Zhōuguān lùtián kǎo 周官祿田考
An Investigation of the Stipend-Lands of the Officials of Zhōu
by 沈彤 (撰)
About the work
Shěn Tóng’s 沈彤 (1688–1752) three-juan investigation of the Zhōuguān’s system of office-count, public-field, and stipend-land — addressing the famous objection raised by Ōuyáng Xiū 歐陽修 (1007–1072) that the Zhōuguān describes “many officials, little land — stipends could not be paid.” The book is divided into three chapters: Guānjué shù 官爵數 (number of offices and titles), Gōngtián shù 公田數 (number of public-field units), and Lùtián shù 祿田數 (number of stipend-field units). For figures not in the classical text, Shěn either consults the commentaries or, where the commentaries are also silent, derives them from internal cross-references. The work belongs to the eighteenth-century Wúpài Hàn-school evidential method as applied to the Zhōulǐ.
Tiyao
We respectfully submit that Zhōuguān lùtián kǎo in three juan was composed by Shěn Tóng of the present dynasty. Tóng holds that the system of granting stipends, since Sòng Ōuyáng Xiū raised the question of “the Zhōulǐ having many officers and little land, with stipends not being paid,” has been followed by many; even those who refuted have done so only by reference to “officers held concurrently.” Tóng alone exhaustively investigated Zhōu institutions to refute the position, and accordingly composed this book in three chapters: Guānjué shù (numbers of offices), Gōngtián shù (numbers of public fields), Lùtián shù (numbers of stipend fields). For all numbers of fields, ranks, and stipends not visible in the classical text — sometimes consulted in the notes; where not in the notes, working from the classic to set up a precedent and inferring laterally — the supplement to what the classic does not have ends up exactly matching what the classic does have.
His account is precise-and-thorough, going beyond Zhèng’s note and Jiǎ’s sub-commentary; he can be said to stand out. Among the points where some are not entirely settled: he holds that the zǐnán (subordinate princely-rank) state cannot have zhōngshì (middle officers). Examining the Mèngzǐ’s “small state of fifty lǐ square has zhōngshì twice the xiàshì” passage, Zhào Qí 趙岐’s note: “zǐnán is the small state”; the Wángzhì “the king’s establishment of stipend-and-rank: gōng, hóu, bó, zǐ, nán, totalling five ranks; the lords’ upper-officers are qīng, lower-officers, upper-shì, middle-shì, lower-shì, totalling five ranks”; Kǒng Yǐngdá’s sub-commentary: “lords subsumes gōnghóubózǐnán, so zǐnán has middle-shì.” The Wángzhì further says “if there are middle-shì and lower-shì, each occupies the upper’s three-thirds”; Zhèng’s note: “shàngzhōngxià shì twenty-seven, each three-thirds-of”; the Zhōulǐ Tàizǎi Jiǎ’s sub-commentary expounding this passage: “in the audience-and-pilgrimage rank order, the next-state’s shàngshì corresponds to the great-state’s zhōngshì; zhōngshì corresponds to xiàshì; xiàshì corresponds to its empty [position]; the small-state’s shàngshì corresponds to the next-state’s zhōngshì; zhōngshì corresponds to xiàshì; xiàshì corresponds to its empty — hence each occupies the upper’s three-thirds.” If zǐnán has no zhōngshì, then the small-state’s shì fail to match the three-thirds count and conflict with the classical text.
Tóng also says: the system of additional fields for an eighty-lǐ state caps additional fields at one hundred lǐ; for a forty-lǐ state at fifty lǐ; for a twenty-lǐ state at twenty-five lǐ. Examining the Sīxūn text: “all reward-lands are without fixed amount; weight visible in merit”; further: “only additional fields are tax-exempt”; Zhèng’s note: “additional fields — already rewarded with land, then additionally bestowed with land.” Reward-fields are without fixed amount — how much more so additional fields! The Chūnqiū Xuān 15 zhuàn: Jìn Hóu rewarded Huánzǐ with a thousand dìchén; further rewarded Shì Bó with the prefecture of Guāyǎn; Xiāng 36 zhuàn: third month jiǎyín, feasted Zǐzhǎn, gave him the senior-track sānmìng robes and the eight pre-prefecture; Xiāng 27 zhuàn: the duke gave Miǎnyú the prefecture of sixty; Xiāng 28 zhuàn: gave Yànzǐ the bìdiàn the rural-zone of sixty. None had fixed amounts — they confirm the Sīxūn text. Tóng fixing them at twenty lǐ, ten lǐ, five lǐ — examining the classic and zhuàn there is no clear text.
