Part V: Spring and Autumn Era
(722 -> 481 BCE)
Historical Background
Eastern Chou: (770-256 BCE)
After some strong rulers, the Chou dynasty became weak. A major turning point came when barbarians from the frontier sacked their western capital and killed the Chou king or emperor. The Chou dynasty regrouped and moved their capital east to Loyang in 770 BCE[i]. This began the period in Chinese history called the Eastern Chou. It is considered weaker because the Chou Emperor was only a figurehead with no real power beyond his own state. This period lasted until 256 BCE – over 500 years.
Spring and Autumn Annals
The Eastern Chou is divided into two phases, the Spring and Autumn Era and the Warring States Era. The first, which lasted from 722 to 481 BCE, is named after the Spring and Autumn Annals, a year-by-year history of this period. This chronicle of events was documented and then commented on by later Chou writers. The Spring and Autumn Annals, ChÕun-chÕiu, is one of the 5 Chinese Classics. In the previous section we mentioned that the other four classics were all written during the Western Chou, the preceding era. Naming an entire era after one of their classics, a historical work, reemphasizes the Chinese reverence for their own history and the written word.
The Philosophers: How to prevent social breakdown
The Spring and Autumn Era of the Chou dynasty saw a great flowering of culture in China that included its first historians[ii], who wrote the outlines of the traditional Chinese history mentioned above. It also included its first great philosophers including Confucius, Mencius, Mo Ti, Lao Tzu, and Chuang Tzu.
ÒThese and others show how diverse and vigorous was the thought of the [Chou] age. Never again was Chinese philosophy to be so creative and so untrammeled by the past. Systems then begun were to persist until modern times.Ó [iii]
During the Spring and Autumn Era, dukes and princes assumed local control due to a weak central government. According to tradition there were as many as 1000 princedoms at the maximum. This splintering of the Chou Empire was due to feudalization combined with a Chinese form of a code of chivalry.
This fragmentation, combined with the presumed degeneration of society, inspired a flowering of philosophy. Each of the philosophers offered cures for the ills of Chinese social forms. They could all see the splintering of Chinese culture because of the constant warfare between the petty kingdoms. In effect they all identified the problem as social breakdown, for which each philosophy proposed a unique solution. The philosophies developed during this period of Chinese history were to be incredibly influential in the rest of Chinese history.
The political philosophical polarity between Confucianism and Taoism began during this period. As we shall see, Confucianism identified the problem as a breakdown in the social rituals, which presumably held the society together. Alternately Taoism suggested that the problem was holding onto outmoded institutions past their time. Confucius, not to be confused with Confucianism, identified the problem and solution as having to do with the rulers.
[i] This is a recurrent Chinese theme, which weÕve seen before and will see again. Entering from beyond its boundaries ÔbarbariansÕ conquer civilized China. (It is suspected that both the Chou and Shang dynasties conquered an indigenous population.) They are assimilated, only leaving traces of their culture. They become less aggressive, and in turn are overrun by the next wave of barbarians, who invade from the fringes of their world. And the center of Chinese culture moves further away from the boundaries.
[ii]Encyclopedia Britannica: China 5-519
[iii]EB 5, 520