Multicultural China in the Early Middle Ages. Sanping Chen

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СКАЧАТЬ his brothers. In fact, Li Shimin set up an “academy” in his official residence to patronize classical literature and scholarship as early as 621, while the regime was not yet solidified (ZZTJ 189.5931-32). One has to admit that Li Shimin had remarkable political foresight and long-term planning in the struggle for succession.

      The situation is perhaps best enlightened by the aforementioned quote of Emperor Gaozu when Li Shimin began to show his independence. It not only indicated the Li clan's ethnic self-identity as discussed earlier but also the notion that Li Shimin's political aspirations were prompted partly by his sinicization—being “taught by educated Hàn.”

      The case of Prince Chengqian can be studied then in the same context. The hapless Prince was known to have frequently “ignored his learning,” whereas his main rival Li Tai was a diligent student and, following in the footsteps of his father, set up a literary “academy” to patronize classical scholarship; his courtyard was then “as crowded as a marketplace.” In the spring of 642, he even presented the court with a major work authored under his sponsorship (ZZTJ 195.6150, 196.6174). On the other hand, his reported love of hunting and war games aside, there were two interesting episodes indicative of his attitude toward the most important national affair in the Central Kingdom—agriculture. First, he was accused of having “interrupted farming” (ZZTJ 196.6168). Second, he was credited with saving the life of an attendant of the imperial manor from Emperor Taizong's order of execution (Tang huiyao 4.44). The incident demonstrated Chengqian's quality of decency, something the official history was reluctant to show. The attendant's alleged offense was, interestingly, that he had been ignoring the maintenance of the garden. It should also be noted that, judging by his surname Mu, this hapless attendant was undoubtedly of Xianbei descent.⁷⁰

      Proceeding from the cases I have reviewed here, a general rule in the succession struggle can be summarized as follows. The elder sons, Prince Yong, Prince Jiancheng, and Prince Chengqian (and the Tuoba Prince Xun in some sense), tended to be upstaged by their more “cultured” and more “sinicized” younger brothers, Emperor Yangdi, Emperor Taizong, and Prince Tai respectively.

      One may find interesting parallels elsewhere. For instance, there were several cases of elder and more militaristic sons being passed over for succession in the Turco-Iranian realm, which has puzzled early Muslim and later authors.⁷¹ Bosworth has suggested they be a reminiscence of the Steppe custom of ultimogeniture. However, as many Mongologists have pointed out, the Mongol practice of ochigin, a term with a Turkic origin, regarding the inheritance of property might not necessarily apply to political power (khanship). In the Särbo-Chinese connection, the cultural aspect of these cases would also seem an interesting topic. One notes that, among the Ghaznavids for example, in contrast to the militarist elder brother Mas'ud, the younger brother Muhammad's tastes “were predominately literary and studious.”⁷²

      The paradox back in the Central Kingdom is that what these more sinicized younger sons had to overcome was the very Chinese primogeniture succession principle. Among other things, it created an acute dilemma for Hàn ministers and officials in taking sides. The famous courtier Wei Zheng is a good example. This deep self-conflict could be observed throughout Wei's life, on which most biographies, including Howard Wechsler's fine study, fail to elaborate. Wei Zheng was noted for his loyalty to Emperor Gaozu's original heir apparent, Prince Jiancheng. As shown by an interesting episode in Jiu Tang shu (71.2559), he was still quite unwavering on the dizhang primogeniture succession rule after many years of service under Emperor Taizong, whose ascension to the throne represented a breach of this very principle.

      This politico-cultural aspect of Turco-Mongol conquest regimes, namely enhancing their legitimacy by patronizing the “native” culture and religion at the expense of their own ethnic heritage, was also amply demonstrated by, inter alia, almost all Turkic dominions in the Middle East, at least up to the fourteenth century, as observed by Richard Frye and Aydin Sayili.⁷³ A similar endeavor would be observed in the Qing's succession struggles, exemplified by the miserable end of both Chen Menglei, the compiler of the voluminous Gujin tushu jicheng (Complete Collection of Literature from Ancient Times to Present Day), and his immediate royal patron.⁷⁴

      However, if the sinicization or patronage of Hàn culture represented the political dimension of the blood tanistry struggle, then the military dimension was equally if not more important. For the support of the imperial guards who would actually carry out the dirty and often bloody job, the military aptitude and valor of the contender were also crucial, as attested by the cases of Emperor Yangdi of the Sui and the Tang emperors Taizong and Xuanzong. Failure in the military aspect and/or an overkill in sinicization would lead to disastrous results for the contenders, best shown by the case of Prince Tai, whose maneuver led to the downfall of the Crown Prince Chengqian but fell short of Tai's ultimate objective of replacing him. One can note similar effort in patronizing traditional Chinese scholarship by Emperor Gaozong's heir apparent, Li Xian, whose famed annotation of Hou Hàn shu (History of the Later Hàn) has since become an integral part of that dynastic history. Li Xian's scholarly pursuits, obviously for enhancing his status in the face of his mother Wu Zetian's blatant political challenge to him and the entrenched Hàn patriarchy tradition, proved counterproductive too.

      The strong opposition to Prince Li Tai as a replacement for Prince Chengqian also suggests in my view the existence of a political force at the Tang court that was not sympathetic to Tai's overt sinicizing tendency. This, among other things, shows that sinicization was a complex and slow process and was not always oneway. Few authors have noted that the choice of the new crown prince Li Zhi, later Emperor Gaozong, represented a political compromise in this ethnico-cultural context. It can be clearly seen from the fact that Li Zhi was close to Li Yuanchang, a follower of Prince Chengqian in the Li clan, and Zhangsun Wuji was once a friend of Hou Junji, another important member of the Chengqian clique (ZZTJ 197.6195 and Quan Tang wen 161.1645). Sun Guodong has pointed out that Zhangsun Wuji, Li Zhi's decisive backer, was not a man of letters, while three major supporters of Prince Wei, namely Liu Ji, Cen Wenben, and Cui Renshi, all were, and all had rather miserable ends.⁷⁵ Indeed, Zhangsun Wuji carried the Tuoba Xianbei legacy both by descent and in deeds. Instead of being stripped off by the “basically sinified” former tribesmen as David Honey has argued, the “Barbarian” felt hat that Zhangsun Wuji wore soon set the fashion and was later labeled by the Confucian historians as “devilish” as quoted earlier, another indication that Prince Chengqian's alleged neurosis was hardly an anomaly in the ruling aristocracy.

      However, the best evidence that this choice was a compromise in the context of sinicization was Prince Li Zhi himself. In addition to ordering Türk companions for his sons as mentioned earlier, he proved himself the ultimate Northern boy by marrying his father's wife as well as allowing her to dominate the court.

       The Issue of Legitimacy and the Role of Religion

      The issue of sinicization (or patronage of native cultures in the general Turco-Mongol political sphere) as the political arm of the blood tanistry struggle leads to the issue of political legitimacy of the Turco-Xianbei regimes, including the Sui and the (early) Tang, in China.

      In his resourceful and often stimulating book on China's frontiers, Thomas Barfield contends that as a universal rule the Steppe nomadic regimes were not interested in settling in and taking over the Chinese heartland.⁷⁶ However, this principle would seem at times dependent on disavowing the Steppe identity of the nomads as soon as they crossed to the south of the Great Wall, for they would soon develop a strong interest afterward in doing exactly that. The Tuobas might have originated in the Xing'an Mountains, but the strong Turkic elements, both linguistic (see the Appendix of this book) and political, in them and their successors were hard to ignore. The Turco-Xianbei rulers in northern China certainly did not show great hesitation in aspiring to become true sons of heaven for all those under heaven. As mentioned earlier, the Tuoba Wei's wholesale sinification and transfer of its capital were viewed by many as prompted by such an aim. It is remarkable that СКАЧАТЬ