Furthermore, Tóng’s calculation of the jīnèi (royal-domain) one million jǐng-units, removing the mountain-and-forest etc. as 360,000 jǐng, leaving 640,000 jǐng of fields — taking it as “remove one-third” — bases this on Bān Gù’s Xíngfǎ zhì. Now consulting one million jǐng removing 360,000 jǐng gives nine-of-twenty-fifths removed; the Bānzhì originally does not say “remove one-third” — Tóng’s citation is in fact a misremember. Furthermore, Bānzhì was not written as a note to the Zhōuguān, so its calculation need not entirely follow the classical text.
Now Tóng has based on classical text — he should consult classical meaning to seek their match. Examining Zhèng’s Zàishī note: in the near-suburb of one hundred lǐ he uses the “remove one-third” method; in the six-suì and beyond he uses the “remove five-of-eighteen” method. The near-suburb-and-within: unmoved-fields one hundred mǔ per family; one-time-moved fields two hundred mǔ per family; twice-moved fields three hundred mǔ per family — averaging three families receive six families’ fields. In the six-suì and beyond: upper-fields one hundred mǔ per family with one hundred mǔ of vegetable-garden; lower-fields one hundred mǔ per family with two hundred mǔ of vegetable-garden — averaging six families receive thirteen families’ fields. The fields received are more than the near-suburb’s; therefore the lands removed should be less than the near-suburb’s — hence the suburb-within “remove one-third” and the suì-beyond merely “remove five-of-eighteen.”
To use “remove one-third” for the suì-beyond is already too much — let alone “remove nine-of-twenty-fifths”! This is where unbelief in Zhèng’s note creates the lapse. As to claiming the Suìrén’s shí fū (ten husbands) are also jǐngtián — this picks up the Sòng-scholars’ loose talk and deserves no further refutation. Through ages those who consider the Zhōulǐ a forgery are not just one school; only the “many-officers, little-land” argument was hard to settle. Tóng’s book settles the millennium of doubt — quite meritorious for the canonical text. Only on these few points it is among his hundred deliberations’ single lapse, hence we attach this to enable critics to consult.
Respectfully revised and submitted, sixth month of the forty-second year of Qiánlóng [1777].
General Compilers: Jǐ Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. General Reviser: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.
Abstract
The Zhōuguān lùtián kǎo is the principal Qīng-evidential response to the long-running Sòng-onward objection that the Zhōuguān describes a structurally impossible administrative establishment (too many officials, too little land). Shěn Tóng’s three-chapter reconstruction — Guānjué shù, Gōngtián shù, Lùtián shù — works through the figures of office-count, public-field, and stipend-field with a quantitative-evidential rigour exceeding ZhèngJiǎ. The Sìkù tíyào characterises the work as “settling a millennium of doubt” on the substantive question, even while detailing several specific errors (Shěn’s denial of zhōngshì in zǐnán states; his fixed maxima for additional-fields; his mis-citation of the Hàn shū Xíngfǎ zhì; his perpetuation of Sòng-period speculation about Suìrén shífū as jǐngtián).
The work belongs to the eighteenth-century Wúpài evidential tradition that produced Huì Shìqí’s KR1d0022 Lǐ shuō and Jiāng Yǒng’s KR1d0024 Zhōulǐ yíyì jǔyào. Shěn’s distinctive contribution is the application of the evidential method to the specific quantitative question of the Zhōuguān’s administrative-economic feasibility — a topic that HànSòng scholarship had largely treated through general argument rather than computation.
The dating “1730–1752” brackets Shěn’s mature evidential career through his death.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located. The work is treated in surveys of Qīng evidential scholarship and in literature on the Wú-pài Hàn school.
Other points of interest
The Sìkù editors’ calculation that “1,000,000 jǐng − 360,000 jǐng = 9/25 removed (not 1/3)” is one of the more specific quantitative-evidential corrections in the Sānlǐ section of the Sìkù tíyào and a clear instance of the editors’ willingness to pursue Shěn Tóng’s own evidential method against him on points where his arithmetic is wrong. The detailed explanation of why Zhèng Xuán’s two-zone (suburb / suì-beyond) land-removal-rate scheme is internally consistent — and why Shěn’s flat 1/3 rate is therefore mistaken — is a model of Qiánlóng-era evidential argumentation.
Links
- Chinaknowledge: http://www.chinaknowledge.de/Literature/Classics/zhouli.html