Emperor W u received his
vassals from all over the country. They submitted annual reports on local affairs，includ­
ing public security, income and expense, the number of households, and the amount of
arable lands.22 The two highly symbolic activities conducted in the Bright H all reveal
how the Han people viewed the workings of political power. The emperor, who through
his ancestors received Heavens mandate to rule, was the Son of Heaven destined to
mediate between Heaven and the human world. He ruled the country by establishing
and maintaining reliable feudal relationships and an efficient bureaucracy.
Although Emperor W u decreed that the feng-shan ceremony should be performed
every five years, he returned to M ount Tai soon, in the winter of 105 bce. This time he
did not ascend M ount Tai for the feng-shan ceremony but only visited the Bright Hall
in Fenggao. Having sacrificed to the Thearch on High, Emperor W u promulgated a new
calendar to his vassals and changed the title of his reign to “Grand Inception” {taichu 太
初 ) . 23 These were symbolic gestures on his part. He had the cycle of the four seasons—
the demonstration of Heavens regularity~translated into a calendrical system that his
people could easily follow. The new calendar, known as the Grand Inception system {tai­
chu li 太 初 曆 )， was prepared with great care by experts at court to ensure accurate pre­
dictions of celestial events. More than a pragmatic update, however, the Grand Incep­
tion system began a year with the first month, which departed from the old custom of
starting a year with the tenth month.24W hy did Emperor W u disseminate in the Bright
H all a calendar so different from the given one?
To answer this question, we have to consider issues surrounding the legitimacy of
the Han reign. The emergence of the Han Empire had long been regarded as a miracle
because never before could a commoner like Emperor Gao have unified China. Every
preceding dynasty was built upon solid aristocratic ground and with persistent efforts
of many generations. Yet, Emperor Gao set out on his path to the throne without any
connections and privileges derived from birthright, beginning as a humble neighbor­
 hood head {tingzhang 亭 長 chief of a commune comprising no more than 1 , 0 0 0 house­
holds. How could his contemporaries not ascribe his surprising success to Heaven?
Emperor Gaos followers, men like Zhang Liang 張良 and Han X in 韓 信 ，apparently
believed that he had Heavens mandate when they maintained their unwavering loyalty
in numerous battles before unification.26 Emperor Gao himself still lent credence to the
blessedness of his destiny when he refused medical treatment shortly before his death.27
Almost one century later, Sima Qian, pondering the establishment of the Han dynasty,
gave credit to the magic wand of fate.28
The rise of a commoner to the throne supported the idea of Heavens mandate, but it
also inevitably posed a threat to any regime, for anyone could try to be another Emperor
Gao. The discourse of Han legitimacy must therefore go beyond the simple claim of pos­
sessing Heavens mandate and the dutiful practice of ancestor worship. Anxiety over the
danger of repeating dynastic change compelled people to consider the Han reign as part
of a longer historical sequence explained by the doctrine of the Five Virtues {wude 五 德 ).
Likely proposed by Zou Yan 鄒 衍 （ ca, 3 0 5 -ca. 2 4 0 bce), the doctrine compares dynas­
tic changes to the succession of the Five Phases (wuxing 五 行 )• The doctrine of the Five
Phases postulates that a conquest cycle arises from the shift of powers from one phase
to another, when earth covers water, water extinguishes fire， fire melts metal, metal cuts
wood, and wood breaks down into earth. Dynastic changes in the human world follow the
cyclical pattern of the Five Phases in nature. Just as one phase conquers another, so does
one dynasty replace another by vanquishing it. Thus, if a dynasty possesses the virtue of
metal, then it has overtaken a dynasty with the virtue of wood (because metal cuts wood),
and it will eventually yield to a dynasty with the virtue of fire (because fire melts metal) . 29
The doctrine of the Five Virtues, by providing only a loose and abstract framework,
invited manipulation when people strove to fill in factual history. The First Emperor of
the Q in, the first ruler to acknowledge this doctrine, assigned the virtue of water to his
dynasty.30 This assignment ensured that the Q in terminated the dynastic cycle, which the
emperor defined as starting from the reign of the legendary Yellow Tliearch (Huangdi
黃 帝 ；earth), passing through the Xia (wood), the Shang (metal), and the Zhou (fire),
and finally concluding with the Q in (water) (Figure 1.4 ). Situated at the very end of the
cycle, the Q in was theoretically beyond the danger of being replaced.31
Nevertheless, the Han did overthrow the Qin. The placement of the Han in the dy­
nastic cycle of the Five Virtues became a challenge. A t first，Emperor Gao attributed
the virtue of water to the Han, the result of accepting its terminal position and adopt­
ing the Q in system. Later generations showed discontent with the inherent ambiguity
of the solution: Was the attribution meant to negate and surpass the existence of the
 1.4 . Conquest cycle o f the Five Virtues in the 1.5. Conquest cycle o f the Five Virtues in the West-
Qin dynasty. ern Han period.

Q in since the dynasty lasted but fifteen years? Or worse, would the attribution mask the
distinctiveness of the Han dynasty? During the reign of Emperor Wen (r. 18 0 - 1 5 7 bce),
officials and scholars like Jia Y i 賈植 and Gongsun Chen 公 孫 臣 launched a campaign
to change the dynastic virtue. They argued that since the Han had defeated the Q in, it
should own the virtue of earth and begin another conquest cycle (Figure 1.5 ). Owing to
strong opposition from conservatives, the attempt to alter the dynastic virtue did not win
official support until the reign of Emperor W u .32
Associating dynastic succession with the Five Virtues was arbitrary, but once officially
recognized， the doctrine had to be made visible or tangible. In the Q in dynasty, acknowl­
edging the virtue of water meant a series of institutional collocations. As Table 1.1 shows，
the color corresponding to water was black，which therefore had to be the color of all
official dimensions. The corresponding number was six, which had to be the measure
applied to all official hats and vehicles. A nd the corresponding calendar had to begin
a year with the tenth month .33 W hen Emperor W u decided to change the Han virtue
from water to earth, he initiated a large-scale institutional reform. Hie color of all official
costumes and banners had to be altered from black to yellow, the standard dimensions of
all official seals and vehicles had to be converted from six to five, and so forth.34
 2
5
Table 1 .1 . The Doctrine of the Five Virtues
D Y N AST Y V IRT U E COLOR NUMBER B E G IN N IN G OF Y E A R

Pre-Xia Earth Yellow 5 9 th month

Xia Wood Green 8 ist month
Shang Metal White 9 12th month
Zhou Fire Red 7 nth month
Qin Water Black 6 10 th month
Han Earth Yellow 5 9 th month

However arbitrary and laborious, all the material modifications for the virtue of earth
were ready for Emperor W us first feng-shan ceremony. Leading his spectacular entou­
rage, distinguished by the color yellow, to M ount Tai，Emperor W u not only confirmed
the Han dynasty’s mandate through the regularfeng-shan ceremony, but also substanti­
ated the Han legitimacy by settling its exclusive position in the dynastic cycle of the Five
Virtues.35 Since then， the symbolic codes of the virtue of earth were associated with the
Han and were exhibited as well on Emperor W us later visits to the Bright Hall in Feng-
gao to reiterate the mandate and legitimacy of his reign.
The attribution of earth to the Han should have changed the month in which the year
began to the ninth. Intriguingly, the new calendar, the Grand Inception system, did not
follow the cyclical rule. Instead, it started the year with the first month, which accorded
with the doctrine of the Triple Concordance {santong 三 I充) .Proposed by the esteemed
Confucian scholar Dong Zhongshu 董 仲 舒 (ca. 195-ca. 115 bce) at the court of Emperor
W u, the doctrine of the Triple Concordance similarly argues that legitimacy derives
from cyclical succession. Rather than natural succession，however, the doctrine favors
three characteristics of sovereignty in the human world as the basis of the rotation. As
shown in Table 1.2，the Triple Concordance refers to the black concordance, which cor­
relates with sincerity {zhong 忠 )，represented by the Xia dynasty; the red concordance,
which correlates with reverence (Jing 敬)， represented by the Shang; and the white con­
cordance, which correlates with refinement (wen 文)，represented by the Zhou. Since
the brutal reign of the First Emperor violated the Confucian principle of benevolence,
the short-lived Q in dynasty was excluded from the cycle of the Triple Concordance. The
Han dynasty thus leapt the Q in and directly succeeded the Zhou; in other words, the
Han would be modeled after the Xia and lead the recurrence of this triple cycle. Since
 Table 1.2. The Five Virtues and the Triple Concordance Compared
T H E FIV E V IRTUES T H E T R IP L E CO N CO RD A N C E

DYNASTY VIRTUE COLOR CALENDAR CONCORDANCE CHARACTERISTIC CALENDAR

Pre-Xia Earth Yellow 9 th month

Xia Wood Blue 1st month Black Sincerity 1st month

Shang Metal W hite 12th month White Reverence 12th month

Zhou Fire Red nth month Red Refinement nth month

Qin Water Black 10 th month — (Excluded) 一

Han Earth Yellow 9 th month Black Sincerity 1st month

the Xia calendar was believed to have started from the first month, the new calendar of
the Han had to be the same.36
No place could have been more appropriate than the Bright H all for Emperor W u to
publicize a new calendar that fortified Han legitimacy by securing the role of the Han
in the dynastic cycle of the Triple Concordance. The affiliation of the new calendar with
the Xia, however, did not negate the institutional codes made to concord with the virtue
of earth. W hen the calendar was finally put into use in the summer of 1 0 4 bce, Emperor
W u recapitulated the full alteration of colors and standard numbers used in official cos­
tumes and objects. The multiplicity of Han symbols of legitimacy~the juxtaposition of
the pre-Han doctrine of the Five Virtues and the Han doctrine of the Triple Concor­
dance— indicated that Emperor W u preferred to proclaim Han legitimacy as compre­
hensively as possible.
The construction of the Bright Hall in Fenggao was directly related to Han anxiety
over its own legitimacy, but later generations hardly appreciated the solution. First of all,
the Fenggao project was subordinate to thefeng-shan ceremony; the Bright Hall did not
exist in its own right. In addition, because the site was at the foot of M ount Tai，Feng­
gao was more than 8 0 0 kilometers away from the capital Chang’an 長 安 . Not only were
journeys to Fenggao time-consuming and expensive，but the great distance also m ili­
tated against frequent trips by the emperor. Officials at the Han court would have pre­
ferred to erect a Bright H all in the capital.
Long before the execution of the Fenggao project, there was a de facto attempt to
build a Bright H all in Chang’an. This occurred when Emperor W u acceded to the throne
in 141 bce.37Young and ambitious, Emperor W u at the age of sixteen was eager to make
 his mark. He promoted his tutors forthwith: Wang Zang 王藏 became the Chamberlain
for Court Attendants {langzhong ling 郎中 令 )，and Zhao W an 趙綰 became the Impe­
rial Counselor {ytcshi dafu 御 史 大 夫 )，one of the three top administrative positions in
the central government. Emperor W u was deeply interested in the ritual reforms pro­
posed by Wang and Zhao, including the construction of the Bright Hall, the restoration
of the feng-shan ceremony, and the change of the official calendar and color. Among all
the initiatives, the plan to erect the Bright Hall south of the capital generated the great­
est activity. Emperor W u invited the eminent scholar Master Shen 申， w ith whom both
Wang and Zhao had studied, to the court as an honorary adviser for the project. Mean­
while, Wang and Zhao devoted themselves to centralizing Emperor W us rule. They
urged the vassals who lingered in the capital to return to their enfeoffed states. They
streamlined the channels of policymaking by excluding Empress Dowager Dou 寶， who
had been in control of the court for several decades. This last move, necessary but unwise,
sealed their fate. The enraged dowager had Wang and Zhao removed from office and
hounded them until they committed suicide. She also forced the emperor to stop deviat­
ing from the status quo.38
Emperor W us interest in ritual reforms was first cultivated by Confucian scholars
like Wang Zang, Zhao Wan, and Master Shen. He remained an ardent supporter of
Confucianism and eventually promoted it as the state ideology. Nonetheless, when he
resumed his interest in ritual reforms after the death of the dowager in 129 bce, he did
not turn to Confucians but to masters of methods. Instead of resuming the project of the
Bright H all in the capital, Emperor W u prioritized the feng-shan ceremony at M ount
Tai. Even though he still accepted the importance in Confucian discourse of claiming
Heavens mandate at M ount Tai, he was more fascinated with the story supplied by mas­
ters of methods that the Yellow Hiearch ascended to Heaven and reached immortality
after he had performed thefeng-shan ceremony. Impatient with the indecision presented
by Confucians, who studied ancient texts but could not reach agreement on how to
restore ancient rituals, Emperor W u dismissed them all. Mainly working with masters of
methods, he had the ritual objects made at court, had the ceremony conducted at M ount
Tai, and had the Bright H all built in Fenggao.39
Emperor W u， s ritual solution to legitimacy was tainted by his personal pursuit of im ­
mortality. The solution found little resonance with later Confucian officials, who, thanks
to the institutionalization of Confucian education under his reign, became the major­
ity of the ruling elite. No longer associated with the feng-shan ceremony, the Bright
H all was more frequently paired with another ritual structure, the Surrounding M oat
{biyong 辟 雍 )_ For example, officials called attention to the significance of the Bright
H all and the Surrounding M oat in demonstrating Chinese etiquette to foreign envoys
in the renowned discussions on salt and iron, a series of public debates mostly on state
control of commerce and industry but also on the general state of affairs at the court of
Emperor Zhao (r. 8 6 - 7 4 bce), the immediate successor of Emperor W u. Opposing the
then-current policy of entertaining foreign visitors with dazzling trifles, rare animals，
and wrestling games，they pleaded with the emperor to follow the model of the Duke
of Zhou, who was said to have won the allegiance of neighboring countries through vir­
tue, a virtue embodied in the rites and music performed in the Bright H all and the Sur­
rounding M oat.40
Ancient texts never make it clear whether the Bright H all and the Surrounding M oat
were two components of one complex or two independent buildings. The ambiguity
lasted until the H an， when one of Emperor W us subjects extolled his Fenggao project
as “the first to establish the Bright Hall and the Surrounding M oat.”41 The Surround­
ing Moat, when mentioned alone, normally referred to the ritual space honoring the
learned and the aged. Since Confucians valued education hig hly le arnin g and teach­
ing the classics compiled by Confucius— the erection of the Surrounding M oat gradu­
ally became the primary concern of those who cared for ritual reforms. Liu Xiang 蜜i]
向（ 7 9 - 8 bce), an erudite scholar in charge of the imperial library, persuaded Emperor

Cheng (r. 3 2 - 7 bce) to build a Surrounding M oat to set proper etiquette, which, in time,
would help promulgate desirable morals and manners to the entire society. Liu’s pro­
posal, widely endorsed by fellow officials, was to be executed south of the capital, but the
untimely death of Emperor Cheng abruptly stopped the project.42
Although morality guided ritual reforms at the Han court, the anxiety over legiti­
macy never faded away. W hen the zeal of ritual reforms once again made the construc­
tion of a Bright H all appealing, such a hall finally appeared in Chang’an by the end of
4 ce. Nevertheless, the second Bright Hall was built not to ensure Han legitimacy, but
to prepare for the concession of the Han mandate. Ironically, this reason had to do with
the increasing demand for morality in the discourse of legitimacy. The trend started with
Sui Hong 眭弘 ，an official who studied the Spring and Autum n Annals (Chun qiu 春
秋 )，one of the key Confucian classics, with Dong Zhongshus disciple. In response to
unusual events happening in 78 bce— a gigantic stone suddenly standing all by itself at
M ount Tai and a withered old willow unexpectedly reviving in the imperial park~Sui
boldly demanded that the present emperor relinquish his power to one who was able and
virtuous. Based on an inference he had made from the Spring and Autumn Annals, these
events could only imply that a commoner would rise to be the Son of Heaven. Sui was
soon executed for the crime of spreading wild rumors to mislead people.43
 Where Sui Hong supported what appeared to be an obscure prophecy, Gai Kuanrao
蓋 寬 饒 (d. 6 0 bce), an official recommended for his knowledge of the classics, criticized
current political affairs. Dissatisfied with the emperor, who preferred harsh legalism to
compassionate Confucianism and who allowed eunuchs to participate in politics, Gai
argued that an unqualified ruler should not occupy the throne. He cited commentaries
on the Book o f Changes^ another important Confucian classic，in evidence. Though pun­
ished lightly with a demotion, Gai chose to declare himself in a more public and dra­
matic manner, by slitting his own throat at the northern gate of the capital city.44
The deaths of these uncompromising martyrs incited followers to denounce the
emperor as an undesirable ruler. Confucian criticism of imperial rule reached its peak
during the reign of Emperor Cheng. Before Liu Xiang proposed erecting the Surround­
ing Moat, he had warned the emperor that Heavens mandate, as shown in the cycle of
the Triple Concordance, would not always favor one family. Lius warning came from
his great disappointment about the abuse of public resources by the emperor, who twice
abandoned half-built mausoleums. Alerted by the high frequency of solar eclipses, which
were believed to indicate Heavens disapproval, Liu further cautioned the emperor to
behave, for whether Heavens mandate appeared or disappeared depended upon the vir­
tue of the ruler. Like Sui Hong and Gai Kuanrao, Liu Xiang also fortified his admoni­
tions with the Confucian classics, including the Book o f Changes, the Spring and Autumn
Annals, and Confuciuss commentary on the Book o f Odes.45
It was Liu Xiang’s colleague, G u Yong 谷 永 ， who made the most alarming and dam­
aging argument against Han legitimacy. He found in Emperor Chengs reign three
numerical disadvantages. First, the reign was the ninth in the Han dynasty. Since things
reverse their courses upon reaching their extremity, nine, the largest yang digit number
{yangshu 陽數)，signaled decline. Second, soon it would be 2 1 0 years after the establish­
ment of the Han. Two hundred and ten was a multiple of seven， another hxg tya n g num­
ber that boded ill. Third, soon it would be 1 0 6 years since Emperor W u had promulgated
the Grand Inception system. The 1 0 6 th year was unfortunately among the fifty-seven
calamitous years singled out in the greater Epoch Cycle {yuan 兀 ) that comprised 4,617
years. Moreover, G u Yong emphasized that the unfavorable convergence of the three key
epochs all pointed toward despair, as illustrated by the hexagram “no hope” (wuwang
无 妄 ）in the Book o f Changes,46
G u Yong’s intention was to provoke Emperor Cheng into acknowledging a crisis，
to see if he would cast aside his personal indulgences, devote himself to public welfare,
and eventually turn the tide of fate.47 Nonetheless, the numerological argument, seem­
ingly objective, made the waning of the Han power look as inevitable as the passage of
 o
3

Table 1.3. Sage Kings and Dynasties in the

Doctrine of the Triple Concordance
BLACK W H IT E RED

Yao Shun Yu
Xia Shang Zhou
Han Post-Han

time. It resulted in two very different solutions to the problem of Han legitimacy. The
first solution was for the Han emperor to receive Heavens mandate once again. Gan
Zhongke 甘 忠 可 ， a master of methods contemporary with G u Yong, was the first to toy
with the idea, but it was not implemented until his pupil, Xia Heliang 夏 贺 良 ， won the
favor of Emperor A i (r. 6 - 1 bce), the heir to Emperor Cheng. Xia managed to persuade
Emperor A i to conduct the ritual that symbolized the reacceptance of the mandate,
which included changing the title of his reign, altering the measurement of time devices，
and， most significantly, naming himself as the successor to the legendary sage king Shun
舜 .The rationale is laid out in Table 1.3 , where three representative dynasties (Xia, Shang,
and Zhou) are compared to three esteemed sage kings (Yao 堯 ，Shun, and Yu 禹 ) using
the doctrine of the Triple Concordance. The Han dynasty matches the Xia dynasty and
King Yao; they all belong to the black concordance. By claiming Shun as his predecessor,
Emperor A i positioned himself in the next concordance, white, and assumed thereby the
mandate after the one granted to his Han forebears. By assuming a new mandate, the
Han emperor would theoretically defuse the crises ordained by G u Yong.48
The second solution, which echoed those offered by Sui Hong and Gai Kuanrao, was
the abdication of the emperor and his replacement by an able and virtuous ruler. The
notion of rejecting an heir in favor of a sage was nothing new, for Confucius and his
prominent follower Mencius (3 7 2 - 2 8 9 bce) had admired the virtue-based succession from
Yao to Shun and to Yu in remote antiquity.49 Wang M ang 王 莽 (4 5 B C E -23 c e ), a learned
scholar and the nephew of the powerful Empress Dowager Wang, detected the trend and
decided to make Confucian utopian thought manifest by ascending the throne himself.
Ambitious, patient, and clever, Wang M ang formulated three stages for the achievement
of his goal.50 The first stage was to attain the status of the regent like the Duke of Zhou,
who governed the country on behalf of young King Cheng. Wang won a similar position
with the title Duke for Pacifying the Han {anhan gong 安 漢 公 )，when Emperor Ping
(r. 1-5 c e ) came to the throne at the tender age of nine right after the death of Emperor
 Ai. The next stage was for Wang to surpass the Duke of Zhou by blurring the boundary
between the regent and emperor. W ith his supporters singing his praises and claiming
that he was far more efficient than the Duke of Zhou in accomplishing the same tasks,
in 4 ce Wang was given the honorable title zai-heng 宰 衡 ， w hich combined the title held
by the Duke of Zhou {tai-zai 太 宰 ）and that held by the revered Shang minister Y i Yin
伊 尹 (fl. 17th century bce; a-heng 阿衡)• He was further awarded the Nine Offerings
{jiu xi 九 錫 )，a tribute said to be fit only for the Son of Heaven. After moving beyond
the Duke of Zhou, the final stage was to compare Wang to Yao, Shun, and Yu, each of
whom became the highest ruler not by virtue of bloodline but by virtue alone. The con­
venient death of Emperor Ping gave Wang room for maneuver. He selected a two-year-
old child as the heir while pressing his other exceptional titles, Regenting Emperor {she
huangdi 攝 皇 帝 ）and Acting Emperor {Jia huangdi j辰皇帝） • Easily deposing the invalid
Han heir, in 8 ce Wang declared himself the emperor of the new X in dynasty.51
W ithout the strong Confucian base at the court and in the country, Wang Mangs
political advance would not have been so smooth and successful.52 And Wang knew all
too well how to rally support by restaging events from the glorified past to demonstrate
and secure Confucian sanction— in particular, by paralleling his actions to those of the
Duke of Zhou. He won his first crucial title when envoys from Yueshang 越 裳 ， a coun­
try reportedly south of the Han border commandery Jiaozhi 交 耻 (part of present-day
Vietnam), presented one white pheasant and two black pheasants to the court in 1 ce.
The event was supposed to evoke the historical memory of the Duke of Zhou, whose
regent accomplishments were so well known that people from remote Yueshang vol­
untarily offered pheasants to pay their respects. However unfathomable to the modern
mind, the staged presentation was directly responsible for Wangs acquisition of the title
Duke for Pacifying the H an .53
Besides recreating historical moments, Wang Mang manipulated the beliefin Heavens
mandate to facilitate his critical leap from regent to emperor. Shortly after the death of
Emperor Ping, the discovery of a white stone in Wugong 武功 was reported to the
court. Not an ordinary stone, this one，retrieved from a well, bore the daring inscription
''Announce the Duke for Pacifying the Han, Mang, as the emperor.HWang Mang imme­
diately used this prophecy to negotiate with Empress Dowager Wang, the symbolic head
o f the ruling family. H e was acknowledged as the Regenting Emperor in 6 ce.54
Two more preposterous yet unobjectionable events shortened Wang Mangs path to
the throne. F irst，a neighborhood head in Q i 齊 Commandery was said to have dreamt
about Heavens envoy, who delivered the message that “the Regenting Emperor should
 be the real [emperor]” ；the authenticity of his dream was confirmed by the magical
appearance of a new and deep well the next day.55 Second, when Wang and his sub­
jects examined two omens in front of the Weiyang 未 央 Palace— a stone bull from Ba
巴 Commandery and a stone from Yong 雍一 two more items emerged out of a gust
of wind, a bronze tablet and a silk chart with the encouraging inscriptions “Heaven
announces the sign of emperorship. He who hands over the sign will be offered a noble
title. Receive Heaven’s mandate and exercise Gods w ill.，’56 W angM ang— reiterating the
numerological argument made by G u Yong and the reception of the mandate once again
recommended by Gan Zhongke and Xia H el ia ng w as able to compel the dowager to
grant him the title of Acting Emperor in 8 ce.
The final showdown was soon staged in the Temple of Emperor Gao. An unimpor­
tant person named A i Zhang 及章 had a golden casket made and brought to the temple.
Supposedly from the Heavenly Thearch, the casket contained a document that declared
Wang Mang the true Son of Heaven and instructed the dowager to comply with Heavens
mandate. Wang accepted the golden casket in the temple in a ritual symbolizing the
transfer of power from the founder of the Han dynasty to that of a new dynasty. Wear­
ing the crown，Wang visited the dowager and informed her of his intention. Then he
received subjects in the Weiyang Palace and formally announced his emperorship and
the establishment of the Xin dynasty.57
It was during the intensive, decade-long campaign for the new mandate that Wang
M ang had the Bright H all built south of Changan. As Duke for Pacifying the Han,
he proposed the construction of the Bright Hall and had the work carried out in 4 ce.
Even though the young Emperor Ping performed the inaugural ceremony in the newly
built Bright H all in the first month of 5 c e , Wang took the credit.58 The Bright Hall
was meant to serve as a physical reminder of Wangs comparability with the Duke of
Zhou, who had erected a Bright H all in the second Zhou capital, Luo, over one thou­
sand years earlier. It became an important asset for his political advancement, just like
his strategic use of the historical memory of the Duke of Zhou. W hen Wang earned
his honorable title zai-heng through a petition made by his supporters that his regency
was far more efficient than that of the Duke of Zhou，one of the benchmarks for their
judgment was the fact that it took merely four years for Wang to accomplish the ritual
reform embodied by the Bright Hall, but it took seven years for the Duke of Zhou to
do so.59 W hen promoted from regent to Regenting Emperor in 6 c e , Wang was further
asked by his supporters to restage the scene as reported in the Record o f Rites ( L i j i 禮
吾已)， one of the three Confucian ritual canons: “The Duke of Zhou received vassals in the
 Bright Hall; the Son of Heaven stood there, carrying an ax and facing south. ” 60 The offi­
cials who pushed Wangs case slyly played with the ambiguity inherent in the text, argu­
ing that the Duke of Zhou was “acting” as the Son of Heaven in the Bright Hall that
he himself erected. The argument was intended to deny another possible reading that
the Duke of Zhou was “assisting” King Cheng to perform the ceremony designated for
the Son of Heaven to carry out in the Bright H all.61 Like the omens and prophecies， the
Bright H all was a tool for Wang to bridge the gap between regent and emperor.
Members of the Han ruling family whom Wang M ang attempted to replace imme­
diately recognized his strategic use of the Bright Hall. Liu Chong 銮!1崇 ，for one，M ar­
quis for Pacifying the Masses {anzhong hou 安 眾 侯 )，was alert to Wangs rising status
when he returned to the capital to participate in the opening ceremony inaugurating
the Bright Hall. Rightly predicting that Wang would soon jeopardize his family’s rule,
Liu did not hesitate to stir up a revolt after Wang became the Regenting Emperor and
performed as the Son of Heaven in the Bright Hall in 6 ce，shortly after the death of
Emperor Ping. Although Lius small army, which comprised only ioo soldiers, failed to
thwart Wang, his strong opposition to Wangs intended usurpation sent a warning mes­
sage to the country. The following year, Zhai Y i 翟 義 ，the governor of Dong 東 Com-
mandery, enthroned another royal family member as the Son of Heaven and fomented
an even larger military rebellion against Wang. Z hai，s revolt was eventually quelled, but
his detrimental accusation and his swift mobilization of more than io o ， ooo active sup­
porters did, for a time, pose a serious threat to Wangs pending emperorship.62
Having successfully seized the crown, Wang Mang directed a change in the symbol­
ism of the Bright Hall; no longer a reminder of the Duke of Zhou, it became again the
visible expression of Heaven s mandate. His urgent task was to establish a pedigree that
would link him, the new emperor, with Heaven, for the Son of Heaven, as Emperor W u
had repeatedly demonstrated, always claimed his mandate by aligning his forefathers
with Heaven when receiving sacrifices offered in the Bright Hall. The Han ruling family
first acknowledged the sage king Yao as their earliest ancestor, but then shifted to Shun
for the purpose of receiving the mandate once again and avoiding the dire fate of dynas­
tic decline. Wang traced his lineage back to Shun. In 9 ce，he designated Shun as the
major figure who shared sacrifices with Heaven in the Bright Hall. To underscore the
superiority of Shun and accordingly of the founder of the X in dynasty，his outstanding
descendant, Wang also invited the forebears of the four orthodox dynasties~Xia, Shang,
Zhou, and Han— to be the guests who would share sacrifices with Shun in the Bright
H all.63 In addition, Wang allowed his remote and immediate ancestors in nine lines
to be worshiped in the Bright H all until the new imperial ancestral temple, the Nine
Temples {jiu miao 九廟 )， was completed in 22 ce.64
W hen Wang Mang constructed his ancestry, he did not follow the doctrine of the
Triple Concordance but revisited the doctrine of the Five Virtues. 65 The conquest cycle
of the Five Phases, which was the foundation of the doctrine of the Five Virtues, had
been dominant since the third century bce. However, interest in its opposite, the genera­
tion cycle, had been growing since the first century bce. People believed that the powers
of the Five Phases could also form a generation cycle because one gave birth to another:
wood provides fuel for fire，fire turns to ashes and becomes earth, earth contains and
helps to form the minerals of metal, metal becomes fluid like water once it is melted, and
water nurtures the growth of wood. W hen applied to the transmission of political power,
the generation cycle explained the mode of “abdication” rather than the mode o farevolu-
tion.” Liu Xiang, who cast grave doubt on Emperor Chengs suitability as a ruler, began
to use the generation cycle to revise the doctrine of the Five Virtues. The revision was
finished by his son, Liu X in 劉 歆 （4 6 BCE-23 ce), who was also the mastermind behind
the Bright H all project.
Three fundamental changes were made from the early doctrine. First, as Figure 1.6
shows, the Lius replaced the conquest cycle with the generation cycle. The former started
with the virtue of earth， the latter with the virtue of wood. Second, the Lius added seven
more sage kings into the cycle, two before the Yellow Thearch and five between the
Yellow Thearch and the Xia dynasty. W ith eight sages and five dynasties promoting
“abdication by benevolence” as the norm for power transmission and downplaying the
significance of “revolution by forces,” the longer list also complicated the recurrence of
the cycle. Whereas the Han led only the first recurrence of the cycle in the early doc­
trine, the Zhou had already entered the second recurrence in the revised doctrine. Third,
to stress the benevolent rule, the brutal Q in was not included in the generation cycle.
The revised doctrine of the Five Virtues certainly paved the way for Wang Mangs usur­
pation. It was based on this new generation cycle that Wang claimed the virtue of earth
for his Xin dynasty and traced his ancestry to Shun. It was also according to this revised
doctrine that retrospectively Wang reassigned the dynastic virtue of the Han reign before
him— it became fire— and thus denied the validity of the institutional reform initiated
by Emperor W u and carried out by his successors.66
In the Bright Hall, Wang M ang not only established a symbolic linkage with Heaven
through ancestor worship but also announced his assumption of the mandate to rule
the human world. He first summoned vassals to the Bright H all for enfeoffment in 12
 5
3
ce. Since the administrative maps and household registration records were not yet com­
pleted, Wang gave only the token of a fief~clods enveloped in grass— to the subjects
he planned to reward. And since the governments finances were worsening， most of the
vassals were actually stuck in the capital with paltry monthly allowances. Wang repeated
the same ritual of enfeoffment in the Bright Hall five years later. W hat he could offer
then was still no more than wrapped clods and minimal allowances, not tangible lands
with ample revenues.67
I f Wang M ang failed to reinstate feudalism, he also proved to be inefficient in dealing
with many national matters. His unrealistic reference to the classics in formulating poli­
cies and his capriciousness in issuing decrees deeply disturbed the political order, shook
the social structure, and impaired the economic system. In just two decades, his reign
turned from hope to despair and finally ended in violence. The ever-significant Bright
H all was burned to ashes when the angry, hungry mobs stormed and took the capital in
23 ce.68
 Although the Bright H all had became an essential component of the capital, from
Emperor W u’s fleeting interest in it to Wang Mangs problematic realization, two
decades passed before the reappearance of a new Bright Hall, for the collapse of the
X in dynasty left the country in chaos. It was Liu X iu 蜜！ 1秀 ，an insignificant descendant
of the Han ruling family, who emerged from competing warlords, enthroned himself as
Emperor Guangwu (r. 25 - 5 7 CE)> and restored Han rule.69 Since Chang’an had been half
destroyed by the mobs, Emperor Guangwu selected Luoyang as the capital. The reign
he restored was traditionally called the Eastern Han or Later Han (2 5 - 2 2 0 c e ) to dis­
tinguish it from the Western Han or Former Han ( 2 0 7 bce—8 ce), the Chang’an-based
reign before the X in dynasty. Emperor Guangwu soon established a functional politi­
cal center, but he did not fulfill the task of reunification until 42 c e .70 Meanwhile, the
anarchy of China invited invasions by its nomadic neighbors, a dire threat that Emperor
Guangwu could not fend off until 52 c e .71 After his victory over the invaders， he was able
to redirect his attention from battlefields to ritual altars.
Even with his Han royal blood and formidable military accomplishments，Emperor
Guangwu felt obliged to justify his regime. H e performed the feng-shan ceremony at
M ount Tai in the second month of 56 c e , becoming the second Han ruler to do so. A l­
though he did stop by Fenggao before ascending M ount Tai, there is no mention of his
offering sacrifices in the Bright H all there.72 Aware of the dilemma posed in the West­
ern Han regarding two Bright Halls, Emperor Guangwu ordered the construction of a
Bright Hall south of Luoyang in the same year. 73 Emperor Guangwu did not live long
enough to see its completion. It was his son and successor, Emperor M ing (r. 58 - 7 5 c e ),
who declared his reception of Heaven’s mandate in the new Bright H all in 59 ce. O n
this occasion，Emperor M ing designated his father to share the sacrifices with the Five
Thearchs, the assumed representatives of Heaven.74
Unlike the short-lived Bright H all in Chang’an，the Bright Hall in Luoyang served
the Eastern Han for more than 100 years until a bellicose subject， Dong Zhuo 董 卓 ，de­
stroyed the capital in 190 c e , which in the long run led to the downfall of the empire.75
Before the end of the dynasty, the emperors residing in Luoyang regularly offered sac­
rifices to Heaven and to designated ancestors in the Bright Hall. W hen this became an
established routine, the tension caused by having two Bright Halls, one in Fenggao and
one in the capital, also eased. After Emperor Guangwu，only two rulers in the Eastern
Han ever ventured to M ount Tai to perform the feng-shan ceremony. Neither, how­
ever, failed to conduct the rites that befitted the Son of Heaven in the Bright H all in
Fenggao.76
 Form and Symbol

H ie Bright Hall was clearly meant to be the place where the Son of Heaven received
and delivered his mandate to rule. A question that we cannot help but ask is whether
the Bright Hall was also a space that embodied the mandate. I f so， the obvious challenge
for both patrons and designers was how they could represent the mandate in architec­
tural form. It is fortunate that two of the three Bright Halls have been excavated. Hie ar­
chaeological information offers us a glimpse of how the Han people endeavored to make
Heavens mandate visible.
The Bright Hall completed in 4 ce was unearthed south of Han Chang’an (now X i’an
西 安 ）in 1 9 56 (Figure 1 .7 ). The site consists of a central building enclosed by a wall built
in a square and surrounded in turn by a circular ditch (Figure 1.8 ). The ditch, approxi­
mately 3 6 0 meters in diameter and 1.8 meters in width, surrounds a circular field with
four rectangular extensions at the four cardinal points. It was irrigated by the Jin River
金 水 to the north. The walls, each 235 meters long and 1.5 meters wide, had gates facing
the cardinal extensions. W ithin the walls, the main building stood on two raised plat­
forms: the circular platform, 6 0 - 6 2 meters in diameter and at least 0 .3 meters in height,
rose above a square platform that measured 2 0 5 meters on each side and 1.6 meters in
height. Hie main building, occupying an area of 42 square meters, included a square unit
with four rectangular extensions (Figure 1.9 ) . 77
The Bright Hall constructed by 59 ce was discovered southeast of Han Luoyang in
1 9 6 3 but was not excavated until 19 78 (Figure i.io).The official report did not come out

until 2 0 1 0 . 78 This Bright H all is made up of three major components: the enclosing
walls, a surrounding ditch, and a central building (Figure i.ii ) . 79 The walls, 4 0 0 by 415
meters, enclosed the central building, which was erected on a round terrace measuring
6 1 .8 meters in diameter (Figure 1.12 a). A ditch, as narrow as 45 to 8 0 centimeters and as

shallow as 2 0 to 4 0 centimeters, closely encircled the round terrace (Figure 1.12b). The
ditch, unlike that in Chang'an, is less prominent and located inside the walls. 80 Judging
from the traces of the post holes on the terrace, the main building was round, although
inside the round building was a square core, to which various chambers were attached.
The main building of the Bright H all in Luoyang therefore looked very different from
the one in Chang’an.
The archaeological evidence for the two Bright Halls sheds light on the textual descrip­
tion of the Fenggao project executed in 1 0 9 bce but never excavated. The design for the
Fenggao Bright Hall featured the following three elements: the main hall— a multi-story
structure covered by thatch and without any walls on its four sides; outer walls enclosing
R ive r

Jianzhang Palace
Nine |回回回回

Temples 丨回i£i回
© Bright
Hall

i km

A: Anterior Hall of the Jianzhang Palace

B: Gate-pillars with Phoenixes
C: Terrace for Deities
D: Jian Terrace
E: Taiye Pond
F: Statue of Oxherd
G: Statue of Weaving Maid
K unm ing Lake

1.7. Layout o f Han Chang’an.

 Gu Gate

---|------
Granary .
Xia Gate
J | Axmory □
lz =

SPJBO UO5
Yong， an
60 Northern

一
Palace
Palace

Shangxi Shangdong
Gate Gate
(Deyang Hall)

Zhongdong
Gate

Yong
Gate Southern
Palace

Guangyang
Hao Gate
Gate '

Jin Gate Xiaoyuan Pmgcheng Kaiyang

Gate Gate Gate

[km Spiritual Bright □ Imperial

Academy
Terrace Hall
Surrounding
•j Moat
%> r r O l d River Luo

1.10. Layout o f Han Luoyang.

 1.11. Floor plan o f the Bright Hall complex in Luoyang.

the main hall; and an irrigation ditch that encircled the outer walls and formed a double
path .81 Despite its simple and crude construction, the Fenggao Bright H all is more rem­
iniscent of the example in Changan, for the main buildings of both were square.
Variations in appearance, structure, and scale notwithstanding, the three Bright Halls
share strikingly similar layouts that favor the interlocking of circles and squares. The
similarity is particularly revealing if we take into consideration their diverse designers.
Emperor W u relied heavily on masters of methods when he prepared for his ritual jour­
neys to M ount Tai. A master of methods named Gongyu Dai 公 玉 帶 provided the lay­
out for that first Bright H all in Fenggao.82 Later, Confucian scholars at court insisted
on incorporating a Bright H all into the design of the capital. W ith Wang M ang’s
recommendation, Liu Xin, having succeeded his father, Liu Xiang, as head of the impe­
rial library, supervised the construction of the second Bright Hall in Changan . 83 Another
group of scholars, who had mostly distanced themselves from Wang Mang, participated
in the erection of the third Bright Hall in Luoyang. Among them were Huan Rong 桓
榮 ，a revered master of the Confucian classic Book o f Documents {Shang shu 尚書)，and
Zhang Chun 張純，a learned official who also orchestrated Emperor Guangwus fen g -
shan ceremony.84 However divergent their backgrounds, the masterminds behind the
three Bright Halls all played with circles and squares to formulate their ideal floor plans.
 b
1.12. Floor plan o f the main building in the Bright Hall complex in Luoyang.
(a) Drawing, (b) Photograph showing the northeastern corner.
 The formal combination of circle and square has deep roots in China. The cong 综
objects unearthed from numerous tombs of the Liangzhu 良渚 culture (ca. 3 4 0 0 - 2 2 5 0
b c e ) along the southeast coast are early examples (Figure 1.13 a). Ground out of jade, a

cong object is a tube, square on the outside with a hollow cylindrical center. Although
cong objects have been circulated among collectors for centuries, their nature and func­
tion remain a mystery.85 Recent archaeological excavations show that they were asso­
ciated mostly with male tomb occupants, who, if powerful, could have a considerable
number of them in a burial pit.86 Still, there is no clue to the artistic intention behind the
combination of circle with square.
The jade plaque retrieved from a Neolithic tomb (ca. 3 7 5 0 - 3 0 0 0 b c e ) at Lingjiatan
凌家灘 in Anhui also indicates an early origin for the formal combination of circle and
square (Figure 1.14 ). The rectangular plaque, slightly convex, is engraved with two con­
centric circles; feather-like marks radiate from the center, which is anchored by an oc­
tagonal star. The plaque was found between two jade pieces shaped like the upper and
lower shell of a turtle (Figure 1.15 ).87 The ancient Chinese often used turtles to predict
the future. The Shang rulers inscribed oracles on turtle shells. Archaeological work in
the south and along the east coast further suggests that turtles already had a sacred use,
though without inscriptions, in the early phase of the Dawenkou 大汶口 culture (ca.
4100-2600 bce).88 The Lingjiatan plaque, then, was most likely placed within the jade
turtle to serve a ritual or divinatory purpose. W hat motivated an ancient artisan to delin­
eate circles on a rectangular surface remains unclear, however.
A nother N eolithic find, at least as intriguing, is a vast burial site o f the H ongshan
紅山 culture (ca. 4 7 0 0 - 2 9 0 0 b c e ) at Niuheliang 牛河梁 in Liaoning (Figure 1.1 6 ). The
site, which covers an area 150 by 6 0 meters, includes six huge human-made mounds. The
best preserved have a round cairn at the center and a square cairn to its east. The round
cairn, 22 meters in diameter, is composed of three concentric circles formed by reddish
basalt strips, each raising the height by 3 0 - 4 0 centimeters, with the lowest at the outside
and the highest at the center. The square cairn consists of two platforms reinforced by
gray strips of granite and limestone: the base measures 17.5 by 18 .7 meters, and the top
3 .6 meters on each side. O n the top platform lies a rectangular burial pit. Archaeologists

believe that the square cairn was a tomb built for a very important figure, whereas the
round cairn, which has no funerary remains, m ust have been an altar.89 Yet nothing is
certain when it comes to the purposeful juxtaposition of circles and squares in shaping
the structures.
The signification of the formal combination of circle and square was spelled out in the
received texts produced not long before the Han dynasty. Song Yu 宋 玉 ，a poet active
 b
1.13. Jade objects. Third millennium b ce. Unearthed in 1978 from Tomb 1
at Sidun in Wujin, Jiangsu, (a) Cong, H. 5.4 cm., (b) Bi, diameter 18.2 cm.
 b
1.15. Jade turtle. Third millennium b c e. 9.4 x 7.5 x 4.6
1.14. Jade plaque. Third millennium b c e. i i x 8.2 cm. cm. Unearthed in 1987 at Lingjiatan in Hanshan, Anhui,
Unearthed in 1987 at Lingjiatan in Hanshan, Anhui, (a) Photograph, (b) Photograph showing how the jade
(a) Photograph, (b) Drawing. turtle contains the jade plaque in Figure 1.14 in the tomb.

in the third century b c e , employed the following metaphor in his Rhapsody on Talks
about Greatness {Dayan fu 大百赋 ）to describe the ultimate goal that all men should
aspire to:

Take square Earth as a chariot.

Take round Heaven as its canopy.
The shining long sword [accompanying the great man]
thus leans far beyond Heaven.90
 N
1

il
w

1.16. Burial Site 2.150 x 80 m. Excavated in the 1980s at Niuheliang, Liaoning,

(a) Floor plan, (b) Photograph.
The same metaphor appears in the Record o fArtificers {Kaogongji 考 工 記 )，a document
probably put together at the end of the Zhou in the Warring States period (475—222 b c e ):

The squareness o f the chariot is to represent Earth;

The roundness of the canopy is to represent Heaven .91

The two texts show that the ancient Chinese considered Heaven to be round, and Earth
to be square; together they could be compared to the canopy and the body of a chariot.
W hat did an ancient Chinese chariot look like? A bronze model unearthed from a pit
just west of the mausoleum of the First Emperor of the Q in is an excellent example. The
canopy, in the shape of a round umbrella, is mounted on the square body of the chariot
(Figure 1.1 7 ).92 Heaven, then, was like a dome covering the flat Earth. This cosmological
perspective was called “Canopy Heaven” [gaitian 蓋 天 ) .93
To what extent the insight gleaned from later texts can help us approach the Neolithic
circles and squares is disputed. Wise though it may be to exercise caution, many schol­
ars have chosen to view the Liangzhu cong, the Lingjiatan plaque, and the Niuheliang
site as preliminary to the cosmology of the Canopy Heaven.94 Some Han and pre-Han
practices may indeed encourage such a linkage, even if it would have to stretch over sev­
eral thousand years with very few pieces of evidence in between. Let us begin with the
cong object. According to the Zhou Rites {Zhou li 周 禮 )， one of the three Confucian ritual
canons, a ruler was expected to use a green bi 璧 disc for w orshiping Heaven and a yel­
low cong tube for w orshiping E arth.95 Both jade objects were chosen apparently because
of their distinct shapes, the bi disc being as round as Heaven and the cong tube as square
as Earth (see Figure 1.13). The date of the compilation of the Zhou Rites is still under
heated debate. Some speculate that the book could have been a Western Han creation,
whereas others maintain that it was most likely a cultural product of the late phase of
the Warring States period.96 In either case, pairing the bi disc and the cong tube as ritual
objects for worshiping Heaven and Earth should not have been a novel idea in the Han,
although no extant documents confirm whether they were ever paired this way at the
Han court.
The Lingjiatan plaque inserted in a jade turtle shell may recall the shi 式 device widely
used in the Han dynasty. An early example comes from the tomb of the Marquis of
Ruyin 汝 陰 （ d. 165 b c e ) at Shuanggudui 雙古堆 in Anhui (Figure 1.18 ). The lacquered
device is composed of a square base and a circular top, with a pin connecting the two. At
the center of the circular top is a group of dots connected by lines, representing the seven
stars that make up the Northern Dipper. Along the rims of both the top and the base
units are inscriptions of various calendrical and celestial systems. A diviner was supposed
1.17. Chariot. Second half o f the third century b ce. G ilt bronze. 225 x 152 cm. Unearthed in 1980 in the west
o f the mausoleum o f the First Emperor o f Qin in Lintong, Shaanxi, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.
 1.18. Drawing o f a ski device, ca. 165 b ce. Wood and lacquer. Circular
top: diameter 9.5 cm; square base: 13.5 x 13.5 x 1.3 cm. Unearthed in 1977
in the tomb o f Marquis Ruyin at Shuanggudui in Fuyang, Anhui.

to orient the Northern Dipper in a certain direction by rotating the circular top and
then find an answer to an inquiry by examining the calendrical and celestial marks on
the rims.97 The design matches a contemporary textual account of divinatory practices:
“Now the diviner invariably takes Heaven and Earth as his pattern and the four seasons
as his model. Conforming to benevolence and righteousness, he divides the milfoil stalks
(ce 策 )，determines the hexagram (gua 卦)，revolves the divining device {ski、, and posi­
tions the divining chessboard {qi 棋 )• Only then does he venture to discuss what is bene­
ficial and what is harmful between Heaven and Earth, or to predict the success and the
failure of undertakings.,,9S W ith the combination of a circular top and a square base, the
shi device was no doubt thought to bring the power of the cosmos into the divination to
improve its efficacy.
Two ritual altars used in the Han dynasty may evoke the Niuheliang site. Emperor
W u began to worship Heaven on a round mound near the Ganquan 甘泉 Palace, in
present-day C hunhua 淳 化 ，Shaanxi, and to worship E arth on a square mound in Fen-
yin 汾 陰 ，Shanxi." Like M ount Tai, both places were far from the capital of Chang’an，
the Ganquan Palace being 1 0 0 kilometers away to the north, and Fenyin, 2 0 0 kilometers
away to the east. Officials at court made several attempts to relocate both ritual structures
to the capital. 100 Wang Mang, as Duke for Pacifying the Han, succeeded in doing so. In
his proposal, Wang viciously attacked the lack of classicism in Emperor W us ritual prac­
tices. One of his major textual sources was the Zhou Rites, which specified that deities
5
o

would descend from Heaven if music in the style of “six variations” was performed on
the round mound at the winter solstice; spirits on Earth would emerge if the music in
the style of “eight variations”was offered on the square mound at the summer solstice.101
Again，the shape of the ritual altars closely corresponded to the cosmology of a round
Heaven and a square Earth.
No matter how dubious claimed associations of the Han examples with their Neo­
lithic precedents may be, the material evidence unambiguously shows that the formal
combination of circle and square was not a Han invention and that the fascination with
circle and square in the layout of the Bright Hall was not new in the Han dynasty.
The designers merely translated the given cosmological vocabulary into an architectural
complex.
The interlocking circles and squares of the Bright H all complex are further reminis­
cent of contemporary geometry. In the concept of the Canopy Heaven, Heaven is sup­
posed to be related to Earth in the same way that a canopy is related to the body of a
chariot. Nevertheless, how the rim of the canopy joins all four sides of the square body is
a point of disagreement. Shan Juli 單 居 離 made what appears to be a geometrical argu­
ment to his teacher Zeng Shen 曾 參 (5 0 5 - 4 3 5 b c e ) , a disciple of Confucius, asserting
that if Heaven were exactly round and Earth square， then the four angles of Earth would
not be well covered.102 Q u Yuan, a celebrated poet in the Chu State, made a similar chal­
lenge in his famous elegy H eavenly Questions {Tian wen 天 問 )：
The round and manifold [Heaven], who devised
and calibrated it?…
The revolving cords, where are they tied?
The heavenly pivot, where is it raised?...
Where lie the borders of manifold Heaven,
and where do they connect?
Numerous are the edges and angles [of Earth]—
who knows how many?103

Owing to the lack of astronomical accuracy, the concept of the Canopy Heaven lost
ground in the Han dynasty to the school of the Spherical Heaven {huntian 渾 天 )， whose
main assumption was that Heaven contains Earth in the same way that an egg contains
the yolk.104 The unresolved puzzle of the Canopy Heaven, however, became a source
of inspiration for those who cared for mathematics. The author of The Zhou Gnomon
{TLhou bi 周 髀 )，a mathematical classic attributed to the Duke of Zhou but most likely
compiled in the first century b c e , turned the problem of joining a round Heaven and a
 5
I
square Earth into the problem of arranging a circle and a square on a plane，especially
one within the other. The author discussed various experimental methods of arranging
a square and a circle: “A square may be trimmed to make a circle, or a circle may be cut
down to make a square. Making a circle within a square is called circling the square， ;
making a square within a circle is called squaring the circle•，” 105 Two attached diagrams,
drawn by a later commentator, illustrate the patterns of “circling the square” and “squar-
ing the circle” (Figure 1.19 ). Both show a geometrical response to the cosmological in­
quiry into the joining of Heaven and Earth.
From the attempt to reason out the physical connection between Heaven and Earth,
the author of The Zhou Gnomon further deduces an instance of the Pythagorean Theorem.
He used the try square, a carpenters tool, to demonstrate the mathematical relationship
among the three sides of a right triangle: “The patterns of these numbers come from the
circle and the square. The circle comes from the square. The square comes from the try
square. And the try square comes from [the fact that] nine nines are eighty-one. There­
fore, fold a try square so that the base is three in breadth, the altitude is four in exten­
sion, and the diameter is five aslant. Having squared its outside, halve it [to obtain] one
try square. Placing them round together in a ring，one can form three, four，or five.” 106
(Figure 1.2 0 ).
The author of The Zhou Gnomon also employed the try square to explain another
method of forming a circle and a square: “To rotate a try square is to make a circle，and
to join two try squares is to make a square. The square pertains to Earth, and the circle
pertains to Heaven. Heaven is circle, and Earth is square. ” 107 Diagrams provided by
Noda Churyo are of great help in grasping the essence of the quotation (Figure 1.2 1 ).108
A lthough the author o f The Zhou Gnomon pushed the try square to its lim it, the ancient
Chinese normally used compasses to draw circles. 109 Depictions of both instruments,
mostly shown being held by the legendary figures Fu X i and N ii W a，can be found on
many Han carved stones (Figure 1.2 2 ) .110
The geometrical mode of thinking as revealed in The ZJjou Gnomon casts new light on
the floor plans of the two excavated Bright Halls. In the Changan case, the square main
building, likely with a circular top, was erected on a round platform; the round platform
was raised centrally in a square yard; and what lay outside the square yard was a circular
moat (Figure 1.2 3 a). In the Luoyang case, a square yard enclosed a round main build­
ing on a round platform; and within the round hall stood a square core, atop which was
likely a circular chamber (Figure 1.23 b). The two architectural complexes brought into
flill play the “circling the square” and “squaring the circle” patterns used to illustrate the
connection of Heaven and Earth in The Zhou Gnomon (see Figure 1.19 ).
 方圓 圓方
Squaring the circle Circling the square

1.19. Circles and squares in The Zhou Gnomon.

1.20 . T ry squares in a ring in The Zhou Gnomon.

 環矩以為圓 合矩以為方
To rotate a try square is to make a circle To join two try squares is to make a square.

1-21. M aking circles and squares in The Zhou Gnomon,

The interplay of circles and squares in a ritual structure like the Bright H all was, how­
ever, more than a game of geometry. The officials who participated in a series of public
debates held in the W hite Tiger H all during the reign of Emperor Zhang (r. 7 6 - 8 8 c e )
offered their interpretation: “The Son of Heaven erects the Bright Hall so that he may
enter into communication with the spiritual forces, undergo [the influence of] Heaven
and Earth, keep the four seasons on the right track, and put forth his reformist teach­
ing-- The Bright Hall is round at the top and square at the bottom___ The top is round
in imitation of Heaven; the bottom is square in imitation of Earth .” 111 Although the
Eastern Han officials focused on the look of the main building, they articulated the sig­
nificance of the formal combination of circle and square: the Bright Hall was no less than
a representation of the cosmos. The visual affinity with the cosmos, in turn, made this
architectural complex a vehicle by which the emperor could share the power of the cos­
mos. Any ruler who regarded himself as the Son of Heaven could justify his sovereignly
by worshiping Heaven and his ancestors, receiving subjects and vassals, and announcing
decrees and policies in a space endowed with the symbolic presence of the cosmos.
The formal combination of circle and square may have signified the cosmos in the first
place. After its application to the construction of the Bright Hall, it also came to con­
note Heaven’s mandate. Wang M ang was again the one who propelled the symbolism
in this direction. As mentioned, Wang took advantage of a white stone retrieved from a
well in Wugong to speed his political advancement. This event happened right after the
death of Emperor Ping, who had conducted the opening ceremony for the newly built
5
4

b
1.22. Try square and compasses on a stone carving in the Wu family shrines. Mid-second
century c e . Discovered in 1786 in Jiaxiang, Shandong, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.

Bright Hall in the capital Chang’an only eleven months earlier. The Wugong stone, with
its inscription identifying Wang as the next emperor, was allegedly round at the top and
square at the bottom, a shape in full accordance with the appearance of the main build­
ing in the Bright Hall complex.112 No doubt the peculiar shape that combined circle and
square reinforced the textual message on the stone; both were meant to create the illu­
sion of Heavens mandate.
The illusion of Heavens mandate spread more widely during the reign of Wang M ang
through a group of bronze objects, called the “TLV mirrors”by scholars in the West. The
term refers to mirrors that bear a TLV design on the unpolished back (Figure 1.2 4 ).
The design normally contains a square at the center, four T-like marks extending from the
square, four horizontal L-like marks rendered opposite the Ts, and four V-like marks
 5
5
1.23. (a) Scheme o f the Bright Hall in Changan, (b) Scheme o f the Bright Hall in Luoyang.

arranged opposite the four corners of the square. The inscription on the mirror unearthed
at Yinwan 尹灣 in Jiangsu explains that the TLV design was intended to represent the
liubo 六博 game board: “Engrave the liubo [board] at the center and [in the shape of]
a square” (Figure 1.2 5 ) .113 Two other inscribed examples, one in the Tol^o National
Museum and the other in the National Museum in Beijing, further enlighten us as to
the purpose of this peculiar representation. Both read: “Engrave the bo board as to expel
the inauspicious.” 114 As I argue elsewhere, the inscription was inspired by a contempo­
rary divinatory practice that cleverly appropriated the design, terminology, and rules of
the liubo game, making the mirror back, with its representation of the game board, a tal­
isman capable of warding off evil spirits, or so it was believed during the Han dynasty. 115
The rendition of a square game board on a circular mirror brings to mind the cos­
mological diagram of Heaven and Earth. Indeed, a mirror, often round, can itself be a
metaphor for Heaven. The author of the Classic o f Peace (T aipingjing 太 平 經 ) ,a Daoist
document written in stages from the third century on, claims that “if the form of Heaven
can be fathomed, it must be compared to a clean and bright mirror.，，116 Likewise, the
square game board alone can be a metaphor for Earth. Ih e earliest extant textual evidence
appears in the work of Cao Zhi 曹 植 （ 192—232 c e ), whose talent in literature thrived when

his family conquered part of the Han Empire: “The Four Seas are just like a game board
{ju 局 ）. H ow can the N ine Provinces even be comparable?”117 B oth the “Four Seas” and
the “Nine Provinces” are expressions referring to the world under Heaven, that is, the
 6
5

a
1.24. T L V mirror. Early first century c e . Bronze. Diameter 27.5 cm. Unearthed in 1993 at Yinwan
in Lianyungang, Jiangsu, (a) Photograph, (b) Ink rubbing o f a detail.

Earth. Together, the square game board on the circular mirror represents the cosmos, as
the inscription on the Yinwan mirror so plainly affirms: “[This mirror] is modeled after
Heaven and Earth, and [it is like] the light of the sun and the moon.，，118
The two referents o f the TLV m irror— the game board and the c o sm o sw e re by
no means contradictory in the Han mind. In addition to divination, Han people also
connected the game liubo with immortals. The inscription “immortals playing the liubo
game^ {xianren liubo 仙 人 六 博 ) on a Han mirror, said to have been acquired in Shaoxing
紹興， Zhejiang, identifies a scene of two winged figures playing at a board with the sim­
plified TLV design cast on the same mirror (Figure 1.2 6 ) . 119 Another self-explanatory
example was unearthed at Guitoushan 鬼頭山 in Sichuan. The inscription— “immortals
playing the bo game” {xianren bo 先 人 博 )一 identifies a scene of two carved immortals,
with tall feathered hats and spread wings, playing the bo game at a board with sev­
eral throwing sticks (Figure 1.2 7 ) .120 The m otif of immortals playing the liubo game was
 ,'
-一
.1

b
1.25. (a) Liubo game set. ca. 168 b ce. Lac . • 45 x 45 x 17 cm. Unearthed in 1973-74
from Tomb 3 at Mawangdui in Changsha, Hunan, (b) Liubo game board.
8
5

1.26. Immortals playing the liubo game on a mirror. Late second to early third century c e .
Bronze. Former U. Asano Collection, Osaka, Japan.

further transformed and fused in the design of the TLV mirror. Part of the inscription
along the circular rim of a TLV mirror discovered in Luoyang singles out the image of
immortals and even specifies the quest for immortality (Figure 1.2 8 ): “This mirror made
by Shang Fang truly is very fine. Upon it are immortals who do not know old age. They
quench their thirst with the springs of jade, and satisfy their hunger with jujubes. [May
you have] long life like [that of] metal and stone, and [may you have] Heavens pro-
tection.” 121 The cosmic implication of the TLV mirror can be related to the desire for
longevity and the craving for immortality. The inscription on another Han mirror, exca­
vated in Guangzhou 廣 州 一 a[May you] be as long-lived as Heaven, and [may you] be as
enduring as Earth”~lends firm support to this connection.122
The referents of the TLV design on mirrors were therefore multiple in the Han
dynasty. W hen the design alluded to divination, it was endowed with the power to pre­
vent misfortune. W hen it referred to the game played by immortals, it bestowed the
hope of immortality. W hen it was compared to the cosmos, it granted longevity. The
 5
9
1.27. Immortals playing the liubo game on a sarcophagus.
Second century c e . Sandstone. Unearthed in 1986 at Gui-
toushan in Jianyang, Sichuan. Ink rubbing o f a detail.

three referents_ one protecting life and two prolonging life_ could together stand for
auspiciousness.
Because of the similar combination of circle and square, the Chang’an Bright Hall
was immediately associated with the existing TLV mirror after its construction. The fol­
lowing text, added to a TLV mirror in the collection of the Shanghai Museum (Figure
1 .2 9 ), makes this clear:123 “The X in dynasty has established the Surrounding M oat and

built the Bright Hall. [May you] be illustrious among promoted scholars and take [your]
place among ranked noblemen___Ten thousand huts of students are in the north. [May
you] have joy without end. ，，124 The inscription highlights Wang M ang’s accomplish­
ments, such as erecting the Bright Hall and the Surrounding Moat, expanding the scale
of the Imperial Academy [taixue 太 學 )， and housing the sudden influx of students in the
capital. 125 In reality, these projects were all proposed and executed about 4 ce, around
the end of the Western Han. For propaganda purposes， however, credit was transferred
to the X in dynasty. Likewise, the given design— the representation of a square game
board on a circular m irro rw as conveniently appropriated to refer to the Bright Hall,
including its layout and look, its resemblance to the cosmos, and its allusion to Heavens
mandate. Given the auspicious connotations of the TLV mirror, the Bright Hall and
the mandate to which it alluded were supposed to share the immortality and longevity
of Heaven and Earth. The Chang'an Bright Hall and the mandate of the Xin dynasty
lasted less than two decades, however.
In ancient texts, it was unclear whether the Bright Hall and the Surrounding Moat
were two independent buildings or two complementary components within one com­
plex. There were thus two very different design solutions in the Han dynasty. In the
Chang’an case, the Bright Hall and the Surrounding M oat appear to have been one and
1.28 . T L V mirror. First century c e . Bronze. Diameter 23.2 cm.
Unearthed in 1957-58 from Tomb 10025 in Luoyang, Henan.
Ink rubbing.

1.29 . T L V mirror. 9-23 c e . Bronze. Diameter 13.5 cm.

Collection o f the Shanghai Museum. Ink rubbing.
 the same. According to the received text, Wang Mang, after his promotion to Regenting
Emperor, visited the Bright H all in the beginning of 6 c e . There he oversaw the Great
Archery Contest and fed the Elders, two ceremonies normally conducted within the
Surrounding M oat. 126 Archaeological excavation shows that there were only two major
ritual structures south of the main gate of the Chang， an city: the Bright Hall and the
Nine Temples, the imperial ancestral temple of the X in dynasty (see Figure 1.7 ) . 127 Both
sources point to the same possibility: the Surrounding Moat, likely the circular ditch,
surrounded the Bright Hall. In contrast, archaeologists discovered three ritual structures
south of Han Luoyang: the Bright H all at the center, the Surrounding Moat to its east,
and the Spiritual Terrace {lingtai 靈 臺 ) to its west (see Figure i.io ) . 128 The received text
also informs us that Emperor M ing visited this group of buildings after their construc­
tion in 5 9 c e . He went to the Bright Hall first, offering sacrifices and receiving subjects.
Then he ascended the Spiritual Terrace, where he observed the clouds and contemplated
change. Finally he went to the Surrounding Moat, where he oversaw the Great Archery
Contest, fed the Elders, and lectured on Confucian classics. 129 It is evident that the
Bright H all and the Surrounding Moat were two separate entities fulfilling different
functions in Luoyang.
Whereas archaeological excavation sometimes reveals architectural plans, it is not as
informative about the structures above the ground. Three proposals have been made for
the reconstruction of the Chang’an Bright Hall. Wang Shiren pictures it as a three-
story building with four halls {tang 堂) on the lower level, five chambers {shi 室) on the
second, and a single room (w u 屋) on the top (Figure 1.3 0 ) . 130 Yang Hongxun contests
this arrangement and presents a two-story model, arguing that there must have been
nine, rather than ten, units within the building~that is, four halls and four chambers on
the first floor and one chamber on the second (Figure 1.31 ). He also maintains that the
chamber on the topmost floor must have been round in shape. 131 W u Hung agrees with
Wang on the structure having three stories, and with Yang on the round shape of the
top floor, but he differs with both on the interior partition (Figure 1.3 2 ). Instead of nine
or ten, W u posits fourteen units in the main building: four halls on the first floor, nine
chambers on the second, and one room on the top. 132
These proposals are all reasonable speculations based on historical documents. Their
contradictions only serve to disclose two insurmountable difficulties. First, the Bright
H all was remembered for a long time in history; later scholars claimed that the site
existed and mentioned it in order to reach back to the glorious past they believed in and
whose passing they lamented. It is therefore not easy to distinguish fact from fiction, to
discriminate specific details from generalized ones in the many textual accounts of the
1.30a-b. Reconstruction o f the Bright Hall in Chang’an by Wang Shiren. (a) Plans o f the
first and second floors, (b) Plans o f the third floor and the roof.
1.30c-d. Reconstruction o f the Bright Hall in Chang’an by Wang Shiren. (c)
Perspective o f the main building, (d) Perspective o f the site.
 , _巷.

H
在（
费)

b
1.31a-b. Reconstruction o f the Bright Hall in Chang’an by Yang Hongxun.
(a) Plan o f the first floor, (b) Plans o f the second floor and the roof.
1.31c. Reconstruction o f the Bright Hall in Chang’an by Yang Hongxun
(c) Perspective o f the site.

1.32. Reconstruction o f the Bright Hall in Chang’an by Wu Hung.

 Bright Hall, or to make sense of their considerable inconsistencies. Second, no docu­
ments directly associated with the appearance of the Chang’an Bright Hall are available.
We have no idea if the Chang’an Bright H all was a faithful representation based on the
texts compiled before its construction, such as the Record o f Artificers, We are equally
uncertain if the Chang’an Bright Hall, which was destroyed in riots, was ever the subject
of the texts composed in the Eastern Han, such as Cai Yongs 蔡 舊 (13 2- 192 c e ) Treatise
on the B right H all and M onthly Observances {M ingtangyueling lun 明 堂 月 令 論 ) -133
Approaching the Chang’an Bright H all through Eastern Han texts means assuming
that the Changan structure was the model for the Luoyang Bright Hall. Evidence from
archaeological sites proves otherwise. As seen in Figure 1.12 , the post holes along the cir­
cular platform indicate that the main building, starting at the ground level, was round,
in striking contrast to its Chang’an precedent, which was composed mainly of cubes.
Yang Hongxun portrays the Luoyang Bright Hall as a three-story building with thirteen
units: four halls on the first floor, eight chambers on the second, and one chamber at the
top (Figure 1.3 3 ) .134
Yang Hongxun is so far the only scholar who has attempted to reconstruct both
Bright Halls. He not only ascribes different exterior appearances— one square, the other
round— but assigns different schemes of interior partition to the two structures: the
Chang’an building has five chambers; the Luoyang building nine. Yang acknowledges
that the former scheme is based on the Record o f Artificers preserved in the Zhou R ites 、
the latter, on Elder DaVs Record o f Kites (D a D ai L i j i 大 戴 禮 記 ) .The reason for the
differences, Yang explains, is that Wang Mang and Liu Xin, the masterminds of the
C hang， an project，were both leaders o f the O ld Text School，w hich favored the C onfu­
cian classics th at survived the First Em perors infamous order to burn books; they m ust
have worked closely with the O ld Texts like the Record o f Artificers. Yang postulates that
scholars of the New Text School, which supported the Confucian classics memorized
by early Han masters, dominated the court of Emperor Guangwu; they would have
followed the New Texts, such as Elder D ais Record o f R ites, to design the new Bright
H all. 135 Yang’s hypothesis, albeit plausible, neglects the fact that the incompatibility of
the two “schools” is more an intellectual construction of later scholars than a description
of academic reality in the Han dynasty, as many modern scholars have pointed out. 136
Wang M ang， for instance，never shied away from the New Texts when they proved use­
ful for political arguments.137
Ancient documents may prove problematic and even misleading as guides for recon­
structing above-ground structures. They nonetheless constitute a rich corpus of material
that tells us how the Han people envisioned various architectural components of the
Bright Hall. Officials partaking in the debates in the W hite Tiger Hall in 79 ce articu­
lated their view as follows:

The Bright Hall is round at the top and square at the bottom. It has eight windows {chuang
窗）and four doors {ta 闥) . It is the building where the orders of the state proceed, and
it is situated south of the capital. The top is round in imitation of Heaven, and the bot­
tom is square in imitation of Earth. The eight windows represent the Eight Winds, the
four doors the Four Seasons; the nine chambers the Nine Provinces, the twelve seats the
Twelve Months, the thirty-six door-leaves、 hu 戶) the Thirty-six Rains, the seventy-two
window-openings (you 傭）the Seventy-two Winds.138

Not only did they compare the circle and square to Heaven and Earth, but they supplied
cosmic references for other elements— doors, windows, chambers, and seats. The Nine
Provinces, believed to have been the administrative districts first regulated by Yu of the
Xia, was an alternative expression of Earth. Seasonal changes, monthly operations, and
natural phenomena (wind and rain) were all demonstrations of the motion of Heaven.
The officials at the court of Emperor Zhang appeared to enjoy encoding architec­
ture, making every aspect of the Bright Hall the cosmos in miniature. Their inclination
to assign symbols to forms was not at all exceptional. Before them, Huan Tan 桓 譚 (ca.
24 BCE-Ca. 56 ce), a scholar and official at the court of Emperor Guangwu，had already
presented a set of codes pertaining to the Bright Hall that was exactly identical to the
set supplied in the W hite Tiger H all. 139 By the end of the Eastern Han, Cai Yong，a
scholar who devoted himself to ancient classics but who had the misfortune to witness
Dong Zhuos wanton destruction of Luoyang, elaborated and modified this popular set
of codes:

The eight doors represent the Eight Trigrams [in the Book o f Changes]; the nine chambers
represent the Nine Provinces; the twelve compartments (gong 宫）correspond to the Twelve
Divisions [of a day] {chen 辰) . Each chamber has four door-leaves and eight window-
openings, so in total there are thirty-six door-leaves and seventy-two window-openings
in the nine chambers___The room for communicating with Heaven is eighty-one chi 尺
high; the number is the squaring of nine, the length of the pitch named “Yellow Bell.”
Twenty-eight pillars line along the four sides; they represent the Twenty-eight Lunar
Lodges (xiu 宿),with seven in each quarter of the sky.140 The building (tang 堂）is three
zhang 丈 high, which corresponds to the Triple Concordance. The four faces and five col­
ors [of the building] represent the Successive Phases (xing 行) . [The structure] outside
[the main building] covers an area of twenty-four zhang on each side, which corresponds
to the Twenty-four [Climatic] Divisions of a year (qi 氣 ).It is surrounded by water, which
represents the Four Seas.141
 1.33a-c. Reconstruction o f the Bright Hall in Luoyang by Yang Hongxun.
(a) Plan o f the first floor, (b) Plan o f the second floor, (c) Plan o f the third floor.
 1.33d. Reconstruction o f the Bright Hall in Luoyang by Yang Hongxun.
(d) Perspective o f the main building.

In addition to doors, windows, and chambers, Cai Yongs description touches on pil­
lars, faces, colors, and measurements. Like his predecessors, Cai endeavored to fill out
the basic cosmological diagram with abundant symbolic details. The Nine Provinces and
the Four Seas were both associated with the Earth. Hie constellations, the climatic cycle,
and the measurement of time were all associated with the operation of Heaven. Tlie
pitches and the Eight Trigrams were human discoveries of the harmony and mystery of
the relationship between Heaven and Earth. W ith all this, Cai Yong never forgot that
the purpose of borrowing the cosmological diagram to build the Bright Hall was to
make Heavens mandate visible. He thus related the height of the building, three zhang,
to the theory of the Triple Concordance. He connected the four faces and five colors of
the building with the succession of the four seasons and the Five Phases, which further
implied the dynastic alternation in the theory of the Five Virtues. Both discourses, the
Triple Concordance and the Five Virtues— like the physical entity of the Bright Hall—
testified to Han anxiety over and fascination with legitimacy.
 Ritual and Audience

The close tie between architecture and legitimacy demanded that the designers of the
three Bright Halls devote their attention to the formal details that would convey the in­
tended political function, including the plan of the complex, the appearance of the main
building, the partition of the interior space, and the number of architectural components.
By borrowing the cosmological vocabulary, the designers were successful in erecting edi­
fices whose political symbols were accessible to viewers who shared the language of the
symbols as tacit knowledge. Although the spatial features of each Bright H all were sup­
posed to embody Heavens mandate permanently, what truly brought the Bright H all to
life were the rituals performed occasionally in the building and the audiences who bore
witness to those temporal performances.
O n Emperor W u s first trip to M ount Tai to claim Heavens mandate, he intended to
participate in two very different kinds of ritual. O n the one hand, he preferred to keep
his communication with Heaven as private as possible. A t the foot of M ount Tai, he
first had an inscribed jade tablet buried beneath thefen g altar where sacrifices to Heaven
were offered; the message on the jade tablet was entirely confidential. Then he ascended
M ount Tai alone, accompanied only by a palace attendant for chariots. The emperor
repeated the ceremony~offering sacrifices to Heaven on the fen g altar— at the sum­
mit, but none could testify as to the details, for the only attendant on the spot soon met
a sudden death. O n the other hand，Emperor W u did not hesitate to meet the public at
the ancient site of the Bright Hall after he had completed thefeng-shan ceremony. There
he received congratulations from his subjects, ordered his vassals to build their lodgings
near M ount Tai for future use, and issued an edict that conveyed his sentiments on this
monumental occasion. 142 The contrast between the secrecy of thefen g ceremony and the
publicity of the Bright Hall visit was resumed upon Emperor W us second trip to M ount
Tai, in 1 0 6 b c e .143 In the newly built Bright H all in Fenggao，the emperor sacrificed to
Heaven and to Emperor Gao while receiving his vassals, who dutifully submitted their
administrative reports.
The public character of the Bright Hall was further accentuated when a Bright H all
was erected in the capital, ChangJan. Among those who attended the opening ceremony
in 5 ce were twenty-eight feudal lords, 120 ranked nobles，and more than 900 members
of the royal family from all over the country. Although the spectacle was calculated to
draw a parallel between the Duke of Zhou and Wang M ang~ not yet emperor~in the
minds of the participants, the results were mixed. The power held by Wang was made
public on the occasion, which alarmed Liu Chong, a feudal lord and member of the
 royal family, and prompted him to stir up a rebellion against Wang for plotting to take
the throne. Nevertheless, the majority of the participants were greatly impressed by the
spectacle. They are reported to have kowtowed to Wang and urged on him more rewards
for his magnificent achievements. The praises from the ruling elite in part contributed to
the Nine Offerings shortly given to Wang. The propaganda orchestrated by Wang and
disseminated at the Bright H all gathering was successful overall. 144
As emperor，Wang M ang twice conducted the ceremony for enfeoffment in the
Bright Hall, although both times he gave out clods wrapped with grass to betoken the
prospective awards. In the first ceremony, held in 12 ce, Wang tried to restore the feudal
system of the Zhou dynasty. He enfeoffed fourteen dukes {gong 公 )，ninety-three mar­
quises {hou 侯)，twenty-one earls {bo 伯 )，seventy-one viscounts (z i 子)，and 4 9 7 barons
{nan 男 ) ; all five ranks conformed to the five ranks said to have been in place in the
Zhou. He also granted the position of subvassal {fucheng 附 城 ）to 1,551 subjects. He fur­
ther promoted eighty-three women among the nine royal clans and gave them official
posts. 145 It is unclear whether women were allowed to be on the scene， but all the other
individuals given awards were supposed to have been present. Together with the impe­
rial attendants and ceremonial assistants, there must have been at least 2 ,5 0 0 people in
the Bright Hall.
How could the Bright H all in Chang’an have accommodated such a crowd either
for the grand opening or for the enfeoffments? According to the archaeological report,
there is a square earthen core at the center of the main building, strongly reminiscent of
what was discovered above the tomb of King Cuo # (r. 32 7—312 b c e ) of the Zhongshan
中山 State in Pingshan 平 山 ，Hebei (Figure 1.3 4 ). Rather than the customary tumulus，
the pounded mound above the burial chambers is accompanied with a number of post
holes, some painted surfaces, and various broken roofing tiles and hollow bricks. These
traces suggest that the pounded mound, measuring 9 0 by 1 0 0 meters at its base, served as
the earthen core of a mortuary hall for offering sacrifices to the deceased king. Since the
remaining height of the mound is fifteen meters high and has roughly three levels, each
smaller than the next, the original mortuary hall must have been a multi-story structure.
A bronze plate with a design of the royal necropolis that was retrieved from the tomb
provides substantial information for reconstruction (Figure 1.35 ). The mortuary hall for
King Cuo anchored the entire necropolis; the halls for his consorts and concubines were
aligned along two sides, and the bureaus for ritual services were in the rear. As Yang
Hongxun shows, the mortuary hall for the king was probably located atop the earthen
core，which was covered by staircases on the first level and galleries on the second
and the third (Figure 1.3 6 ) . 146 Taller than a modern five-story building，the mortuary
 Architectural Remains

Q > . . . ?5 m 1.34. Tomb o f King Cuo. ca. 313 bce. Excavated in 1974
a in Pingshan, Hebei, (a) Floor plan, (b) Cross-section.

hall must have been imposing from afar, especially given the flat landscape. The truly
functional interior space, however, occupied only one story, and only the one with the
smallest area.
W ith the invention of the earthen core, the ancient Chinese were able to build strik­
ingly high buildings even though they could not yet erect a tall wooden structure sup­
ported solely by columns and beams. The same earthen-core technology was used in the
palaces of the Q in capital, Xianyang 咸陽一 at the site labeled Palace no. 1 by archaeolo­
gists, to give one example (Figure 1.37 ). Based on Yang Hongxuns reconstruction, the
irregular shape of the earthen core on an almost rectangular plan, covering an area of
sixty by forty-five meters, allowed more spatial allocation on the lower level. The uneven
height of the earthen core not only created rhythm but also provided protection, particu­
larly the part as tall as a wall next to the main hall and the part as deep as a moat between
two complexes. Again, the supporting earthen core was concealed behind the walls and
floors of ornate rooms and galleries. A passerby would undoubtedly have gazed in awe at
1.35. Design o f the royal necropolis on a plaque, ca. 313 bce. Bronze inlaid with gold and silver. 96 x 48 x 1.2 cm.
Unearthed in 1974 from the tomb o f King Cuo in Pingshan, Hebei, (a) Photograph, (b) Reconstruction by
Yang Hongxun.
1.36. Reconstruction o f the mortuary hall for King Cuo by Yang Hongxun.
(a) Cross-section, (b) Elevation.
 b
1.37a-b. Reconstruction o f the Xianyang Palace, Architectural Site i, by Yang Hongxun. ca. 350-206 bce. Excavated
in 1974-75 in Xianyang, Shaanxi, (a) Floor plan o f the first floor, (b) Floor plan of the second floor.
 a
1.37c-d. Reconstruction o f the Xianyang Palace, Architectural Site i, by Yang Hongxun.
Shaanxi, (c) Cross-section, (d) Perspective.

the grand scale and the splendid appearance of the palace and may not have known that
much of the space inside was not for use. 147
Like the precedents at Pingshan and Xianyang, the main building of the Chang’an
Bright H all was a multi-level structure built with an earthen core. Although the remain­
ing height of the earthen core is only 1.5 meters, its original height must have been much
greater to support the galleries and rooms above it. The traces at the archaeological site
indicate that on the lower level, four rectangular rooms were built along the earthen core,
which measures 1 6 .8 by 17.4 meters; each room was adjacent on its far side to another
longer but narrower rectangular room (see Figure 1.9 ). Whereas Yang Hongxun places
a one-story wooden structure above the one-level earthen core, Wang Siren makes the
earthen core even higher to create more rooms on the second level (Figures 1.3 8 , 1.3 9 ).
 1.38. Yang Hongxuns reconstruction o f the main building in the Bright Hall complex in Changan.
(a) Cross-section, (b) Elevation.

In either proposal, the rooms atop and along the earthen core were simply not spacious
enough to accommodate the 1 ,5 0 0 to 2 ,5 0 0 people who attended the ceremony held in
the Bright Hall. Only a very few high-ranking lords and officials were allowed to enter
the earthen-cored, multi-level building. The majority of the attendants gathered in the
courtyard, which measured approximately 2 0 0 meters on each side.
It is evident that the architecture complicated the publicity to be achieved at Bright
H all ceremonies. Those who were summoned for enfeoffment may have flowed from the
courtyard to the main building on a rotating basis. The audiences attending the ritual for
worshiping Heaven and the royal ancestors had to stay in the courtyard if they were not
among the most important figures. In that case, they could follow what took place in the
main building only through the announcements made by masters of ceremony. Most of
 1.39. Wang Shirens reconstruction o f the main building in the Bright Hall complex in Changan.

the audiences therefore did not witness the ritual. They im agined it through oral trans­
mission, even if they were indeed on site. The demonstration of Heavens mandate in the
Bright Hall thus worked along the fine line between visible audience and invisible ritual.
The Son of Heaven maintained his mysterious power, which could be openly perceived
but not easily seen.
Visible or not, the ritual performed in the Bright H all was further associated with the
practice of monthly observances {yueling 月令 ).The Son of Heaven was expected to ap­
pear in a certain compartment of the Bright Hall to deal with certain affairs that were
prioritized for a certain month, as instructed in the Book o f the K ing o f H uainan {H uai-
nan z i 淮 南 子 )，compiled under the patronage of Liu A n 劉 安 (1 7 9- 122 b c e ) , the king
of Huainan. In the first month, for instance, the Son of Heaven would hold court in the
left compartment of the Hall of Blue Sun {qingyang 青 陽 ）in the main building of the
Bright H all complex (Figure 1.4 0 ). To extend virtue and grant favor, he conferred honors
according to merits, reduced forced labor, and levied taxes. In the second month, the Son
of Heaven would hold court in the central compartment of the Blue Sun Hall. To show
mercy, he ordered those in authority to decrease sentences, remove shackles, stop flog­
gings, and halt criminal trials. In the third month, the Son of Heaven would then hold
court in the right compartment of the Blue Sun Hall. To engage in acts of benevolence,
he bid those in charge to open granaries and treasuries to give relief to the impoverished.
Proceeding in this manner, the Son of Heaven would promulgate monthly ordinances
in the twelve compartments that belonged to the four halls by the end of a year.148 That
is to say, the main building of the Bright Hall is presumably partitioned into four halls,
each divided into three— left, central, and right~compartments. 149
 Black
Water
Winter
North

West East
Autumn Spring
Metal Wood
White Blue

South
Summer
Fire
Red

1.40 . Monthly observances in the Bright Hall.

It goes without saying that having twelve compartments in four halls agrees with the
annual pattern of twelve months in four seasons. The monthly observances conducted in
the Bright H all played an even more significant role, one that integrated the four seasons
and the Five Phases. Not only did the four halls correspond to the four seasons, the four
halls and the central space they surrounded corresponded with the five directions— east,
south, west, north, and center. The five directions are readily related to the Five Phases,
which often go with the five colors~blue, red, white, black, and yellow. The Blue Sun
H all in the east represented spring, whose element was wood and whose color was blue.
The Light H all in the south represented summer, associated with fire and red. 150 The
H all of General Institution {zongzhang 總 章 ) in the west represented autumn, associ­
ated with metal and white. Ih e Dark Hall {xuantang 玄堂) in the north represented
winter, associated with water and black. Finally， the Central Palace {zhonggong 中宫）in
the center was associated with earth and yellow. Not only did the Son of Heaven move
his court from one hall to another according to the season, all of his outward appear­
ance— the clothing and jade pendants he wore, the horses drawing his carriage, and the
banners of his entourage— had to be in the matching color.
Like the joining of round Heaven and square Earth, integrating the four seasons and
the Five Phases through monthly observances in the Bright Hall was awkward. The
obvious challenge was the earth phase. Spatially, earth could be located in the central
space both defined and surrounded by the four halls, but temporally it found no counter­
part, for there are only four seasons. The compilers of the Book o f the K ing o f H uainan
thus forced the earth phase to be represented by the last month of the summer; the Son
of Heaven was required to hold court in the Central Palace in the sixth month. The solu­
tion was bound to create an imbalance between time and space: the three months of the
summer were unevenly distributed between fire and earth; the right section of the Bright
H all in the south, supposedly reserved for the sixth month，was doomed never to be put
to use.
Regardless of the awkwardness of the allocation of months to spaces, the monthly
observances required constant movement by the Son of Heaven, which invigorated the
integration of the four seasons and the Five Phases. As the compilers of the Book o f the
K ing o f H uainan also noted, the seasonal changes amounted to the waxing and waning
of yin and yang. Yin presumably rose in the southwest at the beginning of autumn and
declined in the northwest at the beginning of spring, whereas yang moved in the opposite
direction at the same time (Figure 1.4 1 ) .151 Both j/zVz ^ndyang noticeably drift westward,
which matches the motion of Heaven as explained in the theory of the Canopy Heaven:
uT h t heavens rotate sideways toward the left in the same manner as the turning of a m ill­
stone. The sun and moon both move toward the right, but they have to follow the heav­
ens [to which they are attached], which rotate toward the left.” 152 The leftward motion
of Heaven connects the abstract concept o f yin and with the measurable features of
the seasonal cycle. It is hardly surprising that the moat surrounding the Bright H all is
described in the Record o f R ites as “revolving leftward to represent Heaven.” 153 The west­
ward or clockwise movement of the Son of Heaven from one compartment to another
enhanced the dynamic imagery of Heaven. By performing the rituals for monthly obser­
vances in the Bright Hall, the Son of Heaven was not merely the mediator who received
and executed the mandate between Heaven and the human world; he in effect became
 Water
Winter
North
— Northwest

West
Autumn
Metal

Southwest
where yin arises
South
Summer
Fire
1,41, Integration oiyin-yang^ the four seasons, and the Five Phases.

the incarnation of Heaven, whose existence and operation are manifested through the
seasonal changes that animate the successive phases of the universe.
However plausible, the combination of monthly observances with the Bright Hall
was not realized in Han imperial rituals. W hen Emperor W u chose to build the Bright
H all so far away from the capital, he had already ruled out the performance of monthly
observances. Wang Mang was keen on rituals, but his incentive to have the Bright Hall
erected in Chang’an was to pave the way for his emperorship. For him, monthly obser­
vances were not as critical as the evocation of the Duke of Zhou, the reinstitution of
ancestor worship, and the reinstatement of feudalism. One may hazard a guess that with
a lasting peace in the Eastern Han, the Bright Hall in Luoyang would have seen the
introduction of monthly observances. Still, no official records from Han times verify
such a supposition.
 6
Black
Water
Winter
North

West
Autumn
M etal
W hite
9

South
Summer
Fire
Red

1.42. Integration of the four seasons, the Five Phases, and the Five Thearchs.

In the Eastern Han, the emperor usually entered the Bright Hall at the New Year.
Only in the first month did he offer sacrifices to Heaven and to designated ancestors
there.154 The imperial rituals did not neglect the essence of the monthly observances,
that is，the integration of the four seasons and the Five Phases，but the emperor wel­
comed the seasons in the five suburbs of the city. O n the first day of spring, for example,
he went to the eastern suburb, where he offered sacrifices to the Blue Thearch, the guard­
ian deity of the east; all his clothing, carriages, and banners were blue，
the symbolic color
of wood; and the site of the rituals was eight It 里 to the east of the capital, the number
eight being associated with wood (Figure 1.4 2 ). O n the first day of summer, the emperor,
wearing red clothing and equipped with red carriages and banners, offered sacrifices
to the Red Thearch in the southern suburb at a site seven li from the capital. O n the
first day of autumn, the emperor, this time decked out in white, offered sacrifices to the
W hite Thearch in the western suburb, nine li from the capital. O n the first day of winter,
he appeared in black and offered sacrifices to the Black Hiearch in the northern suburb，
six li from the capital. To accommodate the lone earth phase, he offered sacrifices to the
Yellow Thearch eighteen days before the first day of autumn at a central cult site five li
from the city. 155 Instead of holding court in the Bright Hall, the Eastern Han emper­
ors moved around the capital to maintain the harmony of the four seasons and the Five
Phases.
There may not even have been any rituals designed solely for the Bright Hall in the
H an dynasty. W hen Em peror W u started using the B right H all in Fenggao, he fol­
lowed the suburban ritual to show his respect to G rand U nity {taiyi 太 一 ) and the Five
Thearchs in the high seat and to Emperor Gao in the opposite seat. 156 Long before then,
Emperor W u had experimented with at least three kinds of sacrifices in the suburbs. A t
first，he adopted the Q in custom of offering sacrifices to the Five Thearchs— the Blue
Thearch in the east, the Red Thearch in the south, the W hite Thearch in the west, the
Black Tliearch in the north, and the Yellow Thearch at the center~at the five altars in
Yong，approximately 150 kilometers west of the capital. 157 Then Emperor W u accepted
the idea put forward by M iu Ji 繆 忌 ，a master of methods，that the Five Thearchs were
but the assistants of Grand Unity, who was truly the supreme deity. He ordered that an
altar to Grand Unity be built in the southwest suburb of Chang’an according to M iu Ji s
layout. 158 Later, the emperor combined the worship of Grand Unity and that of the Five
Thearchs in Ganquan, a site 1 0 0 kilometers north of the capital. Sacred to the Xiong-
nu 匈奴 people, that was where they communicated w ith Heaven. The A ltar to G rand
Unity in Ganquan, modeled mainly after M iu jis layout, was octagonal in shape and had
three levels. The Altars to the Five Thearchs were located on the lower level; they were
by and large placed in accordance with the directions they guarded. The only exception
was the Altar to the Yellow Hiearch, which could not claim its central position as Grand
Unity already occupied the position; it was placed instead in the southwest to ward off
evil spirits. For the worship of Grand Unity, the offerings were the same as those used at
the altars of Yong~one standard set of sacrificial animals, which included an ox, a sheep,
and a pig~plus wine, jujubes，and dried meats. A yak was also slaughtered to serve as
a sacrificial vessel. For the worship of the Five Ihearchs, only rich wine in appropriate
containers was offered. W ine was also poured on the ground at the four corners of the
altar to please the attending spirits and the Northern Dipper. W hen the offerings had
 been made, the meats that had been sacrificed were all burned. 159 In the Fenggao Bright
Hall, Emperor W u probably performed the suburban ritual developed in Ganquan to
pay his homage to Heaven and again made offerings to Grand Unity and his deputies,
the Five Thearchs.
Emperor W us suburban rituals, like his rituals at the Fenggao Bright Hall, were far
too am bitious and exhausting for later generations to appreciate. Kuang H eng 匡衡 and
other officials at the court of Emperor Cheng impugned the suburban sacrifices，say­
ing that they defied both the teachings of the classics and the working of the cosmos:
Heaven, which was correlated with yang, should be worshiped in the south，not in the
north in Ganquan; Earth, which was correlated with y in ，should be worshiped in the
south, not to the east in Fenyin. They managed to move the sacrifice to Heaven from
Ganquan to the southern suburb of Chang an, and the sacrifice to Earth from Fenyin to
the northern suburb. Hie old practices were restored on occasion after that, but worship­
ing Heaven and Earth in the capital became a regular part of the imperial rituals begin­
ning with Wang Mangs regency. 160
In the Eastern Han，the ritual performed in the Luoyang Bright H all in the first
month of each year was the same as that carried out in the southern suburb of the capi­
tal. Grand Unity was no longer the deity favored in worship. Heaven was represented
just by the Five Thearchs, who were rendered in the Bright H all according to the direc­
tions they guarded. The Yellow Thearch was still placed in the southwest. Instead of
Emperor Gao，the new dynastic founder, Emperor Guangwn, was designated to share
the sacrifices. His position was south of the Blue Thearch^, facing the west. The offerings
were much more frugal, with only one calf for each deity worshiped.161
Although descriptions of the rituals conducted in the Fenggao and Luoyang Bright
Halls are preserved in the extant documents, no detailed description for the Chang’an
Bright H all exists. Ban G u 班 固 （ 32 —9 2 c e ), the author of the Standard H istory o f the

Former Han {Han shu 漢 書 )， just used the term “collective sacrifices” (xiaji 袷 祭 )，though
quite consistently, to describe the opening ceremony conducted there. 162 The collective
sacrifices were offered in particular to the deceased emperors, who may or may not have
had their own temples. The ritual normally took place in the temple of the emperor who
founded the dynasty. In the early phase of the Western Han, it was customary for each
departed emperor to have memorial temples, which were erected not only in the imperial
capital and atop his mausoleum, but also in the capitals of enffeoffed states and admin­
istrative commanderies all over the country. As a result, the memorial temples of the rul­
ing house numbered more than 3 0 0 during the reign of the eighth ruler, Emperor Yuan
(4 8 - 3 3 b c e ). Hie annual expenditures on the maintenance and routines of the temples
became disturbingly extravagant; they had to cover at least 2 4 ,4 5 5 servings of food for the
sacrifices, 4 5 ,1 2 9 guards for security, and 12,147 supplicants, butchers, and musicians for
rituals. A shake-up was inevitable. Emperor Yuan thus ordered the abandonment of all
royal memorial temples in the local capitals. He also decreed that in the imperial capi­
tal, all royal memorial temples, save the one for Emperor Gao and those for the ensuing
five emperors, be destroyed. The ceremony of collective sacrifices was invented to console
the souls of the emperors whose temples no longer existed. It was far more convenient
and economical to worship the deceased emperors all at once in the temple of Emperor
Gao .163
As discussed， the present ruler had to consolidate his mandate through the ritual con­
nection of Heaven and his ancestors in the Bright Hall. For Emperor W u, worshiping
the founder, Emperor Gao, along with Heaven sufficed for the purpose. Probably out of
filial piety，
he only once added his father, Emperor Jing, to share the sacrifices to Heaven
in the Fenggao Bright H all. 164 W hen Emperor Ping, under Wang Mangs guidance,
performed the ceremony of collective sacrifices in the Changan Bright Hall, the ances­
tors he honored included all the deceased Han emperors. There were certainly benefits to
doing so. O n the one hand, the ceremony strengthened the bond between Heaven and
the current reign through the symbolic presence of the royal lineage in its entirety. O n
the other, it signified the centralization of power under the current reign; all vassals and
royal members had to come to Chang'an to pay their respects to the departed emperors
because there were no longer any royal memorial temples in the local capitals. Heavens
mandate was both assumed and delivered by combining the sacrifice to Heaven and the
collective sacrifices to royal ancestors in front of leading vassals and subjects. Since the
ritual of collective sacrifices was routinely, held in the temple of Emperor Gao, Emperor
Ping probably borrowed the ritual the first time the Changan Bright Hall was used. We
are uncertain how the collective sacrifices to ancestors were integrated with the suburban
sacrifice to Heaven on this occasion. A t any rate, the ritual of collective sacrifices made
the Bright H all no less than a temple to royal ancestors. Soon after usurping the throne，
W ang M ang took advantage of the situation. Before constructing the Nine Temples
to his own ancestors， Wang assigned all the ancestors he claimed to the Bright H all to
receive the collective sacrifices. 165
In addition to worshiping Heaven and ancestors, one of the major functions of the
Bright H all was for the Son of Heaven to receive his vassals. Emperor W u introduced a
new calendar in the Fenggao Bright H all，and Wang M ang promised ranks and fiefs in
the Chang’an Bright Hall. More often than not, however, the Han rulers granted their
audiences in the palace. In the Eastern Han, there was even a ceremony called “court
 audience” {chaohui 朝 會 ）held annually in the main audience hall of the palace on the
first day of the first month. The great court audience was designed for the emperor to
accept the loyalty pledges from his subjects in the form of congratulations and gifts. The
subjects offered their token gifts according to their rank: a jade disc from each feudal
lord，a lamb from each official at the rank of 2 , 0 0 0 bushels {dan 石)，a goose from each
official at the rank of 1 , 0 0 0 or 6 0 0 bushels, and a pheasant from each official at less than
4 0 0 bushels. Only feudal lords and the officials at the rank of 2 , 0 0 0 bushels or above

were allowed to enter the hall, where they raised their goblets before the imperial throne
and saluted the emperor with the exclamation “Long life!， ，
The Grand Minister of Works
{da sikong 大 司 空 ）offered broth to the emperor, and the Grand Minister of Agriculture
{da sinong 大 司 農 ）offered boiled rice. In return, the emperor invited all the lords and
officials to enjoy a banquet.166 The New Years court audience norm ally took place in the
Deyang 4惠陽 Palace, whose courtyard was described as being vast enough for 1 0 , 0 0 0
people to turn around in (see Figure 1.1 0 ). Since only the feudal lords and high-ranking
officials were allowed to enter the audience hall, the majority of the attendees remained
in the courtyard: the members of the royal clans stood in the west; the accountant-clerks
who had returned from administrative counties to report on local events and fiscal affairs
were grouped in the north; and the leaders of the palace guards lined up in the east. 167
The arrangement is reminiscent of the gathering in the Bright Hall, although there is
insufficient information to determine to what extent the audience in the Bright Hall
resembled that in the palace.
The uniqueness of the Bright H all lay in the belief that it was the place where the
Son of Heaven claimed and demonstrated Heavens mandate by worshiping Heaven
and his ancestors and by receiving vassals and subjects. But the functions of the Bright
H all overlapped the functions of the three structures already in existence: the suburban
altar to Heaven, the royal ancestral temple, and the main audience hall of the palace.
Not surprisingly, then，the rituals performed in the Bright H all were adapted mostly
from the rituals conducted in those places on comparable occasions. In the Eastern
Han, when all four ritual structures stood in the capital at the same time, the emperor
rotated from one to another. A t the New Year, he held a court audience in the palace;
next, he worshiped Heaven in the southern suburb and Earth in the northern suburb;
then he went to the Bright H all to offer sacrifices to Heaven (represented by the Five
Thearchs) and Emperor Guangwu; and finally he paid his respects in the temple of
Emperor Gao and the temple of Emperor Guangwu. 168 The Bright H all in between
provided the pivotal space where the emperor repeated all ritual activities essential to
justify his rule.
 Hie fact that monthly observances had never been part of the repertoire of the rites
for the Bright Hall did not diminish the effort to bring the two together. The compilers
of the Book o f the K ing o f H uainan were not the first to associate monthly observances
with the Bright Hall. They in fact borrowed the entire discourse from M aster Lus Spring
and A utum n Annals {Lii shi chun qiu 呂氏春秋)，a book assembled under the patron­
age of Lii Buwei 呂 不 韋 （ d_ 235 bce), a former prime minister of the Q in State.169 The
only difference was the treatment of the earth phase. In M aster Lus Spring and A utum n
A nnals, the earth phase was presented at the end of the summer, with no particular rela-
tion to any month or any season. 170 In the Book o f the K ing o f H uainan, it was assigned
to the third month of the summer; the modification, it was explained, was to accomplish
a more thorough interlocking of the four seasons and the Five Phases, but that solution
failed to overcome the inherent mismatch of four and five. The discourse of monthly ob­
servances in the Bright Hall not only impressed the scholars at the court of King H uai­
nan, but also won the approval of ritual specialists in the Han. It was faithfully reiterated
in the Record o f Rites without any attempt to reconsider the placement of earth.171 The
treatise on monthly observances in the Record o f R ites was said to have come from the
Record ofY in and Yang in the B right H all {M ingtang yinyang /« 明 堂 陰 陽錄 )• In the Stan­
dard H istory o f the Former H an, Ban G u did report the circulation of two books under
exactly the same title in the Han, one containing thirty-three fascicles, the other five.172
It was through literary circulation that the memory of monthly observances was sus­
tained. Scholar-officials，who constituted the core of the Han bureaucracy, enlivened
the cultural memory from time to time. Wei Xiang 魏 相 ，for example, more than once
advocated the advantage of performing monthly observances in the Bright Hall in his
memorials to Emperor Xuan (r. 7 3 - 4 9 b c e ) , even though the ritual structure under dis­
cussion was not yet erected in Changan. His fervent wish was for the Han reign to
attain ultimate harmony and utmost benevolence by modeling itself after the operation
of Heaven and Earth and by complying with the succession of the four seasons.173
Although monthly observances did not find their way to the Bright Hall, they never
ceased to capture scholarly attention. By the end of the Eastern Han, Zheng Xuan 鄭
玄 (1 2 7 - 2 0 0 c e ) , a remarkably erudite scholar who offered synthetic annotations to all
the major Confucian classics, felt obliged to track the formation of the discourse. He
deduced that monthly observances, which had crept into the Record o f R ites, were more
a Q in custom than a Zhou one, because they contained accounts in conflict with those
of the Zhou bureaucracy and the calendar. Like many modern scholars, he presumed
that the idealized descriptions of the monthly observances began with the compilers of
Master Lus Spring and Autumn Annals in the Q in State.174 Nonetheless, Cai Yong, an
equally gifted scholar, was unwilling to accept the analysis presented by his contempo­
rary. He chose to believe that monthly observances in the Bright Hall, which perfectly
represented the dynamic cosmos, were passed down from the Zhou and were the irrefut­
able symbol of the glorious past.175 These rituals, which were never performed in the
Han Bright Halls, curiously won advocates in the realm of historical imagination. And
when even the audiences, who attended the Bright H all ceremonies but stood in the
courtyard, had to exercise their imagination to picture what was going on in the main
building, who would have contested the description of monthly observances so vividly
and firmly set forth in texts?
 CHAPTER 2

Engraving Auspicious Omens

W hen people in the Western Zhou began to construct the notion of Heaven’s mandate,
they were concerned not only about the issue of legitimacy after a revolution, but also
about maintaining the Zhou reign after its military conquest of the Shang. Power trans­
fer through dynastic succession may be the most eloquent expression of Heaven s man­
date, but rulers needed portents to assure their subjects of their right to rule once the
strife and turmoil were over. In the Book o f Odesy a song in praise of the Son of Heaven,
probably composed and performed at the Zhou court, expresses how Heaven may have
shown its approval in peacetime:

May Heaven guard and keep you

In great security,
Make you staunch and hale;
What blessings not vouchsafed?
Give you much increase,
Send nothing but abundance.

May Heaven guard and keep you,

Cause your grains to prosper,
Send you nothing that is not good.
May you receive from Heaven a hundred boons,
May Heaven send down to you blessings so many
That the day is not long enough for them all.1

According to the song, once Heaven granted a ruler the mandate, it would also send
down many “blessings” (fu 寺虽)，such as health and prosperity, to fortify the mandate.
Bronze inscriptions confirm the prevalence of the idea that Heavens blessings mani­
fested its mandate in the Western Zhou. For example, the inscription on the basin com­
missioned by the scribe Qiang 墙 in the late tenth century b c e (Figure 2 .1) states:
 令每M 4 & 务$ + 令谆嗜禹.i i | ^ *
♦ 由0 胬 ST 2 ? 鹎 轉 大 . ir ?'^e^= t
3 庄究卖齣？且4 處 感 案 加 （挖 1
, * 愈 i§6P?阀谜1 袭 f^t
I 轅實替翥凌F 铅 f
f i
|料 W 剛 添亲予.井i 潑知i?iF <
嘗且■ 綠塔^ 匕司辱貼訃由|图科
不蚤典m i 輩 4 去秦、
勸 ' . 今方以琲(|鉀
a
i + 讀 f 鴃V f 鹎 片加癲鞺輯§ ? f 敎

2 .1. Qiangpan. Tenth century b c e. Bronze. H. 16.2 cm.

J d l i P K t t ? 串寅 _ n赫 碎 i# 访
Diameter 47.3 cm. Unearthed in 1976 at Zhuangbai in
也无# t
Fufeng, Shaanxi, (a) Photograph, (b) Ink rubbing. 态 尹 茳 鉍 |»丈 ¥
b
Continuing and tranquil is the Son of Heaven! The Son of Heaven strives to carry on the
long valor of [kings] Wen and W u.The Son o f Heaven is diligent and w ithout flaw, faith­
fully making offerings to [the spirits] above and below, and reverently glorifying the great
plans. Heavenly radiant and incorruptible, the Thearch [on H igh], Hou [Ji]，and the witch
protectors give to the Son of Heaven an extensive mandate, thick blessings, and abundant
harvests.2

The inscription describes how the Zhou rulers carefully managed the country founded
by King Wen and King W u under the protection of Heaven and their first ancestor, Hou
J i 后稷 •The juxtaposition of mandate and blessings at the end of the quotation is remi­
niscent of the song in praise of the Son of Heaven. As in the song, harvests were one of
the many blessings that Heaven bestowed on the rulers. Neither the received texts nor
the bronze inscriptions specify what those many blessings were supposed to be, however,
other than the rulers’ health and the country’s prosperity.
The political environment changed drastically in the Eastern Zhou (7 7 0 - 2 5 6 b c e )
when the Zhou kings, forced to move the capital to Luo, were no longer dominant. Even
though the powerful feudal lords still addressed them as the Son of Heaven, the man­
date was clearly not on the side of the declining and ineffective ruling house. Before
the First Emperor finally unified the warring states, the mandate had been in the dark
for centuries. People were no longer content with the general idea of “blessings” as a
loose reference to abundant harvests, and were anxious to find further signs of Heavens
mandate.
Confucius, in legend， was among the first to give the search a new direction. Shu Sun
叔 孫 ，one of the three mighty subjects of the Lu 魯 State, encountered a one-horned
animal on a hunt and regarded it as inauspicious. Confucius went to see the animal and
identified it as a “unicorn” {Jin 麟 )• Then he sighed, “M y way is coming to an end!^ U n­
willing to leave nothing behind when the end came, even if few heeded the principles he
had been preaching, Confucius started to sort historical documents and soon completed
the Spring and A utum n Annals, a history based on the chronology of the Lu, his home
state, which was first affiliated with the Shang and then with the Zhou. Rather than
being an objective record of the past, the book emphasized the supremacy of the Son
of Heaven and the legitimacy of the succession from the Xia through the Shang to the
Zhou, while denouncing all the attempts from ambitious feudal lords to challenge the
Son of Heaven or his legitimacy. Confucius concluded his historical accounts with the
e v e n t s o f 481 b c e , t h e y e a r th e u n i c o r n w a s s i g h t e d .3
Confucius’s reactions to the appearance of a unicorn intrigued later generations.
Gongyang 公 羊 ，in his commentaries on the Spring and A utum n Annals^ which were
assembled no later than the unification of China by the First Emperor, added that a
unicorn, a benevolent animal, appears only for a sage king. Explaining that Confucius in­
cluded this event because a unicorn was a rare animal seldom seen in China, Gongyang
implied that a unicorn, for its benevolence and rarity, signified a good ruler, one who was
presumably approved by Heaven.4 Dong Zhongshu, a Han admirer of Gongyangs doc­
trines, developed his implication. Dong said that Heaven granted only sages its mandate;
when the sage kings of antiquity kept order in the state they governed, phoenixes gath­
ered and unicorns roamed. Dong encouraged the Han emperor to follow in the footsteps
of the ancients and to seek again the grace of Heaven.5 Uncommon creatures, like phoe­
nixes and unicorns, thus became signs of Heavens mandate. Dong Zhongshu and his
Han contemporaries often called them “heavenly auspicious omens” [tianrui 天 瑞 ) . 6
For whom did the unicorn arrive? In his commentaries, Gongyang mentioned that
Confucius had wondered about that. 7 This piece of information generated heated debates.
The traditional interpretation associated the unicorn with the Zhou king. The failure of
one of the kings subjects to recognize the unicorn only proved that the king was losing
his mandate. Alarmed at the political chaos that ensued with the loss of the mandate,
Confucius felt obliged to try to rectify the situation by describing, however judgmen-
tally, what had happened since the end of the Western Zhou. But Dong Zhongshus
followers presented a more radical view, arguing that the unicorn came for Confucius
himself. They declared that the unicorn was a sign that Confucius had received a man-
date to elucidate the principles of benevolent rule by compiling the Spring and A utum n
Annals. They even hailed Confucius as an uncrowned sage, promoting his accomplish­
ment as just as significant as that of the sage kings of remote antiquity. This radical view
contested the highest ruler’s long monopoly over Heaven’s mandate.8
I f the notion of Heaven’s mandate originated in the Western Zhou, the signs of Heav­
ens mandate一 from vague blessings to specific omenswere better articulated during
the Han period when both ruler and ruled were involved in communication between
Heaven and the human world. Inspired by Confucius^ anecdote, Confucian scholars
defined, enriched, and put forward the discourse of auspicious omens. The enthusiasm
for signs of the mandate played out in contemporary visual culture— the omens carved
on the cliff of the Western Passage in present-day Gansu province provide evidence for
that. Albeit remarkable, the cliff carvings have not yet been fully investigated. For some
reason, scholars who study the images of omens have prioritized materials from tombs
and shrines.9 Those who have focused on the case paid no attention to its visual aspect.10
In this chapter, I will position the cliff carvings in the Han discourse of omens, analyz­
ing their unique medium and patrons, discussing how multilayered meanings could have
derived from the images, and exploring how social communication could have taken
place in this difficult terrain.

Moralization

It was Emperor W u who began to tackle Han anxiety over legitimacy by reassigning the
dynastic virtue, performing thefeng-shan ceremony, and restoring the Bright Hall. It was
also during his reign that the political discourse of omens was consolidated.11 One of
the most significant events in this regard was the appearance of a gigantic bronze tripod
(ding 鼎) in 113 b c e . A shaman was reported to have discovered the tripod in Fenyin，
where the emperor worshiped Earth. Emperor W u immediately had the tripod carried
1 0 0 kilometers northward to the Ganquan Palace, where he regularly offered sacrifices

to Heaven. The emperor himself probably rode along on the later leg of the journey,
from the capital, Chang'an. We are told that on the way to Zhongshan, midway between
Chang’an and Ganquan, yellow clouds rose and covered the sky. Just then, a large deer
passed by; the emperor himself shot it down and offered it as a sacrifice. 12
Emperor W u encouraged his subjects to discuss the significance of this event after
he returned to the capital. Most of them viewed the unearthed bronze vessel as a Zhou
 object，presumably one of the nine tripods said to have been cast by Yu, the founder of
the Xia dynasty, to represent the nine administrative districts that he allocated and gov­
erned. Believed to have been passed down from the Xia to the Shang and to the Zhou,
the nine tripods were not only a symbol of centralized power but also an emblem of
legitimate succession. Linking the newly discovered bronze vessel to the legend of the
nine tripods, the officials at the court of Emperor W u intended to stress that the Han
dynasty was the rightful heir to the Zhou. Nevertheless, it was W uqiu Shouwang 吾丘
釋王 who won the argument and earned a reward of gold from the emperor. He said
that the bronze vessel unexpectedly found in Fenyin was a “heavenly auspicious omen”
that announced Heavens approval of the Han reign; it was a tripod that Heaven directly
granted to the Han, not a tripod that Heaven had once bestowed on the Zhou. Regard­
ing an auspicious omen as a manifestation of Heavens mandate, W uqiu went beyond the
framework of the dynastic cycle and displayed unusual confidence in the government of
which he was part.13
The Han court had recognized the value of auspicious omens to confirm Heavens
mandate before the discovery of the tripod. For instance, officials had recommended
naming the reign years with “heavenly auspicious omens” instead of using only numbers.
They made the proposal in 123 bce, when Emperor W u obtained a white unicorn on his
way to offer sacrifices to the Five Thearchs in Yong. To commemorate this omen， 123 bce
became the beginning of the Epochal Hunting (Yuanshou 元 狩 )• Retrospectively，offi­
cials made 135 bce the beginning of the Epochal Light (Yuanguang 元光）to celebrate
the appearance of a comet. 14 Accordingly, the Epochal Tripod (Yuanding 元 鼎 ）was
to celebrate the discovery of a tripod.15 Emperor Xuan, a great-grandson of Emperor
W u, faithfully followed this precedent by. having various auspicious omens incorporated
into the chronology of his reign, including Miraculous Sparrows, Five Phoenixes, Sweet
Dew, and the Yellow Dragon. 16 By naming reign years after auspicious omens and punc­
tuating the calendar with them, the Han court reiterated the conviction that its rule had
originally been blessed with the mandate, and Heaven continued to approve it. Giving
reign periods auspicious names became a convention, and the practice was adopted until
the end of imperial rule in China.
Whereas rulers used omens to justify the popularity of their reigns, Confucian schol­
ars endeavored to employ omens to promote benevolent rule. Upon the enthronement
of Emperor W u, Dong Zhongshu urged his sovereign to heed the relationship between
Heaven and humans. He asserted that abnormal phenomena in the natural world were
nothing but Heavens response to government. They were bad omens~visitations or
prodigies {zaiyi 災 異 )一 if Heaven was criticizing it; they were good omens if Heaven
approved. A successful ruler would always examine the messages from Heaven with
great care, said Dong. He emphasized that “heavenly auspicious omens” would come
along only in response to the sincerity of a ruler. No favorable omens had occurred so far
because Heaven and Earth had not yet achieved harmony. Accordingly, he advised the
new emperor to replace punishment (xing 刑）with benevolence (de 德)， which should be
realized through the promotion of moral education and social propriety.17
Influenced by Confucianism, Emperor W u indeed puzzled over the signs of Heavens
mandate while longing to realize the political accomplishments of the ancient sage kings,
whose reigns were purportedly characterized by good omens from the natural world, such
as bumper harvests of the five grains, the thriving of the six domestic animals, the fall of
sweet dew, the timely arrival of wind and rain, the flourishing of grasses, the emergence
of vermilion grasses, hills that were never bare, ponds that never dried up, unicorns and
phoenixes that stayed by suburban lakes, turtles and dragons that swam in the marshes,
and diagrams and documents that emerged from the Yellow and Luo Rivers. To learn
how to achieve the same status, the emperor sought advice from the erudite recruited in
130 b c e . Gongsun Hong 公孫弘 offered his opinion， buttressing Dong Zhongshus view
on benign administration and on the harmony between Heaven and Earth. According
to Gongsun, if a ruler demonstrated benevolence at court, then the people would behave
well in the country. The harmony between the ruler’s and the peoples state of mind would
lead to the harmony of qi\ the harmony of qi would lead to the harmony of form, the har­
mony of sound, and eventually the harmony of Heaven and Earth. W hen the harmony of
the universe was complete, auspicious omens would appear to grace the worthy reign. 18
Immersed in the moral discourse of omens, Emperor W u could not help but reflect
upon his own governance when auspicious omens did appear. For example, Emperor W u
asked himself and his subjects why a tripod turned up in Fenyin just after he had offered
sacrifices to Earth to pray for an abundant harvest to overcome flood disasters in the past
few years, but before his prayer came true. That is, the emperor was pondering whether
his political efforts deserved the good omen. In response, W uqiu Shouwang underscored
the principle that a precious tripod would emerge whenever a reign endorsed by Heaven
was benevolent. The Fenyin tripod, he reasoned, was supposed to honor the virtue that
had accumulated since the time of Emperor Gao，the founder of the Han dynasty. In
the end, Emperor W u ordered the tripod, discovered not far from the imperial altar for
worshiping Earth，to be stored in the Ganquan Palace, where the imperial worship of
Heaven took place. The decision not only showed his gratitude to Heaven but also rein­
forced the belief that the auspicious omen derived from the desirable harmony between
Heaven and Earth .19
 Benevolent rule and auspicious omens became inseparable in the Han mind. In an
edict issued in 65 b c e for the blessing of phoenixes and sweet dew, Emperor Xuan, like
his great-grandfather, reviewed his reign with humble remarks: he had not yet enhanced
his forebears’ brilliant achievements, not yet united and pacified the people， not yet kept
pace with the sequence of the four seasons, and not yet complied with Heaven as well
as Earth. He therefore received auspicious omens in awe and promised more diligent
devotion to his duties. He also commanded the renovation of the altars for worshiping
Heaven and Earth in order to pay homage to auspicious omens that presumably arose
from the harmony of the cosmos. After that, Emperor Xuan claimed his lack of vir­
tue whenever he was dignified by propitious omens，and transferred the glory of their
appearance to the country by declaring amnesties and rewarding subjects.20
The rewards given because of the appearance of auspicious omens were fairly generous
during the reign of Emperor Xuan. In the aforementioned edict, he ordered that high-
ranking officials be given noble titles, that minor officials be promoted, that spouses of
the chiefs who supervised 1 0 0 households be given oxen and wines, and that widows,
elders，and social exemplars be granted silks and be forgiven any debts. The emperor
offered rewards when sweet dew descended on the Weiyang Palace in the capital and
when phoenixes gathered at M ount Tai and in Chenliu 陳留 Commandery， both in the
far east. In fact, as early as 73 bce, when phoenixes were reported to be flocking in Jiao-
dong 膠東 Kingdom and Qiancheng 千乘 Commandery，both in Shandong Peninsula,
Emperor Xuan bestowed rewards on a similar scale along with a bonus: taxes would not
be levied for that year. Later imperial rewards were offered more narrowly by the region
in which auspicious omens occurred. In 51 bce, when phoenixes were said to swarm at
Xincai 新蔡 ， near the present border between Henan and Anhui provinces, the emperor
awarded silks to the governor of Runan 汝南 Commandery，to which Xincai belonged，
and to the officials，elders, widowers，and social exemplars at Xincai; he also waived that
years tax for the people of Xincai alone. As a result, local officials were all eagerness to
report the appearance o f auspicious omens. M ore than fifty districts declared that phoe­
nixes descended when the em peror died.21 Auspicious omens thus were appreciated by
both sides: the ruler fortified his mandate with good omens，and many of his subjects
seized opportunities to toady and to profit thereby.
Mistakes did occur when people were too eager to report auspicious omens. Huang
Ba 黃霸 proclaimed in 55 b c e that miraculous sparrows had been sent down by Heaven
to honor his benevolent administration when he was Chancellor {chengxiang 丞 相 )， one
of the three highest ministers in the Han government. It turned out that the sparrows
flying to his office came from the house of Zhang Chang 張敞，then the Metropolitan
 Governor {jingzhaoyin 京 兆 尹 )，administrative head of the capital city and its environs.
Zhang Chang clarified the fact in a memorial to the emperor, to Huang Bas embarrass­
ment.22 There was no guarantee of the validity of many other reports from local offi­
cials. Emperor Guangwu, who resumed the Han dynasty, went so far as to dismiss the
announcement of the fall of sweet dew in thirty-one districts, even though officials at
court protested against his decision by mentioning the precedents set by Emperor Xuan .23
Before being promoted to chancellor, Huang Ba had been graced more than once by
phoenixes and miraculous sparrows. There is no way to verify whether all the auspicious
omens associated with him when he was the governor of Yingchuan 顆 jll Command-
ery in present-day Henan occurred，but he did earn an enviable reputation as a benign
administrator. He was more interested in civilizing people with education than in coerc­
ing them with penalties. Although he was compassionate in offering financial aid to the
poor and to those who had no spouses， parents, or children, he was also capable at man­
aging the commandery finances and creating additional revenue. Under his eight-year
administration, the number of dutiful sons, fraternal siblings， and chaste wives increased,
we are told, and there was no capital crime, the longest term of imprisonment being
only eight years. Huangs achievements inevitably frustrated his immediate successor,
who happened to believe in severe punishment but, despite trying hard, could not break
Huang’s shining record. Even Ban Gu, the compiler of the official history of the West­
ern Han, had to cite Huang Ba as one of the best administrators who had ever served the
country.24
The case of Huang Ba shows that the emperor did not monopolize auspicious omens;
high-ranking officials, particularly the three highest ministers at court and the com-
mandery governors， were allowed to share in the glory of good omens. The three high-
est ministers, traditionally called the Three Excellencies {sangong 三公)， were the heads
o f the bureaucracy. In the W estern H an, the three m ost em inent positions were C han­
cellor, who assisted the em peror in attending to all sorts o f national affairs; Supreme
Commander {taiw ei 太 尉 )，who took responsibility for military affairs; and Imperial
Counselor, who oversaw civil affairs， which included being in charge of documents and
supervising officials. In the X in and Eastern Han, the most eminent positions were
Grand Minister of Finance {da situ 大 司 徒 )，Marshal of State {da sima 大 司 馬 )，and
Grand Minister of Works.25 As the agents responsible for implementing the emperor’s
wishes, the three highest ministers were equally responsible for the outcome of all gov­
ernment policies, good or bad. Huang Ba may have appropriated propitious omens for
his own use， but more often than not, the three highest ministers became scapegoats for
the emperor once unfavorable omens occurred. W hen Mars lingered in the lunar lodge
 Heart (a Scorpii) in 7 b c e , an omen believed to indicate that the emperors life was in
danger, Zhai Fangjin 翟方進 as Chancellor was forced to take the blame; he committed
suicide to mitigate Heavens wrath. Zhais sacrifice proved to be in vain, for Emperor
Cheng died several weeks later.26 Nevertheless, the three highest ministers continued to
pay for the appearance of bad omens by being ruthlessly removed from office， if not put
to death.27 Hie moral discourse of omens was a Confucian strategy to restrain the abso­
lute power of the monarch, but it sometimes turned to strike the helpless subject instead.
Lower in rank, commandery governors {taishou 太 守 ) were seldom punished for bad
omens that seemed to be directed at the emperor or the reign. In 3 b c e , not long after
Zhai Fangjins forced suicide, an imperial adviser suggested that the emperor have a
commandery governor killed in response to a celestial sign that foretold troubles along
the border, but this outrageous proposal was never carried out.28 Except for the capi­
tal and its environs, Han territory was largely divided into two parallel systems, as seen
in Figure 2 .2 : the system of kingdoms over marquisates preserved the feudalism of the
Zhou, and the system of commanderies over districts followed the reforms of the Qin.
To more efficiently control the local government, Emperor W u added thirteen regions
to the structure, each region comprising several commanderies or kingdoms.29 Official
records show that administrators at the second level— governors for commanderies and
counselor-delegates for kingdoms— frequently received auspicious omens if they were
benevolent, but neither heads of regions, a level above them，nor heads of districts or
marquisates, a level below them, did. This was probably because regional administra­
tors were not truly engaged in local affairs, while district and marquisate administrators
were less powerful and too provincial; auspicious omens occurred for all of these only
on occasion. Judging by the interpretation of omens， governors and counselor-delegates
were the proper mediators between the emperor and his people. That is why, in praising
Huang Bas accomplishments as governor of a commandery, Emperor Xuan referred to
Huang as his “humerus” {gonggu 肱 骨 )，or, to use a familiar English metaphor, his right
hand .30 The metaphor vividly captures the pivotal role of the leading local administra­
tors; like the three highest ministers, they were agents of the emperor. M uch as Heaven
bestowed on an emperor the mandate to rule the country, the emperor granted local offi­
cials the mandate to rule their designated areas. Those who proved worthy were there­
fore entitled to auspicious omens.
According to Han official history, auspicious omens honored the benevolent gover­
nors whose commanderies lay at both the center and the periphery of the empire. Propi­
tious signs~phoenixes, unicorns, auspicious grain, and sweet dew~were said to occur
frequently in Yingchuan Commandery, only 1 0 0 kilometers southeast of the Eastern
 Emperor

Three Excellencies
(sangong 三公）

Chancellor Supreme Commander Imperial Counselor

Western Han
{chengxiang 丞相） [taiwei 太尉） (yushi dafu 御史大夫）

Xin Grand Minister Marshal of State Grand Minister of Works

Eastern Han {da situ 大司徒） {da sim a 大司馬） {da sikong 大司空）

Regions
(bu 部 ，zhou 州）

Inspectors
{cishi 刺史）

r
Commanderies Kingdom
(ju n 郡） (wangguo 王國）

Governors Counselor-delegates
(taishou 太守） {wangguo xiang 王國相）

. I
Districts Marquistates
(xian 縣） (houguo 侯國）

Counselor-delegates
Magistrates
{houguo xiang 侯國相）
(xianling 縣令）

2 .2 . Structure o f the Han government.

 Han capital of Luoyang, after Q in Peng 秦彭 became governor in 82 c e . Q in preferred
propriety to penalty，and he regularly inspected archery contests and fed elders at the
local school, two Confucian rites that the emperor also performed in the capital. Q in
Peng formulated four commandments to regulate proper behavior between father and
son, elder and younger brothers, and husband and wife. He promoted meritorious people
and dismissed officials guilty of misconduct, but without otherwise punishing them. Like
Huang Ba, Q in Peng was an exemplary official by Han standards.31 His contemporary
Wang Zhui 王 追 ，the governor of Shu 蜀 Commandery in present-day Sichuan, was
also much admired. The Shu Commandery was more than 900 kilometers from Luo­
yang on the Han frontier. It was full of minority peoples, such as the Qiang 完 . Peace
and civilization on the Chinese model became Wang Zhuis primary goals.To establish
order, he did not hesitate to enforce the law，but he was both firm and fair. To cultivate
propriety，he built schools and instituted a dress code. His governance was believed to
cause the appearance of white crows and sweet dew and the emergence of four miracu­
lous horses from the river.32
It was in the fascination with benevolent rule and auspicious omens that people com­
memorated the administrative accomplishments of Li X i 李 翁 ， the governor ofW udu 武
都 Commandery, on the cliff of the Western Passage near Xiabian 下辨 in present-day
Gansu. The text on the cliff, traditionally called the H ym n o f the Western Passage (X ixia
song 西 狹 頌 )，was incised in 171 c e . The inscription consists of three components: the
preface, the hymn, and the list of patrons. The preface declares that the main reason for
producing the monument was to express immense gratitude to L i X i for improving local
transportation over difficult terrain (Figure 2.3). W udu was a commandery on the north­
western border of Shu, approximately 650 kilometers away from Luoyang; it did not
become part of the Han Empire until the reign of Emperor W u.33 Situated between the
Qinling 秦嶺 Mountains and the Tibetan Plateau, the region was full of high precipices
and deep ravines. Along rivers was the best way to travel, but wherever the water was too
fast to navigate a boat, plank footways and footbridges became necessary. Li X i helped
to improvearouteconnectingWuduandthe Hanzhong漢中andSichuanBasins.The
preface describes how L i Xi, inspecting the route in person, noticed how narrow and
precarious the old footway alongside the cliff was. Travelers on the narrow way, w hich
barely accommodated a vehicle or a horse， could neither make their way swiftly nor stop
to rest, for they were constantly at risk of being overturned and falling into the ravine.
L i X i realized that sooner or later, there would be a disastrous mishap and immediately
initiated a construction project to widen and reinforce the footway. The inscription says
that travelers were now able to take the new footway easily even at night.34
 2 .3. Hym n o f the Western Passage. 171 ce. C liff inscription. 148 x 196 cm. Chengxian, Gansu. Ink rubbing.

Although the primary incentive for producing the monument was to celebrate the
completion of the footway, the first half of the preface was dedicated to Li X is gen­
eral achievements as governor. We are told that he led people with indiscriminate love,
taught them with benevolence and righteousness, and showed them what to like and
dislike, so he was able to rule without being severe and awe-inspiring; he could have his
decrees executed without leaving his office. In his commandery, the powerful refrained
from oppressing the weak, while the learned knew better than to swindle the ignorant;
there were no conflicts between subordinate districts because all officials followed his
teachings and policies; and the people had abundant harvests year after year. As the gov­
ernor of a frontier commandery, Li X i had to deal with rebellious minorities living across
the border. More than 2,000 of them were once brought to his court with their hands
tied behind their backs.35
A ll in all, Li Xis lenient but efficient government deserved the grace of auspicious
omens, and indeed, according to the inscription, some appeared even before he assumed
duty in W udu. To emphasize the point, the images of five good omens— a yellow dragon,
a white deer, sweet dew, auspicious grain, and interconnecting trees~were engraved along
with the text (Figure 2.4). The images may supplement the text, but they occupy a com­
parable area on the cliffside. True, the text is twice as wide as the images, but both the text
area and the image area are 1.5 meters high, and the five images stand out more than the
500-plus characters in the text (Figure 2.5).36In addition, the images are placed before the
text. A ll the arrangements clearly make the engraved omens a comprehensive icon of the
benevolent rule detailed in the incised text. No doubt the monument as a whole attested
to the distinctiveness of omens in the Han, but given the weight of the visual component
here, we may wonder how images figured in the discourse of omens generally. D id pic­
tures of auspicious omens ever constitute a particular genre in Han visual culture?

Canonization

The auspicious omens recorded at court from the time of Emperor W u were intended to
reaffirm the mandate granted to the Han ruling family. Wang Mang, who harbored an
ambition to be emperor himself, realized that auspicious omens instead could facilitate
the transfer of the mandate to him. Wang provided propitious signs at crucial moments
to make his political advances: a white stone in Wugong helped him become Regent­
ing Emperor; the appearance of a new well in Q i, a stone in Yong, and a stone bull in
Ba helped him become Acting Emperor; and the emergence of a golden casket in the
Temple of Emperor Gao helped him make the final step to emperor.37
Most of the Han auspicious omens were open to interpretation, but those related to
Wang Mang, particularly the ones with accompanying texts, were loaded with unam­
biguous messages. The Wugong stone was incised with a sentence announcing Wang
as emperor. W hen Wang received the Yong stone and the Ba bull in front of the pal­
ace, a bronze tablet and a silk chart suddenly turned up from nowhere, bearing longer
inscriptions that began: “Heaven announces the sign of emperorship.”Hie golden casket
2 .4 a. Five om ens at the Western Passage. 171 c e . C liff carving. 153.4 x 100.5 cm
Chengxian, Gansu. Ink rubbing.
2 .4b. Five omens at the Western Passage. 171 c e . C liff carving. 153.4
Chengxian, Gansu. Drawing.
installed in the Temple of Emperor Gao carried an even longer document, which urged
Empress Dowager Wang, currently in control of the court, to heed Heavens mandate by
acknowledging her kinsman Wang Mang as the Son of Heaven.38
The manipulation of auspicious omens continued after Wang Mang had taken the
throne. To begin with, he compiled a book entitled Signs o f the M andate {Fuming 符 命 )
to introduce the sanctioned omens. According to Han official history, the book, no lon­
ger extant, consisted of forty-two fascicles: twenty-five on “signs of the mandate，
” twelve
on “responses of blessings” ( » 叹 福 應 )， and five on “auspicious omens of benevolence”
{dexiang 德 祥 )• The signs of the mandate were portents, like the stone in Wugong, the
new well in Q i, and the golden casket in the Temple of Emperor Gao. The responses of
blessings concerned phenomena such as a hen metamorphosing into a cock.39 The aus­
picious omens of benevolence included matters like the growth of branches and leaves in
Wang Mangs ancestral cemetery.
The canonization of favorable omens in Signs o f the M andate implied an irrefutable
conclusion: that Wang Mang was obliged to establish a new dynasty to rule the coun-
 I
0
5

try. The book started with the auspicious omens of benevolence, claiming that the Han
mandate, once epitomized by the yellow dragon, had faltered since the reign of the ninth
emperor and the 210th year of Han dynastic rule; the claim was grounded on G u Yongs
numerological argument about the decline of the Han mandate.40 Branches and leaves
were said to have sprouted from the catalpa pillars supporting the gate to Wang Bos 王
柏 tomb in present-day Shandong, a sign believed to foretell the birth of a blessed de­
scendant who would bring honor to the clan. An offspring of Wang Bo, Wang Mang
happened to have been born in the year of the sprouting pillars and used the unusual
phenomenon as a good omen for his succession to the throne.41 The book continued
with signs of the mandate, reiterating the omens that had helped Wang to rise in rank,
and concluded with the responses of blessings, twelve omens corresponding to the signs
of the mandate, whose occurrence impelled Wang to assume the position of emperor
when, with pretentious modesty, he initially declined.42
Wang Mang was very conscious not only of the omens but also of the style in which
they were presented. He chose to adopt the E rya style.43 E rya 爾 雅 （ literally，
'approach­
ing the correct and graceful”) is the title of a lexicon of names, terms, and key words;
grouped by subject, the book deals with music, kinship, water, mountains, Earth, Heaven,
and other such topics.44 W hen Wang Mang pushed through the construction of the
Bright Hall in Chang’an，he invited thousands of scholarly specialists to the capital;
experts on E rya were among the most welcome, as were those with training in the 〇ld-
Text classics (for example, M aster M aos 毛 commentaries on the Book o f Odes) and
those with skill in pragmatic fields (for example, astronomy, military strategy, monthly
observances).45 By following the E rya style, Wang Mang intended to introduce selected
omens as objective knowledge to mask his propagandistic message.
To widen his audience, Wang M ang circulated Signs o f the M andate. Shortly after his
enthronement, he dispatched the so-called Generals of Five Majesties {w uw eijiang 五
威 將 ）to distribute the book, granting one of them the title Marquis for Expounding
Omens [shuofu hou 說 符 侯 ).Tliese generals delivered both Signs o f the M andate and seals
of the X in dynasty to feudal lords and local officials and took back the Han seals. They
even performed the same duty outside X in territory, reaching as far as the Xiongnu in the
northern steppes and the kingdoms in the Western Region surrounding the Taklamakan
Desert. The procession of generals was especially impressive. Their carriages, for example,
were decorated with the hexagrams qian 車乞and kun 坤 from the Book o f Changes, sym­
bolizing Heaven and Earth, respectively. Five commanders clustered around each gen­
eral, all of their costumes and vehicles strictly following the color and number guidelines
specified by the doctrine of the Five Phases. The generals, who held sticks with tassels,
were acting as the envoys of Grand Unity, supreme among the heavenly deities; the com­
manders, as the envoys of the Five Thearchs, assistants to Grand Unity, had banners
with feathers.46 The entire procession was meant to mimic the cosmos in motion, with
the generals handing over books and seals as tokens of Heavens mandate. Under the
circumstances, no member of the political elite could escape knowing of the auspicious
omens collected in Signs o f the M andate.
We know very little about individual attempts to standardize the auspicious omens
before Wang Mangs attempt. The only book mentioned in official history that tells of
such an attempt, Good Omens and Abnorm al Things {Zhenxiang bianguai 禎 祥 變 怪 )，is
now lost.47 After Wang, scholars partaking in the debates in the W hite Tiger H all in
the first century cited a document called Commentaries on the Responses o f Auspicious
Omens in the Spring and A utum n Annals (Chun qiu ru iyin g zhuan 春 秋 瑞 應 傳 )，but we
are uncertain whether it existed in Wangs time.48 Although the popularity of Signs o f
the M andate would have dwindled once the X in regime toppled, Wangs effective propa­
ganda must have sparked an enthusiastic interest in omens.49 In the first century, when
Ban G u combed various archives to compile the official history of the Western Han, he
wrote Treatise on the F ive Phases ( W uxing zh i 五 行 志 ）to deal with the large corpus of
documents about visitations, prodigies, and auspicious omens.50
We do not know, either, whether Wang Mangs Signs o fthe M andate or ensuing books
on auspicious omens had illustrations. W hat we do know is that pictures of auspicious
omens were circulated in Han times. As early as 109 b c e , officials at the court of Emper­
or W u “unrolled pictures and checked documents” to ascertain that a fungus with nine
stems and joined leaves growing in the Ganquan Palace was an auspicious omen.51W hen
Wang Chong 王 充 (27-ca. 100 ce), a rationalist and independent thinker, accounted for
the appearance of eight dragons in the south in 80 ce , he noted that with their heads
raised and turned back, they had the posture of dragons represented in pictures.52Wang
Chong even claimed elsewhere that it was not at all difficult to identify a phoenix or a
unicorn as long as one was allowed to examine pictures and study precedents.53
Ban G u used the term rut 如 瑞 圖 (illustration o f auspicious omens) to refer to the
depictions that helped determine good omens.54 Such pictures were so popular that
women in the first century were said to copy the designs in jewelry.55 A synonymous
title, ruiying 瑞應圖（ illustration of the responses of auspicious omens), also appeared
in the Han period; it was more widely used in later times. A document entitled Illustra­
tion o f the Responses o f Auspicious Omens as a Supplement to the R itu a l Canons (L i ruiying tu
禮 瑞 應 圖 )，now lost, was probably assembled and circulated in the Eastern Han, when
the fashion of employing prognostications to explain the Confucian classics reached its
 a

2 .6. Omens in the Wu Liang shrine. 151c e . Stone carving. Discovered in 1786 in

Jiaxiang, Shandong, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.

peak.56 In the third century, scholars like Ru Chun 如淳 began to quote a source called
Illustration o f the Responses ofAuspicious Omens (R uiying tu 瑞 應 圖 ） ，whose authorship
and date of compilation are unclear.57
None of the Han pictures of auspicious omens mentioned in the received texts sur­
vives. Only the carvings on the ceiling of the W u Liang 武梁 Shrine， erected in the sec­
ond half of the second century, offer us a glimpse of this pictorial genre.58 The ceiling
is composed of two rectangular stone slabs on which at least thirty-seven omens, now
heavily damaged, are engraved (Figure 2.6). Each omen is accompanied by a cartouche
explaining the political implication of its appearance. For instance, the image of a cir­
cular disc goes with the text that first identifies the represented object as the “bi disc of
colored glass” {bi liu li 璧琉璃 ）and then expounds on the intended message: “It arrives
when a ruler does not dissemble his faults” (Figure 2.7).59 As W u Hung suggests, these
carvings must have been based on contemporary illustrations of auspicious omens.60The
composition of each slab, with omens placed in five horizontal registers, further reminds
us of the illustrations in the manuals retrieved from Tomb 3 (168 b c e ) at Mawangdui
馬王堆 in Hunan, such as the chart of clouds for divination (Figure 2.8).61 The early
 1
f
b
2 .7. B i disc o f colored glass in the Wu Liang shrine.
151 ce. Stone carving. Discovered in 1786 in Jiaxiang,
Shandong, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Print.

I f € 等
S H S

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篥診
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2 .8. Chart o f clouds for divination, ca. 168

b c e . Ink and color on silk. H. 48 cm.

Unearthed in 1973-74 from Tomb 3 at Mawangdui in Changsha, Hunan.

examples indicate that images available for consultation in Han times, including illus­
trations of auspicious omens, were painted mostly on silk and rolled up like scrolls when
not in use.
Unlike Wang Mangs Signs o f the M andate, which speaks exclusively for the ruler, the
carvings of the W u Liang Shrine convey the viewpoint of Confucian scholars who, as
M artin Powers argues, sought to use the discourse of omens to criticize or prevent gov­
ernment wrongdoing.62 Some cartouches are specific in enumerating favorable behavior
on the part of a ruler that would account for the appearance of auspicious omens, such as
being pure and incorrupt, being just in punishment, honoring the worthy, employing vir­
tuous and qualified officials, taking care of widows and widowers, not dissembling faults,
not drying up ponds containing fish, and not ripping open pregnant animals and harm­
ing the young. Some cartouches state only the general characteristics of a good ruler,
such as not being brutal and tyrannical and instead wearying himself for the sake of the
people, and cultivating a virtue that achieves harmony and reaches far and high, far and
deep. Some cartouches even allude to a political utopia with minimal governance that
emphasizes quiescence and nonaction.63 The message in all the cartouches is consistent:
whether a ruler can win the approval of Heaven, symbolized by the various omens, is
contingent on the degree of his benevolence.
The carvings of the W u Liang Shrine also reveal what counted as omens in the Han
mind. Among the twenty-three decipherable omens, the majority take the form of crea­
tures, including nine animals, two birds, and two fish. The next largest category com­
prises objects: a silver jar, a ding tripod, a sheng 勝 headgear, a bi disc of colored glass,
and a gui 圭 tablet of jade. The remainders are two plants, two human beings, and two
natural phenomena. The human beings are foreigners coming from afar to pay tribute to
Chinese sage kings in remote antiquity. The natural phenomena are a surging well and
the essence of a jade stone. Except for the dragon and the unicorn, all the represented
omens are things that people probably encountered in the real world, but they are either
rare or abnormal. The rarities are the white tiger, the red bear, and the white horse with a
red mane. The abnormal things are a six-legged beast, interconnecting trees, birds joined
at the wing, and fish joined at the eye. Having observed what we now understand as gene
mutation, Han people tried to make sense of it within the framework of cosmology. The
unusual occurrences therefore became Heavens messages, conveying Heavens will and
mood to the human world.
A ll twenty-three of the discernible omens in the W u Liang Shrine reemerged in
Treatise on Auspicious Signs and Omens (Furui zh i 符 瑞 志 )，composed by Shen Yue 沈約
(441—513 c e ) for Standard H istory o f the L iu Song，420—4 ^ {Song shu 宋 書 ) .64 The treatise
 0 %

2 .9 . Omens in a Wu family shrine. Mid-second century c e . Stone carving.

Discovered in 1786 in Jiaxiang, Shandong, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.

marked another major effort after Wang Mangs to canonize the auspicious omens, but
Slien’s motives were more archival than political, even though the discourse of omens
was already politically charged. Unlike Ban Gu, who wrote Treatise on the F ive Phases to
incorporate all signs derived from the correlation between nature and the human world,
Shen felt the need to separate blessings from warnings; he placed bad omens in the con­
ventional treatise on the Five Phases but created a new one in particular for good omens.
Shen enumerated as many as ninety-four good omens by synthesizing various sources
that may or may not have been produced in the H an.65 Since the way the omens are
described in the W u Liang Shrine cartouches are more or less identical to the way the
same omens are described in Shens treatise, Shen and the shrine builder may have both
seen the same illustrated catalogue, one that was popular no later than the second half of
the second century.
It is impossible for us to know exactly how many kinds of illustrated catalogues of
auspicious omens were in circulation during the Han period, but archaeological finds
shed some light. Few images of auspicious omens with cartouches have been excavated
at Han sites, apart from those in the W u Liang Shrine. A stone slab from another W u
family shrine has some of the surviving examples (Figure 2.9). As W u Hung points
out, however, the carvings on this slab are different from those in the W u Liang Shrine
 because they contain both auspicious and inauspicious omens.66 The omens appear to
be more comparable to the lists in such guidebooks as Good Omens and Abnorm al Things^
which assisted people in distinguishing spirits, welcoming the good, and warding off
evil. Omens along this line, even auspicious ones, may or may not have been tied to
Heavens mandate and benevolent rule.
Another variety of catalogue came from Tomb i at Wangdu 望 都 ，Hebei. The brick
tomb is composed of three vaulted chambers; the ones in the front and center have side
chambers, and the rear one is deepened by a niche (Figure 2.10).67 The murals that are
painted on the walls of the front chamber and on the passageway to the central chamber
are divided into two registers: the top register, occupying two-thirds of the wall, displays
a row of dutiful officials and functionaries, and the bottom register displays a string of
auspicious omens (Figure 2.11). The murals make the tomb look like a government office.
The officials with the highest rank are seated at the very back of the front chamber,
flanking the entrance to the passageway. Cartouches identify them as chief recorders in
charge of the flow of documents for the local government. The standing figures shown
on the two long walls of the front chamber are scribes; functionaries in charge of labor,
the police, and justice; and servants to do all sorts of menial tasks. Two gatekeepers, on
the wall opposite the one with the seated officials, are guarding the entrance to the front
chamber. O n the walls of the passageway leading to the central chamber are two scribes,
one functionary, and one gatekeeper, who stand there as if they await the bidding of
their master in the central chamber. Since the functionary at the beginning of the pro­
cession on the east wall carries the title Merciful Warden {renshuyuan 仁 恕 掾 )一 a posi­
tion permitted in the Eastern Han only for governments at the level of a commandery
or a kingdom— the master was probably a high administrator of such a unit.68 And since
Wangdu belonged to Zhongshan Kingdom in the Eastern Han, the tomb occupant was
very likely the counselor-delegate of this kingdom. The memorial hymn written on the
passageway leading from the front chamber to its western side chamber further informs
us that the deceased indeed “took office for the Han ruling house and was a pivotal sup­
port of the country.”69 The auspicious omens painted along the bottom register of the
walls therefore symbolized the benevolent reputation the tomb occupant presumably
enjoyed during his lifetime. The painted omens include five birds, two animals, one plant,
and “goat wine” {yangjiu 羊酒 ) represented by ajar and a goat (Figure 2.11c). Since goat
wine is included in neither the carvings of the W u Liang Shrine nor in Shen Yue’s trea­
tise, the tomb designer must have consulted a different illustrated catalogue.
A simpler version of the visual program at Wangdu is found in the tomb of M iu Yu
繆乡于，who, according to the epitaph, served as counselor-delegate of Pengcheng 彭城
 Central Chamber

Junior clerk 小史 侍閣 Attendant at the official gates

? clerk勉 □ 謝 史 白 事 史 Reporter

Staff of the labor section 門下功曹 主薄 主記史 門下小 史 Headquarters junior clerk
Chief Chief
Headquarters patroller 門下游徼 Recorder Recorder 辟 車 伍 但 八 人 Eight functionaries

Staff of the police section 門下贼曹 伍倍 Functionary

Headquarters clerk 門下史 伍但 Functionary

Front Chamber

Thief-catching clerk 追鼓掾 賊曹 Staff of the police section

? clerk D O 掾 仁 恕 祿 MercifUl warden

門亭長 寺 門卒
Chief at the city gates Guard at the headquarters gates

Tomb
2r
Passage

2 .10. Layout o f Tomb i at Wangdu, Hebei.

2 .11. Functionaries and omens. 25-220 c e . Mural. Unearthed in 1952 from Tomb 1 at Wangdu, Hebei,
on the east wall o f the front chamber, (a) Drawing, (b) Copy, (c) Copy o f a detail showing “goat wine.”
 2 .12. Floor plan and cross-sections o f the M iu Yu tomb.

Kingdom in present-day Jiangsu and was buried in 151 c e .70 Built of stone, the rectan­
gular tomb is partitioned into a front chamber, a central chamber, and the surrounding
corridor (Figure 2.12). Images are incised on three beams in the front chamber and on
the two walls framing the entrance to the central chamber. The carving in question is on
the southern section of the entrance walls. It divides a vertical stone slab into four regis­
ters, with figures in the upper two registers and creatures in the lower two (Figure 2.13).
In the top register, a cartouche to the left of the central seated figure identifies him (or
the fellow next to him) as a gatekeeper. Three different kinds of gatekeepers are repre­
sented in the Wangdu tomb: the chief at the “city gates” {meriting 門亭)， the guard at the
“headquarters gates” {simen 寺 門 ） ，
and the attendant at the “office gates” (ge 閣） • In com­
parison, the gatekeeper in M iu Yus tomb is specified to be the “functionary guarding the
office gates” {shouge li 守 閣 吏 )• Just as the attendant at the office gates in the Wangdu
tomb is painted on the passageway to the central chamber, the functionary guarding
the office gates in M iu Yus tomb is engraved on the wall with the entrance to the cen­
tral chamber. Though reduced to only one title, the gatekeeper in the carving in M iu
Yu’s tomb similarly helps create the illusion that the tomb was the headquarters of the
kingdom and that the tomb occupant in the central chamber~like the living counselor-
delegate in his main office~was in charge. The auspicious omens delineated in the lower
registers likewise glorified the tomb occupant, who was supposed to have maintained
benevolent rule throughout his career. The omens, counterclockwise from the top right,
are identified by cartouches as the unicorn, the blissful and virtuous goat, the red bird,
 I
1
5

2 .13. Figures and omens. 151 c e . Stone carving.

78 x 43 cm. Unearthed in 1982 at Yanzibu in Pei-
xian, Jiangsu, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.
the winged tiger, and the Dark Warrior in the form of a turtle intertwined with a snake.
The blissful and virtuous goat {fadeyang 福 德 羊 ）and the winged tiger [hu qin 虎 禽 ；lit­
erally， “tiger-shaped fowl”) are both absent from the W u Liang Shrine and Shen Yue’s
treatise. The artisan must have taken the omens from yet another illustrated catalogue.
As discussed, the discourse of auspicious omens altered in Wang Mang’s time. Before
then, emperors and Confucian scholars competed to interpret the occurrences of aus­
picious omens. Both considered omens to be signs of Heavens mandate, but whereas
emperors emphasized legitimacy, scholars emphasized benevolence. From the time
of Wang Mang, the focus changed from asserting principles to providing particulars.
Emperors, like Wang Mang, tried to canonize specific omens to support their right to
rule. Scholars, like the author of the catalogue on which the carvings of the W u Liang
Shrine were based, supplied alternatives to uphold the value of benevolent rule. No mat­
ter how the lists and interpretations shifted, auspicious omens had to be recognized. And
illustrations were the key to the identification and verification of auspicious omens. The
issue of identification was crucial not only for the ideological contest between emperors
and scholars but also for the pragmatic interests of the masses, because rewards always
followed reports of auspicious omens. Both the ideological contest and the pragmatic
interests gave impetus to the standardization of auspicious omens and generated vari­
ous illustrated manuals. People consulted the manuals to ascertain the omens they saw,
and artisans looked in the manuals for the omens they were going to depict. The pictorial
genre of auspicious omens was thus similar to religious art; both allowed stylistic varia­
tions but demanded precision in representing the prescribed features of their subject,
whether omens or icons.

Signification

In the Han mind, auspicious omens were without doubt the signs of Heavens mandate.
W hen the number of auspicious omens exceeded forty, as was concluded in the series
of court debates held in the W hite Tiger Hall in the first century, the question arose
whether the omens stood for benevolent rule in general or whether they carried various
messages in particular.71 In the W u Liang Shrine, the meanings of images were both
defined and confined by their lengthy cartouches, which did not give the viewers much
room for interpretation. The carvings on the cliff of the Western Passage presented a dif­
ferent case. W ith only very short cartouches for the simple purpose of identification, the
engraved omens allowed the viewers to contemplate them, to recall what they already
 2 .14. Yellow dragon on the cliff o f the Western Passage.
171 c e . Chengxian, Gansu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

knew, and to reach a new understanding. Viewers, with their diverse backgrounds and
experiences, could each perceive the images differently. Based on information still avail­
able to us, however fragmentary, we may reconstruct the omens， web of signification and
discern what they may have meant to the Han viewers.
Although the five omens on the cliff of the Western Passage must have come from
the pictures of auspicious omens popular in Han times, their composition, unlike other
pictorial examples, does not strictly follow the format of an illustrated manual, in which
the images are equally proportioned. Rather, the creature identified by a cartouche as the
“yellow dragon” {huanglong 黃 龍 ）occupies the largest space (see Figure 2.4). The yellow
dragon, with a body rotated 90。counterclockwise from its usual position, also looks the
most dynamic, as if it is about to ascend and capture its own identification cartouche,
which is placed at the highest point of the carving (Figure 2.14). The visual rendition
makes the yellow dragon the most prominent of the five images.
Later publications do not always faithfully convey the composition of the five omens
of the Western Passage. Hong Gua 洪 适 (1117—1184 c e ) provided an illustration in his
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2 .15. Five omens at the Western Passage published by Hong Gua.

Sequel to the Annotated Clerical Scripts (L i xu 隸 續 ；Figure 2.15).72 For some reason, he
rotated the cartouche of the yellow dragon and placed it horizontally to the right of the
image it identified. He also altered the proportions of the omens and made them more
equal in size. Though inaccurate, Hong Guas illustration has probably been the most
widely circulated reproduction of the five omens since the twelfth century. In the early
twentieth century, Otto Fischer was among the first to introduce a rubbing of the five
omens to European audiences (Figure 2.16).73 The rubbing that he acquired and pub­
lished shows a cartouche of the yellow dragon cut out and pasted to the left of the image.
As in Hong’s illustration, the retouched rubbing fails to show the prominence of the yel­
low dragon in the carving.
The yellow dragon in the W u Liang Shrine is accompanied by a cartouche specify­
ing that “it swims in a pond when [a ruler] does not dry up the pond to fish .， ，74 The
magnitude of the yellow dragon in Han politics was far grander than this simple car­
touche implies. As we have seen, the doctrine of the Five Virtues on dynastic succession
greatly appealed to the Han rulers and officials concerned about legitimacy, an issue that
 2 .16. Five omens at the Western Passage published by Otto Fischer.

loomed large when the Han reign was established. The founder, Emperor Gao, adopted
the attributes of the Q in that he replaced, proclaiming that the Han similarly possessed
the dynastic virtue of water. His solution did not gain support at the court of his son
Emperor Wen. A group of scholar-officials believed that since the Q in had yielded to
the Han, the dynastic virtue of the Han should be earth, to which water yielded (see
Figure 1.5). W hile they were putting forward the reassignment of the dynastic virtue, a
yellow dragon was reported to have appeared at Chengji 成紀 in present-day Gansu in
165 b c e . Because the color of earth was yellow, the reformists immediately seized upon
the appearance of the yellow dragon as an omen for the Han dynasty to assume its own
virtue in a rightful succession granted by Heaven. Emperor Wen, who showed little
enthusiasm for embracing either dynastic virtue before this incident, ordered his subjects
to prepare for a change in the dynastic virtue. Although the conservatives eventually
deflected Emperor Wen from his aim， the yellow dragon remained an encouraging omen
in the reformist camp.75 The contest finally ended when Emperor W u, the grandson of
Emperor Wen and the great-grandson of Emperor Gao, officially recognized earth as
the Han dynastic virtue.76
The yellow dragon played an important role in Wang M ang’s usurpation of rule. Before
VVang, the prevailing approach to the succession of the Five Virtues was to emphasize
the conquest cycle (see Figure 1.5)Ju st as earth covers water， water extinguishes fire, fire
melts metal, metal cuts wood, and wood breaks into earth, so the Han conquered the
Q in, the Q in vanquished the Zhou, the Zhou defeated the Shang, the Shang overtook
the Xia, and the Xia replaced the reign established by the Yellow Thearch. W ith the
increasing interest in civic virtues, however, scholar-officials like Liu Xiang and Liu X in
turned to the generation cycle and valued the nurturing features of the Five Phases (see
Figure 1.6). Just as wood produces fire by fueling it, fire produces earth in the form of
ashes, earth produces metal through mining, metal produces water when melted down
(it turns into a liquid), and water produces wood by feeding trees, so did one sovereignty
produce another by giving the throne willingly to the virtuous and able in remote but
golden antiquity. Under the new doctrine，the Han dynasty was given the virtue of fire，
and the reign following the Han would claim the virtue of earth.77
Wang M ang embraced the generation cycle of the Five Virtues wholeheartedly for
the obvious reason that it justified his accession through forcing abdication. Stage by
stage, W ang obtained absolute power. Right before his promotion to regent in 1 c e , a
yellow dragon allegedly swam in a river in Yuesui 越慯 Commandery in present-day
Sichuan. A group of high-ranking officials viewed this as an auspicious omen in honor
ofW ang, whose virtue was comparable to that of the Duke of Zhou, the most esteemed
regent in history.78 Although there is no further elaboration in the received texts, those
who spoke for Wang at court must have favored the generation cycle of the Five Virtues
and considered him a desirable candidate for emperor after the anticipated abdication.
They no longer associated the yellow dragon with the Han emperor, who possessed the
virtue of earth only according to the old conquest cycle; instead, they credited the omen
to Wang, who, if successful, would possess the virtue of earth based on the new genera­
tion cycle. Once enthroned, Wang did declare that the dynastic virtue of the X in was
earth— superior to the others as the phase of harmony and balance. He also announced
that the virtue of the Western Han was fire， even though the rulers of the Western Han
had considered themselves blessed with either the water or the earth virtue.79 Just as
Wang and his supporters took advantage of the omen, those who did not approve of the
regime manipulated it. Rumor had it that a yellow dragon fell to Earth and died in 15 c e ,
seven years after the establishment of the X in dynasty. Several hundred thousand people
were said to have rushed to the site to see what had happened. Wang, who must have
regarded the rumor as a malicious slander, was very upset, but he failed to identify the
persons who had spread the rumor.80
Liu X iu also learned to manipulate the discourse of the Five Virtues for his own pur­
poses when the country was emerging from the chaos of Wang M ang’s downfall. In 25
ce , s o o n a f t e r t e l l i n g h is f o l l o w e r s t h a t h e h a d d r e a m e d a b o u t a r e d d r a g o n a s c e n d in g to
Heaven, Liu was enthroned as Emperor Guangwu, and eventually he restored the Han
dynasty. Emperor Guangwu and his underlings followed the generation cycle promoted
by Wang Mang, believing that the new reign had the dynastic virtue of fire; the red dragon,
an emblem of fire, thus became the auspicious omen that signaled that Emperor Guang­
wu had received Heaven's mandate. Hie following year, when Emperor Guangwxt selected
Luoyang as the new capital and established his court there, he announced red to be the
official dynastic color, thus formally accepting fire as the dynastic virtue.81The decision has
puzzled many modern scholars, who wonder why Emperor Guangwu did not reinstate
earth, the dynastic virtue of the Western Han, and why he accepted the revised doctrine
of the Five Virtues that the usurper Wang Mang so highhandedly imposed on the West­
ern H an.82As Aihe Wang argues, what truly mattered to Emperor Guangwu and his fol­
lowers was not the person， hateful or not, who first endorsed the revised doctrine but the
benevolent principle behind it. For them, it would have been even more unthinkable to re­
turn to the conquest cycle. To do so would mean including in the cycle the tyrannical Q in
and rejecting the benign generation cycle,.which sanctioned all the venerable sage kings.83
Except in Em peror G uangw us dream, the red dragon did not reappear in the Eastern
Han, as least according to official history. Instead, it was the yellow dragon that frequented
the country. During Emperor Guangwus reign, people once spotted a yellow dragon at
Donge 東 阿 in present-day Shandong.84 The most spectacular report, however, came in
Emperor Zhangs time, when eight yellow dragons were said to have surfaced at Quanling
泉 陵 in present-day Hunan. Wang Chong, who was normally skeptical about the valid­
ity of omens but could not resist acknowledging this one, noted that the group included
two parents and six children. The parent dragons~whose length was about sixteen zhang
(thirty-seven meters) and whose size was larger than that of a horse— raised their heads and
turned their backs, which made them lookjust like auspicious dragons in illustrations.85
The yellow dragon remained one of the most auspicious omens in the Eastern Han.
It occurred not only to approve the ruling power at court but also to honor local officials
who served well. In 219 ce, people in Wuyang 武 陽 (present-day Sichuan) saw a yellow
dragon; one had once responded to the rise of the ruling Liu family, and now one appeared
to honor their beloved governor, Li Yan 李 嚴 ， who had greatly enhanced regional trans­
portation by building a brand-new footway along M ount Tianzhu 天 柱 .86
Another yellow dragon appeared at Qiao 譙 in present-day Anhui in 220 c e . Only
one year after the omen that glorified the Liu family through one of its model officials,
this yellow dragon was thought to justify the rule of Cao Pi 曹 2 ， who, imitating Wang
M ang by usurping the Han throne through a coerced abdication, installed himself as
Emperor Wen (r. 220-226 c e ) and established the Wei 魏 Kingdom. W hat is more, this
was not the first appearance of a yellow dragon in Cao Pi’s hometown, Qiao; a yellow
d r a g o n h a d a lr e a d y v i s i t e d t h e p la c e in 177 c e , s e v e r a l d e c a d e s b e f o r e h is e n t h r o n e m e n t .
Some soothsayers, like Shan Yang 單 颺 ，had interpreted the omen then as foretelling
the rise of a ruler who would soon overthrow the stagnant Han regime.87 The basis of
the prophecy was the generation cycle of the Five Virtues, according to which the sover­
eignty after the Eastern Han would have the virtue of earth, whose corresponding color
was yellow and whose emblem was the yellow dragon.
The yellow dragon incised for Li X i in 171 ce was similar to the one that appeared to
honor Li Yan. In both cases, the yellow dragon was meant to praise the benevolence of
the commandery governor, particularly for constructing footways on challenging terrain.
Nevertheless, the prominence of the yellow dragon on the cliff of the Western Passage
also raises questions. Since the Eastern Han had the virtue of fire, its dynastic symbol
was clearly not the yellow dragon. If the yellow dragon was but one of many positive em­
bodiments of Heavens mandate, then why was it distinguished from the other omens—
made higher, larger, and more dynamic— on the cliff? Could its visual superiority have
implied anticipation of an imperial abdication— that is, the arrival of a new regime with
the next dynastic virtue of earth (see Figure 1.6)? There are not enough clues for us to
verify this implication. Given how the emergence of a yellow dragon was alternatively
perceived by the end of the second century, as in the case of Cao Pi, neither can we deny
the possibility of political discontent with the declining Han regime.
The omen delineated next to the yellow dragon in the top register of the Western
Passage is the white deer (Jbailu 白鹿；Figure 2.17). Unlike the yellow dragon, the omen
that prevailed during the entire Han period owing to incessant disputes over dynastic
virtues, the white deer entered the realm of auspicious omens comparatively late. In
the Western Han, white deer were treasured animals reared in Emperor W us imperial
park.88 W hite deer, together with white cattle and white pigs, were the main sacrifices
when Emperor W u worshiped Heaven at the Altar to Grand Unity.89 In the Eastern
 b

2 .17. White deer on the cliff o f the

Western Passage. 171 c e . Chengxian,
Gansu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

Han, people began to view a white deer as an auspicious omen similar to the white tiger
and the white horse carved in the W u Liang Shrine, which, like albinos in general, were
also rare. Reports of the appearance of white deer were especially frequent in the reigns
of Emperor Zhang and Emperor An (r. 107-125 c e ) .90 In addition, the white deer was
associated with the Three Excellencies in the Han bureaucracy. W hen Zheng Hong 奠
弘 (fl. 72-87 c e ) was the governor of Linhuai 臣品淮 Commandery in present-day Jiangsu,
two white deer came to trot alongside his carriage. One of his subordinates immediately
congratulated him on his prospects for promotion because deer were often painted on
the carriages of the Three Excellencies. Zheng later became Supreme Commander.91
In the Han mind, the white deer was also associated with faraway places. A widely
spread legend told of the acquisition of four white wolves and four white deer by King
M u of the Zhou (r. 956-918 b c e ) during his successful western expedition— that is, after
his victory over the Quanrong 犬 戎 ， who bordered the Zhou on the west.92 In the W u
Liang Shrine, deer have a connection with the two omens referring to foreigners who
paid tribute to Chinese rulers. One omen is about people of South Y i 夷 riding deer to
deliver wine to the Yellow Thearch; the color of the deer is not specified in the cartouche.
 2 .18. Qusou offering furs in the Wu Liang
shrine. 151 c e . Stone carving. Discovered in
1786 in Jiaxiang, Shandong, (a) Ink rubbing,
(b) Print.

The other is about people of Qusou 渠搜 offering furs to Yu; the cartouche does not
mention the means of transportation, but the image is a winged figure riding on a deer
(Figure 2.18).93
The white deer memorialized on the cliff of the Western Passage did not appear dur­
ing Li Xis governorship in W udu but during his former magistracy of M inchi 龜池
District, which was under Hongnong 弘農 Commandery in present-day Henan. The
five omens on the cliff appear to present the high points of his political career. According
to the inscription accompanying the images, both the yellow dragon and the white deer
appeared to honor Li X i as district magistrate. According to the preface to the H ymn
o f the Western Passage, the omens that honored Li X i in W udu were the yellow dragon,
auspicious grain, interconnecting trees, and sweet dew. The yellow dragon graced him in
both W udu and Mingchi. Hence, only the white deer among the five did not appear dur­
ing Li Xis governorship in W udu. If the white deer on the cliff of the Western Passage
 2
5
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2 .19. Interconnecting trees on the cliff o f
the Western Passage. 171 c e . Chengxian,
_________________Gansu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.
a

recalled cases like Zheng Hongs, then the omen could have been meant to approve the
present administration while hinting at future promotion; the rise from district magis­
trate to commandery governor was certainly a large one, if not a great leap. If the white
deer referred to people in bordering countries, the omen would have been welcome in
W udu because it was a commandery right on the western border; some branches of the
Qiang people lived within the commandery during the Han while others hovered out­
side the border. One of Li Xis achievements eulogized in the Hymn o f the Western Pas­
sage was his efficiency in managing border clashes. The Qiang were believed to descend
from the Quanrong, from whom King M u was said to have collected four white deer.94
The inclusion of the white deer on the Western Passage therefore pointed to Li X i and
his achievement in improving transportation elsewhere and could also have stood for the
surrender of non-Chinese along the border.
The omen incised beneath the yellow dragon on the Western Passage is the intercon­
necting trees {m ulianli 木 連 理 ；Figure 2.19). Like the white deer, the interconnecting
 trees were more frequently reported as an auspicious omen in the Eastern Han than in
the Western Han. The official records do not explain the implications of interconnecting
trees, however.95 It is from the W u Liang Shrine that we know that interconnecting trees
appear only “when a rulers virtue is pure and harmonious, and when [people in] the eight
directions are unified into a single fam ily.，
，
96 The omen thus signaled harmony and uni­
fication. Although the cartouche in the W u Liang Shrine can be restored, the picture is
damaged. W hat did the interconnecting trees look like? How could one determine that
interconnecting trees were a natural wonder rather than the result of human cultivation?
The image incised for Li X i informs us that the omen was supposed to be two trees
whose roots and trunks were separate but whose lower branches grew into one branch
like a slightly arched bridge. The way the two lower branches merged into one must
have been a natural occurrence. Two other Eastern Han examples from archaeological
excavations suggest different ways to imagine the interconnecting trees. A stone carv­
ing unearthed at Liangchengzhen 兩 城 鎮 ，Shandong, shows branches above the main
trunks interlocking like a net (Figure 2.20).97 The trees engraved on a stone found at
Suining 睢 寧， Jiangsu，are intertwined from bottom to top (Figure 2.21).98 Artists used
different designs一 a shared branch or interlocking or intertwining branches— to distin­
guish the miraculous feature of the interconnecting trees.
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 The omen placed next to the interconnecting trees on the cliff of the Western Pas­
sage is auspicious grain {jiahe 嘉 禾 )，one of the oldest auspicious omens in the Han
mind (Figure 2.22). Back in the Zhou dynasty, King Cheng was said to have received
auspicious grain from one of his brothers, who viewed it as a blessing from Heaven.
King Cheng bestowed this plant on his beloved uncle, the Duke of Zhou, who had just
quelled a threatening rebellion in the east. By twice changing hands, the omen granted
by Heaven presumably to show approval of sovereignty was tacitly transformed into a
symbol of loyalty and truth between a ruler and his subordinate lords."
In the Han dynasty, auspicious grain fit perfectly into the moral discourse of omens
set forth by Dong Zhongshu and his followers. Gongsun Hong articulated the connec­
tion in response to Emperor W us inquiry about the signs of Heavens mandate: grass
can produce abundant grain only when wind and rain arrive in a timely fashion, which
requires that the universe reach utmost harmony. And only when the ruler and his people
live in accordance with m o rality o ne with benign administration and the other with
proper behavior— can the universe reach perfect harmony.100 Auspicious grain was one
of the favorite and most frequently reported omens in Han times. It occurred to glorify
those who ruled benevolently, emperors as well as leading officials.
The Zhou use of auspicious grain added weight to pleas to shake up the stagnant
bureaucracy, for King Cheng had obviously been wise to honor the regent Duke of
Zhou. Wang Chong had fervently argued in the first century c e that auspicious omens
appeared only because fine gentlemen {jiashi 嘉 士 ) were assisting the ruler to govern
the country. Frustrated by the overbearing eunuchs at court, Dou W u 寶武 reiterated
Wang Chong’s point of view in the mid-second century, reminding the emperor that
auspicious omens emerged because of fine gentlemen and that the auspicious signs came
because people were kind. In between W angs and D ous tim es, Lu G ong 魯 恭 ， a benev­
olent m agistrate o f Zhongm ou 中牟 D istrict in present-day H enan, had a chance to
put the theory into practice when auspicious grain was reported to grow in his court in
101 c e . The emperor took notice of this event when selecting officials from the “Worthy
and Excellent, Straightforward and Upright” [xianliangfangzheng 賢良方正 ) category,
one of the categories for appointing men to government posts in the capital based on
local officials，recommendations. The emperor ended up choosing a person celebrated in
Zhongmou and endorsed by Lu Gong. The emperor evidently saw the auspicious grain
associated with an admirable magistrate as a propitious omen for his recruitment.101
Auspicious grain, like white deer, became an advantageous sign for promotion from
the standpoint o f officials. A com m andery governor in present-day Sichuan, Cai M ao 蔡
茂 ，a contemporary ofW ang Chongs, once dreamed that he was given auspicious grain
 爲
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2.22. Auspicious grain on the cliff o f

the Western Passage. 171 c e . Chengxian,
Gansu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing,
a

while seated in a grand palace. O ne o f his underlings predicted th at he would reach a

rank as high as one o f the Three Excellencies. Later Cai M ao indeed served as G rand
M inister o f Finance.102
The usurper W ang M ang and the restorer Liu Xiu appropriated the auspicious grain
omen for more specific political causes. W ang declared that auspicious grain appeared
many times to support his land reform , an adoption o f the ancient “well-field system”
[jingtian 井 田 ）fo r equal land distribution— a w ell-intentioned policy th at was im prac-
tically form ulated and poorly executed.103 Liu Xiu claimed th at he was given the name
Xiu, “grass grain [caryopsis]， ” because a plant of auspicious grain happened to be grow­
ing in his home district when he was bom. Like the red dragon in the dream, the auspi­
cious grain in the field justified Emperor Guangwus claim to rule.104
In many ways, the occurrence of auspicious grain boded well for a commandery gover­
nor like Li Xi. It at least indicated that he had ruled in conformity with Confucian moral
principles and that under his governance the rare harmony between Heaven and human
being had been achieved. As in Lu Gongs case, the omen could have reflected credit on
his recommendations of candidates to the central government. As with the precedent set
by Cai Mao, the omen could also have indicated his own prospects for promotion.
Just as the interconnecting trees had peculiar attributes beyond human cultivation, so
auspicious grain had to distinguish itself from ordinary plants in order to qualify as an
omen. W hat precisely was auspicious grain in the Han mind? The auspicious plant was
supposed to be rice or wheat, two of the most popular types of grass producing edible
grain in China. The plant that King Cheng received and gave away was described as
having different kinds of grain on the same stem. The plant that appeared in honor of
Emperor Guangwus birth was reported in the official history to have nine spikes on one
stem, but the plant was more elaborate in Wang Chongs account: it had three stems,
each carrying nine spikes, and it was taller than ordinary grasses by one to two chi (23
t o 46 c e n t im e t e r s ) . The t e n d e n c y t o e x a g g e r a t e w e n t o n a n d o n : a s r e g i s t e r e d in 123 c e ,
the plant was blessed with 160 stems and 768 spikes.105 The carving on the cliff of the
Western Passage shows an auspicious grain with nine spikes on one stem. The depic­
tion agrees with the official description of the omen marking Emperor Guangwus birth.
W ith the largest yang digit number, nine, and the drooping spikes, the picture symbol­
izes the highest yield a grass can possibly have.
The omen carved next to the auspicious grain and beneath the white deer is the sweet
dew {ganlu 甘 露 ；Figure 2.23). Sweet dew was widely believed to be the direct result
of harmony between Heaven and Earth, perhaps even more so than auspicious grain.
Thinkers before the Han dynasty had already stated the correlation— people such as
Laozi 老子 and the compilers of M aster Lus Spring and A utum n Annals. Han scholar-
officials such as Gongsun Hong only added a moral dimension to the discussion.106 Like
auspicious grain, sweet dew was among the most prevalent omens in the Han period.
The most incredible reports came during the reign of Emperor Guangwu: sweet dew
that lasted for as long as forty-five days at one time, and sweet dew that spread over
thirty-one administrative units at another.107The omen appeared for both emperors and
officials, provided they cared for benevolent rule. Both Q in Peng and Wang Zhui, two
governors mentioned earlier, were so honored.108 So was Li Xi.
 b

2 .23. Sweet dew on the cliff o f the

Western Passage. 171 c e . Chengxian,
Gansu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

In terms of visual representation, sweet dew was probably the most challenging of the
five omens on the cliff. The color of the yellow dragon and the white deer required infor­
mative cartouches; the features of the interconnecting trees and the auspicious grain
involved symbolic strategies. B ut how could one illustrate a transparent liquid charac­
terized by its taste? The image on the cliff shows a figure under a tree extending both
a r m s ; a c a r t o u c h e id e n t i f i e s t h e f ig u r e a s a p e r s o n r e c e i v in g t h e d e w {chenglu ren 承 露 人 )，
and another says t h a t the scene shows the descent of sweet dew {ganlu jia n g 甘 露 降 )•
The pictorialization was inspired by one of Emperor W us monumental projects in his
capital city. To better communicate with Heaven and the spiritual world, Emperor W u
ordered the construction of a tall structure called “the immortals palms for receiving the
dew.” It was a palm-shaped bronze plate on two bronze columns. The columns, boasting
a height of twenty zhang (forty-six meters), were erected on lofty hills. The palm-shaped
plate was supposed to reach above the clouds and collect dew that was not yet polluted,
as Zhang H eng says in his rhapsody on C h ang an.109 This landm ark structure must have
been so well known that the H an people could not help but think o f it whenever the
subject o f dew came up. The imagery o f an im m ortals palms receiving dew was therefore
adapted to represent the obscure im agery o f sweet dew, even though palms were not the
receptacle when the omens occurred. Placing the person receiving dew under a tree was
a significant m odification because it showed that the dew had descended to the hum an
w orld and was not ju st the unpolluted dew from far above the realm o f m ortals.
The rich web o f signification attests to a fluid relationship between texts and images.
O n the surface, the cartouches identify the omens on the cliff, and the Hymn o f the
Western Passage frames them together as tokens of Li X is achievements. But in reality,
b o t h e f f o r t s — u s i n g t e x t s t o c o n t a in t h e m e a n in g s o f im a g e s _ c a n n o t d ic t a t e h o w a
viewer comes to his understanding. Too often the connotations o f an omen were m ul­
tiple and could be changed over tim e and space during the H an period. N or does the
loose com position compel a viewer to seek for a coherent im plication o f the five omens
as a whole. A n illiterate viewer would have even greater freedom to use his im agination.
Even though the intention o f those who commissioned the project is straightforw ard,
the signification o f carved omens has taken on a life o f its own among viewers.

Perpetuation

Compared with ,tombs and shrines, the cliff provides a unique setting for the five omens.
People had no access to the images in the W angdu tom b or M iu Yus tom b once the
tombs were sealed. The W u Liang Shrine was open to families and friends at first and
probably to the general public later, but its interior~1.8 meters high, 2.4 meters wide,
and 1.4 meters deep一 could barely accommodate one person, especially with an altar in
place.110 The cliff on the W estern Passage was open to view but was almost unapproach­
able on difficult terrain. W hy was it im portant to use the cliff as a medium? W hat kind
o f viewing experiences could this medium possibly have generated? A nd more pertinent,
how did the m edium affect the given discourse o f omens?
Apart from the H ym n o f the Western Passage, two more inscriptions were dedicated
to Li Xi: H ymn o f the Fu Passage {Fuge song 鄱 閣 頌 ；Figure 2.24) and McmoTial to the
Tianjing Passage {Tianjing dao bei 天井道石皁).m Both were meant to commemorate the
reinforcem ent o f the footway initiated by Li Xi soon after his assum ption o f the gov­
ernorship o f W udu C om m andery and carried out one year after the construction o f
2 .24. H ym n o f the Fu Passage. 172 ce. C liff inscription. 164 x 120 cm. Lueyang, Shaanxi. Ink rubbing.
 the Western Passage. Both were similarly inscribed on cliffs rising above the renovated
footways.
To improve the transportation infrastructure appeared to be a very important duty
for a local Han administrator, at least judging from Li X is case.112 Auspicious omens
appeared chiefly to mark his attention in this respect, whether he was the magistrate of
M inchi District or the governor of W udu Commandery. Auspicious omens also hon­
ored other administrators, like Li Yan, who improved the safety and convenience of
roads and other means of travel. And the more arduous the task proved— building foot­
ways above ravines, for example— the more praise in the form of omens followed.
One of the most ambitious projects to overcome natural barriers in Han times was
opening the Bao-Xie 褒斜 Route. Although the author of the Hymn o f the Fu Passage
credited its opening to Emperor Gao, official history shows that the first, not very suc­
cessful attempt was made in the reign of Emperor W u. To streamline grain transport
from the Hanzhong Basin to the capital, Chang’an， Emperor W u approved the proposal
to construct the Bao-Xie Route to connect the Bao and Xie Rivers (Figure 2.25). He
appointed a capable official as the governor of Hanzhong Commandery to supervise the
construction, which involved tens of thousands of laborers. The route, about 500 li (166
kilometers) long, was finally established, but the many rapids and rocks along the route
still made it undesirable for grain transport.113 The challenge of improving grain trans­
port there was not successfully met until one century later, when Emperor M ing ordered
Mr. Chu 鄗 ，the governor of Hanzhong Commandery, to work on the project again.
Besides plank footways and bridges, Chu had a tunnel opened through the mountains at
the most dangerous section of the route along the Bao River. The tunnel was later called
“Stone Gate” (Shimen 石 門 ） .114The construction of the Bao-Xie Route was finished in
66 c e . We know more about it from the inscription on the cliff at the Stone Gate than
from the received texts (Figure 2.26).115 This was the earliest cliff inscription to com­
memorate the improvement of infrastructure under the supervision of a local adminis­
trator. No doubt it greatly inspired Li X i and his subordinates one and a half centuries
later.
The Bao-Xie Route was one of four routes that crossed the Qinling Mountains to facil­
itate transportation between the Guanzhong 關中 Plain in the north, where Chang’an
was located, and the Hanzhong and Sichuan Basins in the south. The route frequently
used before Chu’s success in renovating the Bao-Xie Route was the O ld Route (Gudao
古 道 )， which connected the Wei 渭 River and the upper branches of the M ian 河 River
(now the Han 漢 River). The O ld Route twisted and turned to avoid the most pre­
cipitous ridges of the Qinling Mountains, which made it safer and smoother but more
 SBg suoqzuB^ p§ S 3
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 2 .26. Opening the Bao-Xie Route. 66 ce. C liff inscription. 125.5 x 257 cm- Shimen, Shaanxi. Ink rubbing.

time-consuming to take. Since Emperor W u failed to make the Bao-Xie Route any
more convenient, the O ld Route remained the major route in the Western Han. Wang
Mang, seeking a more efficient alternative, built the Ziwu 子午 Route, a direct route
from Chang’an to the M ian River, but it was too dangerous to be a practical solution.
In the Eastern Han, the Ziwu Route was in service only after the Bao-Xie Route was
destroyed by Qiang rebels in 108 c e and before its restoration about 125 C E .T h e difficulty
of the Ziwu Route later led to the establishment of the Tang-Luo 儒 胳 Route east of
the Bao-Xie Route, w hich linked the W ei and H an Rivers.116
The four routes, all of which were improved by the Han, were probably in use be­
fore the Han dynasty. Emperor Gao had already taken advantage of at least three of the
routes when he was competing with Xiang Yu 項 羽 （ 232-202 b c e ) to establish a unified
empire after the collapse of the Qin. Not being strong enough for a military confronta­
tion, Emperor Gao at first accepted Xiang as his feudal lord and agreed to become king
of the Han 漢 State, which controlled the Hanzhong and Sichuan Basins. Although
Emperor Gao was the first to conquer the Q in capital, Xianyang, he left Xianyang to
assume the throne of the Han State, moving southward by the Ziwu Route and order­
ing that the plank footways of the Bao-Xie Route be burned to show Xiang that he har­
bored no interest in returning. Once his preparations were complete, however, Emperor
Gao went back to the Guanzhong Plain via the O ld Route, and he eventually built the
capital of his own empire there.117The Qin, then, laid the foundation for transportation
between the Guanzhong Plain and the basins to the south. In fact, the infrastructure was
in place even before the First Emperor unified China. It was King Huiwen (r. 337-311
bce) w h o f ir s t a n n e x e d t h e HanzhongandSichuanBasins.Andi t w a s d u r i n g t h e r e ig n
of King Zhao (r. 306—251 b c e ) that 1,000 li (415 kilometers) of plank footways connect­
ing Xianyang to Sichuan were established.118 Emperor Gaos strategic destruction of the
Q in footways made the O ld Route the major highway in the Western Han.
The three passages that Li X i managed to restore were all on the O ld Route. Both the
Western Passage and the Tianjing Passage were in Xiabian, the city where W udu Com­
mandery was headquartered. The Fu Passage was in Ju 沮 (see Figure 2.25).119 Travelers
taking the O ld Route from C hang’an to the H anzhong Basin would have moved w est­
ward along the W ei River to C hencang 陳倉 ，crossed the river to the San 散 Pass，con­
tinued southward to Xiabian, turned eastward at Ju, and finally reached N anzheng 南
鄭. Travelers may not have favored the detour in the Eastern Han, especially after the
successful construction of the Bao-Xie Route, but local people still needed it to carry
out various political and economic activities. Politically, the route connected the head­
quarters city of Xiabian to the capital city, Luoyang. From Xiabian, officials would have
traveled southward to Ju, turned eastward and traveled through Nanzheng all the way
to Rang 穰 ， then turned northward to Luoyang. Economically, the route enabled W udu
to develop all sorts of trade between the Sichuan Basin and the Hexi 河西 Corridor.
The tea trade, for example, made an enormous contribution to the commanderys pros­
perity.120 As estimated in the H ym n o f the Fu Passage, several thousand vehicles passed
through Ju every year. Besides feeling compassion, L i X i must have realized the benefits
of improving traffic conditions along this main transportation artery.
Any project related to the establishment or maintenance of the four routes that cut
through the Qinling Mountains would not have been easy and would have constantly
tested the leadership and resourcefulness of a local administrator. The cliff inscription at
the Stone Gate gives us a detailed account of how demanding the construction of the
Bao-Xie Route was. Chu had to coordinate 2,690 people from four commanderies to
build a mountain road of 258 li (107 kilometers), including five long bridges and 633 sec­
tions of plank footways. In the end, the project, not including timber obtained from local
resources, made use of 766,800 laborers and 369,484 tiles, at the cost of 499,400 hu 斛
(9,988 cubic meters) of grain.121
The success of the Bao-Xie Route inevitably led to the neglect of the O ld Route.
When YuXu 虞詡 was the governor ofWudu Commandery，only five decades after
Chus accomplishment,people could no longer travel along the O ld Route without meet­
ing obstructions. They had no choice but to rely on donkeys and horses, for neither boats
nor carriages could travel that way. Consequently, they paid five times more for trans­
portation than for the goods being transported. To improve the situation, Yu Xu super­
vised in person the restoration of the O ld Route, particularly the section from Xiabian
to Ju. Although the scale of the construction does not compete with that on the Bao-Xie
Route, the recovery of water transportation saved the local population 40,000,000 qian
錢 each year, the cost of 4,000 kilograms of grain.122The condition of the O ld Route was
getting worse again about half a century later, when Li X i became the governor ofW udu
Commandery. Like Yu Xu, Li X is main focus was on the section between Xiabian and
Ju, apparently the most dangerous section with the steepest terrain. According to the
H ym n o f the Fu Passage, the footway in Ju, though only 300 zhang (693 meters) long, was
known as the “ten thousand pillars” ；the planks were laid along a sheer cliff, high above
a deep valley. People took the footway in fear and trembling, for it was not unusual for
both pedestrians and goods to fall into the abyss below.123
The plank footways vividly portrayed in the H ym n o f the Fu Passage are long since
gone. Now we can only imagine their look and structure based on traces left on the Bao-
Xie Route. An archaeological survey in the 1960s identified three types of footways near
the Stone Gate. The standard footway had planks laid on horizontal beams inserted into
the wall of the cliff and supported by pillars set at the base of the cliff (Figure 2.27a).
The bridge-like footway, built on a less steep slope, had planks laid over m ultiple rows
of pillars (Figure 2.27b). The groove-shaped footway, the third type, was chiseled directly
out o f the cliff; there were no tim bers. The distance between the footway and the w ater
ranged from one to eight meters. The width of the footway varied from three to six me­
ters.124The Hymn o f the Fu Passage describes the construction of the footway with several
telling phrases: “cutting out the rock along the c liff，
，
，“fixing pillars on the stable ground， ”
and “boasting ten thousand p illars.， ，125The builders probably chose the best type of foot­
way to comply with the natural features in Ju. According to Guo Rongzhangs investiga­
tion in 1988 and my own inspection in 2006, the Hymn o f the Western Passage is inscribed
on the cliff where a footway was once built (Figure 2.28). The holes that held horizontal
beams in the wall of the cliff are gone, but those supporting a row of vertical pillars still
exist. A standard footway once existed there. The distance between the bottom o f the
inscription and the holes far below is about ten meters, which suggests that the footway
could have been positioned approximately nine meters above the surface of the water, a
height that would have allowed passersby an easy view of the inscription.126
The inscription commemorating Chu’s establishment of the Bao-Xie Route, which
stimulated Li X is followers to produce similar inscriptions, is the earliest cliff inscription
known to us.127 Not only was its content a reminder of an epic project on the very site
2 .28. View o f the Western Passage.
of the project, but its format was also a testament to the difficult features of the terrain.
Its existence celebrated the triumph of human skill and persistence over nature, and at
the same time it was part of the nature that humans had conquered. It was supposed to
last as long as nature itself.128 Its durability was therefore unmatched by any precedents,
either the inscriptions cast on bronze vessels or those incised on stone steles. Before the
First Emperor, rulers and aristocrats preferred to preserve records of significant events
on the interior walls of bronze vessels and place them in temples; they valued the endur­
ing quality of bronze while believing in the sacred power derived from concealm entas
with invisible inscriptions on unapproachable altars (see Figures i .i , 1.2,1.3, 2.1).129 The
First Emperor liked publicity better. He announced his mandate to rule by erecting
steles on his inspection tours around the country he had just unified (Figure 2.29).130 He
certainly attached importance to enduring material, stone, but he was far more inter­
ested in the power of communication, letting people read his edicts engraved on steles in
open spaces.
The convention of cliff inscriptions that developed in the Eastern Han furthered the
longevity of writings by incorporating them into nature while maintaining their visibil­
ity. T h t cliffs at the Stone Gate proved to be an effective place for communication. The
record of Chus opening the Bao-Xie Route was incised on the cliff 270 meters south of
the tunnel, presumably above a plank footway.131 Latecomers mostly left their imprints
on the walls inside the tunnel, probably because it was both safer and easier to carve in
the tunnel than on the footway. The cautious solution should not have diminished the
visibility of the inscriptions, for passersby had to rely on torches to go through the tunnel,
which measures 5.5 meters in width, 6.2 meters in height, and 13.4 meters in length.132
In fact, passersby may have found it more comfortable to view inscriptions when they
were not in danger of falling. Wang Sheng 王升 was the first to use the walls inside the
tunnel; in 147 c e , during his governorship in Hanzhong, he had his eulogy for another
official, Yang Mengwen 楊 孟 文 ，incised there (Figure 2.30). The eulogy recounted the
restoration of the Bao-Xie Route around 125 c e , after its destruction by Qiang rebels in
108 ce. Wang Sheng credited the reopening of the route to Yang, who prevailed over all
dissenting views at court and won the emperor’s full endorsement of the project.133 The
eulogy invited the incision of another tribute on the opposite wall in 173 c e (Figure 2.31).
W hen Bian Yu 卞 玉 ，an attendant at the Palace G ate, traveled through the Stone G ate,
he read the eulogy for Yang Mengwen and recalled his grandsons, Yang Huai 楊淮 and
Yang Bi 楊 弼 ， who were both exemplary officials and served the country well. Bian Yu
composed an essay to relate the achievements and virtues of the two Yangs and had the
essay engraved in the tunnel to complement the eulogy left by Wang Sheng more than
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2 .29. Stele erected by the First Emperor o f the Qin at Langye. 219 bce.

