10 charts to take you to understand the Western Zhou

Bringing you to understand the Western Zhou

Overview of the Western Zhou

The third dynasty of China, the important discovery of the Zhou Yi and the Book of Poetry, and the use of the dynasty to divide into the Western Zhou and the Eastern Zhou.

Famous events:

The Battle of Makino: 1046 BC - 771 BC.

Regency of the Duke of Zhou: duration 275 years, historical capitals Shaanxi and Henan.

Chengkang's Reign: 2 more kings were sent to the throne, founded by Ji Fa (King Wu of Zhou).

Famous people: King Wen of Zhou, King Wu of Zhou, Jiang Ziya, Duke of Zhou.

2. Events of Western Zhou

1. Origin of the Zhou Clan

The ancestor of the Zhou Clan was called Abandonment, also called Houji (稷) (稷, a kind of grain) because he was good at agriculture, and he served as an agricultural official during the period of Yao and Shun, and he was granted a fiefdom in the region of Xunyi, Shaanxi Province, in the period of the Xia Dynasty. In later generations, under the leadership of ancient Gong Xuanfu, the tribe migrated to Zhouyuan (the area of Qishan and Fufeng in present-day Shaanxi), where the Zhou tribe continued to grow and was one of the important western Fang states of the Shang Dynasty.

2. Conflict between Shang and Zhou

After the death of the ancient Duke Xuanfu, his son Jili became the leader of the Zhou tribe. At this time, the Shang dynasty passed the throne to Wending, who was jealous of the Zhou tribe's power, and designed to kill Jili, which resulted in a conflict between the Shang dynasty and the Zhou tribe. After the death of Jili, his son Ji Chang succeeded to the throne as the famous King Wen of Zhou, who bided his time, recruited talents and began to make preparations to conquer the Shang.

3. Moving the capital to Haojing

After the allusion to "Ling Taigong's Fishing", King Wen of the Zhou Dynasty was assisted by Jiang Ziya, who planned the expansion of the Zhou Dynasty a little bit, and after the death of King Wen of the Zhou Dynasty, his son Sifa, that is, the Zhou Dynasty succeeded to the throne, and moved the capital to Haojing, which was closer to the Shang Dynasty, and at this time, the King of the Shang Dynasty was coping with the rebellion of the Eastern Yi Dynasty, and drinking wine and drinking water. Eastern Barbarians' rebellion, while drinking in the forests, and had no desire to deal with the dangers posed by the Zhou clan.

4. Mengjin military

Before the Zhou tribe formally attacked the Shang, King Wu of the Zhou Dynasty did a military exercise to test his appeal in Mengjin (present-day Luoyang, Henan Province), at this time, King Zhou of the Shang Dynasty had lost the hearts of the people due to his despotism, and more than 800 vassals who wanted to attack the Shang came to the exercise together, but because some of the big vassals did not show up, the exercise did not have more actions, but laid the foundation for the formal attack on the Shang afterwards.

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5, the Battle of Makino and the establishment of the Zhou Dynasty

In Mengjin, 2 years after the observation of the soldiers, King Wu of the Zhou Dynasty felt that the time was ripe, in 1046 A.D. formally led the army with the previously assembled vassals together to launch an attack on the Shang Dynasty, the allied army numbered more than 50,000, at this time, the Shang Dynasty, the main army is still in the expedition to the East Barbarians can not return in time, the Shang Dynasty, the King of the Shang Fenghuang can only be temporarily cobbled together an army of slaves and prisoners to deal with the 170,000 strong army. The two armies fought in Muye (an area south of Qi County and north of the Wei River in present-day Henan Province).

At the Battle of Muye, the Shang army, itself dissatisfied with King Zhou of the Shang, turned against the Zhou to help the Zhou reverse the path, and the Zhou thus defeated the Shang with fewer victories and entered the Chaogao, replacing King Zhou of the Shang, and formally establishing the Zhou Dynasty, which ended the more than 500 years of rule by the Shang.

6. The Duke of Zhou

When King Wu of Zhou died shortly after establishing the Zhou Dynasty, he was succeeded by his son, King Cheng of Zhou, who was still very young when he first succeeded the throne, and the Duke of Zhou, the younger brother of King Wu of Zhou, was in charge of the dynasty. During his reign, the Duke of Zhou divided up the feudal lords, pacified the civil strife, built the capital of Luoyi, promoted the rule of morality, and formulated the rules of etiquette and music, and the Duke not only led the Zhou Dynasty to flourish, but also laid down the systems that influenced the future generations.

7. The Rule of Chengkang

After the Duke of Zhou regulated the government for seven years, he returned the throne to King Cheng of Zhou. Based on the foundation laid by the Duke of Zhou, and led by King Cheng of Zhou and his son King Kang of Zhou by example, the Zhou Dynasty created the situation of a prosperous era. "The Rule of Chengkang".

