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A simplified biography of Confucius, explaining his teachings about kindness, respect, and learning in easy-to-understand language.

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An ancient Chinese text recorded the height of Confucius as nine feet six inches tall. While that document may have exaggerated his physical size, there's no doubt that Confucius was a teacher and philosopher of tremendous stature. His ideals have become intrinsically entwined with the national identity of China and the civilization of East Asia.

The individual known in the West as Confucius was born Kongqiu in 551 B.C. near Qufu, in eastern China. His family may once have been aristocratic, but they apparently fell on hard times, because he took menial jobs as a young man.

Love of learning

Confucius showed a zeal for academics early on. "At 15, I set my heart on learning," he later told his disciples. He studied music, mathematics, the classics, history, and more. He was especially entranced by the early years of the Zhou dynasty (1046-256 B.C.), a peaceful period he perceived as a golden age to be emulated.

Confucius stressed the cultivation of personal qualities such as benevolence, reciprocity, and filial piety.

Confucius believed that education and reflection led to virtue, and that those who aspired to command others must cultivate discipline and moral authority in themselves. He strove to rise through the government ranks, but he tended to offend others with his forceful personality, using his position as a bully pulpit for preaching good governance. He eventually was appointed to the influential post of minister of crime in the state of Lu but fell from favor through his aggressive reform efforts.

He tried for years to reenter public service in order to improve it from within, but he found far greater success as a teacher instead. Confucius broke with tradition in his belief that all human beings could benefit from education. He espoused lifelong learning "for the sake of the self," meaning self- knowledge and self-improvement. He attracted a wide circle of followers, who knew him as Kongfuzi (Master Kong). Those pupils recorded his words in The Analects, a collection of ethical concepts.

As stated in The Analects, Confucius believed that social harmony would naturally follow from the proper ordering of individuals in relation to
one another, with the family unit as the basic building block of society. He therefore stressed the cultivation of personal qualities such as benevolence, reciprocity, and filial piety as essential to the formation of well-educated, conscientious individuals who would benefit society through public service.

Spreading his wisdom

Confucius was largely ignored in his own day. When he died in 479 B.C., he left behind perhaps 3,000 students, who devoted themselves to preserving and propagating their master's precepts. Confucius's teachings were enthusiastically adopted as Chinese state ideology by the Han dynasty in the second century B.C. The Analects would go on to guide governments and individuals for millennia, informing and influencing Chinese history and civilization in the process.

This text is an excerpt from the National Geographic special issue The Most Influential Figures of Ancient History.

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An ancient Chinese text recorded the height of Confucius as nine feet six inches tall. While that document may have exaggerated his physical size, there's no doubt that Confucius was a teacher and philosopher of tremendous stature. His ideals have become intrinsically entwined with the national identity of China and the civilization of East Asia.

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An interactive article about the Great Wall with simple explanations, colorful images, and fun facts about its construction.

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Travel through time on an exhilarating expedition to China’s most famous landmark!The Great Wall of China is one of the world’s most intriguing, well-known treasures. Spanning 2,700 years and over 13,000 miles long, embark on the fascinating tale of how the Great Wall was built and how it became one…

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Learn about how the Chinese invented paper and printing, changing the world forever. Includes simple diagrams and explanations.

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Courtesy of Boise Cascade Corporation

Long ago the Chinese discovered that a thin, wet layer of tiny, interlocking fibers becomes paper when it dries. For many centuries paper was used mainly for printed works, for writing letters, and for keeping records. Today paper comes in thousands of types and grades and includes paperboard for packing and construction; newsprint; photocopying and printing papers; papers for writing and wrapping; and papers used for countless consumer products. Despite the popularity of computers and the rising costs of papermaking, worldwide demand for paper products remains strong.

Paper, paperboard, and pulp are produced in nearly all countries, though the industrialized nations dominate the market. China and the United States are the leading manufacturers; other major paper-producing countries are Japan and Germany. The annual output of paper mills worldwide totaled more than 400 million metric tons of paper and paperboard in 2011; American consumers used more than 70 million tons of paper and board during the same year.

Part of the future increase in pulp and paper production will depend on the cultivation of fast-growing tree species in warmer climates and on tree plantations where forests are harvested for commercial use. New technologies in paper production should help conserve forest resources and develop even more uses for this versatile product. ( See also conservation; forest and forestry; lumber.)

The first papermaking materials were those used by the Chinese and consisted of fibers from rags, the bark of trees, and plants and grasses such as hemp, bamboo, jute, and straw. Early Europeans and Americans made high-quality writing paper from cotton and linen rags. Fine writing papers are still made partly or entirely from cloth fibers. Paper that contains bamboo, esparto, straw, and squeezed sugarcane (bagasse) is produced mainly in developing countries. ( See also plant; wood.)

Most paper and paper products manufactured today use fibers derived from wood, primarily from conifers-such as spruce, fir, pine, and hemlock-and deciduous trees-including birch, oak, and aspen. In addition to wood fibers, most writing and magazine papers contain between 1 and 30 percent mineral filler, such as calcium carbonate and clay. These materials, which make paper smoother, less absorbent, and more opaque, improve its optical and printing qualities. ( See also printing.)

Pulp can be produced through mechanical or chemical processes. These methods were first discovered in the 19th century.

Mechanical Pulping
Originally, fibers were obtained by forcing logs against a grindstone, which turned 90 percent of a log into pulp. The groundwood pulp was then mixed with rag fibers and made into newsprint. As the process gradually improved, chemical fibers were added to the groundwood. In the 1960s a new method was invented in which wood chips were made into pulp in an attrition mill, known as a disk refiner. Groundwood pulp, however, contains such substances as lignin, which binds the fibers. Chemical processes were developed in the 1800s that dissolved most of these substances. Manufacturers now vary fiber quality in the pulp-making process by controlling temperature and pressure and by using chemical additives. These pulps are called refiner mechanical pulps, thermomechanical pulps, or-when small amounts of chemicals are added-chemical-mechanical pulps.

Chemical Pulping
The use of chemical pulping increases the strength of wood fibers and produces material to make finer-grade papers. Wood chips for the chemical processes are dumped into large digester tanks and cooked with steam in chemical solutions called cooking liquors. Cooking times vary from two to about six hours, depending on the kind of chemicals used and degree of refinement needed. Pulps are named after the processes used to make them.

The kraft process, first discovered in 1874, accounts for 80 percent of the world's chemical pulp production. Kraft (from the German word for strength) uses sodium hydroxide and sodium sulfide in the cooking liquor. This pulping process is carried out in continuous digesters and yields the strongest fiber for paper. Kraft pulping is particularly effective for some pines that, because they contain resins, waxes, and fats, resist other pulping methods. Manufacturers can also recycle chemicals and recover much of the heat used in this process, making it highly energy efficient. By using chlorine dioxide, kraft pulps can be bleached in several stages to a high brightness. Several kinds of paper are made from kraft pulping, including bag, boxboard, and-in higher grades-book, magazine, writing, wrapping, and specialty papers.

Other methods of chemical pulping account for the remaining 20 percent of world pulp production. The alkaline-soda process, for example, is used mainly to pulp some hardwoods. Bulky papers such as blotters are made of soda pulp. The neutral-sulfite process is used to pulp some hardwoods and softwoods. The cooking liquor is sodium sulfite and is either entirely neutral or slightly alkaline.

In between the mechanical-process and fully cooked chemical pulps are pulps produced by varying the amount of chemical and mechanical treatment. Usually the same chemicals are used as those found in chemical pulping liquors but under more dilute conditions. Sodium hydroxide, sodium sulfite, or sodium sulfide are the most commonly used chemicals. The particular chemical included in the liquor depends on the wood species and the paper product required. Because this process does not completely dissolve undesired substances in the pulp, chemimechanical pulps require more mechanical treatment before they can be used. Chemimechanical pulps are made into lower-grade wrapping, book, and bond papers.

