Zhou dynasty

The Zhou dynasty (周朝) replaced the Shang around 1046 BCE and lasted until 256 BCE: some 790 years, the longest span of any Chinese dynasty. The date 1046 is the one put forward by the Xia–Shang–Zhou Chronology Project and used by Britannica, but it is not certain. Tradition placed the conquest in 1122 BCE, the historian Dong Zuobin in 1111, and the scholars David Nivison and Edward Shaughnessy in 1045.

Historians split this long period in two, according to where the capital stood:

• the Western Zhou (西周), whose capital, Haojing (镐京), lay near modern Xi'an;

• the Eastern Zhou (东周), after the court moved to Luoyi (洛邑), today's Luoyang, in 770 BCE.

The Eastern Zhou is itself divided into two periods, the Spring and Autumn (春秋) and the Warring States (战国). The boundaries of all these periods vary from one author to another: the table gives the dates most often used in China. The Warring States even outlast the dynasty: the last Zhou king disappeared in 256, but the period only ended in 221 BCE, when the state of Qin unified China.

Over these eight centuries the king's real power kept shrinking, while China changed deeply: a new idea of legitimacy, the spread of iron, a flowering of philosophy.

After King Wu (武王) defeated the last Shang king, the young dynasty went through a crisis. Wu died soon after the conquest, leaving a young heir, King Cheng. Wu's brother, the Duke of Zhou (周公), ruled as regent. Zhou princes stationed in the east rose against him with Shang loyalists, a revolt known as the Rebellion of the Three Guards (三监之乱). The duke crushed it and then pushed Zhou rule further east.

To hold this vast territory, the Zhou handed out fiefs to the king's kinsmen and to generals, who ruled in his name: the fengjian (封建) system. And to justify their power they put forward an idea that would last, the Mandate of Heaven (天命, literally "Heaven's command").

According to this doctrine, Heaven (天) grants the right to rule to a virtuous king, the "Son of Heaven" (天子). The last Shang kings, the Zhou said, had become cruel and corrupt, so Heaven took its mandate from them and gave it to the Zhou, just as the Shang had received it when the Xia lost it. But the argument cuts both ways: a dynasty that rules badly can lose the mandate in turn. The Classic of Poetry (诗经), the oldest surviving collection of Chinese poetry, puts it in four characters in the ode "Wen Wang" (文王): "Heaven's mandate is not constant" (天命靡常).

For centuries the idea was used to justify changes of dynasty, down to the Qing. It has been called the Zhou dynasty's most important contribution to Chinese political thought.

Over the generations, the family ties between the king and the lords grew thinner, and the court faced peoples from the north and north-west, such as the Quanrong (犬戎). The crisis broke under King You (周幽王). He set aside his queen, a daughter of the Marquis of Shen, and their son in favour of a favourite, Bao Si (褒姒). The Marquis of Shen then joined forces with the state of Zeng and the Quanrong, who sacked Haojing in 771 BCE and killed the king. Nobles put the disinherited son on the throne as King Ping (周平王), and in 770 he settled in Luoyi, further east: the Eastern Zhou had begun. Duke Xiang of Qin, who had helped escort the court, was rewarded with the old Zhou lands in the west, which he first had to win back from the Rong.

From then on the king ruled only a small domain around Luoyi. He kept his ritual prestige, but power passed to the lords. The first part of the Eastern Zhou takes its name from the Spring and Autumn Annals (《春秋》), the chronicle of the state of Lu from 722 to 481 BCE, which tradition links to Confucius. In China it is usually dated 770–476 BCE, but other end dates are proposed, from 481 to 403.

Hundreds of small states made war and alliances as their interests dictated. The king gave the strongest ruler the title of hegemon (霸), with the duty to protect the court and the weaker states against outside peoples. The first was Duke Huan of Qi (齐桓公, r. 685–643), helped by his minister Guan Zhong. Little by little, the big states swallowed the small ones.

