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新书: The Ming World

The Significance of the Ming in Chinese History

Kenneth Swope, editor of The Ming World, explains the importance of the Ming Dynasty within Chinese history, shaping much of the culture and developments that we know today.

The Ming Dynasty is important for a variety of reasons. First, it was the last native ruling house in imperial Chinese history, sandwiched between the Mongol Yuan (1279-1368) and Manchu Qing (1644-1912) dynasties. As such its governmental institutions and cultural developments represented a maturation of processes initiated in the Qin (220-206 BC) period, most notably the refinement of the civil service examination system to select officials for government service, which included civil and military components in the Ming period. The names and boundaries of many of the provinces of modern China were fixed during the Ming as well.

Additionally, many architectural marvels that modern people consider quintessentially Chinese, such as the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, and the Temple of Heaven, date from the Ming period. It was a golden age of Chinese literature as well, with famous novels such as The Journey to the West, The Golden Lotus, The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and The Water Margin all having been produced in the Ming. Indeed, it is widely accepted that Ming China was the most literate society in the world at the time and scholars estimate that there were more books in Ming China in the early seventeenth century than in the rest of the world combined. Ming achievements extended to other areas of the arts as well. Ming blue and white pottery became so widely desired that black markets producing knock off wares flourished in Southeast Asia. Ming silks were exported around the world and Ming clothing styles influenced its neighbors, especially Korea. The Ming tributary system of foreign relations was a brilliantly flexible way of facilitating diplomatic relations and cultural exchanges that also provided international political stability unrealized in the rest of the world.

With respect to technological achievements, the early Ming naval expeditions under the eunuch Admiral Zheng He featured massive “treasure boats” that dwarfed the vessels that sailed under Columbus nearly a century later and they served to extend Ming power and cultural influence throughout South and Southeast Asia and all the way to Africa and the Middle East. The Ming was also the world’s first “Gunpowder Empire” and it pioneered the creation of dedicated firearms training divisions for its military. Ming military technology was disseminated throughout Asia in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Achievements in mass production of items such as steel weapons and porcelains were not exceeded elsewhere until the Industrial Revolution.

Taken as a whole these achievements and others render the moniker “Empire of Great Brightness,” which is the literal translation of “Ming,” especially fitting.

出版信息

  • The Ming World: 1st Edition (Hardback) book cover

    The Ming World

    1st Edition

    Edited by Kenneth M Swope

    Hardback – 2019-08-30 
    Routledge
    Routledge Worlds

    目录

    Introduction;

    Part One: Institutions;

    Chapter One: Mapping the Background: The Uncertain Influence of the Ming State and Imperial Leadership by Thomas Nimick;

    Chapter Two: Nanjing’s Longjiang Shipyard Treatise and Our Knowledge of Ming Ships by Sally Church;

    Chapter Three: How Yongle Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Gun: Perspectives on Early Ming Military History by Tonio Andrade;

    Chapter Four: The Paradoxical Effect of Autocracy: Collective Deliberation in the Ming Official Merit-Evaluation System by Yang Wei;

    Chapter Five: Deserts and Islands: Politics and Border Control, 1547-49 by Roland Higgins;

    Part Two: Ideas;

    Chapter Six: Cartography in the Ming by Ken Hammond;

    Chapter Seven: Gender & Religion in the Ming by Ann Waltner;

    Chapter Eight: Adopting an Orphan: Theater and Urban Culture in Ming China by Yuming He;

    Chapter Nine: Theater and Society in the Ming World by Hsiao Li-ling;

    Part Three: Identities;

    Chapter Ten: The Han-ness of Ming China by Leo Shin;

    Chapter Eleven: The Hall of Supreme Harmony as Simulacrum of Ming Dynasty Construction by Aurelia Campbell;

    Chapter Twelve: The Confucian Ideal Friend by Ying Zhang;

    Chapter Thirteen: The Lineage Organization in Ming China: A Case Study of Haining by Ivy Lim;

    Chapter Fourteen: Soaring Dragon Amid Dynastic Transition: Dates and Legitimacy among the Post-Ming Chinese Diaspora by Xing Hang;

    Part Four: Individuals;

    Chapter Fifteen: The Legend of Tang Saier by Kenneth M. Swope;

    Chapter Sixteen: Wang Yangming in Chuzhou and Nanjing, 1513-1516: “I Have only two words to say: “Be Truthful!”’ by Larry Israel;

    Chapter Seventeen: Zhang Dai’s Musical Life by Joseph Lam;

    Chapter Eighteen: The Making of an Empress in Life and Death: Empresses Xiaoduan’s and Xiaojing’s Burial Goods in the Ding Mausoleum by Yu-ping Luk;

    Chapter Nineteen: From Peasant Rebel to Loyalist: The Career of Li Dingguo by Kenneth M. Swope;

    Part Five: Interactions;

    Chapter Twenty: The Ming as a Eurasian Power by Edward L. Farmer;

    Chapter Twenty-one: Contested Histories of Ming Agency in the Java Sea, Straits of Melaka and Bay of Bengal Region by Kenneth R. Hall;

    Chapter Twenty-two: Dai Viet & The Ming World by John K. Whitmore;

    Chapter Twenty-three: Korean Eunuchs as Imperial Envoys: Relations with Chosôn Through the Zhengde Reign by Wang Sixiang;

    Chapter Twenty-four: War and Commerce in the Sino-Korean Borderland of the Late Sixteenth Century by Masato Hasegawa;

    Selected Chinese Character Glossary;

    Bibliography;

    Index

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