Final Pulping Operations
Additional refining steps include many washings; screening out bits of knots, sand, and other foreign matter; bleaching with chemicals; and beating ( see bleaching). These steps require huge amounts of clean water, so most pulp and paper mills are built close to a large water supply.

Bleaching removes the residual lignin and brightens the pulp. For environmental reasons some of the chlorine chemicals are being replaced by oxygen and peroxide. Mechanical pulps are also bleached with peroxide and hydrosulfites so they can be used to make higher-grade products.

Finally, the pulp must be conditioned-a step known as beating, or refining. The pulp, either in liquid form or in thick, almost-dry sheets called laps, is mixed and refined. The fibers are frayed, sheared, and cut so they will cling together when matted.

Chemicals also are added to the pulp at this point. Sizing (resins, starch, or gypsum) strengthens the paper and makes it water-repellent. Loading materials (clay, pigments, and chalk) form a surface coating and make the paper opaque. Fillers and dyes for coloring may also be added to the mixture.

In the last step, the pulp passes through a Jordan, a cone-shaped machine that cuts the fibers to the proper length. The final pulp product, called furnish or stuff, is stored until needed in the head boxes of papermaking machines.

In most countries nearly all paper is made by machines. The most widely used machines are the Fourdrinier and the cylinder.

Fourdrinier Machine
The Fourdrinier, which was invented in France in 1799, can make webs (long sheets) of paper from 5 to 30 feet (1.5 to 9 meters) wide at a speed exceeding 3,300 feet (1,000 meters) per minute. At the wet end-where the process starts-the furnish flows from a head box onto a swift-moving fine wire mesh that traps and mats most of the fibers. Much of the water drains away, and the web is carried on belts of felt through press rolls that squeeze more water from it.

At the dry end of the machine, the web passes over and under a series of heated drying rolls. It then runs through a calender stack where it is pressed smooth by cast-iron rolls and then wound on a reel. Enamel-coated papers can be made on the Fourdrinier by adding kaolin, chalk, or other pigments when the web is partly dried.

Cylinder Machine
A cylinder machine can make many kinds of paper but is particularly adapted to making paperboard, light papers, and tissues. In the cylinder machine, the furnish is picked up by revolving, cloth-covering cylinders that are partly immersed in a vat of furnish.

The web is deposited on a screen, then transferred onto felt conveyors that carry it to press and drying rolls. Paperboard is made by laying one or more still-moist webs on top of another and pressing the different layers together. Thin sheets and tissues are made from the web of a single cylinder.

Weights and Sizes of Paper
The weight of a paper is determined by weighing several sheets of paper of uniform size. In the United States printing papers are sold in reams of 500 sheets. Ream sizes and weights are based on the old method of papermaking when paper was made in individual sheets and the sheet mold determined the paper's dimensions.

The most common standard sizes today for printing and writing papers, given in inches, are as follows: writing-17 × 22; book-25 × 38; cover-20 × 26; cardboard-22 × 28. If a ream of 8 ¹/ ₂  × 11 writing paper is marked 20-pound bond, it means that the paper was cut from the original 17 × 22 sheets, which weighed 20 pounds per ream.

Courtesy of Boise Cascade Corporation

Paper can be classified on the basis of use and weight into two general categories: printing grades and industrial grades.

Printing Grades
Printing grades are newsprint and catalog, rotogravure, and magazine papers made from mechanical and thermomechanical pulps. They often contain from 1 to 15 percent chemical pulps. Most of the mechanical pulp is unbleached, though bleached pulps are used. Magazine papers frequently are coated on one or both sides with clay or calcium carbonate. These papers are used for such printed items as business reports, advertising brochures, and quality magazines in which the quality of color reproduction is of great concern. ( See also printing.)

Another class of printing papers includes stationery and copying and computer papers. These are made from bleached softwood and hardwood pulps. Fillers, either clay or calcium carbonate, are added to the furnish to improve the printing quality of their surfaces. More expensive grades often contain cotton, linen, or other rag fibers.

Book paper is made from a variety of furnishes. Paperback books are printed on papers containing mechanical pulp, which deteriorates rapidly when exposed to light and heat. Papers for softcover or hardcover books can be long lasting if they are made from fully bleached fibers and sized under alkaline conditions. Hardcover books are made with less acidic pulps, and finer-quality book paper contains rag fibers. ( See also book and bookmaking.)

Industrial Grades
Industrial grades include bag paper, linerboard, corrugated cardboard, and papers used in consumer products. Bag paper and glassine (dense transparent or semitransparent) paper are gradually being replaced by plastic materials. Production of other industrial paper grades is increasing, however, particularly for boxes and construction use and for such consumer products as tissues, diapers, and food packaging.

In addition to its commercial uses, paper is a versatile material for handicrafts. In about 1500 in Europe decorative papers were used as the first examples of modern wallpaper. The introduction of block printing in the 17th century greatly improved the quality of these papers ( see wall covering).

Developed first in the Orient, papier-mâché (French for "chewed paper") is another paper craft widely practiced today. When paper is soaked in water and mixed with glue, paste, or other such materials, it can be formed into different shapes that harden when the water is removed. An inexpensive material, papier-mâché is used in making theater props and sets, toys, and masks, and in various art and craft projects.

Sipho Mabona; animation by Stoptrick Hamburg

One of the most beautiful paper handicrafts is origami (Japanese for "paper folding"). Developed in Japan, origami is the art of creating objects by folding a sheet of paper in precise steps. The created forms range from simple figures to complex designs complete with moving parts. Originally used for ceremonial purposes, origami today is a handicraft enjoyed worldwide. It has been especially popular as an art form and a hobby in Spain and Latin America.

In most industrialized countries recycled paper provides a significant part of the fiber supply. Besides conserving forest resources, recycling produces fewer pollutants than do conventional pulping and bleaching processes. Recycling begins with the classification of waste paper. Relatively clean wastes such as box and corrugated paper and medium or high-grade office papers require little treatment. The paper is made into pulp mechanically in hot water under alkaline conditions. After a number of screening and washing operations, the fiber is ready for reuse.

Lower grades of wastepaper must be cleaned more thoroughly during fiber disintegration and screening in order to remove contaminants. Pulp from wastepaper may be bleached to improve its quality.

Newsprint, magazine, and other printed materials require special chemical cleaning processes to remove the ink. The dispersed ink particles are removed by extensive washing over screens or through a flotation process. Chemicals and air are added to the dispersed pulp in a specially designed flotation cell. The lighter ink particles rise to the surface of the pulp slurry and are skimmed off.

Paper gets its name from the Egyptian papyrus plant, used to make paperlike sheets as early as 2300 bc ( see papyrus plant). The Chinese, before discovering how to make paper, wrote on tablets of silk or bamboo. Europeans recorded documents on the skins of calves, lambs, sheep, and goats.

The Arabs learned the secret of papermaking from the Chinese and introduced paper to Europe in the 12th century ad. Europeans soon developed their own papermaking methods. The first European paper mill was built in 1270 in Fabriano, Italy, a town whose artisans later introduced many improvements to the craft. William Rittenhouse established the first North American paper mill in Germantown, Pennsylvania, in 1690.

The introduction of the practical application of book printing by Johannes Gutenberg in Germany by 1450 greatly increased the need for a steady supply of printing paper. The heightened demand led to the invention of the first papermaking machine, an early version of the Fourdrinier, by French inventor Nicholas-Louis Robert in 1798. A successful version of the Fourdrinier machine appeared in 1812.

In 1809 the Englishman John Dickinson invented the cylinder machine. The first cylinder machine in the United States was put into operation in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1817. By the beginning of the American Civil War, there were over 500 papermaking companies in the United States producing 60,000 tons of paper each year.

The increasing demand for paper put a heavy drain on rag supplies and sparked a search for other raw materials. In 1840 Friedrich Keller, a German, was the first to find a commercially practicable way to produce paper from wood through mechanical grinding. Wood pulp, combined with some rag fibers, produced newsprint. Although two chemical processes-soda and sulfite-were developed in the mid-1800s, chemical pulping was not used widely for some time.