Discovered in 1921-22 in Zhucheng, Shandong. Ink rubbing.

twodecades earlier.134 Unlike Chu, YangMengwenwas aMetropolitan Commandant

(silijiaowei 司隸校尉）in the capital, not the governor ofHanzhong Commandery, the
local administrator who sawto the practicalities of construction. Yang Hui and Yang
Bi, albeit respected, had nothing to do with the Stone Gate. The three Yangs, Wang
Sheng, and Bian Yu had only one thing in common: they all came fromJianwei 棱
 為 Commandery in present-day Sichuan. Between
Wang Shengs eulogy and Bian Yus essay, there was
another inscription in memory of another official
from Jianwei, L i Yu 李 禹 (fl. 155 c e ) , who helped
improve local transportation as the magistrate
of Chenggu 成固 District，east of Nanzheng, the
southern end of the Bao-Xie Route (Figure 2.32).135
The Stone Gate project appeared, then, to offer an
opportunity to honor distinguished townsmen in
public service. After the Han examples, twenty-six
more inscriptions, most of them referring to one
or another inscription already there, were added to
the tunnel over the centuries.136 The Stone Gate
became a treasury of Chinese cliff inscriptions.137
Though less prominent than the Stone Gate,
Xiabian was also a site with cliff inscriptions. The
Hymn o f the Western Passage, dated to 171 ce, was
the first, followed by the M em orial to the T ian-
jin g Passage in 172, although the exact location of
the latter is unclear because it was destroyed long
ago. Both inscriptions commemorated the footway
projects initiated by Li X i. In 174 another eulogy
was incised on the cliff about 300 meters east of the
H ym n o f the Western Passage. It extolled the virtues
and achievements of Geng Xun 耿 勳 ，Li X is suc­
cessor, a benevolent governor who also maintained
the footway (Figure 2.33).138 In the twelfth century
ce , t w o m o r e i n s c r i p t io n s w e r e a d d e d t o t h e c l i f f
right below the H ymn o f the Western Passage. Both
ofthemwere comments on the Han hymns to Li
Xi andGengXun.139 Likethe StoneGate,Xiabian
stoodasatestament tothevisibilityofcliffinscrip­
tions andtheircapacityfor communication.
2 .31. M arker Record fo r Yang H uai and Yang
The three Han cliff writings in Xiabian were
Bi. 173 ce.C liff inscription. 193 x 61.5 cm . Shi­ producedafter the deaths oftheleaders theyglori­
men, Shaanxi. Ink rubbing. fied.140 AccordingtotheHymn o f the Fu Passage, Li
155 ce. C liff inscription. 63 x 45 cm. Shimen, 2 .33. C liff inscription in memory o f Geng Xun at the Western
Shaanxi. Ink rubbing. Passage. 174 c e . 154 x 150 cm. Chengxian, Gansu. Ink rubbing.

X i assumed the governorship ofW udu in the second month of 170 c e , but he died before
the H ym n o f the Western Passage was engraved, in the sixth month of 171. Geng Xun must
have been L i X is immediate successor. And he must have won the gratitude of local
people by continuing the three projects in Xiabian and Ju. He died some time before the
eulogy to him was carved in the fourth month of 174. These cliff inscriptions were there­
fore not the self-promotion of commandery governors but tribute paid to them by those
who commissioned the inscriptions.
The patrons of the Han cliff inscriptions in Xiabian were all members of the local gov­
ernment. L i M in 李 棰 ， clerk for roads and bridges {daoqiaoyuan 道 橋 掾 )， commissioned
both the M em orial to the Tianjing Passage and the H ym n to Geng X un. As many as twelve
people sponsored the H ym n o f the Western Passage. Ten of them belonged to the com­
mandery government ofW udu, including the aide to the governor; the clerks for head­
quarters, consultation, and general purposes; the retainers in charge of records, labor, and
conscription; the weight master; and the minor scribe. Two of them came from the dis­
trict government of Xiabian: the aide to the magistrate and the head of roads. The minor
scribe, Q iu jin g 仇 靖 ，was the author and calligrapher of the text. The lengthy list indicates
that as the initiator of the projects, Li X i garnered higher esteem than Geng Xun did.
 I
4
5

Local functionaries may have produced the H ymn o f the Western Passage for the foot­
way, but what they had in mind was more than a lasting reminder of a significant project.
The first h alf o f the preface to the hymn is about Li Xi himself. It tells the viewer who Li
Xi was, giving his birthplace and his names and describing his personality and his family
background. It also describes the progress o f Li X i， s career, from serving as a guard at a
palace in his teenage years to being selected as a guard in the capital city in his twenties to
being thrice appointed a local adm inistrator when he was in his prim e. Before proceed­
ing w ith details o f the footway project in its second half, the preface enum erates Li X is
praisew orthy achievements as W udu governor. The first h alf o f the preface to the hymn
thus took an epitaph form that had gradually gained popularity since the early second
century c e . Nor was it unusual for subordinate officials to commission an epitaph for a
deceased superior. A good example is the epitaph for Mr. Jing 景 ，a counselor-delegate
o f Beihai 北 海 Kingdom in present-day Shandong, which was commissioned by more
than fifty functionaries in 143 ce (Figure 2.34).141 The Hymn o f the Western Passage com­
bined the convention of cliff inscriptions that commemorated construction projects (as
in M r. C hus case) w ith the genre o f epitaphs (as in M r.Jin gs case). It was a m onum ent
both to an event and to a person.
Tiziana Lippiello points out that the description of Li X i in the H ym n o f the Western
Passage disagrees with the description recorded in Standard H istory o f the Later H an}42
A ccording to the official history, Li Xi was impeached for slaughtering the Q iang who
had surrendered around 161 c e in a battle he had fought as Defender of the Dependent
State {shuguo duwei 屬國都尉 ）at Anding 安定 Commanderyinpresent-dayGansu .143
This type o f position was created for frontier commanderies to deal w ith non-C hinese
issues. A D efender o f the D ependent State could have had more power than a governor,
depending on the local situation and the personalities o f both officials.144 Li Xi the m er­
ciless defender was a far cry from Li Xi the benevolent governor. I f they were one and
the same, then either L i Xi reform ed him self after his im peachm ent, or the description
by his subordinates was partial and ingratiating. O r perhaps there were two people w ith
the same name. We know nothing o f Li X i the defender beyond his post and miscon­
duct because he was m entioned only briefly in the biography o f his impeacher. There are
really not enough clues for us to refute or acknowledge the connection between the two
citations.
Despite the potential discrepancy, there is no denying that the H ym n o f the Western
Passage reflects how local functionaries perceived and represented the Li X i they knew. If
Li X i was never a ruthless defender, the inscription showed the m erits th at the function­
aries adm ired in their adm inistrator. I f Li Xi had carried out a massacre before serving as
2 .34. Memorial stele for M r Jin g . 143
c e . 195 x 76.5 cm .Jim ng, Shandong.

Ink rubbings, (a) Front, (b) Back.

 governor in W udu, he must have redeemed himself in the eyes of local functionaries, for
they were under no pressure to voluntarily subscribe to a monument to a deceased supe-
rior for whom they had no respect. In any event, the H ymn o f the Western Passage elu­
cidated the model of a local administrator~lenient and capable— at the regional level
of the Han bureaucracy. Local functionaries lamented the death of a beloved governor
while celebrating the glory of benevolent rule. They did not have the right to appoint a
governor, but they could report on his performance according to their moral standards.
No place was better for them to promote ethics than a well-traveled route constructed
for ostensible reasons of compassion and efficiency. Those who took the Western Pas­
sage would learn how the convenient route they currently enjoyed came to be by reading
the cliff inscription; they would also learn that the virtue of the governor went beyond
improving local transportation. And it was impossible for them to miss the auspicious
omens depicted with the text, which were far more eye-catching than the small charac­
ters were. For educated travelers, the images were icons of the benevolent rule to be fur­
ther explained in the text. Illiterate travelers, grasping nothing specific about the project
or the governor, still understood from the omens that something exceptional had been
done. I f they were curious enough, they could discover the details of the good deeds
from those who could read. Some may have already heard stories circulated orally before
they took the footway. In any case, the engraved omens publicized the project while per­
petuating the essence of Heavens mandate.
Auspicious omens as signs o f Heavens mandate were fleeting, seldom staying in the
human world. The illustrations of auspicious omens in various manuals were efforts to
preserve memories of them, as well as to identify and canonize them. The illustrated
manuals, most of them bundles of wooden slips or silk scrolls, could not, however, with-
stand decay or fragmentation. W hen people in the Han appropriated the illustrations for
other purposes, they prolonged the memory and use of auspicious omens. Stone carving
was a plausible solution, as the designer of the W u Liang Shrine found. Still, human-
made structures like steles and shrines could be removed or could topple in the treach­
erous course of time. Nothing was more durable than nature itself. Engraving auspi-
cious omens on the cliff of the Western Passage thus defied the transience of omens and
perpetuated their presence in the human world. W hat truly attained longevity with the
cliff engravings was the sublimity of conventional benevolence; the construction project,
the esteemed governor, and the supporting functionaries were all manifestations of that
value. More than a reminder of an event or a person, the cliff with the incised text and
images became a Confucian monument favoring a moral approach to Heaven.
 CHAPTER 3

Imagining Celestial Journeys

The political turmoil of the Eastern Zhou not only challenged the kings， monopoly on
Heavens mandate but also ended their exclusive right to communicate with Heaven. As
ambitious feudal lords competed for Heaven’s mandate, philosophically minded indi­
viduals pondered the relation of human beings with Heaven. For instance, Q u Yuan, a
high-ranking nobleman of the Chu State, composed several poems， one of them entitled
H eavenly Questions. In it he expressed doubt about the working of the world from its ori­
gin to the present.1
Q u Yuan found it difficult to fathom the rationale for Heaven’s mandate. He set
down his questions, all unanswered. He surveyed the fall of the Shang and the rise of
the Zhou and asked，“W hen the Heavenly Thearch confers his mandate, how does he
give notice of it? W hen he has bestowed dominion over the world on one person, why
does he take it away and give it to another?， ，2 Q u Yuan looked into the establishment of
the Western Zhou, starting with its ancestor: “Hou Ji was the Heavenly Thearch s first­
born; why did he treat his natural child so cruelly? W hen he was left out on the ice, how
did the birds keep him warm? Drawing his bow to the full and grasping the arrow, how
did he become a war leader? After giving the Heavenly Hiearch so great a shock, how did
he come to have a glorious future?^3 Examining more recent events in the Eastern Zhou
gave Q u Yuan no clues to Heaven’s will either. “Duke Huan 桓 (d. 643 b c e ) of the Q i
State assembled the vassals nine times, yet in the end his body was destroyed. Heaven in
its dispensations veered first to one side and then to the other. W hy did it first favor him
and then punish him ?， ，
4
Q u Yuan’s thoughts on Heaven went far beyond the caprice of the mandate. He
viewed Heaven as a physical entity and asked: “How does Heaven coordinate its motion?
How do the sun and the moon hold to their courses, and how do the fixed stars keep
their places?，
’5Hie courses of the sun and the moon led to questions about life and death:
 o
1
5

3.1. Mirror with the pattern o f leaves. Third to second cen- 3 .2 . T L V mirror. First century
b c e to first century c e .

tury b c e . Bronze. Diameter 15.9 cm. Unearthed in 1953-60 Bronze. Diameter 18.95 cm- Collection ofM oriya Kozo
from Tomb 1175 in Guangzhou, Guangdong. Ink rubbing. in the Kyoto National Museum.

“W hat is the peculiar virtue of the moon, the Brightness of the Night, that causes it to
grow once more after its death?”6 He acknowledged death: “The heaven-made pattern
embraces all, and when the yang spirit leaves, death ensues.，，7Accepting of death though
he may have been, Q u Yuan paid attention to the legends about deathlessness, including
the story of Peng Keng 彭 鐘 ， who served the Heavenly Thearch a delicious pheasant and
gained longevity.8 He also marveled at the story about the immortals’land in the north­
west: “Where is the Black Water that dyes the feet, and where is the Mountain of Three
Perils? The folk there put death off for many years; what is the lim it of their age?”9
Q u Yuan’s interest in immortality was to prolong the lives of individuals like him ­
self, not those of kings and reigns. The concern for the relation between individuals and
Heaven gained currency in the Han dynasty.10 The inscription on a bronze mirror un­
earthed in Guangzhou, probably made in the second century b c e , proclaims a personal
wish to be “as long-lived as Heaven” (yu tian xiangshou 與 天 相 朞 ）(Figure 3.1).11 Stories
and legends about Heaven and longevity drew followers during the Han period, just as
they had drawn Q u Yuan. The inscription on another mirror, shown in Figure 3.2, offers
us a glimpse of the Han fantasy:
[If you] ascend M ount Tai, [you will] see the divine men.
[They] eat the essence of jade and drink limpid spring water.
 I
1
5

3.3. T L V mirror. First century bce to first century c e . Print.

[They] yoke the flying dragon to their chariots and mount

the floating clouds.
[They have] attained the Way of Heaven; all things are in
their natural state .12

On some mirrors, the formulaic inscription refers to immortal men, not divine men.
O n others, the inscription ends with “The white tiger pulls, and they go straight up
to Heaven” (Figure 3.3).13 The mirror makers and their customers believed that those
mountain-dwelling immortal or divine men knew both the Way of Heaven and the
way to Heaven. In the Han period, immortals came to replace the Son of Heaven as the
 2
1
5

二 麵 聩 職
3.4. Inscribed brick. 94 c e . 25 x 7 cm. Unearthed in Yibin, Sichuan. Ink rubbing.

new agents between Heaven and Earth. People hoped that immortals could help them
obtain immortality and ascend to Heaven themselves. Even if they could not reach their
goals in life, they wished to achieve them after death. The inscription on a brick exca­
vated in Sichuan province declares that the tomb, built in 94 c e ，
was meant to be “a place
where [the deceased could enjoy] manifested immortality, fitting secularity, and relax-
ation” {xuanxianyishi tanxiu zh i cang 宣 仙 宜 世 彈 休 之 藏 ）(Figure 3.4).14
The concise inscriptions and simple designs on the bronze mirrors, though telling,
cannot fully represent the scope of the visual culture stimulated by the individualistic
approach to Heaven. Architecture and pictorial art took the lead in presenting this new
dimension of Heaven. A large corpus of archaeological finds further elaborates the quest
for “post-mortem im m ortality.，，15 In this chapter, I approach the celestial fantasy blos­
soming in the Han from three directions: the imperial architectural projects that show
how an emperor shifted from his claim of the mandate to his pursuit of immortality, the
tomb furnishings that display how social elites enabled the deceased to reach Heaven,
and the gate m otif that promises the deceased their eternal abode.

Morality and Immortality

It was during Emperor W us reign that the moral discourse of omens was established.
It was also during his reign that the association of omens with immortality was encour­
aged. A t court the competition between the two views— morality versus immortality~
intensified with the discovery of a huge ding bronze tripod in Fenyin in 113 b c e . As we
have discussed, Confucian scholars who laid stress on ethics interpreted the tripod as an
omen sent down by Heaven to honor the virtue of Han rulers; they tried to induce the
emperor to continue his benevolent rule. Masters of methods who vaunted the lure of
 5
3
I
immortality introduced legends of the Yellow Thearch, a sage king of remote antiquity.
According to one legend, the Yellow Thearch collected copper from M ount Shou 首 and
had it cast into a tripod at the foot of M ount Jing 莉；when the tripod was completed,
a dragon descended to carry the Yellow Thearch up to Heaven. According to another
legend provided by Gongsun Qing 公孫 I即，the Yellow Thearch obtained a precious tri­
pod in Wanqu 宛朐 at the winter solstice on the first day of the eleventh month, the
beginning of a heavenly cycle that recurred every two decades; after twenty such cycles,
the Yellow Thearch became an immortal and ascended to Heaven. No matter how the
Yellow Thearch came into possession of a tripod, the consequence was the same: he was
able to attain im m ortality and reside in Heaven. M asters o f m ethods compared the tri­
pod recently unearthed in Fenyin to the tripod said to have been either cast or acquired
by the Yellow Thearch. They wished to encourage the em peror to pursue im m ortality.16
Em peror W u saw no contradiction between the two views. H e had no objection to
the Confucian standpoint as long as it enhanced the legitimacy o f his sovereignty. H e
even richly rewarded W uqiu Shouwang for his compelling argum ent on how the tri­
pod m anifested Heavens approval o f the H an reign. N or did he oppose the perspective
presented by masters o f m ethods, for it promised his personal im m ortality. In fact, he
was fascinated by legends o f the Yellow Thearch. Having listened to G ongsun Q ings
recounting, he sighed, “I f only I could become like the Yellow Thearch, I would think no
more o f my wives and children than o f a castoff slip p er!，
，17
Em peror W us dual interest in receiving the newly excavated tripod com plicated his
worship o f Heaven. Two distinct voices came from the camp o f masters o f methods:
one advocated devotions to G rand Unity, the supreme deity o f Heaven, while the other
urged the perform ance o f the feng-shan ceremony. Em peror W u had followed M iu
Jis recom m endation to build an altar to G rand U nity in the southeastern suburb o f
C hang’an approximately a decade before the discovery o f the tripod in Fenyin, at which
point some masters o f methods seized the opportunity to further establish the suprem­
acy o f G rand Unity: G rand U nity made one tripod, which signified unification and w ith
w hich Heaven, E arth, and all creatures were associated; the Yellow Thearch produced
three tripods to symbolize Heaven, E arth, and humans; Yu cast nine tripods to stand
for the nine adm inistrative districts he governed. The point o f their argum ent was that
the fewer the tripods, the more superior the one who commissioned them .18 A pparently
convinced, Em peror W u soon had another altar to G rand U nity erected in the G anquan
Palace complex in G anquan, where the Yellow Thearch was said to have communed
w ith myriad spiritual beings. The G anquan Palace, which also housed the tripod from
Fenyin, became the place where Em peror W u regularly offered sacrifices to Heaven. H e
 conducted the first sacrificial ceremony at the winter solstice of 113 b c e . Hie occasion was
eulogized: “Heaven has for the first time granted the precious tripod .. . to the emperor.
The first day o f the m onth corresponds to the w inter solstice; w hen the cycles have come
to an end, they shall begin again. The emperor, reverently bowing, appears h ere.， ，
19 W h at
Em peror W u hoped to secure was more than H eavens m andate to rule; he w anted to
reach Heaven as the Yellow Thearch did.
A fter establishing the worship o f G rand U nity in G anquan, Em peror W u proceeded
with the feng-shan ceremony at M ount Tai, as suggested by other masters of methods,
in two years. Although Emperor W u had learned the significance of th .t feng-shan cer­
emony from his Confucian tutors，who naturally emphasized mandate and legitimacy,
w hat inflam ed his enthusiasm now was the prophecy presented by G ongsun Q ing, a
pupil o f M aster Shen. A ccording to G ongsun Q ing?M aster S h en~ w ho claimed to have
communicated with the renowned immortal Anqi Sheng 安期生 in person— said that
the sage o f the H an would be Em peror Gao’s grandson or great-grandson，who would
receive a precious tripod and perform the feng-shan ceremony. Master Shen added force
to the prophecy by bringing in the Yellow Thearch. O f all the seventy-two rulers who
attempted the feng-shan ceremony, he averred, only the Yellow Thearch was able to do
so at M ount Tai. The H an ruler, he believed, would also ascend the m ountain and con­
duct the ceremony, after w hich the H an ruler w ould，like the Yellow Thearch, become
an im m ortal and enter Heaven.20 Em peror W us craving for im m ortality m ust have out­
weighed his w orry over legitimacy, for he was im patient w ith the Confixcians，debates
over ritual propriety and eventually excused them from participating in the preparations
for the event. W hen the em peror and his entourage arrived at M ount Tai, he conducted
the fen g ceremony to Heaven at the foot of the mountain in the same manner as he had
w orshiped G rand U nity in G anquan. Then he climbed to the top o f the m ountain alone
and performed another fen g rite to Heaven.21 No one knows whether his pleas for the
longevity o f the H an reign m atched in degree his prayers for his own immortality.
Em peror W u may have intended a balance between m orality and im m ortality in the
treatm ent o f the Fenyin tripod, b ut he was drawn more and more into the camp o f mas­
ters o f m ethods in the course o f regulating the worship o f G rand U nity and perform ing
the feng-shan ceremony. To be an immortal was his priority because it had taken several
hundred years for the Yellow Thearch to prepare for his ascension if the legend regard­
ing the heavenly cycles was to be believed. A person had to live long enough to reach
the eternal paradise. Right before the feng-shan ceremony, Emperor W u had visited the
nearby coast in the hope o f encountering im m ortals there, for the masters o f methods
all asserted th at im m ortals were living on the sacred m ountains (or islands) in the E ast­
 5
1
5

ern Sea. He even sent thousands of masters ofmethods out to sea to seekimmortals.
Immediately after thefeng-shan ceremony, the emperor returned to the coast， hoping for
a chance meeting, but saw only a few giant footprints allegedly left by immortals.22
It beingimpossible to linger onthe east coast forever, EmperorWudecidedto take
action in or near the capital. Gongsun Qing soothed the frustrated emperor by pointing
out why he had never succeeded in meeting immortals: because he always rushed off in
great haste to see them. The master ofmethods proposed enticing immortals to come
bycreating anenvironment theyliked—amoresuitable strategyfor anemperor. Since
Gongsun Qing said that immortals preferred to live in towers, Emperor Wu had the
Tower ofWind and Cinnamon {feilian gui guan 蜚廉桂觀）erected in Chang’an and
theTower ofLongevity(yiyan shou guan 益延壽觀）erectedin Ganquaninthewinter
of no bce. He also ordered the construction o f the Terrace Leading to Heaven {tongtian
tai 通 天 臺 ) in the Ganquan Palace complex.23To ensure speedy completion of the con­
struction, several tens of thousands of laborers worked on the terrace, more on the other
. 04
projects.
Thesestructures,not describedindetailinHanofficialhistories,havelongsincebeen
destroyed,but archaeologicalinvestigations ofthe GanquanPalacereveal theirlocation.
The entire palace complex, which is enclosed by walls, occupies an area 1,948 meters long
and 600 meters wide. The area is almost a rectangle, except for a cut in the northwest­
ern corner (Figure 3.5). Archaeologists have found the remains of four pounded-earth
mounds in the northeastern corner ofthe complex. Since roofingtiles with “Tower of
Longevity”inscriptions were discovered near Mound 3， archaeologists believe the mound，
now 60 meters in circumference and 6 meters in height, must have been the base of the
tower (Figure 3.6). To the east of M ound 3 are M ound 1 and M ound 2，both gigantic，
about 200 to 220 meters in circumference and 15 to 16 meters in remaining height (Fig­
ure 3.7). Archaeologists identify both mounds as the remains of the Terrace Leading to
Heaven, althoughtheHanofficial records donot detail its twincomponents .25
Nor do the Han records supplythe dimensions ofthe lofty structures for enticing
immortals. Yang Xiong 揚 雄 (53 b c e —18 c e )，
who accompanied Emperor Cheng to the
GanquanPalace,oncerhapsodizedoverthevisual effectonanapproachingvisitor:
At this time, though yet to reach the Ganquan Palace,
He gazes upon the continuous splendor of the Terrace Leading to Heaven:
The base, submerged in shade, is chilly and cold;
The spire, a vast chaos, complexly conjoined,
Straight, tall, and towering, reaches to Heaven;
Its height, alas, cannot be fully measured!26
 d M H

n olu
b ou3q3

.
2
t
x
Ganquan Palace

_
Mound

Ditch
Dongjia Village
毫
□ Village
II
3.5. Architectural remains o f the Ganquan Palace.
m

3.6. Roofing tiles for the Tower o f Longevity in the Ganquan Palace, (a) Yi-yan-? tile. Discovered in
1978 in Chunhua, Shaanxi, (b) ?-yan-shou tile. Discovered in 1980 in Chunhua, Shaanxi. Ink rubbings.
 7
1
5

3.7. View o f Mounds i and 2 at the site o f the Ganquan Palace.

The numbers given for this immeasurable height in post-Han documents range from
thirty to fifty zhang (69 to 115 meters).27 There is no way for us to determine their accu­
racy. The only comparable Han structures are the beacon terraces along the Great Wall.
Terrace 17 in Dunhuang 敦 煌 ，numbered by archaeologists, is an example (Figure 3.8).
The terrace, composed of an earthen core and a brick skin, has a square base of 26.5
meters in perimeter and a remaining height of 8.4 meters.28 If a beacon terrace taller than
8 meters was erected on a base of 26.5 meters in perimeter, then the height of the Terrace
Leading to Heaven on a base 220 meters in circumference could have fallen between 55
and 65 meters.29 No wonder the Terrace Leading to Heaven became the landmark of the
Ganquan Palace complex, catching a visitors eyes from afar.
Other Han archaeological finds offer us further aid in imagining what the structures
built for immortals may have looked like. The mural in an Eastern Han tomb at An-
ping 安 平 ，Hebei, depicts a sky-scraping watchtower standing in a walled city (Figure
3.9).30 The watchtower is a wide-open, one-story wooden structure on an earthen ter­
race. The watchtower apparently gains its soaring height from the earthen terrace, not
 8
1
5

3 .8. Beacon terrace 17. Late second to first century b c e . Pounded earth. 6.4 x 6.85 x 8.4 m. Investigated in
1994-96 along the Basin o f Shule River in Dunhuang, Gansu, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

from the wooden structure itself. The structure could be a guan tower on an earthen
base or a tai terrace with a wooden shelter. In other words, both the Tower of Longev­
ity and the Terrace Leading to Heaven in the Ganquan Palace could have looked like
the painted watchtower. A less ambiguous example comes from a clay tile unearthed in
Chengdu 成 都 ，Sichuan (Figure 3.10). It shows a three-story building in a courtyard
compound. Hayashi Minao considers the multi-story, freestanding building on the right
to be a guan tower.31 Many scholars regard this type of multi-story building developed
in the Han as the forerunner of the Buddhist pagodas that flourished in the medieval
period, but they also acknowledge the huge gap between the two. Han builders had not
yet managed the technical challenges of bringing a wooden structure to its full verti­
cal potential.32 Among hundreds of pottery towers that archaeologists have retrieved
from Han tombs, the majority possess only two to four stories. A seven-story pottery
tower discovered at Jiaozuo 焦 作 ，Henan, is a rarity (Figure 3.11).33 Granted that pot­
tery models may not depict real buildings, a guan tower in Han times was not likely to
have been very high unless it was atop a tall earthen terrace. The fact that the pounded
mound for the Tower of Longevity is still six meters high indicates that the tower itself
 9
1
5

3.9 . Watchtower. 176 c e . Mural. Unearthed in 1971 in Anping, Hebei.

must have gained height from it, like the watchtower painted in the Anping tomb. If
we have to distinguish a guan tower from a tai terrace, then judging from the size of the
pounded bases at the Ganquan Palace, we may hypothesize that a tai terrace is charac­
terized more by its earthen terrace than by its wooden structure; the wooden structure, if
any, on the Terrace Leading to Heaven could not have been wider or more pronounced
than the earthen terrace below. O n the other hand, a guan tower is distinguished more
by its wooden structure than by its earthen terrace. The wooden structure of the Tower
of Longevity could have been more noticeable than the earthen terrace beneath it if
its horizontal dimension was greater. That would make the painted watchtower in the
Anping tomb a more accurate reflection of the Tower of Longevity than of the Terrace
 3.10. Multi-story building on a decorated brick. 25-220 c e . 40 x 47 cm. Unearthed in Chengdu, Sichuan.

Leading to Heaven. From Yang Xiongs rhapsody, however, we can deduce that it was
the Terrace Leading to Heaven, with a base three times larger, that dominated the Gan­
quan Palace complex vertically.
Unfortunately, the towers and terraces in Chang’an and Ganquan did not entice
immortals to come, even though dry meats and jujubes, foods that Gongsun Qing
claimed immortals craved, were constantly offered there. Never giving up, Emperor W u
plunged into an even more ambitious project several years later in 104 b c e . Rather than
isolated towers and terraces, the emperor aimed at a full-scale paradise that matched the
immortals' land he learned about from masters of methods. He had this earthly para­
dise built west of crowded Chang， an，separated from the city walls by a river (see Figure
1.7). According to the preliminary investigation of the site, the entire complex occupied
a rectangle 2,130 meters long and 1,240 meters wide. It was anchored by the Jianzhang
 3.11. Model architecture showing multi-story buildings. Mid-first to
mid-second century c e . Painted pottery. 192 x 168 cm. Unearthed in
1993 from Tomb 6 at Baizhuang in Jiaozuo, Henan.

建 章 Palace, which was comparable in scale to the main Weiyang Palace erected w ithin
the city walls. The Jianzhang Palace was reputed to have had gates by the thousands
and windows by the tens of thousands. In the north of the palace was an artificial lake,
called Taiye 太液 Pond, that covered a vast area一 1,516,000 square meters— and was
designed to look like the Eastern Sea. The most famous immortal islands— Penglai 蓬
莱 ，Fangzhang 方 丈 ， Yingzhou 瀛 洲 ，and Huliang 壷 梁 were replicated. Still believ­
ing that immortals liked to live in towers, Emperor W u had four tall structures erected
in the complex. Gate-Pillars with Phoenixes {feng que 鳳 闕 ) stood to the east of the
palace, while the Jian Terrace {jian ta i 、
漸 臺 ) rose northeast of the lake. A ll three were
higher than twenty zhang (46 meters) according to the Han official records. The Ter­
racefor Deities {shenming tai 神明臺)， built northwest ofthe
palace, reached fifty
zhang
(115 meters) based on the Han official records. Archaeologists have located the pounded
bases for these structures. That the remaining height of the pounded bases ranges from
six to ten meters proves again the dependence on tall earthen terraces to achieve the
soaring height of structures.34
O f the four lofty structures, the Tower of Jinggan [jinggan lou 井 幹 樓 ）is the one
mentioned in Han official histories but not yet identified by archaeologists, h. jinggan
is a type of wooden structure characterized by rows of timbers. As a bronze model un­
earthed from a Han tomb at Shizhaishan 石 寨 山 ，Yunnan，demonstrates, the builders
would have first interlocked four timbers as in the Chinese pictography/^ 井 (well),
such that the timbers formed a rectangle and the ends of the timbers extended beyond
the points of overlap, thus making one layer, and then piled up successive layers to the
desired height of the walls (Figure 3.12).35 The jinggan structure was so popular in the
southwest that local artisans used it to represent buildings in pictorial art, as seen on a
bronze drum discovered at Shizhaishan (Figure 3.13).36 How such a structure could have
sustained the height of fifty zhang (115 meters) as claimed for the Tower of Jinggan in
Han official histories is beyond imagination.37 Unlike a guan tower, which could be a
single-story shelter on a wall or a terrace, a lou tower was a multi-story building~the
meaning is unambiguous. The only way for early builders to gain height was to place
the wooden structure on an earthen core. The excavation of the Yongning 永寧 Temple,
erected in 519 c e in Luoyang, reveals that the renowned nine-story pagoda had a central
core that was composed of a group of pillars and reinforced by pounded earth (Figure
3.14)* Even with the reinforced core, scholars still debate whether the pagoda could have
been higher than the 100 meters mentioned in many received texts.38The Tower ofJing­
gan may show rows of timbers on its exterior, but it most likely contained a reinforced
core as seen in the Yongning Temple. And as with the pagoda, how high the Tower of
Jinggan could have reached remains a mystery.
Apart from towering structures and lakes re-creating the Eastern Sea, another design
element was related to the theme of immortality, as Ban Gu informs us in his Rhapsody
on the Western Capital {X ijin g fu 西 京 赋 )：
Magic herbs blooming in winter,
Sacred trees growing in groves,
Rugged hills, peaked and sharp,
M etal and stones rising, precipitous and steep.
They hoisted an im m ortals palms to receive the dew,
Jutting forth from metal columns standing in pairs.
Having transcended the turbidity of dust and dirt,
They were refreshed by the clear essence of white vapors.39
3.12. Model architecture showing the jinggan structure. Mid-second to mid-first century
b c e. Bronze. 12 (W ) x 9 (H) x 7 (D) cm . Unearthed in 1956-58 from Tomb 3 at Shizhaishan
in Jinning, Yunnan, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawings.
 3.13. Jinggan structure depicted on a bronze drum. Unearthed in 1956-58
from Tomb 12 at Shizhaishan in Jinning, Yunnan. Ink rubbing.

Even though the ''immortals palms for receiving the dew” may have preceded the con­
struction of the Jianzhang Palace, they accentuated the purpose of Emperor W u s earthly
paradise.40 The Rhapsody and other early texts describe the device as a bronze plate
shaped like two palms and mounted on two bronze columns; they do not mention the
statue of an immortal displayed in some later imitations.41 Like the towers and the ter­
races in the palace complex, the device for receiving the dew was nothing if not monu­
mental. The plate was said to have measured seven w ei 圍 （ 1.62 meters) in circumference;
the columns, twenty zhang (46 meters) in height.42 The palms were erected on hills so
they could reach into clouds and collect dew that was not polluted by the secular world.
As discussed earlier, the imagery of the immortals palms for receiving the dew inspired
the illustration of sweet dew, an auspicious omen honoring benevolent rule (see Figure
2.23). The pictorial borrowing also shows the blurriness between morality and immortal­
ity among the Han people, Emperor W u among them.
In moving from isolated towers and terraces to a full-scale immortals， land, Emperor
W u pushed architecture to its limits with the fantasies provided by masters of methods.
Behind all his efforts to meet with immortals and to learn from them the secret of im ­
mortality, the relentless pursuit of high structures indicated an unwavering interest in
ascending to Heaven. Three years after the Jianzhang project, Emperor W u returned
to M ount Tai to perform the feng-shan ceremony. He revisited the east coast, hoping
to encounter immortals this time. To distract the emperor from his disappointment in
another failure, a master of methods supplied another legend about the Yellow Thearch,
who was said to have built five cities and twelve towers in anticipation of the immortals，
arrival in Zhiqi 執期；he named the complex “Welcoming the Years” {yingnian 迎年 )•
 6
5
I
mm
■ hi m I
■ill! 議 |
E ^ i i i ii« 3

p llll ll" _
Wnm)m iiira
mmi
K iiiii
r-.UBIi ：：]
ihii!
hmmii
I: 〜 -；liili
i\ 亂龜密:邊 邊 自 iii^
=i

3.14. Reconstruction o f the Yongning Pagoda by Yang Hongxun.

(a) Floor plan, (b) Cross-section, (c) Perspective.
We are told that the emperor was instantly taken with the legend， ordered the construc­
tion of five cities and twelve towers, which he called “Brightening the Years” {mingnian
明年)，and offered sacrifices there in person to the Thearch on High, ruler of Heaven.
The extant documents inform us of neither the scale of this architectural complex nor
where it was built.43
Emperor W us expenditures in creating an immortals’ land around the Jianzhang
Palace did not escape criticism. Dongfang Shuo 東 方 朔 (154-93 bce) admonished the
emperor for his extravagance, remarking that his Jianzhang project disqualified him
from steering the growing populace~who had indulged in luxurious habits and aban­
doned fa rm in g b a c k to the right course. The discreditable constructions also prevented
him from achievements like those of the sage kings of antiquity.44 More reproofs fol­
lowed after Emperor W us death. Confucian scholar-officials who had judged thefen g -
shan ceremony unfavorably attacked the excesses represented by the Ganquan and Jian­
zhang Palaces. To accommodate the ethical sentiments that came to dominate the court,
Emperor Yuan had to prohibit workers from maintaining the two palaces.45 The total
destruction of the Jianzhang Palace came when Wang M ang was in need of timber to
build his ancestral temple right after his usurpation of the Western Han throne.46 The
immortaTs palms for receiving the dew survived until one decade after Cao Pis usur­
pation of the Eastern Han throne; the accidental breaking of the palm-shaped plate on
its way from Chang5an to Luoyang during the Qinglong 青龍 reign (232-236 c e ) finally
terminated an imperial fantasy initiated three centuries earlier.

The Journeys to Heaven

Emperor W u may have pursued immortality with unrestrained material excess, but he
was not the first ruler to think of reaching Heaven. King Zhao 昭 (r. 515-489 b c e ) of the
Chu State once questioned whether there was truly no communication between Heaven
and Earth, as stated in Zhou documents, because Chong 重 and Li 黎 had been assigned
to take charge of heavenly and earthly affairs, respectively. He probed further: Was a
commoner allowed to ascend to Heaven?47 Clearly, King Zhao was challenging the
received notion that a Zhou king, as the Son of Heaven, held a monopoly over commu­
nications with Heaven. The waning of Zhou power gave rise to the challenge, especially
a f t e r t h e r u l i n g h o u s e w a s c o m p e l l e d t o m o v e t h e c a p it a l e a s t w a r d in t h e e i g h t h c e n ­
Before King Zhao, Duke M u 穆 (r. 659-621 b c e ) o f t h e Q in State h a d a l r e a d y
tu ry b c e .
announced that he dreamed of the Thearch on H igh，who bade him establish peace in
the Jin 晉 State，a mission that would normally be carried out by the Zhou king. Since
the Thearch on High was believed to govern Heaven, it was later rumored that Duke
M u was allowed to climb to Heaven.48 Again, we see the fusion, or confusion, between
the notion of Heavens mandate and the belief in ascending to Heaven.
However desirable it was to reach Heaven, doing so was not easy. King Xiaocheng
孝 成 (r. 265—245 b c e ) of the Zhao 趙 State dreamed that he rode a dragon up toward
Heaven but fell down before arriving at his destination.49 Emperor Wen, Emperor W us
grandfather, dreamed that he was unable to climb to Heaven until a guard with a yel­
low head pushed him upward.50 To overcome the sense that Heaven was impossible to
reach，masters of methods at the court of Emperor W u circulated legends of the Yellow
Thearch，encouraging the emperor to become an immortal first and await the chance to
ascend to Heaven.
The deterioration of the political order during the Eastern Zhou period not only gave
feudal lords the confidence to compete for Heavens mandate but also granted individ­
uals the hope that they might communicate with Heaven. Q u Yuan, besides enumerat­
ing questions about Heaven, described a literary journey to Heaven in his famous elegy
On Encountering Trouble {Li sao 離 騷 ).W riting the elegy may have been his way of vent­
ing his political frustration at being exiled from the court of King Huai 懷 （ r. 328-229
b c e ) , who took that step either because of his belief in accusations that Q u overstepped

royal authority or his fury with Q u for disagreeing with his strategic alliance with the
Q in State, a mistake that eventually cost him his own life.51 Heaven played a twofold
role in Q u Yuan’s account of his political sorrow. O n the one hand，he reiterated the
moral discourse of Heavens mandate: “Heavenly Thearch knows no partiality; he looks
for the virtuous and makes them his ministers.”52 Feeling no regret for the loyalty and
uprightness he had demonstrated, Q u could only lament, “Many a heavy sigh I heaved
in my despair，grieving that I was born in such an unlucky time.”53 O n the other hand,
Heaven became a space where Q u Yuan could liberate himself from the turmoil of the
human world. After bemoaning his sad fate, Q u wrote, “I yoked a team of jade dragons
to a phoenix-figured cart and waited for the wind to come， to soar up on my journey.， ，
54
Making wild flights of imagination, Q u reached Heaven, where “I asked Heavens por­
ter to open up for me，but he leaned across Heavens gate and eyed me churlishly.”55
Although Q u did not get into the palace of Heaven, he envisioned himself befriend­
ing the sun, the moon, rain，wind, thunder, and clouds and roaming high above the
secular world. These delights notwithstanding, Qu never forsook his duty: “But when I
ascended the splendors of the heavens, I suddenly caught a glimpse of my old home. M y
groom’s heart was heavy，and the horses longingly arched their heads and refused to go
on.”56 Q u concluded the elegy with this resolution: “Since none is worthy to work with
[me] in making good government, I shall go and join Peng Xian 彭咸 in the place where
he abides.”57W ho Peng Xian was is unclear, even though Q u Yuan mentions him twice
in On Encountering Trouble and several times in his other works. Peng Xian could have
been the legendary immortal Peng Zu 彭 祖 ，the great shaman W u Xian 巫 咸 ，both of
them in combination, or someone else whose identity is unknown.58 Our understanding
of Peng Xian does not change the narrative of the elegy. Q u Yuan came to terms with
reality and considered an alternative path. He began by reflecting on the moral aspect of
Heaven, proceeded to explore celestial journeys, and finally discovered the transcenden­
tal dimension of Heaven, whether immortal or shamanistic.
Even if the enigma of Peng Xian makes the direction of Q u Yuan’s alternative path
an open question, there is little doubt about the shift from morality to immortality in
F ar-offJourney {yuan you 遠 遊 )，an elegy traditionally attributed to Q u Yuan but proba­
bly composed by a later author.59 Although Q u Yuan in On Encountering Trouble spends
line after line complaining about the political injustice done to him before he embarks
on his celestial flight, the author of F ar-offJourney mentions only fleetingly his vague
grief over “the parlous state of the world’s ways， ” then devotes his full attention to the
pursuit of immortality before depicting a celestial journey. Q u Yuan, discontented with
the monarch he served, praises the ancient sage kings~Yao, Shun, Yu, and Tang 湯一
who appointed wise and virtuous officials and trusted them. W hen he made up a meet­
ing with the renowned shaman W u Xian, he hoped to receive confirmation that ancient
sage kings tried their best to identify and recruit good ministers. In contrast, the author
of F ar-offJourney worshiped legendary figures who enjoyed longevity，such as Chisong
赤 松 ，Fu Yue 傅 說 ，Han Zhong 韓 重 ，and Wang Qiao 王 喬 . He was seeking the key
to immortality when he invented an overnight visit to Wang Qiao, who advised him to
cultivate his inner force {qtj and to reach the status of no-action (w uw ei 無 為 )• These
are two fundamental practices in Daoism. W hen this author clarifies his own position—
“Xuan Yuan 軒 辕 [the Yellow Hiearch]-was too remote for me to aspire to, but I could
follow Wang Qiao for my delight”60— he clearly makes a distinction between those who
ascend to Heaven (the Yellow Thearch) and those who stay on Earth (Wang Qiao), even
though they all reached immortality. In his mind, Heaven no longer possessed a twofold
character— moral and transcendental— as in On Encountering Trouble. Rather, Heaven
was the highest stage to be reached in the pursuit of immortality. Instead of being an es­
cape from turbulence, the celestial journey was an embrace of Daoist tranquility. As the
author of F ar-offJourney concludes: “In the sheer depths below, the earth was invisible;
in the vastness above, the sky could not be seen. W hen I looked, my startled eyes saw
 nothing; when I listened, no sound met my amazed ear. Transcending no-action， I came
to Purity and entered the neighborhood of the Great Beginning.， ，
61
The individual quest for immortality through celestial journeys, first popular among
the literati, was introduced to the ruler in the Han dynasty by Sima Xiangru 司馬相如
(179-117 b c e ), one of the most talented Han writers, who presented his Rhapsody on the
M ighty M an {Daren fu 大 人 赋 ）to Emperor W u. Simas poem was strikingly similar to
Far- o ffJourney in content, although its style and mood were different.62 Whereas the
author of F a r-o ffJourney followed the formula of a Chu elegy and preserved quotations
from Q u Yuan’s On Encountering Trouble、Sima adopted much of the imagery and many
expressions from F ar-offJourney but transformed them into the lengthier pattern of a
Han rhapsody. In addition, Sima changed the protagonist from a humble Daoist figure
to a mighty man, an allusion to the emperor. He also promoted the significance of the
celestial journey, making it the sole focus of the rhapsody. In fact, he wasted only three
sentences on the mighty mans motives before launching into a lengthy description of
the journey. In the rhapsody, the mighty man, whose properties in the central plain were
boundless，decided to float away from tiresome secular restrictions. Like Q u Yuan and
the author of F ar-offJourney, the mighty man reached the gate of Heaven. Q u Yuan
did not pass the gate; the author of F ar-offJourney entered the palace of the Heavenly
Hiearch but did not linger; and the mighty one not only was received in the palace but
was further rewarded with “jade maids,Mwhom he eventually brought back home. Nei­
ther an exiled subject full of trepidation nor a Daoist full of queries，the mighty man
proceeded with his celestial journey in a dominant and majestic manner. Sima claimed
that his purpose in composing the rhapsody was to satirize Emperor W us obsession
with immortality, but his description of the celestial journey somehow obscures his in­
tended admonition, for we are told that the emperor was very pleased with Simas work
and， reading or hearing it, instantly felt himself floating between Heaven and Earth in a
carefree and leisurely mood.63
No pictorial work can better elaborate the theme of ascending to Heaven and the wish
for immortality than the silk painting discovered in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui in Changsha
長 沙 ，Hunan. Nor is it a coincidence that the painting comes from the area where the
Chu State had existed only decades before the painting was made and where the poetic
idea of Heaven was introduced and developed. For centuries, Changsha was part of Chu
territory. W hen Q in vanquished Chu in 223 b c e , Changsha was briefly governed by
Qin. During the Han dynasty it became the capital of Changsha Kingdom. Archaeolo­
gists estimate that Tomb 1was sealed several years after 168 b c e , less than three decades
before the reign of the Han emperor W u.64The evident Chu tie to the painting makes
 3.15. Cross-section o f Tomb 1 at 3 .16. Cross-section o f the wooden structure o f
Mawangdui in Changsha, Hunan. Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

the ample Chu literature valuable to our understanding of it; nevertheless, Chu literature
can both help and hamper the task.65 O n the one hand, scholars are inclined to employ
the received texts to explain the meanings of the excavated painting and are blind to the
obvious gaps of time and intention between the two. O n the other, they feel free to slice
and dice Chu literature to decipher the painting. As a result, they offer various hypoth­
eses depending on which works they adduce. Both approaches inevitably use images to
illustrate texts. To avoid the iconographical pitfalls, I try to give both texts and images
equal weight in the following discussion. I do not view the image as a visual translation
of the textual tradition; rather, I think that ancient painters and writers both strove to
represent as well as they could a fantasy popular in the Chu area.
No looters had disturbed Tomb 1 at Mawangdui before archaeologists opened it in
1972. Located at the base of a twenty-meter-deep shaft, the tomb consisted of a wooden
chamber with four wooden coffins, one tightly fitted inside another (Figures 3.15,3.16).
The silk painting, which has the shape of a T, was found face down, spread over the lid of
the innermost coffin (Figure 3.17). The bamboo pole wrapped at the top of the painting
suggests that it could have been hung like a banner. The painting is generally believed to
depict scenes in the celestial realm on the wider top section, scenes in the human world
in the middle section, and scenes of the underworld at the bottom (Figure 3.18).66
Scholars have been debating the nature of the painting ever since its discovery. Some
associate the painting with fe iy i 衣 ，a term mentioned in the funerary inventories
 3.17. View o f the painted banner atop the
innermost coffin in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

found in the tomb, but have different interpretations of the term. Whereas Tang Lan
proposes thatfe iy i is a curtain-like cloth hung on a door, Shang Zhitan suggests that it is
a garment that helps the soul fly to Heaven.67The funerary inventories specify the length
of a fe iy i as two zhang (2.76 meters); this is longer than the painting, however, which
measures only 2.05 meters.68 Others acknowledge the banner format and link the paint­
ing with m ingjing 名 旌 ，a name banner used to identify a corpse in a coffin, as recorded
 3.18. Painted banner. Second half o f the second century b c e , after 168 b c e . Silk. 205 x 92 cm.
Unearthed in 1972 from Tomb 1 at Mawangdui in Changsha, Hunan, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

in the ritual canons.69 The archaeological report published in 1973 chooses the m ingjing
hypothesis over the fe iy i hypothesis, giving the former an official sanction of sorts.70
Still, it is not easy to explain away an obvious difference between a name banner
and the silk painting. According to the E tiquette and Rites (Yi li 儀 禮 )，a name banner
is inscribed with the words “The coffin of Such-and-Such” ；it is not distinguished by
3.19. Name banner. Second to first century
b c e . Silk. 120 x 41 cm. Unearthed in 1959 3.20 . Final departure on the painted banner in
from Tomb 23 at Mozuizi in Wuwei, Gansu. Tomb 1 at Mawangdui. Detail o f Fig. 3.18.

images.71 An Zhim in and M a Yong point out that in the Eastern Han, the name ban­
ner for the Son of Heaven was painted with the sun, the moon, and intertwined drag­
ons, besides the words. They further introduce related archaeological finds from Gansu
that date to the Eastern Han, proving that the name banners made for commoners
were allowed to bear similar images.72 For example, the banner unearthed from Tomb
23 at M ozuizi 磨嘴1子 has the sun and the moon above the words “The coffin of Zhang
Bosheng 張 伯 升 [from] the Unit of Jingshi 敬 事 [in the city of] Pingling 平 陵 ” (Fig­
ure 3.19).73 W ith or without images, words are undeniably the main focus of the name
banner; they dominate the rectangular piece of fabric. A name banner also provides the
identity of the deceased in no uncertain terms. By comparison, the Mawangdui banner
is full of images, none of which gives the deceased an unambiguous identity.
Many believe that there is a representation of the deceased in the middle section
of the silk painting: the woman accompanied by three maids and receiving two kneel­
ing figures (Figure 3.20). A modern autopsy of the corpse in Tomb 1， preserved through
 3.21. Seals unearthed from Tomb 2 at Mawangdui.

the centuries, established that the tomb occupant was indeed a female who probably
died of a heart attack at about fifty years of age.74 The excavation of Tomb 2 nearby
helped nail down the identity of the female corpse. The seals found in Tomb 2 estab­
lished that its occupant was Li Cang 利 蒼 (d. 186 b c e ), a chancellor of Changsha King­
dom who was promoted and became Marquis Dai 軟 侯 (Figure 3.21).75 In Tomb 1， many
funerary goods were either inscribed with words “The Family of Marquis Dai” or tagged
with stamped clay or wooden tablets that bore the inscription “The Chamberlain of the
Family of Marquis D ai” (Figure 3.22). These directly connect the female corpse with Li
Cang. In addition, Tomb 1 is located due east of Tomb 2, and the tombs' tumuli are com­
parable in size (Figure 3.23). Archaeologists conclude from all these that the occupant of
Tomb 1was Lady Dai, wife of Li Cang.76They further propose that the woman holding
a stick in the middle section of the silk painting is Lady Dai. Slightly bent, she looks old,
which accords with the age of the corpse. Her clothing is much better adorned than the
clothing of the others，and she wears an elaborate headdress. She stands apart from the
maids behind and the kneeling figures in front, giving her a central position befitting her
social status.77
W ith the excavation of Tomb 3 at Mawangdui in 1973, Lady Dais painted banner
gained a mate. Tomb 3 also contained a T-shaped silk painting draped over the lid of
 £

/■

3.22 . Inscribed objects in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

(a) “The family o f Marquis D ai” on a lacquerware;
(b) “The Chamberlain o f the Family o f Marquis
Dai” on sealed clay.

the innermost coffin. Hie occupant of Tomb 3 was a male in his thirties, however, as an
examination of his skeletal remains established. The young man must have been buried
earlier than Lady Dai because the shaft of Tomb 3 was partly damaged by the construc­
tion of Tomb 1to its north (see Figure 3.23). This has led archaeologists to reason that the
young man was Lady Dais son. The burial of the young man was prepared in 168 b c e ,
the twelfth year of the reign of Emperor Wen, as recorded on a wooden board discovered
in the tomb (Figure 3.24). Many archaeologists therefore eliminate the second Marquis
Dai, Li X i 利 豨 ， who died three years later, in 165 b c e , from the list of candidates and
propose that the occupant of Tomb 3 was a brother of Li X i.78 The painted banner from
Lord L i’s tomb is seldom reproduced or discussed because of its poor condition. It bears
a striking similarity to the Tomb 1 banner, having the celestial scenes on top, the human
scenes in the middle, and scenes of the underworld at the bottom (Figure 3.25). Whereas
a woman of high social status is depicted on Lady Dais banner, a man wearing a sword
and leading a group of figures appears in the comparable section on Lord Lis banner
(Figure 3.26). Not surprisingly, archaeologists consider the male image to be a represen­
tation of the tomb occupant, Lord L i.79
 3 .23. Location o f Tombs i, 2, and 3 at Mawangdui.

3 .24. Wooden board. 168 b c e . 25 x 3.5 cm. Unearthed in

1973-74 from Tomb 3 at Mawangdui in Changsha, Hunan.

Even though both paintings from the family cemetery of Marquis Dai may contain a
representation of the deceased, they are still far from name banners. Naming is an arbi­
trary action that designates certain characters to stand for a person, but it minimizes
ambiguity because it operates on the principle that every person is assigned a unique
combination of characters. Pictorial likenesses should have the same function, for the
linkage established between person and representation is based on the person’s unique
physical features. Nevertheless, if we identify Lady Dai and Lord Li on the silk paintings,
we recognize them not by their physical likeness to anyone but by their evident social
status. The female profile and the three-quarter male image do not show many distinct
physical features. It is the elaborate clothing and headdress that identify the lady, and the
sword and the high hat that indicate Lord Li. The paintings could depict any nobleman
or noblewoman in early Han. A name banner, in contrast, does not allow a substitution
of identity. Hie inscription on the aforementioned name banner from M ozuizi includes
not only the name of the deceased but also the administrative unit where he used to live
 3 .25. Painted banner, ca. 168 . Silk. 234.6 x 141.6 cm. Unearthed in 1973-74 from Tomb 3 at Mawangdui in
bc e

Changsha, Hunan, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

and the city to which this administrative unit belonged. The added unit and city ensured
that even if there was another person called Zhang Bosheng, he was not to be confused
with the Zhang Bosheng in the coffin. The purpose of a name banner was therefore to
establish an individual identity. Lady D ai’s and Lord Lis painted banners do not convey
such an identity. In fact, they do not even prioritize the matter of identity. The text speci­
fying the deceased occupies almost the entire space on a name banner, but the images of
the deceased are proportionally tiny on Lady Dais and Lord Lis banners.
The Mawangdui paintings have a closer tie with another group of paintings found
in Chu tombs than they do with name banners. In between the exciting discoveries of
Tombs 1 and 3 at Mawangdui in 1973, archaeologists excavated Tomb 1 at Zidanku 子
 3.26 . Final departure on the painted banner in
Tomb 3 at Mawangdui. Detail o f Fig. 3.25.

彈庫， Changsha.80The event did not generate much attention, but it provided informa­
tion about the Chu manuscript at the Sackler Gallery in Washington, D.C.: the Zi-
danku tomb is probably where the famous manuscript was when looters took it in the
1930s.81 In addition, archaeologists retrieved a silk painting pertinent to our discussion.
Although the funerary goods were disturbed and incomplete, archaeologists could date
the tomb to the middle and later phases of the Warring States period, approximately the
fifth through third centuries b c e . The tomb, at the bottom of a shaft 7.24 meters deep,
consists of a wooden chamber and two nested wooden coffins (Figure 3.27a). Apparently
this type of structure was popular in the Changsha area long before the construction of
the Mawangdui tombs.82The family of Marquis Dai only brought the structure to mag­
nificence, with deeper shafts, larger chambers, and added layers of coffins. Unlike the
Mawangdui tombs, however, the tomb at Zidanku has a layer of thin boards between
the ceiling of the chamber and the lid of the outer coffin. The silk painting was discov­
ered face up on this partition board (Figure 3.27b). Like the Mawangdui painting, the
Zidanku painting has a bamboo rod on the top, but the painting is much smaller in scale,
 3.27. Tomb 1 at Zidanku in Changsha, Hunan, (a) Cross-section, (b) Floor plan.

measuring only 37.5 centimeters in length and 28 centimeters in width. It depicts a man
standing on a dragon, protected by a canopy, and accompanied by a crane and a fish (Fig­
ure 3.28).83Tlie painting is reminiscent of one unearthed from Tomb 1 at Chenjiadashan
陳 家 大 山 ，Changsha, in 1949, although how it was placed in the tomb is unclear.84This
painting is also small, 31 centimeters in length and 22.5 centimeters in width.85 Not hav­
ing a wrapped rod and a hanging strip, the painting may not have functioned as a ban­
ner. It shows a woman with a phoenix and a dragon (Figure 3.29). As many scholars have
mentioned, both paintings may represent the deceased; in particular, an examination
of the skeletal remains confirms that the occupant of the tomb at Zidanku was a male
in his forties, which matches the portrayal on the painting.86 Moreover, both paintings
represent the deceased in profile, which gives more attention to social status than to
physical likeness. Both paintings also associate the figures with other things or creatures
and involve them in certain actions. In other words, the images of the deceased may
3 .28. Painted banner. Fourth century b c e . Silk. 37.5 x 28 cm. Unearthed in 1973 from
Tomb 1 at Zidanku in Changsha, Hunan.
3 .29 . Painted banner. Fourth century b c e . Silk. 31.2 x 23.2 cm. Unearthed in 1949 at
Chenjiadashan in Changsha, Hunan.
dominate the pictorial space， but their context~what and with whom they are acting~
is more pronounced than their identity. The M awangdui banners share the traits o f their
C hu predecessors. Their much more com plicated visual program s only highlight the sig­
nificance o f the context in w hich the smaller images o f the deceased are situated.
The scholarly efforts to determ ine the nature and function o f the M awangdui banners
from the received texts inevitably cloud our understanding o f the pictorial messages on
the banners. Ying-shih Yu, who prefers the fe iy i hypothesis, considers the painted ban­
ner a “mantle,”“shroud， ” or “cover” that must have been used in a death ritual to summon
back Lady D ais soul.The ritual, called> 復 in the Confucian ritual canons, is expected
to be perform ed as soon as a person dies. A summoner, norm ally a family member,
brings a set o f clothes belonging to the deceased w ith him to the roof o f the house and
calls the deceased out loud by name— “O! Ih o u So-and-So，come back!” A fter repeating
the call three tim es, the sum m oner throws the clothes to a receiver on the ground, who
spreads the clothes over the deceased.87 W u H ung refutes Yiis theory th at the painted
banner found in Lady Dais tomb was originally used in the fu ritual by providing coun­
ter-evidence from the Record o f R ites, where a regulation specifies that the clothes used
in sum m oning the soul should not be employed to cover the corpse or dress it.88 W u
regards the painted banner in Lady D ais tom b as a name banner, like one m entioned
in the Record o f Rites, A name banner, inscribed with the words “The Jiu 柩 （ the body in
its perm anent home) o f Such-and-Such，”is usually posted on a bamboo pole in front o f
the m ourning hall w hen various ritual events are taking place inside the hall and when
the bin ceremony is performed outside the hall. In the bin 賓 /殯 ceremony the coffin is
moved outdoors and lowered into a symbolic pit. The name banner remains beside this
temporary grave until it is removed to cover the spirit-tablet of the dead.89 As I have
argued, however, there is a difference between the content o f the name banner and the
visual features o f the M aw angdui banners. There are also questions about the extent to
w hich the Confucian canons affected the funeral practices in the far south o f the C hu
cultural area before Em peror W u prom oted Confucianism as the state ideology and the
degree to which the ritual canons— once said to have been compiled by Confucius but
most likely edited and idealized by Han scholars— reflected Han practices.
Even though Ying-shih Yii and W u Hung differ in their approaches to the silk paint­
ing in Lady Dais tomb, they both cite a Chu song entitled Summoning the Soul {Zhao
hun 招 魂 ）to strengthen their argument. The song is traditionally attributed to Song Yu,
a follower o f Qu Yuan who was active in the third century bce .90 To explain the neces­
sity o f thefu ritual, Yii draws on the first half of the song:
 8
3
I
〇 soul, come back! In the east you cannot abide___
〇 soul, come back! In the south you cannot stay....
O soul， go not to the west!...
〇 soul, go not to the north! ...
O soul， come back! Climb not to the heaven above___
〇 soul, come back! Go not down to the Land of Darkness.91

To establish th at Lady D ais tom b served as an underw orld household m irroring her
happy home in the hum an w orld, W u instead emphasizes the second h alf o f the song:
All your household have come to do you honor;
All kinds of good food are ready....
〇 soul, come back!
Here you shall have respect and nothing shall harm you.92

A ll in all, the song does not present places other than the grave as desirable destinations
for the soul, including Heaven. Nevertheless, if the association o f the silk painting in
Lady Dais tomb with the clothes in the fu ritual and with the name banner in the bin
ceremony is dubious， we need to reexamine whether Summoning the Soul is an appropri­
ate iconographical source for the Mawangdui banners.
The author of Summoning the Soul portrayed Heaven as a dreadful place:

O soul, come back! Climb not to the heaven above,

For tigers and leopards guard the nine gates, with jaws ever ready to rend
mortal men,
And one man with nine heads that can pull up nine thousand trees,
And the slant-eyed jackal-wolves that pad to and fro;
They hang men out for sport and drop them in the abyss,
And only at Gods command may they ever rest or sleep.
〇 soul, come back! Lest you fall into this danger.93

The painter who designed the banner in Lady D ais tom b did not replicate this fearsome
imagery. The only elem ent in the song th at is common to the' banner is leopards. In the
wide upper section of the banner, two leopards are crouching atop a pair of pointed pil­
lars (Figure 3.30). The animals may guard the gate to Heaven, which is simplified as two
pillars，but they do not appear “with jaws ever ready to rend mortal men.”The leopards,
who are dwarfed by two seated figures below them, look as tame as pets as they crouch
there turning back and looking down. The figures seated between the pillars do ，however,
rem ind us o f the porters o f Heaven m entioned by Q u Yuan and his followers in their
 8
I

3 .30 . Celestial field on the painted banner in Tomb i at Mawangdui. Detail o f Fig. 3.18.

imaginary celestial journeys. The presence of the porters, who sit still and are dressed like
gentlemen, only indicates restricted entrance to Heaven; they do not pose an immediate
life-and-death threat to those who are approaching Heaven.
The scene on the banner right above the gate to Heaven does not aim at intimidation
either. It depicts two hybrids riding on two prancing horse-like animals and dragging
a bell between them. The clothing of the riders, one with skirts and the other without,
suggests that they are female and male. W ith its long handle, the bell is reminiscent of
the yong 甬 bells unearthed from the tomb of Marquis Y i of Zeng 曾侯乙，who was
buried some time after 433 b c e (Figure 3.31). The lacquer painting on a duck-shaped
box from the same tomb illustrates how the yong bells were hung on a rack for perfor-
mances (Figure 3.32).94 On the banner, the pair of riders is holding the ropes that would
have fastened the bell to the rack. The bell on the banner is also richly decorated, with a
 3.32. (a) Duck-shaped container. Second half o f
3 .31. Yong bell. Second half o f the fifth century the fifth century b c e . Lacquer. 20.2 x 12.5 x 16.5 cm.
b c e . Bronze. H. 161.1 cm. Unearthed in 1978 from Unearthed in 1978 from the tomb o f Marquis Y i
the tomb o f Marquis Y i o f Zeng at Leigudun in o f Zeng at Leigudun in Suixian, Hubei, (b) Detail
Suixian, Hubei. showing the scene o f striking bells.

string of beads and a tassel extending from its long handle and some ribbons tied at the
two sharp ends of its mouth. The scene appears to say that music will be found in the
realm of Heaven.9 The music also enchanted Q u Yuan and his followers on their liter­
ary flights to Heaven. In On Encountering Trouble, Q u describes how he and the spirits
“played the Nine Songs and danced the Shao f 召Dances, borrowing the time to make a
holiday.”96The author of F ar-offJourney elaborates the episode:
 They played “Pool of Heaven， ” then struck up “To the Clouds/，
Then the two goddesses performed the Nine Shao Songs.
I made the Xiang 湘 goddess play on her zither,
And I bade the Sea God dance with the River God.
They lined up water monsters to join them in the dance:
How their bodies coiled and writhed in undulating motion!
Gracefully the woman-rainbow made circles around them;
Phoenixes soared up and hovered overhead.
The music swelled and swelled into infinity.
After that I left them and resumed my wandering.97

The Nine Shao Songs，“Pool of Heaven， ，

，and “To the Clouds” were all ancient melo­
dies allegedly composed or played by legendary kings such as Yao, Shun, and the Yellow
Thearch. It is unclear whether the bell on the banner signifies that repertoire, which is
sometimes charged with morality in the Chu literature. There is, however, no doubt that
the bell denotes the pleasure of music in the celestial field. The presence of the bell, and
hence music, brings the upper section of the banner further away from the frightening
heaven described in Summoning the Soul but closer to the fanciful heaven introduced by
Q u Yuan and his followers.
Other details in the upper section of the banner are similarly not meant to cause
fear. Beyond the gate and the bell, in the upper right corner，are a vermilion sun with
a crow and, on the opposite side, an ivory crescent moon with a toad; they are celestial
signs indicating the existence of a realm above the human world. Between the sun and
the moon is an unknown deity， who, at the very top of the central axis, appears to be in
charge of the entire celestial field. Though portrayed as a human figure with long scaled
tails, the deity does not look like someone who would command wolves and the nine­
headed man to “hang out men for sport and drop them in the abyss.” Below the sun and
the moon is a pair of gigantic dragons. The one beneath the sun is intertwined with a
mulberry that carries eight vermilion discs. The scene easily evokes the popular myth of
ten suns: each day only one of the ten suns is on duty high up in the sl^; the rest of them
roost on the branches of a mythical mulberry tree.98 As Xiao Bing suggests，however,
the scene could have been derived from the myth of nine suns seen in the Chu literature
because the total number of suns in the painting is nine." Hie other dragon beneath the
moon is distinguished by its spread wings and the figure it carries. The depiction evokes
the myth of Heng E 姮 娥 ， who is said to have flown to the moon after taking the elixir
of immortality.100 It is plausible to have myths associated with the sun and the moon，
especially in consideration of the symmetrical composition of the banner, even though
 8
7
I
scholars also suggest that the figure crouching on the dragons wing could be the soul
of the deceased.101 In any case, the upper section of the banner represents the realm of
Heaven as a place where the sun, the moon, deities, and auspicious animals reside, where
music is provided, and to which entrance is restricted. The place is neither forbidding nor
readily approachable.
The representation of Heaven is not limited to the upper section of Lady Dais banner.
A bi disc is positioned at the center of the vertical strip of the banner. Two dragons intersect
at and emerge from the central hole of the bi (see Figure 3.18).102As we discussed earlier,
this disc, with its circular shape, became a symbol of Heaven in the cosmology of a round
Heaven and a square Earth. Myths often mentioned dragons as creatures who helped
mortals ascend to Heaven. The m otif of two dragons coming through the hole in the
center of a bi could stand for the action of ascending to Heaven.103The dragons， upward
movement and their (re)appearance in the celestial field above reinforce the implication.
The juxtaposition of a physical bi disc and the silk banner on the lid of the innermost
coffin accentuates the significance of Heaven in the tomb of Lady Dai. The bi disc is
made not of jade， but of lacquered wood as a funerary substitute.104 It is fastened on the
north end of the lid， putting it close to the banner and above the head of the deceased
in the coffin (Figures 3.17,3.33), a placement that leads us back to the Chu tomb at Z i­
danku, in which archaeologists also found a banner and a bi disc. That disc, made ofjade,
was similarly fastened to the end of the lid over the head of the inner coffin， although the
banner is on a partition board， not on the coffin (Figure 3.34).105The Chu banner depicts
a male figure standing on a dragon. Scholars believe that the dragon is leading the soul
of the deceased up to Heaven. If so, could the bi disc, a symbol of Heaven, on the inner
coffin in the Chu tomb restate the intended destination of the dead? The side-by-side
arrangement of the bi disc and the banner in the tomb of Lady Dai seems to confirm the
connection between the two. In particular, the bi disc is right next to the upper section
of the banner; the synonyms of Heaven in both mediums only stress the importance of
Heaven in this funerary context. Moreover, the lacquered bi disc is a physical reiteration
of the painted bi disc on the banner; the reiteration inevitably emphasizes the m otif that
signifies ascending to Heaven.
Not just the lacquered bi disc but also the repetition of the m otif of two dragons com­
ing through a bi disc on one of the painted coffins in the tomb of Lady Dai urges us to
consider the banner in a broader context. The fourth and outermost coffin of the nested
coffins in the tomb chamber is devoid of decoration, with only black paint on its exterior
and vermilion on its interior. The first and innermost coffin has the same color scheme,
but with textile rather than paint applied to the surfaces (Figure 3.35).106 Only the two
 8
8
I

3.34. Fourth century b c e . Jade. Diameter 14 cm.

Unearthed in 1973 from Tomb 1 at Zidanku in
Changsha, Hunan.

3.33. B i disc atop the innermost coffin in

Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

coffins in the middle have pictorial details on their exterior. The second coffin is cov­
ered with vermilion paint both inside and out; the third, with black paint. The m otif of
two dragons coming through a bi disc is on the south panel of the second coffin (Figure
3.36). The panel is also called “foot panel” because the head of the corpse is to the north.
O n the counterpart of the foot panel— that is, the north or head panel一 are two deer
climbing up a steep triangle (Figure 3.37). Sofukawa Hiroshi has identified the triangular
contour emerging from the pattern of clouds as the Kunlun 崑崔 Mountains.107 These
mountains in the far west figured in the Han fantasy of ascending to Heaven, as the
authors of the Book o f the K ing o f H uainan articulated:

If one climbs to a height double that of the Kunlun Mountains,

[the peak] is called Cool Wind Mountain.
 Fig. 3.38

Fig. 3.36

Fig. 3.57

Fig. 3.37 Fig. 3.41

3.35. View o f three decorated coffins in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

If one climbs it, one will not die.

If one climbs to a height that is double again [that of the peak,
the next peak] is called Hanging Garden.
If one ascends it, one will gain supernatural powers and be able
to control the wind and the rain.
If one climbs to a height that is double that yet again,
[that peak] reaches up to Heaven itself.
If one climbs there, one will become a god.
It is called the abode of the Thearch on High.108

To connect Heaven and Earth, the authors invented a gateway from the peak of the
Kunlun Mountains, presumably the highest point on Earth. Coincidentally or not, the
b o o k w a s c o m p i l e d u n d e r t h e p a t r o n a g e o f Liu An (d . 12 2 b c e ), King o f Huainan, w h o
happened to command the heartland of the Chu State along the Huai 淮 River and who
rekindled the interest in Q u Yuans elegies at the Han court.109 In any event, the refer­
ence to two deer climbing the Kunlun Mountains is the same as the reference to two
dragons coming through a bi disc: both signify the action of ascending to Heaven.
Tlie pairing of the bi disc with dragons and the Kunlun Mountains with deer deserves
further discussion. The juxtaposition of the disc and the peak alone could indicate Heaven
and Earth and hence the cosmos. Adding dragons to the disc and deer to the peak not
 a b
3.36. Two dragons coming through a bi disc on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui. 69 x 65 cm.
(a) Photograph, (b) Copy.

a b
3 .37. Two deer climbing a mountain on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui. 69 x 65 cm.
(a) Photograph, (b) Copy.

only gives activity to both scenes but also provides assistants to help with the activity, for
it is not easy for a person to reach either the peak of the Kunlun Mountains or Heaven
above. Moreover, there is a sequential connection between peak and disc because a per­
son would have to ascend the Kunlun Mountains to reach Heaven if he or she was fol­
lowing the path outlined by the authors of the Book o f the K ing ofH uainan. The emphasis
 3 .38. Animals and a figure on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui. 230 x 65 cm.
(a) Photograph, (b) Copy.

on helpers, activity, and sequence in the two corresponding panels makes us wonder to
what extent these characteristics may assist us in understanding other painted panels
and whether there is a visual program that integrates the various pictorial details into a
comprehensible whole.
The painting on the east side of the second coffin offers a linkage between those on
the south and the north panels (Figure 3.38). The triangular contour emerging from the
pattern of clouds, the main subject of the north panel, reappears at the center of the east
panel. A pair of dragons, like those who are coming through the bi disc on the south
panel, flanks the central triangle and occupy most of the rectangular space. The scene of
two dragons flanking the peak turns the east panel into a depiction of an intermediate
stage, the place where dragons descend from Heaven to the highest point on Earth. The
 3 .39. Figure on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.
Detail o f Fig. 3.38.

juxtaposition of dragons and the Kunlun Mountains suggests a bridge between Heaven
and Earth, a way across a potentially insurmountable gap, which would have allayed anx­
iety over the approachability of Heaven. In addition, there are helpers: the four creatures
rendered along the dragons' winding bodies— a deer, a tiger, a bird, and a figure. Like the
climbing deer with the peak and the upward-moving dragons with the disc, the crea­
tures on the east panel can assist in the ascension to Heaven. The figure on the far right
shows one of the earliest efforts to depict an immortal (Figure 3.39). Feathers on the
arms and the legs make the immortal different from a human being and give it the abil­
ity to fly between Heaven and Earth. As the legends of the Yellow Thearch tell us, people
were more likely to reach Heaven once they had attained immortality. The figural image
on the east panel thus indicates at once the transformation from mortal to immortal and
the ascension from Earth to Heaven.
The depiction on the east panel helps us to put the remaining two panels of the
second coffin in perspective. The lid presents two dragons intertwining with two tigers
among clouds, which echoes the painting on the east panel by highlighting three of its
components (Figure 3.40). The west panel is filled with the cloud pattern, which appears
on every other painted side of the second coffin as well (Figure 3.41). It is therefore not
far-fetched to regard the animals on the lid as two of the helpers who can assist people
to reach Heaven and to consider the clouds on the west panel as a sign of a realm that is
3.40 . Dragon and tiger on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at
Mawangdui. 230 x 92 cm. (a) Photograph, (b) Copy.

3.41. Cloud pattern on painted Coffin 2 in Tomb 1 at

Mawangdui. 230 x 65 cm. (a) Photograph, (b) Copy.
 3.42. View o f Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui. 256.5 x 118 x 114 cm.

high above the Earth. Taken together, the motifs, creatures, and patterns on the second
coffin express the wish for and belief in ascending to Heaven.
Being able to decode the theme of the second coffin encourages us to examine the
other two decorated coffins. Unlike the second coffin, each of whose panels has its own
motif, the third coffin is both dominated and unified by swirling clouds (Figure 3.42).110
More than 100 creatures are shown floating among the clouds, including real-life crea­
tures, such as an owl, a crane, a rabbit, a deer, a bull, a horse, and a tiger (Figure 3.43), and
imaginary ones, such as a phoenix, an animal with wings, and an animal with four tails
(Figure 3.44). The majority of them are hybrids一 imagined animals dressed like people
or capable of human activities (Figures 3.45-49). One-third of the creatures are rendered
alone, either seated, standing, walking, or running. Two-thirds of them are interacting
 9
5
I

3.45. Chasing a hare on painted Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

with one another and can be grouped in thirty-five scenes: nine scenes depict one chas­
ing another (see Figure 3.45); ten depict one challenging another with a bow or a spear
(see Figures 3.46-47); fourteen depict one conquering another (see Figures 3.48-49), and
two depict dancers and musicians.111 A lthough the hybrids have the upper hand in m ost
confrontations, these images are not meant to generate fear but to celebrate the triumph
of the hybrids. The two scenes that feature dancers and musicians further carry out the
celebratory mood and add a touch of playfulness to the paintings on the third coffin
 f w m

3.47. Combat on painted Coffin 3 in

Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

3.46 . Shooting on painted Coffin 3 in 3.48. Devouring a snake on painted

Tomb 1 at Mawangdui. Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

3 .49. Taming a leopard on painted 3.50 . Dancers and musicians on painted

Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui. Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

(Figure 3.50). The hybrids range from an animal capable of human activities (the per­
former holding clappers) to an animal dressed like a man (the musician waving bells)
to a being with an animal head and a human body (the zither player). The fully clothed
dancer shaking long leaves looks like a human being but may be an immortal mingling
 3.51. Immortal in contemplation on painted 3.52. Immortal riding on a deer on painted Coffin 3 in
Coffin 3 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui. Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.

w ith hybrids. A less ambiguous example o f an im m ortal is the seated figure w ith long
hair and sprouting feathers who is holding a pose of contemplation (Figure 3.51). The
figure with loose hair riding on a deer and looking back is another example (Figure 3.52).
These images are evocative o f the im m ortal helper on the second coffin, but the im m or­
tals on the third coffin are no longer grouped w ith other helpers but seem to reside in a
place that is high above the E arth and full o f auspicious animals and hybrids. The music
and dance perform ances further rem ind us o f the celestial field depicted on the silk ban­
ner. R ather than representing an interm ediate stage like the paintings on the second cof­
fin, the paintings on the third coffin may well represent the realm o f Heaven itself.
The im m ortals w ith sprouting feathers on both painted coffins provide a link to the
decoration o f the first and innerm ost coffin. Two ribbons, each twelve centim eters wide,
were wrapped around the coffin six to seven times (Figure 3.53). Silk fabric was pasted
over them , covering the lid and four sides o f the coffin; brocade strips frame each panel
(Figure 3.54).112W hat deserves our attention is the pattern on the silk fabric. The pattern
is anchored by a floral center; from it four diagonal lines radiate to the four corners o f the
panel. Interlocking lozenges o f various sizes fill the rem aining space. W ith their hooked
ends, the lozenges are m eant to represent clouds. We can find the identical geom etric
shape on the west panel of the second coffin (see Figure 3.41). The floral center, whose
design is often compared in Chinese literature to the stalk o f a persim m on, is obscure in
 ■- r ' • •
,i' - ( ._、v
i ♦、
. • ""、'：
*

3 .53. Coffin 1 in Tomb 1 at Mawangdui. 202 x 69 x 63 cm.

(a) Photograph, (b) Drawings showing the plan and the
cross-section.

its reference. Hayashi M inao argues that in H an decorative art a flower w ith either four
or eight petals represents a lotus, which, before the introduction o f Buddhism , referred
to the “floral canopy” [huagai 華 蓋 ) that appeared with the Thearch on H igh.113 He
substantiates his argum ent by referring to the ancient Chinese astronom ical system, in
w hich the Floral Canopy constellation was near the N orth Star, which was often com­
pared to the Thearch on H igh. H e also provides us w ith visual evidence, such as the
image at the center of a Han brick showing the four cardinal emblems surrounding a
four-petaled flower (Figure 3.55). Since the cardinal emblems— the Blue Dragon in the
east, the Red Bird in the south, the W hite Tiger in the west, and the D ark W arrior in
the north一 are supposed to lead the constellations in the four quarters, the flower would
stand for the celestial center.114 The four-petaled flower, originally a com ponent o f the
throne or vehicle of the Thearch on High, could then be an icon of Heaven in a deco­
rative scheme. A more striking example, not included in Hayashis article, is the floral­
shaped bronze plaque discovered in Wushan 巫 山 ， Sichuan， in the 1980s (Figure 3.56).115
O n the four petals are the four cardinal emblems, which are further accompanied by
deities and auspicious animals. A t the center of the plaque is the image of a bi disc. In
showing an assemblage of various signs of Heaven, the plaque becomes an embodiment
of Heaven itself. The pattern on the silk fabric affixed to the first coffin thus very likely
represents the realm of Heaven because of the floral icon of Heaven inserted into the
clouds, which already indicate a space high above the Earth. The artisan who produced
the pattern did not do so by traditional weaving or embroidering but instead glued
feathers of two different colors to the fabric: dark black feathers for the lozenge shapes
and bright orange feathers for the ground. Next, the artisan employed silk strips, each
only 2.8 millimeters wide, to form the contours of the clouds. Then the artisan added the
four-petal design to the center after preparing it by gluing features to a piece of fabric
in the shape of the floral icon.116 The unusual use of feathers on silk fabric emphasizes
 3.55. Floral canopy and cardinal emblems on a brick. 25-220 c e . Ink rubbing.

the materiality of the decorative scheme of the first coffin and endows the pattern with a
sense of activity. Using feathers to form the pattern that signifies the celestial field must
have been intended to allude to the immortals with sprouting feathers who either reside
in the realm of Heaven or help human beings ascend to Heaven.
The three decorated coffins in Lady D ai’s tomb appear, then, to underscore the theme
of ascending to Heaven. Do the schemes on the three coffins work together as a visual
program? Sequence is a clue to the answer. The paintings on the second coffin sug­
gest progress from the Kunlun Mountains to Heaven. The paintings on the third cof­
fin depict the realm of Heaven filled with clouds, animals, hybrids, and immortals. O n
the north panel of the third coffin, there is a figure in profile emerging from the bottom
frame (Figure 3.57). Sun Zuoyun identifies the half-bent figure as a representation of the
deceased Lady Dai.117 I f so, the image of Lady Dai connects the third coffin with the
corpse lying in the first coffin and provides another sequential implication: the deceased
 3.56. Bronze plaque. Second to early third century
b c e . G ilt bronze.

40 x 40 cm. Discovered in 1982-87 in Wushan, Sichuan. Drawing.

woman in the first coffin would have reached Heaven as delineated on the third coffin.
There is good reason, then, to read the visual program from the innermost coffin out­
ward. The wish for the deceased to reach Heaven is presented in three stages: on the
first coffin, the feathers either equip the deceased to fly or grant her an immortal helper;
on the second coffin, the deer assist the deceased to climb to the top of the Kunlun
Mountains while other helpers support her upward movement; on the third coffin, the
deceased finally arrives in the realm of Heaven.118
It is time for us to consider the silk banner placed on top of the first coffin in rela­
tion to decorations on the first three coffins. As it turns out, the banner is no less than a
road map to Heaven. In contrast to the abstract pattern on the first coffin, the pictorial
details on the banner elaborate the process of ascending to Heaven. Unlike the paintings
on the second and third coffins, the banner contains scenes from both the celestial realm
and the human world and thus supplies a more inclusive view of the entire process. The
bottom section of the banner offers a glimpse of the funeral service (Figure 3.58). Two
rows of figures are kneeling on a platform upheld by a muscular man while a standing
 2
03

3.58. Funeral service on the painted banner in Tomb i at Mawangdui. Detail o f Fig. 3.18.

figure is looking at the gigantic bronze vessels on the ground; these are ding tripods for
cooking meat and hu 壷 containers for storing water and liquor. A table, indicated by a
simple white line, is placed in between or further behind the two rows of kneeling fig­
ures. O n the table are smaller bronze vessels and lacquerware. Beneath or in front of the
table lies an object with four feet and carrying-poles. W illiam Watson speculates that this
object could be a coffin, for it is evocative of the painted ones in the tomb. W u Hung sug­
gests that the object is more likely to be a corpse covered with patterned shrouds because
the box is not rectangular but has a rounded and seemingly soft contour.119 In any case,
the scene shows people who are mourning and offering sacrifices to or for the deceased.
Above the depicted funeral service, in the middle section of the banner, we see a woman
holding a stick, two men kneeling before her, and three women standing behind her (see
Figure 3.20). The central figure probably~given the pictorial context一 represents Lady
Dai after her death. The grouping indicates that she is bidding farewell to her family while
maintaining her social status. The scenes of the funeral service and the final departure are
further connected by the m otif of two dragons coming through a bi disc (Figure 3.18).
The vertical composition and the dragons， upward movement lend the two scenes a sense
of sequence, and the m otif declares the intended destination, which is confirmed by the
scene of the celestial field in the upper section of the banner. The silk banner thus maps
 out how the deceased departs from the human world and ascends to Heaven. It guides
the deceased through the multilayered visual program on the three decorated coffins.
The entire pictorial program in Lady Dais tomb, including the silk banner and the
coffins, challenges the hypothesis of the dualism of the soul in early China. Based on
the received texts, Ying-shih Yu advocates the universality of the distinction between
the hun 魂 and the po 愧 in Han China, the former being a “spiritual” soul and the lat­
ter a “bodily” soul. He argues that at death the hun-so\A went swiftly upward to Heaven,
whereas the 产 -soul moved at a slower pace downward to Earth. Thefu ritual was enacted
when death occurred to summon the hun^ovX to reunite with the^-soul in the hope of
bringing the dead person back to life. A person could be pronounced dead only when the
fu ritual had failed to achieve its purpose. Yii also enumerates the possible homes of the
dead, including the heavenly court and Liangfu 梁父 for the 乃《«_soul and the Yellow
Spring and Haoli 嵩里 for the 产 -soul, but he does not address how a tomb, where the
corpse lies, is related to the dualistic concept of the soul and the possible homes of the
dead.120 If both the hun-%o\A and the soul separated from the body after death，then
what motivated the Han people to furnish their tombs so elaborately? And if the hun-
soul went upward to Heaven after death, why did the Han artisans develop the theme of
ascending to Heaven in an underground tomb such as Lady D ai’s?
Having examined both received and unearthed texts, K. E. Brashier argues that the
hun-po dualism was more a scholarly approach to analyzing the soul than a general belief
about death in the H an.121 One piece of compelling counterevidence that he introduces
comes from Chen Q iu 陳球，a Chamberlain for Law Enforcement during the reign
of Emperor Ling. In a court debate of 172 ce，Chen disputed the proposal to have the
long-deceased Worthy Lady Feng 瑪 share the sacrifices meant for the recently deceased
Dowager Empress Dou. He pointed out that Fengs tomb had been plundered, so her
bones were exposed and her hun-sovX was tarnished; she was not qualified to share the
sacrifices.122 Chen clearly believed that the hun-soul remained with the corpse in the
tomb. Another example that Brashier supplies is an imperial ritual performed after the
middle of the first century ce. The emperors in the Eastern Han established a routine
to offer sacrifices to their dynastic founder, Emperor Guangwn, at his mausoleum in the
first month. To keep Emperor Guangvnxs hun-po informed, each incumbent emperor
also summoned his subjects and vassals to the mausoleum and made them report on cur­
rent national affairs.123The ritual confirms that in the Han mind, the two souls， without
clear-cut distinction, could have stayed with the corpse and resided in the tomb.124Hie
visual program designed for Lady Dai, which was created earlier than the extant tex­
tual accounts of Heaven and death, proclaims the expectation that she will transcend
 2
05

the hum an lim itations in the tom b. Since her corpse was carefully wrapped in tw enty
layers of fabric and is still intact, it is hard to determine whether the transcendence was
intended for just the soul— be it hunypoyor hun-po ~ o r for both the soul and the body.125
In any case, the well-preserved body attests to the pursuit o f post-m ortem immortality,
through which the deceased may have been thought to have a greater chance of reaching
the realm o f Heaven, as elaborated on the silk banner and the decorated coffins.