The second part of the Eastern Zhou takes its name from the Zhanguo ce (《战国策》, Record of the Warring States), a collection compiled under the Han by Liu Xiang (刘向). When it begins is debated. The most cited date, 475 BCE, is the one Sima Qian chose; others prefer 453, when three great families of the state of Jin destroyed a fourth and shared out its lands, or 403, when the Zhou king officially recognised their three new states, Han, Zhao and Wei.

Seven major states were left, the "seven powers" (战国七雄): Qin, Qi, Chu, Yan, Han, Zhao and Wei. Their rulers no longer even pretended to be the Zhou king's vassals: in 344 BCE the ruler of Wei took the title of king (王), and the others followed (Chu had used it since the Spring and Autumn period).

War changed scale. The nobles' chariots gave way to mass armies of foot soldiers armed with swords and crossbows, and cavalry appeared. Iron spread: cast-iron objects, mostly farm tools and weapons, appear on archaeological sites from the 5th century BCE, and by the 3rd century some foundries employed more than two hundred workers. The states reformed and centralised themselves to raise ever larger armies. In the end Qin prevailed: in 256 BCE it took the Zhou capital, and the last king, Nan (周赧王), disappeared; in 221 it completed its conquest of the other states.

During the Spring and Autumn period, in 551 BCE, a man named Kong Qiu (孔丘) was born in the state of Lu (鲁), in today's Shandong. This is Confucius: the Jesuits latinised his Chinese name, Kong Fuzi (孔夫子), "Master Kong". He served Lu as an official, then left his state and travelled for years through the others, looking for a ruler who would put his ideas into practice, without finding one. Back in Lu, he taught until his death in 479 BCE.

Confucius saw himself as a transmitter: he wanted to revive the values of the early Zhou, which he felt had been abandoned. He stressed filial piety, respect for ritual and government by virtue. Tradition credits him with writing or editing the great Classics, but modern scholars are cautious: some of those texts are older than he is.

His sayings were collected by his disciples after his death in the Analects (《论语》, Lunyu). One of the most famous answers the disciple Zigong, who asked whether there was a single word that could guide a whole life: "What you would not want done to yourself, do not do to others" (己所不欲，勿施于人, chapter "Wei Linggong").

His ideas gained ground during the Warring States period, carried by followers such as Mencius (孟子, 4th century BCE). After a setback under the Qin, they received official sanction under the Han.

Confucius was not alone. From the late Spring and Autumn period to 221 BCE, so many currents of thought competed that they are called the Hundred Schools (诸子百家). Rival rulers welcomed wandering scholars who advised them on government, war and diplomacy; the state of Qi even kept an academy at Jixia. Among the schools:

• the Legalists (法家), for whom only strict laws, strictly enforced, could keep order; Qin would make this its doctrine;

• the Mohists (墨家), followers of Mozi (墨子, born c. 470 BCE), who preached impartial care for all (兼爱) and condemned offensive war;

• the Daoists (道家), whose thought is attributed to Laozi (老子).

Tradition makes Laozi, personal name Li Er (李耳), an archivist at the Zhou court, an elder contemporary of Confucius and the author of the Daodejing (《道德经》). But whether he existed is debated. Sima Qian, who wrote his biography, was already unsure and recorded other possibilities; today some scholars see him as largely legendary or as a composite figure, while others find a historical teacher called Lao Dan plausible.

The same caution applies to Sunzi (孙子), "Master Sun". According to Sima Qian, Sun Wu (孙武) was a general in the service of King Helü of Wu (吴王阖闾) at the end of the Spring and Autumn period. The Art of War (《孙子兵法》), a treatise in thirteen chapters, is attributed to him, but its oldest parts probably date from at least a century later, and scholars have doubted his existence since the Song. Its best-known line comes from the chapter "Mou gong" (谋攻): "know the enemy and know yourself, and in a hundred battles you will not be in danger" (知彼知己，百战不殆).