Today efforts continue to find new raw materials and to improve papermaking methods. Logs and parts of logs unsuitable for sawing into lumber, formerly discarded as waste, are being converted into paper. The latest innovation in papermaking machines has been the introduction of two-wire machines. The pulp slurry is forced between two meshes of wire, and water is removed from both sides of the paper. This innovation not only speeds up the papermaking process, it also improves the quality of paper produced.

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Long ago the Chinese discovered that a thin, wet layer of tiny, interlocking fibers becomes paper when it dries. For many centuries paper was used mainly for printed works, for writing letters, and for keeping records.

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The story of the famous Chinese explorer Zheng He and his massive treasure ships that sailed across the oceans.

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Zheng set sail on his first mission in 1405. He commanded 62 ships and more than 27,000 men. They visited what are now Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, and Sri Lanka. They returned to China in 1407.

On the second voyage, in 1408-09, Zheng visited Calicut (in India) again. In 1409 he set out on his third mission. This time he sailed beyond the seaports of India and reached Hormuz, an island off the coast of Persia (now Iran). On the way back to China in 1411, Zheng touched at the northern tip of Sumatra (an island of Indonesia).

The fourth mission began in 1413. The fleet cruised along the coast of the Arabian Peninsula, visiting Oman, Yemen, Mecca, and Egypt. It continued along the east coast of Africa to what are now Somalia and Kenya and almost reached Mozambique. Zheng returned to China in 1415. He brought representatives from more than 30 states to pay homage to the emperor.

Zheng set off on his fifth voyage in 1417. He revisited the Arabian Peninsula and the east coast of Africa. The sixth voyage was launched in 1421 to return the foreign representatives to their homes. In 1431 Zheng sailed on his seventh and final voyage. He again visited Southeast Asia, the coast of India, the Arabian Peninsula, and the east coast of Africa. He died in Calicut in 1433.

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Zheng set sail on his first mission in 1405. He commanded 62 ships and more than 27,000 men. They visited what are now Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, and Sri Lanka. They returned to China in 1407. On the second voyage, in 1408-09, Zheng visited Calicut (in India) again.

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A colorful introduction to the famous trading route that connected China with the rest of the world.

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“The Silk Road cut across borders - and broke down the borders in our minds,” says Dr Sam Willis, pictured. In a new three-part series for BBC Four, the historian and writer traces the story of the most famous trade route in history.

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Simple explanations of traditional Chinese medicine, including acupuncture and herbal treatments.

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In terms of the sheer number and the ingenuity of their inventions, no other past civilization comes close to the accomplishments of ancient China; for kids curious about the birthplace of noodles and the home of the Great Wall, this issue spares no…

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Discover the amazing army of clay soldiers buried with China's first emperor, with stunning photographs.

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China's Terracotta Warriors | Nat Geo Kids Archaeology Playlist

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Learn about the Chinese lunar calendar and the twelve animals of the zodiac in this engaging article.

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CBeebies | Chinese New Year (Lunar New Year) | Zodiac Story

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A child-friendly explanation of the major earthquake that affected millions of people in China.

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Sichuan earthquake of 2008, also called Wenchuan earthquake or Great Wenchuan Earthquake, Chinese Wenchuan dizhen or Wenchuan Da Dizhen, massive and enormously devastating earthquake that occurred in the mountainous central region of Sichuan province in southwestern China on May 12, 2008. The epicentre of the magnitude-7.9 quake (measured as magnitude 8.0 by the Chinese) was located near the city of Dujiangyan, about 50 miles (80 km) west-northwest of Chengdu, the provincial capital, at a depth of 11.8 miles (19 km) below the surface.

The quake was caused by the collision of the Indian-Australian and Eurasian plates along the 155-mile- (249-km-) long Longmenshan Fault, a thrust fault in which the stresses produced by the northward-moving Indian-Australian plate shifted a portion of the Plateau of Tibet eastward. Compressional forces brought on by this shift sheared the ground in two locations along the fault, thrusting the ground upward by approximately 29 feet (about 9 metres) in some places. Numerous aftershocks occurred in the days, months, and years that followed, including a magnitude-5.0 event that struck Chengdu in May 2010. The Longmenshan Fault runs southwest to northeast along the eastern side of the Longmen Mountains (Longmen Shan) and separates the Plateau of Tibet from the flat Sichuan Basin.

The May 2008 quake flattened some four-fifths of the structures in the affected area. Whole villages and towns in the mountains were destroyed, and many schools collapsed. Almost 90,000 people were counted as dead or missing and presumed dead in the final official Chinese government assessment; the officially reported total killed included more than 5,300 children, the bulk of them students attending classes. In addition, nearly 375,000 people were injured by falling debris and building collapses. Hundreds of dams, including two major ones, were found to have sustained damage. Some 200 relief workers were reported to have died in mudslides in the affected area, where damming of rivers and lakes by rocks, mud, and earthquake debris made flooding a major threat until workers could open channels to drain the impounded water.

China's government quickly deployed 130,000 soldiers and other relief workers to the stricken area, but the damage from the earthquake made many remote villages difficult to reach, and the lack of modern rescue equipment caused delays that might have contributed to the number of deaths. After a few days China asked for outside help. One week after the temblor, China declared three days of official mourning for the earthquake victims.

Millions of people were made homeless by the quake, the cost of which was estimated at $86 billion. Repair and rebuilding of housing and infrastructure in the affected areas were soon under way, though progress was slow in the remoter locations. Strong quakes again shook the region in August and September 2008, though they caused considerably less destruction and loss of life.

Several issues emerged in the aftermath of the disaster. One concerned a debate in the scientific community as to whether the large weight of water impounded by a reservoir situated near the epicentre of the quake could have helped trigger the temblor. Also, there was much discussion regarding allegations that shoddy construction was to blame for the catastrophic collapse of so many school buildings in the affected areas. Many questioned the official death toll given for children, stating that it was too low.

A magnitude-6.6 earthquake struck the region nearly five years later, on April 20, 2013. The epicentre of that quake was also located on the Longmenshan Fault, about 53 miles (85 km) south-southwest of the epicentre of the 2008 event and some 19 miles (30 km) north-northeast of the city of Ya'an. More than 200 people died and at least 13,000 were injured from falling debris and structural collapses caused by the quake.

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Sichuan earthquake of 2008 | Overview, Damage, & Facts

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Sichuan earthquake of 2008, massive and enormously devastating earthquake that occurred in the central region of Sichuan, China. Almost 90,000 people were counted as dead or missing and presumed dead in the final Chinese government assessment, with nearly 375,000 injured by falling debris and building collapses.

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Simple explanations about one of the world's largest dams and how it generates electricity for China.

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An introduction to the ancient philosopher Lao Tzu and his simple teachings about living in harmony.

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Taoism is an ancient Chinese philosophy and religion that instructs believers on how to exist in harmony with the universe.

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Explore the history and traditions of Chinese New Year celebrations around the world.

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Chinese New Year traditions: Things to Do | Hong Kong Tourism Board

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From visiting temples to having festive feasts with the whole family, get to know these Chinese New Year customs and etiquette for a prosperous year ahead.

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A virtual tour of Beijing's Forbidden City with simple explanations of its history and architecture.

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Virtual Tour of the Forbidden City - The China Guide

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Forbidden City - Scene 1: Corner tower, city wall, and moat

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Learn about the history of tea in China and how it became popular around the world.

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Smithsonian's National Museum of Asian Art

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Tea Culture in China - Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art

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Discover how scientists and conservationists have worked to save China's beloved giant pandas.

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Explore the life of the ancient Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu and his influential book on strategy and leadership.