Hie Gate of Heaven

W hen the C hu w riters envisioned celestial journeys, they projected the hum an w orld
onto the celestial field and the palaces where the Thearch on High ruled and dwelled.
The gate as an entrance to a building or an architectural compound became an icon of
the celestial palaces. A lthough Q u Yuan came to the gate but did not pass through, the
author of F ar-offJourney was determined to inspect what stood behind the gate:
I bade Heavens porter open his barrier,
And stand by his gate awaiting my arrival.
I summoned the Master of Cloud; I made him ride ahead
And ask the way to the Palace of Mystery.
Passing through the Bright Walls
I entered the Palace of the Thearch on High,
Visited a star near the Northern Dipper, and gazed on the Pure City.
In the morning I set off from the Court of Heaven;
In the evening Mount Weilii 微閭 came in sight below.126

The pictorial depiction o f H eavens gate did not blossom until the H an period. The two
pointed pillars w ith seated figures on Lord Li's and Lady D ais banners are the earliest
examples known to us (see Figures 3.18,3.25,3.30).Ih e prospect of a post-mortem ascen­
sion to Heaven from the tomb gave Heavens gate an even more prominent position,
for it marked the end o f the journey and the beginning o f life in paradise. The gate o f
H eaven as a funerary m otif thus stim ulated a wide variety o f artistic endeavors over the
centuries.
Pillars are just one way to depict Heavens gate. A second mode was found in Tomb
61 in Luoyang.127 Built in the second half of the first century b c e , the brick tomb con­
sists of a rectangular main chamber and two side chambers (Figure 3.59). A gable on a
pillar divides the main chamber into two compartments. O n the side of the gable facing
the rear chamber is the image of a gate with a narrow opening between the two planks
 3.59. Structure o f Tomb 61. First half o f the first century
b c e . Unearthed in 1957 in Luoyang, Henan, (a) View from
the entrance toward the rear wall o f the main chamber,
(b) View from the rear wall toward the entrance.

forming the gate (Figure 3.60). Two winged dragons with winged riders flank the gate.
I f we could open the gate for them, we would see the celestial images, including the sun,
the moon, stars, and clouds, on the ceiling of the front chamber (Figure 3.61). Since the
corpses of a couple were placed in the rear chamber, the intended scenario was for the
deceased to be guided by dragons and immortals through the gate to reach the realm
of Heaven above. Five bi discs are above the door frame, a combination that comes as
no surprise, because the bi embodies the round Heaven. The combination also resonates
with the Gate with B i Discs {bi men 璧 門 ）in the Jianzhang Palace in Chang’an， which
Emperor W u constructed to entice immortals to visit.128The gate, located in the south­
ern part of the palace complex, must have been so well known that artisans appropriated
it to stand for the gate of Heaven in the funerary context. A decorated brick unearthed
in Xinzheng 新奠P， Henan, confirms the appropriation.129The brick features a two-story
or double-roofed structure with two bi discs hanging from the lintel (Figure 3.62). Two
gatekeepers are standing on either side of the structure, and a horse is passing by the
 3 .60 . Painted gable in Tomb 61 in Luoyang. (a) Photograph, (b) Copy.

entrance. Two characters are engraved on the space between the horses chest and the
structure: “The Gate of Heaven” [tianm en 天 門 ） .The inscription equates the Gate with
B i Discs and the gate of Heaven. The Han artisans, however, appeared to have no idea
what the Gate with B i Discs in Chang’an looked like; they simply invented images from
the words. There was thus no consistent representation of the Gate with B i Discs. O n a
decorated brick discovered in Xihua 西 華 ， Henan， the juxtaposition of a huge bi disc and
a gatekeeper in front of a two-story structure suffices to signify the Gate with B i Discs
and hence the gate of Heaven (Figure 3.63).130
 3.61. Painted ceiling in Tomb 61 in Luoyang.

We learn the third mode of representing Heavens gate from another self-explanatory
example on a stone coffin excavated at Jianyang 簡 陽 ，Sichun.131 In the image a figure
is standing behind a half-open gate between two pillars, on top of which two phoenixes
are resting (Figure 3.64). The inscription engraved between the phoenixes identifies the
structure as the gate of Heaven. Although the rough carving does not represent the
structure well, a decorated brick from Dayi 大 邑 ，Sichuan, makes up for the inadequacy
(Figure 3.65). O n the brick the twin pillars stand in front of a building with a wide-open
gate. The Han people labeled twin stone pillars of this type, which mimicked one- or
 3.63. Gate o f Heaven on a decorated brick.
First century bce to first century ce. W. 17 cm.
Unearthed in Xihua, Henan. Ink rubbing.

3.62. Gate o f Heaven on a decorated brick. First

century bce to first century ce. Discovered in X in­
zheng, Henan. Ink rubbing.
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3 .64. Gate o f Heaven on a sarcophagus. Second half o f the second century c e .
Stone carving. Unearthed in 1986 at Guitoushan in Jianyang, Sichuan. Ink rubbing.
 3.65. Gate-pillars with a phoenix on a decorated brick. 25-220 c e . 38 x 44 cm. Unearthed in Dayi, Sichuan.

two-story wooden structures, as que 闕 (gate-pillars). They normally used the twin pillars
to mark the gateway of a city, a palace, an official building, a temple, or a shrine.132 The
author of F ar-offJourney describes the dwelling of the Hiearch on H igh as the “Palace
of Mystery,” the “Pure City,” and the “Court of Heaven.” No wonder the Han artisans
used gate-pillars to depict the gate of Heaven. The image on the Jianyang coffin fur­
ther reminds us of the two Gate-Pillars with Phoenixes in Emperor W us land of the
immortals; they were erected in the east of the Jianzhang Palace.133 Like the Gate with
B i Discs, the Gate-Pillars with Phoenixes must have captured the popular imagination
so profoundly that they became part of funerary art.
Some artisans united a gate with bi discs and gate-pillars with phoenixes to refer to
the gate of Heaven. A bronze plaque affixed to a wooden coffin excavated in Wushan,
Sichuan, demonstrates the combination (Figure 3.66).134 On the circular plaque, a bi disc
 3 .66. Gate o f Heaven on a bronze plaque. Second to early third century bce. G ilt bronze.
Diameter 23.5 cm. Discovered in 1982-87 in Wushan, Sichuan, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

is rendered between the gate-pillars; a phoenix stands on the roof of a building behind
the gate-pillars. Below the bi disc is a seated gatekeeper. Above the bi disc is the inscrip­
tion that unambiguously identifies the subject as the gate of Heaven. The clouds filling
the otherwise blank space add to the scene’s otherworldliness.
Other artisans complicated the m otif of Heavens gate with the presence of the
Mother Queen of the West {xiwangm u 西 王 母 ).135A money tree discovered in Maowen
茂 汶 ，Sichuan, provides evidence (Figure 3.67).136 The artisans placed a gigantic bi disc
between a pair of gate-pillars with phoenixes to form the topmost and most elaborate
branch of the tree. As the Wushan plaque makes clear, the branch was meant to depict
the gate of Heaven. Nevertheless, the artisans added a new element~the Mother Queen
of the West— to the bi disc. We can find a variation of such a grouping on another
bronze plaque from Wushan (Figure 3.68).137There, a horizontal line divides the plaque
into two parts: the top semicircle features the Mother Queen of the West; the bottom
semicircle contains a gatekeeper between two gate-pillars with phoenixes. The inscrip­
tion ^Heavens Gate”is beneath the triangular roof spanning the pillars. Although exam­
ples of the grouping of Heavens gate and the Mother Queen of the West are ample in
Sichuan,138 a pictorial variation is also found on a decorated brick unearthed at Fanji 樊
集 ，Henan (Figure 3.69).139 Here, two bending figures appear to welcome the proces­
sion of chariots outside the gate-pillars, while two horseback riders are passing through
the gate-pillars and presumably heading toward the Mother Queen of the West on the
3.67. Money tree. Mid-first to mid-second century ce.
Bronze. Discovered in Maowen, Sichuan, (a) Photograph,
(b) Detail. W. 28.5 cm. Ink rubbing.
3.68. Gate o f Heaven and the Mother Queen o f the
West on a bronze plaque. Second to early third century
bce. G ilt bronze. Diameter 25.4 cm. Discovered in 1982-
87 in Wushan, Sichuan. Drawing.
 3.69. Mother Queen o f the West on a decorated brick. First century bce. 32 x 115 cm. Unearthed in 1986
from Tomb 28 at Fanji in Xinye, Henan, (a) Photograph, (b) Detail. Ink rubbing.

upper left of the pictorial space. Faced with these intriguing designs, we have to ask:
W ho was the Mother Queen of the West? W hy did she figure in the m otif of Heavens
gate?
It is unclear what xiwangm u referred to in the pre-Han texts: a tribe’s name, a place-
name, a deity, a figure, or a human-beast hybrid. The Han people, however, took the term
literally and associated it with a goddess, the Mother Queen of the West.140 Accord­
ing to the Book o f the K ing o f H uainan, the legendary archer Y i 羿 once begged for the
elixir of immortality from the Mother Queen of the West, but his wife, Heng E, stole
it and ascended to the moon.141 Sima Xiangru, in his Rhapsody on the M ighty M an, also
addresses the association of the Mother Queen of the West with immortality, though not
with an elixir in particular.142 Both texts were produced during the reign of Emperor Wu.
Later, the Han official records reported a religious movement in 3 bce that established
the worship of the Mother Queen of the West. Thousands of people passed through
commanderies and kingdoms to reach the capital city to fulfill the commandment of the
Mother Queen of the West. Among all sorts of dedicative activities, they distributed a
written message declaring, “The Mother says that people who wear this written talisman
will not die.”143
Opinions of where xiw angm u dwelled are widely divided in the pre-Han and Han texts.
As an icon of immortality, however, in the Han mind the Mother Queen of the West was
connected with the Kunlun Mountains and Heaven. The earliest textual account showing
such a connection is in the celestial journey that Sima Xiangru invented for the mighty
man:
Looking westward to the hazy Kunlun M ountains,
I ride straightforward to the M ountain of Three Perils.
I push through Heaven’s gate and enter the palace of the
Thearch on High;
I carry the jade maid who returns with me.
Stretching at Cool W ind,
I sway but collect myself.
I soar high like a bird before a sudden stop.
Hovering low over the winding Yin 陰 Mountains,
I see the M other Queen of the W est today with my own eyes.
W earing a sheng [headgear] on her white hair and living in a cave,
She is fortunate to have a three-legged bird for errands.
If one must live long like this to avoid death,
No congratulations are due even to someone who lasts for all ages.144

Since the mighty man is flying in a trance, as the writer presents him, it is not easy for us
to determine the logical connection between one move and the next. Nevertheless, it was
not a coincidence that Sima puts Heavens gate, the Kunlun Mountains, and the Mother
Queen of the West all together. The authors of the Book o f the K ing o fH uainan believed
that a human was able to reach Heaven from the Kunlun Mountains by overcoming two
peaks in between: the lower peak, called Cool W ind {liangfeng 減風 or langfeng 閬風)，
on which one will not die; and the higher peak, called Hanging Garden {xuanpu 玄 圃 )，
on which one can command natural phenomena.145 It was thus no wonder that Simas
mighty man recuperated at Cool W ind. The authors of the Book o f the K ing o f H uainan
also specified the whereabouts of the Mother Queen of the West: she was at the brink of
Floating Sand, through which one of the four rivers originating in the Kunlun M oun­
tains flowed.146 The Mother Queen of the West appeared to be near but not exactly at
the Kunlun Mountains. The mode of literary expression allowed Sima the freedom to
juxtapose a place of deathlessness (Cool W ind Mountain) with an icon of immortal-
 2
1
5

3 .70. Mother Queen o f the West on painted bricks. Second quarter o f the first century bce. H. 52 cm.
Unearthed in 1976 from Bu Qianqius tomb in Luoyang, Henan. Copy.

ity (Mother Queen of the West). And the juxtaposition inevitably hinted at the role the
Mother Queen of the West might have played in the ascension from the Kunlun M oun­
tains to Heaven. The literary implication later became a religious assumption. One of
the apocrypha popular in the Eastern Han declared that the Mother Queen of the West
resided in the Kunlun Mountains.147
The extant texts on the Mother Queen of the West are few, but her pictorial repre­
sentations were abundant and ubiquitous in the Han period. Scholars have pointed out
regional differences in visualizing this popular goddess.148 In Henan, the early examples
come from tombs built in the second half of the first century b c e . In these, as on the ceil­
ing of Bu Qianqius 卜千秋 tomb in Luoyang, the Mother Queen of the West is emerg­
ing from clouds and receiving the deceased couple, who are riding on a three-headed
phoenix and a snakelike creature (Figure 3.70).149 Scholars identify the Mother Queen
of the West based mainly on the unique headgear she is wearing, called s^eng.150 A sheng
headgear is distinguished by its shape, which looks like two triangles intersecting a cir­
cle, as illustrated in the W u Liang Shrine (Figure 3.71). The aforementioned Fanji brick,
 3.71. Sheng headgear in the Wu Liang shrine. 151c e . Stone carving.

Discovered in 1786 in Jiaxiang, Shandong. Print.

unearthed from Tomb 28，also dates to the second half of the first century b c e . O n the
brick, the Mother Queen of the West is wearing a sheng headgear and receiving a fig­
ure, presumably the deceased, who is kneeling and touching the ground with his fore­
head (see Figure 3.69). The Mother Queen of the West is either kneeling on the ground
or floating in the air, depending on how we understand the pictorial space. To her left
or behind her, there is a hare pounding a mortar with a pestle, an indication that the
Mother Queen of the West is in charge of making the elixir of immortality. Neither the
Luoyang mural nor the Fanji brick represent the Mother Queen of the West in a spe­
cific setting, but a design on a pottery house excavated in Tomb 37 at Fanji clearly places
 b

3.72. Mother Queen o f the West decorated on a pottery house. First century b c e . 30.2 x 26.8 x 36.8 cm.
Unearthed in 1986 from Tomb 37 at Fanji in Xinye, Henan, (a) Photograph, (b) Ink rubbing. 5 x 24 cm.

the goddess in the mountains; she also has a larger entourage, including a hare with a
mortar and pestle, a toad, a nine-tailed fox, a three-legged bird, and an immortal (Figure
3.72).151 Archaeologists give Tombs 28 and 37 the same date because they have similar
structures and funerary goods.152 The design on the pottery house verifies that people at
Fanji associated the Mother Queen of the West with the Kunlun Mountains by the end
 8
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1

o f t h e f ir s t c e n t u r y b c e , so th e d e s i g n o n t h e b r i c k , i n c l u d i n g b o t h t h e g a t e - p i ll a r s a n d
the Mother Queen of the West, could have implied that the mercy of the goddess of im ­
mortality improved peoples chances of reaching Heaven.
In Sichuan, the archaeological finds involving the Mother Queen of the West are
later than those in Henan. The earliest example is on a lacquer plate made by Sichuan
artisans in 69 ce, although it was discovered in a Han frontier commandery, Lolang
樂 浪 ，in present-day North Korea.153 The Mother Queen of the West, who is wearing
a sheng headgear, looks more majestic than in the earlier images; seated on a mat, she
is dignified by a canopy and attended by a maid (Figure 3.73). Hie goddess appears to
emerge from soaring clouds, as in Bu Qianqius tomb, but the exuberant curves form a
base with a wider top. The indefinite base is better defined in later examples, like the one
on a second-century money tree discovered in Xichang 西 昌 ，Sichuan.154 The Mother
Queen of the West, who is wearing a sheng headgear, is seated on a throne covered by an
ornate mat and is guarded by two tigers (Figure 3.74). She has wings extended from her
shoulders to emphasize her supernatural powers. Beneath her are emblems of the elixir
of immortality, said to be under her charge: a hare pounding a mortar with a pestle on
the left, a toad holding a container on the right, as if to receive the freshly made elixir,
and a fungus believed to be the miraculous ingredient at the center. W u Hung suggests
that the mushroom-like base depicts the
Kunlun M ountains, reported Record of as inthe
Ten Continents {Shi zhou j i 十 洲 記 )， a book compiled between the third and fifth centu­
ries c e , whose author says Kunlun “resembles the shape of a flat basin; it is narrow at the
bottom and broad on the top.”155 Li Song considers the elongated stem to be a pillar to
Heaven {tianzhu 天 柱 )，as stated in the Classic o f Spirits and Oddities (Shen y i jin g 神異
經)， a book also compiled between the third and fifth centuries c e ; it says that in the Kun­
lun Mountains there is a bronze pillar high enough to reach Heaven.156 Kominami Ichiro
brings our attention to its possible illustration on a Han bronze mirror.157 The vertical
post guarded by a huge animal with a chain is identified by the inscription on its right as
“bronze pillar” [tongzhu I 同柱； Figure 3.75). Whether the Mother Queen of the West is in
the Kunlun Mountains or on the pillar to Heaven, her connection with Kunlun was evi­
dent in second-century Sichuan. The Xichang example helps us to put into perspective
the combination of Heavens gate and the Mother Queen of the West on the Maowen
branch and on the Wushan plaque. Far more tangible and powerful than auspicious ani­
mals and immortals, the goddess in charge of the elixir of immortality who lived in the
Kunlun Mountains became the people’s principal guide to Heaven in the Eastern Han.
Interestingly, the cult of the Mother Queen of the West modified the perception of
Heavens gate in turn and prompted artisans to invent a fourth mode to depict it. An
3.73. Mother Queen o f the West on a painted plate. 69
c e . Lacquer. Unearthed in 1925 from

Wang Yus tomb in Lolang, North Korea, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.
 a b
3.74. Mother Queen o f the West on a money tree. Mid-second to early third century c e . Bronze. 27 x 13.5 cm. Un­
earthed in 1976 at Gaocao in Xichang, Sichuan, (a) Photograph, (b) Ink rubbing.

example is the gate, half opened by a maid, that anchors the carving on a stone coffin
unearthed in Nanxi 南 溪 ，Sichuan (Figure 3.76a).158 To the left of the gate or behind
it, the Mother Queen of the West is seated on a throne that is covered by a mat and
guarded by a dragon and a tiger; a maid is attending her. To the right of the gate or in
front of it is a procession. A figure holding a stick with tassels and kneeling in front of the
gate is guiding the procession. A t its end, two figures facing each other and attended by
servants are probably the deceased couple. Between the guide and the deceased couple are
a winged deer and a flying bird. The scene shows the deceased, helped by a spiritual guide,
a winged deer, and a flying bird， approaching the immortal world governed by the Mother
 a b
3.75. Mirror. 25-220 c e . Bronze.
Diameter 20.2 cm. Discovered in Shaoxing,
Zhejiang, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Detail showing the “bronze pillar.”

Queen of the West. On another stone coffin, discovered in Xingjing 荥 經 ， Sichuan， a gate
half opened by a maid is similarly rendered at the center of the carving (Figure 3.77a).159
There is, however, no procession. To the right of the gate, the Mother Queen of the West
is seated in front of a table. To the left of the gate, a couple is kissing each other. The com­
position allows at least two different readings. If the maid is opening the gate, then the
scene offers a glimpse of the world of the immortals, which promises the extension of
earthy pleasure. I f the maid is closing the gate, then the deceased have just arrived in the
world of the immortals and are beginning to enjoy the promised pleasures.
W ithout any inscription, we may wonder if the half-open gate on both coffins is
an entrance to Heaven or an entrance only to the world of the immortals ruled by the
Mother Queen of the West. We need to examine the visual programs in which they
are situated before we draw any conclusions. The Nanxi coffin consists of a lid and a
box chiseled out of a stone block. The archaeologists did not report finding any remains
inside the coffin. Their description of direction was based on convention.160 A half-open
gate is carved on the right side of the coffin. Nothing but diagonal lines are on the left
side. A pair of gate-pillars appears on the front side, while a phoenix is on the rear side
(see Figures 3.76c, d). A gigantic floral design decorates the lid (see Figure 3.76b).161
3.76. Carvings on Sarcophagus 3. Second half o f the second centuryc e . Unearthed in 1985-86 at

Changshunpo in Nanxi, Sichuan. Ink rubbings, (a) Side panel. 200 x 69 cm. (b) Lid. 204 x 83 cm.
(c) Front panel. 72 x 72 cm. (d) Rear panel. 63 x 63 cm.
3.77. Carvings on a sarcophagus. Second half c)f the second century c e . Unearthed in 1969 in Xingjing,
Sichuan. Ink rubbings, (a) Side panel. 232 x 79 cm. (b) Side panel. 138 x 78 cm. (c) Front panel. 79 x yo cm.
(d) Rear panel. 79 x 70 cm.
 W ^ ，
' .、、 ' ‘ ^ .、 .' > ；
vV.. v / - 、* ••« Tij
'v■
'ir. „p, // ifjr
:，

■ 賴 _ i% .

3.78. Gate-pillars with bi discs on a sarcophagus. Second half o f the second century c e . 55 x 50 cm.
Unearthed in 1973 in Yibin, Sichuan. Ink rubbing.

Hie fact that the twin gate-pillars and the phoenix are counterparts is evocative of gate-
pillars with phoenixes. The circles on the gate-pillars further allude to a gate with bi
discs. A comparable example can be found on another coffin in the region; there, the
bi discs are attached to the pillars by diagonal ropes (Figure 3.78).162 Like the Maowen
branch, the carvings on the front and rear of the Nanxi coffin combine the second and
third modes of depicting Heavens gate; and the floral design is, as discussed, an emblem
of Heaven (see Figures 3.54-56). Taken together, the decorations on the Nanxi coffin
convey the theme of ascending to Heaven: the deceased are supposed to be guided to
the immortals， land governed by the Mother Queen of the West, and from there they
could go on to Heaven. Since the cult of the Mother Queen of the West is still within
the broader context of ascension to Heaven, we should consider the half-open gate an
element along the way. The need to add a gate half opened by a maid to the gate-pillars
suggests that the Han people were no longer satisfied by the imposing and indifferent
 2
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5
pillars; they appreciated a better welcome for the deceased as they embarked on their
journeys heavenward.
The decorative program on the Xingjing coffin tells a similar story. The half-open gate
is on one of the long sides of the coffin. O n its opposite side is a horse tied to a tree and
attended by two persons, apparently servants (see Figure 3.77b). Two gate-pillars and
a phoenix are carved on the front and rear of the coffin, respectively (Figures 3.77c, d).
Although the lid is missing, the pairing of the gate-pillars and the phoenix signifies the
traditional mode of depicting Heavens gate, as shown on the Nanxi coffin. Like the
composition of the half-open gate, the horse scene also permits two readings. It may
capture the moment before departure, when servants are preparing a horse for the jour­
ney, or it may portray the moment after arrival, when servants are taking care of the
travel-weary horse. In any case, the pairing of the attended horse and the half-open gate
conveys the same message that we saw on the Nanxi coffin. Even though there is no pro­
cession, the deceased, presumably carried by the horse, are supposed to go to the immor­
tals' land governed by the Mother Queen of the West before proceeding to Heaven. The
maid opening the gate is making a friendly gesture that seems to accept the deceased.
To make the entrance to Heaven more approachable, artisans created a fifth mode of
depiction. An example is the single-plank gate that appears on the fagade of a Han tomb
in Suide 绥 德 ，Shaanxi (Figure 3.79).163 A gigantic knocker shaped as a zoomorphic
mask with a ring is engraved on the plank. The single-plank gate is almost identical to
the double-slab gate beneath it, which also has a knocker. Both knockers are like those
used by the Han people on their real-life gates; they resemble the one excavated at the
site of the Weiyang Palace in Chang'an (Figure 3.80). We know that the single-plank
gate is not an ordinary one because the Mother Queen of the West and her entourage
are to its right. It is, however, unclear whether the reception scene on the left has any­
thing to do with the Mother Queen of the West or with the gate at the center. A t best,
we can hypothesize that the gate serves to separate the human and the immortal worlds.
Still, the composition raises the question of whether the gate is an entrance only to the
land of the Mother Queen of the West. A carving from another Suide tomb helps us
answer the question (Figure 3.81). It depicts a scene in which the deceased, who is seated
in a carriage and guided by an immortal holding a banner, is heading toward the Mother
Queen of the West, whose attendants occupy almost the entire rectangular space.164
The sun (the right-hand circle with a bird) and the moon (the left-hand circle with a
hare and a toad) flank the scene. The appearance of the sun and the moon indicates that
Heaven, rather than the land of the Mother Queen of the West, is the final destina­
tion. The cult of the Mother Queen of the West in the Suide area was closely related
 a

3.79. Fagade o f a tomb. First century ce. Stone carvings. 159 x 131 cm.
Unearthed at Sishilipu in Suide, Shaanxi, (a) Ink rubbings, (b) Detail.

to the wish to ascend to Heaven, so there are grounds for considering the single-plank
gate with a zoomorphic knocker a variation of Heavens gate. The variation suggests that
the Han people wanted the deceased to see familiar things when entering the unknown
domain.
A decorated brick unearthed in Xihua, Henan, displays an interesting mixture of
the fifth mode of depiction and the others (Figure 3.82). A n exaggerated zoomorphic
 3 .81. Mother Queen o f the West on a lintel. First century c e . Stone carving. 186 x 12 cm.
Discovered in 1955 at Junliujiagou in Suide, Shaanxi. Ink rubbing.
!M |
m l

_ 1 _ _

3 .82. Gate of Heaven o n d e c o r a t e d b r ic k s . First c e n t u r y b c e t o f ir s t c e n t u r y ce.

Unearthed in Xihua, Henan. Ink rubbing.

knocker, rendered at the center, is flanked by two-story structures with gatekeepers, two
bi discs, andtwophoenixes.Thedesignbrings thegatewith discsandthegate-pillars
bi
with phoenixes together with the homely gate with a zoomorphic knocker to give a
composite image of Heavens gate. The reference of this composite image is, however,
ambiguous. The gate with the zoomorphic knocker could be the gate of a tomb, as on the
fagadeofthe Suidetomb. Ifso, does thegroupofimages ontheXihuabrickmeanthat
the tomb was a space of transcendence, a place where the deceased was expected to be on
the way heavenward? O r do the images declare that the tomb was the heavenly domain
itself?
The ambiguity of location is also evident in funerary practices in northern Shaanxi.
Thefacadeofthetombat Dangjiagou 黨家溝inMizhi 米脂has alintel, twoposts, and
a gate (Figure 3.83).165 The carving on the lintel centers on a two-story building that
houses apair ofwingedfigures.Thefigures’companions，
anine-tailedfoxandamortar-
poundinghare, makethemtheMother QueenoftheWest andher consort, the Father
King of the East. The carvings on the posts represent two gate-pillars and gatekeepers
beneath a pair of animal-headed deities in either the Kunlun Mountains or on the Pillars
to Heaven, which indicates that it is Heavens gate that is depicted. The overall design
informs the viewer that the deceased could reach Heaven through the immortals' land
governedbytheMother QueenoftheWest.ThefayadeofanothertombinShenmu神
木 has a similar decorative scheme (Figure 3.84).166The artisans employed watchtowers,
not twin pillars, to portray Heavens gate on the two posts.They also replaced the winged
deities on the lintel with a couple and a child, who are supposed to be the deceased or
the family the deceased is expected to enjoy. The replacement deftly changes the im pli­
cations of the design. The presence of the deceased in the building where the Mother
Queen of the West and her consort once dwelled announces that the journey is over. But
the winged immortals riding deer and the galloping horses heading toward the central
building suggest that there was a procession to the immortals， land above the Kunlun
Mountains andthento Heaven.Theconflationofthe arrival withthe ascensiononthe
fa9ade of a tomb and right above the gate of the tomb poses the same question raised by
theXihuabrick. Does thevisual programsaythat the deceasedburiedin the tomb are
living in the tomb as if in the heavenly domain?
The design on the facade ofthe tomb at Guanzhuang 官莊 in Mizhi presents the
full ambiguity of being here or there (Figure 3.85).167 The central building on the lintel
is now completely empty. The void embraces all the implications derived from either the
residence of the deities or the residence of the deceased. The void could also serve as the
3 .83. Fagade o f a tomb. 25-220 ce. Stone carvings. 176 x 154 cm. Discovered in 1981 at
Dangjiagou in M izhi, Shaanxi, (a) Ink rubbings, (b) Detail.
 b

3 .84. Fagade o f Tomb 20. 25-220

c e . Carving and painting on stone. 156 x 150 cm. Unearthed in

1996 at Dabaodang in Shenmu, Shaanxi, (a) Ink rubbings, (b) Detail (photograph).
 2
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1
3 .85. Facade o f a tomb. 25-220 ce. Stone carvings. 200 x 158 cm.
Unearthed in 1981 at Guanzhuang in Mizhi, Shaanxi. Ink rubbings.

entrancetotheheavenlypalace,whichismarkedeitherbytwingate-pillars inprofileor
bytwinwatchtowers. Ifweenter the tomb,weseeareiterationofthe ambiguityonthe
left wall (Figure 3.86). A two-story building and a pair of gate-pillars are at the center
ofthewall.TheMother QueenoftheWest,wearingher headgear, isinthebuild­
sheng
ing,receivingafigureseatedbehindalowtable.Thefigurecouldbethedeceased, already
arrivedin the immortals， land.Twoscenes next tothe gate ofHeaven depict entertain­
ments ofthe kindthat Hanpeopleimaginedtheywouldenjoyinthe celestial paradise.
But twogiganticposts standingat the edges ofthewall complicatethe pictorial space.
Theappearanceoftheposts,whicharesupposedtosupport the tombchamber, reminds
us that the world of the immortals exists within atomb. Two modes of interspatiality
are thus involved in the visual programofthe Guanzhuang tomb: the gate ofHeaven
 b
3 .86. West wall o f the front chamber. 25-220
c e . Stone carvings. 251 x 143 cm.

Unearthed in 1981 from a tomb at Guanzhuang in Mizhi, Shaanxi, (a) Ink rubbings, (b) Detail.

frames the gate ofthe tomb on the fayade，but the structure ofthe tomb contains the
architectural complexofHeavenontheleftwall.TheinterspatialityexemplifiestheHan
efforts tobringthe realmofHeavennear.Thoughpromisingpost-mortemimmortality,
Heavenwasotherwiseremoteandunapproachable.
 Departing fromthe Zhou legacies, the Han people embarked on celestial journeys
toHeaven.Toovercomethe separationofHeavenandEarth, theyinventedall sorts of
agents一 immortals, auspicious animals, the goddess in charge of the immortals，
land一
to guide themupward. Reaching immortality came to be the prelude to the celestial
ascent, aprocess that couldbebothpre- andpost-mortem. Sincetheworldtheycraved
was not here on Earth, they commissioned artisans to make it visible. The belief in
ascendingto Heaventookarchitecture andpaintingtothe forefront ofHan art. Never
beforehadtheverticalityofarchitecturebeensoindemandaswhenthebuilders at the
court of Emperor Wu exerted all their skills inwoodworkingand earthworks to open
up new possibilities for tall structures_ ta i terraces, guan towers, and lou buildings一 in
Chang’an and Ganquan. Likewise, never before had painting been a dominant medium
in tomb furnishings. The request to map out the process of the celestial ascent for the
deceased prompted the artisans who worked for the family of Marquis Dai to devise a
pictorial program, introducing a kind of wondrous world that could never be replaced
by funerary goods from this world. The gate of Heaven, signifying at once the end of a
journey and the beginning of the afterlife, further captured the popular imagination. The
m otif encouraged artisans to explore pictorial space. Some chose to integrate murals into
their architectural space,whereasotherspreferredtoinsert multiplespacesonthepicto­
rial surface. The celestial fantasybecame one ofthe drivingforces that pushedforward
thedevelopment ofHanvisual culture.
 CHAPTER 4

Highlighting Celestial Markers

Q i1Yuan, as we saw earlier, composed H eavenly Questions w hen feudal lords were com­
peting w ith Zhou kings for H eavens m andate and when individuals were overwhelmed
by the idea of communicating with Heaven. He approached Heaven inquisitively. “How
can we be sure what it was like before the sl^ above and the earth below took shape?”
he asked. Puzzled by the rotation of the cosmos, he sought an explanation, “The revolv­
ing cords， where are they tied? The heavenly pivot, where is it raised?”And the tilt of the
Earth led him to inquire, “Where do the eight pillars meet the sky, and why are they too
short for it in the southeast?”1
Q u Yuan was fascinated by the celestial field but not content with the given answers.
As we have seen, he challenged the assumption of round Heaven and square Earth: “Hie
round and manifold [Heaven], who devised and calibrated it? … Where lie the borders
of manifold Heaven, and where do they connect? Numerous are the edges and angles
[of Earth]~who knows how many?”2 He watched celestial bodies and marveled at their
operation: “How does Heaven coordinate its motion? • • • How do the sun and the moon
hold to their courses and the fixed stars keep their places?”3 Q u Yuan was certainly not
the first to ask these questions. Oracle bone inscriptions reveal that the Shang people
had already had extensive records on sunrise, sunset, solar eclipses, lunar eclipses, and
bright stars.4 Q u Yuan’s attention, however, shows that astronomy was no longer forbid­
den knowledge kept only at the court. Any interested intellectual was allowed to study
celestial matters.
The author of F ar-offJourney, Q u Yuan’s follower, who also enjoyed the freedom to
explore celestial knowledge, incorporated heavenly bodies into an imaginary journey:5
I took hold of the Broom Star to use it as a banner;
I brandished the Dippers Handle as my baton.
2
5
3
 Up and down went our long train, plunging and soaring,
D rifting on the moving waves of the fleeting mist.
The daylight was fading and darkness was gathering
As I summoned the Dark W arrior to serve in my train.
I made W enchang follow, too, to marshal the procession,
Disposing the gods in their places in my retinue .6

The Broom Star is the Chinese name for a comet. The Dark Warrior is the spirit com­
manding the stars in the northern sky. The dipper is the Northern Dipper, a group of
seven stars encompassing the North Star (Figure 4.1). Wenchang is a constellation that
is also close to the North Star. The author of F ar-offJourney, who may have been active
in the early Han, employed some of the most detectable celestial bodies to enrich his lit­
erary efforts.
The Han artisans could not afford to ignore the visible bodies in the sky when they
attempted to picture Heaven. It was truly an art to translate stars, the sun, and the moon
into pictorial entities that made sense to viewers. It was also a challenge to transform the
physical sky into the conceptual heaven, as artisans were commissioned to do. Based on
archaeological finds, this chapter focuses on the most popular celestial markers in Han
art: the cardinal emblems, the M ilky Way, and the sun and the moon.

The Cardinal Emblems

After usurping the Han throne, Wang Mang compiled Signs o f the M andate into a book
to legitimate his reign. He even sent out the Generals of Five Majesties to kingdoms
and commanderies to distribute the book while they were delivering the official seals of
his dynasty and recalling the Han ones. The carriages that the generals used were deco­
rated with the hexagrams qian and kun from the Book o f Changes to symbolize Heaven
and Earth, but Wang Mang wanted to see more than the hexagrams on the carriages of
his subjects. He once encouraged his subjects to revere the mandate of the X in dynasty
by decorating their carriages with the Blue Dragon on the left, the W hite Tiger on the
right, the Red Bird in the front, and the Dark Warrior at the back, in addition to the
hexagrams.7 Archaeologists have retrieved roofing tiles with the same decorations at
the site of the Nine Temples, the imperial ancestral temples that Wang Mang built to
justify his usurpation through a set of lineages that would have linked his ancestors to
Shun and the Yellow Thearch, two sage kings of remote antiquity. Located in the west
of the Bright Hall, the Nine Temples comprised the most gigantic project Wang Mang
 4.1. Stars around the North Pole.

had initiated in the capital (see Figure 1.7). The complex was likely composed of twelve
identical structures, with eleven clustered inside the walls and one standing in front of
the southern wall. Each structure, having a central building enclosed by four walls, was
about the size of the Bright Hall (Figure 4.2). It took three years, from 20 to 22 c e , to
complete the project. We are told that many buildings in the imperial park, including
 8
2
3

a
4.2. (a) Floor plan of the Nine Temples. 22 c e . Unearthed in 1958-60 in Xi’an, Shaanxi,
(b) Reconstruction of Structure 3 in the Nine Temples. 270 x 270 m.

Emperor W us Jianzhang Palace, were torn down to assemble construction materials for
the Nine Temples. At the site of Structure 2，archaeologists discovered tiles with drag­
ons near the eastern gate, tiles with tigers near the western gate, tiles with birds near
the southern gate, and tiles with turtles and snakes near the northern gate (Figure 4.3).8
W hy did Wang Mang prefer this particular set of zoomorphic signs and place them at
the cardinal points?
The association of these animals with the four directions had an astronomical basis.
The ancient Chinese divided the sky into twenty-eight segments and grouped the
brighter stars within each segment. They called each group of stars a “lodge”because they
viewed the moon cyclically moving from one to another.9 Sima Qian gave us a compre­
hensive description of how the Han people viewed the system of lunar lodges in his Book
o f Celestial Offices. He described the sky as an array of bureaucratic offices, divided among
five palaces: the North Star, like the emperor, anchored the Central Palace. The twenty-
eight lunar lodges, like imperial subjects, were allotted equally to the Eastern, Western,
Southern, and Northern Palaces. Each palace had its governor— the Eastern Palace had
the Blue Dragon, the Western Palace had the Harmonious Pond {xianchi 咸 池 ) or the
W hite Tiger, the Southern Palace had the Red Bird, and the Northern Palace had the
Dark Warrior {xuanwu 玄武） .10
Sima Qian explained why the Southern Palace was associated with the imagery of a
bird by highlighting four of the seven lunar lodges allocated to that palace: W illow (liu
柳）was its beak, Star (xing 星）its nape, Stretch [zhang 張）its crop, and W ing {yi 翼）its
 4 .3. Roofing tiles unearthed from Structure 2 in the Nine Temples. 22
c e . Unearthed in 1958-60 in X ian,

Shaanxi, (a) Blue Dragon. Diameter 18.1 cm. (b) White Tiger. Diameter 18.4 cm. (c) Red Bird. Diameter
19 cm. (d) Dark Warrior. Diameter 18.5 cm.

wings (Figure 4.4).11 The connection of the southern stars with a bird was very ancient.
The author of the Canon ofYao {Yao dian 堯 典 )， a document compiled no earlier than the
eighth century b c e , recorded that the lunar lodge Star, with a bright star at its center (a
Hydrae), reached its highest point in the sky in mid-spring, an observation probably first
m a d e a b o u t 2300 b c e .12 Moreover, t h e a u t h o r u s e d t h e t e r m “ b i r d li k e s t a r ” to d e s c r ib e
the constellation. For the ancient Chinese observers, it must have been a scene when the
Star rose high, pulling along the W ing, which seemed to bend and stretch as it sparked
 11h 10h 9h 8h 7h

in the sky. Together, the Star and the W ing must have looked like a bird raising its beak,
spreading its wings, and flying across the starry sky.13 The flying bird portrayed on the
ceiling of the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X ian, probably built in the late first
century b c e , must derive from this projection (Figure 4.5).14In this artistic rendition, the
projected image even becomes the main body, with which the abstract constellations are
affiliated.
Sima Qian also accounted for the association of the Eastern Palace with a dragon,
although the physical referents were less definite than those of the southern bird.15 Six
o f t h e s e v e n lu n a r l o d g e s in t h e e a s t e r n s k y r e f e r to d if f e r e n t p a r t s o f a d r a g o n — H o r n
{jiao 角） ，Neck {gang 宄)，R o o t 、di 氏)一 its chest, Chamber {fang 房)一 its belly, Heart
(xin 心)，and Tail (w ei 尾 )，but it is unclear why the heart was placed between the belly
and the tail (Figure 4.6). The celestial dragon was well-established in the pre-Han mind.
The lunar lodge Heart, which had one of the brightest stars at its center (a Scorpii), also
appeared in the Canon o f Yao. The author called this group of stars Fire {huo 火) and
regarded it as the celestial point marking mid-summer.16 The Han artisans who deco-
 b
4 .5. Celestial bird. Second half o f the first century
b c e . Mural. Unearthed in 1987 at

Jiaotong University in X i’an，

Shaanxi, (a) Drawing, (b) Photograph.

rated the painted tomb in X ia n also depicted the Eastern Palace, skillfully incorporating
the six lunar lodges into a sinuous, climbing dragon (Figure 4.7): its long body carries
four stars at the tips; its four limbs stretch wide, each claw clutching a star; and its tail
curls back just enough to hold another star. Scholars believe that the red circle caught
in the left rear claw of the dragon, the only red star on the painted ceiling, represents
the fiery lunar lodge recorded in the pre-Han texts.17The celestial dragon depicted on a
brick discovered in Chengdu, Sichuan, is not as elaborate as the painted example; still,
it includes the bright three-starred Heart in the middle of the body and the two-starred
Horn atop the horns (Figure 4.8). A carved stone unearthed in Nanyang 南陽 ，Henan,
depicts the celestial dragon in a similar way (Figure 4.9). Its maker quite precisely cap­
tured the two-starred Horn near the head and the four-starred Root along the body,
although he reduced the lunar lodge Tail at the end from nine to six stars. In contrast,
the artisan who created the celestial dragon on another carved stone in Nanyang was
interested only in the zoomorphic image; the stars that he added had nothing to do with
what people could see in the sky (Figure 4.10).
The qian hexagram in the Book o f Changes informs us more substantially of the asso­
ciation of a dragon with spring and the east. Scholars believe that the original hexa­
grams and the statements associated with the hexagram lines were created no later than
 4 .7. Celestial dragon. Second half o f the first century
b c e . Mural. Unearthed in 1987 at the

Jiaotong University in X i’an, Shaanxi, (a) Drawing, (b) Photograph.

the ninth century bce. The qian hexagram is composed of six solid lines. The statement
offered for each line gives a different dragon posture: “submerged dragon” {qian long j朁
龍）for the bottom line, “see the dragon in the field” (jia n long za i tian 見 龍 在 田 ) for the
second, “now jumping in the depth” {huo yue za i yuan 或 躍 在 淵 ）for the fourth, “flying
dragon in the sky”、 fe i long za i tian 飛 龍 在 天 ）for the fifth, “necked dragon” {gang long
4 .8. Celestial dragon. 25-220
c e . Stone carving. 45 x 44 cm. 4 .9 . Celestial dragon. 25-220
c e . Stone carving. 135 x 95

Unearthed in Chengdu, Sichuan. Ink rubbing. cm. Unearthed in Nanyang, Henan. Ink rubbing.

4 .10. Celestial dragon. 25-220 ce. Stone carving. W. 266 cm. Unearthed in Nanyang, Henan. Ink rubbing.

宄 龍 ）and “see the flock of headless dragons” (Jian qun long wushou 見 羣 龍 无 首 ）for
the top line.18 Edward Shaughnessy argues that the various postures reflect the seasonal
positions of the celestial dragon because they correspond to the different positions of
the lunar lodges in the eastern sky from spring to autumn.19 Accordingly, the submerged
dragon of the qian hexagram represents the human inability to see the eastern stars in
winter (Figure 4.11a). The field dragon describes the appearance of the lunar lodge Horn
on the western horizon in early March (Figure 4.11b). The depth dragon denotes the
full emergence of the lunar lodges Neck, Root, Chamber, and Tail in mid-May (Figure
4.11c). The flying dragon stands for the appearance of the lunar lodge Tail— and thus the
 Chamber fang 房

Heart xin 心

Tail wei 尾

4 .11a. Dragons described in the Book o f Changes. Submerged dragon

(the position o f the Dragon constellation at dusk at winter solstice, 800 b c e ).

Horn jiao 角
East Horizon West

Neck gang 宄

Root di 氐

Chamber fang 房

Heart xin 心

Tail wei 尾

4.11b. Dragons described in the Book o f Changes. See the dragon in the fields
(the position o f the Dragon constellation at dusk in early March, 800 b c e ).
 Horn jia o 角

Neck gang 7C
Root di 氐
\ Chamber fang 房
J
Heart xin 心

•~ * East___________________________Horizon______________________________West
Tail wei 尾

4 .11c. Dragons described in the Book o f Changes. And now jumping in the depths
(the position o f the Dragon constellation at dusk in mid-May, 800 b c e ).

East Horizon West

4.11d. Dragons described in the Book o f Changes. Flying dragon in the skies
(the position o f the Dragon constellation at dusk at summer solstice, 800 b c e ).

Heart xin 心^ ^
Chamber fang 房

Root di 氐
r\
Neck gang 亢 ^ •
East___________________________ Horizon_________________________________west

4 .11e. Dragons described in the Book o f Changes. Necked dragon. See the flock o f dragons without heads
(the position o f the Dragon constellation at dusk in mid-August, 800 b c e ).
 8
I 9

10 11 12

4.12. (i)-(7) Graphs o f dragons in Shang oracle bone inscriptions, (8) and (9) Graphs o f dragons
in Western Zhou bronze inscriptions, (io)-(i2) Projection o f the celestial dragons.

complete dragon— in late June (Figure 4.nd).The “necked dragon” indicates the descent
of the lunar lodge Neck below the western horizon in mid-August (Figure 4.iie). Since
the lunar lodge Horn also passes out of sight beneath the horizon, the “necked dragon”
is described as “see the headless dragon.”20The “seeing the dragon in the field”was par­
ticularly significant for farmers. The ceremony of praying for timely rain was usually held
as soon as the dragon became visible, that is, when the lunar lodge Horn made its first
appearance of the year.21
How did the image of a dragon come to represent the eastern lunar lodges? Hie
dragon as a whole may not find its match in reality, but the separate portions of its body
do resemble parts of other animals: its horns are similar to a deers, its long, lithe torso
resembles a snake, and its sharp claws are like a tigers.22 Hence, the dragon could have
been a combination of tribal totems, as Wen Yiduo proposes, or it could have been a
mixture of auspicious animals highly regarded in shamanistic practices, as K. C. Chang
suggests.23 In any case, Feng Shi points out that as oracle bone inscriptions show, the
Shang people had already adopted the imagery of these separate parts in their picto-
graphs to refer to a dragon (Figure 4.12).24 Dragon imagery must have played an impor­
tant role in the religious and political life of the ancient Chinese. W hen they watched
the appearance of Horn and the rise of Heart, and observed the long, twisting, narrow
array of stars through which the moon passed, the ancient Chinese must have recalled
the dragon imagery that they had invented and projected it onto the sky.
 Sima Qian did not assign the W hite
+20 Tiger to govern the Western Palace, but
he connected it with two of the seven
western lunar lodges: Tuft {zi 紫) was its
+10 head, and Triad {shen 參)~ w ith four stars
outside the three stars in a straight line at
the center~resembled its shoulder and
hip (Figure 4.13).25 A carved stone discov­
ered in Nanyang shows the Han depiction
of the celestial tiger (Figure 4.14). The ar­
-1 0 tisan was fascinated by the three stars in a
straight line at the heart of Triad, but he
combined the tiger image and the three
stars quite freely as if he were unaware of
-2 0
the astronomical structure of the tiger in
the sky.
Sima Qian did not make any attempt
-30
to link the Dark Warrior with the lunar
4 .13. Lunar lodges Tuft and Triad. lodges of the Northern Palace. None of
the Han visual examples known to us
illustrates the Dark Warrior and its celestial references. In fact, Sima Qian did not even
inform us of what the Dark Warrior was and how it looked. His omission makes us
wonder when the Dark Warrior came to indicate the northern sky.
During the reign of Emperor W u, Sima Qian represented an astronomical approach
to the cardinal emblems, in regard to which there were two other discourses. Gongsun
Hong, a senior scholar recruited to the court in 130 b c e , elaborated on four creatures
in the context of omens. As we have discussed, he told the emperor that when ancient
sage kings ruled their people with benevolence, the unicorn, phoenix, turtle, and dragon
would appear, although he did not connect them with the four different directions.26
Sometime before 139 b c e , the authors of the Book o f the K ing ofH uainan presented four
kinds of creatures in the context of monthly observances, a ritual system they took from
M aster L us Spring and A utum n Annals, a book compiled in the Q in State about 239
b c e .27 The authors recommended that the Son of Heaven receive his subjects in the
eastern chambers of the Bright Hall while riding a dragon-patterned carriage, wear­
ing a blue robe, and holding a blue banner. In the summer, the Son of Heaven should
move to the southern chambers of the Bright Hall, with a red carriage, a red robe, and
 4 .14. Celestial tiger. 25-220 ce. Stone carving. 120 x 60 cm. Unearthed in Nanyang, Henan. Ink rubbing.

a red banner. W hen autumn came, he should move again, to the western chamber, and
change to a white carriage, a white robe, and a white banner. In the winter, he should
visit the northern chambers with a black carriage, a black robe, and a black banner (see
Figure 1.40). In this idealized ritual system, the authors assigned four kinds of creatures
to the four seasons and the four directions: creatures with scales to spring and the east,
creatures with feathers to summer and the south, creatures with fur to autumn and the
west, and creatures with shells to winter and the north. Thus, three of the four animals
match in the three very different discourses: the dragon has scales, the bird/phoenix has
feathers, and the turtle/Dark Warrior has a shell/armor. In astronomy the creature with
fur could be a tiger; in the discourse of omens, the creature with fur could be a unicorn.
Archaeological finds provide us with a picture unlike descriptions in the received
texts. The pairing of dragon and tiger appeared very early in the Yangshao i^P韶 culture
(ca. 5000-2750 b c e ) . The most startling example comes from Tomb 45 at Xishuipo 西水
坡 in Puyang 瀵 陽 ，Henan.28 One of the tomb occupants is accompanied by images of
a dragon and a tiger, both formed by clamshells and as large as the corpse (Figure 4.15).
Since the dragon is placed in the east and the tiger in the west, Feng Shi argues that the
images are representations of the eastern and western lunar lodges as articulated in later
texts, but K. C. Chang believes that they attest to shamanistic practices.29 Another re­
markable example is a bronze mirror from a tomb in Sanmenxia 三 門 峽 ，Henan, dated
to the ninth to seventh centuries b c e .30 The mirror shows the images of a dragon, a tiger,
a bird, and a deerlike animal (Figure 4.16). It is, however, unclear whether the mirror
4 .15. Dragon and tiger, ca. 4500 b c e . Clamshells. Dragon:
178 x 67 cm. Tiger: 139 x 63 cm. Unearthed in 1987 from
Tomb 45 at Xishuipo in Puyang, Henan, (a) Drawing,
(b) Photograph. b

maker had any astronomical intentions. The design on a lacquer chest in the tomb of
Marquis Y i of Zeng, dated to the second half of the fifth century b c e , is less ambiguous
in terms of its astronomical references.31 The inscriptions at the center of the lid are the
names of the Northern Dipper and the twenty-eight lunar lodges (Figure 4.17). The back
of the tiger is near the lodges in the west (Triad, Tuft), and the tail of the dragon winds
along the lodges in the east (Tail, Heart, Belly, Chest). The images on the three sides of
the box are less definite. Feng Shi suggests that the creature on the side by the tiger is
a bird and that the two animals on the side by the northern lunar lodges are deer.32 If
so, the designs on Marquis Y is chest may, in turn, prove that the grouping of the four
animals on the Sanmenxia mirror was not random. In these early archaeological exam­
ples, unlike in the received texts, the association of a tiger with the west is not uncertain.
These examples do indicate, however, that the creature that stands for the north could
have been a deerlike animal, not a turtle, as stated in the received texts.
Visual examples before and during the reign of Emperor W u confirm the inconsis­
tencies in picturing the creature of the north. One of the painted coffins in Lady D ai’s
 2
5
1
4 .16. Cardinal emblems on a mirror. Eighth century bce.

Bronze. Diameter 6.7 cm. Unearthed in 1957 at Shangcun-

ling in Sanmenxia, Henan, (a) Photograph, (b) Ink rubbing.

to m b , c o n stru c te d se v e ra l y e a rs a fte r 168 b c e , s h o w s t w o d r a g o n s f l a n k i n g a p e a k a n d

accompanied by a phoenix, a tiger, and a deer (see Figure 3.38). The combination echoes
the pre-Han examples. Nevertheless, the incense burner discovered in the tomb of Dou
Wan 竇 綰 ，the consort of the king of Zhongshan Kingdom, buried sometime before
104 b c e , t e lls a d if f e r e n t s t o r y .33 The c r e a t u r e s s u r r o u n d in g t h e e x t e r io r o f t h e in c e n s e
burner are a dragon, a phoenix, a tiger, and a camel (Figure 4.18). The interchangeability
of a deer and a camel suggests that their mutual attribute is more terrestrial than celes­
tial. Chen Jiujin speculates that using deer to represent the north could have come from
 2
5
2

4 .17. Cardinal em
h alf o f the fifth century b c e . Lacquer. 71 x 47
x 40.5 cm. Unearthed in 1978 from the tomb
o f Marquis Y i of Zeng at Leigudun in Sui­
xian, Hubei, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawings,
a

the reverence for deer among nomads living along the steppe that neighbored northern
China.34 Likewise, camels were often seen in the Mongolian north. Yet the painted
tomb at Shiyuan 柿園 in Yongcheng 永 城 ，Henan, delivers another surprise. The tomb,
whose occupant was likely the king of Liang 梁 Kingdom, was built sometime before 118
b c e .35 The painting on the ceiling of the main chamber depicts a gigantic dragon whose
horn is held in a bird’s mouth and who seems to be devouring a fishlike creature; a tiger
 4 .18. Cardinal emblems on an incense burner, ca. 118-104 bce.

Bronze. H. 32.3 cm. Unearthed in 1968 from the tomb o f Dou

Wan in Mancheng, Hebei, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

climbing a peak is rendered at the bottom (Figure 4.19). Though unidentifiable, the fish­
like creature is at least aquatic, like a turtle.
Even if the received texts that date to the reign of Emperor W u associated a turtle
with the north, the iconography of the north was not yet stabilized in the contemporary
visual and material culture. We have no clues as to why Sima Qian called the governor
of the Northern Palace “Dark Warrior” rather than plain turtle.36 One of the earliest
 a

4 .19. Cardinal emblems, ca. 136-118 b c e . Mural. 514 x 327 cm. Unearthed in
1986-91 at Shiyuan in Mangshan, Henan, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.
 2
5
5
4 .20 . Dark Warrior on a decorated brick. First century b c e . 117.5 x 37.5 cm.
Unearthed in 1974 in Xingping, Shaanxi. Ink rubbing.

visual examples that portray the Dark Warrior as a turtle with a snake comes from the
decorated bricks at the site of the Mao 茂 Mausoleum, built by Emperor W u for him ­
self in present-day Xingping 興 平 ，Shaanxi (Figure 4.20).37 In Xianyang, archaeologists
have also found bricks decorated with the four creatures— dragon, tiger, phoenix, and
turtle with snake一 that were made and reused in smaller and simpler tombs dated to
the end of the first century b c e , but these bricks were not placed in the cardinal direc­
tions that their designs implied.38 Even so, it appears that the idea and the iconography
of the Dark Warrior were introduced no later than the reign of Emperor W u, and that
the Dark Warrior gradually became the standard symbol of the north afterward. Still, it
is unclear why a snake was added to a turtle to form the image of the Dark Warrior.
The cardinal emblems originated from observations of the sky, but the Han people
used them in contexts unrelated to astronomy. Sometimes the significance of the car­
dinal emblems did not even lie in the directions they indicated but at the center they
defined. The center, for instance, is the floral canopy that signifies the dignity of the
Heavenly T hearchw e saw it earlier on a brick (see Figure 3.55). O n another brick, dis­
covered at Jiayuguan 嘉 略 關 ， Gansu, the center is a bi disc, an embodiment of the round
Heaven, here at the top of a floral canopy (Figure 4.21). Moreover, the notion of “celestial
offices,” articulated by Sima Qian, appealed to the ruling elite. W hen the roofing tiles
decorated with the cardinal emblems were installed in the Nine Temples, the emblems
implied that the central building they demarcated was comparable to the Central Pal­
ace. As the Heavenly Thearch dwelled in the Central Palace, the Son of Heaven received
Heavens mandate through the ancestors worshiped in the Nine Temples. The cardinal
emblems, originally shaped by human projections, were replicated from the celestial field
and carried symbolic power of increased potency back to the human world.
 6
2
5

4 .21. Cardinal emblems on a decorated brick. Third century ce. 34 x 34 cm.

Unearthed in 1972-73 in Jiayuguan, Gansu.

W ang M ang’s manipulation of the cardinal emblems in the scheme of the Nine Tem­
ples, done to claim his mandate, made an impact on contemporary material culture. As
we have seen, the design of the TLV mirror took a new turn after the construction of the
B right H all, another ritual building th at W ang M ang erected to prepare for his usur­
pation. The TLV m irror was first distinguished by its pattern, w hich was derived from
a game board (see Figures 1.24,1.25). The design— a square at the center of the circular
mirror~happened to resemble the layout of the Bright Hall, which interlocks squares
and circles to elaborate the cosmology of round Heaven and square Earth. The TLV
mirror came to represent the new ritual and political structure created during the reign
ofW ang Mang, as some inscriptions explain (see Figure 1.29). Artisans added the cardi­
nal emblems to the TLV mirror as if to make the cosmic embodiment more complete,
 2
4 .22 . Cardinal emblems on a T L V mirror. First century c e . Bronze. Diameter
16.7 cm. Unearthed in 1957-58 from Tomb 7052 in Luoyang, Henan.

as the example unearthed in Luoyang shows (Figure 4.22).39 As in the case of the Nine
Temples, the symbolic design on the TLV mirror linked the Bright Hall to the Central
Palace; the Son of Heaven received Heavens mandate and proclaimed it to his subjects
in the central building of the Bright Hall complex.
The cardinal emblems, before their standardization, had already appeared in funerary
contexts. In Lady Dais tomb, the four creatures— dragon, tiger, phoenix, and deer~and
an immortal are painted on the east side of the second coffin (see Figure 3.38). They are
situated between the panel depicting two deer climbing up a peak and the panel with
two dragons coming through a bi disc (see Figures 3.36,3.37). As we have discussed, the
two panels suggest a journey from the Kunlun Mountains, the highest point on Earth,
to the realm of Heaven. The four creatures that represented the celestial quarters had the
power to lead the deceased to Heaven. Belief in the power of the cardinal emblems is
even more evident in the tomb decorations of the King of Laing. The four creatures—
dragon, tiger, phoenix, and fish— are the only focus of the huge mural on the ceiling
of the main chamber, which is 5.14 meters long and 3.27 meters wide (see Figure 4.19).
Below the sinuous dragon, the tiger is climbing up a mountain whose peak holds the
 8
2
5

a b
4 .23. Cardinal emblems. First half o f the first century c e . Mural. Unearthed in 1972 from the tomb o f
Shiqi Yao in Qianyang, Shaanxi. Drawings, (a) Blue Dragon, (b) White Tiger.

mushroom o f im m ortality. The m ountain could represent the Kunlun M ountains in the
west because the tiger is the emblem o f th at direction. It could also represent M ount Tai
in the east because many H an m irror inscriptions describe how the W hite Tiger guided
the immortals on M ount Tai up to Heaven (see Figures 3.2.3.3). In either case, the mural
indicates the possibility o f ascending from E arth to H eaven at the peak o f a m ountain
as long as the deceased secured the guidance of the cardinal emblems that belong to the
celestial field. The exaggerated size o f the dragon on both Lady D ais coffin and King
o f Liangs tom b ceiling suggests that people in the early H an were more in awe o f the
dragon than o f the other cardinal creatures. The legend o f the Yellow Thearch, who was
said to have ridden a dragon heavenward, and other similar stories also speak to the supe­
riority o f having a dragon help on the journey to Heaven.40
The cardinal emblems in the process o f standardization became more equally repre­
sented in funerary contexts. W hen W ang M ang ordered the coffin decoration for his
political rival, D ong Xian 董 賢 ，th e artisans in charge had to paint the coffin w ith the
colors of the four seasons— blue for spring, red for summer, white for autumn, and black
for winter. Then they had to delineate the Blue D ragon on the left side o f the coffin and
the W hite Tiger on the right.41 Beginning in the late first century b c e and the early first
c e n t u r y c e , a r t is a n s s t a r t e d t o d e p ic t t h e c a r d in a l e m b le m s o n t o m b s a c c o r d in g t o e it h e r
absolute directions or relative positions. The badly damaged murals in Shiqi Yaos 侍其
M tom b in Q ianyang 千 陽 ，Shaanxi，probably have the dragon on the east wall and the
tiger on the west (Figure 4.23).42 More images of the cardinal emblems are preserved in
a painted tomb in Pinglu 平 陸 ，Shanxi, although it is also damaged. Hie tomb is a rect­
angular room with a side chamber (Figure 4.24).43 That the cardinal emblems are high
on the ceiling and accompanied by the sun, the moon, and clouds also makes their celes­
tial attribution evident (Figure 4.25). Since the murals on the walls were not preserved, it
 2
5
9
I1
議1 1

4 .24. Cardinal emblems. First half o f

the first century c e . Mural. Unearthed in
1959 in Pinglu, Shanxi, (a) Floor plan and
cross-section o f the tomb, (b) Blue Dragon,
(c) White Tiger, (d) Dark Warrior.

is unclear w hether the cardinal emblems there were an index o f Heaven alone or o f the
helpers who, it was hoped, assisted the deceased to reach Heaven.
A ccording to the archaeological report o f the Pinglu tomb, the dragon is on the north
slope o f the ceiling, the tiger is on the south slope, and the D ark W arrior is on the west
slope (Figure 4.24). Interestingly, artisans did not place the cardinal emblems in the
tom b as we would see them in the sky or on a m odern map. Instead, they decorated
the tom b in a way that matches W ang M angs description o f the cardinal ornam ent
on carriages: the Blue D ragon on the left, the W hite T iger on the right, and the D ark
W arrior at the back. The orientation makes sense only when we place ourselves at the
center and face south; we then have the eastern dragon on our left, the western tiger
 4 .25. Celestial images. First half o f the first century c e . Mural. Unearthed in 1959 in Pinglu, Shanxi. Copy.

on our right, and the Dark Warrior at our back. W hen the Son of Heaven received his
subjects, he was always seated in the north like the North Star, while his subjects were
always standing to his south. The specific orientation of the cardinal emblems on car­
riages or in tombs thus reflects the viewpoint reserved for the emperor.44 Not only did
the appearance of the cardinal emblems define the centrality of the Son of Heaven, but
their spatial arrangement also conveyed his superiority. Eventually, the spatial arrange­
ment that turned absolute directions into the relative positions became formulaic, and
the formula, later adopted in contexts that had nothing to do with politics, may have
contributed to the standardization of the cardinal emblems in the X in and the Eastern
Han dynasties.
 The role o f the cardinal emblems in the funerary context on the W ushan bronze
plaque, likely made in the late second century c e , is straightforward (see Figure 3.56).
The plaque is shaped like a floral canopy and has a bi disc at its center. The com bination
of two signs of Heaven is similar to the representation on the Jiayuguan brick mentioned
above. The cardinal emblems are rendered on the four petals o f the floral shape based on
their relative positions. The Mother Queen of the West is seated above the Red Bird and
her consort is located beneath the Dark Warrior. Since the Han people believed that the
M other Q ueen o f the W est was in charge o f the land o f the im m ortals near, on, or above
the Kunlun M ountains, they favored her guidance to Heaven after death.45 A lthough
the cardinal emblems were derived from astronomical observations of the sky, people
in the Eastern Han believed that the creatures symbolized by the emblems could come
down to Earth. Wang Chong, a scholar active in the first century c e , understood the car­
dinal emblems as “the essence of four stars descending to the bodies of four animals.”46
In the H an m ind, then, the cardinal creatures and the M other Q ueen o f the W est not
only possessed supernatural powers but also were willing to stay in the world and make
themselves available to humans in need. The conflation o f the M other Q ueen o f the
W est and the cardinal emblems on the plaque ensured “double indem nity ”：the M other
Queen of the West resides in the land of the immortals between the Kunlun M oun­
tains and Heaven, whereas the four cardinal creatures can descend from and ascend to
Heaven. Given a design alluding both to Heaven and to those beings who could assist
w ith ascension, the bronze plaque fixed on a wooden coffin reflected the H an peoples
wish to travel heavenward after death.
The Han artisans also incorporated the cardinal emblems into the m otif of Heaven’s
gate, the presum ed destination on the im agined journey to Heaven. N ot far from the
M ao M ausoleum , archaeologists discovered a jade object in the shape o f a zoom orphic
mask that is evocative of contemporary zoomorphic doorknockers (Figures 4.26,3.80).47
A rtisans added the cardinal emblems to the mask but did not arrange them according to
either absolute directions or relative positions. W ithout any context, it is difficult for us
to speculate about the intention behind the design. The standardized cardinal emblems,
however, became a popular decoration on tomb facades. In a second-century example
from Suide, Shaanxi, a dragon, a tiger, and two phoenixes are carved on the tomb gate,
and two Dark Warriors are on the posts next to the gate (Figure 4.27). Still, the implica­
tion of the cardinal emblems here is uncertain. Do the creatures function as tomb guard­
ians like the fierce zoomorphic masks on the doorknockers? O r do they indicate that
the gate is in the celestial field and hence the tom b is in the realm o f Heaven? We may
grasp their implication better on another fagade， which is also decorated with the m otif
 a b
4.26 . Cardinal emblems on a jade object. First century b c e . 35.6 x 34.2 x 14.7 cm.
Unearthed in 1975 in Xingping, Shaanxi, (a) Photograph, (b) Ink rubbing.

4 .27. Cardinal emblems on the fagade o f a tomb. Second century c e .

Stone carving. 180 x 163 cm. Unearthed in 1951 at Housijiagou in Suide, Shaanxi.
of Heavens gate. As we saw earlier, the tomb fagade discovered at Dangjiagou, in M izhi,
Shaanxi, shows two winged figures— the Mother Queen of the West and her consort一
seated in a two-story building at the center of the lintel (see Figure 3.83). Their appear­
ance makes the pair of gate-pillars and gatekeepers on the two posts the representation
of Heaven’s gate.48 Only three of the cardinal emblems are engraved on the gate of the
tomb: a dragon, a tiger, and two birds. Artisans added wings and auspicious plants to the
dragon and the tiger to accentuate their celestial and immortal attributes. Yet the car­
dinal creatures are the only immortal and celestial beings on the functional gate of the
tomb. They appear to bridge the two worlds: the tomb interior, for one, and the land of
the immortals and Heaven, for the other, all depicted on the space surrounding the gate
of the tomb. The cardinal creatures were supposed to convey the deceased to the land
of the immortals, governed by the Mother Queen of the West, and eventually on to
Heaven.
If the fagade of the Suide tomb is ambiguous, we find a more plausible solution to the
use of the cardinal emblems on the stone coffin unearthed in Lushan 蘆 山 ，Sichuan.49
The m otif on the front of the coffin is a gate half opened by a maid, which, in Sichuan,
often indicates entry to the Mother Queen of the Wests land of the immortals (Figures
4.28b, 3.76a, 3.77a). The isolated gate alluding to the entrance to the coffin may or may
not have anything to do with the Mother Queen of the West, but the wing at the maids
shoulder suggests that she is either an immortal or in the celestial field. The inscrip­
tion on the unopened slab of the gate informs us that Wang H ui 王 暉 ，an accounts
clerk in the local government, was buried in the sixth month of 212 c e . The reliefs of
three cardinal emblems are on the box of the coffin— the dragon on the left, the tiger
on the right, and the Dark Warrior at the back~in the formulaic arrangement already
described by Wang Mang (Figures 4.28c-e). The lid of the coffin is plain except for the
relief of a gigantic zoomorphic doorknocker on the front (see Figure 4.28b). The juxta­
position of the ferocious zoomorphic mask and the welcoming maid also points to the
double nature of the cardinal emblems: on the one hand, they and the zoomorphic mask
work together to protect the deceased from evil; on the other, they invite assistance for
the deceased’s journey to the land of the immortals or Heaven, the destination indi­
cated by the half-open gate and the maid. Here, the cardinal emblems are at once the
index of Heaven and the signs of those who help with ascension precisely because the
illusory entrance to the coffin and the allusive entrance to the land of the immortals or
Heaven are one and the same. The cardinal creatures thus protect the deceased, guide
him on his way heavenward, and ensure him a residence in Heaven— be it within or
outside the tomb.
4 .28. Carvings on a sarcophagus. 212 c e . 250 x 101 x 83 cm. Unearthed in 1942 from the tomb o f
Wang Hui in Lushan, Sichuan. Photographs and ink rubbings, (a) Overview, (b) Frontal view,
(c) Blue Dragon, (d) White Tiger, (e) Dark Warrior.
 6
2

5
Emperor W u was interested in developing diplomatic relations with the Juandu 身毒
Kingdom (present-day India) once he heard that people in Bactria had purchased fab­
rics made in Sichuan from the Juandu m erchants. H is plan was ham pered by the king o f
Dian 滇 (present-day Yunnan province), who refused to let the Han envoys pass through
his land. In 120 b c e , in preparation for a potential war against this irritating neighbor,
who held Lake D ian as a protective barrier against conquest, Em peror W u sent dem oted
officials and functionaries to dig a huge lake in the Shanglin 上林 imperial park so his
army could learn how to conduct battles on water. H e named the artificial lake after one
of the major regions in Dian: Kunming 昆明 .50 According to later texts, the perimeter of
Kunming Lake reached forty li (16.58 kilometers; see Figure 1.7).51 In the end, Emperor
W u did not wage war on D ian, but his “navy” was put to use in the suppression o f a
revolt from Nanyue 南 越 (present-day Guangdong province) almost a decade after the
m aking o f Kunm ing Lake. To house his navy, Em peror W u had buildings erected along
the lake. H e also ordered the construction o f m ulti-story ships whose height was said to
exceed ten zhang (twenty-three meters).52
Em peror W us prim ary m otivation for creating Kunming Lake was military, but his
interest soon shifted to immortality. In 115 b c e , while he watched the spectacular multi­
story ships in Kunming Lake, Emperor W u was struck by the notion of building an even
higher structure on land一 the Terrace of Cypress Beams [boliang ta i 柏 梁 臺 ).53The ter­
race must have been the first of many high-rise structures that Emperor W u commis­
sioned to entice the immortals to visit, even though the function of the terrace is not
specified in known records. It was the destruction o f the Terrace o f Cypress Beams by
fire in the winter of 105 b c e that gave the emperor the incentive to build the Jianzhang
Palace, a more comprehensive earthly paradise, in the following spring in the hope that
the im m ortals would appear.54
The extant H an records tell us little o f the transform ation o f K unm ing Lake from a
naval base into an earthly paradise. Archaeologists unearthed a stone whale on the west
bank o f the lake, which still covers ten square kilom eters.55 The installation o f the stone
whale would have made Kunming Lake an ocean comparable to the E astern Sea, where
the legendary islands o f im m ortality were located. Indeed, archaeologists discovered the
remains o f an island in the eastern part o f the lake.56 The re-creation o f the lands o f
im m ortals in the sea was later repeated in the Jianzhang Palace.
Two stone figures are preserved to the north of Kunming Lake. The male figure, 1.92
meters high, is to the west, and the female figure, 2.3 meters high, is to the east; they
are about three kilometers apart (see Figure 1.7).57 Ban G u，in Rhapsody on the Western
Capital, said a visitor arriving at Kunming Lake would see the Oxherd on the left and
the Weaving M aid on the right, representing the breadth of the M ilky Way.58 Scholars
believe that the two stone figures are indeed the Oxherd and the Weaving M aid men­
tioned by Ban Gu.They also suggest that during the Han period, a river linked Kunming
Lake in the south and Hao 鎬 Pond, said to have been made in the Western Zhou, in the
north.59 The Oxherd and the Weaving M aid were installed to make the river embody
the M ilky Way, whose presence lent the immortal paradise in Kunming Lake a heavenly
touch. But why would the sculptures of an oxherd and a weaving maid suffice to symbol­
ize the M ilky Way in Emperor W us imperial park?
The ancient Chinese had noticed the M ilky Way long before the Han dynasty. It had
already served as a metaphor in the Book o f Odes:
Bright was that Cloudy River,
Shining and revolving in the sky.
The king said, Oh!
W hat crime is chargeable to us now
That Heaven sends down death and disorder?
Famine comes again and again .60

Scholars believe that the king in the song was most likely King Xuan (r. 827-782 bce),
who prayed for rain to overcome years of drought.61 Emperor W u replicated King Xuan s
compassionate conduct in 100 bce when his people suffered from a long drought. He
also changed the title of his reign to “Heavenly River” [tianhan 天 漢 ) .62 “Cloudy river”
{yunhan 雲漢）or “Heavenly River” {tianhan, tianhe 天 河 ）became the terms that the
Han people used to refer to the Milky Way.63
The earliest known pictorial representation of the Milky Way comes from the tomb
of Yuan Y i 元 乂 （ d. 526 ce) in Luoyang: the Milky Way, painted with the blue whirlpool
pattern, stretches across the ceiling (Figure 4.29).64 In contrast, the Han artisans did not
depict the M ilky Way as a river. But they did employ the image of the River Lord to allude
to the existence of the M ilky Way. A self-explanatory example appears on a bronze mirror
unearthed in Xinye 新 I f ，Henan (Figures 4.30, 0.4).65 A short inscription identifies the
winged figure seated on a cloud carriage pulled by fish as the “River Lord” [hebo 河 伯 )•As
a longer inscription explains, the images decorating the outer rim depict the royal progress
of the Heavenly Lord. The River Lord, presumably in charge of the M ilky Way, is part of
the progress. As some of the apocrypha popular in the Eastern Han confirm, the Han peo­
ple believed that the spirit or lord of a river would ascend to the M ilky Way.66 On a carved
 4 .29. M ilky Way. 526 ce.

Mural. Unearthed in 1974

from the tomb o f Yuan Y i
in Luoyang, Henan.

4.30 . River Lord on a bronze mirror. First

to second century c e . Unearthed in Xinye,
Henan. Ink rubbing. Detail o f Figure 0.4.
 4 .31. River Lord. 25-220
c e . Stone carving. 105 x 65 cm.

Unearthed in Xuzhou, Jiangsu. Ink rubbing.

stone discovered in Xuzhou 徐州 Jiangsu, a scene with fish-drawn carriages surrounded

by clouds and approaching the sun is also an allusion to the M ilky Way (Figure 4.31).67
Another song in the Book o f Odes describes the M ilky Way as a river but also associ­
ates it with two constellations, the Weaving M aid and the Oxherd:

There is a river in Heaven,

W hich looks down on us in light.
And the three stars together are the Weaving M aid,
Passing in a day through seven stages [of the sky].
Although [she] goes through her seven stages,
She completes no bright work for us.
Brilliant shines the Oxherd,
But he does not serve to draw our carts.68

The Weaving M aid constellation is composed of three stars in a triangle; it has one of
the brightest stars in the Northern Hemisphere— a Lyrae— at its center. The Oxherd
contains three stars in an almost straight line, with another bright star (a Aquilae) at its
center (Figure 4.32).
We have no idea why two bright constellations along the Milky Way were personified
as a weaving maid and an oxherd, but a Han poem offers us a contemporary view:
 4.32. Stars along the M ilky Way.

Far far away, the Oxherd star;

Bright bright, the M aid of the River of Heaven.
Slim slim, she lifts a pale hand,
Clack clack, plying the shuttle of her loom.
All day l o n g b u t the pattern’s never finished;
Welling tears fall like rain.
The River of Heaven is clear and shallow;
W hat a little way lies between them!
Only the span of a single brimming stream—
They gaze and gaze and cannot speak.69
The poem portrays the O xherd and the W eaving M aid as two sad lovers separated by the
M ilky Way. O ther H an texts tell us that the Oxherd and the W eaving M aid are allowed
to meet once a year on the seventh night of the seventh month, by way of a bridge
formed by sym pathetic m agpies.70 Some post-H an texts add that the separation was a
punishm ent m eted out by the Heavenly Thearch because they were so caught up in their
mutual passion that they ignored their duties.71
The two stone figures along a river in Em peror W us im perial park are probably the
only H an visual examples that capture all the fictional elem ents related to the M ilky
Way. The next example is the mural in a tomb dated to 409 c e in Taesongri 德興里， in
present-day North Korea (Figure 4.33). A winding river divides a man holding an ox
from a woman standing and facing him; clouds and stars accompany both figures. The
inscription to the left of the man identifies him as the “image of the Oxherd” {qianniu
zh i xiang 牽 牛 之 象 ).72 Archaeological finds so far have not yet provided us with any
H an pictorial representations o f the love story, although the H an artisans did draw the
O xherd and the W eaving M aid as constellations. O n the ceiling o f a H an shrine still
preserved in Changqing 長清， Shandong, a woman is seated in front of a loom and next
to the sun; atop her head are three stars forming a triangle (Figure 4.34). The carving
clearly conveys both the constellation and its associated imagery.
The two bright constellations close to the M ilky W ay were sometimes mixed up w ith
the two lunar lodges bearing similar names— Ox (niu 牛) and M aid (nil 女).The lunar
lodge Ox, whose position in the northern sky is equivalent to that of Capricorn, is com­
posed of six stars in a radiant shape (see Figure 4.32). The lunar lodge Maid, which occu­
pies approximately the place of Aquarius, includes four stars. For some reason, Sima
Qian called the two constellations along the M ilky Way River Drum [hegu 河 鼓 ）and
Weaving M aid {zhinu 織 女 )，but named the northern lodges Oxherd {qianniu 牽牛）
and Serving M aid (wunii 婺 女 ).73 A carved stone discovered in Nanyang shows the
confusion (Figure 4.35). Since the seated woman framed by four stars at the lower left
corner is m ost likely the lodge M aid, the ox-herding scene at the upper right m ust have
been a depiction o f the six-star lodge Ox, m isrepresented as the three-star Oxherd con­
stellation, if the artisan intended the woman and the oxherd to be a couple. If, on the
other hand, the three stars in the ox-herding scene were m eant to represent the Oxherd
constellation, then the stars w ith the seated woman should have represented the W eav­
ing M aid constellation, but there are four stars, not three stars in a triangle. A nother
possibility is that the carving shows the O xherd constellation and the lunar lodge M aid,
but not as a pair.74
4.33. Oxherd and Weaving Maid. 409 c e . Mural. Unearthed in Taesongri, North Korea,

(a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

 4 .34. Celestial images. First century c e . Stone carving. 218 x 30 cm.
On the ceiling o f a shrine at Xiaotangshan in Changqing, Shandong, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.

4 .35. Celestial images. 25-220 ce. Stone carving. 187 x 52 cm. Unearthed in Nanyang, Henan. Ink rubbing.
 The few H an pictorial examples th at we have for the M ilky
W ay are all from funerary contexts. No inform ation about the
tom b in w hich the Nanyang stone was discovered has been pub­
lished, so it is not easy for us to conjecture how the constellations,
if they were m eant to be the O xherd and the W eaving M aid,
were expected to function for the deceased. W e do have, however,
clues about the image o f the W eaving M aid in the Changqing
shrine (Figure 4.34). Scholars in the past paid attention to the
scenes o f hum an affairs on the walls and the depiction o f deities
on the gables o f the shrine.75 Few studied the celestial images on
the ceiling. Even fewer noticed the engraving on a post. The ceil­
ing is long and narrow. The sun and the moon engraved on two
sides define the space as celestial. H ie W eaving M aid is closer
to the sun. The three stars in a straight line next to her could
be the O xherd if the artisans intended to indicate the entire
sl^-. A nother three stars in a straight line far from the W eaving
M aid and closer to the moon could be the O xherd if the artisans
intended to emphasize the lovers，separation by the M ilky Way.76
The sun and the moon are each accompanied by a constellation
o f seven stars. The one next to the moon could be the N orthern
Dipper, but its shape is not precisely correct. The one next to the
sun is floating above clouds below which a flying bird is chasing
another mass o f clouds; this group o f stars is unidentifiable. Even
w ith this much uncertainty, we can safely conclude that the ceil­
ing represents the sky because its m ost distinguishable markers
are assembled there, including the sun, the moon, and one o f the
brightest constellations, the W eaving M aid. The engraving on a
post supporting the front eaves, however, turns the represented
sky into Heaven, the intended destination for the deceased. The
images on the post from bottom to top are a gatekeeper, a fig­ 4 .36. Dragon, an immor­
ure holding som ething that eventually blends w ith the curling tal, and a gatekeeper. First
clouds, and a dragon climbing upward (Figure 4.36). The evident century c e . Stone carving.
138 x 32 cm. On a pillar o f
intention is for the deceased to move from E arth to Heaven w ith
a shrine at Xiaotangshan
the aid o f the dragon and the figure (likely an im m ortal) who is in Changqing, Shandong.
holding som ething. The W eaving M aid and the O xherd, because Ink rubbing.
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4 .37. Carvings on a sarcophagus. Late second to third century c e . 217 x 78 x 90 cm. Unearthed in 1973 fron
Tomb 2 at Xinsheng in Pixian, Sichuan. Ink rubbings, (a) Lid, (b) Front panel, (c) Rear panel.

of their brightness in the sky and their popularity in folklore, came to stand for Heaven,
the desired destination of the Han people when they died.
A final pictorial example related to the M illy Way is on the stone coffin unearthed
from Pixian 郫 縣 ，Sichuan.77 The Oxherd with an ox and the Weaving M aid with a
spindle are carved on the lid of the co伍n (Figure 4.37a). They are dwarfed by the huge
dragon and tiger on the opposite side of the lid. It is from the bi disc held by the dragon
 b
4 .38. Celestial palace on a sarcophagus. Second half o f the second century c e . W. 217 cm.
Unearthed in 1973 in Pixian, Sichuan, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.

and the tiger and from their wings that we learn that the images on the lid signify the
celestial field. The Mother Queen of the West is carved on the front of the coffin box
(Figure 4.37b). As usual, she is seated on a throne guarded by a dragon and a tiger, but
oversized mushrooms replace her canopy, as if to point out the elixir of immortality in
her care. The sun and the moon, accompanied by a pair of hybrids, are carved on the back
of the coffin (Figure 4.37c). One side of the coffin box, at its left, depicts gate-pillars with
a phoenix, likely the gate of Heaven, and at its right, we see that a carriage has pulled
up (Figure 4.38). The scene in between could be a reception, which is presumably taking
 4 .39. World o f the immortals on a sarcophagus. Second half o f the second century c e .
W. 217 cm. Unearthed in 1973 in Pixian, Sichuan, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.

place in the heavenly palace. The other side of coffin box, at the lower-right corner, por­
trays the carriage approaching the world of the immortals, where two o f the inhabit­
ants are playing a chess game— they are at the upper-right corner— while a gigantic fish
at the left carries the immortal mountains (Figure 4.39). According to M aster Lie {Lie
z i 列子)，a book probably compiled from early sources in the fourth century c e , the five
immortal mountains in the Eastern Sea— including the legendary Penglai, Yingzhou,
and Fanghu, which Emperor W u reproduced in the Jianzhang Palace— floated freely in
the ocean because they were not connected to the ocean floor. To grant the immortals
more secure places to live, the Heavenly Thearch ordered fifteen gigantic turtles [ao 鼇)
to take turns carrying the mountains and thus stabilize them.78 The scene on the cof-
fin must have been inspired by a story like this. The carvings on the coffin remind us
of the visual program for Lady Dais decorated coffins, in which sequentiality is key. In
the Pixian case, two sets of images imply two sequential moves, from the land of the
immortals to Heaven: the first set includes the images from the front icon of the Mother
Qyeen of the West to the rear icon of the sun and the moon; the second set includes the
images from the side of the mountains of immortality to the side of Heavens gate and
palace. The repetition of the carriage in which the deceased is supposed to ride empha­
sizes the notion of a journey. The Oxherd and the Weaving M aid on the lid, as tacit signs
of Heaven, were thus appropriated to help represent the belief in ascending to Heaven.

The Sun and the Moon

So far, we have encountered several images that include representations of the sun and
the moon. O n the Mawangdui banners, the sun is a vermilion disc containing a black
crow, and the moon is an ivory crescent with a hare and a toad above it (Figure 4.40).
Later examples preserve the animals but present both the sun and the moon as full cir­
cles (Figure 4.41).
The sun had long been associated with a crow and the moon with a hare and a toad
when Q u Yuan composed his H eavenly Questions in the third century b c e . Unable to
fathom the reasons for the association, he wondered why the moon kept a hare in its
belly and why the crows shed their feathers when the legendary archer Y i shot down the
nine additional suns.79 The Han people were also mystified by these received associa­
tions. Zhang Heng, a leading astronomer and gifted writer in the early second century
ce， could c o m e u p w i t h n o better a n explanation t h a n t h is : t h e a c c u m u l a t i o n o f yang
formed a bird like a crow in the sun, and the accumulation of yin formed an animal like
a hare in the moon; Heng E was transformed into a toad after she stole the elixir of im ­
m ortality and ascended to the m oon .80 M odern scholars speculate th at early observation
of sunspots inspired the fabrication of a solar crow, and that observations of the moons
dark maria inspired the invention of a lunar hare and toad.81
Probably because the elixir that Heng E stole from her husband originally came from
the Mother Queen of the West, we see the fusion or confusion of certain animal indexes
in Han art. The carved stones unearthed in Anqiu 安 丘 ， Shandong, show the sun with a
three-legged crow and a fox, and the moon with a hare and a toad together pounding a
 a b
4 .40 . Sun and moon on the painted banner from Tomb 1 at Mawangdui.
Detail o f Figure 3.18. (a) Sun, (b) Moon.

b
4 .41. Sun and moon on a stone carving unearthed from Suide, Shaanxi.
Detail o f Figure 3.81. (a) Sun, (b) Moon.
 I
I

a b
4.42. Stone carvings. Late second century to early third century ce. Unearthed in 1959 at
Dongjiazhuang in Anqiu, Shandong. Ink rubbings, (a) Sun, (b) Moon.

mortar with a pestle (Figure 4 .42 ).82These animals resemble the entourage of the Mother
Q ueen o f the W est portrayed in many paintings and carvings (see Figures 3 .72 , 3 .74, 3 .81,
3 .83). In the early H an, the received texts m entioned the sun w ith a three-legged crow,
but they did not touch upon the nine-tailed fox and the pestle-wielding hare.83 A llu­
sions to the worship of the Mother Queen of the West in the representation of the sun
and the moon are more pronounced in archaeological finds than in texts.
Myths of the personified sun and moon also circulated in ancient China. The story of
Heng E is one of them, recorded by the authors of the Book o f the K ing o f H uainan' she
stole the elixir of immortality that her husband had begged from the Mother Queen of
the West.84The female figure on Lady D ai’s banner riding toward the moon could depict
this story (see Figure 3.30). In the solar myth preserved in the Classics o f M ountains and
Seas {Shan hai jin g 山海經 )，abookcompiledfromearlysources around the third cen­
tury b c e , ten suns bathed in a valley and perched in a mulberry tree.85The huge tree with
red discs that we see on the upper section of Lady D ai’s banner likely represents this
scene (see Figure 3.30). The ten suns were supposed to perform their duties in rotation.
W hen they all appeared in the sky at the same time and brought drought to the Earth,
Yi, Heng Es husband, was the hero who shot down nine of the suns and prevented
calamity. The earliest visual representation of the myth is on the lid of another lacquer
chest in the tomb of Marquis Y i of Zeng.86 A huge bird, with an arrow trailing a string,
 b
4 .43. Solar myth painted on a chest. Second half o f the fifth century b c e . Lacquer. 69 x 49 x 37 cm. Unearthed in
1978 from the tomb o f Marquis Y i o f Zeng at Leigudun in Suixian, Hubei, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

is f a l l i n g d o w n f r o m a t r e e f u l l o f r a d ia n t s u n s ; i t is e v id e n t t h a t th e t i n y a r c h e r n e a r b y
just loosed the arrow from his bow (Figure 4.43). The action is repeated on the opposite
side of the lid. Although the number of suns in the trees is excessive, the suns that have
been shot take the form of birds, which echoes what Q u Yuan described in H eavenly
Questions as “shedding feathers.” Archaeologists have discovered a H an representation o f
 4 .44. Solar myth on a sarcophagus. Second half o f the second century c e . 220 x 70 cm.
Discovered at Baozishan in Xinjin, Sichuan. Ink rubbing.

the same myth on a stone coffin in Xinjin 新津， Sichuan.87There, the archer is about to
shoot one of the suns on a widely branched tree; the suns in this case are all in the form
of birds (Figure 4.44).
The interchangeability of the sun and a bird in pre-Han and Han pictorial art reveals
a deeply rooted historical memory. The first group of astonishing examples comes from
the Hemudu 河姆渡 culture (ca. 5000-3300 b c e ) in Zhejiang.88 In one carving on an
ivory plaque, the sun is composed of concentric flaming circles from which two birds
w ith sharp hooked beaks em erge facing each oth er (Figure 4.45). The second group o f
remarkable examples is dated to the Liangzhu culture in Zhejiang and Jiangsu. A jade
plaque discovered there displays two birds, each containing concentric circles on its
body (Figure 4.46).89 W hen Sima Qian traced the remote history of the Xia dynasty, he
reported that the basin of the Huai River and the lands to its south were where the “sun-
奶 陽 鳥 ）resided.90 His account was not completely u n g r o u n d e d . The merg­
ing of the sun and a bird as seen on Hemudu and Liangzhu objects was very likely the
visual translation of the sunbird.91 We have no idea how the visual memory was passed
down over such a very long period of time, but we have examples from Han tombs that
refashion the imagery of the sunbird. For instance, the carved stone excavated at Ying-
zhuang 英 庄 ，in Nanyang, presents a bird containing a disc and flying among stars and
clouds (Figure 4.47).92
The Han artisans developed the imagery of the sunbird by personifying it. An inscrip­
tion on a coffin unearthed in Jianyang, Sichuan, identifies two birds with human heads
as the sun and the moon (riyue 日月；Figure 4.48).93 By convention, the sun, containing
the disc with a crow, is on the right, and the moon, containing the disc with a toad, is
on the left. The artisans, no longer restricted by the literal meaning of “sunbird， ，
，merged
the sun and the moon with the anthropomorphic birds. In some cases, as on the bricks
 8
2

b
4 .45. Sunbirds on an ivory plaque, ca. 4000 b c e . 16.6 x 5.9 x 1.2 cm.
Unearthed in 1973-78 at Hemudu in Yuyao, Zhejiang, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

discovered at Xinfan 新 繁 ，in Chengdu, artisans even added upward-curling wings

to the anthropomorphic birds (Figure 4.49). The Han artisans first drew the upward-
curling wings to distinguish the immortals from humans by enabling them to float in
the air or to fly up to Heaven (see Figures 1.26,1.27,3.39,3.51，
3.52). No doubt the upward-
curling wings are a redundancy for the anthropomorphic birds because they already have
a set of feathered wings. The upward-curling wings, however, add a touch of immortal­
ity to the anthropomorphic birds. W ith the Sichuan examples in mind, we can read the
controversial stone carving from Nanyang (Figure 4.50). Scholars in the past considered
the bird containing the disc with a toad to be a rare example of the sun and the moon in
3
8
2
 4 .47. Sunbird on a stone carving. First century c e . 167 x 82 cm.
Unearthed in 1983 at Yingzhuang in Nanyang, Henan. Ink rubbing.

