Re-understanding of the historical position of the Song Dynasty (the second academic seminar)
Zhu ruixi
(Institute of Ancient Books of Shanghai Normal University, Shanghai 200234)
Journal of Hebei, No.5, 2006
As early as the early 1980s, the author had participated in the compilation of the article "Song Dynasty" in the Historical Volume of China. The last section of this article was devoted to "the historical position of the Song Dynasty", with nearly 900 words, which briefly discussed the position of the Song Dynasty in the history of the world, China and China at that time, and put forward: 1. "The Song Dynasty was a world power at that time" and "its economy and culture were various. Second, the Song Dynasty "belongs to the middle period of feudal society and has not yet produced the seeds of capitalism." With the rapid development of social production, the development level of agriculture, handicrafts and commerce greatly surpassed that of the Tang Dynasty, which became another peak of China's feudal economy after the Warring States, Qin and Han Dynasties. Third, the Song Dynasty was "the smallest dynasty in the history of China." In the competition with the Northern Liao Dynasty, the Song Dynasty was at a disadvantage, which was later occupied by the emerging Jin Dynasty and finally destroyed by the Northern Yuan Dynasty "[1] (P106-107).
In the spring of 2004, the author was invited to undertake the task of rewriting the article Song Dynasty. Because the original "Song Dynasty" has more than 70,000 words, and the new "Song Dynasty" is limited to 1.4 million words, and it is necessary to absorb the research results of historians in the past 20 years. Therefore, in the last section, the historical position of the Song Dynasty is briefly described in less than 120 words:
The Song Dynasty was the Central Plains dynasty with the smallest territory in China's history, but its height in economy, education, science and technology and culture was unprecedented in ancient China. At the same time, it was a world power at that time, and its achievements in economy and other aspects were in the leading position in the world at that time, which made great contributions to human civilization and had far-reaching influence.
Compared with the old "Song" prose, the new "Song" prose absorbs the achievements of the old prose as much as possible, especially the first point of the old prose. However, the new Song has made the following three changes to the old one:
First, the position of the Song Dynasty in the history of China. The old article thinks that the Song Dynasty is a "feudal empire with highly developed economy and culture" and "in the long river of China's historical development, the Song Dynasty belongs to the middle period of feudal society"; "The civilization of the Song Dynasty undoubtedly surpassed that of the Tang Dynasty and became the heyday of the development of feudal culture in China", and so on. This time, the author draws lessons from the research results of China historians in recent years, and thinks that the word "feudalism", which has been popular in academic circles for a long time, is not the original intention of "establishing the country by closing the land" and "establishing the clan by closing the country" in ancient China, but to determine its meaning from the perspective of "five social forms", which is actually a problem left over from the translation and introduction of innovative vocabulary, which is easy to cause confusion. Since the early 1920s, with the spread of international translated words produced by * * * in China, especially in the debate about the social nature of China around 1929, the word "feudalism" was generalized, and the history of Qin, Han, Ming and Qing dynasties that was not "feudal" for more than 2000 years was included in the "feudal era" [2]. On this basis, the new article defines the Song Dynasty as the "Central Plains Dynasty" established by Zhao in ancient China after the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, and points out in the section of "Social Class Structure": "The Song Dynasty formed a new social class structure. From the old social stratum structure such as gentry, landlords, slaves, untouchables, craftsmen and handmaiden before the mid-Tang Dynasty to the new social stratum structure such as bureaucratic landlords, tenants, rural households, hired craftsmen, hired craftsmen, manpower and female envoys in the Song Dynasty. This is a major change in the social class relations in ancient China. It is an adjustment of social production relations, and this change is gradually affirmed by law. " In the "political system" section, it is pointed out: "With the complete disintegration of the old emperor and the butcher regime in the late Tang Dynasty, the centralization of the emperor and the decentralization of officials were established in the Song Dynasty; Centralized and decentralized emperors and bureaucratic political systems. " This has actually pointed out the position of the Song Dynasty in the history of China, that is, a new period of sustainable development after the middle Tang Dynasty.
Second, about the status of Song Dynasty in China at that time. The old article emphasized that the Song Dynasty was at a disadvantage to Liao Dynasty, Jin Dynasty and Meng Yuan in the north. The new clause does not follow this statement. This is because the Northern Song Dynasty and the Liao Dynasty were evenly matched for a long time, especially after Song Zhenzong and the Liao Dynasty entered the "Temple Alliance". Except for the first fifteen years of Song Gaozong's rule, that is, for a long time after the "Shaoxing Peace Conference", the strength of the Southern Song Dynasty and the Jin Dynasty was almost equal, and it was hard to say who had the advantage and who had the disadvantage. At the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, that is, the first year of Duanping in Song Lizong (1234), after the allied forces of Song and Mongolia attacked and destroyed the Jin Dynasty, the Mongolian army took the opportunity to attack the Song Dynasty south until the Southern Song Dynasty perished 1279. From the beginning to the end, the Southern Song Dynasty was in a completely inferior position to Meng Yuan's enemies for 45 years, but it resisted tenaciously.
Third, the estimation of social and economic development in Song Dynasty. The old article spoke highly of the social and economic development level of the Song Dynasty, but the new article is slightly different: First, while fully affirming that "the Song Dynasty was a period of rapid social and economic development and made outstanding achievements in agriculture, handicrafts and commerce", it pointed out that the Song Dynasty "completed the shift of the economic center of gravity to the south". Second, while affirming the social and economic development in the Song Dynasty, it also pointed out that "it also caused certain damage to the ecological environment". Specifically, since the Northern Song Dynasty, "the forest vegetation in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River and its tributaries Wei and Luo continued to be destroyed." By the middle of the Northern Song Dynasty, all the pine forests between Qi and Lu had been cut down, and most of Taihang Mountain and Songshan Mountain in the west and south of Beijing had lost vegetation. "Serious soil erosion on both sides of the Yellow River causes the Yellow River to burst or divert once a year on average. Overexploitation of terraced fields is also at the expense of destroying forests in hilly areas. Overfilling of polder fields in the south has led to the disappearance of many lakes and frequent floods and droughts in surrounding areas. " "All these have left irreversible hidden dangers for social economy and the sustainable development of future generations."
In a word, the author believes that historians of all dynasties, including the author, only paid attention to the "rapid development" when evaluating the historical position of the Song Dynasty at that time, but ignored the high price paid by these "developments", which caused some damage to the ecological environment and left many hidden dangers for future sustainable development and future generations. As far as the status of China at that time was concerned, previous historians overemphasized that the Northern Song Dynasty was at a disadvantage to the Liao Dynasty and the Southern Song Dynasty was at a disadvantage to the Jin Dynasty. In fact, most of the time, the Northern Song Dynasty was evenly matched with the Liao Dynasty and the Southern Song Dynasty with the Jin Dynasty, and neither side destroyed the other's strength. Regarding the position of the Song Dynasty in the history of China, the old theory of "the middle period of feudal society" is no longer adopted, but "the new period of sustainable development in ancient China" is replaced.