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The Art of War (Sunzi bingfa) is a 5th-century BCE military treatise written by the Chinese strategist Sun-Tzu (aka Sunzi or Sun Wu). Covering all aspects of warfare, it seeks to advise commanders on…

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Li Qingzhao: China's Greatest Female Poet

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Li Qingzhao: China's Greatest Female Poet

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Learn about the Song Dynasty poet who revolutionized Chinese literature with her emotional and personal poetry.

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Discover how ancient Chinese engineers built the world's longest man-made waterway, connecting northern and southern China.

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Grand Canal

Literal meaning

"Great Transport River"

The Grand Canal, known to the Chinese as the Jing-Hang Grand Canal ( simplified Chinese: 京杭大运河; traditional Chinese: 京杭大運河; pinyin: Jīng-Háng Dà Yùnhé ; 'Capital-Hangzhou Grand Canal', or more commonly, as the「大运河」("Grand Canal")), a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is the longest canal or artificial river in the world. Starting in Beijing, it passes through Tianjin and the provinces of Hebei, Shandong, Jiangsu, and Zhejiang to the city of Hangzhou, linking the Yellow River and Yangtze River. The oldest parts of the canal date back to the 5th century BC, but the various sections were first connected during the Sui dynasty (581-618 AD). Dynasties in 1271-1633 significantly restored and rebuilt the canal and altered its route to supply their capital. The Grand Canal played a major role in reunifying north and south China. The canal was built by conscripted laborers and connected the Yellow River in the north with the Yangtze River in the south, which made it much easier to transport grain from the south to the centers of political and military power in north China.

The total length of the Grand Canal is 1,776 km (1,104 mi). Its greatest height is reached in the mountains of Shandong, at a summit of 42 m (138 ft). Ships in Chinese canals did not have trouble reaching higher elevations after the pound lock was invented in the 10th century, during the Song dynasty (960-1279), by the government official and engineer Qiao Weiyue. The canal has been admired by many throughout history including Japanese monk Ennin (794-864), Persian historian Rashid al-Din (1247-1318), Korean official Choe Bu (1454-1504), and Italian missionary Matteo Ricci (1552-1610).

Historically, periodic flooding of the Yellow River threatened the safety and functioning of the canal. During wartime, the high dikes of the Yellow River were sometimes deliberately broken in order to flood and thus sweep away advancing enemy troops. This would cause disaster and prolonged economic hardships for local residents. Despite temporary periods of desolation and disuse, the Grand Canal furthered an indigenous and growing economic market in China's urban centers from the Sui period onwards to the present. It has allowed faster trading and has thus improved China's economy. The portion south of the Yellow River remains in heavy use by barges carrying bulk materials and containers.

In the late Spring and Autumn period, Fuchai, King of the State of Wu (whose capital was in present-day Suzhou), ventured north to attack the State of Qi. He ordered a canal to be constructed for trading purposes, as well as a means to ship ample supplies north in case his forces should engage the northern states of Song and Lu. This became known as the Han or Hangou Canal Hángōu). Work began in 486 BCE, from south of Yangzhou to north of Huai'an in Jiangsu, and within three years the Han Canal had connected the Yangtze with the Huai River utilizing existing waterways, lakes, and marshes.

The Han Canal is known as the second oldest section of the later Grand Canal since the Hong Canal ( Hónggōu, "Canal of the Wild Geese" or "Far-Flung Canal") most likely preceded it. It linked the Yellow River near Kaifeng to the Si and Bian rivers and became the model for the shape of the Grand Canal in the north. The exact date of the Hong Canal's construction is uncertain; it is first mentioned by the diplomat Su Qin in 330 BCE when discussing state boundaries. The historian Sima Qian (145-90 BCE) knew of no historical date for it, placing his discussion of it just after the legendary works of Yu the Great; modern scholars now consider it to belong to the 6th century BCE.

The sections of the Grand Canal today in Zhejiang and southern Jiangsu provinces were in large part a creation of the Sui dynasty (581-618), a result of the migration of China's core economic and agricultural region away from the Yellow River valley in the north and toward the southern provinces. Its main role throughout its history was the transport of grain to the capital. The institution of the Grand Canal by the Qin dynasty and the Sui dynasty, mostly the Sui, also obviated the need for the army to become self-sufficient farmers while posted at the northern frontier, as food supplies could now easily be shipped from south to north over the pass.

By the year 600, there were major buildups of silt on the bottom of the Hong Canal, obstructing river barges whose drafts were too deep for its waters. The chief engineer of the Sui dynasty, Yuwen Kai, advised the dredging of a new canal that would run parallel to the existing canal, diverging from it at Chenliu ( Yanzhou). The new canal was to pass not Xuzhou but Suzhou, to avoid connecting with the Si River, and instead make a direct connection with the Huai River just west of Lake Hongze. With the recorded labor of five million people under the supervision of Ma Shumou, the first major section of the Grand Canal was completed in the year 605-called the Bian Qu. The Grand Canal was fully completed under the second Sui emperor, from the years 604 to 609, first by linking Luoyang to the Yangzhou (and the Yangtze valley), then expanding it to Hangzhou (south), and Beijing (north). This allowed the southern area to provide grain to the northern province, particularly to troops stationed there. Running alongside and parallel to the canal was an imperial roadway and post offices supporting a courier system. The government also planted an enormous line of trees. The history of the canal's construction is handed down in the book Kaiheji ('Record of the Opening of the Canal').

The earlier dike-building project in 587 along the Yellow River-overseen by engineer Liang Rui-established canal lock gates to regulate water levels for the canal. Double slipways were installed to haul boats over when the difference in water levels were too great for the flash lock to operate.

Between 604 and 609, Emperor Yang of the Sui dynasty ordered several canals to be dug in a 'Y' shape, from Hangzhou in the south to terminate in (modern) Beijing and the capital region along the Yellow River valley. When the canal was completed it linked the systems of the Qiantang River, the Yangtze River, the Huai River, the Yellow River, the Wei River, and the Hai River. Its southern section, running between Hangzhou and the Yangtze, was named the Jiangnan River (the river 'South of the Yangtze'). The canal's central portions stretched from Yangzhou to Luoyang; the section between the Yangtze and the Huai continued to the Shanyang River, and the next section connected the Huai to the Yellow River and was called the Tongji Channel. The northernmost portion, linking Beijing and Luoyang, was named the Yongji Channel. This portion of the canal was used to transport troops to what is now the North Korean border region during the Goguryeo-Sui Wars (598-614). After the canal's completion in 609, Emperor Yang led a recorded 105 km (65 mi) long naval flotilla of boats from the north down to his southern capital at Yangzhou.

The Grand Canal at this time was not a continuous, man-made canal, but a collection of often noncontiguous artificial channels and either canalized or natural rivers.

Although the Tang dynasty (618-907) capital at Chang'an was the most thriving metropolis of China in its day, it was the city of Yangzhou-in proximity to the Grand Canal-that was the economic hub of the Tang era. Besides being the headquarters for the government salt monopoly and the largest pre-modern industrial production center of the empire, Yangzhou was also the geographical midpoint along the north-south trade axis, and so became the major center for southern goods shipped north. One of the greatest benefits of the canal system in the Tang dynasty-and subsequent dynasties-was that it reduced the cost of shipping grain that had been collected in taxes (caoyun) from the Yangtze River Delta to northern China. Minor additions to the canal were made after the Sui period to cut down on travel time, but overall no fundamental differences existed between the Sui Grand Canal and the Tang Grand Canal.

By the year 735, it was recorded that about 149,685,400 kilograms (165,000 short tons) of grain were shipped annually along the canal. The Tang government oversaw canal lock efficiency and built granaries along the route in case a flood or other disaster impeded the path of shipment. To ensure smooth travel of grain shipments, Transport Commissioner Liu Yan (in office from 763 to 779) had special river barge ships designed and constructed to fit the depths of each section of the entire canal.