4 .48. Sun and moon on a sarcophagus. Second century c e . Sandstone.

Unearthed in 1986 at Guitoushan in Jianyang, Sichuan. Ink rubbing o f a detail.
 8
2

5
a b
4 .49. Decorated bricks. 25-220 ce. 37 x 25 cm. Unearthed in 1955 at
Xinfan in Chengdu, Sichuan. Ink rubbings, (a) Sun, (b) Moon.

combination. They did not understand that the Han artisans did not mind associating
birds with both the sun and the moon.94
The Xinfan example has a further indication of sex: the sun hybrid with a three-forked
hat is male, whereas the moon hybrid with a coiffure is female. Zhang Hengs comments
on the nature of the sun and th t yin nature of the moon find support here. The Han
artisans brought in the representation of Fu X i 伏羲 and Nii W a 女媧 to further the y in -
yang dualism, as shown on the stones discovered at Qilingang 麒 麟 崗 ，in Nanyang.95
The sun and the moon are now held, not contained, by another pair of hybrids, who have
human heads and bodies but animal legs and snakelike tails (Figure 4.51). Even though
there are no animal indexes on the discs, we can still tell the sun from the moon based on
th t yin-yang principle: the hybrid with the three-forked hat is holding a sun, and the hy­
brid with a coiffure is holding the moon. Inscriptions on the Jianyang coffin identify two
 266 cm. Unearthed in Nanyang, Henan. Ink rubbing.

similar hybrids of humans and serpents as

“Fn X i” and “Nii W a” (Figure 4.5a).96
Fu X i and N ii Wa both played multi­
ple roles in ancient Chinese history and
mythology. N ii W a was probably a legacy
from China’s purported matriarchal past.
She was also a crucial figure in the myth
of creation: she mended the sky by melt­
ing stones of five colors after the pillars
supporting Heaven collapsed;97 she also
fashioned yellow earth into human beings
after Heaven and Earth separated.98 Fu Xi,
in comparison, was a bearer of human cul­
ture: he invented nets for fishing and hunt­
ing, and he designed the hexagrams, later
used in the Book o f Changes, after observing
the phenomena of Heaven, the patterns of
Earth, and human affairs." Since Nii Wa
and Fu X i stood for genesis and civilization
respectively, it is unclear how they came to
be a divine pair. In the texts available in the
Han，they were mostly presented as two
of the Three Sovereigns {sanhuang 三皇)；
occasionally they were described as brother
a b
and sister.100 Not until the ninth century
4 .51. Stone carvings. First to second centuryc e . Un­

earthed in 1988 at Qilingang in Nanyang, Henan. Ink c e was their “incestuous marriage” re­

rubbings, (a) Sun. 122 x 30 cm. (b) Moon. 145 x 28 cm. corded.101 In Han art, however, Fu X i and
Nii W a as a pair were a popular motif.102
 4 .52. Fu X i and Nii Wa on a sarcophagus. Second century c e . Sandstone.
Unearthed in 1986 at Guitoushan in Jianyang, Sichuan. Ink rubbing o f a detail.

According to Wang Chong, his contemporaries portrayed N ii W a as a female in paint­

ings and regarded her as the representation o f y in .103 The Han people probably paired Fu
X i and N ii W a to embody the yin-yang harmony, a combination that emphasized their
roles more as deities of creation than as driving forces of civilization.
I f the representation of Fu X i and N ii W a supplies a visual embodiment of yin-yang
dualism, then depicting the divine pair holding the celestial pair (sun and moon) on the
Qilingang stones reiterated the same dualism:

Yin = Female = Moon = Nii Wa

Yang = Male = Sun = Fu Xi
 a d
4 .53. Sun and moon on stone carvings. 25-220 c e . Unearthedin 1966 in Bixian, Shandong.
Ink rubbings, (a) Sun and Fu X i. 66.5 x 41.5 cm. (b) M oon and Nii Wa. 66 x 35 cm.

The Han artisans never tired of the analogy; in fact, they strove to extend it. O n the
carved stones unearthed in Bixian 費 縣 ，Shandong, Fu X i is holding compasses, and Nii
Wa, a try square (Figure 4.53).104 Both are portrayed as hybrids, and we might not have
been able to tell their sex if not for other carvings in the tomb. One of them shows a
group of musicians entertaining their host and hostess (Figure 4.54). The male musicians
on the left wear simple, square hats like Fu Xis. The headgear of the female musicians on
the opposite side is more ornate; the two in the front, like their hostess on the far right
and like N ii W a, have coiffures with three topknots. Since the ancient Chinese relied on
compasses to make perfect circles and try squares to produce exact squares, they often
 h j 辦

4.54. Entertainm ent on a stone carving. 25-220 ce. 257 x 48.5 cm.
Unearthed in 1966 in Bixian, Shandong. Ink rubbing.

compared compasses to round Heaven and the try square to square Earth.105 We can
therefore translate Bixian carvings as follows:

Yin = Female = M oon = Nii Wa = Try square = Earth

Yang - Male = Sun = Fu Xi = Compasses = Heaven

Associating a celestial body with Earth may seem odd, but the Han people considered
Heaven to be the ultimate force in the universe; the cycle of four seasons on the Earth,
for instance, was nothing but a manifestation of Heavens will.106 The presence of the
try square did not equate moon with Earth but gave the moon the yin attribute, which
was expected to work with the yang attribute to complete the operation of Heavens will
and thus promote the working of the cosmos. The Han artisans who decorated the tomb
in Shenmu, Shaanxi, used a modified schema (Figure 4.55).107They reversed the instru­
ments held by Fu X i and Nii Wa. The association of the compasses with N ii Wa may
have had something to do with the story that she mended the damaged heavens.108The
artisans also brought the cardinal emblems into play; they added two dragons_ a larger
one at the side and a smaller one at the bottom一 to accompany Fu X i, and two tigers,
similarly placed, to accompany N ii Wa. We can translate their schema as follows:

Yin = Female = Moon = Nii Wa = [Compasses] = [Heaven] = White Tiger

Yang = M ale = Sun = F uX i = [Try square] = [Earth] = Blue Dragon

I f some Han artisans formulated visual puns on the y in -yang dualism accepted by
their contemporaries, others explored not their parallel existence but the joining of yin
and yang. A carved stone unearthed in Pixian, Sichuan, displays Fu X i holding the sun
with one arm and N ii W a holding the moon with one arm while they embrace each
other with their other arms (Figure 4.56). The artisan accentuated their intimacy by plac­
ing their faces in close proximity as if they are kissing, and by intertwining their tails
three times as if they are tangled in sexual intercourse. M y reading is not far-fetched;
 4 .55. Celestial images on the fagade o f Tomb 11. 25-220
ce. Carving and painting on stone. Unearthed in 1996
at Dabaodang in Shenmu, Shaanxi. Photographs and
drawings, (a) and (b) Sun and Fu Xi. 116 x 33.5 cm.
(c) and (d) Moon and Nii Wa. 69 x 33 cm.

comparable examples exist: for instance, a carving in the W u Liang Shrine (Figure 4.57).
There, Fu X i, holding a try square, is intertwined with Nii Wa. Between them is an in­
fant whose body is turned toward Nii Wa but whose hand is pulling at Fu Xis sleeve.
The scene is about the creation and reproduction of humankind.109 An artisan was less
subtle in another design, on a stone coffin discovered in Jiang’an 江 安 ，Sichuan, where
the intertwined Fu X i and Nii Wa hold a phallus together (Figure 4.58).110The intention
is clearly to emphasize the aspect of fertility in the interaction o iy in and yang.
Like images of the cardinal emblems and the M ilky Way, most of the Han images of
the sun and the moon come from funerary contexts. Even though their basic forms— the
sun with a crow and the moon with a hare and a toad— could have been derived from
欺务，
il'
? ' 纖
:a h . 命 , 游- 淡 -•' • ■ -
::'妇

寒找辟评鞭. … - . ' ,, 4 56
. . Sun and moon on a sarcophagus. Late

興te ss零 ■ 雜 雜 & cm. Unearthed in 1972 from Tomb66.51 at Xin-41.5

k絡 纖 雜 >.♦ 狡、
：
•,:'為 ' 於 .
;'
、、
second to early third century ce. x

sheng in Pixian, Sichuan. Ink rubbing.

4 .57. Fu Xi and Nii Wa in the Wu Liang shrine. 151 c e . Stone carving.

Discovered in 1786 in Jiaxiang, Shandong, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.
 4 .58. Sun and moon on Sarcophagus 1. Second century ce.
H. 51 x 53 cm. Discovered in 1985 in Jiang’an，
Sichuan.

empirical observations, their pictorial representations are more conceptual than factual.
For one thing, the sun and the moon always appear together, even though the moon
often fades away when the sun rises. The Han artisans paired the sun and the moon in
tombs for several purposes. First, the sun and the moon help to represent the sky. As we
saw, the ceiling of the Changqing shrine is decorated with the sun, the moon, notable
constellations within the M ilky Way, and other unidentifiable stars and clouds. The carv­
ing on a post, which includes a gatekeeper, a figure who is possibly an immortal, and a
climbing dragon, turns the sky into the destination for the deceased (see Figures 4.34,
4.36). A n earlier example, a wood coffin lid, probably produced in the late first century
b c e , from Xuyi 盱目台， Jiangsu, conveys the same message (see Figure 0.5).111 The carving
on the lid features the sunbird and the moon. Three fish in between suggest the Milky
Way.Thethree stars behindthe mooncouldbethe Oxherdconstellation or theWhite
Tiger, emblemofthewest. Other stars arescatteredaround.Theflyingfigure abovethe
sunbird, which is either an immortal or the deceased, makes the picture not the sky but
therealmofHeaven,whichthe deceasedwishestoreach.
Second, the Han artisans paired the sun and the moon to help define the pictorial
space as celestial. For example, the appearance ofthe sunandthe moononLadyDai’s
banner unambiguously makes its upper portion represent the celestial field (see Fig­
ure 3.30). The sun and the moon also distinguish Heavens gate from ordinary pillars or
watchtowers, as on the Shenmu stones (see Figure 4.55). Their presence further clarifies
theconnectionbetweenHeavenandthelandoftheimmortals,wherethelatterservesas
the gateway to the former. That is why we see the sun and the moon flanking the m otif
of the deceased approaching the Mother Queen of the West on the Suide stone (see
Figure 3.81). Likewise, the juxtaposition of the Mother Queen of the West with the sun
and the moon onthe front and rear sides ofthe Pixian coffinimplies the proximityof
the land of the immortals to Heaven (see Figures 4.37b, c). In the Xinfan tomb, the sun
and the moon, merged with anthropomorphic birds, appear on each side of the scene
that depicts the Mother Queen of the West receiving the deceased (Figure 4.59).112The
Mother QueenoftheWestisseatedonathronedignifiedbyacanopyandguardedbya
dragonandatiger. Her attendants一athree-leggedbird,atoad, ahare,andanine-tailed
fox~are nearby. Her maids are receiving a kowtowing figure, presumably the deceased.
An immortal, the one who guided the deceased to this place, is standing behind the
deceased.Weshouldnote that the sunandthe moonarenot flyingtowardthe Mother
QueenoftheWestbutmovingupward,indicatingthat therealmofHeavenisabovethe
land of the immortals, which she rules.
Onoccasion, theHanartisans madethe sunandthemoontheonlyfocusofHeaven.
Take，for example, Bu Qianqius tomb, excavated in Luoyang and probably built in the
second half of the first century b c e . 1 13 A mural on the long and narrow ceiling is com­
posed of twenty painted bricks (Figure 4.60). The sun and the moon, accompanied by Fu
X i and Nii Wa, mark the two ends of the mural (Figure 4.61). Between the sun and the
moonis aprocessionmovingfromright toleft.Thedeceasedcoupleis at the endofthe
procession: the woman is riding on a three-headed phoenix, the man on a serpent-like
creature.TheyareheadingtowardtheMotherQueenoftheWest,whoisfloatingontop
of clouds and whose attendants— a three-legged bird, held by a female figure, a nine­
tailed fox, and a toad— are guiding the deceased couple (see Figure 3.70). The land of the
immortalsis not the destination,for theprocessioncontinues tomoveforward.Thecar­
dinal emblems in their not-yet-standardized grouping—awinged dragon, twowinged
 b
4 .59. Mother Queen o f the West, sun, and moon in a tomb.
Unearthed in 1955 at Xinfan in Chengdu, Sichuan, (a) Drawing, (b) Ink rubbings.

unicorns, a phoenix, and a tiger— are racing past the Mother Queen of the West (Figure
4.62). In the vanguard is the immortal holding a stick with three tassels (Figure 4.63).
This composition mixes space with time, resulting in ambiguity. Tlie least likely inter­
pretation is that the procession is moving from the sun to the moon. A more plausible
approach is to consider the sun and the moon as Heaven, the destination toward which
the procession is moving. The destination is, however, split into two, and the two sepa­
rated spaces frame the procession. The unusual rendition of the destination— split and
yet framing~complicates our understanding of the painted ceiling. If we see the proces­
sion in one realm and the sun and the moon in a different realm, we can read the mural
as portraying the arrival of the deceased in Heaven after a long journey. Ambiguity not­
withstanding, the painted tomb serves as an excellent example of how the Han artisans
transformed celestial elements into signs and structured the celestial signs to reflect their
belief in ascending to Heaven after death.
 2

5
9
Fig. 4.62c Fig. 4.62b --- 1----- Fig. 3.70

4 .60 . Celestial ascent. Mid-first century bce. Painted bricks. 1040 x 24 cm.
Unearthed in 1976 from the tomb o f Bu Qianqiu in Luoyang, Henan. Drawing.

4 .61. Sun and moon in the painted tomb o f Bu Qianqiu in Luoyang.

Details o f Figure 4.60. (a) Sun, (b) Moon.

The funerary commissions that stressed the celestial ascent gave the Han artisans
ample opportunities to explore how to represent the sky and to turn the represented sky
into Heaven. Although many celestial bodies were observable in the sky, they favored
the regularity of the sun and the moon, the prominence of the M ilky Way, and the order
of the cardinal emblems. They developed various strategies to make these celestial bod­
ies more tangible to viewers. Taking advantage of well-known myths and folklore, the
artisans animated the sun and the moon with zoomorphic images and personified the
Milky Way as a pathetic couple. They also made good use of deeply rooted similes, such
 4 .63. Immortal guide in the painted tomb of
Bu Qianqiu in Luoyang. Detail o f Figure 4.60.

as comparing the M ilky Way with a river, projecting a dragon onto the eastern sky, and
likening the lunar lodges in the south to a bird. They further adopted succinct principles
that were familiar to dl\yyin-yang dualism for one and the directional formula of the car­
dinal emblems for another. Tacit knowledge thus served as the bridge between the arti­
sans and the intended viewers. Highlighting celestial markers became artistic adventures
that enriched pictorial signification and social communication in Han visual culture.
 CHAPTER 5

Mapping Celestial Bodies

The Han writers had been competing to refashion the celestial journey in verse since Q u
Yuan created the genre in the third century b c e . Zhang Heng impressed his contempo­
raries with his unique vision. In Rhapsody on Contemplating the M ysterious (S i xua n fu 思
玄赋 )， he described himself flying up to Heaven:

I exit from the solemnity of the Purple Palace,

And gather the highness of the Taiwei Enclosure.
I command Wang Liang to administer the Whip on the
Four Horses,
And jump over the towering Stepped Road with a heavy clang.
I spread the nets densely from the carriage
To hunt in the vast Green Wood.
I bend the mighty Bow sharply
To shoot the great Wolf on Mount Bozhong.
Looking over the Ramparts from the Northern Territories，
I cut down the rumbling roar of the River Drum.
Traveling by the smooth flow of the Celestial Pond，
I drift along the swift current of the Heavenly River.
Leaning on the Twinkling Indicator and Assistant Conductors,
I fly low and turn
To observe the continuous motion of the sun, the moon,
and five planets.1

Most readers can grasp the literal meanings of the words, but only those who are famil­
iar with Chinese astronomy can appreciate how skillfully Zhang blended constellations
with imagery.
 1h Oh 23h 22h

+50 +50

+40 +40

+30 +30

+20 +20

+ 10 + 10
1h Oh 23h 22h
5.1. Constellations in Rhapsody on Contemplating the Mysterious

The Purple Palace and the Taiwei 太微 Enclosure were two imagined celestial courts;
the first was at the center of the northern sky, and the second was south of the North­
ern Dipper. The poet mentioned both to indicate the palaces of the Heavenly Thearch.
Coming from the heavenly palaces, the poet told Wang Liang 王 良 （ a star named after a
legendary charioteer) to use a W hip (ce a nearby star) on his team of Four Horses (si
-10, four stars surrounding Wang Liang), a group of stars stretching from the North Pole
into the western sky (Figure 5.1). The poet then described himself and his team jum p­
ing over the Stepped Road {gedao 閣道， a six-star constellation in an almost straight line
next to the group led by Wang Liang).
After lingering in the west, the poet arrived at the lunar lodge Net {bi 畢)一 he associ­
ated its hunting net imagery with the Celestial Park [tianyuan 天 苑 ，a sixteen-star con­
stellation compared here to a green wood; Figure 5.2). Then the poet wandered south­
ward, taking a nine-star constellation that resembled an arrow notched on a Bow [hu
弧 )， and aiming the arrow at the stars that composed a W olf (Jang 狼 ；Figure 5.3). A ll of
a sudden, the poet made a leap into the northern sky, reaching the Northern Territories
 3h 2h 1h Oh

5.2 . Constellations in Rhapsody on Contemplating the Mysterious.

{beiluo 北 落 )，and from there he looked at the twelve-star Ramparts [bilei 璧 良 Figure
5.4). He advanced to the River Drum [hegu\ alternatively, Oxherd). One moment he was
visiting the Celestial Pond [tianhuang 天 潢 ，a nine-star constellation); the next he was
floating down the M ilky Way.
Finally the poet approached the east, going from the Twinkling Indicator [zhaoyao 招
搖 ，an extension of the Northern Dipper) to the Assistant Conductors {sheti 攝 提 ，near
the lunar lodge Neck; Figure 5.5). Since both were seasonal indicators, Zhang recalled
 7h 6h 5h 4h 3h

his responsibility for celestial affairs at the Eastern Han court and, returning from his
journey to his duty, came back to the secular, human world.
These couplets, as David Knechtges points out, make readers feel that an astronomer
is speaking.2 Indeed, Zhang Heng was an astronomer who advocated the concept of the
Spherical Heaven and improved the armillary sphere, the main instrument for observ­
ing celestial motions. But Zhang was not the first to relate stars to a celestial journey. As
we saw earlier, the author of F ar-offJourney had already made the attempt. W hat distin­
guished Zhang was his extensive use of constellations in accordance with their positions
in the sky. Zhangs readers must have been equipped with the same degree of familiar­
ity in order to appreciate his efforts. The development and popularity of astronomical
knowledge in the Han was thus far beyond what Q u Yuan could have imagined.
Like the Han writers, the Han artisans drew on astronomical knowledge for their
representations of Heaven. Since they were not as educated as writers were, their knowl-
edge could be partial and uneven. To make their images attractive, they also needed to
strike a balance between art and science. In this chapter, I investigate how astronomi­
cal Heaven was shaped in Han society through the painted tomb at Jiaotong University
in X i’an, with special attention to celestial cartography and oral tradition that may have
bridged the gap between the professional and the amateur.
zuo shell
左攝提
 3
05

Sky Lore

Heaven as a realm beyond the earth has often been associated with the sky above the
horizon, where the visible motions of celestial objects take place. The regularity of ce­
lestial motions helped ancient people to measure time and define space for agricultural
and ceremonial purposes. Tracking the passage of the sun and the moon through the
stars was the initial focus of ancient astronomers. In the West, based on the Mesopota-
mian legacies, the Greeks chose twelve arcs of thirty degrees along the ecliptic to mark
the path of the sun and named this zodiac for constellations that each contained. In the
East, like the Arabs and the Indians, the Chinese established twenty-eight constella-
tions to mark the path of the moon by dividing the equatorial circle into twenty-eight
unequal segments (Figure 5.6).3 Since the moon traveled from one segment to another
over 27.3 days (the sidereal month), the ancient Chinese called each segment a “lunar
lodge.”4 W ith the twenty-eight lunar lodges as reference points, the Chinese measured
the positions of the sun, the moon, and five planets at given moments.
Although the Chinese have observed certain stars ever since the Neolithic period, a
set of lunar lodges probably was not established until the fifth century bce. The earliest
known representation is on the lid of a lacquer chest excavated from the tomb of Marquis
Yi of Zeng, who was buried sometime after 433 bce (Figure 5").5 The design includes
cloud patterns at the four corners, zoomorphic images on two sides, and written char­
acters— not images of stars— around the center. Scholars have identified these more or
less circularly arranged characters as the names of the twenty-eight lunar lodges.6 W ith
the exception of Chariot {che 車 ) which later became Chariot Baseboard {zhen 糝)一
these characters are identical to those found in later texts, such as M aster L us Spring and
A utum n Annals compiled about 239 bce in the Qin state.7
The design on the lacquer chest not only demonstrates the early use of the twenty-
eight lunar lodges but also displays the fundamental structure of the sky as the ancient
Chinese perceived it. The pictograph with bold lines at the center is the character dou 斗
(dipper), referring to the Northern Dipper constellation that encompassed the Pole Star.
There is another dou in the circle of the lunar lodges. The artisan wrote the character for
the Northern Dipper with much more fluidity than he did the character for the lunar
lodge Dipper, and with elongated lines in a much larger space (Figure 5.8). The length­
ened lines make the central pictograph seem to extend to the four cardinal points. A
dragon winds through the eastern constellations, and a leaping tiger has its back near the
western constellations. The Northern Dipper at the center and the animals on two sides
visually dominate the smaller characters for the lodges.
 5.6 . Tw enty-eight lunar lodges.

The com position o f the design on the chest prefigured the sky that Sima Q ian de­
scribed in the Book of Celestial Offices in the early first century b c e . 8 According to Sima,
the N orthern D ipper consisted o f seven stars: four stars formed the dippers scoop, whose
head lay above the western lodge Triad; three stars formed its ladle, one end o f which
pointed toward the eastern lodge H orn and the other end o f which pointed toward the
northern lodge D ipper (Figure 5 .9 ). Linked thus to the lunar lodges, the N orthern D ip­
per controlled the four sides o f the sky as it pivoted around the N orth Star like a chariot.
The centrality gave the N orthern D ipper a special place among the asterisms.
5.7. Twenty-eight lunar lodges on a chest. Second half o f the fifth century
b c e . Lacquer. 71
x 47 x 40.5 cm. Unearthed in 1978 from the tomb o f Marquis
Y i o f Zeng at Leigudun in Suixian, Hubei, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

# V . ..

,- ..

5.8. The graph dou 斗on a lacquer chest in the tomb o f Marquis Y i o f Zeng.
(a) Dou as in the Northern Dipper, (b) Dou as in the lodge Dipper.
 As we have discussed, Sima Q ian imagined the sky as a celestial bureaucracy divided
among five celestial palaces. The supreme deity, w ith the assistance o f the N orthern D ip­
per, governed the C entral Palace. The Blue D ragon governed the Eastern Palace, which
was composed o f the seven lodges in the eastern sky from H orn to Basket (Table 5 .1).9
The Red Bird governed the Southern Palace, w hich included the seven lodges from
W ell to C hariot Baseboard. The H arm onious Pond (later, the W hite Tiger) governed
the W estern Palace, w hich included another seven lodges from Swine to Triad. The D ark
W arrior governed the N orthern Palace, w hich included the rem aining seven lodges from
D ipper to W all.
The structure o f the Chinese s k y w i t h the N orthern D ipper controlling the car­
dinal emblems, w hich ruled the tw enty-eight lunar lodges~w as firmly established in
 Table 5.1. Cardinal Emblems and Lunar Lodges
EMBLEMS LODGES EXTENSIONS (du) D ETERM IN ATIVE

Horn {jiao 角） 12 .10 a Virginis

Neck (gang 尤） 9 .2 0 k Virginis
E ast
Root (di 氏） 16 .3 0 a2Librae
Blue Dragon Chamber {fang 房） 5 .6 0 7i S c o r p ii

Heart (xin 心） 6 .5 0 0 Scorpii

T a il {wei 尾） 1 9 .1 0 (i1 Scorpii
Basket {ji 箕） 1 0 .4 0 y Sagittarii
W e ll {jing 井） 3 3 .3 0 |i Geminorum
Ghost [gui 鬼） 2 .2 0 0 Cancri
South Willow (Jiu 柳） 13.30 5 Hydrae
Red Bird Star (xing 星 ） 6.30 a Hydrae
Stretch [zhang 張 ） 17.25 uVv/[i Hydrae?
W ing (yi 翼 ） 18.75 a Crateris
Chariot Baseboard {zhen 17.30 Y Corvi
Swine {kui 奎 ） 16.60 CAndromedae
Pasture {lou 婁 ） 11.80 (3Arietis
West
Harmonious Stomach {wei 胃） 15.60 35/41 Arietis?
Pond Mane {mao 昂） 11.30 17/r| Tauri?
(W hite Tiger) Net {bi 畢 ） 0.05 £ Tauri
Tuft (zi 觜 ） 11.10 c^VXVk Orionis?
Triad {shen 參 ） 11.10 5/( Orionis?
Dipper {dou 斗 ） 25.20 (\>Sagittarii
Ox {niu 牛 ） 7.20 (3 Capricorni

North Maid {nil 女 ） 11.35 £ Aquarii

Dark Warrior Tumulus (xu 虛 ） 8.9575 P Aquarii
Rooftop {wei 危 ） 15.40 a Aquarii
Room {shi 室 ） 17.10 a Pegasi
Wall {bi 壁 ） 8.60 Y Pegasi
the Han dynasty.10The structure, systematicallypresented by Sima Qian, was built on
observations ofthe celestial sphere. Simahimself, awell-trainedastronomer, succeeded
his father as the Grand Historian in charge of celestial matters for the ruling court.11
He was one of the few astronomers who proposed and executed calendrical reform dur­
ing the reign of Emperor W u; this was the reform resulting in the Grand Inception sys­
tem, which Emperor W u promulgated in the Fenggao Bright H all in 105 bce and used
to placethe Han dynastyinthe discourse oftheTriple Concordance.12The calendrical
reformrequired newmeasurements of the positions ofthe twenty-eight lunar lodges,
with the help ofanarmillarysphere.13SimaQians detailed descriptions ofstars in the
Book o f Celestial Offices、especially their relative positions in the sky, must have been the
fruit ofthoseastronomical activities.
ThestructureoftheskypresentedbySimaQianwasacombinationnotonlyofobjec­
tiveobservationbut alsoofsubjectiveprojectionfromthe humanworld. He namedthe
circumpolarareathe CentralPalaceasrepresentingtheinnermostcourt;healsoadopted
the titles of imperial family members to label stars in that palace. He described the
Northern Dipper as the emperors chariot movingthrough the four quarters, a celes­
tial model similar to the centralized political systemthat was a product of the Han
dynasty. Along the same lines, he followed the theory of “field allocation” (fenye 分 野 ）
tocorrelatethetwenty-eightlunarlodgeswiththethirteenadministrativeregionsunder
Emperor W u.14
Astronomy,astrology,anddivinationwereinseparableduringtheHan,andthetheory
offieldallocationconnectedthem.Thetheoryassumesthat terrestrial regionshavecor­
respondingcelestial sectors;it isthereforepossibletolearnabout earthlyeventsthrough
observationsofsolar,lunar, andplanetarymovementsinaparticularsector. Forinstance,
in the Book o f Celestial Offices, Sima Qian recorded the conjunction of the five planets
in thelunar lodgeWell as agoodomenfor Emperor Gaos victoryoverthe Qin.15The
prognosticationwas basedontwopremises: first, it is sounusual for the fiveplanets to
converge in the segment of one lunar lodge that their conjunction was an auspicious
sign; second, the Qinwerebasedin theYongregion， whose sector ofthe skyincluded
the lodges W ell and Ghost. W hen Liu Bang 劉 邦 ， the future Emperor Gao, approached
the Q in capital, Xianyang, in the tenth month (November 14-December 12) of 207 bce,
the conjunction of the five planets reportedly occurred in the lunar lodgeWell. As if
blessedbyHeavensmandate, LiudefeatedtheQinguards easily.16
The correlation amongastronomy, astrology, and divination, whichunderscored the
prevailing beliefin Heaven’s will, had to be interpreted byhumans. The celestial sign
related to Liu Bangs victory is an example; it has been proved not to have occurred
 at the time claimed. Based on a Han manuscript excavated from Tomb 3 at Mawang­
dui, in which the planetary positions from 246 to 177 bce were recorded, X i Zezong has
calculated that the five planets did not converge when Liu Bang arrived in Xianyang;
instead, their conjunction in the lodge W ell happened several months later, in the sev­
enth month of the following year (August 7—September 4，206 bce).17 Even though Liu
Bang was the first warlord to seize the Qin capital, his military forces were inferior to
those ofXiangYu, his chiefcompetitor in the east.Towinthe support ofZhangEr 張
耳 ，another powerful player in interstate conflicts, Liu Bang and his advisers apparently
advanced the time of the planetary conjunction so it would be a sign of his becoming the
Son of Heaven.18 This ploy, preserved in official documents, reveals that Heaven's man­
date, a notion established in the Western Zhou, played an even more important role in
Han politics.19 It also clarifies the extent to which certain celestial phenomena—here,
the twenty-eight lunar lodges~were not natural facts but creations o f human observers
who believed that the human world was influenced by the forces of Heaven and wished
to show how.
Hie belief in the correlation between celestial phenomena and human affairs resulted
in careful and well-recorded (if sometimes manipulated) celestial observations. The
celestial records could be solely textual, as in the Book o f Celestial Offices. But because
lunar lodges had shapes and appeared in space, their forms and positions were also visu­
ally preserved. By the end of the first century b c e , Liu Xiang, an erudite and frequent sky
watcher, once felt obliged to discuss with Emperor Cheng what a comet passing over the
lodge Well implied. To underscore his field of study, Liu reminded the emperor that the
structure of the sl^y was so obscure that he had better consult an expert who could use
charts to determine the influence of celestial phenomena on human situations.20 Lius
remarks testified to the use of celestial charts in Western Han astrology. The usurper
Wang M ang had studied the Charts and Texts o f the Purple Palace (Zige tuw en 紫 閣 圖 文 ）
when court astronomers informed him that the moon was invading the lodge Heart in
20 ce.21 Since none of these early documents survive, we have no idea how they visually
represented the structure of the sky.
Astronomers in the Han court used celestial charts in their astronomical and astro­
logical work. Because their computational methods were still not very accurate, and their
instruments rudimentary, they had to observe constantly and periodically correct their
predictive methods.22 For instance, Geng Shouchang 玦 壽 昌 （ fl. 73-49 bce) routinely
employed charts {tu 圖) for reference and instruments (y i 儀 ) to measure solar and lunar
movements.23 Based on his empirical work, Geng put together the Silk Charts o f Lunar
Movements (Yuexing botu 月 行 帛 圖 )，a long-lost illustrated document.24 In 85 ce, almost
 twocenturies after SimaQian’sreform, the calendar in usefell sofar behind the celes-
tialphenomenathat EmperorZhangorderedanotherreform.25Duringthatprocess,the
leading astronomer of the time J ia Kui 賈 逵 （
30-101 c e ), cited earlier reports to show
that using equatorial coordinates to measure celestial motions led to large systematic
errors, and proposed that the astronomical bureau avoid thembymeasuring orbits on
the ecliptic. Consultingwithagroupofyoungcourt astronomerswhohadnotyet been
appointedto thebureau, helearnedthat the officialsdidnot haveeclipticrings ontheir
armillarysphere, andsodidnot knowhowtomakesuchmeasurements; celestial charts
usedforreferencethus followedtheconventionanddidnot includethe ecliptic.26
Celestial charts must havebeeninwideusefor calendrical andastrological purposes
duringthe Han,but noneofthemhavesurvived. Onlythechart ofthe CanopyHeaven
(gai 如蓋圖 ） is a t t e s t e d t o b y t e x t u a l r e f e r e n c e s . Zhao Shuang 趙 爽 （
fl. t h i r d c e n t u r y c e ) ,
in his annotations to the Gnomon o f the "Zhou, described the chart of the Canopy Heaven
as acombinationoftwoother charts—oneyellow ）andoneblue {huangtu 黃圖 {qingtu
青圖)•Theyellowchartwas acircular disccontainingsevenconcentric circles,withthe
North Pole marked at the center ofthe chart and the lunar lodges amongthe circles
(Figure 5_10). blue chart was identical but smaller; its circumference represented
the extent ofhumanvision.27Accordingto BoShuren, ifthe center ofthebluechart is
placedwithin the innermost circle ofthe yellowchart andpinned to it at the point of
the North Pole, the lunar lodges canbe made to appear and disappear byrotating the
yellowdisc.28This simpleapparatusisverysimilartoamodernplanisphere, astarfinder
made oftwo discs rotating ona commonpivot, which shows howconstellations enter
andleaveanobserver’sfieldofvision.Unsatisfiedwiththe chart oftheCanopyHeaven’s
astronomical accuracy, however, the Han scholar Yang Xiong commented in his E ight
Refutations ofthe Theory ofthe Canopy Heaven {Nan gai tian ba shi 難蓋天八事）thatifan
observerreliedonthechart, thelunarlodgeshewouldseewerefew， butthosehewould
not seeweremany.
Theyellowchart, withthe lunar lodges markedalongits concentric circles, was also
known as the chart of the seven orbits {qiheng /w 七 衡 圖 ) ;it was probably a prototype of
Chinesecelestial charts thatwerebasedontheconcept ofthe CanopyHeaven.30Asthe
author of The Zhou Gnomon explained, three of the seven circles held great significance:
the innermost,wherethe sunmovesintothelodge Oxat thewinter solstice; the outer­
most， where the sunmoves into the lodgeWell at the summer solstice; andthe middle
circle,wherethe sunenters thelodgePastureat the springequinoxandthelodgeHorn
at the autumn equinox. The middle circle also represented the equator, near which all
twenty-eightlunarlodgeswererendered(Figure5.n).Tlieratioofthediametersofthese
 Winter solstice

5.10. Yellow chart, or chart o f the seven orbits.

three circles was 1:1.5: 2.31 Hie chart apparently used the suns seasonal path to create a
framework for all celestial motions. As Shigeru Nakayama points out, such charts are
dependent upon linear distances projected from the terrestrial onto the celestial~a re­
flection of the view of the Canopy Heaven, a view heavily restricted by gnomon-based
observations and templates.32
The concept of the Spherical Heaven began to affect celestial cartography during the
second century c e with improvements in armillary spheres.33 Cai Yongs account of the
celestial charts used by officials (guan fu 官 圖 ) of that period reveals the strong influence
of new observational instruments.34 He specified three concentric circles on the courtly
charts: the inner circle {net gut 內規) represented the northern circumpolar area in which
celestial motions were visible during t h e entire year; t h e outer circle (wai gui 夕卜規) r e p ­
r e s e n t e d t h e s o u t h e r n c ir c u m p o l a r a r e a i n w h i c h c e le s t i a l m o t io n s w e r e u n o b s e r v a b l e in
north China; and the middle circle {zhonggui 中規）represented the equator, near which
 o
oc

ooo //_
Dimension o f the universe as conceived by the theory
o f Canopy Heaven. The maximum visible and
------ 167,000 li-------- - illuminated area is a circle having a radius o f
238,000 li + 167,000 li, or 405,000 li.

5.11. Concept o f the Canopy Heaven in the Zhou Gnomon.

5.12. Celestial chart. 942 c e . Stone carving. Unearthed in 1965 in the tomb
o f Qian Yuanguan, King o f the Wuyue Kingdom, in Hangzhou, Zhejiang.
Ink rubbing.
 3
1
5

5.13. Celestial chart. 1247 CE* Stone carving.

Erected in Suzhou, Jiangsu. Ink rubbing.

the twenty-eight lunar lodges appeared.Theratioofthe diameters ofthese three circles

was about 1: 2.5: 4.35 Cais description, clarifying the method involving circles {guifa 規
法)asseenintheofficial charts, confirmsJia Kuis remarks that the eclipticwas not im­
portant inHancelestial cartography.
Charts fromthe Han period based on the viewof the Spherical Heaven are not
availablefor study.Theearliest exampleknowntous is the celestial chart carvedonthe
ceilingofthe tomb ofQianYuanguan 錢兀獾，the kingoftheWuyue 吳越Kingdom
who died in 941 c e (Figure 5.12).36 This chart very closely matches Cai Yongs descrip­
tion, with the twenty-eight lunar lodges arranged among three circles, whose diametrical
ratio is 1: 2.4: 3.8.37The lack of the ecliptic in this case is also significant. In later exam­
ples, like the famous chart engraved on a thirteenth-century stele in Suzhou， Jiangsu， the
ecliptic was added (Figure 5.13).38
 Astronomy in the Han was both objective and subjective. The empirical observa­
tions of celestial motions resulted in the system of the twenty-eight lunar lodges, but the
articulation and the use of the system hinged on human conditions. The planar represen­
tation of celestial bodies further depended on to which— a canopy or a sphere— the Han
people compared the universe. Sky lore became a fertile land from which artisans picked
and chose whatever was suitable for the tasks they were commissioned to do.

Pictorial Elaboration

Han artisans represented the system of the twenty-eight lunar lodges in a tomb discov­
ered in 1987 on the campus of X ian Jiaotong University.39 The brick tomb dates to the
late first century b c e . The astronomical images are on the arched ceiling of the main
chamber (Figure 5.14). The artisans first delineated two concentric circles on the arched
ceiling and then filled the resulting circular band with lunar lodges (Figures 5.15, 5.16).
The circles bring to mind the circles in the Han charts produced either by the school of
the Canopy Heaven or by the school of the Spherical Heaven. Since the theory of the
Spherical Heaven had not been fully developed until the late first century c e , the circles
in the X i’an tomb were based mostly on the view of the Canopy Heaven. The rendition
of the lunar lodges on an arched ceiling also suggests an association with the canopy
metaphor, and the concentric circles suggest a close connection with the chart of the
seven orbits. The circles appear to represent the equatorial belt, near which the lunar
lodges would appear. Astronomically speaking, however, the lunar lodges would never
appear so neatly between two circles. A dome would also be more suitable than an arch
for a canopy model. Together, these features indicate that the artisans~who may have
had access to some simple version of the chart of the seven orbits— felt no pressure to
draw an accurate celestial map. The concentric circles could, therefore, have signified an
equatorial belt that contained the lunar lodges, or they may have been a simple allusion
to round Heaven, which contained the constellations.
The tomb artisans indeed had no intention of replicating the celestial charts made for
empirical observations. Only four lodges一 Rooftop, Room, Wall, and Well— retain their
basic form, defined by circular stars and linking lines, but not to scale. A ll the others
are elaborated with additional details, although the depictions of three lodges— Pasture,
Stomach, Mane一 are too damaged to decipher. O f the remaining lodges, fifteen are
associated with animals, and six resemble persons.
Most of the zoomorphic lunar lodges have something to do with the cardinal emblems.
 5.14. View of the main chamber. Second half o f the first century bce.
Unearthed in 1987 at Jiaotong University in Xi’an, Shaanxi.

The way the artisans related the lunar lodges to the cardinal emblems is very similar to
the way Sima Qian described their relationship. The Blue Dragon governs six lodges in
the east, with each lodge capturing a different portion of the dragon: Horn, Neck, Root
for its chest, Chamber for the belly, Heart, and Tail (see Figures 4.6,4.7).40The Red Bird
governs four lodges in the south, each of which also refers to an anatomical part of the
bird: W illow to its beak, Star to its nape, Stretch to the crop, and W ing to the wings
(see Figure 4.4).41 Sima did not make the W hite Tiger the emblem of the west, but he
associated the imagery of a tiger with two of the western lunar lodges: Tuft is the tigers
head, Triad, the tiger’s body.42 The artisans of the Xian tomb depicted Triad as a tiger,
but elaborated Tuft as an owl, perhaps preferring the literal meaning of the character
z i clusters of feathers on the crown of an owl (Figures 5.17, 4.13).43 Another animated
western lunar lodge in the tomb is Swine. Though partly damaged, archaeologists sug­
gest that it is probably in the shape of a pig, which matches Simas description (Figure
5.18).44 Sima assigned the Dark Warrior to the northern sky, but he neither articulated
the imagery nor connected any lunar lodges with it.45The tomb artisans inserted a snake
in the lodge Tumulus (Figure 5.19).
5.15. Restoration of the celestial images in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in Xi’an.
 N

(gui 鬼）Ghost Chariot Baseboard {zhen 轸）

(jing 井）Well 角）
Neck (gang 尤）
(shen 參 ）Triad
Root (di 氐）

(zi 觜）Tuft Chamber

(fang 房）

Heart {xin 心）

(bi 畢）Net Tail {wei 尾）

Basket (ji 箕）
{mao 昂）Mane
(wei 胃）Stomach
(lou 婁）Pasture Dipper (dou 斗）
(kui 查）Swine
(W 壁 ) W a 丨
(shi 室）Room
Ox (niu 牛）
(wei 危 ）Rooftop
Tumulus Maid (nu 女 )
(xu 虚）

5.16. Twenty-eight lunar lodges in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X ian.
5.17. Lunar lodges in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an, (a) Triad {shen)y (b) Tuft (zi).
 (a) Blue Dragon, (b) Red Bird, (c) White Tiger, (d) Dark Warrior.

The mural in the X i’an tomb sheds light on our understanding of the cardinal
emblems of the Han period. First, the cardinal emblems had probably not yet been sta­
bilized before Wang Mang promoted them in contemporary architecture and material
culture.46 Sima Qian did not favor the W hite Tiger for the western celestial palace. Nor
did the artisans of the X i，an tomb adopt the entire imagery of the Dark W arrior~a
turtle with a snake— for the northern lunar lodges, even though the iconography had
already been invented no later than the reign of Emperor W u，as the decorated bricks
found near his mausoleum confirm (see Figure 4.20).47 Second， the correlation between
lunar lodges and their emblems in the Han was not as neat as later scholars assume.
Gao Lu， for instance, provides us with a set of illustrations to explain Sima Qians astro­
nomical vision. These illustrations show that each cardinal emblem contains seven lunar
lodges from the quarter of the sl^ it was supposed to command (Figure 5.20).48 Never­
theless, if we read the Book o f Celestial Offices carefully, Sima associated only six lodges
with the imagery of a dragon，four with the imagery of a bird, and two with the imag­
ery of a tiger; he associated no specific lunar lodges with the Dark Warrior. The mural
in the Xi'an tomb more or less complies with Simas specifications, except that the arti­
sans reduced the imagery of a tiger to one lunar lodge and let the Dark W arrior~in its
not-yet-standardized snake form-~have one lunar lodge. Both Simas accounts and the
X i’an mural suggest that the allocation of the twenty-eight lunar lodges to the cardinal
emblems was still new in the Western Han. Responding to the growing importance of
the Five Phases, astronomers like Sima created five palaces in the sky, with the Heavenly
Thearchcontrollingthe center andfour cardinal emblemssupervisingthefour quarters.
The system that Sima tried to establish was well founded, because the ancient Chinese
did project the imagery of a bird onto the southern sky, that of a dragon onto the eastern
sky, and that of a tiger onto the western sky; but they saw a bird formed from four groups
of stars， a dragon from six groups, and a tiger from one or two. W hen Sima transformed
the projected images into a structure, he did not alter the convention, but added a brief
statement before introducing each celestial palace. Hie artisans apparently perceived the
loose correlation of the lunar lodges and their emblems in the same way. It was not
until the five celestial palaces became prevalent that people began to seek a close match
between lunar lodges and their cardinal emblems.
Although the artisans of the X i’an tomb accepted the popular cardinal emblems, they
set aside precision in the interest of decoration. Based on the drawing of the mural, the
seven lunar lodges in the south are squeezed into the smallest quarter (73 degrees; Fig­
ure 5.21). O n astronomical charts, in contrast, the southern lunar lodges usually enjoy the
largest quarter (102—109 degrees).49
Three ofthe six anthropomorphic lunar lodges are named after utensils. The lodge
Dipper is composed of six stars, with four making a scoop and two making a ladle, giv­
ing it a shape like the seven-star Northern Dipper (Figure 5.22a). Even though the lodge
Dipper is in the northern celestial palace, the ancient Chinese sometimes called it the
Southern Dipper to distinguish it from the Northern Dipper near the pole. The tomb
artisans portrayed the lodge as a dipper held by a person (Figure 5.22b).
The depiction ofthe lodge Net is also straightforward. Oracle bone inscriptions in
the Shang dynasty had already included the pictograph of a net (Figure 5.23).50 The Book
o f Odes tells us that the Zhou people relied on the lodge Net to forecast the weather;
theynoticedthat oncethemoondepartedfromthat segment，
heavyrainfollowed.51The
ancient Chinese associated the constellation of eight stars with the net they used for catch­
ing birds or small animals (see Figure 5.2). This hunting tool was still in use in the Han.
 \ \ §■ Wing 0,• 翼 ）
(gui 鬼 ）Ghost Baseboard {zhen 轸）

(jing 井 ）W e l l ^ ^ i H ° rn 角）
Neck (gang 尤）
(shen 參 ）Triad
Root {di 氐）

(zi 觜 ）Tuft Chamber

(fang 房 ）

Heart (xin 心）

(bi 畢 ) Net Tail (wei 尾 ）

Basket (ji 箕）

(mao 昴）Mane
(wei 胃）Stomach
(lou 婁 ）Pasture Dipper {dou 斗）
(kui 全 ）Swine
(bi 壁 ）Wall
(shi 室 ）Room
Ox (niu 牛)
{wei 危 ）Rooftop
Tumulus Maid (n u 女 ）
(xu 虛 ）
5.21. Extensions o f the four celestial palaces in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X ian.

A brick discovered in Fangcheng 方 城 ， Henan, shows a hunter holding a net with wide-
apart hands and chasing a running hare among hills (Figure 5.25).52The brick was made
in the late first century b c e , about the time the X i’an tomb was built. The tomb artisans
were obviously familiar with the hunting m otif and applied it to the representation of
the lodge Net (Figure 5.24). By borrowing a popular m otif from contemporary art, they
not only enlivened the depiction of an abstract lunar lodge but also evoked memories of
how ancient people envisioned the constellation. The number of stars forming the net in
the tomb is correct (eight), but their relative positions are rearranged to better accommo­
date the depiction of hunting a hare with a net. The rearrangement, again, shows that the
artisans were more concerned with pictorial elaboration than with astronomical accu­
racy. The same was true for an even simpler carving on a stone unearthed in Nanyang.
 17h 16h

5.22. (a) Lodge Dipper {dou)\ (b) Lodge Dipper in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X ian.
 rubbing. 5.24 . Lodge Net in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an.

There, the lodge Net, with only seven stars, is the net that contains a hare about to be
caught (see Figure 4.35).
The visual elaboration of the lodge Basket in the eastern sky is less comprehensive.
The earliest pictograph of a basket appears on Shang oracle bones (Figure 5.26). The
Books o f Odes records how Zhou people perceived this lunar lodge:
In the south is [the lodge] Basket,
But it is useless for winnowing.
In the north is [the lodge] Dipper,
But it ladles out no wine.53

Here, the southern lodge, with its four stars, was a winnowing basket (Figure 5.27a). Han
art portrays two kinds of baskets in common use: the winnowing basket for gathering
grain or separating grain from chaff as engraved on a stone unearthed at Y i’nan 沂 南 ，
 a

5.26. Oracle bone inscription

showing the graphji. Ink rubbing.

5.27. (a) Lodge Basket {ji)\ (b) and (c) Lodge Basket in
the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X ian.
 8
2
3

5.28. Harvest scene on a stone carving. Late second to early third century c e .
Unearthed in 1953 in Y i ，
nan, Shandong. Ink rubbing.

Shandong (Figure 5.28)54 and the refuse bas­

ket for collecting debris or animal manure as
carved on another stone excavated at Guan-
zhuang, Shaanxi (Figure 5.29).55 Both kinds
were necessities for farmers and servants.
Archaeologists have discovered many figu­
rines holding baskets in Han tombs (Figure
5.3。 ).56
O ur knowledge of the basket, however,
does not help us understand the image of the
lodge Basket in the X i’an tomb. The artisans
depicted the lodge with a seated man holding
a string of stars (see Figure 5.27). The man,
who is wearing a robe, is not dressed for
5.29 . Collecting animal manure on a stone carving. physical labor like winnowing or cleaning. In
25-220 c e . Unearthed in 1981 at Guanzhuang in Mizhi, fact, he looks more like a master on whom
Shaanxi. Ink rubbing.
servants wait, as in the scene painted on a
brick discovered at Jiayuguan, Gansu (Figure 5.31).57 The soft cap around his topknot
even reminds us of the image of a deceased nobleman in a Chu tomb (see Figure 3.28).
The clothing that suggests high social rank also sets the man in the lodge Basket apart
from the hunter in the lodge Net and the servant in the lodge Dipper. His noble bearing
leads us to another reference to the lodge Basket. Just as the ancient Chinese relied on
the Net to signal rain, they looked toward the Basket to signal wind. They even personi­
fied the lodge Basket as the W ind Lord.58 Han artisans typically portrayed the W ind
 5.32. W ind Lord on a stone carving. Late second
century to early third century ce . Unearthed in
1959 at Dongjiazhuang in Anqiu, Shandong. Ink
rubbing.

5.30 . Figurine holding a basket. Second

century c e . Pottery. H. 48.2 cm. Unearthed
in 1941-42 from Tomb 666 in Pengshan,
Sichuan.

5.31. Dining scene on a painted brick. Third century ce.

36 x 17 cm. Unearthed in 1972-73 in Jiayuguan, Gansu.

 a
5.33. Lodge M aid {nu) in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X ian , (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

Lord as a person blowing a horn or a trumpet, such as the one carved in a Han tomb at
Anqiu, Shandong (Figure 5.32).59 The person representing the lodge Basket in the X i’an
tomb defies the pictorial convention. If the four stars were a trumpet, the person is hold­
ing, not blowing, the instrument.
The rest of the zoomorphic constellations in the X i’an tomb are M aid, Ox, and
Ghost. Composed of four stars, the lodge M aid is in the northern sky (see Figure 4.32).
The artisans portrayed it as a seated figure (Figure 5.33). Han artisans often adopted the
submissive posture to portray serving maids, like the shape of a bronze lamp found in
Dou Wans tomb (Figure 5.34).60The lodge Ox, next to the lodge M aid, includes at least
eight stars in the depiction of a man leading an ox, although, to be accurate, the number
of stars should be six (Figures 4.32,5.35). Many Han artisans mistook the brighter con­
stellation Oxherd (or River Drum) along the Milky Way for the dimmer lodge Ox. The
tomb artisans left the mistake uncorrected, incorporating the image of the Oxherd—
which was distinguished by three stars in a straight line一 into their representation of
the Ox (see Figure 4.32).61 They did add several more stars to set the Ox apart from the
 3
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5.34. Lamp. ca. 118-104 b c e . G ilt bronze. H. 48 cm.

Unearthed in 1968 from the tomb o f Dou Wan in 5.35. Lodge Ox (niu) in the painted tomb at Jiaotong
Mancheng, Hebei. University in X i’an, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

Oxherd, but they arranged stars in such a way that the lodge looks more like herding an
ox than like its original radiating form.
The pictorial details of the lodge Ghost in the southern sky are intriguing. The arti­
sans depicted it as two people carrying an unidentifiable creature on a stretcher (Fig­
ure 5.36). The image does not come directly from the literal meaning of the name of the
lodge, but from its alternative name, “ghost in a vehicle” (yugui 輿 鬼 ) . Sima Qian used
this a lt e r n a t iv e name in his Book o f Celestial Offices.62 Yu is a general term for transport
vehicles, including stretchers. Stretchers, which are usually just two long poles, can be
used to fetch water, as seen on a third-century brick from Jiayuguan (Figure 5.37).63They
can also be used to carry people, as seen on a stone coffin made no later than the sixth
century c e and discovered in Luoyang (Figure 5.3s).64The Xian tomb artisans chose to
depict the vehicle as a simple stretcher, probably to avoid concealing its passenger— a
ghost.
One of the most interesting debates in Chinese art history concerns the represen­
tation of ghosts.65 As we have seen, Han Fei was the first to define the issue. W hen
asked to name the most difficult and the easiest things to paint, he picked dogs and
horses as the most difficult, because people know them well and see them often, and
 8h 7h 6h

5.36. (a) Lodge Ghost (gui); (b) and (c) Lodge Ghost in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an.
 5.37. Fetching water on a painted brick. Third century c e . 36 x 17 cm. Unearthed in 1972-73 in Jiayuguan, Gansu.

he picked ghosts and goblins as the easi­

est, because they have no definite form.66
Zhang Heng followed Han Feis logic to
explain why the artisans of his time pre­
ferred depicting ghosts and goblins over
depicting dogs and horses: “Truly, this is
because substantial entities are difficult to
shape, whereas insubstantial counterfeits
are inexhaustible [in shape].，，67
For the ancient Chinese, were ghosts
as invisible and insubstantial as Han Fei
and Zhang Heng declared? There were
dissenters from this view. Ge Hong 葛
洪 (283-343 ce), a Daoist scholar, combed
historical documents to demonstrate that
spirits of the deceased could have meta­
morphosed into dogs or pigs.68We can see
dog imagery for a ghost in the legend that
5.38. Abandoning the elder father on a sarcophagus, ca. Ru Y i 如 意 ，the king of the Zhao King­
493~535 CE- Discovered in Luoyang, Henan. Ink rubbing. dom in the second century bce, appeared
as a dog to gain revenge on Queen Gao, who had poisoned him for being the son of
Emperor Gaos favorite concubine.69In fact, dogs were associated with ghosts long before
the Han. Earlier accounts of dogs as ghosts are in the almanacs (rishu 日書) excavated
from a Q in tomb at Shuihudi 睡 虎 地 ， Hubei. One almanac, which contains a demonog-
raphy with instructions on how to exorcise evil spirits, proposes dogs as a possible dis­
guise for ghosts who enter houses, seize husbands, and seduce wives.70
The pig imagery derived from an anecdote popular in the Eastern Zhou. Duke Xiang
襄 of the Q i State once sent Peng Sheng 彭 :i to kill Duke Huan of the Lu State, but
he later executed his loyal knight. In 686 b c e , Peng showed himself to Duke Xiang as
a large pig, who stood up like a man and screamed while being shot. The anecdote was
widely circulated from the Eastern Zhou to the Han. Scholars from both states recorded
this event.71 Nor did Han historians miss the story: Sima Qian included it in the history
of the Q i aristocratic families; Ban G u cited it in a discussion of omens.72 Wang Chong
even singled out the event to distinguish what he believed to have been real (the appear­
ance of a pig) from what he believed to have been imagined (the association of the pig
with the dead Peng Sheng).73
The Xia n tomb artisans had to present some kind of recognizable image for the lunar
lodge Ghost. They could have depicted a ghost as described in a well-known account. As
the mural shows, however, they portrayed the ghost as a monster with a large lump on
its back and thick and protuberant lips. The monster may look more like a pig than any
other animals associated with ghosts, as we can see by comparing it with the pig being
butchered in a scene painted on another brick at Jiayuguan (Figure 5.39).74 The depic­
tion of a ghost as a pig further suggests that the artisans and their intended viewers had
to stand on the same iconographical ground; only if the legend of Peng Sheng or other
stories employing similar imagery were widely circulated would the image of a pig have
signified the lodge Ghost. Nevertheless, the fleshy color of the monster’s face and the
strings of hair on its head make the monster look halfway between a pig and a man. By
portraying the ghost as a manlike pig (or a piglike man), the artisans successfully con­
veyed a sense of transformative dualism while avoiding the potential confusion between
a pig and a ghost manifested as a pig.
If we examine the mural more closely, we discover that the artisans attached no stars
to the image of the lodge Ghost; in fact, Ghost is the only lodge on the painted ceil­
ing without any celestial symbols. The lodge is believed to have contained five stars, but
why it inspired anyone to name it Ghost is unclear. One possible explanation, put forth
by Sun Xiaochun and Jacob Kistemaker, is the appearance of Praesepe, an open cluster
of about 1,000 stars in the zodiac constellation Cancer. That the cluster is visible to the
 5
3
3
5.39. Butchering a pig on a painted brick. Third century c e . 36 x 17 cm. Unearthed in 1972-73 in Jiayuguan, Gansu.

unaided eye as a small patch of bright haze may have led the ancient Chinese to make a
mythical association.75The Treatise on Astrology in the Kaiyuan Reign {Kaiyuan zh an jin g
開 兀 占 經 )， compiled in 729 ce, includes a passage from an earlier source describing this
milky spot as “white as powders, like clouds but not clouds, and like stars but not stars.
W hat can be seen is merely qu It is hence called ‘heaped corpses，[jish i 積 尸 ].”76 The
indefinite composition of the lunar lodge— misty looking and without bright stars—
may have influenced the artisans to omit stars from their illustration and instead to por­
tray a ghost in a vehicle.
Despite the artisans’typical disregard for astronomical accuracy, scholars have a
high regardfor the representation ofthe Chinese skyin the Xi’antomb. Accordingto
E. C. Krupp, this mural is probablyolder than the famous Egyptian “circular zodiac”
ofDendera, makingit the earliest celestial chart ever recovered.77Richard Stephenson
adds that the mural is alsounusual becausethe pictorial elaborationofthe entire set of
twenty-eight lunar lodges was rare in ancient East Asia.78Moreover, the visual depic­
tionoflunarlodgesshowshowtheHanpeoplemayhaveapproachedthepatterns inthe
skybasedontheir everydayastronomical or astrological knowledge.Themural conveys
not onlyhowthe Han artisans sawconstellations throughthe eyesofthe ancients—by
projectingaflyingbird ontothe southernsky,for instance, andaclimbingdragononto
theeasternskybut alsohowtheyspeculatedaboutimagesinheritedfromtheancients,
as in the scenes of netting a hare and carrying a ghost. To make their pictorial repre­
sentations more comprehensible, the artisans explored contemporary sources, includ­
ing popular visual motifs and well-known verbal accounts. The pictorial elaboration of
the twenty-eight lunar lodges in the X i’an tomb is therefore both a mixture of factual
knowledge and artistic expression, as well as a fusion of the past and the Han present.

Popular Astronomy

That astronomical knowledge was extremely popular in the Han is evident from the
many depictions of celestial bodies in art. The system of twenty-eight lunar lodges was
so well known that it became a rhetorical metaphor. Kong Zang 孔 藏 ，a Confucian
scholar active in the late second century bce, compared the twenty-eight chapters of
the Book o f Documents to the twenty-eight lunar lodges.79 Sima Qian also associated the
thirty chapters entitled “Hereditary Families” in his Records o f the Grand H istorian with
the celestial images; the hereditary families, he said, should support the throne as faith­
fully as the twenty-eight lunar lodges encircle the Pole Star.80
Royal experts and learned scholars did not monopolize celestial knowledge, however.
Documents for people of lower social rank referred to the twenty-eight lunar lodges.
For instance, the almanacs excavated from the aforementioned tomb at Shuihudi, whose
occupant was a local functionary and who probably died in 217 bce, cited the system. In a
section entitled “Stars,” the twenty-eight lunar lodges indicate auspicious times for mar­
riage, birth, worship, travel, trade, hunting, construction, and so on.81 The names of the
lunar lodgesw hich were probably used for astrological purposes— also appeared on
bamboo slips unearthed from Han military posts along the northwestern border.82 The
artisans who represented the structure of the entire sky in the X i’an tomb were probably
illiterate but shared in the popular knowledge of astronomy.
Although the mural of the Xi'an tomb suffers from inaccuracies, it does preserve
the structure of the twenty-eight lunar lodges within the widely accepted notion of
the Canopy Heaven. Other depictions show no structure at all. In the painted tomb in
Pinglu, Shanxi, the sun, the moon, and the cardinal emblems are intermixed with clouds
and more than 100 unlinked stars in unidentified groups (see Figure 4.25).83 The moon,
clouds, and numerous stars on the ceiling of a Han tomb discovered in Ordos, Inner
Mongolia, also appear out of order (Figure 5.40).84 And in a rendering on a narrow, rect­
angular ceiling of Tomb 61 in Luoyang, stars are dispersed among clouds (Figures 5.41,
3.61).85 Xia Nai has proposed viewing the Tomb 61 ceiling as a representation of the
 irst century bce to early
rthed in 1992 from Tomb ]
ngolia. Drawing.

8
5.41 Celestial images. First h alf o f the first century b c e .
M ural. Uneart:hed in 1957 in Luoyang, Henan. Drawing.

entire set of twenty-eight lunar lo dges, but there is no inherent ordei.in the depiction to
support his tentative reconstructi on.86 The artisans of the Luoyang, Ordos, and Pinglu
tombs may have been under no cobligation to duplicate celestial charts. O r perhaps the
sources the artisans consulted were catalogues with illustrations of ce：rtain constellations,
not charts with views of the entin
 Star catalogues were widely circulated in the Han, especially those attributed to Shi
Shen 石申 and Gan De 甘德 from the Warring States period and to W u Xian from the
Shang dynasty. Sun Xiaochun and Jacob Kistemaker argue that Shi Shens catalogue,
updated by Han followers, carried greater weight; it mentioned 783 individual stars in
120 constellations and included the twenty-eight lunar lodges. Gan Des and W u Xian’s
catalogues were based more on ideology, but their influence was also profound because
they added 118 and 44 more constellations, respectively, to Shi Shens.87 None of the three
works, except for a compendium, has survived. We can only speculate on what a Han
star catalogue looked like by examining later examples, like Su Song’s 蘇 頌 (1020-1101)
Essentials o f the M ethodfor the N ew A r m iliary Sphere and Celestial Globe {Xin y i xiang fa
yao 新 儀 象 法 要 ).88 Su presented the stars in the northern polar region within a circle,
but he organized other stars, such as those observed from the autumn to the spring equi­
noxes, within rectangular zones (Figure 5.42). He named every constellation in maps,
but added no connecting lines to indicate how stars were grouped into constellations.
Removing their names would have made it difficult for an untrained reader to identify
most of the constellations introduced in the catalogue. If star catalogues were ever illus­
trated this way in the Han, they could have been the visual sources on which the artisans
of the Pinglu, Ordos, and Luoyang tombs relied.
Astronomical accuracy varied in Han art in more than the overall structure of the sky.
In the X i’an tomb, the artisans convincingly incorporated six lunar lodges into the body
of a dragon, which suggests that they were equipped with adequate astronomical knowl­
edge to arrange affiliated stars in an artistic way (see Figures 4.6,4.7). O n a carved stone
in Nanyang, the artisans reduced six lunar lodges to four groups of stars but attached
them appropriately to the head, belly, back, and tail of a dragon (see Figure 4.9). They
also correctly placed the lodge Basket— the only lunar lodge not connected to dragon
imagery in the eastern sky~next to the tail of the dragon, even though they added
two extra stars. These renditions display a creative departure from whatever astronomical
sources the artisans may have consulted. The Blue Dragon on another stone in Nanyang
is associated with six stars in aT shape (see Figure 4.10). The arrangement indicates that
the artisans who made the carving did not care— and perhaps did not know~what was
accurate.
There are many reasons for the various degrees of astronomical accuracy in Han art.
Artisans，freedom to balance art and knowledge is one. The quality of star catalogues
artisans may have used as references is another. Zhang Heng, in his comments on rep­
resenting ghosts versus dogs and horses, was not concerned about the nature of repre­
sentation; rather, he appropriated Han Fei’s argument only to criticize the discipline of
5.42. Celestial charts in Essentials o f the M ethodfor the N ew A rm illary Sphere and
Celestial Globe. O riginally published in 1088 c e . Prints in Siku quanshu, 1773-1782.
(a) Stars in the Ziw ei enclosure, (b) Stars in the northeastern sky.
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5.43. Chart o f comets for divination, ca. 168

b c e . Ink and color on silk. H . 48 cm.

Unearthed in 1973-74 from Tomb 3 at M awangdui in Changsha, Hunan. Detail.

astronomy. For Zhang, those who were afraid to fall behind others in learning 'prognos­
tication charts” [tuchen 圖讖 or tuw ei 圖緯）were like the painters who preferred depict­
ing ghosts and goblins— both focused on insubstantial counterfeits. A leading astrono­
mer, Zhang felt obliged to point out what he considered a false approach to celestial
bodies: emphasis on ideological construction over empirical observation.89 Cai Yong, a
learned scholar who saw the end of the Han, took the same attitude and blamed those
who easily believed the prognostication charts for the calendrical incorrectness at the
court.90
Zhang Hengs and Cai Yongs criticisms serve as evidence that prognostication
charts were more popular than celestial charts. Accordingly, they had a greater impact
on the way the Han Chinese learned about and viewed the stars. A prognostication
chart unearthed from Tomb 3 at M awangdui contains images o f comets and clouds that
were based more on im agination than on em pirical observation (Figure 5.43).The author
also added divinatory texts— mostly associated with national affairs— to the celestial
images.91 Some later prognostication charts were preserved in the Cave Library in Dun-
 huang. An eighth-century manuscript, probably copied from earlier sources, presents
a circle of stars surrounding the North Pole and a rectangle of stars outside that circle
(Figure 5.44); these are similar to the two modes of representation in Su Song’s Essen­
tials o f the M ethodfor the N ew Arm illary Sphere and Celestial Globe?1 Unlike Su, however,
the authors of the Dunhuang charts standardized the shapes of constellations crucial to
divination while neglecting the positions of other stars. Despite criticisms from more
empirically oriented astronomers, the prognostication charts were probably included in
the star catalogues available to artisans, who copied their possibly imprecise details.
In addition to celestial treatises, maps, and catalogues, we cannot ignore the oral
tradition that may have facilitated the spread of astronomical knowledge in the Han.
Nothing specifically from the Han has been passed down, but two later examples may
offer us a glimpse of how oral transmission of astronomical knowledge might have been
achieved. The first example is the Poem o f the Occult Images {Xuan xiang shi 玄 象 詩 )• The
poem, which is not mentioned in any received texts, was preserved in the Cave Library
in Dunhuang. It must have been compiled before 621 ce because a dated inscription, a
copy of the poem, and other documents are written on the same scroll. Scholars have
identified the poem from two different scrolls, which attests to its potential popularity.93
The poem has five characters to a line and a total of 246 lines. It introduces the constel­
lations in Shi Shens star manual, continues with those in Gan Des manual, moves on to
those in W u Xian’s manual, and ends with those surrounding the North Star. The author
did not elaborate on the shape and structure of each constellation, but he made clear its
relative position. His purpose, as he explained in the last two lines, was to help people re­
member the names of the constellations and identify them in the sky: “Use this memo­
randum to calculate pacing, how can all stars hide [from you]?” It was challenging for the
author to incorporate the names and positions of constellations into a rhymed verse, but
his rhymes made memorization much easier than it would otherwise have been. Even an
illiterate person could have managed to remember the constellations well enough.
The second example is the Song o fPacing the Heavens (Bu tian ge 步 天 歌 )， traditionally
attributed to Wang Xim ing 王希明 in the Kaiyuan 開兀 era (713-741 ce).94 This verse,
with seven characters on each line and 372 lines in total, is e v e n longer than the Poem o f
the Occult Images. Its author paid attention to the positions and shapes of constellations.
In most cases, he described them in terms of their names. For example, he said that the
lodge Basket contained four stars resembling a winnowing basket. He introduced the
lodge Ox as six stars, close to the bank of the Heavenly River, that take the form of an
ox with two horns on its head but missing a leg. He portrayed the lunar lodge Ghost as
four stars that look like a wooden cabinet, with something white at its center because
 w I —
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 of the qi accumulated from corpses. In other cases, the author exercised his imagina­
tion. For instance, he characterized the lodge Net as eight stars shaped like a melon. He
defined the lodge Swine as sixteen stars surrounding a worn shoe with a narrow waist
and a pointed toe— Sima Qian and the X i’an tomb artisans compared the lodge to a pig,
not a shoe.95 By hearing the song, people, literate or not, could learn the shapes of the
constellations. The song also shows us that there was more than one way to picture the
shape of a constellation. Descriptions of the constellations had not been stabilized even
as late as the eighth century; human projections onto the sky were an ongoing and end­
less process.
Oral tradition may provide a key for us to grasp how astronomy came to be everyday
knowledge in the Han. Even without any surviving examples to study, we can postulate
that astronomical formulas in rhyme, long or short, were created and circulated in a soci­
ety where people believed in the correlation between human affairs and celestial signs.
Rhymed formulas offered commoners opportunities to understand Heaven and master
their own fate. Some artisans may have gained astronomical knowledge in this way. The
six-star depiction of the Blue Dragon on the Nanyang stone was unlike the depiction
that anyone who had ever looked at a celestial map, star catalogue, or prognostication
chart would have seen (see Figure 4.10). But what if the artisans who produced the carv­
ing had only heard that the dragon in the eastern sky governed six constellations? They
could have gotten the number right through the oral tradition; they just needed visual
sources to make the structure correct. The Nanyang carving informs us that the artisans
were not completely clueless, as we first assumed.
Oral tradition, in turn, helps us to understand the X ian tomb better. The artisans
who designed the mural must have consulted some visual sources— celestial maps, star
catalogues, or prognostication charts— because their representation of the twenty-eight
lunar lodges was well grounded. There was, however, a huge gap between the basic com­
position of the constellations and their pictorial elaboration. D id the artisans invent
the images on their own? Did they learn them from mentors? Or did they get inspira­
tion from an oral tradition, perhaps from rhymed formulas that used plain similes to
help people remember the constellations? The pictorial details that the artisans added
had to make sense to the intended viewers, be they the commissioners of the tomb or
the deceased. Everyday knowledge shaped by oral tradition may have been the middle
ground where artists and viewers met.
Archaeologists discovered another painted tomb in Dingbian 定 邊 ， Shaanxi, in 2003.
Their brief report informs us that it contains the visual representation of the twenty-
eight lunar lodges plus eleven stars or constellations on the ceiling.96 I can tell from my
preliminary examination of the unpublished photographs, however, that the pictorial
details are different from those in the X i’an tomb. These differences have at least two
implications: the shared knowledge of astronomy, which was the foundation of pictorial
elaborations, had regional variations; and regional variations in the depictions of the sky
sprang from the vigor of popular astronomy during the Han period.

Space or Place

The representation of the twenty-eight lunar lodges, however significant, is only part
of the murals in the X i’an tomb. The tomb has two side chambers along the passage-
way leading to the rectangular main chamber, which is 4.55 meters long, 1.83 meters
wide, and 2.25 meters high (Figure 5.45).97 Compared to the tomb of the King of Liang,
whose main chamber is double the size, the X i， an tomb is moderate in scale, but it is
large enough for a person to walk around in.98The wooden chamber built for Lady Dai,
though larger than the main chamber in the Xi'an tomb, is partitioned and has four cas-
keted coffins snugly fitted into the central compartment; there is no room for anyone to
move around (see Figure 3.16)." Compared to Lady Dais tomb, the moderate-size X i’an
tomb has a more distinguished architectural space.
Although the X i’an tomb was disturbed and looted sometime in the past, archaeolo­
gists have unearthed a variety of objects from the main and side chambers, including
a bronze mirror, several pottery containers, and some jade objects, coins, weapons, and
chariot fittings. These objects were buried with the deceased, a man who died at the age
of approximately fifty-five to sixty-five; his corpse, now decayed, was placed in the main
chamber.100 I f space is an area in which the relationships between measurable things are
played out, then this architectural space was intended to be a mortuary space. Yet the
funerary goods, mostly daily utensils, give the illusion that the space was a house, a mate­
rial continuity of the human world. If 1 place is a particular form of space that expresses
the sense of belonging that those who dwell in it feel, then the tomb storing funerary
goods used by or made for the occupant was also a place for the deceased, not just a
space.
The X i’an tomb is furnished not only with funerary goods, but also with murals. The
most famous is the one with celestial images on the arched ceiling of the main chamber.
W hy did the artisans choose to represent the twenty-eight lunar lodges, the structure of
the sky, in the tomb? Scholars are inclined to answer by pointing to Sima Qians account
of the First Emperor’s mausoleum, which was said to have “the patterns of Heaven on its
 3
4
5

5.45. Structure o f the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X ian , (a) Floor plan, (b) Photograph.

top and the features of Earth at its bottom .，，

101 The combination of Heaven and Earth
makes a tomb more than a house. The combination makes it a replica of the cosmos.
Representing the “pattern of Heaven”一 the twenty-eight lunar lodges一 in the X ian
tomb could have defined the mortuary space as the cosmos in miniature.
But the representation of the twenty-eight lunar lodges is only part of the visual pro­
gram on the ceiling in the tomb. The sun and the moon appear inside the circular band.
The artisans followed the convention of depicting the sun as a red disc with a flying bird
and the moon as a white disc with a running hare and an elongated toad (Figure 5.46).
Flying cranes among floating clouds fill in otherwise blank areas both inside and outside
the circular band (Figure 5.47). According to the Book o f the K ing ofH uainan, cranes live
as long as 1,000 years.102 Some people even believed that cranes would turn from white to
black when they reached 260 years of age, as recorded in the Classic o f the Physiognomy o f
Cranes {Xiang hejin g 相 鶴 經 )， a book lost to us but frequently cited by Tang scholars.103
In the northwestern corner of the ceiling, among the ubiquitous clouds and cranes,
sits a toad (Figure 5.48). Another toad, in company with a hare, is in the moon. As we
saw earlier, the Han people believed that the toad in the moon was Heng E, who was
transformed into a toad after she stole the elixir of immortality and fled to the moon.104
Han artisans often represented the Mother Queen of the West with a toad, probably
 5.46. Sun and moon in the painted tomb at
Jiaotong University in X i’an, (a) Sun, (b) M oon.
 3

5.47. Cranes in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an.

because the elixir that Heng E stole originally came from the goddess. In Ge Hongs
Daoist world, toads were ranked high among long-lived creatures; they were believed to
live for 3,000 years.105 In a Han folk song, toads were even regarded as desirable ingre­
dients for the elixir; people believed that taking toad pills (or toad balls) helped them
become immortal.106
 5.48. Toad in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an.

5.49. Three-legged crow in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an.

In the corner opposite the toad is a three-legged crow (Figure 5.49). In a rhapsody by
Sima Xiangru, the Mother Queen of the West has a three-legged crow to perform daily
chores.107 In Bu Qianqius tomb, artisans placed a three-legged crow by the hand of the
female deceased, who is depicted riding on a phoenix toward the Mother Queen of the
West (see Figure 3.70). But the Mother Queen of the West is not present in the X i’an
 3
49

tomb. Like the toad, the three-legged crow, derived from the cult of the Mother Queen
of the West, became a self-contained symbol of immortality.
There are striking differences between the design on the lacquer chest introduced at
the beginning of the chapter and the mural in the Xi'an tomb. The modes of represen­
tation一 calligraphic versus pictorial— are dissimilar, and so is the element placed at the
center. The artisans who decorated the chest let the Northern Dipper anchor the design
and control the surrounding lunar lodges. The Northern Dipper, whose dominance Sima
Qian declared in the Book o f Celestial Offices, is nowhere to be found in the X i，
an tomb.
Instead, the artisans filled the spaces inside and outside of the circular band that car­
ries the lunar lodges with floating clouds and flying cranes. W hat made the cranes and
clouds so important that they replaced the Northern Dipper as the center of the sky?
Before answering this question, we should examine the murals that are all over the
main chamber in the X i’an tomb. The artisans used a strip of repeated rhomboid pat­
terns to divide the murals into two parts (see Figure 5.14). The upper part includes the
arched ceiling and the segmental space on the rear wall, and the lower part includes
the three walls. The murals on the three walls are not preserved as well as those in the
upper part of the tomb. Still, we can tell that swirling clouds continue to dominate the
design. Among the clouds, various animals roam about (Figure 5.50). The scenes remind
us of the painted coffin in Lady Dais tomb that displays hybrids, immortals, and aus­
picious animals among clouds (see Figures 3.43-52). The only difference is that in the
X i’an tomb, the animals are mundane, like tigers, deer, cranes, pheasants, wild geese,
and so forth. Archaeologists have tried to argue that the murals on the walls represent
the human world in compliance with the cosmic model allegedly in the First Emperors
mausoleum.108The repetition of the cloud motif, however, indicates the lower part of the
tomb as a realm above the human world, though not the Heaven depicted on the ceiling.
Like the ceiling, the segmental space on the rear wall is filled with swirling clouds
and animals (Figure 5.51). A deer is at the bottom, two flying cranes are at two sides, and
a creature holding a fungus is at the center. The creature holding a fungus reminds us of
the immortals in Han art (see Figures 3.39,3.51,3.52,4.63), except that the hairs standing
up on his head and his long tail defy our earlier impression that an immortal is a human
with wings (Figure 5.52). Such a portrayal was rare but not exceptional. An immortal
with upright hairs and a tail is painted in the tomb unearthed at Qianjingtou 淺井頭 in
Luoyang (Figure 5.53).109 Another comparable image is in the tomb discovered on the
campus of the Technical University in X i’an.110 The immortal on the segmental space
in the Technical University tomb even has a pair of erect ears in addition (Figure 5.54).
Both the Qianjingtou and the Technical University tombs date to the late first century
 o5
3

5.50. Anim als roaming among clouds in the painted tomb at

Jiaotong University in X i’an, (a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.

about the same time when the Jiaotong University tomb was built. These examples
bc e ,
indicate that there was another Han trend that made an immortal a hybrid of human
and animal. The fungus {zhi 芝)，or mushroom of immortality, held by the immortal
was thought to be a macrobiotic food, like toads, to bring long life.111 Even before the
Han, mushrooms of immortality were ingredients in an elixir at the court of the First
Emperor.112 In Han art, the magic plant was associated with either the immortals, as
here, or with the Mother Queen of the West (see Figures 3.74,4.37b).
Beneath the long-tailed immortal is a deer fixed at the bottom of the segmental space.
Like cranes and toads, deer in Ge Hong’s world were believed to live as long as 1,000
years.113 Deer held a significant position in Han tombs, often appearing prominently
on a door or on the tympanum above a door. In Lady D ai’s tomb, deer are associated
with the Kunlun Mountains, the immortals, and the cardinal emblems in their not-yet-
standardized grouping (see Figures 3.37,3.38,3.52). The artisans and their patrons appar­
ently regarded deer as helpers in the ascent to Heaven. The carving on a stone coffin from
Nanxi, Sichuan, reaffirms this belief. There, an immortal and a deer guide the deceased
couple to Heavens gate (see Figure 3.76a). The Han people even imagined deer-drawn
carts for immortals, as Zhang Heng described in his rhapsody.114An immortal driving a
 I
5
3

5.51. Celestial ascent in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an,

(a) Photograph, (b) Drawing.
5 .52. Immortal holding a fungus in the painted tomb at Jiaotong University in X i’an.

5.53. Immortal. Second h alf o f the first century

b c e . M ural. Unearthed

in 1992 from a painted tomb at Qianjingtou in Luoyang, Henan.

 5
3
3
5.54. Immortal. Second h alf o f the first century
b c e . M ural. Unearthed in 2004

from a painted tomb at the Technical University in X i’an, Shaanxi.

5 .55. Deer-drawn cart. 25-220 ce. Stone carving. 125 x 46 cm. Unearthed in Nanyang, Henan.

deer-drawn cart is vividly depicted on a stone discovered in Nanyang (Figure 5.55). The
figure seated in the cart but not engaged in driving may be either an immortal or the
deceased being taken to the otherworld. The depiction in the X i’an tomb is also ambigu­
ous. Does the deer carry the long-tailed immortal to a certain location and wait for his
return? Or does the deer await the arrival of the tomb occupant, whom it will carry to
join the immortal above for the journey heavenward?
 5
3

There is a strong sense o f upw ard m ovem ent in the scene on the segm ental space.
The cranes at both sides flap their wings, moving up through the clouds at full speed.
The clouds surge up from the bottom, twisting ever higher and linking the deer to the
immortal, who is climbing and about to touch the ceiling. I f the immortal, the deer, the
cranes, and the clouds are the guides, helpers, or companions of the tomb occupant, then
their destination must be paradise— and they are all evidently heading toward the ceil­
ing. The ceiling must therefore depict the imagined paradise. Although the representa­
tion of the sun, the moon, and the twenty-eight lunar lodges suggests that the location
of paradise is high in the sky, the presence of cranes, a toad, and a three-legged crow sig­
nals that it is not the physical sky, but in a place that promises longevity and immortality.
The murals in the Xian tomb are thus not an exercise in astronomy but an artistic effort
that modifies astronomical knowledge for a religious purpose. Although the funerary
goods characterize the tomb as a place for material continuity with the human world,
the murals make the tomb a place that stands for another world.
Does the painted ceiling truly depict the world in which the deceased may reside?
Compared to later representations of Buddhist paradises, such as the Pure Land and
the Tushita Heavens, the representation of Heaven in the X i’an tomb gives no sense
of space一 there are no buildings, no terraces, no courtyards, nowhere to linger or stay
(Figure 5.56). The lack of spatiality inevitably cancels the locality of the paradise on the
ceiling. Heaven as portrayed on the ceiling is neither a space nor a place. The absence
of an illusion of space brings us back to the presence of a strong movement upward
on the rear wall. The artisans and their patrons appeared to be more interested in the
action of ascension than in the fabrication of Heaven. Nor were they alone in their
preference.
Tomb 61 in Luoyang was likely built one or two decades earlier than the X i’an tomb.
The main chamber, partitioned by a gable on a pillar, is slightly larger than the main
X i’an chamber; it is 6.1 meters long, 2.35 meters wide, and 2.3 meters high (see Figure
3.59).115Hie deceased, apparently a couple, were placed in the rear chamber. The painting
on the side of the gable facing the rear chamber depicts two winged immortals riding
on winged dragons toward a half-open gate with five bi discs above its lintel— the discs
mark it as Heavens gate (see Figure 3.60). If the deceased guided by the immortals pass
the gate, they will reach Heaven, which is portrayed on the ceiling in the front chamber
(see Figure 3.61). The painting of Heaven, as obscure as that in the X i’an tomb, includes
the sun, the moon, curling clouds, and many unidentifiable stars (see Figure 5.41). How
the deceased couple reach Heaven’s gate with the aid of dragons and immortals is pre­
sented more clearly than whatever awaits them in Heaven.
 5
3
5
5.56. Amit^yus’ Pure Land. First half o f the eighth century. Mural.
In Cave 320 o f the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang, Gansu.