8, Zhaomu era

After the rule of Chengkang, King Zhaowang of Zhou and King Mu of Zhou successively succeeded to the throne, and by the time of King Mu of Zhou, his reign lasted for 55 years, and the prosperity of the Zhou Dynasty reached its peak, but in order to proclaim the strength of the country, King Mu of Zhou often conquered the country, especially the Rongdi tribes of the north-west, which caused a strong counterattack of the Rongdi and sowed a hidden danger for the Zhou Dynasty for the later generations, and it was also since then that the Zhou Dynasty changed its prosperity to decline.

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9. The Age of Decline

After King Mu of the Zhou Dynasty, King ****, King Yi, King Xiao and King Yi successively succeeded to the throne, which was called the Four Kings in the middle period, and the power of the Zhou Dynasty was gradually weakened, and then went through the following three stages.

King Li's tyranny: During his reign, King Li sent people to supervise the public opinion, which caused the phenomenon of "the road to the eye", and finally caused a large-scale mass revolt, so King Li left the country in a hurry despite the throne.

*** and administration: During the 14 years of King Li's escape, the crown prince was unable to succeed to the throne in a legitimate manner, so the Zhou Dynasty was without a leader, and the vassals discussed **** together with the proxy ruler, which is known as "**** and administration".

King Xuan of the Zhou Dynasty: After the death of King Li of the Zhou Dynasty, his son, King Xuan of the Zhou Dynasty, formally succeeded to the throne, and learned from his father's mistakes, and after taking office, the Zhou Dynasty was revitalized.

10, Zhou Yuwang beacon fire play all the vassals

In the Zhou Xuanwang, the Western Zhou ushered in the last monarch of a Zhou Yuwang, the allusion to the "beacon fire play all the vassals" is from him, in order to get the consort to praise to prepare a smile, many times to light up only when the invasion of foreign enemies can be lit beacon, staged a real version of the "Wolf"! "

When the external enemy formally invaded, the vassals no longer helped King Yu of Zhou, so the Western Zhou Dynasty fell, and then King Ping of Zhou succeeded to the throne, the capital was moved to Luoyang, the Eastern Zhou Dynasty began.

Three: Contributions of the Western Zhou (1)

1. Duke of Zhou's Regency

Duke of Zhou assisted King Cheng of Zhou in his regency for seven years, and in addition to calming civil unrest, the following three major initiatives have had a profound impact on the future generations.

Partitioning and patriarchy: In the early days of the Western Zhou Dynasty, the Shang Dynasty still had most of the power of the old clans, and the Zhou Dynasty was not in full control, so the Duke of Zhou introduced the partitioning system and the patriarchy in order to strengthen the rule.

The feudal system was a system in which the Zhou dynasty sent its own representatives or close associates to various places to establish vassal states, each of which ruled on behalf of the Zhou dynasty, not only to help the Zhou dynasty manage the remnants of the Shang dynasty, but also to guard against encroachment by outside tribes! The clan system, on the other hand, established the first-born son as the major clan, and the rest of the sons as the minor clans, which strengthened the stability of the administration and internal cohesion through the blood relationship.

Establishment of the Eastern Capital: At the beginning of the Western Zhou Dynasty, the capital was Haojing (present-day Xi'an, Shaanxi Province), which was located in the west. In order to strengthen the administration, the Duke of Zhou built a second capital at the center of the country, Luoyi (present-day Luoyang, Henan Province), which was the eastern capital, also called Chengzhou, and echoed with Haojing in the west. After the West was destroyed, Luoyi also became the capital of the Eastern Zhou.

Establishment of the Zhou Rites: The Duke of Zhou formulated the Zhou Rites, which covered all aspects of life, from the most important state affairs to the smallest nodes of life, and included the five rites of auspiciousness, auspiciousness, auspiciousness, auspiciousness, auspiciousness, auspiciousness, auspiciousness, auspiciousness, auspiciousness, auspiciousness, auspiciousness, military rites and bad rites. The birth of the Zhou rituals not only promoted the stability and harmony of the internal order of the Zhou Dynasty, but also laid the foundation of Chinese etiquette and civilization.

Four, the Western Zhou contribution (2)

1, industry

In the Western Zhou, compared with the Shang Dynasty, handicrafts are more refined, there are many craftsmen with specialized skills, known as the "Hundred Workers", in these industries, bronze is still one of the most important sectors, the number of excavated bronze in the Western Zhou Dynasty is far more than the Shang Dynasty, and because of the widespread distribution, the number of bronze objects excavated in the Western Zhou Dynasty is far more than the Shang Dynasty, and because of the widespread distribution, the number of bronze objects excavated in the Western Zhou Dynasty is far more than that of the Shang Dynasty. The number of bronzes unearthed in the Western Zhou Dynasty far exceeded that of the Shang Dynasty, and because of its wide distribution, it had begun to gradually take on various local characteristics.

