Nanchang, 12 Feb (Xinhua) -- Title: Full of Ritual Sense: The "Etiquette Jane" of Haidian for the first time revealed the etiquette of the princes of the Western Han Dynasty
Xinhua News Agency reporter Yuan Huijing
The long history of 5,000 years has made China known as an "ancient civilization and a state of etiquette".
Based on the contents of dozens of bamboo tablets, such as "Wang Hui Drinking Righteousness (Yi)", the research team inferred that it was a ceremonial literature. It is worth mentioning that this is the first time that a document has been found specifically documenting the etiquette of the princes.
Liu He was the grandson of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, and his life was bumpy, and he went through four identities: emperor, king, marquis, and people. Tian Tian, a member of the research team and an associate professor at Peking University's School of Archaeology and Literature, said that the bamboo janes unearthed from Liu He's tomb are very similar to the "Ritual Rites", one of the Thirteen Confucian Classics, from the content and wording, and are temporarily named "Ritual Jane". Since the subjects recorded in the "Liturgical Jane" are mostly "Wang", it is speculated that it is a ceremonial text used by Liu He when he was the King of Changyi in Shandong.
"With the exception of the Rites, early documents documenting the practical etiquette of the Han Dynasty are very rare, and documents documenting the etiquette of the princes are the first to be found." Tian Tian said that from these bamboo briefs, it can be seen that by the time Liu He was the king of Changyi, the etiquette and behavior of the princes had been followed in the written "yi" literature. It can be inferred from this that the middle and late period of Emperor Wu when Liu He was the King of Changyi was a key period in the development of "Yi" literature in the Han Dynasty. The large-scale production of "Yi" literature is a major embodiment of Emperor Wu's political thinking of "abolishing the Qin system and establishing the Han system".
According to Tian Tian, the research team has identified two major types of etiquette in the Changyi Kingdom from the "Liturgical Jane": feasting and drinking ceremonies and sacrificial ceremonies, which help people understand the details of the etiquette of the Changyi Kingdom.
One is the banquet and drinking ceremony, which records the position where the participants of the ceremony stand, the ceremony of entering and retreating, and the order of the presiding officer, such as "the right king will drink righteousness (yi)", "the guests and the official doctors are reversed and restored (bit)", "Li Lejin, that is, 'Please order the instrument to go along'" and so on. It can be seen from the content of the bamboo record that at different stages of the feast and drinking ceremony, the position where the king of Changyi stood was also different, either west or south. There is also a song playing at the banquet, which has been affected today, for example, people like to play music at banquets.
Another type of speculation is related to the ritual of sacrifice presided over by the princes, and the text on the bamboo text has been preliminarily identified as "Shi, Zhu Zanyue: Si Wang... As righteous as (yi)" and other content. Experts speculate based on the existing literature that the "Si Wang" here is the self-designation of the King of Changyi, and "Ruyi (Yi)" means "in line with the provisions of the 'Yi' type of literature". At the end of this type of text, a word count of "865 characters" is found, which is speculated to be a complete, fixed text written and used by the Changyi Guozhu History to guide the actual process of performing rituals.
Experts also said that from the pre-Qin to the middle of the Western Han Dynasty, rongli with "advance and retreat" as the core has always been a very important part of Confucian etiquette; but because of the lack of early literature, there has been a lack of basis for discussion on how to implement specific rituals. The discovery of the "Liturgical Jane" fills this gap.
Infrared scan of "Wang Hui Drinking Yi (Yi)" Zhu Jian. Courtesy of Jiangxi Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology