Zhòngcháng Tǒng 仲長統 (180–220, zì Gōnglǐ 公理) was a late Eastern-Hàn / Wèi political philosopher and essayist, native of Gāopíng 高平 in Shānyáng 山陽 commandery (modern Shāndōng). He served briefly as a Jiànglù shàngshūláng 尚書郎 under Cáo Cāo 曹操 and was patronized by Xún Yù 荀彧. His chief surviving work is the Chānglùn 昌言 (Frank Words), preserved in fragments in Hòu Hàn shū 後漢書 (j. 49) and Yán Kějūn’s 嚴可均 Quán Hòu Hàn wén 全後漢文 — a vehement critique of Eastern-Hàn aristocratic government, calling for stricter penal law, equal-field land redistribution, and a return to fēngjiàn 封建 enfeoffment as a check on bureaucratic over-centralization. The Hòu Hàn shū biography portrays him as eccentric (狂生 kuángshēng) and indifferent to office. He is conventionally credited with the preface to the present Yǐnwénzǐ 尹文子 (KR3j0004), although the Sìkù editors note that his death in 220 is hard to reconcile with the preface’s date “end of Huángchū 黃初” (i.e. c. 226), suggesting the preface may be a WèiJìn forgery in his name. He is not in CBDB.