The Aristocratic Families in Early Imperial China: A Case Study of the Po-Ling Ts'ui Family

Cambridge Studies in Chinese History, Literature and Institutions

by Patricia Buckley Ebrey

Much scholarly work has been published on the Chinese medieval 'aristocracy', in Chinese, Japanese and Western languages. It is commonly accepted that the change from an aristocratic society to a 'meritocracy' was one of the turning points of Chinese history. But since almost every aspect of political, economic and cultural history is involved in questions of the nature of the aristocracy, perhaps the only way to test theories of the means by which a small elite preserved its social status and political prestige for seven or eight hundred years is by tracing the fortunes of a single family in great detail. The present work is a fully documented case study of the Ts'uis of Po-ling from the first through the ninth centuries. By observing OW evolution of the Ts'uis as an aristocratic kinship group – and an unusual quantity of rich and original source material was available to Dr Ebrey – the author demonstrates OW fluctuation in aristocratic influence and tic changing basis of such families' prestige and power. Studies such as this are essential to enlarge our knowledge not only of medieval society and politics in China but also the development of family and lineage. In the light of the detailed evidence Dr Ebrey provides, many conventional views many well have to be abandoned.

Genres: China

240 pages, Hardcover

First published June 22, 1978

About the author

Patricia Buckley Ebrey is an American historian specializing in cultural and gender issues during the Chinese Song Dynasty. Ebrey obtained her Bachelor of Arts from the University of Chicago in 1968 and her Masters and PhD from Columbia University in 1970 and 1975, respectively. Upon receiving her PhD, Ebrey was hired as visiting assistant professor at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She became an associate professor in 1982 and a full professor three years later. She is now a professor at the University of Washington.

Ebrey has received a number of awards for her work, including fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, and the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation. Ebery's The Inner Quarters: Marriage and the Lives of Chinese Women in the Sung Period received the 1995 Levenson Prize from the Association for Asian Studies. Her 2008 work, Accumulating Culture: The Collections of Emperor Huizong, received the Smithsonian Institution's 2010 Shimada Prize for Outstanding Work of East Asian Art History.

(from Wikipedia)

Reviews

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

The histories of the Northern and Southern Dynasties as well as the Tang were dominated by a set of powerful and eminent lineages and in this volume, Ebrey documents the history of the Boling Cui clan. In the Tang there was a unique focus on genealogy and eminent clans. The prime minister office was effective monopolized by the leading clans.

The disappearance of these clans in the Song period has been remarked upon as the start of the late imperial Chinese meritocracy.

[Alex · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the classic studies of the Chinese aristocracy as a "class" and "status group" from the viewpoint of the "clan," taking into account the latest in Japanese and Chinese research at the time. We follow (the?) story of the Boling Cuis from the Han, through the Northern Dynasties, into their eventual Tang success and disappearance from the historical record.