After the An Shi Rebellion (755-763), the economy of northern China was greatly damaged and never recovered due to wars and to constant flooding of the Yellow River. Such a case occurred in the year 858 when an enormous flood along the Grand Canal inundated thousands of acres of farmland and killed tens of thousands of people in the North China Plain. Such an unfortunate event could reduce the legitimacy of a ruling dynasty by causing others to perceive it as having lost the Mandate of Heaven; this was a good reason for dynastic authorities to maintain a smooth and efficient canal system.

The invention of the water-level-adjusting pound lock in the 10th century was done in response to the necessity of greater safety for the travel of barge ships along the rougher waters of the Grand Canal.

The city of Kaifeng grew to be a major hub, later becoming the capital of the Song dynasty (960-1279). Although the Tang and Song dynasty international seaports-the greatest being Guangzhou and Quanzhou, respectively-and maritime foreign trade brought merchants great fortune, it was the Grand Canal within China that spurred the greatest amount of economic activity and commercial profit. During the Song and earlier periods, barge ships occasionally crashed and wrecked along the Shanyang Yundao section of the Grand Canal while passing the double slipways, and more often than not those were then robbed of the tax grain by local bandits. This prompted Qiao Weiyue, an Assistant Commissioner of Transport for Huainan, to invent a double-gate system known as the pound lock in the year 984. This allowed ships to wait within a gated space while the water could be drained to appropriate levels; the Chinese also built roofed hangars over the space to add further protection for the ships.

Much of the Grand Canal was ruined for several years after 1128 when Kaifeng's governor Du Chong Dù Chōng, d.1141) decided to break the dykes and dams holding back the waters of the Yellow River in order to decimate the oncoming Jurchen invaders during the Jin-Song wars. Over a series of floods, this entirely shifted the river south of Shandong, capturing the course of the Si River and emptying the Yellow River into Hongze Lake and the East China Sea for centuries. The Jurchen Jin dynasty continually battled with the Song in this region. The warfare led to the dilapidation of the canal until the Mongols invaded in the 13th century and began necessary repairs.

During the Mongol Yuan dynasty (1271-1368) the capital of China was moved to Beijing, eliminating the need for the canal arm flowing west to Kaifeng or Luoyang. A summit section was dug across the foothills of the Shandong massif during the 1280s, shortening the overall length by as much as 700 km (430 mi), making the total length about 1,800 km (1,100 mi) and linking Hangzhou and Beijing with a direct north-south waterway for the first time. As in the Song and Jin era, the canal fell into disuse and dilapidation during the Yuan dynasty's decline.

The Grand Canal as infrastructure has had influence on other architectural works in the west. The Erie Canal in North America is designed and draws inspiration from the Chinese architecture. Many saw the canal as an economic advantage that could bring economic prosperity, like the canal and its benefits. Matteo Ricci's Journals describes the canal in great detail documenting the economic prosperity. The pound lock is one of the more notable features of the Erie canal that is directly connected to the infrastructure of the Grand Canal as it is used in other similar bodies of water.

The Yongle Emperor (r. 1402-1424) restored the Grand Canal in the Ming era.

The Grand Canal was renovated almost in its entirety between 1411 and 1415 during the Ming dynasty (1368-1644). A magistrate of Jining, Shandong sent a memorandum to the throne of the Yongle Emperor protesting the current inefficient means of transporting 4,000,000 dan (428,000,000 liters) of grain a year by means of transferring it along several different rivers and canals in barge types that went from deep to shallow after the Huai River, and then transferred back onto deep barges once the shipment of grain reached the Yellow River. Chinese engineers built a dam to divert the Wen River to the southwest in order to feed 60% of its water north into the Grand Canal, with the remainder going south. They dug four large reservoirs in Shandong to regulate water levels, which allowed them to avoid pumping water from local sources and water tables. Between 1411 and 1415 a total of 165,000 laborers dredged the canal bed in Shandong and built new channels, embankments, and canal locks.

The Yongle Emperor moved the Ming capital from Nanjing to Beijing in 1403. This move deprived Nanjing of its status as chief political center of China. The reopening of the Grand Canal also benefited Suzhou over Nanjing since the former was in a better position on the main artery of the Grand Canal, and so it became Ming China's greatest economic center. The only other viable contender with Suzhou in the Jiangnan region was Hangzhou, but it was located 200 km (120 mi) further down the Grand Canal and away from the main delta. Even the shipwrecked Korean Choe Bu (1454-1504)-while traveling for five months throughout China in 1488-acknowledged that Hangzhou served not as a competitor but as an economic feeder into the greater Suzhou market. Therefore, the Grand Canal served to make or break the economic fortunes of certain cities along its route and served as the economic lifeline of indigenous trade within China.

The scholar Gu Yanwu of the early Qing dynasty (1644-1912) estimated that the previous Ming dynasty had to employ 47,004 full-time laborers recruited by the lijia corvée system in order to maintain the entire canal system. It is known that 121,500 soldiers and officers were needed simply to operate the 11,775 government grain barges in the mid-15th century.

Besides its function as a grain shipment route and major vein of river-borne indigenous trade in China, the Grand Canal had long been a government-operated courier route as well. In the Ming dynasty, official courier stations were placed at intervals of 35 to 45 km (22 to 28 mi). Each courier station was assigned a different name, all of which were popularized in travel songs of the period.

Grand Canal. Drawing by William Alexander, draughtsman of the Macartney Embassy to China in 1793.

The Manchus invaded China in the mid-17th century, allowed through the northern passes by the Chinese general Wu Sangui once the Ming capital at Beijing had fallen into the hands of a rebel army. The Manchus established the Qing dynasty (1644-1912), and under their leadership, the Grand Canal was overseen and maintained just as in earlier times.

In 1855, the Yellow River flooded and changed its course, severing the course of the canal in Shandong. This was foreseen by a Chinese official in 1447, who remarked that the flood-prone Yellow River made the Grand Canal like a throat that could be easily strangled (leading some officials to request restarting the grain shipments through the East China Sea). In 1855 the dikes of the canal were opened to flood advancing troops of the Taiping Rebellion's Northern Expedition. Because of various factors-the difficulty of crossing the Yellow River, the increased development of an alternative sea route for grain-ships, and the opening of the Tianjin-Pukou Railway and the Beijing-Hankou Railway-the canal languished and for decades the northern and southern parts remained separate. Many of the canal sections fell into disrepair, and some parts were returned to flat fields. Even today, the Grand Canal has not fully recovered from this disaster. After the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, the need for economic development led the authorities to order heavy reconstruction work.

The Grand Canal played a major role during the Great Leap Forward as it provided an efficient way to transport grains.

By the 1990s, pollution in the canal had reached the point where boat and barge crews could tell when they were nearing Hangzhou by the stench of the visibly black water. A $250 million restoration project begun in 2001 has improved water quality to the point where it no longer smells and is once again capable of supporting some fauna.

The economic importance of the canal likely will continue. The governments of the Shandong, Jiangsu, and Zhejiang Provinces planned dredging meant to increase shipping capacity by 40 percent by 2012.

On June 22, 2014, The Grand Canal was listed as a World Heritage Site, at the 2014 Conference on World Heritage.

The Qianlong Emperor's Southern Inspection Tour, Scroll Six: Entering Suzhou along the Grand Canal dated 1770.

As well as its present-day course, fourteen centuries of canal-building have left the Grand Canal with a number of historical sections. Some of these have disappeared, others are still partially extant, and others form the basis for the modern canal. The following are the most important but do not form an exhaustive list.

In 12 BCE, in order to solve the problem of the Grand Canal having to use 160 kilometers (100 mi) of the perilous course of the Yellow River in Northern Jiangsu, a man named Li Hualong created the Jia Canal. Named after the Jia River whose course it followed, it ran 140 kilometers (87 mi) from Xiazhen (modern Weishan) on the shore of Shandong's Weishan Lake to Suqian in Jiangsu. The construction of the Jia Canal left only 100 kilometers (62 mi) of Yellow River navigation on the Grand Canal, from Suqian to Huai'an, which by 1688 had been removed by the construction of the Middle Canal by Jin Fu.