Bu Qianqius tomb in Luoyang was Tomb 6is contemporary in the second half of the
first century b c e . Its structure is similar to that of Tomb 61，although it is smaller and
has no gable partition.116 A couple is buried there, too. The mural on the ceiling presents
both the procession and its destination (see Figures 4.60-63).Tlie artisans employed thir­
teen bricks to detail the procession but only seven bricks to delineate the destination. An
immortal is leading the procession, and the deceased couple is riding on a phoenix and a
serpent-like creature at the end. The Mother Queen of the West, her attendants, and the
cardinal emblems are between the immortals and the deceased to ensure the success of
the journey heavenward. The sun and the moon with their jym and yang embodiments—
Fu X i and Nii Wa一 stand for the destination of the procession. Again, the artisans and
their patrons were concerned about how the deceased could approach Heaven, not what
they would find there.
Lady D ai’s banner, produced a century earlier than the painted tombs, supplies more
details about the realm of Heaven (see Figures 3.18, 3.30). W hat define the realm of
 6
5
3

Heaven are the sun, the moon，and the gate guarded by a pair of porters. A human-
serpent hybrid appears to govern the realm, in which the pleasure of music is promised.
A ll creatures and things are symmetrically rendered on a flat pictorial plane; they are
more iconic than spatial. The most compelling and vigorous forces are the two dragons,
which reappear on a more magnificent scale below the celestial field. That the mag­
nificent dragons traverse a bi disc, the symbol of round Heaven, declares their power to
reach Heaven. Their upward movement furthers the action of ascension. The signs of
ascending to Heaven visually dominate the banner, not the depiction of Heaven itself.
The program on the three decorated coffins in the tomb reinforces the idea of ascension.
Feathers form a floral design— the symbol of the floral canopy that glorifies the Heav­
enly Thearch— and the cloud pattern on the surface of the innermost coffin; they suggest
the capacity to fly or allude to an immortal with feathered wings who can fly (see Figures
3.53，3.54). O n the second coffin are all the creatures and things that help the deceased
approach Heaven: the immortal, the cardinal emblems, the deer climbing a mountain,
and the dragons traversing a bi disc (see Figures 3.36-41). O n the third coffin is a won­
derland among the clouds where immortals， hybrids, and auspicious animals reside. The
deceased emerges from the bottom as if to join the wonderland (see Figures 3.42-52， 57).
I f this wonderland is Heaven, it looks more like a place to stay，however indefinite its
location among the engulfing clouds. O r perhaps the wonderland is an outpost on the
way to Heaven. A t any rate, the visual program for Lady D ai’s coffins， like the one on her
banner, emphasizes the means to ascend rather than the destination itself.
The carvings on the stone coffins in Sichuan, most of which were produced more
than a century later than the painted tombs in the metropolitan areas, display a greater
sense of place. The breakthrough has something to do with the growing interest in the
land of the immortals ruled by the Mother Queen of the West. The Nanxi coffin depicts
a procession arriving at a half-open gate through which the deceased are expected to go
in order to visit the Mother Queen of the West (see Figure 3.76). That the deceased can
reach Heaven from her land is suggested by the gate-pillars with a phoenix depicted on
the two ends of the coffin and by the floral design on the lid. Like the gate on Lady Dais
banner, the half-open gate on the coffin suggests the existence of a building or a com­
pound, but nothing is visible beyond the gate except for the icon of the Mother Queen
of the West.
In contrast, the Xingjing coffin shows a separation of journey and arrival (see Fig­
ure 3.77). The deceased is supposed to enter the gate half opened by the maid, visit the
Mother Queen of the West, and enjoy sexual pleasure. The stairways and the pillars with
brackets add to an illusion of an architectural space in which one could move around.
 3
ThedomainoftheMother QueenoftheWest looks like areal place, but the realmof
Heavenis as insubstantial as ever, indicated onlybythe gate-pillars with aphoenixon
the two ends of the coffin.
On the Pixian coffin, the artisans were less interested in the Mother Queen ofthe
West.Theymovedhericontooneend,whereit isbalancedbythesunandthemoonon
the other end; together theystandfor the immortalitypromisedbythe Mother Queen
of the West and the eternality granted by Heaven (see Figure 4.37). The artisans pre­
sented places on the two sides of the coffin box: one is the heavenly palace— it is marked
by the gate-pillars with a phoenix and enlivened with a reception scene— and the other
is the immortal mountains in the Eastern Sea，given life by the immortal playing chess
(see Figures 4.38,4.39). Like the carvings on the ends of the coffin, the places illustrated
on the sides are meant to ensure immortality and eternality, but they are more spa­
tial than iconic. Still, the artisans were unable to go beyond pictorial convention. They
inserted carriages presumably conveying the deceased into the heavenly palace and the
immortal mountains. O n the lid of the coffin they also placed signs of Heaven— the per­
sonified Oxherd and the Weaving M aid near the M ill^ W ay~and signs of ascension
to Heaven— a dragon and a tiger holding a bi disc (see Figure 4.37a). Hie Han people
appeared to believe that as long as a deceased person was guaranteed passage to Heaven,
all would end well. Heaven, a place for the deceased in a mortuary space，was there­
fore reduced to a group of signs that are often realized by celestial bodies and various
fantasies.
To sum up，celestial bodies were instrumental to the Han approach to the belief in
ascendingtoHeaven.Highinthe s岭，theirpresenceconvenientlycreatedaspaceabove
thehumanworld. Obscureandremote,theirpresencejust aseasilynegatedanysenseof
place on the planar surface. The artisans could then make the ascent— a process rather
than a destination— the focal point of the visual programs they devised for the deceased.
Nowonder the pictorial representation ofcelestial bodies，accurate or not，
prevailedin
Han funerary art.
 CONCLUSION

Visibility and Visuality

Scholars are inclined to weigh texts more than images when they unveil the past. In
depictionsofHeaveninHanChina,however,textsandimagespreservedifferentaspects
ofthe past. The painted tomb atJiaotongUniversityinXian does not illustrate Sima
Qian’s renowned Book o f Celestial Offices' its pictorial elaboration of the twenty-eight
lunarlodgescastslight onthepopularizationofastronomy,whichSimadidnot address.
Nor does the visual programofLadyDai’stombat Mawangdui illustrate the Chuele­
gies；it offers adifferent perspective onpost-mortemimmortality.Thebeliefin ascend­
ingtoHeavenandthecult oftheMother QueenoftheWest arerarelyrecordedinthe
extant Hantexts; it ismostlythroughimagesthatwegainunderstanding.
IndepictionsofHeaven,textsandimagesbothrepresenttacit knowledge. SimaQian
and the Xian tomb painters reveal howthe Han people mapped the sky.The artisans
who furnished LadyDai’s tomb and the writers who created and developed the Chu
elegies impart the Han fantasyofcelestialjourneys. The designers ofthe Bright Halls
andthecompilersofThe Z.hou Gnomon showtheinfluenceoftheconceptoftheCanopy
Heaven. Ihe functionaries who commissioned the cliff engravings along the Western
Passageemployedbothtexts andimagestoconveythe moral implicationofomens.
Although artisans playedacrucial roleintransformingknowledgeinto images, they
did not accomplish the transformation all alone. The process—not simplytranslating
text into image—involvedother agents.The agents couldbepeople: amaster ofmeth­
ods supplied the layout ofthe Fenggao Bright Hall; Confucian scholars brought their
classical training to the construction ofthe Bright Halls in Chang’anandLuoyang. In
manycases, the agents wereillustrated catalogues for pragmatic uses, fromwhicharti­
sanssoughtinspirationtodepictomensandcelestialbodies.Theagentscouldalsobethe
orallytransmittedrhymesandlegendsthat helpedspreadknowledgeofastronomy, cos-
mology， andmythology.WesawhowtheHanartisanslearnedabout famouslandmarks
 C .l. Celestial images. First to second century c e . Stone carving. 327 x 164 cm.
Unearthed in 1988 at Qilingang in Nanyang, Henan. Ink rubbing.

inthe capital~the immortals palmsfor receivingthe dew,the GatewithB i Discs, and

the Gate-pillars with Phoenixes—fromoral tradition andborrowed themto stand for
sweet dewandthegate ofHeavenintheirwork.
Picturing Heaven, after all, required both visual signification and social communi­
cation. On the basis oftacit knowledge, artisans encodedimages, andviewers decoded
them. Nevertheless, the semantics ofthe celestial signs_ the relation of signs to refer­
ents~was often open to interpretation. Howthe travelers whowent along the West­
ernPassageunderstoodthe cliffengravings differentlydepended, first，onwhether they
wereliterate.Whenscholarsandofficialswhotookpartinthecourt debateattheWhite
Tiger Hall agreed on the numerical symbols ofthe Bright Hall, theymayor maynot
havecapturedthe original intention ofthosewhohaderectedthebuildingin Luoyang
two decades earlier. Some scholars even advocated the monthlyobservances that were
saidtohavebeenperformedbythesonofHeavenintheBright Hallbutwerenevercar­
riedout byanyHanemperors inanyBright Halls.
The syntaxofcelestial signs—the relation ofsigns to signs—alsovariedin Han art.
Take, for example, the carving on the ceiling of a first-century tomb at Qilingang in
Nanyang,Henan(FigureC.i).1Theceiling,whichiscomposedofsixflagstones,showsa
seatedfiguresurroundedbythecardinal emblemsagainstabackgroundfilledwithswirl­
ing clouds. The central group—a seated figure and the cardinal emblems—is flanked
bytwo symmetricallyrendered pairs. The inner pair comprises the sun, held byhigh-
hattedFuXi (ontheright), andthemoon， heldbylong-hairedNiiWa(ontheleft); the
 outer pair comprises the seven-star Northern D ip­
per and the six-star Southern Dipper. The identity
of the seated figure is ambiguous. If the seated figure
is Grand Unity, then the ceiling represents the Han
sky, where the supreme deity resided in the Central
Palace and controlled the four quarters through the
cardinal emblems: the Blue Dragon governed the
Eastern Palace, the W hite Tiger governed the West­
ern Palace, the Red Bird governed the Southern Pal­
ace, and the Dark Warrior governed the Northern
Palace. But if the seated figure is the Yellow Tliearch,
C .2 . Inscription on a pottery jar. First h alf
o f the second century c e . Unearthed in 1957 the central group represents the Five Thearchs: the
at Sanlicun in Chang’an， Shaanxi. Drawing. Yellow Thearch at the center, the Blue Thearch in the
east, the W hite Thearch in the west, the Red Thearch
in the south, and the Black Thearch in the north. During the reign of Emperor W u, the
Five Thearchs were believed to aid Grand Unity, but before and after W us promotion of
the cult of Grand Unity, the Five Thearchs sufficed to stand for Heaven. They were the
main recipients of imperial sacrifices to Heaven atYong in the Q in dynasty and the early
Western Han and at the Luoyang Bright Hall in the Eastern Han.
The pairing of the Dippers may help us determine the relation of the celestial signs
on the Qilingang ceiling. The Southern Dipper, one of the lunar lodges, did not appear
in the received texts as the antithesis of the Northern Dipper until Gan Bao 干 寶 （ fl.
317-322 c e ) compiled Records o f Searching the Supernatural {Sou shen j i 搜 神 記 ).2 Gan
introduced the Northern Dipper as the God of Death and the Southern Dipper as the
God of Birth. Although Gan did not give any explanation for the attributions, some
Han archaeological finds provide us with clues. For instance, the inscription on a pot­
tery jar unearthed in Chang’an， dated to the mid-first century, identifies the Lord of the
Northern Dipper [beidou ju n 北 斗 君 ）as the deity in charge of death (Figure C.2).3 The
Han people probably promoted the Southern Dipper and assigned birth as its area of
responsibility at least partly for the sake of antithesis.
We can also trace the pairing of the Dippers to the dualistic mode of Han thought.
Yang Xiong, for example， wrote, “The sun moves eastward while the heavens move west­
ward. The heavens and the sun cross paths. Yin 2Mdyang alternate in their circuits. Death
and birth are intertwined. Only then do the myriad things become inseparably bound.， ，4
He expounded on the idea in The Grand M ystery (Tai xuan 太 玄 )：
 As soon as the sun turns south, the myriad things die.
As soon as the sun turns north, the myriad things are born.
As soon as the Northern Dipper points north,
the myriad things empty out.
As soon as the Northern Dipper points south,
the myriad things fill up.
The sun in its southward path proceeds toward the right
[of the Pole Star], and then returns in a leftward path.
The Northern Dipper in its southward path proceeds toward the
left [of the Pole Star], and then returns in a rightward path.
Sometimes going left, sometimes going right; sometimes dying,
sometimes living.5

According to the concept of the Spherical Heaven, the heavens rotate clockwise, and the
sun moves counterclockwise.6W hen the heavens and the sun cross paths in the south—
that is，when the Northern Dipper points south and the sun turns north一 the yang force
is replenished and things are born. Conversely, when the heavens and the sun cross paths
in the north, the yin force is replenished and things die. The observation that the North­
ern Dipper pointed north and then south was somehow replaced by the ideological
opposition of the Northern Dipper and the Southern Dipper, as seen in the QUingang
carving. The carving was made several centuries before Gan Bao compiled his records.
The pairing of the Northern Dipper and the Southern Dipper accords with the pair­
ing of the sun and the moon on the Qilingang ceiling: both indicate yin and yang. The
Han artisans added N ii W a and Fu X i to the lunar and solar images to accentuate their
yin and yang attributes. Intriguingly, the sun with Fu Xi, the symbol o f yang, is next to
the Northern Dipper, the symbol of death and thus yin; and the moon with N ii Wa, the
symbol of y in , is next to the Southern Dipper, the symbol of life and yang. The picto­
rial arrangement may reflect the observation that the sun and the heavens are moving
in opposite directions, as Yang Xiong said, even though the sun appears with the moon，
and the heavens are represented as two Dippers.
The entire ceiling of the Qilingang tomb reminds us of the Heaven presented by the
Q in and Han cosmologists，who emphasized that Heaven manifested its will through
the interaction o f yin and yang, the changing of the four seasons, and the succession of
the Five Phases. We have seen how they interlocked all these elements into a system that
was expressed by monthly observances (see Figures 1.40,1.41， 1.42). I f the ceiling displays
a pictorial version of this cosmological system, then the seated figure is more likely to
be the Yellow Thearch than Grand Unity. The cardinal emblems, which are equated with
 the four seasons，also stand for the Five Phases and the Five Thearchs when they are
groupedwiththeYellowThearch, the symbol ofearthandthecenter.
The Qilingang ceiling conveys more than the idea of a cosmological Heaven. The
artisans, instead of adopting the standardized image of the Dark Warrior, replaced the
usual intertwined snake with a fungus, thus connoting longevity, which was what turtles
and fungi signified in the Han mind. If the pairing of the two Dippers indicated the
cycle of life and death, like the cycle of the four seasons and the cycle of the Five Phases,
then the turtle holding a fungus suggests immortality after death. W ith that modifica­
tion, the artisans turned the cosmological Heaven into the funerary Heaven.
The Qilingang carving is an assemblage of celestial signs of different kinds: the sun,
the moon，the Dippers, the cardinal emblems，the Five Phases, and the Five Tliearchs.
A ll the celestial signs are integrated into an organic whole that demonstrates an artistic
appropriation of the cosmological Heaven in a funerary context. Most of the cases ana-
lyzed in this book have a similar degree of integration. The Bright Halls— their layout,
structure, furnishings, and rituals~were built upon the idea of the cosmological Heaven
in order for the emperors to claim their mandate to rule. The pictorial programs in Lady
Dai’s tomb, in the painted tombs in Luoyang and X i， an， and on the decorated sarcophagi
in Sichuan were created for the deceased according to the popular belief in ascending to
Heavenafter death.
In other examples of Han art, however, celestial signs are not so well integrated. Ih e
first-centurybce tombdiscoveredat Zhenzhichang#織廠 inTanghe唐河，
Henan,isa
case in point.7 Celestial images appear on the ceilings of its twin chambers (Figure C.3).
The southern chamber is decorated with the moon and two groups of stars (Figure C.4).
The seven-star group on the right should be the Northern Dipper, but the ladle is not as
straight as it is normally drawn. The eleven-star group on the left resembles no constel­
lation known to us.8The northern chamber contains four groups of images. The second
stone from the entrance has the sun and a tiger; the latter, even without its accompa-
nying stars, should be the W hite Tiger, governor of the western celestial palace (Figure
C.5).Tlie fourth stone has a depiction of the River Lord in a fish-drawn cart， a symbol of
the M ilky Way (Figure C.6).The fifth stone displays the four cardinal emblems (Figure
C.7).The innermost stone presents an arch shared by two dragons, which is the Han way
of picturing a rainbow, as seen in a W u family shrine (Figures C.8, C.9). These celestial
images are presented in no apparent order. The moon, surrounded by patterns of stars,
does not form a neat pair with the sun. The W hite Tiger is repeated on two stones. It is
quite obvious that the artisans simply juxtaposed various signs associated with the sky to
signify the funerary Heaven. The five omens in honor of Li X i are similarly juxtaposed
C .3. Layout o f a tomb. First century c e . Unearthed in 1972 at Zhenzhichang in Nanyang, Henan,
(a) Floor plan, (b) Celestial images on the ceiling.
C .5. Sun and the celestial tiger. First century c e . Stone carving. 93 x 46 cm. Unearthed
in 1972 at Zhenzhichang in Nanyang, Henan, (a) Photograph, (b) Ink rubbing.
 b
C .9. Rainbow on a stone carving in the Wu fam ily shrines. M id-second century c e .
Discovered in 1786 in Jiaxiang, Shandong, (a) Ink rubbing, (b) Drawing.

on the cliff of the Western Passage, although the immediately following inscriptions
help to define them.
As the many examples show, Han artisans focused more on signification than on
mimesis to make Heaven visible. W ith the aid of various agents, they transformed tacit
knowledge into images by extracting diverse signs from cosmology, mythology, and
astronomy; they then selected, modified, and arranged the signs in a way that appealed
to the eye and suited the purpose of each commission. The artistic rendition of signs,
by either juxtaposition or integration, often generated new meanings that spoke for
new contexts. The function of the signs— articulating the mandate of Heaven or the
belief in ascending to Heaven— became their syntax and determined how they should
be organized. Each step in the process, from the shaping of tacit knowledge to its visual
transformation, was contingent on cultural convention: viewers had to comprehend the
artistic rendition. The visibility of Heaven therefore elucidates the kind of visuality avail­
able only in Han China.
 Illustration Credits

Figure
0.1 Illustration by the author.
0.2 Illustration by the author.
0.3 (a) Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1980 (tianwen), fig. 49a; (b) Liu Xingzhen,
' 1991, fig. 227.
0.4 Zhongyuan wenwu 1986.1: 104.
0.5 (a) Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1980 (tianwen), fig. 45; (b) Drawing commis­
sioned by the author.
0.6 (a) K aogu 1979 .5 : p i. 3 .4 ; (b) D raw in g com m issioned b y the author.
0.7 (a) K aogu 1979 .5 : p i. 4 . 1 ; (b) D raw in g com m issioned b y the author.
0.8 (a) K aogu 1979 .5 : p i. 4 .2 ; (b) D raw in g com m issioned b y th e author.
0.9 Reunion des Musees Nationaux/ Art Resource, New York.
0.10 http://c0 mm0 ns.wikimedia.0 rg/wiki/File:Vibia_Wilpert.jpg
1.1 (a) and (b) P h otograph courtesy o f the P o ly M useum , B eijin g , C h in a.
1.2 (a) Zhongguo meishu quanji bianji weiyuanhui, 1985，Gongyi meishu 4: pi. 146; (b) Shaanxi
sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, 1979,4: 83.
1.3 (a) Zhongguo meishu quanji bianji weiyuanhui, 1985，Gongyi meishu 4: pi. 147; (b) Zhongguo
meishu quanji bianji weiyuanhui, 1987, Shufa zhuanke 1: pi. 6 .
1.4 D iagram b y the author.
1.5 D iagram b y the author, based on G u Jie g a n g , 1996 , 3 : 30 2 .
1.6 D iagram b y the author, m odified from G u Jie g a n g , 1996 , 3 : 302 .
1.7 Map by the author, based on Wang Zhongshu, 1982, figs. 2，28.
1.8 Wang Zhongshu, H an civilization, trans. K.C. Chang and collaborators (New Haven: Yale Uni­
versity Press, 1982)，fig. 30. © Yale University Press, 1986; reprinted by permission.
1.9 K aogu xuebao 1959 .2 : 46 .
1.10 Map by the author, based on Wang Zhongshu, 1984, fig. 18 and Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan
kaogu yanjiusuo, 2010 ，figs. 2 ，3.
1.11 Map by the author, based on Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 2010，fig. 58.
1.12 (a) Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 2010，fig. 74; (b) Ibid., pi. 54.1.
1.13 (a) Zhejiang sheng wenwu kaogu yanjiusuo, 1989, pi. 34; (b) Ibid., pi. 84.
1.14 (a) Zhongguo yuqi quanji bianji weiyuanhui, 1992,1: pi. 59; (b) Wenwu 1989.4:15.
1.15 (a) Zhongguo yuqi quanji bianji weiyuanhui, 1992,1: pi. 60; (b) Wenwu 1989.4:14.
1.16 (a) Liaoning sheng wenwu kaogu yanjiusuo, 1997, fig. 18; (b) Ibid.，pi. 51.
1.17 (a) Qin Shihuang bingma yong bowuguan, 1998, color pi. 6; (b) Ibid., 23.
1.18 Wenwu 1978.8: 25.
1.19 Diagram by the author, based on Cullen, 1996,182.
1.20 Diagram by the author, based on Cullen, 1996, 86.
1.21 Diagram by the author, based on Noda, 1933,18.
1.22 (a) Liu Xingzhen, 1991，fig. 168; (b) Ibid., fig. 169.
1.23 (a) and (b) Diagrams by the author.
1.24 (a) Lianyungang shi bowuguan, 1997,47; (b) Ibid., 171.
1.25 (a) and (b) Fu Juyou, 1992,76.
1.26 Umehara, 1939, pi. 6 .
1.27 G ao W en , 1996 , 7 .
1.28 K aogu xuebao 1963 .2 : fig . 21.3
1.29 Chen Peifen, 1987, fig. 39.
1.30 (a) Kaogu 1963.9: 510; (b) Ibid” 511; (c) Ibid” fig. 21 before 515.
1.31 (a) Yang Hongxun, 1987，179; (b) Ibid., 180; (c) fig. 34 after 198.
1.32 W u H u n g, 1995 , fig . 3 . 16 .
1.33 (a) Yang Hongxun, 1998，fig. 40; (b) Ibid” fig. 41; (c) Ibid” fig. 42; (d) Ibid., fig. 44.
1.34 (a) Drawing by the author, based on Hebei sheng wenwu yanjiusuo, 1996,1: fig. 5; (b) Drawing
by the author, based on Hebei sheng wenwu yanjiusuo, 1996,1: fig. 7.
1.35 (a) Hebei sheng wenwu yanjiusuo, 1996,2: color pi. 2; (b) Yang Hongxun, 1987，135.
1.36 (a) and (b) Yang Hongxun, 1987,125.
1.37 (a) Yang Hongxun, 1987，157; (b) Ibid., 163; (c) Ibid” fig. 4 after 154; (d) Ibid” fig. 6 before 157.
1.38 (a) Yang Hongxun, 1987，182; (b) Ibid., 181.
1.39 Kaogu 1963.9: fig. 12 after 510.
1.40 Diagram by the author.
1.41 Diagram by the author.
1.42 Diagram by the author.
2.1 (a) Zhongguo meishu quanji bianji weiyuanhui, 1985，Gongyi meishu 4: pi. 215; (b) Zhongguo
meishu quanji bianji weiyuanhui, 1987, Shufa zhuanke 1: pi. 11.
2.2 Chart by the author.
2.3 Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan.
2.4 (a) Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, Kyoto,
Japan; (b) Drawing commissioned by the author.
2.5 Stone carving restored by the author.
 2.6 (a) Chavannes, 1893，pi. VI; (b) Drawing commissioned by the author.
2.7 (a) Detail of Chavannes, 1893，pi. VI; (b) Feng Yunmeng, 1821-22，Shi suo 4: Han Wu shi
shishi xiangrui tu 2 .
2.8 F u Ju y o u , 1992 , 155 .
2.9 (a) Chavannes, 1893，pi. VII; (b) Drawing commissioned by the author.
2.10 Layout by the author.
2.11 (a) Beijing lishi bowuguan, 1955, pi. 4; (b) Ibid., pi. 9; (c) Ibid., pi. 24.
2.12 Wenwu 1984.8: 23.
2.13 (a) and (b) Wenwu 1984.8: 27.
2.14 (a) Photograph by the author; (b) Detail of Figure 2.4b.
2.15 Hong Gua, 1986,5.17.
2.16 Fischer, 1931,T22,T23.
2.17 (a) Photograph by the author; (b) Detail of Figure 2.4b.
2.18 (a) Detail of Figure 2 .6a; (b) Feng Yunmeng, 1821— 22，Shi suo 4: Han Wu shi shishi xiangrui tu
2.
2.19 (a) Photograph by the author; (b) Detail of Figure 2.4b.
2 .2 0 Sh an d on g sh eng bow uguan, 1982 ，
fig . 4 1 .
2.21 Xuzhou shi bowuguan, 1985, fig. 254.
2.22 (a) Photograph by the author; (b) Detail of Figure 2.4b.
2.23 (a) Photograph by the author; (b) Detail of Figure 2.4b.
2.24 Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, KyotoJapan.
2.25 Map by the author.
2.26 Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, Kyoto， Japan.
2.27 (a) and (b) Wenwu 1964.11: 29.
2.28 Photograph by the author.
2.29 Zhongguo meishu quanji bianji weiyuanhui, 1987，Shufa zhuanke 1 : pi. 35.
2.30 Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, KyotoJapan.
2.31 Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, KyotoJapan.
2.32 Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan.
2.33 Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan.
2.34 Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, KyotoJapan.
3.1 Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1981,1: fig. 92.3.
3.2 Kyoto kokuritsu hakubutsukan, 1970, fig. 19. Photograph courtesy of the Kyoto National
Museum, Kyoto, Japan.
3.3 Feng Yunmeng, 1821-22，Jin suo 6.
3_4 Gao Wen, 1987 (zhuan)，fig. 231.
3.5 Map commissioned by the author, based on Yao Shengmin, 2003，33.
3.6 (a) Yao Shengmin, 1998，fig. 23; (b) Ibid., fig. 24.
3.7 Yao Shengmin, 2003，pi. 3.
3.8 (a) Yue Banghu, 2001，pi. 25; (b) Ibid” fig. 16.
 3.9 H eb ei sh eng w enw u yanjiusuo ，
2000 ，
fig . 2 5 .
3.10 Z h o n ggu o m eishu quanji b ian ji w eiyuanh u i, 1988 , H u ih u a 18 : p i. 23 8 .
3.11 P h otograp h courtesy o f the H en an M useu m , Z h en gzh ou , C h in a.
3.12 (a) Y un n an sh eng bow uguan, 1981 ，
p i. 184 ; (b) K aogu xuebao 1991 . 1 : 2 6 .
3.13 Y u nnan sheng bow uguan, 1959 , p i. 121 .
3.14 (a) W enw u 1992 . 9 : 84 ; (b) Ib id ., 85 ; (c) Ib id ., 86.
3.15 Hunan sheng bowuguan, 1973，1: fig. 4.
3.16 Ib id ., fig . 6.
3.17 Ib id ., 2 : p i. 58 .
3.18 (a) Fu Juyou, 1992,19; (b) Hunan sheng bowuguan, 1973,1: fig. 38.
3.19 Zhongguo meishu quanji bianji weiyuanhui, 1987, Shufa zhuanke 1 : pi. 48.
3.20 Hunan sheng bowuguan, 1973，2: pi. 76.
3.21 Fu Ju yo u , 1992 ， 40.
3.22 (a) Fu Ju y o u , 1992 ，60 ; (b) Ib id ., 1992 , 3 9 .
3.23 W enw u 1974 .7 : 4 0 .
3.24 Fu Ju yo u , 1992 , 3 7 .
3.25 (a) Fu Ju yo u , 1992 ，
2 3 ; (b) H un an sheng bow uguan, 2004 ，
fig. 31 .
3.26 Fu Ju yo u , 1992 , 2 4 .
3.27 (a) W enw u 1974 .2 : 37 ; (b) Ib id ” 38 .
3.28 Z h o n ggu o m eishu quan ji b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1986 ，H u ih u a 1 : pi. 4 4 .
3.29 Ib id ., 43 .
3.30 H unan sh eng bow uguan, 1973 , 2 : p i. 72 .
3.31 Photograph courtesy of the Hubei Provincial Museum, Wuhan, China.
3.32 (a) and (b) Photograph courtesy of the Hubei Provincial Museum, Wuhan, China.
3.33 H unan sh eng bow uguan, 1973 , 2 : pi. 59 .
3.34 P h otograph cou rtesy o f the H unan P ro vin cial M useum , C h an gsh a, C h in a.
3.35 Fu Ju yo u , 1992 , A -S .
3.36 (a) Z h o n ggu o m eishu quanji b ian ji w eiyu an h u i, 1986 ，H u ih u a 1 : p i. 57 ; (b) L i Z h en ggu an g,
1986 ，
fig . 80 .
3.37 (a) Fu Ju yo u , 1992 , 15 ; (b) Z h en ggu an g, 1986 ，
fig. 79 .
3.38 (a) H un an sheng bow uguan, 1973 , 2 : p i. 33 ; (b) L i Z h en ggu an g, 1986 ，
fig. 81 .
3.39 F u Ju yo u , 1992 , 16 .
3.40 (a) Hunan sheng bowuguan, 1973，2: pi. 34; (b) Li Zhengguang, 1986，fig. 78.
3.41 (a) Fu Ju yo u , 1992 , 14 ; (b) L i Z h en ggu an g, 1986 ，
fig . 82 .
3.42 H unan sh eng bow uguan, 1973 , 2 : p i. 25
3.43 Li Zhengguang, 1986, fig. 52.
3.44 Ib id ., 4 7 .
3.45 Ib id ., 7 0 .
3.46 Ib id ., 7 1 .
 3
3.47 Ib id ., 66.
3.48 Ib id ” 3 5 .
3.49 Ib id ” 39 .
3.50 Ib id ., 4 8 .
3.51 Ib id ., 57 .
3.52 Ib id ., 5 4 .
3.53 (a) H un an sh eng bow uguan, 1973 ，
2 : pi. 37 ; (b) Ib id ” 1 : fig . 2 7 .
3.54 (a) H un an sheng bow uguan, 1973 , 2 : p i. 116 ; (b) Ib id ” 1 : fig. 2 8 .
3.55 Photograph courtesy of the Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, Kyoto，
Japan.
3.56 K a o g u l 9 9 S . 1 2 : 83 .
3.57 H un an sh eng bow uguan, 1973 ，
1 : fig . 18 ; (b) L i Z h en ggu an g, 1986 , fig . 4 2 .
3.58 P h otograph from H un an sheng bow uguan, 1973 ，
2 : p l. 77 .
3.59 (a) and (b) K aogu xuebao 1964 .2 : 110 .
3.60 (a) K aogu xuebao 1964 .2 : p i. 4 .3 ; (b) H u an g M in g lan , 1984 , 37 .
3.61 H u an g M in g lan , 1986 , 30 .
3.62 X u e W encan, 1993 , 19 .
3.63 P h otograph courtesy o f the H en an M useu m , Z h en gzh ou , C h in a.
3.64 G a o W en, 1996 , 12 .
3.65 Z h o n ggu o m eishu quan ji b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1988 ，H u ih u a 18 : p i. 2 2 7 .
3.66 (a) K aogu 1998 . 12 : color p i. 8 .2 ; (b) Ib id ” 79 .
3.67 (a) and (b) P h otograph courtesy o f H e Z h ig u o .
3.68 K aogu 1 9 9 ^ . 1 2 :
3.69 (a) Z h ao C h en gfu , 1990 (N anyang), p i. 59 ; (b) Ib id ., fig . 149 .
3.70 H u an g M in g lan , 1986 , 24 .
3.71 F en g Y un p en g, 1821 - 2 2 ，S h i suo 4 .
3.72 (a) K aogu xuebao 1990 .4 : p i. 2 0 .3 ; (b) Z h ao C h en gfu , 1990 (N anyang), fig . 159 .
3.73 (a) Harada, 1930，pi. 58; (b) Drawing courtesy of Kominami Ichiro.
3.74 (a) P h otograph courtesy o f H e Z h ig u o ; (b) K aogu 1987 . 3 ，
27 9 .
3.75 (a) and (b) W ang Sh ilu n , 1957 , fig . 27 .
3.76 (a) G o n g T in gw an , 1998 , fig. 375 ; (b) Ib id ” fig . 435 ; (c) Ib id ., fig. 39 ; (d) G ao W en , 1996 , 37 .
3.77 (a), (b) ，
(c) and (d) G a o W en, 1987 (shi), 60- 62 .
3.78 G ao W en, 1996 ，
24.
3.79 (a) and (b) L i L in , 1995 ，
figs. 229 - 23 3 .
3.80 Z h o n ggu o shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1996 (H an ), 2 : p i. 22 7 . 6 .
3.81 So n g Y in x iu , 1982 .
3.82 P h otograph courtesy o f the H en an M useum , Z h en gzh ou , C h in a.
3.83 (a) and (b) L i L in , 1995 ，
figs. 78 - 82 .
3.84 (a) and (b) Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, 2001，fig. 135; (c) Ibid., color pi. 20.2.
3.85 Kaogu 1987.11: 998.
3.86 (a) and (b) K aogu 1987 . 11 : 999 .
4.1 C h a rt m od ified b y the author from Sun and K istem aker, 1997 ，fold ed m ap 1 .
4.2 (a) D e ta il o f F ig u re 1 . 7 ; (b) K aogu 1960 .7 : 36 - 37 .
4.3 (a), (b) ，
(c), and (d) L iu Q in gzh u , 1999 ，
p is. 1 . 11 , 1 . 12 ，
1 . 13 ，
1 . 14 .
4.4 D raw in g b y the author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 ，fold ed m aps 1 ，
2.
4.5 (a) D e ta il o f F ig u re 5 . 16 ; (b) M u ra l restored b y the author.
4.6 D raw in g b y the author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 , fold ed m ap 3 .
4.7 (a) D e ta il o f F igu re 5 . 16 ; (b) M u ra l restored b y the author.
4.8 G o n g T in g w a n , 1998 ，
fig. 29 4 .
4.9 W ang Jian zh o n g , 1990 , fig . 2 7 0 .
4.10 N an yan g H an dai huaxiang shi b ian ji w eiyu anh ui, 1985 ，
fig. 527 .
4.11 (a), (b)，(c)，(d)，and (e) Drawings by the author, based on Shaughnessy, 1997, figs. 7.1-7.7.
4.12 F en g S h i, 1990 , fig . 2 .
4.13 D raw in g b y the author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 , fold ed m ap 2 .
4.14 Z h o n ggu o m eishu quan ji b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1988 ，H u ih u a 18 : pi. 173 .
4.15 (a) W enw u 1988 .3 : 4 ; (b) Ib id ., pi. 1 .
4.16 (a) and (b) P h otograp h courtesy o f the N atio n al M useum o f C h in a, B eijin g , C h in a.
4.17 (a) P h otograp h courtesy o f the H u b ei P ro vin cial M useum , W uh an, C h in a; (b) H u b ei sheng
bow uguan, 1984 ，
9.
4.18 (a) Z h o n ggo n g m eishu quan ji b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1986 ，G o n g yi m eishu 5 : p i. 20 2 ; (b) Z h o n ggu o
shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1980 (M an ch en g), 1 : 25 7 .
4.19 (a) Y an G en q i, 2001 ，color pi. 1 ; (b) Ib id ” fig . 4 9 .
4.20 P h otograp h cou rtesy o f the M a o lin g M u seu m , X in g p in g , C h in a.
4.21 P h otograph courtesy o f the G an su P ro vin cial B ureau o f C u ltu ral R elics.
4.22 K aogu xuebao 1963 .2 : 21 ，
fig. 2 1 . 1 .
4.23 (a) and (b) K aogu 1975 .3 : 180 .
4.24 (a) K aogu 1959 . 9 : 462 ; (b), (c)，and (d) Ib id ., pi. 1 .
4.25 Z h o n ggu o shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1980 {tia n w en ), fig . 4 6 .
4.26 (a) Z h o n ggo n g m eishu quan ji b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1986 , Y u q i: p i. 172 ; (b) Ib id ” 61 .
4.2 7 L i L in , 1995 , figs. 206 - 21 0 .
4.28 (a), (b) ，
（c) ，
(d), and (e) G ao W en, 1996 ，
1- 4 .
4.29 Z h o n ggu o shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1980 {tia n w en ), color p i. 6.
4.30 D e ta il o f F igu re 0 .4 .
4.31 Z h o n gyu an w enw u 1993 . 1 : 69 .
4.32 D raw in g b y the author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 ，fold ed m ap 4 .
4.33 (a) K o k u ri bunkaten jik k o iin k ai, 1985 ，
p i. 2 8 ; (b) D raw in g courtesy o f K om in am i Ich iro.
4.34 (a) Z h o n ggu o shehui kexueyuan kaogu yan jiusuo, 1980 {tia n w en ), fig . 49 b; (b) Z h o n ggu o shehui
kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1989 ，
170 .
4.35 Z h o n ggu o shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1980 {tia n w e n )y fig . 48 b.
 4.36 Fu X ih u a, 1950 - 51 ，
1 : fig . 2 2 .
4 .37 (a) Z h o n ggu o m eishu quanji b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1988 , H u ih u a 18 : p i. 90 ; (b) and (c) G ao W en,
1996 , 78 - 79 .
4.38 (a) G a o W en, 1996 , 78 ; (b) D raw in g com m issioned b y the author.
4.39 (a) G ao W en, 1996 ，
79 ; (b) D raw in g com m issioned b y the author.
4.40 (a) and (b) D etails from F igu re 3 .30 .
4.41 (a) and (b) D etails from F igu re 3 . 81 .
4.42 (a) A n q iu xian w enhuaju, 1992 ，
p i. 36 ; (b) Ib id ” p i. 38 .
4.43 (a) Ph otograph courtesy o f the H u b ei P ro vin cial M useum , W uhan, C h in a; (b) H u b ei sheng
bow uguan, 1984 , 9 .
4.44 G ao W en, 1987 (shi), 83 .
4.45 (a) Z h o n ggu o m eishu quan ji b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1987 , G o n g yi m eishu 1 1 : p i. 7 7 ; (b) W enw u
1980 .5 : 10 .
4.46 (a) and (b) Z h e jia n g sheng w enw u kaogu yanjiusuo, 1989 ，
p i. 121 .
4.47 Z h o n ggu o m eishu quan ji b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1988 ，H u ih u a 18 : p i. 175 .
4.48 G ao W en, 1996 ，
9.

4.49 (a) and (b) P h otograph courtesy o f the Sich u an P ro vin cial M useum , C h en gd u, C h in a.
4.50 N an yan g H an dai huaxiang shi b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1985 ，
fig . 527 .
4.51 (a) and (b) H an Y u xian g, 1998 ，
139 .
4.52 G ao W en, 1996 , 13 .
4.53 (a) and (b) Sh an d on g sh eng bow uguan, 1982 , figs. 428 , 42 9 .
4.54 Ib id .，
fig . 423 .
4.55 (a) and (c) Sh aanxi sh eng kaogu yanjiusuo, 2001 ，color p i. 9 ; (b) and (d) Ib id ., figs. 122 ，
123 .
4.56 Z h o n ggu o m eishu quan ji b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1988 ，H u ih u a 18 : p i. 94.
4.57 (a) and (b) L iu X in gzh en , 1991 ，
17 .
4.58 K a o g u yu v je n w u 1991 . 1 : 37 .
4.59 (a) W enw u 1961 . 11 : 36 ; (b) Illu stratio n by the author, based on F igu re 49 and G a o W en ，1987
(zhuan), fig . 96 .
4.60 W enw u 1977 . 6 : 10—11 .
4.61 (a) M u ral restored b y the author, based on W enw u 1977 . 6 : color pi. 1 and H u an g M in g lan , 1996 ,
73 ; (b) M u ral restored b y the author, based on W enw u 1977 . 6 : color p i. 1 and H u an g M in -
glan , 1996 , 68.
4.62 (a) H u an g M in g lan ，
1996 , 70 a; (b) Ib id ., 73 a; (c) Ib id ., 71 a; (d) Ib id ., 70 b.
4.63 H u an g M in g lan , 1996 , 69 .
5.1 D raw in g b y the author, based on Su n and K istem aker, 1997 , fold ed m ap 5 .
5.2 D raw in g b y the author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 ，fold ed m ap 5 .
5.3 D raw in g b y the author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 , fold ed m ap 2 .
5.4 D raw in g b y the author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 , fold ed m ap 4.
5.5 D raw in g b y the author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 , fold ed m ap 3 .
5.6 C h art m odified b y the author from N eedh am , 1959 , 3 : fig . 94.
 6
7
3

5.7 (a) Photograph courtesy of the Hubei Provincial Museum, Wuhan, China; (b) Hubei sheng
bowuguan, 1984，9.
5.8 Illu stratio n b y the author.
5.9 D ra w in g b y the author, based on N eedham , 1959 , 3 : fig . 88.
5.10 D ra w in g b y the author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 , fig . 2 .2 .
5.11 Reprinted by permission of the publisher from A History o fJapaneseAstronomy: Chinese Background
a n d W estern Im p a ct by Sh igeru N akayam a, p. 32 , C am brid ge, M a ss.: H arvard U n iversity
Press, Copyright © 1969 by Harvard-Yenching Institute.
5.12 Z h o n ggu o sh eh ui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiu suo, 1980 {tia n w en ), fig . 69 .
5.13 Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo，1980 {tianwen}^ fig. 82.
5.14 Sh aan xi sh eng kaogu yanjiu suo, 1991 ，color p i. 1 .
5.15 M u ral restored b y the author.
5.16 Drawing by the author, based on Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, 1991，25.
5.17 (a) and (b) M u rals restored b y th e author.
5.18 M u ral restored b y the author.
5.19 M u ral restored b y the author.
5.20 (a), (b), (c)，and (d) Gao Lu, 1933，A-7.
5.21 Drawing by the author, based on Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, 1991，25.
5.22 (a) D ra w in g by th e author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 ，fold ed m ap 4 ; (b) M u ral re­
stored by the author.
5.23 C h in -h siu n g H sii, 1979 ，
p i. 99 : B 1626 . W ith perm ission o f the R o yal M useum © R O M .
5 .24 M u ral restored b y th e author.
5.25 Z h ao C h en gfu , 1990 (N anyang), fig. 125 .
5.26 C h in -h siu n g H sii ，
1979 , p i. 86: B 1460 . W ith perm ission o f the R o yal M u seu m © R O M .
5.27 (a) Drawing by the author, based on Sun and Kistemaker, 1997，folded map 4; (b) Shaanxi sheng
kaogu yanjiusuo, 1993, color pi. 71; (c) Drawing commissioned by the author.
5.28 Z e n g Z h ao yu , 1956 ，p i. 4 8 : ru b bin g 35 .
5.29 L i L in , 1995 , fig . 102 .
5.30 N an jin g bow uyuan, 1991 ，
p i. 18 .
5.31 G an su sheng w enw udui, 1985 ，
p i. 61 . 1 .
5.32 A n q iu xian w enhuaju, 1992 ，
p i. 15 . -
5.33 (a) Mural restored by the author; (b) Drawing commissioned by the author.
5.34 Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1980 (Mancheng), 2: color pi. 23.
5.35 (a) Mural restored by the author; (b) Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, 1991,25.
5.36 (a) D ra w in g b y th e author, based on Sun and K istem aker, 1997 , fold ed m ap 2 ; (b) M u ra l re-
stored by the author; (c) Drawing commissioned by the author.
5.3 7 G an su sh eng w enw udui, 1985 , p i. 64 . 1 .
5.38 Huang Minglan，1987, fig. 8.
5.39 Gansu sheng wenwudui, 1985，pi. 67.2.
5.40 W e ijia n , 1998 , 172 .
5.41 Z h o n ggu o shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1989 , 165 .
5.42 (a) Z h on ggu p shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1980 (tia n w e n ) ，fig . 74 ; (b) Ib id ., fig . 75 .
5.43 Fu Ju yo u , 1992 ，
160 .
5.44 (a) Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 1989，pi. 1 ; (b) Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan
kaogu yanjiusuo, 1980 {tia n w en ), fig. 62 .5 .
5.45 (a) Shanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, 1991,5; (b) Ibid., pi. 5.1.
5.46 (a) Sh an xi sh eng kaogu yanjiusuo, 1991 ，b ack cover; (b) Ib id ” fron t cover.
5.47 (a) and (b) Murals restored by the author.
5.48 M u ral restored b y the author.
5.19 Mural restored by the author.
5.50 (a) Mural restored by the author; (b) Drawing commissioned by the author.
5.51 (a) Mural restored by the author; (b) Drawing commissioned by the author.
5.52 Mural restored by the author.
5.53 H u an g M in g lan , 1996 , 82 .
5.54 W enw u 2006 .5 : 26 ，
fig . 42 .
5.55 Z h a o C h e n g fii, 1990 {N an ya ng )y p i. 76 .
5.56 D u n h u an g w enw u yanjiusuo, 1987 , 4 : p i. 4 .
C .l Han Yuxiang, 1998，143.
C .2 Zhongguo lishi bowuguan guankan 1997.2，28，fig. 4.
C .3 (a) and (b) W enw u 1973 .6 : 33 ，
35 .
C.4 (a) Nanyang Han dai huaxiang shi bianji weiyuanhui, 1985，pi. 43; (b) Ibid., fig. 25.
C.5 (a) Nanyang Han dai huaxiang shi bianji weiyuanhui, 1985, pi. 42; (b) Wang Jianzhong, 1990，
fig . 27 9 .
C .6 (a) Nanyang Han dai huaxiang shi bianji weiyuanhui, 1985, pi. 44; (b) Wang Jianzhong, 1990,
fig . 152.
C.7 Wang Jianzhong, 1990, fig. 179.
C .8 (a) N an yan g H an dai huaxiang sh i b ian ji w eiyuanh ui, 1985 ，pL 45 ; (b) W an g Jian zh o n g , 1990 ,
fig . 27 3 .
C.9 (a) and (b) Liu Xingzhen, 1991, figs. 212，213.
 Endnotes

Introduction
1. W ang Xianshen 王先慎，H an Fei z i jijie 韓非子 7. For different philosophical approaches to the
集解， 11.202 ；
a translation is available in Bush and Shih, relation o f H eaven and man in the Eastern Zhou, see
E arly Chinese Texts on Painting, 24. Graham, D isputers o f the Tao.
2 . Fan Ye 范曄，Hou H an shu 後漢書，
59.1912; a 8. Sivin and Lloyd, The Way and the Word, 195.
translation is available in Bush and Shih, E arly Chinese 9. Ibid., 253-71.
Texts on Painting, 24. 10. Nagata Hidemasa 永田英正，K andai sekkoku
3. For paleographical studies o f tiany see Wang shusei漢代石刻集成， 1:31 广i8.
Guowei 王國維，“Shi tian” 釋天，in G uantangjilin 觀堂 11. Sim a Qian 司馬遷，S h iji 史 言己， 27.1289-93. For a
集林， 6.282-3; Creel, “Shi tian”; Yan Yiping 嚴一萍，
“Shi comprehensive introduction, see Needham, Science and
tian”; Chen Fucheng 陳復澄，“W enzi de fasheng yu fen- C ivilisation in China, 3:229-41; Yoke, L i} Qiy and Shut
hua shili zhiyi: shi da, tian, fii, tai” 文字的發生與分化 I3I-33-
釋例之一: 釋大、天、夫、太. 12. Liu Shaoming 劉紹明，“ ‘Tiangong xingchu’jin g”
4 . Although the Zhou people worshiped tian, their 天公行出鏡.
predecessors, the Shang people, worshiped di. In the 13. Saussure, Course in General Linguistics 、
9—17,65-70.
bronze inscriptions, tian and d i are either interchange­ 14. Schier, Deeper into Pictures，89-114. For portraiture
able or combined as a compound. See Guo M oruo 郭沐 in particular, see Brilliant, Portraiture, 23-44.
若，“Ten no shis6” 天幻思想; Chen Gaoyong 陳高傭， 15. H ongX ingzu 洪興祖，Chu cibuzhu 楚辭補注,29 ，
“Zhongguo gudai 'tian de guannian zhi fazhan” 中國古 168-69; Hawkes, Songs o f the South, 74，
196.
代天的觀念之發展; Creel, O rigins o f Statecraft, 81-100; 16. W atson, Chinese Lyricism y 28.
Rao Zongyi 饒宗頓, “Tainshen guan yu daode sixiang” 17. N anjing bowuyuan 南京博物院，“Jiangsu Xuyi
天神觀與道德思想; H sii and Linduff，Western Chou Dongyang H an mu” 江蘇吁暗東陽漢墓.
C ivilization, 68—h i; Eno, Confucian Creation o f H eaven 、 18. Graham, Disputers o f the Tao\ Puett, To Become a
19—29. God\ Eno, Confucian Creation o f H eaven 、M achle, N ature
5. The hexagram qian depicts the rise and fall o f the and H eaven in the Xunzi; M ajor, H eaven and E arth in
dragon constellation across the sky; see Shaughnessy, E arly H an Thought,
“Composition o ffQian and ‘Kun’ Hexagram s.” 19. Sivin, The Way and the Word; Sun and Kistemaker,
6. Take, for instance，the poem eulogizing King Chinese Sky during the H an' Cullen, Astronom y and
Wen in Daya; see Eno, “Was There a H igh God 77?” 14. M athematics in A ncient China,
 20 . H sii and Linduff, Western Chou C iviH zation ，
10 1- archaeology in Communist China, see Tong, “Thirty
11; Shaughnessy and Loewe, Cambridge H istory o f A ncient Years o f Chinese Archaeology (1949-1979); Falkenhausen,
China, 314-15; W ang, Cosmology and Political Culture in KRegionalist Paradigm in Chinese Archaeology.”
E arly China. pi. 1 ，
24. Loewe, Ways to Paradise， fig. 7. For criticism,
21. H ie leading scholars who established the three see Silbergeld, “M awangdui，Excavated M aterials, and
areas o f research in Chinese art in the two decades after Transm itted Texts.”
1949 include M ax Loehr in ancient bronzes, Harrie 25. Cassirer, Philosophy o f Symbolic Forms, originally
Vanderstappen in Buddhist art, and Jam es C ahill and published as Philosophic der symbolischen Formen in 1923—
Wen Fong in later paintings. See Loehr, “Bronze Styles 29. Panofsky，Perspective as Symbolic Formy originally
o f the Anyang Period” (1953); Vanderstappen and Rhie, published as “D ie Perpektive als ^ymbolische Porm ” ，
“Sculpture o f T ’ien Lung Shan” (1965); Cahill, Chinese in 1927. For my discussion o f Panofsky and the study o f
P ainting (i960); Fong, “Toward a Structural Analysis o f Chinese art, see Tseng, “Traditional Chinese Painting
Chinese Landscape Painting” (1969). For Loehr’s schol­ through the M odern European Eye.”
arship, see Bagley, M a x Loehr and the Study o f Chinese 26 . M erleau-Ponty, Visible and the Invisible^ originally
Bronzes. For C ahill and Fong’s later debate on connois- published as Visible et Vinvisible in 1964; Dam isch, Theory
seurship, see Fong and Sm ith, Issues o f A uthenticity in of/Cloud/y originally published as Theorie du nuage in 1972.
Chinese P ainting 、7-9 ,13-6 3. For a b rief review o f collect­ 27. Gom brich, M editations on a Hobby Horse，1-11.
ing and studying Chinese art in the United States, see 28. Summers, R eal Spaces. For his criticism o f art
Cohen, E ast A sian A r t and Am erican Culture. and semiotics, see Summers, “This Is N ot a Sign•” For a
22. For the development from ancient antiquarian- comprehensive introduction to the semiotic approach,
ism to modern archaeology, see Chang, Archaeology o f see B al and Bryson, “Semiotics and A rt H istory.”
A ncient China, 4 -21. For Anyang archaeology, see L i Chi, 29 . For the stele, see Schm andt-Besserat, When W rit­
Anyang\ Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo ing M et A rty 87-100. For the visual convention o f divine
中國社會科學院考古研究所, Yin xu defa x ia n y u y a n - kingship in ancient M esopotam ia, see W inter, “Touched
jiu 殷墟的發現與研究. For prehistoric archaeology, see by the G ods.”
Chen Xingcan 陳星燦，Zhongguo shiqian kaoguxue shi 30 . For the hypogeum, see Ferrua, “L a catacomba di
y a n jiu 中國史前考古學史研究. V ibia.” For discussion o f the fresco, see Baum, “Symbolic
23. Yang Zhefeng 楊哲峰gave this estimate o f Representations o f the Eucharist，” 273; M cD annell and
the number o f discovered H an tombs in his lecture, Lang, H eaveny16; Jensen, U nderstanding E arly Christian
“Changes ofTom b Structures in H an China,Mat Yale Arty 55; Dunbabin, Roman Banquet, 189-92; Jensen, “D in-
University on January 29，
2009. For the development o f ing with the Dead,” in .

Chapter 1

1. Qu W anli 屈萬里， Shijin g quanshi 詩經餘釋， Kong market and exhibited it in 2002. H ie museum also
45工一54; the translation is modified from Waley, Book o f published a catalogue in which scholars identify the
Songs，250-51. commissioner as either Sui Gong or B in Gong. For an
2 . For the notion o f Heaven’s mandate in the Zhou, English translation and further analysis o f the inscrip­
see H sii and LindufF, Western Chou C ivilization, 10 1-11; tion, see Shaughnessy, “Bin Gong X u Inscription and the
Puett, To Become a God, 54-68. Origins o f the Chinese Literary Tradition•”
3 . The Poly Museum (Baoli yishu bowuguan 保 4. For discussions o f the inscription, see Tang Lan
利藝術博物館） purchased this vessel on the Hong 唐藺，“H e zun mingwen jiesh i” M 尊銘文解釋; M a
 8
3

I
Chengyuan 馬承源，“H e zun mingwen chushi” 何尊錦 12. W ang Guowei，“M ingtang qinmiao tongkao” 明
文初釋; Zhang Zhenglang 張政烺，“H e zun mingwen 堂寢廟通考（Research on the Bright H all, the royal an­
jieshi buyi” 何尊銘文解釋補遣; H sii and Linduff, West­ cestral temple, and the royal palaces), in G uangtangjilin,
ern Chou C ivilization ，96-100. A n English translation is 3.122-144, originally published in 1921; Hamada Kaido 濱
available in Puett, Ambivalence o f Creation, 33—34. 田恢道， “M eid6 seido shikoM明堂制度私考; M aspero,
5. M ichael Puett considers the significance o f the “M in g-t，ang et la crise religieuse chinoise avant les
inscription on the H e zu n as indicating how ancestors Han*; Soothillj H a ll o f L ight, 66-110. For a comprehen­
played an intermediate role between the ruling king sive review o f ancient texts on the Bright H all in C h i­
and Heaven; King Cheng pacified his father, King W u, nese, see Zhang Yibing 張一兵，M ingtang zh iduyanjiu
through rituals in the hope that King Wu in turn would 明堂制度研究， 334-440; in Japanese, see Tanaka Tan
work to maintain Heavens mandate; see Puett, To Be­ 田中淡，Chugoku kenchikusht no kenkyu 中国建築史CD
come a God, 66—67. A s Edward Shaughnessy points out, 研究，
5-26. In English, see Hwang, “M ing-tang,”27-59;
“Great Proclamation” (da gao 大語)，now a chapter in Corradini, uAncient Chinas m ing tang between Reality
the Book o f Documents, provides another piece o f evi­ and Legend/' 184-94; Lew is, Construction o f Space in
dence that King Cheng appealed to Heaven’s mandate Early China ，260-73.
when his uncles challenged his power; see Loewe and 13. W ang Shiren 王世仁，“Han Chang’an cheng
Shaughnessy, Cambridge H istory o f A ncient Chinay314-15. nanjiao lizhi jianzhu yuanzhuang de tuice” 漢長安城
6. For a study o f the inscription, see Chen M en^ia 南郊禮制建築原狀的推測; Yang H ongxun 楊清勛，
陳夢家， t ongqi duandai 西周銅器斷代， 1:3-6. “Cong yizhi kan X i-H an Chang’an M ingtang (Biyong)
For ancestral worship and Heavens mandate as seen in xingzhi” 從遺址看西漢長安明堂(辟雍) 形制（ 〇n the
the inscription, see Puett, To Become a God, 61-64. form at o f the Bright H all [Surrounding M oat] in light
7. Sim a Qian, Based sim ply on the o f the W estern Han site in Changan), in Jianzhu kaogu-
context provided in S h iji and without benefit o f the in­ xue lu n w e n ji 建築考古學論文集， 169-200.
scription on the Tian 'W ong gu i vessel, we would not know 14. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo 中
for sure that the H eavenly Chamber was a ritual site. 國社會科學院考古研究所，H an Wei Luoyang gucheng
8- For various translations o f the term in the West, nanjiao lizh ijia n zh u y iz h i 漠魏洛陽故城南郊禮制建築
see Corradini, ^Ancient Chinas m ing tang between Re­ 遺址， 80-125; Yang Hongxun，“M ingtang faniun” 明堂
ality and Legend/， 179-80. 泛論.
9 . P i X irui 皮錫瑞， j i ng Zheng zhu shu 孝經鄭 15. H enri M aspero, W illiam Soothill, Piero Corradini,
注疏， 2.2a—6b. X iao jin g w o s traditionally attributed to . and Zhang Yibing introduce the three Bright H alls
Z en g Shen (505-435 bce), but it was most likely com­ erected in the Han, but they do not articulate those
piled in the H an. For its compilation, see Loew e, Early buildings in broader political contexts. Wu H ung ana­
Chinese Texts、141-53. lyzes the Chang’an Bright H all in its political context,
10. Sun Xidan 孫希旦，L ijijijie 禮記集解， 31.842. but he does not tackle the other two. See M aspero,
L i j i was traditionally attributed to D ai Sheng 戴聖（ fl. “M ing-t’ang et la crise religieuse chinoise avant les
73-49 b c e ), b u t the extant version could have been put H an,Mi-i6 ; Soothill, H all o f L ig ht、105; Corradini, “A n-
together much later in the Eastern Han. For issues sur­ cient Chinas m ing tang between Reality and Legend ，
，
，
rounding its compilation, see Loewe, Early Chinese Texts, 明堂制度
194-204; Zhang, M ingtang zhidu yu an liu kao
293-97. 源流考，
93—加; Wu, M onum entality in E arly Chinese A rt
11. For example, Kao gong j i 考工記，an appendix to and Architecture, 176-87.
"Zhou It, mentions that there were five chambers in the 16. Scholars believe that monthly observances were
Bright H all, whereas D a D ai L i j i states that there were the main rituals held in the Bright H all; see Soothill,
nine. See Sun Yirang 孫' 飴讓，Zhou li zhengyi 周禮正義， H a ll o f L ig h t、22-51; Corradini，“Ancient Chinas m ing
84.3449; W ang Pinzhen 王聘珍，D a D ai L ijijie g u 大戴 tang between Reality and Legend，” 182-84. In contrast,
禮記解話， 67.149-52. I argue in this chapter that none o f the H an emperors
had ever performed those rituals in any H an Bright Grand Inception system in the early H an, see Tang Ru-
H all. Zhang Y ibing has surveyed the activities truly chuan 唐如川，HQin zhi Han chu yizhi xingyong Zhuan
conducted in the H an Bright H alls; see Zhang, M ing - X u li” 秦至漢一直行用類頊曆; Zhang P e iy u 張培瑜，
tang zhidu ya nfiu, 448-51. H e does not, however, pay “Qin zhi H an chu lifa shi buyiyang de” 秦至漢初曆法
any attention to how architectural space influenced the 是不一樣的.
perception o f those activities, which is a dimension I ex­ 25. Sim a Qian, S kij i y 8.342-43. For an English trans­
plore in this chapter. lation o f the annals o f Em peror Gao see W atson, Records
17. To restore the H an historical reality as faithfully o f the Grand H istorian, 1:77-119.
as possible, I focus on the H an texts that relate the Han 26. Sim a Qian, S h iji’ 55.2036,92.2628. For an English
Bright H alls and avoid grounding my arguments on the translation o f Zhang Liang’s and H an Xin’s biographies,
pre-H an or post-H an texts. see W atson, Records o f the Grand H istorian, 1:134—51，
208—
18. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 12.480,28.1401; Ban G u 班固， 32-
H an shu 漢書， 6.194. For an English translation o f the 27. Sima Qian, S h iji, 8.391-92.
treatise on the feng-shan ceremony, see W atson, Records 28. Ibid., 16.760. For an English translation o f Sima
o f the Grand H istorian 、2:13—69. For further discussion Qian’s comment, see W atson, Records o f the Grand H isto-
of feng-shan ceremony, see Chavannes, T ’ai Chan, riatiy 1:120 -21.
159-261. 29. For the formation and development o f the five­
19. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 28.1355. fold categories, see Sivin and Lloyd, The Way and the
20 . King Xuan 宣（ r. 319-301 bce) o f the Q i State Word, 253- 66. There are three different cycles o f the Five
once asked M encius about the destruction o f the Bright Phases: the conquest cycle, the generation cycle, and the
H all. The H an scholar Zhao Q i 趙岐（ d. 201) in his magic square order. For a comprehensive explanation o f
notes to M encius explained that the Bright H all used to the three cycles, see A ihe W ang, Cosmology and Political
be a place where the Zhou king received vassals on his Culture in E arly China ，75-128. Ih e generation cycle w ill
inspection tour o f the east, but the Qi ruler later pos­ be discussed later in this chapter.
sessed the building. See Zhao Q i, M eng z i zhushu 孟子 30 . Sim a Qian, Shij i , 6.237-38.
注疏， 2a.8a. For Em peror W u’s decision, see Sim a Qian, 31. G u Jiegang 顧領剛，“Wude zhongshi shuo xia de
S h iji, 12.480. zhengzhi he lishi” 五德終始說下的政治與歷史（ Poli-
21. Sim a Qian, Shij i , 12.480—81; Ban G u, H an shu, tics and history under the doctrine o f the succession o f
6.196. Ban G u called the object o f worship the Thearch the Five Virtues), in Gu Jiegang gushi lunw enfi 顧頡剛
on H igh, whereas Sim a Qian called it Grand U nity and 古史論文集， 3:272^79; Figure 1.4 is modified from G us
the FiveThearchs. For the latter, see the section on ritual diagram on p. 302. Aihe W ang argues that the First Em ­
and audience in this chapter. peror favored the virtue o f water in order to justify his
22 . Ban G u, H an shu, 6.196. Ban G u wrote that Em ­ excessive use o f laws and punishments; see W ang, Cos­
peror Wu received the annual reports，# 言 十，from the en­ mology and Political Culture in E arly China, 138—43.
feoffed states and administrative commanderies. For tKe 32. G u Jiegang, Gu Jiegang gusbi lunw enjiy3:279-84.
routine o f submittingjV，see Yan Gengwang 嚴耕望，Qin Christopher Cullen discusses the series o f events leading
H an dtfang xingzbeng zhidu 秦漢地方行政制度, z^y-6S. to the change o f the dynastic virtue from the perspec­
23. Sima Qian, Shiji , 130.3296; Ban G u, H an shu, tive o f astronomical reform; see Cullen, “M otivations for
6.199 ，25-1244, 62.2715. Scientific Change in Ancient China ， ，，192-201.
24 . Ban G u, H an 血， 2^.974-76. For the astronomi­ 33. Sim a Qian, Shiji , 6.237-38; G u Jiegang, G u jie-
cal systems used before and during the reign o f Emperor 3:272—78.
ganggushi hm w enji，
W u, see Cullen, “M otivations for Scientific Change 34. Ban G u, H an shuy 6.199; G u Jiegang, Gu Jiegang
莫紹按，rtQin Han ji
in Ancient China”; M o Shaokui gushi lunw enji}3:276-78,289-90.
yiqian de guli tanwei” 秦漢及以前的古曆探微. For 35. Sim a Qian, S h ijiy12.475,28.1398; Ban G u, H an
the controversy over the calendar used right before the sku 、25a.i235. Based on H an shu^ Loewe believes that the
 change o f the dynastic virtue from water to earth hap­ to the throne, for he was Em peror W u’s grandson but
pened in 104 b c e , but he ignores the preference for the had been raised as a commoner outside the court. For
color yellow in Em peror W us firstfeng-shan ceremony the implications o f Sui H ongs request, particularly the
in n o b ce as reported in Shij i \ see Loew e, D ivination, intellectual trend in favor o f abdication, see Arbuckle,
M ythology and Monarchy in H an China, 57. Based on Shi “Inevitable Treason.”
jh 28.1395, Christopher Cullen points out that Emperor 44. Ban G u, H an shu 、77.3247-48, 8.262. M ore pre­
W u, clad in yellow robes, worshiped Grand U nity for cisely, what G ai Kuanrao quoted was H an shi Y i zhuan
the first time in 113 bce; see Cullen, “M otivations for 韓氏易傳（M aster Han’s commentaries on the Great
Scientific Change in Ancient China,” 200. Treatises o f the Book o f Changes).
36. Sim a Qian, S h ijit 26.1258-61. G u Jiegang recon­ 45. Ban G u, H an shu、
36.1950-51,36.1963-64.
structs the doctrine o f the Triple Concordance from 46 . Ibid., 85.3468; G u Jiegang, Gu Jiegang guski lu n -
“Sandai gaizhi zhiwen” 三代姜制質文(Ih e institutional 3:322-24; Q izn M u 錢穆，“Liu X iang Xin fuzi
reforms o f the Three Dynasties and their basic or refined nianpu” 割向歆父子年譜， 43- 45. Ban G u mentioned
characters) in Chun q iufan /m春秋繁露，a text most that an Epoch Cycle had 4,617years (H an shu 2^.984 )，
likely completed by Dong Zhongshu，s followers. M ore but modern scholars define the cycle as 4,560 years; see
cautiously, A ihe W ang accepts only the information pro­ Cullen, Astronom y and M athem atics in A ncient China’ 25.
vided in D ongs biography in H an shu. Equally cautious, The interpretation o f the hexagram w uw ang here follows
G ary Arbuckle suggests that the information preserved the opinions o f the Han scholars like Jin g Fang 京房
m “Xiuwen” 修文（Cultivating refinement) in Shuo yuan and Y in g Shao 應助，as quoted in G u Jiegang’s article.
說苑，compiled by L iu Xiang, represents a transitional 47. Ban G u, H an shu, 85.3465-72.
stage from Dong’s biography to his follower’s elabora­ 48. Ban G u, H an shu, 75.3192-93,56.2517-19; Qian
tion. See Gu Jiegang, Gu Jiegang gushi hm w enji, 3:2名4— M u, “Liu X iang X in fuzi nianpu，” 73-74. For the cycle
98; W ang, Cosmology and Political Culture in E arly China ， o f sage kings in the doctrine o f the Triple Concordance,
148-51; Arbuckle, “Inevitable Treason.” Table 1.2 is see Arbuckle, “Inevitable Treason/’ 590—94. H an people
modified from W ang’s Table 4.3 on p. 149. Liu X in later considered Yu as one o f the Three Kings (sanwang 三
developed a calendar known as the Triple Concordance 王)，even though he was also the founder o f the X ia,
system. See Sivin, “Cosmos and Computation in Early the first o f the Three Dynasties [sandai 三代).Table 1.3
Chinese M athem atical Astronom y”; Cullen, Astronomy shows how H an people juxtaposed the category o f Three
and M athem atics in A ncient China, 28-33; Bo Shuren 薄 Kings and that o f the Three Dynasties.
樹人，“Shitan Santong li he Taichu li de butongdian” 試 49. Cheng Shude 程樹德， p jish i 論語集釋，
探三統曆和太初曆的不同點. 39.1345-70; Jiao Xun 焦循，M e n g zi zhengyi 孟子正義，
37. Em peror W u acceded to the throne right after 19.646-52. For the pre-H an notions o f abdication, see
Em peror Jin g s death in the first month o f 141 bce. H e A llan, The H eir and the Sage, 27-54; Pines, “Disputers o f
began his o w n reign in the ten th m o n th o f 14 1 bce. Abdication■”
38. Sim a Qian, S h ijiy12.452，
107.2843,121.3121; Ban 50 . Wu H ung presents W ang M ang’s usurpation in
G u, H an shu, 6.157,52*2379, 88.3608. two stages in M onum entality in Early Chinese A r t and
39. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 28.1384-99; Ruan Zhisheng 阮 Architecture, 184-87. For a b rief account ofW ang M ang’s
芝生，“San Sim a yu H an W udi fengshan” 三司馬與漢 rise，see Loewe and Twitchett, The Ch'in and H an E m -
武帝封禪. pires, 223-31. For an English translation ofW ang M ang’s
40 . W ang L iq i 王利器，Yan tie lun jia o zhu 鹽鐡論校 biography in H an shu、see Dubs, The H istory o f the For­
注，7.437-38; Ban G u, H an shu 、253.1139. mer H an Dyriastyy 3:466-74.
41. Ban G u, H an shuy58.2632. 51. Ban G u, H an sku, 99a.4044~49, 99a.4o66~75,
42. Ibid., 22.1033. 993.4078-82,99a.4093~96,9^.4099.
43. Ibid., 75.3153-54. The unusual events were later 52. For W ang M ang and Confucianism , see Thomsen,
viewed as signs, predicting Em peror Xuan’s ascension A m bition and Confucianism.
 53. Ban G u, H an shu, 12.348,992.4046-47. The story tue o f earth in the generation cycle o f the Five Virtues.
o f Yueshang appears to have been popular only after the See G u Jiegang, Gu Jiegang gushi iunw enji, 3:442-43.
m id-H an. It was first mentioned in the debates on salt 66. Ban G u, H an shu, 2 1 3 . 9 7 9 , Gu Jie -
and iron in 81 b ce (W ang L iq i, Yan tie lun jiaozh u 、 gang’s lengthy analysis o f the revised doctrine remains
38，8.494-95,8.515). It was further circulated through the most insightful; see Gu Jiegang gushi lunw enjiy3:
some anthologies, such as X in xu and Shuoyuan^ both 298-313,331—38， 408-56. For the moral implications o f
compiled by L iu Xiang; see Shi Guangying 石光琪， 石 the revised doctrine, see A ihe W ang, Cosmology and
xu jiaoshi S r 序校釋，2.152-55; X iang Zonglu 向宗魯， Political Culture in E arly China, 143-55.
Shuoyuan jiaozheng 說苑校證， 18.457-58. Sim a Qian did 67. Ban G u, H an shut 9915.4128-29， 99C.4149; Dubs,
not mention this faraway country in Shij i 、even though H istory o f the Former H an Dynasty^ 319-23,367-68.
Ban G u gave it a precise geographical location in H an 68. Ban G u, H an shuy 99C.4190. For a brief account
shu、86.2835. o f W ang M ang’s interregnum, see Loewe and Twitchett,
54. Ban G u, H an shu, 992.4078^79. Ch'in and H an Empires^ 232—40. For W ang M angs fail­
55. Ibid.，
99a.4〇
93. ure in economic and political reform s, see Thomsen,
56. Ibid., 99a_4〇 93-94. It was customary for the new A m bition and Confucianism^ 117-207.
emperor to be crowned in the Temple o f Em peror Gao 69. Loewe and Twitchett, Ch'tn and H an Empires,
ever since Em peror Zhao did so (Ibid., 7.127,8.238,9.278 ， 240-51.
10 .302 ’ 1 1 .334 , 15.347 )- 70. The last powerful warlord, Lu Fang 盧芳，fled to
57. Ibid.，99a.4〇95-96. X iongnu in 42 ce, and eventually died in the nomadic
58. Ibid., 12.357-59,99a.4070-7i. land. See Fan Ye, H ou H an shu、12.505-9. For a brief
59. Ibid., 99a.4069~70.The Record o f R ites said that account o f the civil war in the early Eastern H an, see
the Duke o f Zhou accomplished the task in six years; Loewe and Twitchett, Ch'in and H an Empires, 251-56.
Sun Xidan, L ij i jijie ，
31.842. 71. Northern Xiongnu in the steppes, a ferocious
60 . Ban G u, H an shut 992.4080-81; Sun Xidan, L iji enemy, begged for a truce in 52 ce . See Fan Ye, Hou
承，
31.839. H an shu, ib.8o, 89.2946-48. For a b rief account o f for­
61. In the same chapter in the Record o f R ites (Sun, eign relations in the early Eastern H an, see Loewe and
L i j i jijie , 31.842), the Duke o f Zhou was said to have as­ Twitchett, Ch'in and H an Empires, 264-74.
sumed the role o f the Son o f Heaven to rule the country. 72. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu，ib.81-82; Sim a Biao, Hou
In the sixth year o f his reign, the Duke o f Zhou received H an shu: zh iy7.3161-70.
feudal lords in the Bright H all. The following year, he 73. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu 、
ib.84; Sim a Biao, H ou H an
returned the power to King Cheng. shu: zh i, 8.3177.
62. Ban Gu, H an shu, 99a.4082—88; Fan Ye, H ou H an 74. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu 、
2.100; Sim a Biao, Hou H an
shuy 14.561. shu: zh i，8.3181.
63. Ban G u, H an sbu, 9 ^ .4 10 5. For W ang M ang’s 75. Fan Ye, H ou H an shuy 9.369-70.
construction o f his pedigree, see Loewe, “W ang M ang 76. The two rulers were Em peror Z h an g (r. 76-88 ce)
and H is Forbears,” and Em peror H e (r. 89-105 ce). See Fan Ye, Hou H an
64. Ban G u, H an shu} 9 ^ .4 10 6 -8 ,99C.4161-62, shuy 3.149-50,5.238; Sim a Biao, H ou H an shu: zh i、8.3183-
99C.4147. 84，
8.3187.
65. Like Em peror W u, W ang M ang used the doc­ 77. Tang Jinyu 唐金裕，“X i’anxijiao H an dai jianzhu
trines o f the Triple Concordance and the Five Virtues yizhi fajue baogao” 西安西郊漢代建築遺址發掘報告.
for different purposes. In his calendar, he began the year 78. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo,
with the twelfth month, an acknowledgment that his H an Wei Luoyanggucheng nanjiao lizh ijia n zh u yizh i,
reign belonged to the white concordance in the doctrine 80-125. Before the report was published in 2010，scholars
o f the Triple Concordance. For his dynastic color, he could only rely on the unofficial accounts provided
chose yellow because the X in dynasty went with the vir­ by W ang Zhongshu and Yang Hongxun. See W ang
 8
5
3
Zhongshu, H an C ivilization ，
39; Yang Hongxun, “M ing- 發掘.There is a gender distinction in the eleven tombs
tang fanlun•，’ clustered around the altar-like platform at Yaoshan in
79. Archaeologists found other architectural remains Zhejiang as well. Archaeologists believe that male occu­
between the central building and the outer walls. As pants were furnished with axes and cong objects, female
seen in Figure i.ii, the remains are located in the west­ occupants with jade spinning whorls. See Zhejiang
ern, southern, and eastern sides o f the central building. sheng wenwu kaogu yanjiusuo 浙江省文物考古研究所，
It is unclear how these subordinate buildings looked and Yaoshan 墙山， 201-7; Jam es, “Images o f Power.”
what their function was. 87. Anhui sheng wenwu kaogu yanjiusuo 安徽省文
80. Yang Hongxun provides us with a floor plan that 物 考 古 研 究 所 ，“Anhui Hanshan Lingjiatan Xinshiqi
has a circular ditch outside the walls. H e even suggests shidai mudi fajue jianbao ”
安徽含山凌家灘新石器時代
that the distance between the w all and the outer ditch 墓 地 發 掘 簡 報 ; Chen Jiujin 陳 久 金 and Zhang Jingguo
is about 57.36 meters. A s Figure 1.11 shows, however, the 張敬國，“Hanshan chutu yupian tuxing shikao” 含 出
complex o f the Bright H all is sandwiched between that 土玉片圖形試考.
o f the Spiritual Terrace and that o f the Surrounding 88 . Gao Guangren 高廣仁 and Shao Wangping
Moat. There are only thirty some meters between the 召P望平，“Zhongguo shiqian shidai de linggui yu quan-
western w all o f the Bright H all and the eastern wall o f sheng” 中國史前時代的靈龜與犬牲. For the signifi-
the Spiritual Terrace. In addition, a road, leading to the cance o f turtles in early China, see A llan, The Shape o f
Pingcheng gate o f the H an Luoyang city, is located be­ the Turtle.
tween the two complexes. The eastern wall o f the Bright 89. Liaoning sheng wenwu kaogu yanjiusuo 遗寧
H all is next to the western edge o f the Surrounding 省文物考古研究所，“Liaoning Niuheliang Hongshan
Moat, with only a road in between. The road, leading to wenhua nushenmiao yu jishizhong fajue jianbao” 遼寧牛
the Kaiyang G ate, measures 30 meters. Archaeological 河 梁 紅 山 文 化 女 神 廟 與 積 石 塚 發 掘 筒 報 ; Guo Das-
evidence does not support Yang’s speculation. See Yang hun, “Understanding the Burial Rituals o f the H ong­
Hongpcun, “M ingtang fanlun,wfig. 46; Zhongguo shehui shan Culture through Jade.”
kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, H an Wei Luoyanggucheng 90 . Yan Kejun 嚴可均，Quan shanggu sandai w en ，
nanjiao lizh ijia n zh u y izh i, 82-84. 10.2a ，vol. 1 o f Quan shanggu sandai Q in H an Sanguo L iu -
81. Sim a Qian, Shij i y 28.1401. Scholars have drawn chao w e n 全上古三代秦漢三國六朝文 . Unless other­
possible layouts o f the Fenggao Bright H all. See Cor- wise indicated, translations are mine.
radini, “Ancient Chinas m ing tang between Reality and 91. Sun Yirang，Zhou li zhengyi, 77.3232. The Record o f
Legend，” pi. 11; Zhang Yibing ，
M ingtang zh id uyan jiu 、 . Artificers is traditionally an appendix to the Zhou Rites.
367. For the controversy over the date o f its compilation, see
82. Sim a Qian, Shiji , 28.1401. Wen R en ju n 聞人軍， 心 daodu 考工記導讀，
83. Ban G u, H an shu, 12.359,36.1972,99a.4076. 122—44.
84. For Huan Rong’ see Fan Ye, H ou H an shu^ 92. For an archaeological report, see Qin Shihuang
35.1196 ，
37.1249-54. For Zhang Chun, see Fan Ye, Hou bingma yong bowuguan 秦始皇兵馬俑博物館，Qin
H an shu, 35.1193-97. Although Zhang Chun contributed Shihuang ling tong chemafa ju e baogao 秦始皇陵銅車馬
to the project by presenting various documents on the 發掘報告；for research on ancient Chinese chariots, see
Bright H all, he died early in the third month o f 56 ce. Hayashi M inao 林巳奈夫，“ChUgoku senshin jidai no
85. Zhixin Sun, “The Liangzhu Culture”; Rawson, basha” 中國先秦時代tD 馬車.
Chinese Jadefrom the Neolithic to the Qing, 122-29. 93. The theory o f the Canopy Heaven is explained in
86. For example, the male occupant ofTom b M 3 detail in Fang Xuanling 房玄‘ ， 力>2 shu 晉書， 11.279. A
at Sidun in Jiangsu was buried w ith more than 100 translation is available in H o, L i, Q i and Shu, 126-27. For
pieces o f jade, o f which 33 were cong objects. See Nan­ further studies of this theory, see Chatley, “‘Heavenly
jin g bowuyuan, “1982 nian Jiangsu Changzhou W ujin Cover” ’
； Needham, Science and C ivilisation in China,
Sidun yizhi de fajue” 19 82 年江蘇常州武造寺墩遣址的 3:210-16.
 94. On the Liangzhu congt see K. C . Chang, “A n Essay theory, see Needham, Science and C ivilisation in China ，
on Cong,”O n the Lingjiatan plaque, see LiX ueqin, “N eo- 3:216-19.
lithic Jade Plaque and Ancient Chinese C osm ology, 105. Qian Baocong 錢寶辕，Suanjingshishu 算經十
On the Niuheliang site, see Feng Shi 馬 時，ltHongshan 書， 43. The translation is based on the one in Cullen,
wenhua sanhuan shitan de tianwenxue yanjiu” 紅山文化 Astronom y and M athematics in A ncient China 、182.
三環石壇的天文學研究. 106. Qian Baocong, Suanjing shishu, 13-14 ; Cullen,
95. Sun Yirang, "Zhou li xhengyi, 35.1390. Astronom y and M athem atics in A ncient China, 81-92,174.
96. For a comprehensive summary o f the debate, 107. Qian Baocong, Suanjing shishu, 22-23; Cullen,
see Jin Chunfengs 金春峰 preface to his Zhou guan zh i Astronom y and M athematics in A ncient China, 174.
chengshujiq i fa n yin g de wenhua y u shidai xinkao 周官之 108. Noda Churyo 能田忠亮，Shusi sankei no kenkyu
成書及其反映的文化與時代新考， 周髀算經O 研究， 成
97. Anhui sheng wenwu gongzuodui 安徽省文物工 109. Chen Qiyou 陳奇猷，L ii shi chun qiu jiaoshi 呂氏
作隊，“Fuyang Shuanggudui Ruyin hou mu fajue jian- 春秋校釋， 25.1659.
bao” 阜陽雙古堆汝陰侯墓發掘簡報; Yan D u n jie 嚴敦 110. L i Yan 李傭，“G ui ju he gudai jihexue” 規矩和古
杰，“Guanyu X i-H an chuqi de shipan he zhanpanM關於 代幾何學.
西漢初期的式盤和占盤; Y in D ife i 殷滌非， “X i-H an 111. Chen L i 歡 立 ，Baihu tongshuzheng 白虎通疏證，
Ruyin hou mu chutu de zhanpan he tianwen yiqi” 西漢 6.265-67. H ie translation is based on the one in Som , Po
汝陰侯墓出土的占盤和天文儀器. H u T'ungy 488.
98. Sima Qian, Shiji , 127.3218. For an English trans­ 112. Ban G u, H an shu 、99a.4078~79.
lation o f the biographies o f the diviners o f lucky days, 113. Lianyungang shi bowuguan 連雲港市博物館，
see W atson, Records o f the Grand H istorian ，2:468-75. Yinwan H an m ujian du 尹灣漢墓簡牘，
i6 o -6 i, 166 ，
171.
99. Ban G u, H an shu 、22.1045. Yang Xiong in his The T L V mirror comes from Tomb M 4. The dating o f
famous Rhapsody on the Ganquan Palace {Ganquan fu 甘 this tomb is based on the buried coins o f daquan w ushi
泉赋)，composed in 13 bce for Em peror Cheng, also 大泉五十，which were circulated in the reign ofW ang
mentioned the round mound associated with Heaven M ang.
near the Ganquan Palace {Han shuy57a.3533). Neverthe­ 114. N ishida M orio 西田守夫，aHokaku kiku kyo no
less, the shape o f the mound used to worship Earth in zumon no keifli” 「 方格規矩鏡」 园紋O 系講; Zhou
Fenyin was not that consistent. Sim a Qian reported that Zheng 周静，“ ‘G uiju jin g’ ying gaicheng ‘boju jin g ’
，
，規
both the First Em peror and Em peror Wu worshiped 矩鏡應改稱博局鏡.
Earth on a “round” mound w ithin a pond {S h iji、28.1367, 115. Tseng, “Representation and Appropriation.”
1389). Ban Gu kept both accounts in H an shu. 116. W ang M ing 王明，T aipingjing hejiao 太平經合
100. Ban G u, H an shu, 25)3.1253—55，
2513.1258—59， 校，
117.660.
25b.i262-64. 117. Cao Z h i 曹植，“Xianren pian” 仙人篇（On im­
101. Ibid., 251x1264—66; Sun Yirang, Zhou li zhengyi, mortals), in Guo M aoqian 郭茂倩，Yuefu shiji 樂府詩集，
43-1757- 64.923-24.
102. W ang Pinzhen, D a D ai L i j i jiegu, 5.98. 118. Lianyungang shi bowuguan, Yinw an H an mu
103. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu, 3.86-87. The transla­ jia n d u , 161，
171.
tion is based on Field, “Cosm os, Cosm ograph, and the 119. Lian-sheng Yang, “Additional Note on the So-
Inquiring Poet,” 106. Called T L V M irrors and the Game Liu-poP
104. The theory o f the Spherical Heaven was ex­ 120. L e i Jianjin 雷建金，“Jianyang xian Guitoushan
plained by Zhang H eng in L in g xian 靈憲(Spiritual faxian bangti huaxiang shiguan” 筒陽縣鬼頭山發現榜
constitution o f the universe), preserved in L iu Zhao’s 割 題畫像石棺. For the rubbing, see Gao W en 高文and
昭annotations to Sim a Biao 司馬彪，Hou H an shu: zh i Gao Chenggang 高成岡!I，Xhongguo huaxiang shiguan y i-
後漢書志， 10.3215-17. Liu was a scholar in the Southern 血中國畫像石棺藝術， 7.
L ian g (525-557 c e ). For an E nglish introduction to the 121. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo
 8
7
3
Luoyang fajue d u i 中國社會科學院考古研究所洛陽 translation is based on the one in Som ，Po H u T ’ung ，
發掘隊，“Luoyang xijiao H an mu fajue baogao” 洛陽西 488.
郊漢墓發掘泰告.The mirror is from Tomb No. 10025, 139. Sun Fengyi 孫瑪翼，H uan z i xin lun 桓子新論，
dated to the middle phase of the Eastern Han. 9a. Huan Tan's paragraph on the Bright H all is pre­
122. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, served in Liu Zhaos annotations to the “Treatise on
Guangzhou Han twz/ 廣州漢墓，
153-54. Ceremonies” in Sima Biao, H ou H an shu: zh i} 8.3177.
123. This mirror had the sim plified T L V design. For 140. The system o f the twenty-eight lunar lodges was
variations in the TLV design, see Tseng, “Representation the Chinese way of mapping the sl^ in the premodern
and Appropriation/，
207-15. era. Since the clustered constellations were meant to
124. Chen Peifen 陳佩芬，Shanghai bowuguan cang measure the movement o f the moon, they were tradi­
qingtongjing上 海 博 物 館 藏 青 銅 鏡 ， 23, fig. 39 . 见 e tionally called “lunar lodges.” For further discussion o f
translation is modified from the one in Karlgren, “Early this system, see chapter 5.
Chinese M irror Inscriptions,wexx. 108,109, no. 141. Cai Yong, M ingtang yueling lun, in Sim a Biao,
125. Ban G u, H an shu, 692.4069. Hou H an shu: zhi, B.3180. The translation is adapted from
126. Ibid., 99a.4o82. the one in W u, M onum entality in E arly Chinese A r t and
127. Huang Zhanyue 黃展岳，“H an Chang’an cheng Architecture’ 180. Translations o f three terms have been
nanjiao lizhi jianzhu de weizhi jiq i youguan wenti” 漢長 significantly revised: shier chen 十二辰(twelve divisions
安城南郊禮制建築的位置及其有關問題. o f a day), qi xiu 七宿(seven lunar lodges), and santong
128. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo (Triple Concordance). John Henderson also offers a
Luoyanggongzuo d u i 中國社备科學院考古研究所洛 comprehensive translation in D evelopm ent and D ecline o f
陽工作隊，“H an W ei Luoyang cheng nanjiao de lingtai Chinese Cosmology., 78.
yizhi” 漢魏洛陽■城南郊的靈台遺址; W ang Zhongshu, 142. Sim a Qian, S h iji ，28.1398.
38-40.
H an C ivilization ， 143. Ibid., 28.1401.
129. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu’ 2.100-02,8.3181,792.254^—46. 144. Ban G u, H an shu,
130. W ang Shiren, “Han Chang’an cheng nanjiao lizhi 145. Ibid., 99^4128-29.
jianzhu yuanzhuang de tuice” (1963) and “M ingtang zhi- 146. H ebei sheng wenwu yanjiusuo 河北省文物研究
du chutan” 明堂制度初探(吵力. W ang revises his 1963 所，Cuo m u 譬墓， u -2 2 ,1 。
4一io ; Yang Hongxun, “Zhan-
proposal in his 1987 article, but his earlier reconstruction guo Zhongshan wangling jiq i zhaoyu tu yanjiu” 戰國
still remains the most frequently cited. For an English 中 山 王 陵 及 其 兆 域 圖 研 究 （Research on the mauso­
introduction to "Wang’s 1963 proposal, see Steinhardt, leum of the Zhongshan State and the design of the royal
“Han Ritual H all,” in her Chinese TraditionalArchitec­ necropolis in the W arring States period), in Jianzhu
ture, 70-77. kaoguxue lunw enji, 120-42; Robert L . Thorp, uThe, A r­
131. Yang Y {o n ^ \in yJianzhu kaoguxue lunw enji, 169- chitectural H eritage o f the Bronze A ge,” in Steinhardt,
200. Chinese TraditionalArchitecture, 60—67.
132. Wu Hung, M onum entality in E arly Chinese A rt 147. Qin du Xianyang kaogu gongzuo zhan 秦都咸陽
and Architecture，177. 考古工作站, Qin du Xianyang diyihao gongdian jian-
133. C ai Yong, M ingtang yueling lunypreserved in Liu zhuyizhijianbao” 秦 都 咸 ‘第一 4 官 殿 建 築遺址簡
Zhao’s annotations to the “Treatise on Ceremonies” in 報; Yang Hongxun, “Qin Xianyang gong diyihao yizhi
Sim a Biao, Hou H an shu: zh i, 8.3180. fhyuan wenti de chubu tantao”
秦咸陽官第一號遺址復
134. Yang Hongxun, “M ingtang fanlun，” 63-73. 原問題的初步探討(Issues surrounding the excavation
135. Ibid., 58-73. o f the site o f the Qin Palace 1 in Xianyang), in his Jia n ­
136. N ylan, uChin Wen/Ku Wen Controversy in Han zhu kaoguxue lu n w en ji, 153-68.
Times”
；Ess, “The Old Text/New Text Controversy.” 148. Liu Wendian 劉文典，H uainan H ongliejijie 淮南
137. Qian M u, “Liu X iang X in fuzi nian pu，” 105. 鴻烈集解， 5•巧9_ 90. For a translation, see M ajor, H eaven
138. Chen L i, Baihu tongshuzheng, 6.265-67.The and E arth in E arly H an Thought^ 217-68.
 149. M any scholars speculate that based on the in the Qin dynasty. Em peror Gao o f the H an completed
scheme o f “nine palaces” {jiugong 九宫)，the Son o f the system o f the five altars in Yong. Em peror W en was
Heaven moved around nine compartments in the Bright also enthusiastic about worshiping the Five Thearchs in
H all; therefore, the four halls must have overlapped in Yong. Em peror Wu merely followed his predecessors in
the right and left sections. See Steinhart, “H an Ritual doing so. For more on the suburban sacrifices, see Ling
H all,” in Traditional Chinese Architecture^ pi. 3.5; Wu, Chunsheng 凌純聲，“ Han shidai de zh i 秦漢時代
M onum entality in E arly Chinese A r t and Architecture, fig. 的畤 .
3.19; M ajor, H eaven and E arth in E arly H an Thought, 158. Sim a Qian, S h ijiy 28.1386.
fig. 5.1. Nevertheless, there is no indication o f spatial 159. Ibid.，
28.1394; Ban G u, H an sku, 251x1256. For the
overlapping in the received texts. N or do architectural significance o f the Ganquan Palace, see Guan Donggui
remains support the scheme o f nine compartments. I 管東貴，uQin Han Ganquan gong xiaoshi” 秦漢甘泉宫
picture the interior, in historical imagination, as having 小識 .
twelve compartments as required for monthly obser­ 160. Ban G u, H an shu, 251x1253-66. For more on the
vances; see Figure 1.40. W ang Guowei has proposed the critics o f Em peror Wu’s sacrificial system by the end o f
scheme o f the twelve compartments; see his Guantang the Western Han, see Puett, To Become a God、 307-13.
3.12b. For a discussion o f both schemes, see Hwang,
ji!in 、 161. Sim a Biao, Hou H an shu: zh i, 8.3181.
figs. 2.4-2.13. 162. Ban G u, H an sku ，12.358, ggQ..40j0.
150. In the received texts, the southern hall is also 163. Ibid ., 73.3115-20.
called mingtang. Not to confuse it with the entire com­ 164. Ibid ., 6.207.
plex, I translate this mingtang as “Light Hall，” in con­ 165. Ibid., 9 9 ^4107-8 ,99C.4161.
trast with the Dark Hall in the north. It is unclear 166. Sima Biao, H ou H an shu: zh iy5.3130. For the court
whether the name o f the entire complex was promoted audience, see Bodde, Festivals in Classical China ，139-45.
from the name o f the southern hall in the discourse o f 167. The description was given by the Han scholar
monthly observances. C ai Z h i 蔡質 in his H an y i 漢儀（H an rites), which was
151. Fung Yu-lan, H istory o f Chinese Philosophy, 2:26. preserved in Liu Zhao’s annotations to Sim a Biaos Hou
152. Ih a t is to say, even if the sun and the moon are H an shu: zh i、5.3131.
moving east, they appear to set in the west as the heav­ 168. Sim a Biao, Hou H an shu: zh i, 4.3102.
ens turn and drag them along. The quotation is from 169. Chen Qr^ou, L ii shi chun qiu jiaoshi, 1.1-2 ，
2.63-64,
Fang Xuanling,/f« shu, 11.281-84. For a translation, see 3.121-22 ，
4.185-86,5.241—42， 6.311-12,7.375-76, 8.421-22,
H o, Astronom ical Chapters o f the Chin sku 、49—58. For an 9.467-68,10.515-16,11.56 广68,12.615-16.
explanation o f this phenomenon, see Needham, Science 170. Ibid., 6.312.
and C ivilisation in Chinay3:213. 171. Sun Xidan, L ijijijie , 15.399-505.
153. H ie quotation is said to have come from “M ing- 172. Ban G u, H an shu 、
10.1709-10. The version with
tang yin yang lu” 明堂陰陽祿（Record o f Yin and Yang thirty-three fascicles was believed to have been discov­
in the Bright H all) in the Record o f Rites. Though not ered by Liu Xiang when he surveyed the old texts col­
included in the extant version o f the Record o f Rites^ the lected in the imperial library; see W ei Zheng 魏徵，Sui
quotation is preserved in N iu H o n g s 牛 弘 （
d. 610 ce) shu 隋書， 32.925. In any event, both books mentioned
essay on the Bright H all in L i Yanshou 李延壽，Bei shi by Ban G u were no longer available when Niu Hong
北 i ，72.2498. (d. 610 ce) prepared his proposal for erecting the Bright
154. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu, 2.100 ，
3.136,4.174. H all; see L i Yanshou, Bei ski, 72.2496.
155. Sim a Biao, H ou H an shu: zh iy 8.3181-83. For wel­ 173. Ban G u, H an sku 、
74.3139-40.
coming the seasons, see Bodde, Festivals in Classical 174. Sun Xidan, L i j i jijie , 15.399. Zheng Xuans opinion
China ，192-200. is preserved in his annotation to the treatise on monthly
156. Sima Qian, Shiji , 28.1401. observances in the Record o f Rites. For the development
157. Ibid., 28.1384. There were only four altars in Yong o f the discourse o f monthly observances, see Feng You-
 8
3

9
lan, Zhongguo zhexue shixinbian 中國 哲學史新編，
1:457— title of the treatise on monthly observances), in Yan Ke-
64; M ajor, Heaven and E arth in E arly H an Thought, 217-20. jun, Quan shanggu sandai Q in H an Sanguo Liuchao wen,
175. Cai Yong, “Yueling pianming” 月令篇名（The 2 {Quan H ou H an wen): 80.8.

