Yi

When reading the history of the pre-Qin Dynasty, we often fall into a confusion of names and facts: Why are Shang Yang, Wei Yang, and Gongsun Yang called three persons? Similarly, should Qin Shihuang, the first emperor in ancient times, be called "Ying Zheng" or "Zhao Zheng"? This confusion originated from the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period to the early Han Dynasty, which was the transitional period when the "surname separation" system gradually collapsed and moved towards "surname confluence". At the time of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, Sima Qian could not figure it out, but when he wrote "Historical Records", he recorded multiple possibilities side by side, which caused misunderstandings in later generations. The first rule of the pre-Qin surname system: "A woman's surname is used to distinguish her from marriage; a man's surname is used to distinguish her from high or low." A woman's "surname" is like a genetic ID card, used to identify blood relatives during intermarriage. The "family" will change with the change of a noble man's social status, fiefdom and official position. Case: Shang Yang's "name change" ① He was born in the Wei Kingdom clan, so he can be called "Wei Yang"; ② His surname is Ji, and he belongs to the Gongsun family (grandson of Gong), so he can be called "Gongsun Yang"; ③ He was granted the title of Shang Yu due to his merits, and was able to build his own ancestral temple, breaking away from the Wei Kingdom clan status and becoming the ancestor of "Shang". So his final and most glorious title is "Shang Yang". The change of "clan" is a "declaration of independence" in the patriarchal sense, marking a change in its patriarchal affiliation. So, who was Qin Shihuang's surname? First of all, it is definitely not "Zhao"! The most famous source of "Zhao" is the "surname Zhao" in "Historical Records." There are three fallacies in this statement: ① Confusing "surname" and "family name", "surname Zhao" is a mixed and nondescript expression. It was completely unreasonable under the pre-Qin etiquette system. ② Misunderstood the patriarchal affiliation and humiliatingly demoted Qin Zong to Zhao Zong's branch. "Ying surname Zhao": "Ying surname" comes from "Feilian", the general of King Zhou of Shang Dynasty; "Zhao" comes from "Zeofu" who was granted the title of Zhaocheng by King Zhou Mu. However, the direct ancestor of the Qin State "Feizi", his father Da Luo was the nephew of Zaofu. It is difficult to say whether Da Luo ever offered sacrifices in the ancestral temple of Zhao. Furthermore, as early as the period of King Xiao of Zhou (about 900 BC), Feizi was granted the title of "Qin" (today's Tianshui, Gansu) for his merits in raising horses. This means that Feizi's branch has become independent from the Ying clan and established a new clan system with "Qin" as its surname. They and the Zhao clan, who also had the same surname of Ying but had "Zhao" as their surname, had already parted ways as early as the middle of the Western Zhou Dynasty. Each worshiped its own ancestral temple. The relationship between the two was an equal, not a relationship between a large clan and a small clan. Therefore, calling Qin Shihuang "Zhao Zheng" is equivalent to denying the legal status of the Qin State as an independent clan since Feizi in terms of pre-Qin etiquette and law, and forcibly classifying the king of the country as a descendant of the Zhao clan. This was a huge political insult at the time, and its nature was similar to denying the legal system of the other country. This title is likely to be the resentment of the defeated nobles of the Six Kingdoms of Shandong, and they deliberately belittled and cursed Qin Shihuang in name. Sima Qian may have taken it from such historical materials of the Six Kingdoms with strong political tendencies - after all, all the descendants of the First Queen were killed by Hu Hai, and other clans of the Qin State were massacred by Xiang Yu. ("Zhao Zhengshu" was also revised during the Han Dynasty.) ③ Ignore the nobility and independence of Qin's own legal system. The "Qin family" of the Qin State was established by the Emperor of Zhou (or the Western Zhou Dynasty) himself, and its legitimacy has a long history. On the other hand, Zhao State was founded much later than Qin. It was not until the early Warring States Period (403 BC) that the "three families were divided into Jin" and the princes were later recognized by King Weilie of Zhou Dynasty. The history and dignity of the "Qin family" are much earlier than and much higher than that of the "Zhao family". It is another insult to use the "Zhao family" with a shorter history and relatively weak legal