In 1566, to escape the problems caused by flooding of the Yellow River around Yutai (now on the western shore of Weishan Lake), the Nanyang New Canal was opened. It ran for 75 kilometers (47 mi) from Nanyang (now Nanyang Town, located in the center of Weishan Lake) to the small settlement of Liucheng (in the vicinity of modern Gaolou Village, Weishan County, Shandong) north of Xuzhou City. This change in effect moved the Grand Canal from the low-lying and flood-prone land west of Weishan Lake onto the marginally higher land to its east. It was fed by rivers flowing from east to west from the borders of the Shandong massif.

North of the Jizhou Canal summit section, the Huitong Canal ran downhill, fed principally by the River Wen, to join the Wei River in the city of Linqing. In 1289, a geological survey preceded its one-year construction. The Huitong Canal, built by an engineer called Ma Zhizhen, ran across sharply sloping ground and the high concentration of locks gave it the nicknames chahe or zhahe, i.e. 'the river of locks'. Its great number of feeder springs (between two and four hundred, depending on the counting method and season of the year) also led to it being called the quanhe or 'river of springs'.

This, the Grand Canal's first true summit section, was engineered by the Mongol Oqruqči in 1238 to connect Jining to the southern end of the Huitong Canal. It rose to a height of 42 meters (138 ft) above the Yangtze, but environmental and technical factors left it with chronic water shortages until it was re-engineered in 1411 by Song Li of the Ming. Song Li's improvements, recommended by a local man named Bai Ying, included damming the rivers Wen and Guang and drawing lateral canals from them to feed reservoir lakes at the very summit, at a small town called Nanwang.

Duke Huan's Conduit

In 369 CE, General Huan Wen of the Eastern Jin dynasty connected the shallow river valleys of the Huai and the Yellow. He achieved this by joining two of these rivers' tributaries, the Si and the Ji respectively, at their closest point, across a low watershed of the Shandong massif. Huan Wen's primitive summit canal became a model for the engineers of the Jizhou Canal.

The Shanyang Canal originally opened onto the Yangtze a short distance south of Yangzhou. As the north shore of the Yangtze gradually silted up to create the sandbank island of Guazhou, it became necessary for boats crossing to and from the Jiangnan Canal to sail the long way around the eastern edge of that island. After a particularly rough crossing of the Yangtze from Zhenjiang, the local prefect realized that a canal dug directly across Guazhou would reduce the journey time and thus make the crossing safer. The Yilou Canal was opened in 738 CE and still exists, though not as part of the modern Grand Canal route.

The Grand Canal nominally runs between Beijing and Hangzhou over a total length of 1,794 km (1,115 mi); however, only the section from Hangzhou to Liangshan County is currently navigable. Its course is today divided into seven sections. From south to north these are the Jiangnan Canal, the Li Canal, the Inner Canal, the Middle Canal, the Lu Canal, the South Canal, the North Canal, and the Tonghui River.

Man-Made Lake Lianhu

Training Lake "Lianhu" was used to feed water to the Grand Canal section near Jiangnan. Since the canal was man-made there was not enough naturally flowing water to keep the canal at proper depth so that boats could travel through it. So a man-made lake was used to feed water to the Jiangnan section of the Grand Canal. It was protected by the Government from reclamation and any use of the lake water without proper taxation was deemed illegal. It was supposed to be protected from profitable exploitation, but because the government changed over the years, lake Lianhu had been reclaimed many times and it started to become more shallow. The government changed the lake to become more profitable farmland which led to reclamations and agricultural irrigation using the lake. This began to lead to Lake Lianhu not being able to properly feed water to the Grand Canal. Loss of depth due to reclamation and maintenance costs became too high for the lake to become practical to use. Even though it was a man made lake it was still a beautiful sight. Many different people praised its beauty and various poems have been written about the lake. In recent years recreational uses for the lake have become more popular and may lead to the lake being restored.

The Jiangnan (or 'South of the Yangtze') Canal is heavily utilized by barge traffic bringing coal, containers and construction materials to the booming delta. It is generally a minimum of 100 meters wide in the congested city centers, and often two or three times this width in the neighboring countryside. In recent years, broad bypass canals have been dug around the major cities to reduce 'traffic jams'.

The Suzhou section of the Jiangnan Canal flows through the western part of the city. It includes ten city gates and over 20 stone bridges of traditional design and historic areas that have been well preserved as well as temples and pavilions.

At Weishan Lake, both courses enter Shandong province. From here to Linqing, the canal is called the Lu or 'Shandong' Canal. It crosses a series of lakes-Zhaoyang, Dushan, and Nanyang-which nominally form a continuous body of water. At present, diversions of water mean that the lakes are often largely dry land. North of the northernmost Nanyang Lake is the city of Jining. Further on, about 30 km (19 mi) north of Jining, the highest elevation of the canal (38.5 m or 126 ft above sea level) is reached at the town of Nanwang. In the 1950s a new canal was dug to the south of the old summit section. The old summit section is now dry, while the new canal holds too little water to be navigable. About 50 km (31 mi) further north, passing close by Dongping Lake, the canal reaches the Yellow River. By this point waterless, it no longer connects to the river. It reappears again in Liaocheng City on the north bank where, intermittently flowing through a renovated stone channel, it reaches the city of Linqing on the Shandong - Hebei border. Liangshan County is the northern terminus of the canal for barge traffic.

In Tianjin, the canal heads northwest, for a short time following the course of the Yongding, a tributary of the Hai River, before branching off toward Tongzhou on the edge of the municipality of Beijing. It is here that the modern canal stops and that a Grand Canal Cultural Park has been built. During the Yuan dynasty, a further canal on the Tonghui River connected Tongzhou with a wharf called the Houhai or "rear sea" in central Beijing. In the Ming and Qing dynasties, however, the water level in the Tonghui River dropped and ships could not travel from Tongzhou to Beijing. Tongzhou then became the northern shipping terminus of the canal. Cargo was unloaded at Tongzhou and transported to Beijing by land. The Tonghui river still exists as a wide, concrete-lined storm-channel and drain for the suburbs of Beijing.

The Eastern Zhejiang Canal ( simplified Chinese: 浙东运河;; traditional Chinese: 浙東運河;; pinyin: zhèdōng yùnhé ), also known as the Hangzhou-Ningbo Canal (杭甬运河) is located in Zhejiang. Its west end is in Xixing Street, Binjiang District, Hangzhou City, crossing Cao'e River and Shaoxing City to its east end, the Yong River estuary in Ningbo City. The canal is 239 kilometers (149 mi) long. Early canal construction took place in the Shanyin old canal in Shaoxing City, in the Spring and Autumn period (approximately 771 to 476 BC). In the third century AD, an official named He Xun supervised the construction of the Xixing Canal, establishing the complete Eastern Zhejiang Canal.

In the Southern Song dynasty (1127-1279), the capital was established at Linan, which meant that the Eastern Zhejiang Canal became an important shipping channel. From the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1912), the Eastern Zhejiang Canal lost its privilege but remained navigable. In recent years, because of newer modes of transportation, the canal has been gradually replaced. The reconstruction of the canal began in 2002, by 2007 it was partially navigable, and the renovation project finished in 2009, though the Ningbo section was not navigable until the end of 2013.

In May 2013, the Eastern Zhejiang Canal was listed in the seventh group of Major Historical and Cultural Site Protected at the National Level and was included in the Grand Canal. In November 2008, as an extension of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal and the passage between the Grand Canal and the Maritime Silk Road, the Eastern Zhejiang Canal was placed into the nomination file in the UNESCO World Heritage program. In 2014, with Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal and Sui & Tang Grand Canal, the Eastern Zhejiang Canal became one World Heritage site.