Chapter 2

1. Qu W anli, S h ijin g quanshtj 292-94; the transla­ 234—44)，but he does not touch upon the omens on the
tion is from Waley, The Book o f Songs, 175. cliff o f the W estern Passage.
2 . Y in Shengping 尹盛平， Weishijiazu 10 . Tiziana Lippiello, for example, provides an icono-
和妒西周微氏家族青銅器群研究， 4 1- graphic overview o f the omens on the cliff o f the W est-
58，
91—92， 233_377，395一 Based on the context o f the in­ ern Passage based on the texts on omens from the Han
scription and the style o f decoration, Y in suggests that the to the Southern Dynasties. She does not discuss their
basin was in use mainly during the reign o f King Gong (r. visual attributes. N or does she consider them specifically
9J7^9I5- 9 ° ° bce). The translation is from Shaughnessy, in the historical context o f the Han. See Lippiello,
Sources ofW estern "Zhou H istory, 1-4,183-9 2. For the signif­ picious Omens and Miracles in A ncient China, 89-112.
icance o f this basin, see Falkenhausen, Chinese Society in 11. For the omen records and their implications
the Age o f Confucius, 29-73. during the reign o f Em peror W u, see Kern, “Religious
3 . Sim a Qian, S h iji, 47.1942-44. For a study o f lin Anxiety and Political Interest in W estern Han Omen
in ancient texts, see Izushi Yoshihiko 出石誠彦，Skina Interpretation.”
shinw a densetsu no kenkyu 支那神話傳說研究， 163- 12. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 12.464-65,28.1392; Ban Gu,
86 . H an sku 、2^.122^-26.
4 . Ruan Yuan 阮兀，Chun qiu G ongyangzhuan 13. Ban G u, H an shu, 252.1225—26; 343.2797—98. For
zh u sh u 春秋公羊傳注疏， 28.158-60. the legend o f the nine tripods and the significance o f
5. Ban G u, H an sh ^ 56.2513-23. Em peror W us obtaining a tripod in Fenyin, see Tseng,
6. Ibid.，56.2500. Dong Zhongshu was not the first “M yth, History, and M emory■”
to coin the term. It was already in use during the reign 14. Ban G u, H an shu, 12.460-61,253.1221. The Han
o f Em peror Wen; see Sim a Qian, Shij i 、28.1382. began a year with the tenth month before the G reat In ­
7. Ruan Yuan, Chun qiu Gongyang zhuan zhushu 、 ception system was put to use in 104 bce. Therefore, the
28.158-60. first year o f the Epochal Ligh t started from the tenth
8. Su Yu 蘇舆，Chun q iu fa n luyizheng 春秋繁露義 m onth o f 135 bce and en ded in the n in th m o n th o f
證, 16.157-58. 134 bce. Since there was an intercalary month between
9. M artin Powers's “H ybrid Omens and Public Is­ the ninth and the tenth months, the first year o f the
sues in E arly Im perial China” marks the earliest atten­ Epochal Ligh t included that additional month. The first
tion to the H an images o f omens in the W est Although year o f the Epochal H unting was from the tenth month
he continues to address the importance o f omens in his o f 123 b c e to the nin th m o n th o f 122 b c e . See Xu X iqi
A r t and Political Expression in E arly China 、224-78, Pow­ 徐錫棋， ( Gonghe) zh iX i-H a n lipu 西周共和至
ers does not include the cliff carvings at the Western 西漢曆譜.
Passage in his discussions. Wu H ung begins his concern 15. It is noteworthy that the tripod under discussion
about the images o f omens with “Sanpan Shan Chariot was discovered in Fenyin in the sixth month o f 113 bce,
Ornament and the Xiangrui Design in Western Han but the Epochal Tripod began in the tenth month o f 117
A rt.” He further offers a deep analysis o f the omens bce. Sim a Qian did not offer any explanation. Ban Gu
carved in the W u Liang shrine (W u Liang Shrine ，73—107， added that a tripod was retrieved from the River Fen in
the first year o f the Epochal Tripod, but did not provide 33. Ban G u, H an sku 、28b.i6c>9.
any details o f this event. See Ban G u, H an shu} 6.181-82, 34. For a transcription o f the inscription, see Nagata,
184. K andai sekkoku shuseiy 2:186. For an English translation,
16. Ibid., 25b.i252； Fan Ye, H ou H an shuy ib.82. see Lippiello, Auspicious Omens and Miracles in A ncient
17. Ban G u, H an shu 、 56.2495-505; Fung Yu-lan, H is­ China, 255-57.
tory o f Chinese Philosophy、2:55-58. For Dong Zhongshus 35. Nagata, K andai sekkoku shUsei、2:186; Lippiello,
omenology, see Puett, To Become a God, 289—300; Powers, Auspicious Omens and Miracles in A ncient China 、255.
A r t and Political Expression in E arly China, 229-33. 36. The main text is composed o f 3B5 characters. I f
18. Ban G u, H an shuy58.2613-17. the information about the patrons is included, then the
19. Ibid., 25a.i225_26，
34a.2797_98. characters total 527.
20 . Ibid.，
8.253,258,259,263. 37. Ban G u, H an sku 、99a.4078-79,99a.4093-96. See
21. Ibid., 8.242, 253，
272; 25b. 1252. the related discussion in chapter 1.
22. Ibid., 89.3632.The birds were recorded as he que 38. Ibid. See the related discussion in chapter 1.
鹖雀. 39. Ibid ., 99^4112.
23. Fan Ye, H ou H an sku, ib.82; Zhou Tianyou 周天 40 . Ibid., 85.3468. See chapter 1 for further discus­
游，H ou H a n jijia o zh u 後漢紀校注，
232. sion.
24. Ban G u, H an sku 、
59.3627-34,60.3670. 41. Ibid., 27^ 1412-13. The omen occurred in 45 bce
25. Ibid., i9a.724~26; Sim a Biao, Hou H an shu: in the reign o f the eighth ruler, Em peror Yuan.
zM y 24.3556-62. T he titles and duties o f the three posts 42. Ibid., 99b.4ii2—13.
changed over time. For a comprehensive introduction to 43. Ibid., 99b.4ii2.
the system, see Zhou D aoji 周道濟，H an Tang zaixiang 44. For a brief introduction to E ry a ysee Loewe,
zhidu 漢唐宰相制度, 7-266; Loewe and Twitchett, E arly Chinese Texts, 94-99.
ChHn and H an Empires, 466-70,492-93. 45. Ban G u, H an shuy 99a.4o69.
26 . Ban G u, H an shu, 84.3421-24. The celestial sign 46. Ibid., 99a.4ii2-i8.
was called yinghuo shou xin 癸惑守心、，meaning that 47. Ibid., 30.1772.
M ars stays in the lunar lodge H eart for a period o f time. 48. Chen L i, Baihu tong shuzhengy 8.361.
A lthough Z h ai Fangjin died in the spring o f 7 bce, 49. W ang M an g certainly did not initiate the dis­
M ars did not appear in the lodge X in until the summer course o f auspicious omens, but his intensive propa­
o f that year; see Zhang Jiafeng 張家鳳 and H uang Y i- ganda enhanced its significance and popularity. For
long 黃一農，“Zhongguo gudai tianwen dui zhengzhi de further discussion ofW ang M ang’s impact on the pur­
yingxiang” 中國古代天文對政治的影響. suit o f auspicious omens, see Chen Pan 陳榮, “Qin Han
27. Kageyama Terukuni 影山輝國，“Kandai ni okelu jian suowei ‘fbying’ lunlue” 秦漢間所謂符1應論略(The
saii to seiji” 漠代丨〔招【 于■?>炎異匕政治. so-called “signs and responses” in the Qin and Han
28 . Ban G u, H an shu, 45.2181- 88，11.342. periods), in his Gu chenw eiyantaojiqi shulujieti 古識緯
29. Ibid., 83.1543-671, i9a«742； Ban Biao, Hou H an 研討及其書錄解題，
i - 98.
shu: zh i, 19.3385-543,28.3621. For a comprehensive intro­ 50 . Ban G u, H an shuy 27.1315-522. For a deep analy­
duction to the organization o f the Han local govern­ sis o f the “Treatise on the Five Phases，，，see A ihe Wang,
ment, see Yan Gengwang, Q in H an difang xingzheng Cosmology and Political Culture in E arly China, 130—55.
zhidu\ Loewe and Twitchett, Ch'in and H an Empires、 51. Ban G u, H an shu, 22.1065; W u, Wu Liang Shrine 、
47°~79>5° 6-12* 77; Lippiello, Auspicious Omens and M iracles in A ncient
30 . Ban G u, H an sku 、89.3631. China, 76.
31. Fan Ye, H ou H an shut 76.2467-68. 52. Ban G u, H an sku, 3.141; H uang H ui 黃曝，Lun
32. Ibid., 86.2847; Wu Shuping 吳樹平，Dongguan hengjiaoshi 論衡校釋， 19.842.
H an jijia o zh u 東觀漢記校注， 13.501. W ang Zhui was 53. H uang H ui, L un hengjiaoshi、16.721; Lippiello,
called W ang Fu i in Dongguan H an ji. Auspicious Omens and Miracles in A ncient CMna, 77-78.
 For Wang Chongs attitude toward omens, see Powers, acting for a counselor-delegate instead. Nagata Hide-
A r t and Political Expression in E arly China ，224—29. masa counters Song’s reading with a comparable Han
54. Ban G u, H an shu, 40IX1373; W u, Wu L iang Shrine, example. Zhou Xiaolu seconds Nagata and provides
77- 79- . more Han examples. See Song Zhim in 宋系民，“M iu
55. Chen Pan, Gu chenweiyantao jiq i sku lu jieti、648. Yu bushi Pengcheng xiang” 缕 宇 不 是 彭 城 相 ; Nagata,
56. Ibid., 301-4. K andai sekkoku shusei, 1:75-76 n. 1; Zhou Xiaolu 周曉陸.，
57. Lippiello, Auspicious Omens and Miracles in A n ­ “Miu Yu muzhi dukao” 缪 i 于墓志讀考 .
cient China ，78. Ru Chun quoted the book in his com­ 71. Chen L i, Baihu tongshuzheng, 6.283-88.
mentaries on Ban G u’s H an shu. 72. H ong Gua, L i xu, 5.17.
58. W ho the shrine was dedicated to has been under 73. Fischer, D ie chinesische M alerei der H an-Dynastiey
heated debate. Here I follow the conventional attribu­ T. 22, T. 23.
tion as explained in W u, Wu L iang Shrine ，24—30. For 74. W u, Wu Liang Shrine, 237.
a recent discussion of the issue, see Liu, Nylan, and 75. Sim a Qian, S h ijiy10.429-30,16.1260 ，28.1381，
Barbieri-Low , Recarving Chinas Past. 96.2681; Ban G u, H an shu, 4.127,2^.1212. The association
59. W u, Wu L iang Shrine 、240, of the yellow dragon with the change of dynastic ^dr-
60 . Ibid., 80. tue is also discussed in Izushi, Shina shinw a densetsu no
61. For the archaeological report, see Hunan sheng kenkyU 、673-74; Lippiello, Auspicious Omens and Miracles
bowuguan 湖南省博物館，“Changsha M awangdui er in A ncient China ，106.
san hao Han mu fajue jianbao” 長沙馬王堆二、三號漢 76. Sim a Qian, S h ijit 28.1398; Ban G u, H an shu ，
墓發掘簡報. 6.199. The color o f official costumes had already changed
62. Pow ers,^r/ and Political Expression in E arly China, to yellow when Em peror W u performed thefeng-shan
246-63. ceremony in n o bce. See the related discussion in chap­
63. For the transcription, textual references, and ter 1.
English translation o f the cartouches, see W u, Wu Liang 77. Ban G u, H an shu, 2^.979, 25b. 1270-71; G u Jie -
Shrine, 235-43. gang，Gu Jiegang gushi lunw enjiy 298-313, 331-38, 408-56;
64. Ibid., 234—43. A ihe W ang, Cosmology and Political Culture in E arly
65. Shen Yue 沈約，Song shu 宋書，
27.759-29.878. For China, 143-55. Also see the related discussion in chap­
a thorough analysis of Shen Yue’s treatise on auspicious ter 1.
omens, see Lippiello, Auspicious Omens and Miracles in 78. Ban G u, H an shu，yy.^262.
A ncient China, 113-54. 79. Ibid., 99b.4i09 ，
4113.
66. W u, Wu L iang Shrine，80-84,243-44. 80 . Ib id .，
99b.4i39.
北京歷史博物館，
67. Beijing lishi bowuguan Wang- 81. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu, ia.27,17.644-45. For a brief
duH an mu b ih u a 望都漢墓壁畫. account, see Loewe, D ivination, M ythology and M onar­
68. Yan Gengwang, Q in H an difang xingzheng zhidu, chy in H an China, 59-60.
137; Hucker, D ictionary o f O fficial Titles in Im perial China ， 82. Sun Guangde 孫廣德， Qi n L iang H an y in -
272. yang w uxing shuo de zhengzhi sixiang 先秦兩漢陰陽五
69. Beijing lishi bowuguan, Wangdu H an mu bihua 、 行說的政治思想，
136-39 ■
13，pl.3 6. 83. A ihe W ang, Cosmology and Political Culture in
70. N anjing bowuyuan, “D ong-H an Pengcheng xiang E arly China, 151-55.
M iu Yu mu” 東漢彭城相谬宇墓.TKe title o fM iu Yu in 84. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu, ib.59.
the epitaph was “The counselor-delegate of Pengcheng 85. H uang H ui,L u n hengjiaoshi-, 19.842.
Kingdom acting for the magistrate of Lu District.” Song 86. Ren N aiqiang 任乃後 , H uayangguo zh ijiaobu tu -
Zhimin questions the possibility that a higher-ranking z h u 華陽國志校補圖注， 3 .17 2 H
official would have acted for a lower-ranking official 87. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu 、8.338，82IX2733. For Cao P i’s
and suggests that Miu Yu should have been a magistrate usurpation, see Leban, “Managing Heaven^s Mandate*7;
 3
9
2

Knechtges, “Rhetoric o f Im perial Abdication and 赋)，” in Xiao Tong 蕭統，Wen xuan 文選，
2.60. See the
Accession .’
， related discussion in chapter 3.
88. Sima Qian, S h iji’ 12.457,28.1387，
30.1425. 110. The measurements are based on those in Jiang
89. Ban G u, H an shuy252.1230. Yingju 蔣英炬 and W u W enqi 吳文祺，H an dai Wu shi
90 . Fan Ye, H ou H an shu, 3.144 ， 5.239; Wu Shuping, muqun shikeyanjiu 漢代武氏▲ 群石刻研究,29.
Dongguati H an jijia o zh u 、2.77-78,3.102. 111. For an introduction to the H ym n o f the Fu Pas-
91. X ie Cheng 謝承，H ou H an shu 後漢書， 2.38，in sagei see Hanzhong diqu wenjiao ju 漢中地區文教局，
Zhou Tianyou, Bajia Hou H an shujizh u 八家後漢書輯 “ ‘Fuge song’ moya shike” 郁閣領摩崖石刻. For its tran­
注. Linhuai Comm andery became Xiapei 下那 King­ scription and rubbing, see Nagata, K andai sekkoku shuseiy
dom in 72 ce; see Fan Ye, H ou H an shu, 2.119. 2:196-97; for a translation, see Lippiello, Auspicious
92. Sim a Qian, S h ijiy 4.135^36,110.2881; Fan Ye, Hou Omens and Miracles in A ncient China, 257-59. For a dis­
H an sku 、87.2871-72. cussion o f its date, see Yuan W eichun 袁維春，Q in H an
93. W u, Wu L iang Shriney 242. bei shu 秦漢石皁述， 399-400. The original carving o f the
94. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu、87.2869-902. M em orial to the T ianjing Passage does not survive. For its
95. Ib id ” 5.225,5.239 ，
7.293; W u Shuping, Dongguan transcription, see H ong Gua 洪适，L i xu 隸 系賣， 11.9 b -
H an j i jtaozhu, 2.77-78,3.101-2. 10b; for a translation, see Lippiello, Auspicious Omens and
96. W u, Wu L iang Shrine ，240. Miracles in A ncient China 、260-61.
97. Shandong sheng bowuguan 山東省博物館， 112. For a brief account o f the maintenance o f roads,
dong H an huaxiang shi xuanji 山東漢畫像石選集，
i6 ， bridges, and facilities for travelers in the H an, see Loewe
fig. 41. and Twitchett, Cb’in and H an Em pires、613-14.
98. Zhongguo huaxiang shi quanji bianji weiyuanhui 113. Sim a Qian, S k iji, 29.1141; Ban G ^ H a n shu 、
29.1681.
中國畫像石全集編輯委員會，Zhongguo huaxiang shi 114. Guo Rongzhang fP 榮章，Shimen moya keshiyan­
q u a n ji 中國晝像石全集，
4:99. jiu 石門摩崖刻石研究， 8-io. According to the archaeo­
99. Sim a C^an, S h iji, 33.1518-19. logical investigation, the tunnel is 14 meters long, 3.95-
100. Ban G u, H an sku 、
58.2613-17. 4.25 meters wide, and 4-4.75 meters high; see Shaanxi
101. Huang H ui, L un hengjiaoshi, 59.844-45; Fan Ye, sheng kaogu yanjiusuo 陝西省考古研究所， “Bao-Xie
H ou H an shuy 25.874-75, 69.2239-40. dao Shimen fujin zhandao yiji ji tike de diaocha” 襃斜道
102. Ren Naiqiang, H uayangguo zh ijiaobu tuzhu, 石門附近接道遺路及題刻的調查，
29. For an English
iob.563. introduction to the Bao-Xie Route, see H arrist, Land­
103. Ban Gu, H an sku 、6913.4110—11. For W ang M angs scape o f Words, 34-38.
land reform, see Thomsen, A m bition and Confucianism^ 115. Nagata, K andai sekkoku shusei, 2:20-21. For a study
124-27. and translation o f the inscription, see H arrist, Landscape
104. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu，ib.86. o f Words,
105. Wu Shuping, Dongguan H an jijia o zh u ，
3.102. 116. G uo Rongzhang, Shimen moya keshi yanjiu, 43-44;
106. Zhu Q ianzhi 朱謙之，L aozijiaoshi 老子校釋， Guo Rongzhang, Shimen shike daquan 石門石刻大全，
32.130; Chen Qiyou, L it ski chun qiu jiaoshi, 1.44; Ban G u, 55; Tan Zongyi 譚宗義，H an dai guone'i lulu jiaotong kao
58.2613-14.
H an sku 、 漢代國內陸路交通考，
卜^ .
107. Wu Shuping, Dongguan H an j i jiaozhuy 1.11; Zhou 117. Yan Gengwang, “Han Tang Bao-Xie dao kao” 漢
Tianyou, Hou H an j i jiaozhu, 232. 唐襃斜道考，
103-5.
108. For accounts o f local officials, see Fan Ye, Hou 118. Ibid., 102-3.
H an sku, 76.2467-68,86.2847; Zou Tianyou, Bajia Hou 119. Xiabian is present-day Chengxian 成藉' in Gansu;
H an shu jiz h u 、154,157,175, 606. see Huang Yongdi 黃泳■第，Chengxian xin zh i 成縣新
109. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 12.459, 28.1388; Sim a Guang 司 志， 1.30a, 3.49a, 4 .ia-2a.Ju is present-day Lueyang 略陽
馬光，Tjizhi tongjian 資治通鑑， 20.655; Zhang Heng, in Shaanxi; see Tan Yu 譚■璃’ Lt/eyang x ia n z h 略陽蘇志，
“Rhapsody on the Western M etropolis {X id u fu 西都 1.13a—15a，
4.ia_4b_ For a discussion o f the location o f Ju
 in the Han, see Yan Gengwang, “Tong dian suoji Han- 132. The measurements are based on Chen M ingda,
zhong tong Qinchuan yidao kao” 通典所記漢中通秦川 “Bao-Xie dao Shimen jiq i shike,w57.
驛道考，
26-32,4°- 5.207,5.211，
133. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu 、 6.251; Guo
120. W ang Bao 王褎，Tongyue 僮約，in Yan Kejun ， Rongzhang, Shimen shike daquany55. W ang Sheng’s in­
Quan shanggu sandai Q in H an Sanguo Liuchao w en Quan scription was traditionally called Eulogy o f the Stone Gate
H an w en, I {Quart H an wen): 42,11b—12b. {Shimen song 石門頌) .For its transcription and rubbing,
121. Nagata, K andai sekkoku shuseij 2:20—21; H arrist, see Nagata, K andai sekkoku sbusei} 2:104-5. For a transla­
Landscape o f Words, 38. For the cost o f this project, see tion and further study, see H arrist, Landscape o f Words,
Chen M ingda 陳明達， “Bao-Xie dao Shimen jiq i shike” 53-67.
展斜道石門及其石刻， 6o-6i. 134. Bian Yu’s inscription was traditionally called
122. Fan Ye, Hou H an shu, 58.1869; L i Jiannong 李劍 M arker Recordfo r Yang H uai (Yang H uai biaoji 楊淮表
農 , X ia n Q in Hang H an jin g ji shi gao 先秦兩漢經濟史 言 己) .For its transcription and rubbing, see Nagata, K andai
稿， 194—98. sekkoku sM sei, 2:200-01. For its content, see Guo Rong-
123. Nagata, K andai sekkoku sM sei, 2:196-97. zhang, Shimen moya keshiyanjiu, 49-57. For a translation
124. Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, “Bao-Xie dao and further study, see H 2sx\styLandscape o f Words, 68-74.
Shimen fujin zhandao yiji ji tike de diaocha”; Qin 135. For the transcription and a rubbing, see Nagata,
秦中行，
“Bao-Xie zhandao diaocha ji ，
Zhongxing ，
襃斜 K andai sekkoku shusei, 2:120-21. For further research, see
棧道調查記. Guo Rongzhang, Shimen moya keshiyanjiu 、46-48. For a
125. Nagata, K andai sekkoku shuseiy 2:196—97. translation, see H arrist, Landscape o f Words, 68. H arrist
126. Guo Rongzhang, KH an X ixia song moya tanyuan” also pointed out the Jianw ei connection among the
漢西狹頌摩崖探源，
49. Stone Gate inscriptions.
127. M a H eng speculates that the First Em perors 136. For a comprehensive introduction to the post-
edict at M ount Jieshi 碼石 could have been a c liff in­ Han inscriptions and their translations, see H arrist,
scription, but there is no way to verify this, for the origi­ Landscape o f Words, 74-89.
nal carving has long since disappeared; see M a H eng 馬 137. For the archaeological investigation o f the cliff
衡，Fanjiang zh a ijin sh i conggao 凡將齋金石叢稿， 68. inscriptions at the Stone Gate, see Shaanxi sheng kao­
In 1994 a Han cliff inscription was discovered in Inner gu yanjiusuo, “Bao-Xie dao Shimen fujin zhandao yiji
Mongolia. The first report claims that it is Emperor ji tike de diaocha ，”3〇一42. For a comprehensive intro­
Wu’s edict, but according to Sun Wei, the latest date to duction and illustrations, see Guo Rongzhang, Skimen
which the inscription refers is 110 ce, so the inscription shike daquan. O wing to the construction o f a dam at
could not have been produced earlier; see Sun W ei 孫 ' 危， the Stone G ate in 1967-1970, some o f the inscriptions
“Nei Menggu Alashan Han biansai beiming diaocha ji” were removed and later installed in the Hanzhong 漢
內蒙古阿拉善漠邊塞碑銘調查記. 中M useum, The remainder are now submerged in the
128. For the nature o f c liff inscriptions, see H arrist, reservoir. We can no longer appreciate this unique group
Landscape o f Words, 17-30. o f c liff inscriptions in its original, spectacular site. For
129. For a comprehensive introduction to inscribed an English account o f the modern transformation, see
bronze vessels, see Shaughnessy, Sources o f Western Zhou H arrist, Landscape o f Words，89-91.
H istory. For the hidden monumentality o f bronze ves­ 138. The distance is based on Guo Rongzhang，“Han
sels, see W u, M onum entality in E arly Chinese A r t and X ixia song moya tanyuan,M51. For the transcription and
Architecture, 1-15. a rubbing, see Nagata, K andai sekkoku shusei, 2:210—11.
130. For the promotion o f stone steles by the First 139. Guo Rongzhang, “H an X ixia song moya tanyuan，”
Emperor, see Kern, Stele Inscriptions o f Ch'in Shih-huang. 52.
131. H ie measurement is based on Shaanxi sheng kao­ 140. The authors used hui 韓，rather than m ing 名，to
gu yanjiusuo, “Bao-Xie dao Shimen fujin zhandao yiji ji introduce L i X i and Geng Xun’s names. The word hui is
tike de diaocha，” 36-37. used only when the person referred to is dead.
 141. Nagata, K andai sekkoku shUsei、2:88-91. Wu Hung China ，91-93. M isunderstanding the fact that the H ym n
used Kong Zhou’s 孑L 宙 memorial stele as an example o f the Western Passage was produced after L i X is death,
to explain how friends and colleagues played a role in Lippiello considers the inscription to have been “en-
shaping Han funerary culture; see W u, M onum entality graved during his tenure as Grand Adm inistrator” and
in E arly Chinese A r t and Architecture 、217-23. For mourn­ suggests that “it was in this capacity that he was able to
ing obligations in H an local politics, see Ebrey, “Patron- build a sound reputation.”
Client Relations in the Later Han”; Brown, Politics o f 143. Fan Ye, Hou H an shu, 65.2132-34.
M ourning in E arly China, 85—103. 144. Yan Gengwang, Q in H an difang xingzheng zhidu 、
142. Lippiello, Auspicious Omens and Miracles in A ncient 157-60,162-71.

Chapter 3

1. For research on this poem in Chinese, see Tai Jin g- modified from Hawkes, Songs o f the South, 128-29.
n o n g 臺靜農，Chu ci Tian wen x in jia n 楚辭天問新隻； 10. For a discussion o f the individualistic approach,
You Guoen 游國恩，Tian wen zuanyi 天問纂義；Sun see Poo, In Search o f Personal Welfare.
Zuoyun 孫作雲，T ian wen yan jiu 天問研究; SuX ue- 11. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo,
lin 秦雪林，Tian w en zhengjian 天問正簡. In English, Guangzhou H an mu, 153-54.
see Hawkes, Songs o f the South, 122-51; Field, “Cosmos, 12. Kyoto kokuritsu hakubutsukan 京都国立博物館，
Cosmograph, and the Inquiring Poet,” 守屋
M oriya Kozo shushu hokaku kikus shishinkyo zuroku
2 . H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu 、115; the translation is 孝藏蒐集方格規矩四神鏡国錄, fig. 19 ；
the translation
modified from Hawkes, Songs o f the South, 133. is modified from Karlgren, “E arly Chinese M irror In ­
.3 . H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu, 112—13; the translation scriptions/1 29.
is modified from Hawkes, Songs o f the South, 132. A s we 13. Feng Yunpeng搏雲鵬，/fw shi suo 金石索， 769.
saw in chapter 2，when the scribe Q iang commissioned a 14. G ongTingw an襲廷萬 et al., B a Shu H an dai
bronze basin, he felt gratitude to the H eavenly Thearch h uaxian gji 巴蜀漢代晝像集，fig. 446. The brick was dis­
and to Hou Ji for giving the Zhou kings an extensive covered in Yibin.
mandate; never, however, did he mention the shock that 15. Anna Seidel first coined the term to acknowledge
H ou J i gave the Heavenly Thearch. The boundary be­ the tokens o f im m ortality in Han tombs. See Seidel,
tween story and history was blurred in Qu Yuan’s review; uPost-mortem Im m ortality \ Seidel，“Tokens o f Im m ortal­
widely circulated stories became the perceived reality for ity in H an Graves.”
the poet to ponder. 16. Sim a Qian, S k ijit 12.464-68,28.1392—94; Ban
4 . H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu 、m ; the translation is G u, H an shu 、25a.1225~28.H1e cycle mentioned here was
modified from Hawkes, Songs o f the South, 132, called j i 紀(era). Each Era Cycle had twenty Obscura­
5. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu, 87^88; the translation tion Cycles. For an explanation o f the numerical aspect
is modified from Hawkes, Songs o f the South, 127. o f the legend, see Cullen, “M otivations for Scientific
6. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu 、88; the translation is Change in Ancient China,” 188， 198-99. For discussion
modified from Hawkes, Songs o f the South, 127. o f divine kingship and the Yellow Ihearch’s ascension,
7. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhuy 101; the translation is see Puett, To Become a God, 242-45.
modified from Hawkes, Songs o f the South 、130. 17. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 12.468,28.1394; Ban G u, H an
8. Hong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu, 116; Hawkes, Songs o f shu, 25a.i228.
the South, 133. 18. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 12.465,28.1392; Ban G u, H an
9. Hong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu 、96; the translation is Shu, 25a.i225.
 19. Sim a Qian, S h iji 、12.470,28.1395; Ban G u, H an 30 . H ebei sheng wenwu yanjiusuo, A nping D ong-H an
shuy 25a.1231.The translation is slightly modified from bihua m u 安 平 東 漢 壁 晝 墓 ，pi. 50-52.
Watson, Records o f the Grand Historian o f China，2:53. Hie 31. H ayashi, K andai no bunbutsu漢代O 文物, i6o.
year is based on H an shu、6.185. 孫機’ “Guanyu Zhongguo zaoqi gaoceng
32. Sun J i
20 . Sim a Qian, S h ijiy 12.467，
28.1393; Ban G u, H an fota zaoxing de yuanyuan wenti” 關吳中國早期高層揚
shu、25^1228. For a discussion o f Qi scholars' construc­ 塔造型的淵源問題; QiYingtao祁英涛，“Zhongguo
tion o f the feng-shan ceremony since the W arring States zaoqi mu jiegou jianzhu de shidai tezheng” 中國卓期木
period, see Xu Xingwu 徐興4 ，“Zhanguo Qin H an jian 結構建築的時代特徵.
fengshan sidian de jiangou”戰國秦漢間封禪祀典的 33. For a survey o f H an pottery towers, see Lew is,
構建 . "Pottery Towers o f Han D ynasty China.，，For discus­
21. Sim a Qian, S b iji, 12.473-75，
28.1396-98; Ban Gu, sions o f the seven-story pottery towers, see Zhang Yong
Shu, 2511233-35. M aster Shen, a master o f methods, 張勇 and Cui Yurong 崔玉榮，
“Jiaozuo qiceng liange
came from Qi. He was different from the Confucian caihui tao cang lou de niandai wenti，’ 焦知七邊連H 彩
M aster Shen from Lu in chapter 1. 繒' 陶倉樓的年代問题; Zhang Songlin張松林，
“Xing-
22 . Sim a Qian, S h iji, 12.474-76,28.1397^98; Ban Gu, yang Weihecun Han dai qiceng taolou de faxian he yan-
H an shu, 252.1234- 36. jiu ” 滎陽魏河村漢代七層陶樓的發現和研究.
23. Sima Qian, S h iji, 12.478-79, 28.1400; Ban Gu, 34. Sim a Qian, S h ijit 12.481-82 ，
28.1402; Ban Gu,
H an shuy 6.193,251x1241-42. Ban G u changed “Feilian gui H an shut 6.199 ，25b.i244—45. For the archaeological in­
guan’’ to “Feilian guan，，and “guai guan.，，H e also split ayi vestigation, see Liu Qingzhu 劉慶柱 and L i Yufang 李
yan shou guan，’ into “yi shou guan’’ and “yan shou guan•” 毓芳, H an Chang'an cheng 漢長安城， 186-90. Wu Hung
The discovery o f the roofing tiles with the characters “yi also gives a b rief account o f the construction o f the Jian -
yan shou guan” proves that the record in Shij i is correct. zhang Palace in his M onum entality in E arly Chinese A r t
Therefore I follow Shij i and treat “Feilian gui guan,” too, and Architecture 、174-76.
as one tower. 35. Y i Xuezhong 易學鐘, “Shizhaishan sanjian ren-
24_ Sim a Qian, S h iji, 122.3150; Ban G u, H an shu, wu wuyu diaoxiang kaoshi”
石寨山三件人物羞宇雕像
90.3658. 考釋.The model was discovered in Tomb 3，which was
25. Yao Shengmin 姚生民，Ganquan gong zb i 甘泉 likely built during the reign o f Emperors Wen and W u.
宫志，29-35, 6 2 -6 3,75~78* 36. Yunnan sheng bowuguan 雲南省博物館， 仰
26 . Yang Xiong, Rhapsody on Sw eet Springs {Ganquan 雲南晉寧石
Jin n in g Shizhaisban gum uqunfajue baogao
f u 甘泉赋)，in Ban G u, H an shu, 80.3525. The translation 寨 山 ■墓群發掘報告， 1:77^-78,2:121. For a discussion o f
is slightly modified from Knechtges, Wen xuan, 2:23. th t jinggan structure, see Tanaka, Chugoku kenchikushi no
漢舊儀 records thirty zhang, whereas
27. H a n jiu yi kenkytiy 61-67.
Sanfujiushi 三辅舊事 says fifty. See Yao Shengmin, 37. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 12.482,28.1402; Ban G u, H an
Ganquan gong zh i、76. sbu, 25b.i245.
28. Yue Banghu 岳邦湖 and Zhong Shengzu 鍾聖 38. For the archaeological report, see Zhongguo she-
祖，Shule he liuyu H an dai changcheng kaocha baogao 疏勒 hui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, B ei-W ei Luoyang Yong
河流域漢代長城考察報告， 23-24. ningsi 北魏洛陽■ 永寧寺， 13—
19. For the architectural
29 . Since the base o f the beacon terrace measures reconstruction, see Yang Hongxun, “Guanyu Bei-Wei
6.85 by 6.4 meters, its diagonal is 9.38 meters. Since Luoyang Yongning si ta fuyuan caotu shuoming” 關於
the circumferences o f M ounds 1 and 2 are 200 and 220 北魏永等■寺塔復原草圖說明; ZhongXiaoqing鐘曉青，
meters, their diameters are 63.66 and 70 meters. I f the “Bei-W ei Luoyang Yongning si ta fuyuan tantao” 北魏
height o f the beacon terrace is 8.4 meters, then the 洛暘永寧寺塔復原探討.
height o f cone-like M ound 1 reaches 57 meters [(63.66 + 39. Ban G u, H an shu, 403.^42. H ie translation is
9.38) x 8.4 = 57], and the height o f M ound 2 reaches 63 modified from Knechtges, Wen xuan, 2:135.
meters [(70 + 9.38) x 8.4 = 62.68]. 40 . Sim a Qian, S h iji, 12.459,28.1388; Sima Guang,
Z izh i tongjiany 20.655. Sim a Qian did not specify the 59. For the controversies over the authorship o f
year when the im m ortals palms for receiving the dew F ar-offJourney j see Hawkes, Songs o f the South, 191-93;
were erected. Jud gin g from the context, Sim a G uang as­ W ang Yuan 王媛，wYuanyou zuozhe yanjiu zhuangkuang
signed this event to 115 b c e . The Jianzhang Palace was zongshu” 《 遠遵》作者研究狀況綜述.Based on his
constructed in 104 bce. analysis o f religious practices, M ichael Puett suggests
41. Other early texts include Zhang H eng，s Rhapsody that Yuan you should have been composed earlier than
on the Western M etropolis [Xidu fu ) and Cao Z h i’s H ym n the compilation o f the Book o f the K ing ofH uainan under
o f the P latefor Receiving the D ew {Chenglupan song 承 the patronage o f L iu A n (d. 122 bce); see his To Become a
露盤頌) .See the form er in X iao Tong, Wen xuan, 2.60; God.., 217-20.
the latter in Yan Kejun, Quan Sanguo w en, 19.2a, vol. 2 60. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci bu%hu、166; Hawkes, Songs
o f Quan shanggu sandai Qin H an Sanguo Liuchao wen. o f the South 、195.
Cao Z h i’s hymn was composed for a replication erected 61. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu 、174-75; Hawkes,
in 237 ce in Luoyang after the original plate was bro­ Songs o f the South, 199.
ken when Em peror M ing o f the W ei had it moved from 62. Scholars have different interpretations o f the
Chang’an to Luoyang. sim ilarities between Yuan you and Daren fu \ (1) Daren
42. Sim a Guang, Z izh i tongjian^ 20.655. fu imitates Yuan you, (2) Yuan you imitates D aren f u 、or
43. Sim a Qian, Shij i y12.484,28.1403; Ban G u, H an (3) Yuan you is a draft o f D aren fu . See Hawkes, Songs o f
shu, 6.201. the South, 191-93 ；
W ang Yuan, ltYuanyou zuozhe yanjiu
44. Ban G u, H an sbuy 65.2858. zhuangkuang zongshu,” 47.
45. Ibid” 9.284，24a.na4,75.3174-75,81.3337. 63. Sim a Qian, Shij i , 117,3056- 63.
46. Ibid., 99C.4161-62. 64. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui
47. Xu Yuangao 徐兀誥，G uoyujijte 國語集解，
18.512. yihao H an m u 長沙馬王堆一號漢墓， 1:156-58; Hunan
48. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 28.1360-61. sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui er san hao H an
49. Ibid., 43.1824-25. m u 長沙馬王堆二、 三號漢墓， 1 :237- 40 .
50. Ibid.，
125.3192; Ban G u, H an shu, 93.3722. 65. Silbergeld, “M awangdui，Excavated M aterials,
51. In S h iji, overstepping royal authority was the of­ and Transm itted Texts.”
fense that led to the estrangement between King Huai 66. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw ang-
and Qu Yuan, but modern scholars argue that Qu Yuans duiyihao H an mu, 1:1-45; Loewe, W ays to Paradise, 17-59;
protest against Chu’s alliance with Qin was what truly Sofukawa H iroshi 曾布川寬 ’ “Konronsan to Shosenzu**
caused his exile. See Sim a Qian, Shiji , 84.2481-82; Sun 崑 搭 山 S 昇 仙 圖 ,118 -5 0 .
Zuoyun, ^Qu Yuan de fangzhu wenti” 屈原放逐問題. 67. Tang Lan, “Zuotan Changsha M awangdui yihao
52 . H ong Xingzu, Chi ci buzhu 、23; Hawkes, Songs o f H an mu” 座談長沙馬王堆一號漢墓， 59; Shang Zhitan
the South 、72. 商志釋，“M awangdui yihao Han mu ‘feiyi，
shishi” 馬王
53. H ong Xingzu, Chi ci buzhu, 25; Hawkes, Songs o f 堆 一 號 漢 墓 ‘非衣’試 釋 , 43.
73.
the South 、 68. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui
54. H ong Xingzu, Chi ci buzhu, 25; Hawkes, Songs o f yihao H an mu} 1:39 ，
149.
the Southyj^' 69. A n Zhim in 安志敏，“Changsha xin faxian de X i-
55. H ong Xingzu, Chi ci buzhu, 29; Hawkes, Songs o f Han bohua shitan” 長 沙 新 發 現 的 西 漢 帛 晝 試 探 ，49~5r，
the South174. Ma Yong 馬 雍 ，“Lun Changsha Mawangdui yihao Han
56. H ong Xingzu, Chi ci buzhu, 47; Hawkes, Songs o f mu chutu bohua de mingcheng he zuoyong” 論長沙馬
the South ，78. 王 堆 一 號 漢 墓 出 土 帛 晝 的 名 稱 和 作 用 ;Wu Hung,“Art
57. H ong Xingzu, Chi ci buzhu^ 47; Hawkes, Songs o f in a Ritual Context,” 116 -21.
the South 、78. 70. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui
58. Jin Kaicheng 金開誠 et al.，Qu Yuan j i jiaozhu 屈 yihao H an m uy1:43-45.
36 - 39 .
原集校注， 71. H u P eih ui胡 培 翬 /f z知w幻/f儀禮正義，
26.12a-
 13b. Wu H ung has a more sophisticated understanding 86. Hunan sheng bowuguan, “Changsha Zidanku
o f the te rm jiu and translates the phrase as “Ih e J iu (the Zhanguo muguo mu,H37-38.
body in its permanent home) of Such-and-Such.” See 87. Ying-shih Y ii，“‘0 Soul, Come Back!’” 365-69.
W u, “A rt in a Ritual Context,M116-17. 88. Wu Hung, “A rt in a Ritual Context,n115.
72. A n Zhim in, “Changsha xin faxian de X i-H an bo- 89. Ibid., 116-18.
hua shitan，” 49-51; M a Yong, “Lun Changsha M awang­ 90. For the authorship o f Sum m oning the Souly see
dui yihao Han mu，” 121-22. Sun Zuoyun, “Shuo Zhao bun wei Song Yu zhao Chu
73. Gansu sheng bowuguan甘肅省博物館，呢 而 ■ Xiangwangzhihun”說 《招魂》為宋玉招楚襄王之魂，
H an jia n 武威漢簡,148-49 ， pi. 23. 772—
9°-
74. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui 91. Ying-shih Y ii，‘“ O Soul, Com e Back!，
” 373. For an
yihao H an m uy 1:31-32. unabridged quotation, see H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu,
75. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui er 9.197—202; Hawkes, Songs o f the Southt 223—25.
san hao H an muy 1:23-25,237-40. 92. Wu Hung, “A rt in a Ritual Context," 138-39. For
76. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui an unabridged quotation, see H ong Xingzu, Chu ci bu-
yihao H an m u 、1:112-18 ; Hunan sheng bowuguan, Chang­ 9.202—215; the translation is modified from Hawkes,
sha M aw angdui er san hao H an mu, 1:237-40. Songs o f the South 1226-29.
77. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui 93. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu 、9.201; Hawkes, Songs
yihao H an m u, 1:42. o f the South, 225.
78. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui 湖北省博物館，Z eng
94. H ubei sheng bowuguan
er san hao H an mu 、1:43 ，
103-9,237-40. The record on ^ ou W 饥“ 曾候乙墓，
1:8—99，
362—65，
459—64. For further
the wooden board says “the twelfth year” but does not studies on the bronze bells, see Falkenhausen, Suspended
specify the reign. In the period during which the funer­ Music; Bagley, “Percussion.”
ary goods must have been made, only Em peror Wen had 95. M y reading o f the scene is different from Loewe’s
a reign longer than twelve years. Some scholars believe in his W ays to Paradise, 55-56: K[T]he riders on the
L i X i, not his brother, to be the occupant o f Tomb 3. prancing horses suspend the bell, and the bell supports a
For a review o f the controversy, see L i Shisheng 黎石生， vessel which attracts the attention of the birds. As yet no
“Changsha Mawangdui sanhao muzhu zaiyi”長沙馬王 satisfactory explanation has been furnished for the indi­
堆三號墓主再議. vidual elements or the whole complex.”
79. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui er 96. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu, 1.46; Hawkes, Songs
san hao H an mu, 1:106. o f the South 、78.
80 . Hunan sheng bowuguan, “Changsha Zidanku 97. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu 、 5.172-73; Hawkes,
Zhanguo muguo mu” 長沙子彈庫戰國木榻墓. Songs o f the South, 198. Hawkes in his translation moves
81. Barnard, Ch'u Silk Manuscript^ 1—18; L i L in g 李零， the couplet on the Xiang goddess and the Sea God
Changsha Zidanku Zhanguo Chu boshuyanjiu 長沙子彈 ahead of the couplet on the “Pool of Heaven” and the
庫戰國楚帛書研究，
j- n . Nine Shao Songs.
82. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha Chu wm 長沙 98. For an early textual reference to ten suns, see
楚墓，
1:14-9 1. Yuan Ke 袁何，Shan h a ijin g jia o zb u 山海經校注，
83. For a discussion o f the painting, see Sofukawa, 9.260-62; for a translation, see Birrell, Classic o f M oun­
KKonronsan to ShdsenzuJ,>114-18. tains and Seas，128.
84. Guo M oruo，“Guanyu wan Zhou bohua de kao- 99. Xiao Bing 肖兵，“M awangdui bohua yu Chu a
cha” 闕於晚周帛晝的考察; X io n gC h u an xin 熊傳新， 馬王堆帛晝與楚辭， 171_72.
“Duizhao xinjiu moben tan Chu guo renwu longfeng 100. H eng E s story probably appeared as early as the
bohua” 對照新舊摹本談楚國人物龍鳳帛晝. Warring States period; see Yuan Ke, Zhongguo shenhua
85. I follow Xiong Chuanxin’s measurement in shi 中國神話史， 150. For an English introduction to the
“Duizhao xinjiu moben,1590. story, see Birrell, Chinese M ythology 、144—45.
 101. Chow, “M a-w ang-tui，” 13; Loewe, W ays to Para­ shu 、44.2145; Gopal Sukhu, “M onkeys， Shamans, Em ­
dise, 55. peror, and Poets，” in Cook and M ajor, D efining Chu,
102. Kominami Ichiro reads the contour o f the two 158-65.
dragons with the canopy atop as the shape o f a jar, which 110. For a discussion o f the cloud designs, see Powers,
could have been associated with the belief in im m ortality Pattern and Person, 233-42.
in early and medieval China. See Kominami Ichiro 小南 111. Archaeologists identify fifty-one scenes in Henan
一郎， “Tsubogata no uchuv 壷型O 宇宙， 177-79 . sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui yihao H an mu.
103. For research on the m otif, see Lu Pin 呂品， Figures 18-21. The nine scenes depicting one chasing
“ ‘G aitian shuo’ yu H an hua zhong de xuanbi tu” 蓋天 another are 2， 15,17 ,2 7,42，
47,51，
53，55 in their numbering
說與漢晝中的懸璧圖； S u jia n 蘇健，“H an hua zhong scheme. The ten scenes depicting one challenging an­
de shenguai yushe he longbi tu kao” 漢晝中的神怪御 other are 16 ，2 4 ,26，28,30 ，35，4 0 ,46，48， 57. The fourteen
蛇和龍璧圖考. For a discussion o f the bi as an emblem scenes depicting one conquering another are 1 ， 3，5 ,9 ,10 ,
ofH eaven, see Chen Jiangfeng 陳江風，“H an hua yubi 11 ，
2 3,29 ,31，
34 ,36， 45，49， 50. Tlie three scenes featuring
tuxiang de wenhua xiangzheng” 漢晝玉璧圖像的文化 dancers and musicians are 43，
44,45.
象 徵 .Hayashi Minao, however, offers a different read­ 112. Henan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui
ing. He considers the bi disc a symbol of qi. See Hayashi, yihao H an m uy1:27.
Chugoku kogyoku no kenkyu 中国古玉0 破究， 33I_ 50. 113. H ayashi，“ChOgoku kodai ni okelu hasu no hana
104. Hunan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui no shocho"中國古代【 〔怒W*石蓮◦ 花◦ 象徵.
yihao H an mu, 1:39. 114. For further discussion o f the cardinal emblems,
105. Hunan sheng bowuguan, “Changsha Zidanku see chapter 4.
Zhanguo muguo mu,” 39. 115. Cong Dexin 叢德新 and Luo Zhihong 羅志宏，
106. Wu Hung suggests that black stands for death “Chongqing Wushan xian D ong-H an liujin tong paishi
and the underworld, whereas red represents life and de faxian yu yanjiu ”
重慶巫山縣東漢藥金銅牌飾的發
immortality; see Wu Hung, “Art in a Ritual Context,” 現與研究， 82-83. H e X ilin mentions this plaque in his
127-34. However, black and verm ilion are also the stan­ discussion of the innermost coffin. He emphasizes the
dard background colors o f H an lacquerware. cardinal emblems on the plaque, but pays no attention
107. Sofukawa, “Konronsan to Shdsenzu，” 85-114. to the denotation and connotation o f the floral design.
108. Liu W endian, H uainan H ongliejijie, 4.135; the See He Xilin 贺 西 林 ，“Cong Changsha Chu mu bohua
translation is m odified from M ajor, H eaven and E arth in dao M awangdui yihao Han mu qiguan yu bohua” 從長
E arly H an Thought, 158. 沙楚墓帛晝到馬王堆一號漢墓漆棺晝與帛晝，
i5i.
109. Huainan Kingdom under Q ing B u s 黯布 com- 116. Henan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M aw angdui
mand included Liu 六，Jiujiang 九江, Lujiang 廬江， yihao H an m u 、1:62-63.
Hengshan 衡山，and Yuzhang 豫章. Later Emperor 117. Sun Zuoyun, “M awangdui yihao Han mu qiguan
Wen divided the kingdom into three and made Liu An hua kaoshi” 馬王堆一號漢墓漆棺晝考釋， 143.
and his two brothers the kings. One brother had H eng­ 118. Although scholars pay more attention to the silk
shan Kingdom while the other, Lujiang Kingdom. Liu banner than to the three decorated coffins, Wu Hung,
An, the king of Huainan Kingdom, controlled LiuJiu ­ H e X ilin, and Eugene W ang have attempted to con-
jiang, and Yuzhang in present-day Anhui and Jiangxi textualize the banner and the three coffins. Wu Hung
provinces. For the accounts o f the Huainan Kingdom, concludes that the banners central purpose is to depict
see Ban G u, H an shuy34.1886,44.2144-45; for further death and to convey the hope o f the living that after her
research, see Ariba Suguya 有 馬 卓 也 ，“Kainam o koku burial Lady D ai w ill resume her existence in her under­
no hachijunen 淮南王國◦ 八十年■，’ For the territories ground “permanent home”; he considers that the outer
of the Chu State, see Barry Blakeley, “The Geography of coffins offer the illusion o f underground protection and
Chu，” in Cook and M ajor, D efining Cbu} 9-20. For Liu the immortal paradise. He Xilin proposes that both the
An，s promotion of Qu Yuan’s works, see Ban Gu, Han banner and the coffins are intended to represent the
 process from death to rebirth to immortality. Eugene 129. Xue Wencan 薛文燦 and L iu Songgen 割松根，
W ang suggests that the images on the banner and the H enan X in zh en g H an d a i huaxiang zhuan 可南新鄭漢
two painted coffins were meant to perform a ritual pro­ 代晝像磚，
19. Liu Zenggui first brings this instance into
cedure o f conjugating y in and yang in the hope o f re­ the discussion o f Heaven’s gate, although he does not
vitalizing the deceased. See Wu Hung, “A rt in a Ritual associate it with the bim en convention. See Liu Zenggui
Context, 121-34; H e X ilin, “C ong Changsha Chu mu 劉增貴，“H an dai huaxiang que de xiangzheng yiyi” 运
bohua dao M awangdui yihao Han mu qiguan hua yu 代 晝 象 闕 的 象 徵 意 義 ，97.
bohua”；Eugene W ang, “W hy Pictures in Tombs?” 130. Zhongguo huaxiang zhuan quanji bianji weiyuan­
119. Wu Hung, “A rt in a Ritual Context/’ 123-24. hui 中國晝像碑全集編輪委員會，Zbongguo huaxiang
"Watson’s opinion is elaborated by Loewe in Ways to zhuan quanji: H enan huaxiang zhuan 中自晝像碑全意：
Paradise’ 45-46. 河南晝像磚，
pi. 56. For more bim en examples, see Sa-
120. Y ing-shi Y ii, “ ‘O Soul, Come Back!，” take Yasuhiko 佐竹靖彥，“Han dai fenmu jisi huaxiang
12 1. Brashier, “H an Thanatology.” zhong de tingmen, tingque he chema hanglie^ 漢代填墓
122. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu 、
56.1832-^33; Brashier, “Han 祭祀晝像中的亭門、亭闕、和車馬行列，
6卜64.
Hianatology ，”i36. Brashier does not summarize the 131. L ei Jianjin, “Jianyang xian Guitoushan faxian
event correctly: “F or exam ple C hen Q iu, grand adm in­ bangti huaxiang shiguan.” Under discussion here is C of­
istrator o f N anyang, w rote in 172 ce that i f a grave is fin 3; see Gao Wen, Zhongguo huaxiang shiguan yish u t
opened in order to be moved, it would be plundered, 6—14.
the bones would be exposed, and the hun (here hunling) 132. X u Wenbin 徐文推，Sichuan H an dai shique 四川
would deteriorate.” 漢代石闕，
卜6.
123. Y in g Shao, H a n g u a n yi 漢官儀，
2.5b-6a，in Sun 133. Sima Qian, S h iji, 12.482; Ban G u, H an shu,
Xingyan 藤星衍，H an guan liuzhong 漢官六種; Brashier, 28.1402.
“H an Thanatology,” 136. 134. Cong Dexin and Luo Zhihong，“Chongqing
124. Nathan Sivin reminded me o f another expres­ W ushan xian D ong-H an liujin tong paishi de faxian yu
sion一san hun q ipo 二魂七魄(three hun souls and seven 趙殿增 and Yuan Shuguang
yanjiu，” 80; Zhao Dianzeng
po souls)— that complicates the number o f souls. In a 袁曙光，“ ‘T ian men’ kao，’ 天門考，
3-4. Both articles in­
forthcom ing review article entitled “Souls?，” he sug­ troduce other examples found in W ushan, Sichuan. The
gests th at “w hether at a given m oment one thinks o f the b i disc can sometimes be replaced by the w uzhu coin;
kun vitality in the singular or plural is a matter o f what see Figure 2.1 in Cong and Luo’s article.
functions one is thinking about, for reasons th at are not 135. Nathan Sivin kindly reminded me that the Han
normally theological.” people created a spouse for Xiwangmu, which makes
125. On the preservation and condition o f the corpse, the conventional translation— the Queen M other o f the
see H unan sheng bowuguan, Changsha M awangduiy i­ W est~inappropriate.
hao Han mu, 1:28-34. 136. Zhang Shanxi 張善熙 and L i Qingyu 李清裕，
126. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzuy 168-69 ;如 translation “ ‘Tianm en’ tuxiang qianshu chutan” 天門圖像錢樹初
is modified from Hawkes, Songs o fthe South, 196. 探; H e Zhiguo 何志國，H an W eiyaoqianshu chubuyan-
127. Henan sheng wenhuaju wenwu gongzuodui 河 f i t i 漢魏搖錢樹初步研究， 57-59.The base shown on the
南省叉化局又物工作隊， “LuoyangX i-H an bihua mu photograph did not originally go w ith the money tree.
fajue baogao” 洛陽西漢壁晝墓發掘報告. 137. Cong Dexin and Luo Zhihong, “Chongqing
128. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 12.482; Ban G u, H an shu ，
28.1402. W ushan xian D ong-H an liujin tong paishi de faxian yu
Guo M oruo first pointed out the significance o f b i discs yanjiu，
’’81.
in the Luoyang murals. H e considers the painted gate 138. H e Zhiguo, H an Weiyaoqianshu chubu ya n jiu , 26,
as Heaven’s gate, but does not relate it to the bim en in 33，42.
Chang^an. See Guo M oruo, HLuoyang Han mu bihua 139_ Zhao Chengfu 趙成甫，“Xinye Fanji H an hua­
shitan” 洛陽漢墓 壁 晝 試探，
4-5. xiang zhuan mu” 新野樊集漢晝像奋墓， 479-82,503.
For a discussion o f the carving, see Sofukawa, “Kandai rubbing was first published by W ang Shilun 王士倫 in
kazoseki ni okelu shosenzu no keifli” 漢代晝像石 his 1957 catalogue, Z hejiang chutu tongjing xu a n ji 浙江出
trf § 昇仙圖 ◦ 系譜 , 6 o -6 i. 土銅鏡選集, % . 27，but the location o f the bronze m ir­
140. Fracasso, “H oly M other o f Ancient China ”
； ror is unclear.
Cahill, Transcendence and D ivin e Passion、11--65; Yuan Ke, 158. Cui Chen 崔陳，“Yibin diqu chutu H an dai
Zhongguo shenhua shi’ 66-71; W ang Qing 王青，H an chao huaxiang shiguan” 宜賓地區出土漢代晝像石棺. The
de bentu zo n ^jta o yu shenhua 漢朝的本土宗教與神話， image under discussion is on Coffin 3.
251—66. 159. L iX ia o ’ou 李f t 鷗，“Sichuan Xingjing faxian
141. Liu W endian, H uainan H o n g liejijie, 6.217. D ong-H an shiguan huaxiang” 四川荥經發現東漠石棺
142. The Rhapsody is preserved in Sim a Qian, Shij i y 晝像.
117.3060. 160. For this archaeological practice, see Luo Erhu 羅
143. Ban G u, H an shu 、270^.1476; Loewe, Ways to 二虎，H an dai huaxiang shiguan 漢代晝像石棺, 12.
Paradise，98-101. 161. A rchaeologists discovered four stone coffins in
144. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 117.3060. Nanxi. Their rubbings are mislabeled in general cata­
145. Liu W endian, H uainan H onglie jijie , 4.135; M ajor, logues on stone carvings in Sichuan. The images that I
H eaven and E arth in E arly H an Thought、158. introduce here are based on the prim ary archaeological
146. Liu W endian, H uainan H ongliejijie , 4.134,149. report and on Luo Erhus investigation. See Cui Chen,
147. Kominami, Seiobo to tanabata densho 西王母匕七 “Y ibin diqu chutu Han dai huaxiang shiguan，” 31; Luo
夕 傳 承 ，145. Erhu, H an dai huaxiang shiguan, 91-93.
148. W u Hung, “Xiwangmu”; Jam es’ “Iconographic 162. Gao W en, Zhongguo huaxiang shiguan yishut 24.
Study o f Xiwangm u”; L i Song 李鞭，L un H an daiyishu The stone coffin was discovered in Yibin.
zhong deX iw angm u tu xia n g 論漢代藝術中的西王母圖 163. For a discussion o f the carving, see Sofukawa,
像. “Kandai kazoseki ni okelu shosenzu no keifia，” no—12.
149. Luoyang bowuguan 洛隱博物館，“Luoyang X i- 164. L i Song disputes Sofukawa H iroshi’s reading
H an Bu Qianqiu bihua mu fajue jianbao” 洛曝西漢卜千 o f the scene as the meeting o f the M other Queen o f
秋壁晝墓發掘簡報. the W est and her consort, the Father King o f the East;
150. SofUkawa，“Konronsan to Shosenzu,n158-63. instead, he argues that it depicts the journey made by
151. Zhao Chengfu, “Xinye Fanji H an huaxiang zhuan the deceased to the immortals，land governed by the
mu，
，
，pl. 20.3; Zhao Chengfu, N anyang H an dai huaxiang M other Queen o f the W est. L i also suggests that both
zhuan 南陽漢代畫像磚， v jo 、figs. 159，
160. Suide carvings under discussion were made before no
152. Zhao Chengfu, “Xinye Fanji H an huaxiang c e , w hen the pairing o f the M other Q ueen o f the W est
zhuan mu,” 499-500 ，
507-8. and the Father King o f the East appeared and became
153. Harada Yoshito 原田淑_人，Rakuro 楽浪， 42- 43. popular in this region. See Sofukawa, ‘‘Kandai kazoseki
154. Liu Shixu 劉世旭，“Sichuan Xichang Gaocao ni okelu shosenzu no keifU,” 113-16 ; L i Song, L un H an
chutu H an dai yaoqianshu5canpian” 四川西昌高草出土 dai Yisbu zhong de Xiwangmu tuxiang, 164-67.
漢代搖錢樹殘片. H e Zhiguo suggests that the money 165. L i L in 李林 et al., Shan bei H an dai huaxiang shi
tree was probably made in the mid-second century ce; 陝北漢代晝像石， 25.
see H e, H an W eiyaoqianshu chubuyanjiu 、96. 166. Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, Shenm u D abao-
155. W u Hung, “Xiwangmu，” 28. Kominami views the 而叹神木大保當，
92-98.The facade is from Tomb 20.
base as the representation o f a cosmic tree; see Kominami, Another example was found in Suide; see L i Lin et al.,
Seiobo to tanabata denshoy177-78. Shan bei H an dai huaxiang shi, 103.
156. L i Song, L un H an d a iyish u zhong de X iw angm u 167. W u Lan 吳蘭 and Xue Yong 學勇，“Shaanxi M i­
tuxiangy 156-59,197-98. zhi xian Guanzhuang D ong-H an huaxiang shi mu” 陝
157. Kom inami, Seiobo to tanabata denshd、
152-53. The 西米脂縣官莊 東漢晝像石墓 .
 Chapter 4

1. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu 、85-87. The transla­ obscure Harmonious Pond as the emblem o f the west in
tions are based on Hawkes, Songs o fthe South, 127; Field, Han popular culture.
“Cosm os, Cosmograph, and the Inquiring Poet.” 11. Ibid., 27.1303.
2. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu, 86-87; the transla­ 12. The Canon ofYao is preserved in the Book o fDocu­
tion is based on the one in Field, “Cosm os, Cosm o­ m ents. See Qu W anli, Shang shu jis h i 尚書集釋， 8; a
graph, and the Inquiring Poet.” translation is available in Legge, Shoo K ing, 18-22. X iao­
3. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu, 87-88; Hawkes, Songs chun Sun and Jacob Kistemaker suggest the date o f
o fthe South 、127. 2300 b ce in Chinese Sky during the H a n 、15—18.
4 . Pan N ai 潘氣 Zhongguo hengxingguance shi 中 13. The reference star o f the lunar lodge Star, a H y-
國恆星觀測史，3- 5; Chen M eid on g 陳美東，Zhongguo drae，is o f apparent magnitude 1.98, probably the forty-
kexuejishu shi: tianw enxuejuan 中國科學技街史:关文 fifth brightest star in the skj^. Still, it is the brightest
學卷， i8- 3。 ; Feng Shi, Zhongguo tianw en kaogu xue 中國 among the lunar lodges in the south, for the apparent
天文考古學， 296-33^* magnitudes o f other reference stars range from 2.59 to
5. For further discussion o f F a r-o ffJourneyt see 9.6. These stars are noticeable m ainly because they are in
chapter 3. a dim part o f the sky. Except for experts, it is unlikely that
6. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu, 170-71; Hawkes, ordinary people in ancient China would have paid atten­
Songs o f the South, 197. tion to the lunar lodge W ing (a Crateris), which is o f ap­
7. Ban G u, H an shu, 69C.4152-53. parent magnitude 9.6. Therefore, the bird imagery, once
8. Ibid” 99C.4161-62,4174. For archaeological re­ formed, must have been transmitted through oral and
ports, see Luo Zhongru 維走■如， “X i’an xijiao faxian textual traditions without people really looking at the sky.
H an dai jianzhu yizhi” 西安西郊發現漢代建築遺址； 14. Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, X ia n Jiaotong
H uang Zhanyue and Zhang Jianm in 張建民，“Han daxue X i-H a n bihua 39—42.
Chang’an cheng nanjiao lizhi jianzhu yizhi qun fajue 15. Sim a Qian, Shij i 、27.1295-98.
jianbao” 漢長安城南郊禮制建築遺址群發掘簡報. 16. Qu W anli, Shang shu jis h i、9; a translation is avail-
For further discussion o f the N ine Temples, see Huang able in Legge, Shoo K ing, 18-22. The apparent magnitude
Zhanyue, “Guanyu W ang M angjium iao de wenti” 關於 o f a Scorpii is 1.09，one o f the twenty-five brightest.
王莽九廟的問題: 漢長安城南郊一組建築遣址的定名. 17. Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, X Van Jiaotong
Each structure in the Nine Temples has four walls, each daxue X i-H a n bihua m u, 31; Sun and Kistemaker, Chinese
measuring about 270 meters in length; the Bright H all Sky during the H an, 114.
complex also has four walls, each measuring 235 meters 18. L i Daoping 李道平，"Z h o u yijijie zuanshu 周易
in length. 集解纂疏， 27-68; the translation is from W ilhelm and
9. For further discussion o f the twenty-eight lunar Baynes, I C hing, 3-10 .
lodges, see chapter 5. A s Table 5.1 shows, the twenty- 19. Shaughnessy，“The Com position o f‘Qian，and
eight segments were uneven in their extensions, ranging *Kun* Hexagrams o f the Zhouyu
from 0.05 to 33.3 degrees (du 度)• 20 . Ibid.; Chen Jiu jin ，“ ‘Zhou yi qian gua liu long yu
10. Sim a Qian, Shij i s 27.1289-311. Sim a compared jijie de guanxi” 《周 易 • 乾卦》六龍與季節的關係.
one o f the western lodges，
Triad, to a white tiger. Some­ 21. Yang Bojun 楊伯後，Chun qiu Zuo zhuan zh u 春
how the more vivid im agery o f a white tiger replaced the 秋左傳注, 106-7. For further discussion o f the cult o f
the dragon and the prayer for rain, see Loewe, D ivin a - 35. Yan Genqi, M angdang shan X i-H a n L ia n g w ang
tioriy M ythology and M onarchy in H an C hina, 142-59. m u d i郊場山西漢梁王墓地， 8i - 247-
22. The description here is based m ainly on the 36. For a discussion o f the term, see M ajor, “New
dragon in the painted Han tomb at Jiaotong University Ligh t on the Dark W arrior.”
in X i’an. The shape o f a dragon changed over time; see 37. W ang Zhijie 王志杰 and Zhu Jieyuan 朱杰兀，
L iu Zhixiong 劉志雄 and Yang Jingrong 楊靜榮，Long “H an M aolin gjiqi peizang zhong fujin faxian de zhong-
yu "Zhongguo w enhua 龍與中國文化， 113-226. yao wenwu” 漢茂陵及其陪葬塚附近發現的重要文物.
23. Wen Y id u o 聞一多， 办神話與詩， 38. Xianyang shi wenguan hui 咸陽市文管會，
1—68; K . C . C hzngyA rty M yth and R itual^ 56-80. Liu “Xianyang shi kongxin zhuan H an mu qingli jianbao” 咸
Zhixiong and Yang Jingrong further developed Chang’s 陽市空心磚漢墓清理簡報.
view in L ongyu Zhongguo w enhuay1-88. For the images 39. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo
o f dragons and their significance, see Hayashi, R yu no Luoyang fajue dui, “Luoyang xijiao Han mu fajue
hanashi 龍O 話. baogao,MFigure 21.1，
pi. 8.4. The mirror is from Tomb
24. Feng Shi, Zkongguo tianw en kaoguxue、
416-17. 7052, dated to the early phase o f the Eastern Han.
25. M any scholars understood z i as Beak (zu t 豐 )t 40 . For further discussion o f the Yellow Ihearch and
but Sim a Qian used the term z ix i 背鵃(literally, tufted the role o f the dragon in ascending to Heaven, see chap­
cone) to name the lodge; see Sim a Qian, Shij i } 27.1306. ter 3.
According to the H an etym ologist Xu Shen 許 (fl. 41. Ban G u, H an shu 、93.3739-40.
58-147 ce), zi refers to the tufts— clusters o f feathers 42. Baoji shi bowuguan 寶雞市博物館，“Shaanxi
that are often confused as horns or ears—
— on the crown sheng Qianyang xian H an mu fajue jianbao” ^ ^
o f an owl; see Duan Yucai 段玉裁，Shuo w en jie z i zhu 陽縣漢墓發掘簡報.
說文解字注，
^ .3 3 0 . 43. Scholars in the past tried but failed to explain the
26 . Ban G u, H an shu, 58.2613，
2616. For further dis­ seem ingly “erroneous” arrangement o f the cardinal em­
cussion, see chapter 2. blems in H an art. See L iu Daoguang 劉道廣，“Guanyu
27. Chen Qiyou, L u shi chun qiu jia o sh i, 1.1-12.647; Han ‘sishen xingxiang tu’ de fangwei wenti” 關於漢四.神
L iu W endian, H uainan H onglie jijie } 5.159-90. For fur­ 星象圖的方位問題; L iu H o n g 割弘，“Sichuan H an mu
ther discussion, see chapter 1. zhong de sishen gongneng xintan” 四川漠墓中的四神
28. Puyang shi wenwu guanli weiyuanhui 漠陽市文 功能新探.
物管理委員會，“Henan Puyang Xishuipo yizhi fajue 44. Shaanxi sheng wenwu guanli weiyuanhui I^.W
jianbao” 河南濮陽西水坡遺址發掘簡報. 省文物管理委員會，“Shanxi Pinglu Zaoyuan cun bihua
29 . Feng Shi, Zhongguo tianw en kaoguxuet 374-409; Han mu” 山西平陸棗園村壁晝漢墓.
K . C . Chang, Zhongguo qingtong shidai 中國青銅時代， 45. For further discussion o f the M other Queen o f
2:91-97. the W est, see chapter 3.
30 . Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 46. H uang H ui, L un bengjiaoshi, 3.150-52.
Shangcunling G uoguo m udi 上村嶺號國墓地， 27.The 47. W ang Zhijie and Zhu Jieyuan, wHan M aolingjiqi
mirror was in Tomb 1612. peizang zhong fujin faxian de zhongyao wenwu,M54-55.
31. Hubei sheng bowuguan, Z eng hou Y i m u、1:352-56. 48. See chapter 3.
32. Feng Shi, “Zhongguo zaoqi xingxiang tu yanjiu” 49. Ren N aiqiang 任乃強，“Lushan xian chutu Han
中國早期星像圖研究，
H 4-7. shi tukaow盧山縣出土漢石圖考, 19-25.
33. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 50 . Sim a Qian, Shi7V, 30.1428,116.2991-98; Ban Gu,
M anchengH an m ufajue baogao 滿城漢墓發掘報告， H an shu, 6.177. Juandu is also pronounced as Yuandu.
253- 57. 51. Chen Zh i 陳直，San fu huang tu jia o zh en g 三辅黃
34. Chen Jiu jin , “Cong beifang shenlu dao beifang 圖校證，
92.
gui she guannian de yanbian” 從北方神鹿到北方龜錄 52. Sim a Qian, S h ijty30.1436; Ban G u, H an sku,
觀念的演變. 6.186—88.
 53. Sim a Qian, S b ijij 30.1436; Ban G u, H an shu 、 69. Xiao Tong, Wen xuan，
29.1347; the translation is
6.182. modified from W atson, Chinese L yricism , 28.
54. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 28.1402; Ban G u, H an shu’ 70. Kominami, Seiobo to tanabata denshoy30.
6.199. For further discussion o f the tall structures erected 71. Ibid., 31-32.
by Em peror W u, see chapter 3. 72 . Ibid., 25-27.
55. H u Qianying 胡謙盈，“H an Kunming chi jiq i 73. Sim a Qian, Shiji , 27.1310-11.
youguan yicun tacha ji ”漢昆明池及其有關遣存踏查 74. Chen Jiangfeng discussed the “mistakes” in "N an­
自 己; Liu Qingzhu and L i Yufang, H an Chang’an cheng， yang tianwen huaxiang kaoshi”
南曝天文晝像石考
196-97- 釋，in Han Yuxiang 韓玉祥, N anyang H an dai tianw en
56. H u Qianying, “H an Kunming chi jiq i you­ huaxiang sh i y a n jiu 南陽漢代天文晝像石研究， 19 -21.
guan yicun tacha ji ”
；Liu Qingzhu and L i Yufang, H an 75. Luo Zhewen 羅哲文，“Xiaotangshan Guo shi
C hangan chengy 196-97. mu shici” 孝堂山郭氏墓石稍； Soper, “The Purpose and
57. Tang C hi 湯池， “X i-H an shidiao qianniu zhinii Date o f the H siao-tang-shan O ffering Shrine”; X ia
bian” 西漢石雕牽牛織女辨; L iu Qingzhu and L i Yu­ Chaoxiong 夏超雄，“Xiaotangshan shici huaxiang, nian-
fang, H an C hang'an cheng7197^-98. d a iji zhuren shitan” 孝堂山石祠晝像年代及主人試探；
58. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu, 4oa.i348. Wu Hung, Wu L iang Shrine, 112 -16 ，
199-201.
59. Tang C hi, “X i-H an shidiao qianniu zhinu bian”
； 76. Kominami Ichiro proposes the second reading,
Liu Qingzhu and L i Yufang, H an Chang’an cheng^ 197- but does not hint at the possibility o f the first reading;
98. see his Seiobo to tanabata denshoy 23.
60 . Qu W anli, S h ijin g quanshi, 527-33; the translation 77. Sichuan sheng bowuguan 四川省博物館， “Si-
is modified from Legge, She K ing, 528. chuan Pixian Dong-H an zhuan mu de shiguan huaxiang”
61. Qu W anli, S h ijin g quanshi, 528. 四川郫縣東漢碍墓的石棺晝像.The coffin under dis-
62. Ban G u, H an shu 、6.202. cussion is no. 1. Some catalogues on H an carvings m is­
63. For more alternative names o f the W ay in take rubbings from this coffin as being from no. 2.
traditional literature, see Chen Zungui 陳遵姨， Zhong­ 78. Zhang Zhan 張湛’ L ie z i 列子，
5.52-53. Qu Yuan
guo tian w enxueshi 中國天文學史， 2:388-93. had been puzzled by the legend, “W hen the great turtles
64. Luoyang bowuguan 洛陽博物館，“Henan Luo­ walk along mountains on their back, how do they keep
yang Bei-W ei Yuan Y i mu diaocha” 河南洛隱北魏元 mountains steady?wSee H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu^.\o% \
乂墓調查. For further discussion o f the celestial image Hawkes, Songs o fthe South, 130. For a study o f the legend,
in the tomb, see W ang Che 王車and Chen Xu 陳徐， ■ see Izushi, Shina shinw a densetsu no kenkyui 325—43.
“Luoyang Bei-W ei Yuan Y i mu de xingxiang tu” 洛陽 79. H ong Xingzu, Chu ci buzhu 、88,96; Hawkes,
北魏兀乂墓的星象圖; T seng,“Visual Replication and Songs o fthe South 、127,129.
Political Persuasion.” 80 . Zhang Heng, L in g xia n . The document is pre­
65. Liu Shaoming, K,Tiangong xingch ujing/1 served in the commentaries on Sim a Biao, H ou H an shu:
66. Such as H e tu gua d i xiang 河圖括地象 and X iao zh it 10.3216.
jin g yuan shen q i 孝經援神契; see H ong Liangji 洪亮吉， 81. Izushi, Shina shinw a densetsu no kenkyii} 77;
M ao Sh i tianw en kao 毛詩天文考. Krupp，B eyond the B lue H orizon ，71-77.
67. Qiu Yongsheng 邱永生. “Xuzhou jinnian zhengji 82. Anqiu xian wenhuaju 安丘縣文化局，A nqiu
de Han huaxiangshi jicui”徐 州 近 年 徵 集 的 漢 晝 像 石 D ongjiazhuangH an huaxiangshi m u 安丘董家莊漢晝像
集粹. For a survey o f the images o f the River Lord in 石墓，figures 36,38. For a study o f the stone carvings in
Nanyang, see L i Chenguang 李陳廣，“Nanyang Han the tomb, see Tseng, “Getao，zuofang yu diyu zi chuan-
huaxiang hebo tu shixi” 南陽漢晝像河伯圖試析，but he tong” 格套、作坊與地域子傳統.
does not touch upon their celestial connotation. 83. L iu W endian, H uainan H ongliejijie y 7.221; Sim a
68. Q u W anli, S h ijin g quansht, 389-92; the transla­ Qian, S h iji, 128.3237.
tion is modified from Legge, She K ing, 355-56. 84. Liu W endian, H uainan H ongliejijie 、6.217.
 85. Yuan Ke, Shan h a ijin g jia o zh u y 9.260. a study o f the textual accounts o f N ii Wan and Fu X i,
86. Hubei sheng bowuguan, Zeng hou Y i m uy1:355—57. see Lew is, Flood M yths o fE arly C hina 、109-25.
87. Lim , Storiesfro m C hina's P ast、
157. 101. L i Rong 李冗， 2:6/ 獨異志,79. For further
88. Zhejiang sheng wenwu kaogu yanjiusuo, H em udu discussion o f Fu X i and Nu W as possible incestuous
河姆渡，
1:284-85. marriage, see W en Yiduo, Shenhua yu shi、 3-12,62-67.
89. Zhejiang sheng wenwu kaogu yanjiusuo, Yaoshan, 102. Chen Liisheng 陳履生，Shenhua xhushen ya n jiu

33- 35. 神話主神研究,6 1-7 1.

90 . Sim a Qian, Shij i 、2.58. 103. H uang H ui, L un hengjiaoshit 15.686, 688-89.
91. For further discussion o f the sunbird, see Wu 104. Shandong sheng bowuguan, Shandong H an hua-
Hung, “Bird M otifs in Eastern Y i A rt.” 43-44.
xiang sh i xu a n ji，
92. W ei Renhua 魏仁華 and M a Facheng 馬法成， 105. For further discussion o f the connection o f tools
“Nanyang Han huaxiang shi zhong de huanri tuxiang and cosmology, see chapter 1.
shbd” 南陽漢晝像石中的幻日圖象試析，in Han Yu- 106. For further discussion o f the manifestation o f
xiang, N anyang H an dai tianw en huaxiangshiyanjiu, Heavens w ill on the Earth, see chapter x.
61-63. The authors consider the image as representing 107. Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, Shenm u D abao-
the solar halo. dangy 86—88.
93. L ei Jianjin, “Jianyang xian Guitoushan faxian 108. M ark Lew is argues, “the allocation o f the tools
bangti huaxiang shiguan•” clearly reflects their m ythological achievements rather
94. Wu Zengde 吴曾德 and Zhou Dao 周到, “Nan­ t\i2 n yin /ya n g cosmology.” However, he pays no atten­
yang H an huaxiang shi zhong de shenhua yu tian wen” tion to the inconsistency in allocating tools to Fu X i
南陽漢晝像中的神話與天文，and Chenjiangfeng, and N ii W a in Han art. See Lew is, Flood M yths o fE arly
“Nanyang tianwen huaxiang kaoshi/’ both in Han Yu- C hina, 126—2 j.
xiang, N anyang H an dai tianw en huaxiang sk i ya n jiu , 109. W u Hung, Wu L ia n g Shrine^ 161,245-48.
9 -10 ,14 -16 . 110. C ui Chen 崔陳，“Yibin diqu chutu H an dai
95. H an Yuxiang 韓玉祥 and L i Chenguang 李陳廣, huaxiang shiguan” 宜賓地區出土漢代晝像石棺， 39_
南陽漢代晝像石墓，
N anyang H an dai huaxiang sh i m u 111. N anjing bowuyuan, “N anjing Xuyi Dongyang
135-58. Han mu.” For further discussion o f the carvings, see
96. L ei Jianjin, “Jianyang xian Guitoushan faxian Hayashi, K a n-dai no kam igam i 漢代O 神神， 3:9~33.
bangti huaxiang shiguan•” 112. For a discussion o f the grouping, see Sofukawa,
97. Liu W endian, H uainan H ongliejijie , 6.207. “Kandai kazoseki ni okelu shosenzu no keifli，” 94-98.
98. W ang L iq i 王利器，F engsu to n g yijia o zh u 風俗 113. Luoyang bowuguan，“Luoyang X i-H an Bu Qian­
通義校注，
6oi. qiu bihua mu fajue jianbao.” For research on the murals,
99. L i Daoping, Zhou y ijijie zuanshu ，9.621-24. see Sofukawa, “Konronsan to Shosenzu,"155-171; Hayashi,
100. W ang L iq i, Feng su to n g yijia o zh u , 1.2 -3 , 599. For K an-dai no kam igam iy 281-317.

Chapter 5

1. The rhapsody is preserved in Fan Ye, H ou H an ing the Seasons, 90-94; Chen Zungui, Zhongguo tia n -
5^,59.1934. w enxue sh i, 2:305-84. For the origin o f the twenty-eight
2 . Knechtges, “Journey to M orality，” 173. lunar lodges, especially the complicated relations among
3. For an introduction to the system, see Needham, Arabic, Indian, and Chinese astronomy, see Zhu Kezhen
Science and C ivilisation in C hina} 3:229-52; Sivin, G rant­ 竺可楨，
Z hu K ezhen w en ji 竺可禎文氣 234-54,317^22;
 4
°5

Feng Shi, Zhongguo tianw en kaoguxue, 347-70. For the 18. Sim a Qian, Shij i 、89.2581; Ban G u, H an shu,
development o f the system over time in ancient China, 32.183B. Sima Qian attributed the prophecy to G an De
see Pan N ai, Zhongguo hengxingguance shi、1-38. 甘德，a well-known astronomer and astrologer, but Ban
4. For discussions o f the term, see M ajor, “Note on G u did not specify who employed the omen to persuade
the Translation o f Two Technical Terms in Chinese Sci- Zhang E r to turn to Liu Bang.
encc”； Kunst, KM ore on X iu and W uxing] M ajor, HReply 19. Pankenier，“Cosm o-political Background o f
to Richard Kunst’s Comments on H siu and W u-ksing•” Heaven’s M andate.”
5. Hubei sheng bowuguan, Z eng hou Y i m u, 1:352-59. 20 . Ban G u, H an shu’ 36.1963-66.
6. W ang Jianm in 王建民 et al., “Zeng hou Y i mu 21. Ibid., 99b_4i59_6o, 4154.
chutu de ershibaxiu qinglong baihu tuxiang” 曾侯乙墓 22. In the H an, calendrical reform could also be
出土的一十八宿青龍白虎圖象; Feng Shi, ‘‘Zhongguo politically caused. See Cullen, “M otivations for Scien­
zaoqi xingxiang tu yanjiu.” tific Change in Ancient China;” Eberhard, “Political
7. Chen Qiyou, L u sh i chun qiu jiaoshi^ 13.657-58. Function of Astronomer and Astronomy in Han China,w
8. Sim a Qian, S h iji} 27.1289—1311. 62-66.
9. The table is modified from Sivin, G ranting the 23. Sim a Biao, H ou H an shu: zb i，2.3029.
Seasons^ Table 2.9. 24. Ban G u, H an shu、
30.1766.
10 . The system o f the five celestial palaces was grad­ 25. Sim a Biao, H ou H an shu: zh it 2.3025-27.
ually replaced by the system o f the three enclosures 26. Ibid., 2.3027-29. Nathan Sivin kindly shared
(sanyuan 三垣) after the H an dynasty. See Chen Zun- with me his translation: “ [Jia Kui] consulted on this
gui, Zhongguo tianw enxue sk i、2:290-304. with .. • twelve Expectant Sky Watchers, who said that
11. Sim a Qian, Shij i y 130.3295. sky charts incorporate a method that involves circles.
12. See chapter 1. The sun and moon actually follow the Yellow W ay [i.e.,
13. Sim a Qian, Shiji , 26.1260; Ban Gu, H an shu ， ecliptic], but the bureaucrats have no relevant tool,
2^.974-76. so they have no idea how to put [this principle] into
14. Sim a Qian, Shij i , 27.1330. The theory o f field al­ practice•”
location divided ancient China into twelve areas. Since 27. Qian Baocong, Suanjing shishut 44—52; Cullen,
Em peror W u had thirteen administrative regions, Sima A stronom y and M athem atics in A n cien t C hina, 221-23.
Qian changed the number. 28. Bo Shuren，“Zhongguo gu xingtu gaiyao” 中國古
15. Sim a Qian, S h ijiy 27.1348-49. 星圖概要.
16. Ban G u, H an shu, 26.1301-2. 29. Yang Xiong’s refutations are preserved in W ei
17. X i Zezong席澤宗，“M awangdui H an mu boshu Zheng, S u i shu 、19.506-7.
zhong de W uxing z h a n 馬王堆漢墓帛書中的《 五星 30 . Qian Baocong, “Gaitian shuo yuanliu kao” 蓋天
占》，in Zhongguo gudai H anwen w enw u lu n ji 中國古代 說源流考.
天文文物論集， ed. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu 31. Qian Baocong, Suanjing shishu’ 44-52; Cullen,
yanjiusuo, 46-58. Based on computation, Y i-lon g Huang A stronom y and M athem atics in A n cien t C hinay185-88,
proposes that the conjunction o f the five planets in the 221-23. According to the Gnomon o fthe Zhou、the diam­
lodge W ell occurred neither in 206 nor 207 b c e , but in eters o f the innermost, the fourth, and the outermost
the fourth and fifth months o f 205 bce. See Y i-long circles were 238,000 li, 357,000 //, and 476,000 l i in a
Huang, “Study o f Five-Planet Conjunction in Chinese ratio 1:1.5 : 2.
H istory.” However, my computer-aided restoration 32. Nakayama, H istory o fJapanese A stronom yy 24-35.
through Starry N ig h t Pro shows that the five planets 33. For the theory o f the Spherical Heaven, see
converged in the eastern sky in 206 bce, from August 3 Nakayama, History o f Japanese Astronomyy35-39. For the
to 31. It supports X i Zezong’s calculation based on the development o f arm illary spheres, see Needham, Science
M awangdui manuscript. See Tseng, “Xingzhan, fenye, yu and C ivilisation in C hina, 3:339-82.
jiangjie” 星占、分野與疆界， 188-89，Figure 9. 34. Cai Yong, Yueling zhangju 月令章句，now pre-
served in Qutan X ida 瞿曇悉達，K aiyuan %hanjin g 開 48. Gao Lu 高亀、X ingxiang ton 幻ian 星象統箋，
元占經，
1:4-5. 4-7-
35. Bo Shuren, “Zhongguo gu xingtu gaiyao ，
，
，8-9. 49. A s Table 5.1 shows, the total extension o f the
The ancient Chinese divided the circumference into seven lodges in the south is 108.4 degrees. The precision
365.25 degrees, following their measurement o f a year o f ancient celestial maps varies from one to another.
as 365.25 days. The diameter o f the circle covering the 50 . Chin-hsiung H sii, Oracle B onesfrom the W hite
visible area at the northern pole was 36 degrees. The and O ther Collections., B1626.
diameter o f the circle covering the invisible area at the 51. Qu W anli, Shijin g quanshi, 446; Legge, She K ing ，
southern pole was 146.62 degrees (365.25 + 2 - 36). The 356.
diameter o f the equator was 91.31 degrees (365.25 + 4). 52. For more examples, see Zhao Chengfu, N anyang
Their diametrical ratio was therefore about 1: 2.5: 4. H an dai huaxiang zhuan, Figures 125,125. Shi Jie argues
36. Zhejiang sheng wenwu guanli weiyuanhui 浙 that bi nets were only used for hunting birds by citing
江省文物管理委員會，
“Hangzhou，Lin an W udai mu Han apocrypha, but he misses the pictorial representa­
zhong de tianwen tu he mise ci” 杭州、臨安五代墓 tion o f using nets to hunt hares and other animals in
中的天文圖和秘色瓷; Y i Sh iton g 伊世同， "H ang­ Han art. See Shi Jie 施杰， “Y iy i，jieshi yu zai jiesh i” 意
zhou Wuyue mu shike xingtu” 杭州吳越墓石刻星圖， 義，
解釋與再解釋.
in Zhongguo gudai tianw en w enw u lu n ji、ed. Zhong­ 53. Qu W anli, S h ijin g quanshi, 389; the translation is
guo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, 252-58. For an modified from Legge, She K ing) 422.
English introduction, see Stephenson, “Chinese and 54. Zeng Zhaoyu 曾昭搞，Y tn a n gu huaxiang sh i mu
Korean Star M aps and Catalogs,” 539—40. fa ju e baogao 折南古畫像石墓發掘報告， pi. 48- For re­
37. A ccording to the archaeological report, the diam ­ search on the tomb decoration, see Ihom pson, “Y i’nan
eters o f the three circles are 49.5 cm , 119.5 cm , and 189.5 Tomb.”
cm. Y i Shitong measured them again and provided an­ 55. L i L in , Shan bei H an dai huaxiang shi，Figure 102.
other set o f numbers: 51.1 cm, 123,1 cm, and 195.7 56. N anjing bowuyuan, Sichuan Pengshan H an d a iya
diametrical ratio remains 1: 2.4:3.8. m u 四川彭山漢代崖墓， p ls.18 ,19 ,36,37-
38. Rufus and T ien , Soochow A stronom ical C hart, Pan 57. Gansu sheng wenwudui 甘肅省文物隊，//«-
N ai, Zhongguo hengxing guance ski、253-64. yuguan bihua m ufajue baogao 嘉略關壁晝墓發掘報告，
39. Shaanxi sheng kaogu y a n j i u s u o , Jiaotongda- pi. 6 i.i.T lie brick was discovered in Tomb M 6.
xueX i-H a n bihua m u\ Luo Qikun 雜啓坤， “X i’an Jiao- 58. Zhang Heng, S i xuan fu , in Fan Ye, H ou H an shu.,
tong daxue X i-H an muzang bihua ershiba xiu xingtu kao- 59.1933.
shi” 西安交通大學西漠墓葬壁畫二十八宿星圖考釋. 59. Anqiu xian wenhuaju, A nqiu D ongjiazhuang H an
40 . Sima Qian, S h iji, 27.1295. For further discussion huaxiang sh i m u, Figure 15.
o f the Blue Dragon, see chapter 4. 60 . Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo,
41. Ibid., 27.1303. For further discussion o f the Red M ancheng H an m ufa ju e baogao、L255-61, II: pi. 177.
Bird, see chapter 4. - For further discussion o f the making o f the lamp, see
42. Ibid., 27.1306. For further discussion o f the Barbieri-Low , A rtisans in E arly Im perial C hina, 10 -16 .
W hite Tiger，see chapter 4. 61. For further discussion o f the confusion between
43. Duan Yucai，Shuo w en jie z i zh u ，
^ .330 . the Oxherd and N iu，see chapter 4.
44. Sima Qian, S M jiy 27.1305. H e compared the lodge 62. Sim a Qian, Shij i , 27.1302.
to a large pig {fengshi 封豕). 63. Gansu sheng w cnvm d\iiyJiayuguan bihua m ufajue
45. Ibid., 27.1308. For further discussion o f the Dark baogao, pi. 46.1. The brick was found in Tomb M i.
W arrior, see chapter 4. 64. H uang M inglan 黄明藺，Luoyang B ei-W ei shisu
46. For further discussion, see chapter 4. sh ik e x ia n h u a ji洛陽北魏世俗石刻線晝集，Figure 8.
47. W ang Zhijie and Zhu Jieyuan, “H an M aolingjiqi For further discussion o f the sarcophagus, see Soper,
peizang zhong fujin faxian de zhongyao wenwu.” “Life-M otion and the Sense o f Space in E arly Chinese
 Representational A rt/1 180—85; Wu Hung, M onum ental­ 78. Stephenson, “Chinese and Korean Star M aps and
ity in E arly Chinese A rt and A rchitecture, 264-68. Catalogs.”
65. Zhuang Shen 莊申，“Luo Pin jiq i guiqu tu” 羅聘 79. Kong Zang used the comparison in one o f his
及其鬼趣圖. • letters to Kong Anguo 孔安國，preserved in Sima
66. W ang Xianshen, H an F ei z i jijie , 11.202; a transla­ Zhen’s 司馬禎 commentaries on Shij i . See Sim a Qian,
tion is available in Bush and Shih, E arly Chinese Texts on S h ijiy 121.3125-26.
P aintings 24. BO. Sim a Qian, Shij i , 130.3319.
67. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu ，
59.1912; a translation is 81. Yunmeng Shuihudi Qin mu bianxiezu, Yun­
available in Bush and Shih, E arly Chinese Texts on P a in t­ m eng Shuihudi Q in m u, pi. 121，slips 797-787. For more
ing, 24. examples o f using the twenty-eight lunar lodges to
68. W ang M ing, B aopu z i neipian jia o sh i 抱朴子内 choose auspicious times in Almanac A , see the sections
篇校釋，
2.21 . entitled “Dark Dagger” [X uange 玄戈] (slips 776-787-
69. Ban G u, H an shu, 27.1397. 824), “Functionaries” [L f 吏] (slips 895V—886v)，and
雲夢睡虎
70. Yunmeng Shuihudi Qin mu bianxiezu “Eviction” {Chu 除] (slip 730); in Alm anac B , see slips
地秦墓編寫組，Yunm eng Shuihudi Q in m u 雲夢睡虎地 975-1002. For research on the astronomical information
秦墓，
pi. 133, slips 872V-828V. H ie section entitled “ S p ell- in the almanacs, see Kalinowski, “Les traits de Shui­
binding” {Jie 詰) also m entioned that a m ouse is a dis­ hudi et rhemerologie chinoise a la fin des Royaumes-
guise fo r a ghost; see pi. 132, slips 871V-870V. F or further Combattants.”
research on “Spellbinding,” see Harper, “Chinese D e- 82- W u Rengxiang 吳初讓 et al.，D unhuang H an jia n
monography of the Third Century B.C.”
；Poo, “Popular shiw en 敦煌漢筒釋文， 256-58，slips 2350-68; L in M ei-
Religion in Pre-Im perial China■，’ cun 林梅村 and L iju n m in g 李均明，Shule he liuyu chutu
71. For the Lu record, see Yang Bojun, Chun qiu Zuo H an jia n 疏勒河流域出土漢簡， 89，slips 870-82.
zhuan zh u , 175. For the Q i record, see Guo M oruo et al., 83. Shanxi sheng wenwu guanli weiyuanhui, “Shanxi
Guan zijijia o 管子集校， 18.267-69. Both books could Pinglu Zaoyuancun bihua H an mu.”
have been compiled by H an scholars— Liu X in for the 84. W ei Jian 魏堅，N ei M engu zhongnan bu H an dai
form er and his father, Liu Xiang, for the latter. For the m u zan g 內蒙古中南部漠代墓葬， 161-75-
controversies over the books， authorship, see Loewe, 85. Henan sheng wenhuaju wenwu gongzuodui,
E arly Chinese Texts, 67-76,244-51. HLuoyang X i-H an bihua mu fajue baogao,
72. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 32.1483-84; Ban G u, H an shu, 86. X ia N ai 夏蕭， “LuoyangX i-H an bihua mu
27.1436. zhong de xingxiang tu” 洛陽西漢壁晝墓中的星象圓.
73. Huang H ui, L un hengjiaoshi, 22.940. 87. Sun and Kistemaker, Chinese Sky during the H an 、
74 . Gansu sheng w crm udm yJiayuguan bihua m ufa ju e 37-94.
baogao，pi. 67.2. The brick was discovered in Tomb M 6. 88. The book includes five star maps. For further dis­
75. Sun and Kistemaker, Chinese Sky during the H an ， cussion o f these maps, see Pan N ai, "Zhongguo hengxing
160. guance shi, 238-53; Stephenson, “Chinese and Korean
76. Q utan X id a, Kaiyuatt zh an jin g ，63.416. The de­ Star M aps and Catalogs,” 541-45.
scription com es from Shi shi xin gjin g 石氏星經 ，an as­ 89. Fan Ye, H ou H an shu, 59.1911-12.
trological treatise lik ely com piled in the first century bce. 90 . Sim a Biao, H ou H an shu: zh i, 2.3039.
For further discussion o f S h i shi xin g jin g , see Pan Nai, 91. X i Zezong，“M awangdui H an mu boshu zhong
Zhongguo hengxingguance shiy48-72; Sun and Kistemaker, de huixing tu” 馬王堆漢墓帛書中的彗星圖，and Gu
37-74; Sivin, G ranting the Sea­
Chinese Sky during the H an 、 Tiefu 顧鐵符，“M awangdui boshu yunqi huixing tu yan-
sons, 114. jiu ” 馬王堆帛書雲氣彗星圖研究，in Zhongguo shehui
77. The X i’an tomb could have been built as early as kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, Zhongguo gudai tianw en
86 bce. The Egyptian temple in Dendera is usually dated w enw u lu n ji, 29—45.
to about 30 b ce. See Krupp, Choices ofthe Ancient Skies, xv. 92. The manuscript (S 3326) is now preserved in the
British Library. For further discussion, see X i Zezong, 舉有 and Chen Songchang 陳松長，M aw angdui H an
“Dunhuang xingtu” 敦煌星圖; M a Shichang 馬世長， m u w en w u 馬王堆漢墓文物， 2.
“Dunhuang xieben ziweiyuan xingtu” 敦煌寫本紫微垣 100. Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, X i'a n Jiaotong
星圖. In addition, X iang D a 向達discovered another daxue X i-H a n bihua m u, 6,13-20.
manuscript in Dunhuang in 1944 that is also an excel­ 101. Sim a Qian, Shij i y 6.265.
lent example o f an ancient astrological chart; see X ia 102. Liu W endian, H uainan H onglie jijie , 17.579.
N ai, “Lingyijian Dunhuang xingtu xieben” 另一件敦 103. Part o f the text is preserved in Yan Shigu’s 顏師
煌星圖寫本. A ll three articles are in Zhongguo shehui 古annotations to Ban G u, H an shu} 572.2543. For a study
kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo, Zhongguo gudai tianw en o f the connection o f cranes and immortality, see Izushi，
w enw u lunjiy 181-222. For an English introduction, see Shina shinw a densetsu no kenkyu, 707-22.
Stephenson, “Chinese and Korean Star M aps and Cata­ 104. Sim a Biao, H ou H an shu: zh i，10.3216.
lo g s/'534-37- 105. W ang M ing, B aopu z i neipian jia o sh i、
3.47.
93. Deng W enkuan ® 文寬，“B i B u tia n g e genglao 106. The song was called D ong Tao ge 董逃歌or D ong
de tongsu shixing zuopin: X uan xiang shi 比步天歌更 Tao xin g 董逃行，and is preserved in Guo M aoqian,
老的通俗識星作品： 玄象詩.The two scrolls-—P 2512 Yuefu shiji^ 34.505.
and P 3589~-are now in the Bibliotheque nationale de 107. Sim a Qian, Shij i 、
117.3060.
France. 108. Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, XVan Jiaotong
94. For the controversies over its authorship, see daxue X i-H a n bihua m u, 12 -13 , 49-
Zhou Xiaolu, B u tia n ge ya n jiu 步天歌研究， 196-204. 109. Luoyang shi dier wenwu gongzuodui 洛陽市第
95. Zhou Xiaolu, B u tia n ge ya n jiu ，26 (Basket), 32 二文物工★ 隊，“Luoyang Qianjingtou X i-H an bihua
(O x), 82 (Ghost), 67 (Net), 55 (Swine). mu fajue jianbao” 洛陽淺井頭西漢壁畫墓發掘筒報.
96. Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, “Shaanxi D ing- 110. X i’an shi wenwu baohu kaogusuo 西安市文物保
bian xian Haotan faxian D ong-H an bihua mu” 陝西定 護考古所， “X i’an Ligong daxue X i-H an bihua mu fajue
邊縣郝灘發現東漢壁晝墓. jianbao” 西安理工大學西漢壁晝墓發掘簡報.
97. Shaanxi sheng kaogu yanjiusuo, X ia n Jiaotong 111. H uang H ui, L un hengjiao ski、
7.324,19.843.
daxue X i-H a n bihua m u ，4-6. 112. Sim a Qian, S h iji, 6.257.
98. The main chamber o f the tomb o f the King o f 113. W ang M ing, B aopu z i neipian jia o sh i, 3.47.
Liang at Shiyuan is 9.2 meters long, 5.2 meters wide, and 114. X iao Tong, Wen xuan ，2.76.
3.1 meters high. However, the tomb has a long passage­ 115. Henan sheng wenhuaju wenwu gongzuodui, "Luo­
way and eight chambers annexed to the main one. The yang X i-H an bihua mu fajue baogao.” For further discus­
entire tomb is 95.7 meters long, 13.5 meters wide, and 3.1 sion o f the murals, see Guo M oruo, “Luoyang H an mu
meters high. See Yan Genqi, M angdang shan X i-H a n bihua shitan”; Chaves, “H an Painted Tomb at Luoyang.”
L iang w ang tnudiy 83-100. 116. Luoyang bowuguan, “Luoyang X i-H an Bu
99. Lady D ais wooden chamber is 6.72 meters long, Qianqiu bihua mu fajue jianbao/’The main chamber is
4.88 meters wide, and 2.8 meters high. See Fu Juyou 傅 4.6 meters long, 2.1 meters wide, and 1.86 meters high.