foundation to cover and represent the "Qin family" with a longer history and was personally named by Emperor Zhou. To sum up, the record of "surname Zhao" in "Historical Records" is a historical error limited by the times. It not only misunderstood the core rules of the pre-Qin surname system, but also misjudged the patriarchal relationship between Qin and Zhao, and inadvertently spread the politically stigmatizing discourse of the old aristocrats of the Six Kingdoms. Therefore, when the "Shi Huang" is called "Shi Huang", the most accurate and most consistent title for the etiquette at that time should be "Qin Zheng". When can we be called "Ying Zheng"? This involves the second standard of the "separation of surnames" system: "The world is the common ruler, and the surname is the surname." As the largest "big clan" in the world, the emperor of Zhou has no royal land in the world. All the land in the world legally belongs to him, so there is no need to use "family" to identify subordinates, so they can be called "surnames" alone, such as Zhou Wen Wang Jichang, Zhou Wu Wang Jifa, Zhou Nan Wang Ji Yan. The Qin royal family has experienced three key nodes in obtaining this qualification, which can be divided into three levels according to the standard degree of leniency: ① The broadest: 256 BC (Qin Zhaoxiang King destroyed Zhou) In that year, Qin Zhaoxiang King (Ying Ji, or "Qin Wang Ji") attacked and destroyed the Western Zhou Principality, and the "Nine Tripods" symbolizing the highest power entered Qin. Since then, the King of Qin has replaced the King of Zhou as the "co-owner of the world" in legal terms. According to the rule of "taking surname as surname", King Zhaoxiang can be called "Ying Ji". Children of the Qin royal family can also "use their surname as their surname" when they are addressed respectfully. Just like "Jiang Taigong Jiang Shang" is not the emperor, he is originally the Lu family, but as the arm of the emperor, to a certain extent, using his surname as his surname can express respect for him, so there is "Jiang Shang". Therefore, "Qin Zheng", the grandson of the King of Qin, can also be respectfully called "Ying Zheng". ② Slightly stricter: 247 BC (Ying Zheng is the throne of Qin) The false name of "the common master of the world", he was 13 years old, and he was the throne of Qin in 247 BC, that is "Ying Zheng". ③The strictest: 221 BC (Qin Shihuang unified the six kingdoms) If it is believed that the concept of "Emperor" has existed in name only at the end of the Warring States Period, the destruction of the Zhou Dynasty has only symbolic significance. Then, by serving the King of Qin to "wipe out the Liuhe and unify the world" and create the title of "Emperor", he would have become the absolute and unquestionable co-owner of the world. At this time, "Ying Zheng" is his most noble and accurate title. At this time, he is no longer just the sect leader of the "Qin family with the surname Ying", but also the sect leader with the surname "Ying", one of the eight ancient surnames: "Ji, Jiang, Si, Ying, Gui, Gui, Yao, and Su (one says "" means "pregnancy")". To call him "Qin Zheng" is to put him into the "Xiao Zong Qin Branch" again. Therefore, the First Emperor of the Qin Dynasty Yingzheng.

["Shi Yiguang" is not Xi Shi's real name, but a fictional or refined name created by literati after the Song and Yuan Dynasties. She is called "Xi Shi" in official history and pre-Qin documents, but her real name is unknown. Xi Shi was first found in pre-Qin documents such as "Guanzi", "Mozi", and "Zhuangzi", but these texts only called him "Xi Shi" and did not record his real name. Sima Qian's "Historical Records" did not mention his specific name. "Xi Shi" is more likely to be a pronoun or title, meaning "the woman surnamed Shi in the West Village" (her birthplace of Zhuji Zhuluo Village has two villages, East and West, and the surname Shi is a common local surname) The name "Shi Yiguang" was first seen in local documents such as "Kuiji Zhi" in the Southern Song Dynasty. It was further interpreted in notebook novels such as "The Story of Lang Huan" in the Yuan Dynasty, and "Yi Guang" was Xi Shi's real name. This kind of statement belongs to the literary processing of historical figures in later generations and lacks historical data support from the Pre-Qin or Han Dynasties. In ancient times, beauties were often given symbolic names (such as Diao Chan, Zhaojun, etc.). As a cultural symbol, Xi Shi's name "Yi Guang" (meaning "Guanghua") may have originated from the literati's imagination of a "glorious and moving" image, rather than real historical records. So I saw the debate under that long comment about using Xi Shi's name "Shi Yiguang" to