Though the canal nominally crosses the watersheds of five river systems, in reality, the variation between these is so low that it has only a single summit section. The elevation of the canal bed varies from 1 m below sea level at Hangzhou to 38.5 m above at its summit. At Beijing, it reaches 27 m, fed by streams flowing downhill from the mountains to the west. The water flows from Beijing toward Tianjin, from Nanwang north toward Tianjin, and from Nanwang south toward Yangzhou. The water level in the Jiangnan Canal remains scarcely above sea level (the Zhenjiang ridge is 12 meters higher than that of the Yangtze River).

From the Tang to Qing dynasties, the Grand Canal served as the main artery between northern and southern China and was essential for the transport of grain to Beijing. Although it was mainly used for shipping grain, it also transported other commodities and the corridor along the canal developed into an important economic belt. Records show that, at its height, every year more than 8,000 boats transported four to six million dan (240,000-360,000 metric tons) of grain. The convenience of transport also enabled rulers to lead inspection tours to southern China. In the Qing dynasty, the Kangxi and Qianlong emperors made twelve trips to the south, on all occasions but one reaching Hangzhou.

The Grand Canal also enabled cultural exchange and political integration to occur between the north and south of China. The canal even made a distinct impression on some of China's early European visitors. Marco Polo recounted the Grand Canal's arched bridges as well as the warehouses and prosperous trade of its cities in the 13th century. The famous Roman Catholic missionary Matteo Ricci traveled from Nanjing to Beijing along the canal at the end of the 16th century.

Since the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, the canal has been used primarily to transport vast amounts of bulk goods such as bricks, gravel, sand, diesel, and coal. The Jianbi ship locks on the Yangtze are currently handling some 75,000,000 tons each year, and the Li Canal is forecast to reach 100,000,000 tons in the next few years. When first constructed, the canal served as a major source of transportation, linking northern and southern China. With the introduction of expressways, railways and high speed railways in modern China, passenger travel on the canal became far less common.

Currently, ships can only travel up to Jining. The section from Jining to Beijing is not available for transport due to the silt deposit buildup from the Yellow River and lack of water sources. There are plans for restoring transportation up to Tai'an.

The South-North Water Transfer Project central route starting point in Nanyang. Looking "upstream", toward the Danjiangkou Reservoir, from which the water is coming.

The Grand Canal is currently being upgraded to serve as the Eastern Route of the South-North Water Transfer Project. Additional amounts of water from the Yangtze will be drawn into the canal in Jiangdu City, where a giant 400 m ³/s (14,000 cu ft/s) pumping station was already built in the 1980s, and is then fed uphill by pumping stations along the route and through a tunnel under the Yellow River, from where it can flow downhill to reservoirs near Tianjin. Construction on the Eastern Route officially began on December 27, 2002, and water was supposed to reach Tianjin by 2012. However, water pollution has affected the viability of this project.

In 1169, with China divided between the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty in the north and the Southern Song dynasty in the south, the Southern Song Emperor Xiaozong sent a delegation to the Jurchen to wish their ruler well for the New Year. A scholar-official named Lou Yue, secretary to the delegation, recorded the journey, much of which was made upon the Grand Canal, and submitted his Diary of a Journey to the North to the emperor on his return.

In 1170, the poet, politician, and historian Lu You traveled along the Grand Canal from Shaoxing to the river Yangtze, recording his progress in a diary.

In the late 1200s, Marco Polo traveled extensively through China and his trips included time on the Grand Canal, then a major artery for shipping silk, porcelain, and wine.

In 1345, Maghrebi traveler Ibn Battuta traveled China and journeyed through the Abe Hayat river (Grand Canal) up to the capital Khanbalik (Beijing).

In 1488, the shipwrecked Korean scholar Choe Bu traveled the entire length of the Grand Canal on his way from Zhejiang to Beijing (and on to Korea) and left a detailed account of his trip.

In 1600, Matteo Ricci traveled to Beijing from Nanjing via the Grand Canal waterway to gain the support of the Wanli Emperor of the Ming dynasty with the help of Wang Zhongde, the Director of the Board of Rites in the central government of China at the time.

In 1793, after a largely fruitless diplomatic mission to Jehol, a large part of Lord Macartney's embassy returned south to the Yangtze delta via the Grand Canal.

In 1848, Robert Fortune reached Hang Chow Foo by the Grand Canal in his quest for tea plants.

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China's Ancient Lifeline Archived 2018-01-28 at the Wayback Machine published May 2013 National Geographic magazine

中国运河, 竞放、杜家驹 主编, 金陵书社 1997年 ; China's Canal, Jing Fang and Du Jiaju eds, Jinling Book Society, 1997.

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Grand Canal Literal meaning "Great Transport River" The Grand Canal, known to the Chinese as the Jing-Hang Grand Canal ( simplified Chinese: 京杭大运河; traditional Chinese: 京杭大運河; pinyin: Jīng-Háng Dà Yùnhé ; 'Capital-Hangzhou Grand Canal', or more commonly, as the「大运河」("Grand Canal")), a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is the longest canal or artificial river in the world.

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Read about the brilliant inventor who created the first seismoscope to detect earthquakes over 1,800 years ago.

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Zhang Heng ( Chinese: ; AD 78-139), formerly romanized as Chang Heng, was a Chinese polymathic scientist and statesman who lived during the Han dynasty. Educated in the capital cities of Luoyang and Chang'an, he achieved success as an astronomer, mathematician, seismologist, hydraulic engineer, inventor, geographer, cartographer, ethnographer, artist, poet, philosopher, politician, and literary scholar.

Zhang Heng began his career as a minor civil servant in Nanyang. Eventually, he became Chief Astronomer, Prefect of the Majors for Official Carriages, and then Palace Attendant at the imperial court. His uncompromising stance on historical and calendrical issues led to his becoming a controversial figure, preventing him from rising to the status of Grand Historian. His political rivalry with the palace eunuchs during the reign of Emperor Shun (r. 125-144) led to his decision to retire from the central court to serve as an administrator of Hejian Kingdom in present-day Hebei. Zhang returned home to Nanyang for a short time, before being recalled to serve in the capital once more in 138. He died there a year later, in 139.

Zhang applied his extensive knowledge of mechanics and gears in several of his inventions. He invented the world's first water-powered armillary sphere to assist astronomical observation; improved the inflow water clock by adding another tank; and invented the world's first seismoscope, which discerned the cardinal direction of an earthquake 500 km (310 mi) away. He improved previous Chinese calculations for pi. In addition to documenting about 2,500 stars in his extensive star catalog, Zhang also posited theories about the Moon and its relationship to the Sun: specifically, he discussed the Moon's sphericity, its illumination by reflected sunlight on one side and the hidden nature of the other, and the nature of solar and lunar eclipses. His (rhapsody) and poetry were renowned in his time and studied and analyzed by later Chinese writers. Zhang received many posthumous honors for his scholarship and ingenuity; some modern scholars have compared his work in astronomy to that of the Greco-Roman Ptolemy (AD 86-161).

Born in the town of Xi'e in Nanyang Commandery (north of the modern Nanyang City in Henan province), Zhang Heng came from a distinguished but not affluent family. His grandfather Zhang Kan () had been governor of a commandery and one of the leaders who supported the restoration of the Han by Emperor Guangwu (r. 25-57), following the death of the usurping Wang Mang of the Xin (AD 9-23). When he was ten, Zhang's father died, leaving him in the care of his mother and grandmother.

An accomplished writer in his youth, Zhang left home in the year 95 to pursue his studies in the capitals of Chang'an and Luoyang. While traveling to Luoyang, Zhang passed by a hot spring near Mount Li and dedicated one of his earliest fu poems to it. This work, entitled " Fu on the Hot Springs" ( Wēnquán fù 溫泉賦), describes the throngs of people attending the hot springs, which later became famous as the " Huaqing Hot Springs", a favorite retreat of imperial concubine Yang Guifei during the Tang dynasty. After studying for some years at Luoyang's Taixue, he was well-versed in the classics and friends with several notable persons, including the mathematician and calligrapher Cui Yuan (78-143), the official and philosophical commentator Ma Rong (79-166), and the philosopher Wang Fu (78-163). Government authorities offered Zhang appointments to several offices, including a position as one of the Imperial Secretaries, yet he acted modestly and declined.

