Royal Rebels - article ; n°1 ; vol.69, pg 315-325

A.F.P. Hulsewé

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Bulletin de l'Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient - Année 1981 - Volume 69 - Numéro 1 - Pages 315-325
11 pages
Source : Persée ; Ministère de la jeunesse, de l’éducation nationale et de la recherche, Direction de l’enseignement supérieur, Sous-direction des bibliothèques et de la documentation.

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• Publié par: BULLETIN_DE_L-ECOLE_FRANCAISE_D-EXTREME-ORIENT
• Publié le: 01 janvier 1981
• Nombre de lectures: 150
• Langue: English

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A.F.P. Hulsewé
Royal Rebels
In: Bulletin de l'Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient. Tome 69, 1981. pp. 315-325.
Citer ce document / Cite this document :
Hulsewé A.F.P. Royal Rebels. In: Bulletin de l'Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient. Tome 69, 1981. pp. 315-325.
doi : 10.3406/befeo.1981.3369
http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/befeo_0336-1519_1981_num_69_1_3369ROYAL REBELS
BY
A.F.P. HULSEWÉ
Abbreviations.
HFHD H.H. Dubs a.o., History of the Former Han dynasty, 3 vols. (Baltimore,
Waverly Press, 1938, 1944, 1955).
HHSCC Wang Hsien-ch'ien, Нои-Han shu chi chieh, ЕЕ^Щ, &ШШШШ
(Gh'ang-sha, 1923; reduced facsimile reprint by the Yi-wen Ц^£
publishers, Taipei, 1955).
HSPC Wang Hsien-ch'ien, Han shu pu chu Ш'ШШШ (Gh'ang-sha, 1900;
reduced facsimile reprint by the Yi-wen publishers, Taipei, 1955).
Kamada Kamada Shigeo, Shin-Кап seiji seido no кепкуп, ШШ'Ш.Ш, МЩШУлШШО
Щ% (Tokyo, Gakujutsu shinkôkai, 1962).
Mh Edouard Ghavannes, Les mémoires historiques de Se-ma Ts'ien (Paris,
Ernest Leroux, 1895-1905; orig. in 5 vols.; republished with a sup
plementary volume: Paris, Adrien Maisonneuve, 1969).
RHL A.F.P. Hulsewé. Remnants of Han law (Leiden, Brill, 1955).
SC Takigawa Kametarô, Shiki kaichu kosho, Hi I №:£$$, Й.Ш#£Е#Ш
(Tokyo, 1934; reprinted in Taipei).
Watson Burton Watson, Records of the Grand Historian of China translated from
the Shih chi of Ssu-ma Ch'ien (New York and London, Columbia
University Press, 1961), 2 vols.
More than a century ago T.T. Meadows published his famous study on the
T'ai-p'ing under the title The Chinese and their rebellions,1 laying particular stress
on the strength of the large popular movements throughout Chinese history. A
hundred years later, Mao Tse-tung was to value these movements as the moving
force in Chinese history2 and during several years these were extensively studied
(1) Originally published in 1856.
(2) Selected works (New York, International Publishers, 1955), vol. 2, p. 76. A.F.P. HULSEWÉ 316
by Chinese historians.3 In this paper, however, I shall not discuss the popular
movements under the Han dynasty, but rather the rebellions fomented by the
opposite stratum of the social structure, namely by the kings. The reason why
I have chosen to discuss these royal rebellions is because of the consequences for
the history of the Han empire ; at the same time, also some aspects of Han law
will become clearer. The number of such royal rebellions — or of plots that were
not realised — is not inconsiderable, but, as already noted by Shen Ghia-pen,
"the lawsuits for plotting rebellion were most numerous during the Western -
i.e. Former -Han."4 Why this was so, may become apparent in the following
pages.
The Western term "rebellion" implies resistance against an established
regime, and so does the Chinese term fan, Ы, "to turn (against)." Now the use of
this term fan in an historical text depends to a certain extent on the attitude of
the historian, that is to say in those cases where he uses it in the descriptive parts
of his work where he is not quoting documents and which may therefore be
taken to reflect his own views. If he is favourably inclined towards the authorities
in power, he will call any action undertaken against them "rebellion"; if he is
not, he will use a more neutral term like "rising." In this way, the latter word,
i.e. ch'i /ÎB, is used by Han authors for the revolt against the Ch'in, whereas
movements directed against the Han are called fan.5 Besides fan we also find the
term той Ш fan, "to plot rebellion," but curiously enough, the two terms are
used indiscriminately, for we find the same action described as fan in one passage
and as mou fan in another.6
Although the expressions fan and mou fan occur frequently in our texts, we
do not possess a contemporary explanation of these terms. In the T'ang code the
meaning of the concept "rebellion" is clearly set out,7 but in the extant frag
ments of the Ch'in and Han laws no such stipulation has been preserved.8 That
stipulations concerning rebellion existed is clear from the single Han legal rule