Conclusion

1. Nanyang H an hua guan 南隱漢晝館，“Nanyang 2 . G an Bao 干寶，

Sou shen j i 搜神記, 3:33-34.
faxian daxing H an huaxiangshi mu” 南陽發現大型漢晝 3 . For the tomb where the pottery was found，see
I 石I ; H an Yuxiang and L i Chenguang, N anyang H an Shaanxi sheng wenwu guanli weiyuanhui, wChang'an
dai huaxiangshi m u, 135-58. xian Sanlicun D ong-H an muzang fajue jianbao” 長安
縣二里村東漢墓葬發f 簡報. For the inscription, see Zhenzhichang Han huaxiangshi mu de fajue” 唐河針
王育成，
W ang Yucheng
“Zhongguo gudai daojiao qiyi 織廉漢晝像石墓的發掘. For a comprehensive study o f
中國古代道教奇異符銘考論，
tim in g kaolun” 28-29. the tomb and its carvings, see Huang Yafeng 黃 雅 峰 ，
4. Sim a Guang, Tai xuan jiz h u 、
7.185; the translation N anyang Q ilingang H an huaxiangshi m u 南陽麒麟崗漢
is modified from Nylan, E lem ental Changes, 343. 晝像石墓.
5. Sima Guang, T ai xuan jiz h u y 7.188; the translation 8. Chen Jiangfeng suggests that the seven-star
is modified from Nylan, E lem ental Changes, 346-47. group represents the lodge Tail, and the eleven-star
6. Yang Xiong eventually subscribed to the con­ group represents the lodges O x and M aid, but W ei
cept o f the Spherical Heaven. Huan Tan claimed that he Renhua considers the eleven-star group to be the lodge
directed Yang’s attention to the concept at a time when W ing. N either proposal is convincing. See Chen, “N an-
Yang held to the idea that the heavens pulled the sun yang tianwen huaxiangshi kaoshi，” and W ei, “Tanghe
and the moon to the left. See Sun Fengyi, H uan z i xin Zhenzhichang Han huaxiangshi de tianxiang tu” 唐河針
lurij i8a-i9b. 織廉漢晝像石墓的天象圖，both in H an Yuxiang, N an­
7. Zhou Dao 周到 and L i Jinghua 李京華，“Tanghe yang H an d a i tianw en huaxiang sh iya n jiu , 16 -19 ,26 -31.
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Frequently cited journals and series:

B eifang w e n w u 北方文物 Toho g a k u h o 東方學報
Chugoku shigaku 中國史學 W e n w u 文物
K a o g u 考古 X in ya x u e b a o 新亞學報
Kaogu x u e b a o 考古學報 Zhongguo H an huayanjiu 中國漠晝研究
Kaogu yu w e n w u 考古與文物 Zhongyuan w enw u 中原文物
Sibu b e iy a o 四部備要 Z iran k e x u e s h iy a n jiu 自然科學史研究
Sichuan w enw u 四川文物

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管理委員會. “Hangzhou, Lin’an W udai mu zhong --------- et al. G uangzhou H an 廣州漢墓(The H an
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Beijing: Wenwu, 2003. 寺 （The Yongning Temple of the Northern Wei in
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北魏洛陽永寧寺塔復原探討 -------- • H an Wei Luoyang gucheng nanjiao lizh ijia n zh u
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“Luoyang xijiao H an mu fajue baogao，’ 洛陽西郊漢 --------- . H ou H an j i jia o zh u 後漢紀校注（Collation
墓發掘報告（Report on the excavation o f the Han and notes to Record o f the L ater H an), by Yuan
tombs in the western suburb o f Luoyang). Kaogu H ong 袁宏(328-376). Tianjin: Tianjin guji chu-
xuebao 1963.2:1-58. banshe, 1987.
Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo Luoyang Zhou Xiaolu 周曉陸. “M iu Yu muzhi dukao” 缪好墓
gongzuo dui 中國社會科學院考古研究所洛陽工 志讀考（Study o f M iu Yu’s epitaph). W enwu 1995.4:
作隊. “H an W ei Luoyang cheng nanjiao de lingtai 83-87.
yizhi” 漢魏洛陽城南郊的靈台遺址(The Han-W ei --------- . B u tia n ge ya n jiu 步天歌研究（A study o f the
site o f the Spiritual Terrace in the southern suburb o f Song o fPacing the H eavens). Beijing: Zhongguo shu-
Luoyang). Kaogu 1978.1:54-57. dian, 2004.
Zhongguo yuqi quanji bianji weiyuanhui 中國玉器全 Zhou Zheng 周錚. “ ‘G uiju jin g’ ying gaicheng ‘boju
集編輯委員會. Zhongguo yu q i q u a n ji中國玉器全集 jin g’” 規矩鏡應改稱博局鏡(“The mirror with
(The complete collection o f Chinese jade objects). 6 the design o f compasses and try squares” should be
vols. Shijiazhuang: H ebei meishu, 1991—93. renamed as “the mirror with the design o f the bo
Zhou Dao 周到 and L i Jinghua 李京華. “Tanghe board”). Kaogu 1987.12:1116-18.
Zhenzhichang H an huaxiangshi mu de fajue” 唐 Zhu K ezh en 竺可禎. X hu K ezhen w e n ji竺可禎文集
河針織戚漢畫像石墓的發掘（The excavation o f (Collected essays o f Zhu Kezhen). Beijing: Kexue,
the H an carved tomb at Zhenzhichang in Tanghe). 1979.
W enwu 1973.6: 26-40. Zhu Q ianzhi 朱謙之（1899-1972)，
ed. L a o zijia o sh i 老子
Zhou D aoji 周道濟. H an Tang za ixia n g zh id u 漢唐宰相 校釋(Collation and commentaries on L a o zt). B ei­
M 度 (The institutions o f Chancellor-in-chief from jing: Zhonghua, 1982.
H an to Tang). Taipei: Jiaxin shuini gongsi wenhua Zhuang Shen 莊申. “Luo Pin jiq i guiqu tu” 羅聘及其鬼
jijinhui, 1964. 趣圖（Luo Pin and his ghost paintings). Zhongyang
Zhou Tianyou 周天游， ed. B ajta H ou H an shu jiz h u 八 yanjiuyuan L ish iyu ya n yanjiusuo jik a n 中央研究院歷
家後漢書辑注（Collected notes for eight historical 史語言研究所集刊44，
no. 33 (:972): 4。3- 34.
 Index

abdication, 30 ，
34 ，
120，122 auspicious grain, 97，
10 1,124 ,128 —31
A cting Emperor, 31-32，101 autumn equinox, 312
after death, 3 ，9，152，
204,261，
294，363
afterlife, 14,233 bailu 白鹿，
丨浞white deer
A i Zhang 哀章， 32 B an G u 班 固 (32-92 ce), 84，
87，
96，
10 6 ，
110 ，
16 2 ,266，334
almanac, 334,336 Bao-Xie Route 襃斜道，
134-40，143
ambiguity, 23，
28，
3 3 ,176 ，
228，
231，294 beidouju n 北斗君，see Lord o f the Northern Dipper
A n Zhim in 安志敏’ 173 beiluo 北落，see Northern Territories
anhan gong 安漢公， see Duke for Pacifying the Han bell, 67，
184-86,196
Anping 安平， 157,159 benevolence, 25，
34， 49， 78，87，9 1,94，100,10 4 —5，
io 9，
n6,
A nqi Sheng 安勤i ，154 122 ，
147，
248. See also benevolent rule
A n q iu 安丘>277,330 benevolent rule, 10 ,34 ,9 2 -9 3,95，
99，
10 1 ，
111 ，
114 ，
116 ,130 ,
Anyang 安陽，ii 147? 152，164. See also benevolence
apocrypha, 215，266 bi 畢， see lunar lodge N et
appropriation, 7，
206,363 Bian Yu 卞玉， 140-41,143
Aquarius, 270 disc 璧， 47，1。7，io 9， 18 7-9 1,199 ，
203，255， 257,261，
360.
Aquila, 7,268 See also dragon: b i discs; Gate with B i Discs
arm illary sphere, 302,310 b ilei 壁壘， Ramparts
ascending to Heaven, 15，
27,121，152-53,164， 166-69 ,187- b i men 璧門，w Gate with B i Discs
89，200—1，204 224,226,261， 356; belief in, 3 ，
12 ，
167, Bin G ong I f 公，
i8
194，233，
277，
294，
357,359，
363 ，
367, also celestial bin ceremony 賓/殯， 182-83
ascent Bixian 費縣， 288-89
A ssistant Conductors, 2 9 9 ,30 1,312-13,338，
341 biyong 辟雍，
j 從Surrounding M oat
astrology， 3 10 -11，335 blessings, 2,89-90 ，92， 10 4 -5,110
astronomer, 1 ，
277，
302 ， 30 5,310 -12 ,323，
340-41 blissful and virtuous goat, 114 ,116
astronomical accuracy, 50， 312 ，
324,335，338 Blue Dragon, 198 ，
236,238-39,258-59,289，
308-9 ，
317,338,
astronomical knowledge, 302 ，
336,338,341,343，354 343，361. See also cardinal emblems
astronomy, 7 ,10 ，
105，
235, 249,255,299，
310 ，
316 ，
336,340 ， Blue Sun H all, 78-79
343-44,354,359,367 Bo Shuren 薄樹人，312
auspicious animals, 3 ，
7，
187,197，
199 ，
218 ,233，
247，
349，356 boliang ta i 柏梁臺，see Terrace o f Cypress Beams
Book o f C elestial O ffices, 5,238 ,30 6 ,310 ,311 ，
323，
331，
349, celestial field, 12 ，
186-87, ^97，20°> 203,205,235,255，
258,
359 2 6 1,263，275,293,356. See also celestial realm
Book o f Changes，2 ,2 9 ,67，
105,236,242,245-46,286, celestial image, 206， 273,336， 340， 344,363
3^3n44 celestial journey, 168—69, J84,205,214 ，
233， 299,302，359
Book o fD ocum ents, 41,336,381115 celestial map, 15,311 ，
316 ，
343，4061149
Book o f Odes，2,17, 29, 89，105, 266， 268,323 celestial palace, 5,205,308,322-23,363. See also heavenly
Book o fthe K ing o fH uainan ，78 ,8 0,8 7,1S8 ,19 0,213-14 , palace
248, 279>345 Celestial Park, 299-300
Bow, 299-300 Celestial Pond, 299,301
Brashier, K. E .，204 celestial realm, 7,9 ,170 ,2 0 1. See also celestial field
Brightening the Years, 166 celestial sign, 3 ，
97,186 ， 294， 310 ，343， 360-61，363
Bright H all, 10 ，
14 -15 ,3 7 -4 1,6 1-6 9 ,76~77，236-37， 359-61, Central Palace, 79 -8 0,238，
255，
257，
308 ，
310，361
363; history of, 18 ，20-22 ， 25-28,32-36 ， 92， 105 ，
310; chancellor, 95—98，174
layout of, 41，50-51， 53-54 ， 59， 256-57; rituals in, 70-71, Chang, K. C .，
11 ，
247,249
77-88,248. See also under Chang^n; Em peror Wu; Chang’an 長安， 49， 83-84 ， 92，132， 13 4 17 ，
巧3 ， 225,361; and
Luoyang; Son o f Heaven; W ang M ang im m ortality,15,155,160 ， 16 6 ,20 6 -7,233> and Bright
bronze inscription, 1-2 ，
Bu Qianqiu 卜千秋，
Buddhism, 198
2巧
18 ，
，
20，
218，
89-90
293,348，355 , 長清，
H alls, 26 ，
28 ,32 ,36 -4 1,51，
85，87 105,359
Changqing 270,273,292
54,59， 61-66 ， 7 0 -7 1,76 ，
81，

Buddhist, 11 ，158，354 Changsha 長沙， 169， 174， 178,179

bureaucracy, 7， 22,87,96，123，128， 147,308 chaohui 朝會 ，see court audience
B u tia n ge 步天歌， see Song o fPacing the H eavens chart o f the Canopy Heaven, 312
chart o f the seven orbits, 312
C ai M ao 蔡茂，
128-30 C harts and T exts o fthe P urple Palace, 311
C ai Yong 蔡邕（ 132-192) ，6 6-67,石
9，87,313 ，
315，340 • Chen Jiu jin 陳久金,251
calendrical reform , 310，4051122 Chen Qiu 陳球, 204
camel, 251-52 Chencang 陳倉，137
Cancer, 334 Chengdu 成都， 158，
241，282
Canon ofYao, 239-40 chengxiang 丞相，咖chancellor
Canopy Heaven, 47,50 ，
80， 312-13 ，
316 ，
336，359 Chenjiadashan 陳家大山，179
Cao P i 曹玉（ 187-226)，
122, i66 Chisong 赤松， i68
Cao Zh i 曹植（ 192-232X55 Chong 重， i66
Capricorn, 270,309 Chu cf 楚辭，see Elegies o fthe Chu
cardinal emblems, 198-200,236,248,255-63,289-90,293, Chun qiu see Spring and A utum n A nnals
295，
297>3o8—9， 322—23，
336 ，
35。，355—56，36。 —63. Chun qiu ru iy in g zhuan 春秋瑞應傳，see Com m entaries
See also four creatures; Blue Dragon; Dark W arrior; on the Responses o fA uspicious Omens in the Spring and
Red Bird; W ang M ang: cardinal emblems; W hite A utum n A nnals
civilization, 286-87
Cassirer, Ernst, 12 Classic o fM ountains and Seas, 279
ce 策，see W hip Classic ofPeace^ 55
celestial ascent, 9,15,233,295. See also ascending to Classic o fS p irits and O ddities, 218
Heaven Classic o fthe Physiognom y o f Cranes, 345
celestial bodies, 6，
235—36 ，
295,316 ，
336，
340，
357,359 * clerk for roads and bridges, 144
celestial cartography, 303，
313，315 c liff engraving, 15，
147,359-60
celestial chart, 311—16 ，
335，
337，340 c liff inscriptions, 140 ，
143-45
 5
3
IN D E X 4
-

Cloudy river, 266. See also M ilky W ay destination, 14—15，

167，
183，
18 7,203,225，
261，
263; 273-74,
collective sacrifices, 84-85
292-94,354-57
comet, 93,236,311,340 Deyang Palace _ 陽殿，86
Com m entaries on the Responses o fA uspicious Omens in the d i 氐，see lunar lodge Root
Spring and A utum n Annals^ 106 Dian 滇， 265 ,
compasses, 51,288-89 鼎， see tripod
ding ,
Confucianism , 27，
29， 94，182 Dingbian 定邊，343
Confucian scholar, 10 ，25,27,41,92—93,109 ，
116 ，
152,166 ， divination, 21， 49，56，
58，
107,310，341
336,359 D ong Xian 董賢，258 ,
C onfucius 孔 子 （
551-479 b ce), 10 ,18 ,2 8 -3 0 ,5 0 ,9 1-9 2 ,18 2 D on g Zhongshu 董 仲 舒 （
ca. 19 5-ca. 115 b ce), 25，
28，
9 1，
object 凉，
43，47 93- 94，128
conjunction, 3 10 -11，4051117 D ong Zhuo 董卓，3 6 ,6 j
conquest cycle, 23-24,34,120-21, D ongfang Shuo 東 方 湖 (154-93 b ce), 166
Cool W ind, 188，214 dou 斗，see lunar lodge D ipper -
correlation, no, 130 ，
310 ，
3 11，343 Dou Wan 竇結， 251，330
cosmologist, 3 ，
10 ，362 D ouW u 竇武，I28
cosmology, j, 15，
4 7,50,109 ，
187，
256，
359，367 dragon, 8，
94，
10 6 ,109 ，
151，
173，
18 6 ,240=52，
363; and cart,
cosmos，
3 ,14 ，
49,53,56,58—59，
67，
84，
88，
95，
10 6 ,189，
235， 5，
7，
151,167; and ascent, 9，
153,167，
179,186-87, 2o6 ，
258，
289,345 273，292,335，354；
and b i discs, 187-92 ，
203，
274,356—57;
counselor-delegate, 9广98，
ii i ，
114,145 and M other Queen o f the West, 220,275,293; and
court audience, 86 cardinal emblems, 248—55,257， 261， 263， 293; in astron-
crane, 179，19 4,345，
349—50，354 omy， 240-47,305,323， 338， 343. See also Blue Dragon;
creation, 286-87,29 ° red dragon; yellow dragon
crow, 99 ,186，
277，
281，
290; three-legged, 277，
279,348-49, dualism, 204 ,285，
287,289， 297，234 *
354 Duke for Pacifying the H an, 30-32,49, See also W ang
Cullen, Christopher, 10 M ang
D uke H uan o f the Q i (d. 643 b c e ), 149
D a D ai L ij i 大戴禮§己，see E lder D a i、Record o fR ites D uke M u o f the Q in (r. 659-621 b c e ), 166-67
Dam isch, Hubert, 12 Duke o f Zhou, 18，20， 28 ,30 -33,50 ,7 0 ,81，
12 0 ,128，3841161
Dangjiagou 黨家溝，
228,263 . Dunhuang 敦煌， 157，341
Daoism ，168 dynastic cycle, 23，
25-26,93. See also dynastic virtue; Five
D aoist， 55，168-69,333， 347 Virtues
daoqiao yuan 道橋祿, see clerk for roads and bridges dynastic virtue, 24，34 ，
92， 119-22 ，
3821132，
3831135，
3911175.
D aren fu 大人赋，see Rhapsody on the M ighty M an See also dynastic cycle; Five Virtues *
D ark H all, 79-80,38811150
D ark Warrior, 116 ,198，
236, 238-39,248-49 ，
253,255，
259- earthen core, 71-72,76-77,157,162
61’ 263，
308—9，
317,322-23,361，
363. See also cardinal earthen terrace, 158-59,162
emblems Eastern Palace, 238， 240 -4 1,308，361
D aw enkou culture 大汶口 文 化 （
ca. 4 10 0 -26 0 0 b c e ),43 eclipse, 29,235
D ayan> 大百赋，see Rhapsody on Talks about Greatness ecliptic, 305,312 ，
315，4051126
D ayi 夫邑，208 E ig h t R efutations o fth e Theory o fthe Canopy H eaven, 312
de 德，see benevolence E igh t Trigram s, 67, 69
deer, 92，
123-24 ，
194,197,247,249,250-52 ，
257; and immor­ E lder D a is Record o fR ites, 66. See also Record o fR ites
tals, 124 ，
197,350; and ascent, 188-90 ，
192 ，
201，
220,228, Elegies o fthe Chu, 7. See also F a r-o ffJourney, Qu Yuan;
349—50 ，
353—54，
356. See also white deer Song Yu; Sum m oning the Soul
 Em peror A i (r. 6—i b c e ), 30 Feng Shi 馮時 ’ 247’ 249-50
Em peror A n (r. 10 广125)，123 Fenggao 奉高, 21-22 ，
2 5-28 ,36 ^ 7,41，
70, 83-85，
3 10 ,359，
Em peror G ao (r. 207-196 b ce), 9 4 ,119 —2 0 ,134 ，
136-37, 3851181
154,310 ， fe n g que 麗闕，
334; sacrifices to, 22-23,7°» 83-85; temple of, 似 G ate-Pillars with Phoenixes
32,8 6 ,10 1,10 4 . See also Liu Bang fen g -sh a n ceremony 封襌, 21-22,25-27 ， 36，yo392，
153-55,
Em peror Guangwu (r. 25-57), 3^» 4h 66-67,84，
86,9 6,121， 164
130,204. See also L iu X iu fen ye 分野， 财 field allocation
Em peror Jin g (r. 15 7 -14 1 b c e ), 85 Fenyin 汾陰， 49, 84，
92-94,152-54,3861199
Em peror M ing (r. 58-75), 36 ，
61，134 fertility, 290
Em peror Ping (r. 1-5) ，
30-33,53,85 field allocation, 299，
305,310，4051114
Em peror Wen (r. 180-157 BCE)» 24，
119 -20,167,175 fine gentleman, 12B
Em peror Wen (r. 220-226), 122 F irst Em peror (r. 222-210 b ce), 3 ,6 ，
2 0 ,2 3 ,2 5 ,6 6 ,9 0 -9 1,
Em peror W u (r. 14 1-8 7 b ce), 29 ，
92，9 7 ,13 4 ,136 ，
18 2 ,233， 137，140 ，350; mausoleum of, 47,344,349
238， 255,310; and Bright H alls, 2 1-2 2,33,36 ，4 1,8 1; and Fischer, Otto, 118
Five Virtues, 24—28， 34 ，
120; and rituals, 49， 70,83-85 ， five colors, 67， 69， 79，286
361; and omens, 92-94 ， 10 1,10 6 ,12 2 ,128，
131; reign of, five directions, 79
99,248,250，
253，
322; and immortality, 152—55,160-61, five palaces, 238，323
16 4,166 -6 7,169 ，
20 6 ,210 ，
213,26 5-6 6,270，276 Five Phases, 23， 34， 67,69， 79—83，87,105-6, n o, 120,323,
95-9 7,3^3n43
Em peror X uan (r. 73-49 b ce), 87, 93， 362-63,3821129
Em peror Yuan (48-33 b ce), 84—85,166 five planets, 310—11，4051117
Em peror Zhang (r. 76-88)’ 53，6 7 ,12 1,123，312 Five Thearchs, 36 ， 83-84,86， 93，106 ，
361,363
Em peror Zhao (r. 86-74 bce), 28 Five Virtues, 23—26，34-35, 6 9 ,118,120 -22,3821131. See
Empress Dowager Dou, 27 also conquest cycle; dynastic cycle; dynastic virtue;
Empress Dowager W ang, 30 -31,10 4 generation cycle
Eno, Robert, 10 floral canopy, 198，
255，
261,356
epitaph，145 folklore, 274,295
equator, 312-13 footway, 9 9 -10 0 ,122 ,132 ，
134， 136-40,143—45,147
E rya 爾雅, 105 four creatures, 192, 248,255， 257. See also cardinal
E ssentials o fthe M ethodfor the N ew A rm illary Sphere and emblems
C elestial Globe, 338 Four H orses, 299^00
E tiq u ette and R ites, 172 Four Seas, 55，
67,69
four seasons, 22， 49,53， 67,69，
79—83，
87,95，
249，
258，
289,
fa n g 房, see lunar lodge Chamber 362-63
Fangcheng 方城，324 fox ，217，228,277， 279，293
fa n g sh i 方士，see master o f methods fu ^§ t see blessings
Fangzhang 方丈 , i6 i Fu X i 伏羲，
51，285-90，
293,355，
3^0,362,40411101
Fanji 樊集， 2 ii，
215-17 Fu Yue 傅說，i68
fantasy，
150 ,152,164 ，166 ，
17 0 ,188，
233,357,359 Jkd eya n g 福 德 羊 ，see blissfid and virtuous goat
F a r-o ffJourney、16 8 -6 9 ,185，205,210,235-36,302,396n59 Fuge song 郁閣頌，see H ym n o fthe F u Passage
Father King o f the East, 228,40011163 fu m in g 符命，see Signs o fthe M andate
feather, 43， 5 6 ,10 6 ,192 ，
197，199-201,249,277,280,282, functionary, n i- 12 ，
145，
147,265，
336,359
37’356 functionary guarding the office gates, 114
fe ilia n g u i guan 蜚廉桂觀， Tower ofW in d and C in­ fungus, 106,218,349 一
50 ，
363. See also mushroom o f
namon im m ortality
fe iy i 非衣，
170-72,182 Fu Passage, 137
fu ritual 復, 18 2-8 3,2°4 governor, 33,9 5-101,122-25, ^ 8 ,130 ,134 ,137 -38 ,14 0 -4 1,
F urui zh i 符％志，see Treatise on A uspicious Signs and 143—45，147
Omens Graham , A . C .’ 10
Grand Inception system, 22，
25，
29,310
G a i Kuanrao 蓋 寬 饒 (d. 60 b ce), 29^30 G rand M ystery, the、361
g a itia n 蓋 天 ’ see Canopy Heaven Grand Unity, 5， 83-84， 106 ，122，
153-54 ，
36 1-6 2,3821121，
g a i 蓋圖，see chart o f the Canopy Heaven 3831135. See also supreme deity
G an Bao 干寶（ fl. 3 17 12 2 ) ，
361—62 Great Archery Contest, 61
Gan D e 甘德， 338， 341，4051118 G u Yong 谷永， 29-30 ,32 ，
io5
Gan Zhongke 甘忠可， 30，32 Guangzhou 廣州， 58,150
gang 尤，see lunar lodge Neck guan /w 官圖，see official charts
ganlu 甘露， sweet dew Guanzhong 關中， 134，13 6 17
Ganquan Palace 甘泉宫，
49，
83-84,92，
94，
io 6 ,153-60 ， Guanzhuang 官莊， 228，231,328
166,233 Gudao 古道，see O ld Route
Gao Lu 高魯，322 g u ifa 規法，see method involving circles
gatekeeper, 7，111 ，
114 ,2 0 6 -7 ,2I1，228,263，273，292 Guitoushan 鬼頭山，56，
59,209,284,287
gate o f Heaven, 2’ 14 -15 ,184， 186 ，205，233，26 0 ,263，
293， Guo Rongzhang 郭榮章,138
350 ，
354- 57, 3 6°；
as gate pillars, 5，
7,205,210—11 ，
218;
in literature, 7,16 7,169 ，
183,205,214; inscriptions, 207, H all o f General Institution, 79—80
208， 211; and the M other Queen o f the W est, 211-31, H am m urabi (r. 1792-1750 b c e ), 13
260， 263， 275,277， 356-57，
359; as a half-open gate, 208， H an Fei 韓 非 （ 28o?~233 b ce), i, 331,333,338
221,224—225，263 354-56. See also gatekeeper; Gate H an Zhong 韓重, i68
with Bi Discs; Gate-Pillars with Phoenixes; porter H anging Garden, 189，214
gate-pillars, 210 ，
21B, 221—24,231,263. See also G ate-Pillars H an River 漢水， 134，136
with Phoenixes H an shu 漢書，see Standard H istory o fth e Form er H an
G ate-Pillars with Phoenixes, 38，
161，
210—11 ，
221，
224-25, Hanzhong 漢中， 99 ,134-37,140-41
228,275，356-57， 36o H aoli 蒿里，204
Gate with B i Discs, 206-7, 2 10 -11,2 2 4 ,228，354 hare, 195，
216-18 ，
225,228，
277，
279,290，
293，
324,326 ，
336,
G e H ong 葛洪（ 283~343) ，
333，
347，
35。 345
gedao 閣道， see Stepped Road . Harmonious Pond, 238，
308-9,4011110
generation cycle, 34-35,120-22,3821129 harmony, 6 9 ,83，
87,94-95,109 ，
12 0 ,126 ，
128,130，287
genesis, 286 Hayashi M inao 林巳奈夫, 158，198
G en g Shouchang 耿 壽 昌 （
fl. 73-49 b ce), 311 H e 无可，i8
Geng Xun 耿勳，
143-44 heaped corpses, 335
ghost，
1，331-36,338,340，
4071170. See also lunar lodge heavenly auspicious omen, 91,93-94
Ghost Heavenly Chamber, 18 ， 20,381117
ghost in a vehicle, 331 heavenly court, 2，204
goat wine, h i, 113 H eavenly Lord, 5,7,266
Gom brich, E . H ., 12 heavenly palace, 2，
7 ,231，
276，
300,357. See also celestial
Gongsun Chen 公孫臣，24 palace
Gongsun H ong 公孫弘，94’ 128，
130，248 H eavenly Questions^ 50，
14 9 ,235，
277，280
Gongsun Q ing 公孫卿，
153-55,l6。 Heavenly River, 266,299,341. See also M ill<y Way-
Gongyang 公羊，91 Heavenly Thearch, 2 -5 ,32，
14 9 -50 ,167，
169 ，
255,270，
277，
Gongyu D ai 公玉帶,4 1 300 ，
323，356
Good Omens and A bnorm al Things, 10 6 ,111 Heaven’s gate, see gate o f Heaven
Heavens mandate, see mandate o f Heaven immortals, 56， 58，151-6S passim t 347; land of, 4 ,10 ，
12 ，
150,
hebo 河伯，see River Lord 164， 210 ，265-66,276-77,292， 357; image of, 14,192,
hegu 河鼓, see River Drum 196-97,263,282,349-50; and ascent, 200,206,233,
H em udu culture 河 姆 渡 文 化 （
ca. 5000-3300 b ce), 281 257^-58, 273, 292-93,350-56; and M other Queen o f
H eng E 短娥， i86 ，
213，
277,279，345，347,39711100 the W est, 217—18 ， 220-21,224-25,228,231’ 261’ 263，
294，
hexagram, 29,49^105,236，242—44,286 356. See also deer: immortals; immortaTs palms for
H ong Gua 洪适（
1117^1184)，
m , 118 receiving the dew
H ongshan culture 紅 山 文 化 (ca. 4700-2900 b ce), 43 im m ortals palms for receiving the dew, 131，
164，
166 ，
360,
horse, 80，137,16 7,18 4,19 4 ,20 6 -7,2I1，
225» 228; and rep­ 396n40
resentation, 1,12,331,333,338 ; and omens, 99,109, Im perial Academy, 59
121,123. ^ ee a^so Four Horses im perial park, 10 ，
28,122 ，
237,265-66, 270
Hou J i 后稷， 90 ，149 ，
394^3 inner circle, 313
H sii, Cho-yun, 10 interchangeability, 251,281
hu 弧，see Bow interconnecting tree, 125-28 ，
130-31
huagat 華 蓋 t see floral canopy interspatiality, 231-32
H uai nan z i 淮南子. See Book o fthe K ing o fH uainan
Huan Rong 桓榮, 41 jade maid, 169，214
H uan T an 桓 譚 (ca. 24 BCE-Ca. 56 ce ), 67,38711139,409116 Jia Kui 買逵（ 30- io i) ，
312 ，
3巧，4051126
Huang Ba 黃霸, 95-97,99 jia h e 嘉禾，俯 auspicious grain
Huangdi 黃帝，撕Yellow Thearch jia huangdi 假皇帝， 撕A cting Em peror
H ulian g 壺梁，
i6 i Jian g’an 江安，290
huntian i軍# ，see Spherical Heaven jta n ta i 渐臺，see Jian Terrace
hu qin 虎禽，see tiger-shaped fow l Jian Terrace, 38,161
hybrid, 184,194—97，
200,213,275,285-86,288,349-50,356 Jianyang 簡陽， 59 ,208,210 ，281，285
Hydrae, 239,309,4011113 Jianzhang Palace 建章宫， 16 0-6 1 ，
164 ，
i6 6 ,206，
210 ，
238，
H ym n o fthe F u Passage, 132-34,137^-38,143 265,275
H ym n o fthe W estern Passage, 9 9 ,124 -25,132,138 ,14 3,14 4 - jia o 角, see lunar lodge H orn
45，
r47，
394ni42. See also W estern Passage Jiaotong University in X i'an, 240，
303，
316 ，
350,359
Jiaozuo 焦作，158
iconography, 11-12 ，253， 255,322 jia sh i 嘉士，
挪 fine gentleman
illustrated catalogue, 10 ，
no—11,116 ,359 Jia Y i 賈 (20 1-16 9 b ce), 24
illustrated manual, 116 -17,14 7 Jiayuguan 嘉略關，
255，
26 i, 328 ,331,334
illustration o f auspicious omens, 106 jin g 井, see lunar lodge W ell
Illu stra tio n o fth e Responses o fA uspicious Omens、106-7 jin g g a n lou 井幹樓，see Tower o f Jinggan
Illu stra tio n o fthe Responses o fA uspicious Omens as a Sup­ jis h i 積尸， j 從heaped corpses
plem ent to the R itu a l Canons, 106 jiu m ia o 九廟, see N ine Temples
im agination, 1 ， 15， 88，132 ，
167，
210 ，
233,340,343 jiu x i 九錫, see N ine O fferings
im itation, 1. See also mimesis Ju 沮, 137-38，144
immortality, 10 ，
15，
58-59,150-54,162-64,168-69,282,349; Juandu 身毒，265
and the M other Queen o f the W est, 12 ， 213 ，
357; and
celestial ascent, 27,192 ，
233,354; and Em peror W u, 27, K aiyuan zhan jin g 開兀占經，see Treatise on A strology in
152-54,166 ，
265; post-mortem , 152,205,232-33,-359,363; the K aiyuan R eign
elixir of, 186 ,213-14, 216 ，
218,275, 277,279,345. See also K aogongji 考工記，see Record o fA rtificers
Chang’an: im m ortality; Em peror W u: im m ortality; K in g C h en g o f the Z hou (r. 1042/1035—1006 b ce), 18 ，
20 ，
mushroom o f im m ortality 30 ，
33 ,128 ，
130 ，
381115，3841161
 K in g C uo o f the Zhongshan (r. 327—312 b ce), 71 Liangzhu culture 良渚文化（
ca. 34 0 0 -225 。b ce), 43,47,
K in g H uai o f the C h u (r. 328-229 b ce), 167 281
K in g H uiw en o f the Q in (r. 337-311 b ce), 137 L ie z i 列子，see M aster L ie
K in g M u o f the Z h ou (r. 956-918 b ce), 123,125 Light H all, 79,38811150
K in g o f L ian g (d. ca. 118 b ce), 252，
258,344，4081198 L ij i 禮記，see Record o fR ites
K in g W en o f the Z h ou (r. 10 9 9 -1050 b ce), 17 -18 ,2 0 ,9 0 lin 麟, see unicorn
K in g W u o f the Z h ou (r_ 1049/1045-1043 b ce), 18 ，
90 ， Lingjiatan 凌家灘，
43，47
381115 lin g ta i 靈臺，see Spiritual Terrace
K in g X iaocheng o f the Z h ao (r. 265-245 b c e ), 167 Lippiello, Tiziana, 145，
3891110,39411142
K in g X uan o f the Z hou (r. 827-782 b c e ), 266 L i ruiying 禮瑞應圖，see Illu stra tio n o fthe Responses o f
K in g Zhao o f the C hu (r. 515-489 b c e ), 166 A uspicious Omens as a Supplem ent to the R itu a l Canons
K in g Zhao o f the Q in (r. 30 6 -251 bc e) L i sao 離騷, see On E ncountering Trouble
Kistemaker, Jacob, 10,334,338 L iu A n 劉 安 （
179 -122 b ce), 78,189 . See also Book o f the
Knechtges, D avid, 302 K ing o fH uainan
knocker, 225-28,261-63 L iu Bang 割邦，
310 -n . See also Em peror Gao
Kong Zang 孔藏，336 Liu Chong 割崇， 33，jo
Krupp, E .C .,3 3 5 L iu X ian g 劉 向 （
70-8 b ce), 2 8 -2 9 ,34 ，
4 h I20 ，
3n
Kuang H eng 匡衡，84 L iu X in 裏!1歆 (46 BCE-23 ce ), 34 ，
4 1，
66，120
kun 105,236 L iu X iu 割秀， 36 ，i2i, 129. ^ ee a^so Em peror Guangwu
Kunlun M ountains 處奋山， 188-90 ，
192，
20 0 -1,214 -15, liu 柳, see lunar lodge W illow
21 广18，228, 257—58，
26l, 350 liubo game 六博，
55-59
Kunming Lake S 明池， 38， 265-66 L i xu 雜續，see Sequel to the A nnotated C lerical Scripts
local government. 10 ， 97，
111 ，
144，263
Lady D ai, 15,174-77,182-83 ，
187,200 ，
20 3-5,250，
25^-58, Loewe, M ichael， 11-12
277, 279，
293，344,349-50,355_56，
359,363. See also Lolang 樂浪， 2i8
M awangdui: Tomb 1 longevity, 58-59,140,147，巧0，154—59，168,354,363
lang 狼，see W olf Lord L i, 175-77,205. See also M awangdui: Tomb 3
langfeng 閬風, see Cool W ind Lord o f the Northern Dipper, 361
Laozi 老子，130 L ii Buw ei 吕不 韋 (d. 235 b ce), 87
legend, 9 1,93，
123 ，
150,333-34,359; o f Yellow Thearch, L u G ong 魯恭, 128，130
153-54,164 ，
166-67, r92»258 lunar lodge, 238，
2 4 0 -4 1,244，248-49,297，
306 ，312,322—23;
legitimacy, 10 ，
15,21-23,25-30 ,6 9 -70 , 8 9 ,9 1-9 2 ,116 ,118 ， twenty-eight, 15 ,67， 238， 250,305，
308-12 ，
315-17,323，
巧 3—54 335- 38,343 一45，349，534> 359
Li 黎’ i66 lunar lodge Basket, 308-9,326-28,330,33B, 341
L i C an g 利 蒼 (d. 186 b ce), 174 lunar lodge Chamber, 240,244， 309,317
L i C h i 李濟，h lunar lodge Chariot Baseboard, 305,308-9
L i M in 李棰, 144 lunar lodge Dipper, 305-6,308—9，
323,326,328. See also
L i X i 李翕，
99, io o - i ，
122 ，
124—26 ，
13 0 ,132 ，
134,137^38, Southern Dipper
工43一45，
3幻，393ni4o, 394^42 lunar lodge Ghost, 30 9 -10 ,330 ，
331，
334,341
L i X i 利 豨 (d. 165 bce), 175,3971178 lunar lodge H eart, 97，
240—41，
247,250,309 ，
311 ，
317，
L i Yan 李嚴， m , 134 3901126
L i Yu 李禹（ fl. 155)，
i43 lunar lodge H orn, 240，242,244，247,306 ，
308 -9,312,317
Liangchengzhen 兩城鎮,126 lunar lodge M aid, 270,309,330
liangfeng 凉風，see Cool W ind lunar lodge M ane, 309,316
Liangfu 梁父，204 lunar lodge Neck, 240，
244，
247,301，
309，317
lunar lodge N et, 299-300,309,323—24， 326,328,343， M ars, 96,3901126
4061152 M aster L ie ，276
lunar lodge Ox, 270， 309 ，312 ，
330,341 M aster L u s Spring and A utum n Annals^ 87,130,248,305
lunar lodge Pasture, 309 ,312，316 master o f method， 10 ,27，30 ,4 1,8 3,152 -55,16 0 ,164，
167，
lunar lodge Rooftop, 309,316 359
lunar lodge Room , 309,316 M aster Shen 申公(o f L u )，27
lunar lodge Root, 240,242,244,309,317 M aster Shen 申公（o f Q i), 154
lunar lodge Star, 238-40 ，
309 ,317，4011113 M awangdui 馬王堆， 177-78,18 2-8 3,277; Tomb 1 ， 15，
lunar lodge Stomach, 309,316 169-73,359; Tomb 3 ，
107， 174，
311 ，
340. See also Lady
lunar lodge Stretch, 238,309，317 D ai; Lord L i
lunar lodge Swine, 308-9 ，317，343 M a Yong 馬雍，173
lunar lodge Tail, 240,242,244,250,309,317 medium, 92，
132 ，
187，233
lunar lodge Triad, 248，250,306,308-9 ， 317,4011110 M em orial to the T ia n jin g Passage, 132,143-44
lunar lodge Tuft, 248，250’ 30 9 ,317，4021125 memory, 2 0 ,3 1-3 2 ,87， 147,281，324
lunar lodge Tumulus, 309，317 M encius 孟子(572-289 b c e ) , 30
lunar lodge W all, 308-9,316 M erciful W arden, m -12
lunar lodge W ell, 30 8 -9 ,310 -12 ，
316,4051117 M erleau-Ponty, M aurice, 12
lunar lodge W illow, 238，
309，317 method involving circles, 315
lunar lodge W ing, 238-40,309,317 M ian River 134,136
Luo 洛’ 18,32,9 0 middle circle, 313
Luoyang 洛陽， i8 ,99 ,121 ，
137，
162,166; Bright H all, 36— M ilky Way, 6’ 7’ 15，236,265-70,273-74,290， 292,295,297,
4 1,51，61， 66-67,8工’ 84,359-61; archaeological finds, 58， 301，330,357,363. See also H eavenly River
257,331; painted tombs, 2 0 5,215-16 ,266 ，293，
336-38, mimesis, 367. See also imitation
349’ 354- 55’拘 m ingjing 名旌, see name banner
Lushan 盧山，263 m ingnian 明年，see Brightening the Years
L u shi chun qiu 呂氏春秋. See M aster Lu's Spring and m ingtang 明堂(complex o f halls), see Bright H alls
A utum n A nnals m ingtang 明堂（southern hall), see Ligh t H all
Lyra, 7，268 M ingtangyinyang 明堂陰陽錄，see Record o fY in and
Yang in the B rig h t H a ll
M achle, Edward, 10 M ingtangyueiing lun 明堂月令論，see Treatise on the
magistrate, 98， 124 -25,128 ,134 ，
143-44 B rig h t H a ll and M onthly Observances
M ajor,John, 10 miraculous sparrow, 93， 95-96
mandate o f Heaven, 2，
10 ,17，
h i, 140 ，
147，
367; in the Han, M iu J i ,缪忌， 83,153
3，23，25， 29 ^ 0 ,9 3—95，97,116 ，
152，154，
255,310-11; and M iu Yu 谬纤， ii i ，
ii4 ，
132,3911170
Confucians, 10 ， 91-92,154; and Bright H alls, 14-15, M izhi 米脂, 228,263
20-22 ，25，28， 33,36 -37,53， 69-70,78,80,85-86 ， 257, money tree, 211-12,218
363; in the Western Zhou, 17-18 ,8 9-90; andfe n g - monthly observances, 78—82，
87-88,105,248，
360 ，
362,
shan, 21,25,27,70; and W ang M ang, 31-32,53-54 ， 59， 38811149
85，10 1，1:04-6， 116 ，
236,256; and omens, 9 1-9 5,116 ， moon, 6 -7,15,56 ，
80，
277，
281,292-95,299; in astronomy,
121-22,128 ,147; in the Eastern Zhou, 149,167,235. See 80，238,247,305-11,323 ； by Qu Yuan, 149-50 ，
167, 235;
also Signs o fthe M andate on banners, 173,186-87’ 35^；in murals, 206，
258,336，
M ao Mausoleum 茂陵， 255，261 345，
354-55； in carvings, 225， 273，360,362-63; on a sar­
maria, 277 cophagus, 235，275,357. See also under H eng E ; N ii W a
M arquis D ai 軚侯， 174-76 ,178，233 morality, 15，
28，
128,152，154， 16 4 ,168，186
M arquis Y i o f Zeng 曾侯乙， 184，250, rj% 305 M other Queen o f the W est, 211， 261,277, 279,293-94,345，
 348一 359，
50, 355， 399，
^135,40011164. See also Gate o f official charts, 313，315
Heaven: M other Queen o f the W est; sheng headgear Old Route, 134-38
M ount Tai 泰山， 21-22,25-28,36 ，41，
49， jo y 95，
150 ,154， O ld Texts 古 文 ，66
164,258 omens, 15，
95-97, 9 9 ,248，
3l °y 334；discourse of, 10 ，
92, 94,
M ozuizi 磨嘴子，
173，176 132，152，249; images of, 12 ，92，10 1 ，
106-18 ，
147， 359; and
M r. Chu 鄗君， 134 ，
137-38,140-41,145 W ang M ang, 32 -33,10 1,10 4 -6 ， no, 116 ，
120 -21,129 ,
mulberry, 186,279 3901149; five omens, 117-18 ,124 ,131-32,36 3. See also
m ulianli 木連理，see interconnecting tree auspicious grain; Em peror W u: omens; Good Omens
m ulti-level building, 77 and A bnorm al Things; heavenly auspicious omen;
m ulti-level structure, 76 horse: omens; interconnecting trees; sweet dew;
m ulti-story building, 158，162 white deer; yellow dragon
m ulti-story ship, 265 On E ncountering Trouble, 167-69,185
m ulti-story structure, 37，7 1 oracle bone inscriptions, 247，
323,326
mushroom o f immortality, 258,275,350. See also fungus oral tradition, 303 ，
341，
343,360
music， 28,5 0 ,105 ，
185-87,197,356 outer circle, 313
musician, 85， 195—96， 288,39811111 Oxherd, 7，
38，
266，
268-74,277，
293，
301，
330-31,357
myth, 186—87,279一 81，^86,295
mythology, 7，9 ,286，359，367 Panofsl^ ，
Erw in, 12
paradise, 9，12,154,266; celestial，
9 -10 ,205，
231，
354; earthly,
Nakayama, Shigeru, 313 16 0 ,164，265
name banner，171-73,176-77,182—83 pattern o f Heaven, 2,344-45
N an gai tia n ba shi 難蓋天八事， see E ig h t R efutations o f Peng Keng 彭鏗，150
the Theory o fthe Canopy H eaven Peng Sheng 彭生，334
Nanxi 南溪，
220-22 ，
224-25,350，
356,4ooni66 Peng Xian 彭咸， i 68
Nanyang 南陽，242，
248,270,273,281-86,324,33B, 343， Peng Z u 彭祖， i68
353，36o Penglai 蓬莱，
i6 i, 276
Nanyue 南越，265 phoenix, 91，
93-97,10 〜167,179 ，
18 6 ,194，
208，
215,248,249,
Nanzheng 南鄭， 251 ，
巧5，芍7，261， 293-94,348,355. See also G ate-Pillars
n eig u i 內規，see inner circle with Phoenixes
New Texts 今 文 ，66 pictograph, 162，247， 305，
323，326
N ew Year, 82, 86 pillar to Heaven, 218
Nine O fferings，3 1，7 1 Pinglu 平陸，258
Nine Provinces, 55, 67，69 Pingshan 平山, 7 1，76
Nine Temples, 34,38, 61，85,166,236,238-39,255-57 Pixian 郫縣， 274， 277， 289,293,357，4031177
niu 牛，see lunar lodge Ox Poem o fthe O ccult Im ages, 341
Niuheliang 牛河梁， 43,47,49 Pole Star, 7，
305，
336，
362. See also North Star
Northern Dipper, 5，
7,47,49，
83,205,236,250, 273，
300— porter, 167,183-84, 205,356. See also gatekeeper
1，
3。5一8，3IO»323，
349，
361-63. See also Lord o f the Powers, M artin, 12 ,109，398119
Northern Dipper Praesepe, 334
Northern Palace, 238， 248，253，308,361 procession, 105-6 ，
111 ，
2 11,2 2 0 -2 1,225，
228,236，
293-94,
Northern Territories, 299—300 355-56
North Pole, 237,300,312,341 prodigy, 93,106
North Star, 198，236,238，260,306 ，
341. See also Pole Star prognostication, 3 ，
10 6 ,310 ，
340-41,343
nu 女，see lunar lodge M aid prognostication chart, 34 0 ,34 1，343
N ii W a 女嫩，
5i，
285-90 ，
293，
355，
360 ，
362，4 0 41110 1 projection, 240，
255， 310 ，343
 Puett, M ichael, 10 rhyme, 341，
343，359
punishment, 94， 96，109,270,3821131 rishu 曰書，see almanac
Purple Palace, 299-300 River Drum , 27。，299， 30 1，330
Puyang 襥陽，249 River Lord, 7，266,363
Pythagorean Theorem, 51 round Heaven, 45，
50 ，
80，
187,206 ，
235，
255，
256，
289，
316,
356
qian乾， 105，236， 242-44 Ru Chun 如淳，107
Qian Yuanguan 錢元璀，315 R u Y if 意，
333
Qiang 墙，89 ru i tu 瑞圖，
_?從illustration o f auspicious omens
Qjang 羌， 99，12 5,136 ,140，145 R u iyin g tu 瑞應圖，see Illu stra tio n o fthe Responses o f
Qianjingtou 淺 # 頭 ，349 Auspicious Omens
qianniu 牽牛，see Oxherd rushi 儒士，see Confucian scholar
Qianyang 千陽，258
qiheng 七衡圖， j 此chart o f the seven orbits sanhuang 二皇， Sovereigns
Qilingang 麒麟崗， 285，287,360-63 sangong 三 公 ，财 Three Excellencies
Qin Peng 秦彭，99，130 Sanmenxia 三H 峽， 249-50
qingyang 青陽，see Blue Sun H all San Pass 散關，137
(fillin g 秦嶺，
99， 134 ，137 santong 三統，see Triple Concordance
Qlu Jin g 仇靖，i44 Scorpii, 97, 240，
309,401
Q i1 Yuan 屈 原 ，
7，50,149-50,167-69,182—86，
189，205，
235, Sequel to the A nnotated C lerical Scripts, 118
277，28o， 299,302. See also H eavenly Q uestions; On sequence, 23， 95,153,191，200，203
E ncountering Trouble Serving M aid, 270
Quanrong 犬戎， 123，125 Shan Ju li 單居離,5 。
que 闕，see gate-pillars Shan Yang 單颺iz z
Q llS O U 渠搜 ，124 Shang Zhitan 商志 I f ，
171
shangd'i 上帝，
seeThearch on H igh
Ramparts, 299，30 1 Shanglin 上林, 265. See also im perial park
Rang 穰，137 Shang shu 尚書, see Book o fD ocum ents
Rhapsody on C ontem plating the M ysterious, 299 Shan h a ijin g 山海經，see Classics o fM ountains and Seas
Rhapsody on Talks about Greatness, 45 Shaoxing 紹興， 56 ,22i
Rhapsody on the M ighty M an, 169,213,3961162 Shaughnessy, Edward, 10 ，244
Rhapsody on the W estern C apital, 162,266 she huangdi 攝皇帝， 说 Regenting Em peror
Record o fA rtificers，47, 66 shen 參，see lunar lodge Triad
Record o fR ites, 32，
8 0 ,87，
1B2. See also E lder D a is Record sheng headgear 勝，
10 9 ,2 14 -16 ,218，231 ，
o fR ites shenm ing ta i 神明臺，^ T e rra ce for Deities
Record o f Ten C ontinents^ 218 Shenmu 神 木 , 228， 289，293 .
Record o fY in and Yang in the B rig h t H all, 87，38811153 ^hen y ijin g 神異經，see Classic o fS p irits and O ddities
Records o fSearching the Supernatural，36 1 sheti 攝提，see Assistant Conductors
Records o fthe G rand H istorian, 18 ，336 Shi Shen 石申， 338,341
Red Bird, 198， 236， 238，
261，
306 ，
308-9 ，
317,361. See also shi device 式盤， 47,49
cardinal emblems S h iji 史§己 ，see Records o fth e G rand H istorian
red dragon, 12 1，130 S h ijin g 詩經，see Book o f Odes ,
Regenting Emperor, 3 1-3 3 , 6 1，10 1 Shimen 石門，see Stone Gate -
renshuyuan 仁恕掾，see M erciful Warden Shiqi Yao 侍其縣，258
reproduction, 290 Shiyuan 柿園，252
 Sliizhaishan 石褰山，162 Stone Gate, 134 ，
137-38,140-43
Shi zhou j i 十洲自己，see Record o fTen C ontinents Su Song 蘇領（ 1020-iio i)’ 338，
34i
shouge " 守閣吏，see functionary guarding the office suburban ritual, 83—84
gates • suburban sacrifice, 84-85
Shu Sun 叔踩， 9i Sui H ong 睡弘， 28—30
Shuanggudui 雙古堆，47 S u id e 綏 德 ，
225,228,261,263,293,40011164
Shuihudi 睡虎地， 334，336 Suining 睢寧，126
Shun 舜， 30-31,33-35, i6 8 ,186，236 Summers’ D avid, 12
si |H, see Four Horses summer solstice, 5 0 ,246，312
signification, 7， 9，43,116 -17, x3 2 ,297， 360，367 Sum m oning the Soul, 182-83, T86,3971190
Signs o fthe M andate, 105 ， 10 6 ，10 9 ，236 sun, 6 -7 ,15，
56, 236，277-79, 293-95,299; astronomy, 80，
S ilk C harts o fL unar M ovem ents^ 3 11 305， 312-13,36 1-6 2; by Qu Yuan, 149 ，
167， 235; on ban­
Sim a Q ian 司 馬 遷 (ca. 145—ca. 86 b ce), 5 ，
21，
23,240,248, ners, 173， 186-87,356; myths of, 186 ，
277,279-81; in
253，
255， 27。 ，281, 3o8， 3:2 ，37 ，334, 343~44- See also murals, 206,259,336,345， 354-55; in carvings, 225,268，
Book o f C elestial O ffices' Records o fthe G rand H istorian 270， 273,360 ， 363; on a sarcophagus, 235, 277,357. See
Sima Xiangru 司 馬 相 如 （
179-117 BCE)，
i69，
213-14,348 also Fu X i; N ii W a; sunbird; Y i
simile，295,343 Sun, Xiaochun, 10 ， 334，338
Sivin, Nathan, 10 ，
39911124,39911135，4051126 Sun Zuoyun 孫作雲， 20。
S i xuan fu 思 、玄赋，see Rhapsody on C ontem plating the sunbird, 281-85
M ysterious sunspot, 277
social communication, 9 ,92，
297,360 supreme deity，
2 -3,5-9 ，
83，153,308，361
Sofukawa H iroshi 曾布川寬， i88 Surrounding M oat, 27-29,59，61
solar eclipse, 29，235 sweet dew, 93-97，99，I01，I24» 130-32,164，360
Song Yu 宋玉， 43，182. See also Rhapsody on Talks about
Greatness tacit knowledge, 7，
9，70 ，
297,359-60，367
Song o fPacing the H eavensy 341 Taesongri 德興里，x jo
Song shu 宋書. See Standard H istory o fthe L iu Song taichu li 太初麼，see Grand Inception system
Son o f Heaven ，
2 ,31-30 ,8 9 -9 0 ,104 ，
166; and Bright H alls, ta ip in g jin g 太 平 良 see Classic o fPeace
10 ，
22,33， 36-37， 53，
78 ,80，
85-86,248，
257,360; in the taishou 太 守 ，see governor
H an, 2 8 ,33,151,173,311 Taiwei Enclosure 太微垣， 299-300
soul, 85，171， 182—83,186—87，
204-5 Tai xuan 太玄， see G rand M ystery, the
Sou shen j i 搜神記，see Records o fSearching the Super­ taixue 太學，see Im perial Academ y
natural Taiye Pond 太液池，
38, i6 i
Southern Dipper, 323,361—62. See also lunar lodge D ipper ta iy i 太 一 , see Grand Unity
Southern Palace, 238，
308，36 1 Tang 湯， i68
Spherical Heaven, 50 ,302 ，
313 ，
315-16,162 Tang Lan 唐藺，17 1
Spiritual Terrace, 61 Tang-Luo Route 儻路道，136
Spring and A utum n A nnals、28-29,91-92 Technical University in X i’an, 349
spring equinox, 312，338 Terrace for Deities, 38，16 1
square Earth, 45， 50 -5 1,71， 8 0 ,187，
235,256，289 ' Terrace Leading to Heaven, 155,157-60
Standard H istory o fthe Form er H an, xxi, 84,87 Terrace o f Cypress Beam s, 265
Standard H istory o fthe L iu Song, 109 text and image, 132,147,170,359
star catalogue, 338 ,34 1，343 ‘ Ihearch on H igh, 17，20， 22，166-67 ，
I^9,19 8 ,205，
210 ，214
Stephenson, Richard, 335 Three Excellencies, 96,123，129
Stepped Road, 299-300 three-legged bird, 2 14 ,217，293
Three Sovereigns, 286 Vibia, 14
tia n 天，i visibility, 140 ，
14 3，367
T ian W ang 天亡， i8 ，38 1117 visitation, 93，106
tia n d i 天帝,财H eavenly Thearch visual program, 12 ，
15 ，
111,18 2 ,191，
2 0 0 -1，
204,221，
228,231,
tiangong 天 官 ，see heavenly palace, celestial palace 2 " ’ 345，
356- 57’ 359
tiangong 天公，see H eavenly Lord
T ian guan shu 天官書，see Book o f C elestial Offices w ai g u i 夕卜規，see outer circle
tianhan 天 '襄 ，see Heavenly River W ang, A ihe, 10 ，12 1
tianhe 天 河 ，see Heavenly River W ang Bo 王柏，105
tianhuang 天 潢 ，see Celestial Pond W ang Chong 王充(27-ca. 100)，
106 ，
121，
128’ 130 ，
261,
T ia n jin g dao bet 天井道碑，see M em orial to the T ia n jin g 287,334
Passage W ang H ui 王陣，263
Tianjing Passage, 137 W ang Liang 王良， 299^300
tianm en 天門， gate o f Heaven W ang M an g 王 莽 (45 bce- 23 ce), 4 9 ,8 4 ,136 ，
3 1 1 ,322 ，
Hemming 天侖，see m andate o f Heaven 3841165; usurpation, 30 -34 ,122，3831150; and Bright
tia n ru i 天 瑞 ，see heavenly auspicious omen H all, 34-^6,41，53-54 ，59-61， 66，7 0 -7 1,81，
85; and
tianshi 天 室 ，似 Heavenly Cham ber cardinal emblems, 236, 258-59,263,322. See also
tia n tin g 天廷，see heavenly court A cting Emperor; D uke for Pacifying the H an;
tianw en 天 文 ，see pattern o f Heaven omens: W ang M ang; Regenting Em peror; Signs o f
T ian w en 天問，see H eavenly Q uestions the M andate
tianyuan 天 氣 see Celestial Park W ang Qiao 王喬， i68
tia n zh u 天柱, see pillar to Heaven W ang Sheng 王升， 14 0 -4 1，143
tia n zi see Son o f Heaven W ang Shiren 王世仁，61-63 ，
7^
tiger-shaped fowl, 116 W ang Xim ing 王希明，34 1
T L V mirror, 54，
56，
58-60,150-51,256-57 W ang Zang 王減，27
toad, 6，186，2 1 广18 ,225，
277> 281-82’ 290，
293’ 345-350,354 W ang, Zhongshu, 11
tongtian ta i 通天臺，see Terrace Leading to Heaven W ang Zhui 王追， 99，130,3901132
Tower o f Jinggan, 162 W angdu 望都’ in -14 ，132
Tower o f Longevity, 155，
158-59 watchtower, 157-59,228, 231，293
Tower o f W ind and Cinnamon, 155 W atson, W illiam , 203
Treatise on A strology in the K aiyuan R eign, 335 W eaving M aid, 7,38， 266，
268,270，
273-74 ,277，357
Treatise on A uspicious Signs and Omens，109 w ei 尾，see lunar lodge Tail
Treatise on the B rig h t H a ll and M onthly Observances, 66 W eilii 微閭，205
Treatise on the F ive Phases, 10 6 ，no W ei River 渭河， 134 ，137
Triple Concordance, 25-26 ， 2 9 ^ 0 ,3 4 ,67，
69,310 W ei Xiang 魏相，87
tripod, 8，92-94 ，
109 ，152-54,203 . W eiyang Palace 未央宫，
32 ，
38,95, i6 i, 225
try square, 51，
288-90 W elcoming the Years, 164
tuchen 圖讖， j 從prognostication chart Wen Yiduo 聞一多，247
turtle， 4 3,47，
94，116 ，
238,248-50,253， 255,277，
322，363 W enchang 文昌，236
tu w ei 圖,緯，see prognostication chart Western Palace, 238，
248,308,361
Twinkling Indicator, 299，30 1 Western Passage, 92，99’ 116 -17 ，m ’ I24—25，
128 ,130 ，
132 ，
134 ，
137，147,359-60,367. See also H ym n o fthe Western
underworld, 170 ，
175，
18 3，39811106 Passage
unicorn, 91—94，
97，
106 ，
10 9 ,114 ，
248-49，294 W hip, 299-300
 white deer, 10 1,122-25,128 ,130 -31 x in 心，see lunar lodge H eart
white tiger, 109 ，123，151 Xinfan 新繁， 282, 285, 293
W hite T iger (cardinal emblem), 19 8 ,236，
238，
248，
258- xin g M.ySee lunar lodge Star
59，
289, 293,308-9 ，
317,322,361，
363,4011110. See also xin g 邢，see punishment
cardinal emblems Xingjing 荥經， 22i, 225,356
W hite T iger H all 白虎觀，
53，
67, io 6 ,116 ，360 Xingping 興平，255
W ind Lord’ 328-29 Xinjin 新津, 281
winter solstice, 50 ，
153-54 , 245,312 Xinye 新野，266
W olf, 299-300 X in y i xia n g fa yao 新儀象法要，see E ssentials o fthe
worshiping Earth, 47,49,84,94-95 M ethod fo r the N ew A rm illa ry Sphere and C elestial
worshiping Heaven, 18， 47， 49,53， 77，84—86，
95，122 Globe
W u, Hung, 12, 61，107，n o, 18 2,203，218 Xinzheng 新鄭，206
W uX ian 巫咸， 168 ，
338，34 1 Xiongnu 匈奴， 83，105
w ude 五 德 ，see Five Virtues Xishuipo 西水坡，249
W u fam ily shrines 武氏祠， 4，
5，no, 363. See also Wu xiu 宿，see lunar lodge
Liang shrine xiw angm u 西王母，see M other Queen o f the West
W ugong 武功，
3 1，
53-54, io i, 104 X ixia see W estern Passage
W u Liang shrine 武梁祠， 12 ,10 7 -11 ，
116 ’ 118 ，
123-24 ,126 ， X ixia song 西狭領，see H ym n o fthe W estern Passage
132，147，
215,290 xuanpu 玄圃， 挪H anging Garden
w unii 婺女，see Serving M aid xuantang 玄堂， 撕Dark H all
W uqiu Shouwang 吾丘壽王， 93-94,153 xuanw u 玄 武 ，see D ark W arrior
Wushan 巫山, 198， 210—12 ，
2i8 ，261 X uan xiang sh i 玄象詩，see Poem o fthe O ccult Im ages
w uxing see Five Phases Xuan Yuan 軒辕，
168. See also Yellow Thearch
W uxing zh i 五行志，see Treatise on the F ive Phases Xuyi 吁暗，292
Wuyue 吳越，315 Xuzhou 徐州，268

X i Zezong 席澤宗， 3 11，4051117 Yang B i 楊弼，

14 0 -4 1
Xiabian 下辨， 99， 135， 137-^8,143-44,392 m i9 Yang Hongxun 楊鴻勛, 6i，64—66，
68-69 ，
7I_77> 165
X ia H eliang 夏贺良， 30，32 Yang H uai 楊淮, 140
x ia ji 拾祭, see collective sacrifices Yang M engwen 楊孟文， 140-41
X i’an 西安， 15，37， 240-41， 303， 316-28, passim , yang jiu 羊酒，see goat wine
-,
343 54 359)363 yangniao 陽鳥，see sunbird
X ia N ai 夏氣 336 Yangshao culture 仰 韶 文 化 (ca. 5000-2750 b ce), 249
xianchi 咸池， 撕 Harmonious Pond Yang X io n g 揚 雄 (53 b ce -i8 ce), 155,160 ，
312 ,36 1-6 2 ，
xiang ^ , see counselor-delegate 3861199，409116
X iang Yu 項羽（ 232-202 bce), 136 ，3 11 Yao 堯， 3〇i i ，
33，i6 8 ,186
X ia n g hejin g 相鶴經，see Classic o fthe Physiognom y o f Yao dian 胃:ft , see Canon ofYao
Cranes yellow dragon, 9 3,10 1，
105 ，
117 -2 2 ,12 4 —25，13 1
xia n lin g 縣令, see magistrate Yellow Spring, 204
Xianyang 咸陽，7 2 ,76，
136-37,255,310 -n Yellow Thearch, 23， 34， 83-84,120 ，123,186’ 236， 361-63;
Xiao Bing 肖兵，i86 and celestial ascent, 27,153-54,164， 16 7-6 8 ,192， 258.
Xichang 西昌，218 See also Xuan Yuan
Xihua 西華，
207，226，228 . Y i 羿， 213， V7
X ijin g fu 西 京 赋 ，see Rhapsody on the Western Capital y t 翼，see lunar lodge W ing
Y ijin g 易經, see Book o f Changes Zhang Chun 張純，41
Y i U 儀禮，see E tiq u ette and R ites Zhang E r張耳， 3 11，4051118
Y i’nan 诉南，326 Zhang H eng 張衡(78-139), 132，
277,285，
299,302 ，
350;
^ndyang, 3 ，
80，
84, 87，
277, 285，
287，
289-290, 297,355, painting, 1,333,33^
361-62 zhang 張，see lunar lodge Stretch
yingnian 迎年, see W elcom ing the Years Zhao Shuang 趙爽，312
Y in gzh ou 瀛洲 ，
i6 i，276 Zhao W an 趙綰，27
Yingzhuang 英庄, 281 Zhao hun 招魂，see Sum m oning the Soul
Yinwan 尹灣 ， 55- 56 zhaoyao 招搖， Twinkling Indicator
y i yan shou guan 益延壽觀，see Tower o f Longevity zhen see lunar lodge Chariot Baseboard
Yong 雍， 32，83, 93,10 1 Zheng H ong 鄭弘(fi. 72—87)， 123’ 125
Yongcheng 永城，252 Zheng Xuan 鄭玄（ 127-200) ，
87，38811174
Yongning Temple 永寧寺，162 Zhenxiang bianguai 摘祥變怪，see Good Omens and
Yu 禹， 3 o ii，67,93，124 ，
153, i68 ，
310 ，36 1 A bnorm al Things
Y u X u 虞翔， 137-38 Zhenzhichang 針織廠，363
Y ii, Ying-shih 182，204 zh i 芝，see fungus, mushroom o f im m ortality
Yuan Y i 兀乂（d. 526), 266 zh in u 織女，see W eaving M aid
Yuan you 遠遊，see F a r-o ffJourney zhonggong 中宮， 俯 Central Palace
yueling 月令，see monthly observances zhong g u i 中規，see middle circle
Yueshang 越裳，31 Zhou bi 周髀，see "Zhou Gnomon
Yuexing botu 月行帛圖，see S ilk C harts o fL unar M ove­ Zhou G nomon, 5 0 -53,312，359
m ents Zhou li 周禮，see Zhou R ites
yugui 舆鬼， 撕ghost in a vehicle Zhou R iteSj 47,49,66
襄 , see Cloudy river
yunhan 雲 、 z i 紫，see lunar lodge Tuft
Zidanku 子彈庫， 177-79,187
zai-heng 宰衡， 31-^2 Zige tuw en 紫閣圖文，
see C harts and T exts o fthe P urple
災異, see visitation, prodigy
za iy i Palace
Zhai Fan 由in 翟方進,97,3901126 Ziw u Route 子午道，136
Zhai Y i 翟義，33 zongzhang see H all o f General Institution
Zhang Bosheng 張伯升， 173,177 Zou Yan 鄒 衍 （
ca. 305-ca. 240 b c e ) , 23
 H arvard E ast Asian Monographs
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109. Ralph W illiam Huenemann, The D ragon and the Iron H orse: The Economics o fR ailroads in CM na, 1876—1937
*110, Benjamin A . Elm an, From 'Philosophy to Philology: In tellectu a l and SocialAspects o f Change in L a te Im perial
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*120. Robert Borgen, Sugaw ara no M ichizane and the E arly H eian C ourt
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156. George J. Tanabe, Jr., M yoe the D ream keeper: Fantasy and K nowledge in K am akura Buddhism
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162. W illiam Johnston, The M odern Epidem ic: H istory o f Tuberculosis in Japan
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164. Irm ela H ijiya- Kirschnereit, R itu a ls o fSelf-R evelation: Shisbdsetsu as L iterary Genre and Socio-C ultural
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165. Jam es C . Baxter, The M eiji U nification Through the Lens o fIshikaw a Prefecture
166. Thomas R . H . Havens, A rchitects o fA ffluence: The Tsutsum i F am ily and the Seibu-Saison E nterprises in
T w entieth-C entury Japan
167. Anthony Hood Chambers, The Secret W indow : Id ea l Worlds in TanizakVs F iction
168. Steven J. Ericson, The Sound o fthe W histle: R ailroads and the State in M eijiJapan
169. Andrew Edmund Goble, K enm u: G o-D aigos R evolution
170. Denise Potrzeba Lett, In P ursuit o fStatus: The M aking o fSouth K oreas uN ew u Urban M iddle Class
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178. John Solt，Shredding the Tapestry o fM eaning: The Poetry and Poetics ofK itasono K atue (1902—1978)
179. Edward Vv2iXXyJapans P rotoindm trial E lite: The Economic Foundations o fth e Gono
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189. Susan Daruvala, Zhou Zuoren and an A ltern a tive Chinese Response to M odernity
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Chinese F iction
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203 . Robert S. Ross and Jian g Changbin ， eds., R e-exam ining the C old War: U .S.-C hina D iplom acy, 1954—1973
204 . Guanhua W ang, In Search o fJustice: The 1905-1906 Chinese A nti-A m erican Boycott
205 . David Schaberg,^ P atterned Past: Form and Thought in E arly Chinese H istoriography
206. Christine Yano, Tears o fLonging: N ostalgia and the N ation in Japanese Popular Song
207 . M ilena Dolezelova-Velingerova and O ldrich Krai, with Graham Sanders, eds., The A ppropriation o f C ultural
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208 . Robert N . Huey, The M aking o f'S h in ko kin sh ii
209. Lee Butler, Em peror and Aristocracy in Japan, 146J—1680: R esilience and R enew al
210. Suzanne Ogden, In klin g s o fDemocracy in C hina
211 . Kenneth J. RuofF, The People’s Em peror: Democracy and the Japanese Monarchy^ 1^4^—ig%
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214. Rebecca E . Karl and Peter Zarrow, eds” R eth in kin g the i8g8 Reform Period: P olitical and C ultural Change in
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215 . Kevin O’Rourke，The Book o fKorean Shijo
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219 . Daqing Yang, Technology o fE m pire: Telecom m unications andJapanese E xpansionism in A sia, 1883—1945
220 . Qianshen Bai, Fu Shan's World: The Transform ation o f Chinese C alligraphy in the Seventeenth C entury
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222 . Rania Huntington, A lien K ind: Foxes and L ate Im perial Chinese N arrative
223. Jordan Sand, H ouse and H ome in M odern Japan: A rchitecture, D om estic Space、and Bourgeois C ulture, i88o—ip jo
224. Karl Gerth, C hina M ade: Consum er C ulture and the C reation o fthe N ation
225. Xiaoshan Yang, M etam orphosis o fthe P rivate Sphere: Gardens and Objects in Tang-Song Poetry
226. Barbara M ittler,^ N ew spaperfo r C hina? Power, Id en tity’ and Change in Shanghai's N ew s M edia, 1872—1912
2 2 1 . Joyce A . M adancy，The Troublesome Legacy o f Com m issioner L in : The O pium Trade and O pium Suppression in
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228 . John M akeham, Transm itters and Creators: Chinese Com m entators and Com m entaries on the A nalects
229 . Elisabeth Koll, From C otton M ill to Business E m pire: The Emergence ofR egional E nterprises in M odern C hina
230 . Emma Teng, Taiw an's Im agined Geography: Chinese C olonial T ravel W riting and Pictures, i6 8 j-i8 p j
231 . W ilt Idema and Beata Grant, The R ed Brush: W riting Women o fIm perial C hina
232 . E ric C . Rath, The E thos ofN oh: A ctors and Their A rt
233. Elizabeth Rem ick, B uilding Local States: C hina D uring the Republican and Post-M ao Eras
234. Lynn Struve, ed., The Q ing Form ation in W orld-H istorical Tim e
235. D . M ax M oerman, L ocalizing Paradise: Kum ano P ilgrim age and the R eligious Landscape o fPrem odern Japan
236. Antonia Finnane, Speaking ofY angzhou:A Chinese C ity, 1550-1850
237. Brian Platt, B urning and B uilding: Schooling and State Form ation in Japan, 1750—1890
238 . G ail Bernstein, Andrew Gordon, and Kate W ildm an Nakai, eds., Public spheres, P rivate L ives in M odern
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240 . Stephen Dodd, W riting Home: R epresentations o fthe N a tive Place in M odern Japanese L iterature
241 . David Anthony Bello, O pium and the L im its o fE m pire: D rug P rohibition in the Chinese Interior, 1729-1850
242 . Hosea H irata, D iscourses o f Seduction: H istory, E v il, Desire) and M odern Japanese L iterature
243 . Kyung M oon Hwang, Beyond B irth : Social Status in the Emergence o fM odern Korea
244 . Brian R . D ott, Id en tity R eflections: Pilgrim ages to M ount Tai in L ate Im perial C hina
245 . M ark M cNally, P roving the Way: C onflict and Practice in the H istory o fJapanese N a tivism
246 . Yongping W u, A P olitical E xplanation o fEconomic G row th: State S u rviva l, Bureaucratic P olitics, and P rivate
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247. Kyu Hyun Kim, The A ge o f Visions and A rgum ents: P arliam entarianism and the N a tio n a l Public Sphere in E arly
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248. Z\d Ben-D or Benite, The D ao ofM uham m ad: A C ultural H istory o fM uslim s in L ate Im perial C hina
249. David Der-wei W ang and Shang W ei, eds., D ynastic C risis and C ultural Innovation: From the L ate M in g to the
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250. W ilt L . Idema, W ai-yee L i, and Ellen W idmer, eds., Traum a and Transcendence in E arly Q ing L iterature
251 . Barbara M olony and Kathleen Uno, eds., G endering M odern Japanese H istory
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253 . W ai-yee L i, The R eadability o fthe P ast in E arly Chinese H istoriography
254 . W illiam C . Kirby, Robert S. Ross, and Gong L i, eds., N orm alization o fU .S .-C h in a R elations:A n In tern a tio n a l
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255 . Ellen Gardner Nakamura, P ractical P ursuits: Takano Chdei, Takahashi K eisaku, and Western M edicine in
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256 . Jonathan W . Best, A H istory o fthe E arly Korean K ingdom ofPaekchey together w ith an annotated translation o f
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258. Richard B elsl^, Localities a t the C enter: N a tive Place, Space、and Pow er in L ate Im perial B eijing
259. Zw ia Lipkin, u Useless to the S tate”: “Social Problem s^ and Social E ngineering in N a tio n a list N anjing, 1927—1937
260. W illiam O. Gardner, A d vertisin g Tower:Japanese M odernism and M odernity in the 1920s
261. Stephen Owen, The M aking o fE arly Chinese C lassical Poetry
262. M artin J. Powers, P attern and Person: O rnam ent Society、and S e lfin C lassical C hina
263. Anna M . Shields, C rafting a Collection: The C ultural C ontexts and Poetic Practice o fthe H uajian ji 花間集
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264 . Stephen Owen, The L a te Tang: Chinese Poetry o fthe M id -N in th C entury (827-860)
265 . Sara L . Friedm an, In tim a te P olitics: M arriage^ the M arket，and State Power in Southeastern C hina
266 . Patricia Buckley Ebrey and M aggie Bickford, Em peror H uizong and L ate N orthern Song C hina: The P olitics o f
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267 . Sophie Volpp, W orldly Stage: Theatricality in Seventeenth-C entury C hina
268 . Ellen W idm er, The B eauty and the Book: Women a n d F iction in N ineteenth-C entury C hina
269. Steven B. M iles，The Sea ofL earning: M o b ility and Id en tity in N ineteenth-C entury G uangzhou
270. Lin M an-houng, C hina Upside D ow n: Currency, Society, and IdeologieSy 1808—1856
271 .Ronald Egan, The Problem o fB eauty: A esthetic Thought and P ursuits in N orthern Song D ynasty C hina
272 .M ark Halperin, O ut o fthe C loister: L ite ra ti Perspectives on Buddhism in Sung C hina 、p6o-i2yp
273. Helen Dunstan, State or M erchant^ P olitical Econom y and P olitical Process in IJ40S C hina
274. Sabina Knight, The H eart o fT im e: M oralAgency in T w entieth-C entury Chinese F iction
275 . Tim othy J. Van Compernolle, The Uses o fM em ory: The C ritique o fM odernity in the F iction ofH iguchi Ichiyo
276 . Paul Rouzer,^? N ew P ractical P rim er o fL iterary Chinese
211 . Jonathan Zwicker, Practices o fthe Sentim ental Im agination: M elodram a, the N ovel, and the Social Im aginary in
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278 . Franziska Seraphim, War M em ory and Social P olitics in Japan, 1945—2005
279 .Adam L_ Kern, M angafrom the F loating World: Comicbook C ulture and the Kibyoshi o fE do Japan
280 .Cynthia J. Brokaw, Commerce in C ulture: The Sibao Book Trade in the Q ing and R epublican Periods
281. Eugene Y . Park, B etw een D ream s and R eality: The M ilita ry E xam ination in L ate Choson Korea、1600—1894
282. N am -lin Hur, D eath and Social O rder in Tokugawa Japan: Buddhism , A n ti-C h ristia n ity^ and the Danka System
283 . Patricia M . Thornton, D isciplining the State: V irtue, Violence, and State-M aking in M odern C hina
284 . Vincent Goossaert, The Taoists o fPeking ，1800-1949:A Social H istory o f Urban Clerics
285 . Peter Nickerson, Taoism ，Bureaucracy, and Popular R eligion in E arly M edieval C hina
286 . Charo B. D ’Etcheverry，L ove A fter The Tale o f G enji; R ew ritin g the W orld o fthe Shining P rince
287 . M ichael G . Chang, ^ C ourt on Horseback: Im perial Touring £sf the C onstruction o f Q ing R ules i6 8 o ~ iy8 j
288 . Carol Richmond Tsang, War and F aith: Ikko Ikki in L a te M urom achiJapan
289 . H ilde D e W eerdt, C om petition over C ontent: N egotiating Standardsfo r the C iv il Service E xam inations in
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290 . Eve Zimm erman, O ut o fthe A lleyw ay: N akagam i K enji and the Poetics o f O utcaste F iction
291 . Robert Culp, A rticu la tin g C itizenship: C ivic E ducation and S tu d en t P olitics in Southeastern C hina, ipi2~ ip4o
292 .Richard J. Smethurst, From Foot Soldier to Finance M inister: Takahashi Korekiyo, Japans Keynes
293. John E . Herman, t h e Clouds and M ist: C hina's C olonization o f G uizhou, n o o -rjo o
294. Tomoko Shiroyamaj C hina D uring the G reat D epression: M arket^ State, and the World Economy^ ig2p—ig jj
295. Kirk W. Larsen, T radition，Treaties and Trade: Q ing Im perialism and Choson Korea、i8 ^o -xg io
296 . G regory Golley, W hen O ur Eyes N o Longer See: R ealism ，Science, and Ecology in Japanese L itera ry M odernism
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298 . Rebecca Suter, TheJapanization ofM odernity: M urakam i H aruki betw een Japan and the U nited States
299 . Yuma Totani, The Tokyo War Crim es T rial: The P ursuit o fJustice in the Wake o f W orld War I I
300. Linda Isako Angst, In a D ark Tim e: M em ory、C om m unity，and Gendered N ationalism in P ostw ar O kinaw a
301. David M . Robinson, ed., Culture) C ourtiers, and C om petition: The M ing C ourt (1368-1644)
302. Calvin Chen, Some Assem bly R equired: Works C om m unity and P olitics in C hinas R u ra l E nterprises
303. Sem Vermeers ch, The Pow er o fthe Buddhas: The P olitics ofB uddhism D uring the Koryo D ynasty (918-1392)
304 . T in a Lu, A ccidental Incest, F ilia l C annibalism , and O ther Peculiar Encounters in L ate Im perial Chinese L iterature
305 .Chang W oei Ong, M en o fL etters W ithin the Passes: G uanzhong L ite ra ti in Chinese H istory, g o y -ig n
306. W endy Swartz, R eading Tao Yuanm ing: S h iftin g Paradigm s o fH istorical Reception (4 2 ^1 9 0 0 )
307. Peter K. Bol, N eo-C onfucianism in H istory
308. Carlos Rojas, The N aked G aze: R eflections on Chinese M odernity
309. Kelly H . Chong, D eliverance and Subm ission: E vangelical Women and the N egotiation o fP atriarchy in South
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310. Rachel D iN itto, Uchida H yakken: A C ritique o fM odernity and M ilita rism in P rew arJapan
311. Jeffrey Snyder-Reinke，D ry Spells: State R ainm aking and Local Governance in L ate Im perial C hina
312. Jay Dautcher, D ow n a N arrow Road: Id en tity and M asculinity in a U yghur C om m unity in X in jia n g C hina
313. Xun Liu, D aoist M odern: Innovation，L ay Practicey and the C om m unity o fInner Alchem y in R epublican Shanghai
314. Jacob Eyferth, E a tin g R ice fro m Bamboo Roots: The Social H istory o fa C om m unity o fH andicraft Paperm akers in
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315 . David Johnson, Spectacle and Sacrifice: The R itu a l Foundations o f Village L ife in N orth C hina
316 . Jam es Robson, Pomer o fPlace: The R eligious Landscape o fth e Southern Sacred Peak {N anyue 南嶽）in M edieval
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317 . L ori W att, W hen E m pire Comes H ome: R epatriation and R eintegration in P ostw arJapan
318 . Jam es Dorsey, C ritica lA esthetics: Kobayashi H ideo, M odernity, and W artim e Japan
319. Christopher Bolton, Sublim e Voices: The F ictional Science and Scientific F iction o fA be Kobo
320. Si-yen Fei, N egotiating Urban Space: U rbanization and L ate M in g N anjing
321. Christopher Gerteis, G ender Struggles: W age-Earning Women and M ale-D om inated U nions in Postw arJapan
322. Rebecca Nedostup, Superstitious Regim es: R eligion and the P olitics o f Chinese M odernity
323. Lucien Bianco, W retched Rebels: R u ra l D isturbances on the E ve o fthe Chinese R evolution
324. Cathryn H . Clayton, Sovereignty a t the Edge: M acau and the Q uestion o f Cbineseness
325. M icah S. M uscolino, F ishing Wars and E nvironm ental Change in L ate Im perial and M odern C hina
326. Robert I. Hellyer, D efining Engagem ent:Japan and G lobal C ontexts, iy^o-1868
327 . Robert Ashm ore, The Transport ofR eading: T ext and U nderstanding in the W orld o fTao Q ian (365-427)
328 . M ark A . Jones, C hildren as Treasures: C hildhood and the M iddle Class in E arly T w entieth C entury Japan
329. M iryam Sas, E xperim entalA rts in Postw arJapan: M om ents ofE ncounter, Engagement^ and Im agined R eturn
330. H . M ack Horton, Traversing the F rontier: The M anyoshu A ccount o fa Japanese M ission to S illa in
331. Dennis J. Frost, Seeing Stars: Sports C elebrity，Id en tity、and Body C ulture in M odem Japan
332. M arnie S. Anderson, A Place in Public: Womens R ights in M eijiJapan
333. Peter M auch, Sailor D iplom at: N om ura K ichisaburd and the Japanese-Am erican War
334. Ethan Isaac Segal, Coins，Trade, and the State: Economic G row th in E arly M edievalJapan
335. David B. Lurie, Realm s ofL iteracy: E arly Japan and the H istory o f W riting
336 . Lillian Lan-ying Tseng, P icturing H eaven in E arly C hina