identify the surname... Don't do this. [But the names for women before the Zhou Dynasty were not like this, such as "Su Daji": The name "Daji" first came from "Guoyu·Jinyu No. 1": "Yin Xin conquered Su, and there was Su's daughter Daji." During this period, she was usually referred to as "Daji" for short - this was the way the Shang Dynasty called aristocratic women. Judging from the archaeological discoveries of oracle bone inscriptions, female noble names in the Shang Dynasty mostly used the structure of "personal name + clan name". For example, the famous "Fu Hao": "Fu" is a personal name (indicating a marriage relationship with the King of Shang), "Hao" is the clan name (i. E., The surname "Zi"). Similarly, "Da" may refer to her identity, while "Ji" comes from her clan origin. The royal family of the Shang Dynasty practiced the custom of naming the heavenly stems (Japanese names), such as "Shangjiawei", "Baoding", "Shiren", etc., But this had little impact on female names. Most of the names of Shang Dynasty women discovered by archeology are related to their clan origins. [ps: But there are still "Japanese names" for women - another name for "Fu Hao" - "Si Mu Xin", which is a temple title (or the name of the temple owner), which is the title of the temple owner established by her descendants to worship her. A strict posthumous title system has not yet been formed during the Shang and Zhou dynasties (posthumous titles matured in the middle and late Western Zhou Dynasty), and the temple title system has not yet been established (temple titles originated in the Shang Dynasty, but were only used for former kings, and the number was very small). "Si Mu Xin" is not an evaluation of Fuhao's virtue during her lifetime (the core of her posthumous title), nor is it the title she represents in the ancestral temple (the core of her temple title) for the lineage of the previous king, but the honorific title given to her by future generations during sacrifices in the ancestral temple. ​The meaning of "Simu Xin": "Xin" is the temple name of Fu Hao (or "Japanese name", the nobles of Shang and Zhou Dynasties used Tianqian as the sacrificial code); "Mother" reflects her role as a female ancestor of the royal family; "Si" means "sacrifice", and the overall meaning is "sacrifice to the mother (ancestor) whose temple name is Xin". is the honorific title given to her by future generations in the ancestral temple sacrifices. [Back to "Su Daji" Although "Daji" was still commonly used in the text of "Historical Records" in the Western Han Dynasty, Sima Qian officially linked the country name/clan name "Su" with the personal name "Daji" by recording its origin (including the Su family). In order to facilitate understanding, later generations naturally called her "Su Daji", which means "Daji from the Su family". The Western Jin Dynasty's "Emperor Century" (written by Huangfu Mi): This book further "clarifies" her surname. "Zhou conquered Su, and there were Su people who took Da as their daughter. Daji was named Da, and her surname was Su." It is clearly pointed out that "Da" is a character, "Ji" is a given name (or another explanation), and "Su" is her surname. Since then, the full name "Su Daji" has been fully formed. Then the Ming Dynasty "Feng Shen Yi", a god and demon novel, pushed the image of Daji as the incarnation of a "vixen", a demon concubine who confused King Zhou and harmed loyal and good people to its peak, making the name "Su Daji" a household name, and its literary image completely covered up the limited historical records. There are significant differences in the address systems between the Shang and Zhou dynasties. Female names in the Shang Dynasty were often in the format of "", such as "Fuhao", "Fujing", "Fupang", etc. That appeared in oracle bone inscriptions, among which "someone" mostly represented the name of the country from which they originated. The Zhou Dynasty formed a more systematic naming method of "country name/posthumous name/place name + surname". This difference reflects two different political and cultural systems. The Shang Dynasty paid more attention to marriage relationships with tribes in various countries and established political alliances through marriage; On this basis, the Zhou Dynasty further developed a strict patriarchal system and a feudal system, and the naming method became more institutionalized. The female names in the bronze inscriptions of the Western Zhou Dynasty mostly conform to the pattern of "country name + surname", such as "Wang Jiang" (Queen Zhou, surnamed Jiang), "Guo Jiang" (Mrs. Guo Guo, surnamed Jiang), etc., Which reflect the Zhou Dynasty's patriarchal system's regulation of female identity.