And in pottery, the technology is more mature than that of the Shang Dynasty, and the types are more diversified, covering many aspects of food and drink, mainly in gray pottery. There were also many primitive porcelains unearthed, an important stage in the history of Chinese porcelain.

2, agriculture

In the Western Zhou, with the wider application of copper farming tools, the Western Zhou crop varieties and the number of crops have increased, poetry in the "Song of Zhou - Fung Nian" in the had caught up with: Fung Nian more than millet more than said, there are high government grants, trillions of dollars and zigzag, for the wine for lilac, expressed the Western Zhou harvest scene, the grain more than the wine is sweet and fragrant, the following picture is one of the Western Zhou wine ware.

3, culture

In the Western Zhou Dynasty, the text is mainly used in the Shang Dynasty oracle bone writing, and engraved in bronze on the gold more popular; in the rituals and music, because the weekly rituals are very elaborate, there has been a special officer to manage the rituals and music and choreography, and in the rituals and sacrifices from the Shang Dynasty's superstition of ghosts to the Western Zhou Dynasty began to more ancestor sacrifices to propagate the idea of virtue and governance.

Fifth, the Western Zhou characters

1, Jiang Ziya

Ginger Ziya, ginger name Shang, was honored by the later generations of the Hundred Patriarchs, there is the famous Jiang Taigong fishing, willing to hook the story, according to legend, Jiang Ziya fishing in the river without bait straight hooks to fish, was passing by the king of the Zhou Dynasty found that the king of the Zhou Dynasty, in the time of asking the reason for the up and the king of the Zhou Dynasty found that the ginger Ziya talented, full of tactical strategy, therefore After the death of King Wen, he continued to assist King Wu of Zhou, eventually defeating the Shang Dynasty and founding the Zhou Dynasty.

2, the Duke of Zhou

Duke of Zhou, Ji name Dan, is the brother of King Wu of Zhou, in the "Shangshu Dazhuan" in the evaluation of the Duke of Zhou: one year to save the chaos, two years of the Keshan, three years to trample on the am, four years to build the Houwei, five years to build into the Zhou, six years to make the rituals and music Duke of Zhou was honored by the later generations, known as the "Yuan Sheng", is the role model of Confucius, Confucianism's origin, in the early days of the Zhou Dynasty, the Duke of Zhou was the first to be established. At the beginning of the Zhou Dynasty, not only did he lay the foundation of the Zhou Dynasty through a series of systems, but he also formulated a system of Zhou rituals, which ensured the social order while laying the foundation of ceremonial civilization.

Six, Western Zhou writings

1, "Zhouyi"

Zhouyi is known as the first of the group of scriptures, the source of the road, the author is Ji Chang (Zhou Wen Sanri Wang), according to legend, Ji Chang was imprisoned by King Zhou of the Shang Dynasty according to the Fuxi's predecessor of the eight trigrams deduced the sixty-four hexagrams, six lines of each hexagram, a **** three hundred and eighty-four Ai, and were equipped with whether or not the good and bad trigrams and hexagrams, the contents of the profound and sophisticated!

At that time in ancient times because of the backwardness of science, people will be more based on divination to predict the future direction or things lucky or bad, and Zhou Yi is precisely the ancient people summarize things behind the law of the books, the later generations of the various fields have a very profound impact.

2. The Book of Poetry

The Book of Poetry, one of the Five Classics, is an early collection of ancient Chinese poetry, collecting poems from the beginning of the Western Zhou Dynasty to the middle of the Spring and Autumn Period, *** counting 311 songs. It is divided into three parts: "Wind", "Elegance" and "Collar", and in terms of technique, it is divided into "Fugue", "Bi" and "Xing", collectively known as the six meanings. It is said that during the Western Zhou Dynasty, there was a poetic officer who would collect folk songs from the people, and compose those folk songs into tunes and sing them to the Emperor, as a reference for the implementation of the system.

Seven, Western Zhou Yandu Ruins Museum

Western Zhou Yandu Ruins Museum is located in Dongjialin Village, Liulihe Town, Fangshan District, Beijing, which is the seat of the Western Zhou state of Yan, in which the cultural relics of the Western Zhou state of Yan are displayed, including the important cultural relics of the Western Zhou such as the Sumire Din Bo矩鬲,克盉, and so on, on behalf of the Western Zhou dynasty, and the above inscriptions record the King of the Zhou dynasty sealed the eldest son of Duke Zhaogong, Ke, as a Marquis of Yan.