on this point which we happen to possess; there they are mentioned as
(3) James P. Harrison, The Communists and Chinese peasant rebellions; a study in the rewriting of
Chinese history (New York, Atheneum, 1968).
(4) Shen Chia-pen (1840-1913), Han lu. chih i гкШ^, ШШШШ (reduced anastatic re
print by the Taiwan Commercial Press, Jen-jen wen-k'u АА&.Ш, no. W 451-453, 1976),
3.1b.
(5) Cf. note 100 on p. 115 of my contribution to the volume edited by Professor Albert
Feuerwerker, History in Communist China (Cambridge, Mass, M.I.T. Press, 1968).
(6) E.g. the rebellion of Liu Hsing-chu, king of Chi-pei, in 177 B.C. is called fan in an
imperial edict, but mou fan in the summary of the clan register; see HSPC 4.12a, HFHD I, p. 248,
SC 10.26, Mh II, p. 470, and HSPC 14.7a {SC 18.30 is defective) .- For mou, "to plot", see
RHL, p. 265.
(7) T'ang lu su-i ШШШШ (Shanghai Commercial Press, Wan-yu wen-k'u edition) I,
1.15 and III, 17.40; in the second passage fan and moufan are equated.
(8) In view of the fact that during the law reform under the Wei in A.D. 234 the old Han
chti Iti -AW was placed at the beginning of the code and renamed hsing ming Щ$з {ku chi tsui li i
wei hsing ming ЙШР1ШШУ£, Chin shu 30.10b in the Tung-wen edition; Uchida Tomoo,
éd., Takuchu Chukoku rekidai keihôshi, ftffl^ít, Ш&ФШШ'^ШШ^ (Tokyo, Sobunsha, 1964),
p. 99), the Ch'in-Han chu-lii may have contained such a stipulation. Unfortunately, the
single extant quotation of the chii-lii {Chin shu 30.11a, Uchida, op. cit., p. 104; see RHL, p. 34,
no. 6) sheds no light on this point, nor do the recently discovered Ch'in laws. Royal Rebels 317
Throughout the history of the Chinese empire, rebellion was one of the
crimes considered as heinous; in Han times the qualification of such heinous was ta ni pu (or wu) tao, ~кзЕ/^(Ш)Ш "greatly refractory and impious".
These crimes also included "uttering imprecations against the emperor",
"deceiving the emperor", parricide and matricide, etc.9
The single rule just mentioned stipulates that "according to the rules
rebellion" persons who had joined rebels and had raised troops concerning
were to be "executed together with their relatives."10 From actual examples
we know that this punishment was applied to the leaders themselves.11 If the full
rigour of the law was used (which seems to have been comparatively rare) the
chief culprit was only killed after having been horribly mutilated ; his flesh was
then made into pickled mince-meat and sent to the feudal lords to serve as a
warning. His "three groups of relatives," i.e. his parents, his wives and children,
and his brothers and sisters, and theoretically also his grandparents and grandc
hildren, were beheaded.12 Sometimes he was cut in two at the waist.13 whereas
his relatives were made government slaves or banished,14 sometimes to the
confines of the empire.15 Exceptionally the enslaved relatives were amnestied;
this happened to persons involved in the rebellion of the seven states in 153
B.C. who were liberated in 140 B.C.16 In this case these persons were freed
because of a special edict; it seems unlikely that such slaves profited from general
amnesties which occasionally even included persons condemned or under
adjuciation for rebellion.17
The number of persons who were co-adjudicated could be considerable.
The largest mentioned is "several tens of thousands of the clique (of the
kings of Huai-nan and Heng-shan)" who were killed late in 123 B.C.18 It is
impossible to arrive at exact figures on this point, because the texts usually
mention only the names of prominent persons who were executed, whereas many
lower officials and commoners who had actively or passively supported the re
bels were also punished. This last point is clear from several edicts which
mention people who had been "led astray," and which order that they were
(9) See RHL, pp. 156-204, and the study by Professor Oba Osamu у^ШШ in Toho gakuhó
27 (Kyoto, 1956).
(10) HSPC 66.4b: i fan fa tsu, ШШЖ.
(11) E.g. in the cases of P'eng Yueh and Han Hsin; see HSPC IB. 16b and 18b, HFHD I,
pp. 128 and 132, SC 8.79, Mh II, p. 395; HSPC 34.19a, SC 91.12; HSPC 34.13a, SC 92.39,
Watson I, pp. 195 and 231.
(12) ЖРС 23.17b, RHL, pp. 112-121 and 341.
(13) See RHL pp. 1 1 1 and 158, and Nunome Chofu, "Kan-ritsu taikeika no shiron - rekko
no shikei wo megutte", *Р@Ш, ШШ&%\Ь®ШШ - Ш©?Ш%-£> <-от, in Tôhô gakuhô 27
(Kyoto, 1956), pp. 117-140, esp. p. 123 sq.
(14) See RHL, p. 132 sq.
(15) E.g. to Lung-lo prefecture (HSPC 18.11a) in Tun-huang commandery (HSPC 28BI.
19b), or to the Ho-p'u commandery 12.1b, HFHD III, p. 62) in southwestern Kuang-
tung (see Michael Loewe, Records of Han administration (Cambridge, University Press, 1967) I,
pp. 178-179, no. 31).
(16) HS