"Yi Jiang" is traditionally believed to be the daughter of Jiang Taigong, the wife of Ji Fa, and the mother of King Ji Song. Here we may be able to get a glimpse of a game of pre-Qin historical and political structure that is still controversial in academic circles. The "Yi" in "Yi Jiang" may refer to its fiefdom or residence, which is consistent with the naming method of aristocratic women in the Zhou Dynasty. But the problem is that the name of Jichang's brother "Bo Yi Kao" also contains the word "Yi". "Bo" means rank (eldest son), "Yi" may refer to a fiefdom or official position, and "Kao" is often used to refer to the deceased father in Zhou Dynasty inscriptions, but it is rare for "Bo" and "Kao" to both exist in the same title. One speculation is that "Bo Yi Kao" may have been granted the title of "Yi" first and then died young; later, "Yi Jiang" may have married Boyi Kao first and then King Wu of Zhou. If this theory is true, the bloodline issue of King Cheng of Zhou may have become a factor in the power struggle in the early Zhou Dynasty. "Zuo Zhuan·Year of Zhaogong" records: "When King Wu was the uncle of Yijiang Fangzhen, Emperor Meng said to himself: He has a son named Yu with his remaining life, and he will be with him in the Tang Dynasty. He belongs to Zhu Shen, and Fan will raise his descendants." This is the most direct early document record about Yijiang, indicating that she had a certain status in the politics of the early Zhou Dynasty. There may indeed be a power game between Duke Zhou and Yi Jiang (and the forces of Jiang Taigong behind him). Zhou Gong represents the power of the clan, while Yi Jiang represents the relatives and the group of heroes. So King Wu of Zhou died early, and the young King Cheng of Zhou was unable to rule personally. Was the supreme power of Zhou controlled by the Queen Mother, or by Uncle Wang and the two groups behind him? As descendants, of course we know the result - Duke Zhou won. Then how did he win? First of all, maybe we can get a glimpse of it from the title of "Bo Yi Kao": the Zhou Gong Group questioned the lineage of King Zhou Cheng - if he is the son of Boy Kao, then he is not the son of King Wu of Zhou, and the successor to the throne should not be selected based on the concept of "father dies and son succeeds", but should be based on the concept of "brother among younger brothers." King Zhou Cheng cannot inherit the throne, so the "Yijiang" group may make concessions in order to at least keep King Zhou Cheng's throne, and the "Queen Mother" will not be in control. Due to the existence of this kind of message, King Zhou Cheng could not figure out his biological father, but whether it was King Wu of Zhou or Boyikao, he was the only heir of these two people, so they called them father together, so Boyikao's "kao" was born. Secondly, the Duke of Zhou initially gained the highest power. In order to further suppress the "just" nature of the Queen Mother "Yi Jiang" in gaining power, he began to use public opinion to influence - rewriting the "Oath of Shepherd", King Zhou Wu's crusade against the Shang Dynasty, adding the king's saying: "The ancients There is a saying: "There is no morning for a hen; the morning for a hen is only the rope of the family." Now the king of Shang only uses the woman's words, and she is unconscious and worships her. There is no answer. The large number of inscriptions on the bronzes unearthed from Fuhao's tomb in the Yin Ruins show Fuhao's status and power. As the consort of Shang King Wuding, Fuhao not only presided over sacrifices, but also led the army on expeditions. This reflects that women in the Shang Dynasty were honored for participating in politics. Then using women to participate in politics to attack King Zhou of Shang is untenable, because he must have the purpose of "wanting to gain the support of the enemy's knowledgeable people" by publishing Xiwen. Moreover, didn't King Wu of Zhou appoint women to participate in politics? "The Analects of Confucius Taibo" records that Confucius said: "Shun had five ministers and ruled the world. King Wu said: 'I have ten rebellious ministers.' Confucius said: 'Talent is difficult, isn't it? During the period of Tang and Yu, this was prosperous. There were only nine women.'" And Zhou Yuan Oracle Bones H11:1 There are records of "Yi Wenwu Emperor Yizong", and H11:8 contains "Concubine Temple" and other contents, indicating that the Zhou people may have inherited part of the Shang Dynasty sacrificial tradition in the "early period", including the role of women in religious activities - national events, both in sacrifice and military affairs, this is the best proof that women can participate in political rights. (But with the improvement of the etiquette system in the Zhou Dynasty, women were gradually excluded from core political and religious activities - who formulated the "Zhou Rites"?) So the passage "There is no morning for hens" in "The Oath of Shepherd" does seem abrupt, which may be related to the suppression of women's participation in political affairs during the political struggles in the early Zhou Dynasty.