At age 23, Zhang returned home with the title "Officer of Merit in Nanyang", serving as the master of documents under the administration of Governor Bao De (in office from 103 to 111). As he was charged with composing inscriptions and dirges for the governor, he gained experience in writing official documents. As Officer of Merit in the commandery, he was also responsible for local appointments to office and recommendations to the capital of nominees for higher office. He spent much of his time composing rhapsodies on the capital cities. When Bao De was recalled to the capital in 111 to serve as a minister of finance, Zhang continued his literary work at home in Xi'e. Zhang Heng began his studies in astronomy at the age of 30 and began publishing his works on astronomy and mathematics.

In 112, Zhang was summoned to the court of Emperor An (r. 106-125), who had heard of his expertise in mathematics. When he was nominated to serve at the capital, Zhang was escorted by carriage-a symbol of his official status-to Luoyang, where he became a court gentleman working for the Imperial Secretariat. He was promoted to Chief Astronomer for the court, serving his first term from 115 to 120 under Emperor An and his second under the succeeding emperor from 126 to 132. As Chief Astronomer, Zhang was a subordinate of the Minister of Ceremonies, one of Nine Ministers ranked just below the Three Excellencies. In addition to recording heavenly observations and portents, preparing the calendar, and reporting which days were auspicious and which ill-omened, Zhang was also in charge of an advanced literacy test for all candidates to the Imperial Secretariat and the Censorate, both of whose members were required to know at least 9,000 characters and all major writing styles. Under Emperor An, Zhang also served as Prefect of the Majors for Official Carriages under the Ministry of Guards, in charge of receiving memorials to the throne (formal essays on policy and administration) as well as nominees for official appointments.

When the government official Dan Song proposed the Chinese calendar should be reformed in 123 to adopt certain apocryphal teachings, Zhang opposed the idea. He considered the teachings to be of questionable stature and believed they could introduce errors. Others shared Zhang's opinion and the calendar was not altered, yet Zhang's proposal that apocryphal writings should be banned was rejected. The officials Liu Zhen and Liu Taotu, members of a committee to compile the dynastic history Dongguan Hanji (), sought permission from the court to consult Zhang Heng. However, Zhang was barred from assisting the committee due to his controversial views on apocrypha and his objection to the relegation of the Gengshi Emperor's (r. 23-25) role in the restoration of the Han dynasty as lesser than Emperor Guangwu's. Liu Zhen and Liu Taotu were Zhang's only historian allies at court, and after their deaths Zhang had no further opportunities for promotion to the prestigious post of court historian.

Despite this setback in his official career, Zhang was reappointed as Chief Astronomer in 126 after Emperor Shun of Han (r. 125-144) ascended to the throne. His intensive astronomical work was rewarded only with the rank and salary of 600 bushels, or , of grain (mostly commuted to coin cash or bolts of silk). To place this number in context, in a hierarchy of twenty official ranks, the lowest-paid official earned the rank and salary of 100 bushels and the highest-paid official earned 10,000 bushels during the Han. The 600-bushel rank was the lowest the emperor could directly appoint to a central government position; any official of lower status was overseen by central or provincial officials of high rank.

In 132, Zhang introduced an intricate seismoscope to the court, which he claimed could detect the precise cardinal direction of a distant earthquake. On one occasion his device indicated that an earthquake had occurred in the northwest. As there was no perceivable tremor felt in the capital his political enemies were briefly able to relish the failure of his device, until a messenger arrived shortly afterwards to report that an earthquake had occurred about 400 km (248 mi) to 500 km (310 mi) northwest of Luoyang in Gansu province.

A year after Zhang presented his seismoscope to the court, officials and candidates were asked to provide comments about a series of recent earthquakes which could be interpreted as signs of displeasure from Heaven. The ancient Chinese viewed natural calamities as cosmological punishments for misdeeds that were perpetrated by the Chinese ruler or his subordinates on earth. In Zhang's memorial discussing the reasons behind these natural disasters, he criticized the new recruitment system of Zuo Xiong which fixed the age of eligible candidates for the title " Filial and Incorrupt" at age forty. The new system also transferred the power of the candidates' assessment to the Three Excellencies rather than the Generals of the Household, who by tradition oversaw the affairs of court gentlemen. Although Zhang's memorial was rejected, his status was significantly elevated soon after to Palace Attendant, a position he used to influence the decisions of Emperor Shun. With this prestigious new position, Zhang earned a salary of 2,000 bushels and had the right to escort the emperor.

As Palace Attendant to Emperor Shun, Zhang Heng attempted to convince him that the court eunuchs represented a threat to the imperial court. Zhang pointed to specific examples of past court intrigues involving eunuchs, and convinced Shun that he should assume greater authority and limit their influence. The eunuchs attempted to slander Zhang, who responded with a fu rhapsody called " Fu on Pondering the Mystery", which vents his frustration. Rafe de Crespigny states that Zhang's rhapsody used imagery similar to Qu Yuan's (340-278 BC) poem " Li Sao" and focused on whether or not good men should flee the corrupted world or remain virtuous within it.

While working for the central court, Zhang Heng had access to a variety of written materials located in the Archives of the Eastern Pavilion. Zhang read many of the great works of history in his day and claimed he had found ten instances where the Records of the Grand Historian by Sima Qian (145-90 BC) and the by Ban Gu (AD 32-92) differed from other ancient texts that were available to him. His account was preserved and recorded in the 5th-century text of the Book of Later Han by Fan Ye (398-445). His rhapsodies and other literary works displayed a deep knowledge of classic texts, Chinese philosophy, and histories. He also compiled a commentary on the Taixuan (, "Great Mystery") by the Daoist author Yang Xiong (53 BC-AD 18).

Xiao Tong (501-531), a crown prince of the Liang dynasty (502-557), immortalized several of Zhang's works in his literary anthology Selections of Refined Literature ( Wen xuan ). Zhang's fu rhapsodies include "Western Metropolis Rhapsody" ( Xī jīng fù ), "Eastern Metropolis Rhapsody" ( Dōng jīng fù ), "Southern Capital Rhapsody" ( Nán dū fù ), "Rhapsody on Contemplating the Mystery" ( Sī xuán fù ), and " Rhapsody on Returning to the Fields" ( Guī tián fù ). The latter fuses Daoist ideas with Confucianism and was a precursor to later Chinese metaphysical nature poetry, according to Liu Wu-chi. A set of four short lyric poems ( 詩) entitled "Lyric Poems on Four Sorrows" ( Sì chóu shī ), is also included with Zhang's preface. This set constitutes some of the earliest heptasyllabic shi Chinese poetry written. While still in Luoyang, Zhang became inspired to write his "Western Metropolis Rhapsody" and "Eastern Metropolis Rhapsody", which were based on the "Rhapsody on the Two Capitals" by the historian Ban Gu. Zhang's work was similar to Ban's, although the latter fully praised the contemporaneous Eastern Han regime while Zhang provided a warning that it could suffer the same fate as the Western Han if it too declined into a state of decadence and moral depravity. These two works satirized and criticized what he saw as the excessive luxury of the upper classes. Zhang's "Southern Capital Rhapsody" commemorated his home city of Nanyang, home of the restorer of the Han dynasty, Guangwu.

In Zhang Heng's poem "Four Sorrows", he laments that he is unable to woo a beautiful woman due to the impediment of mountains, snows and rivers. Scholars Rafe de Crespigny and David R. Knechtges claim that Zhang wrote this as an innuendo hinting at his inability to keep in contact with the emperor, hindered by unworthy rivals and petty men. This poem is one of the first in China to have seven words per line. His "Four Sorrows" reads:

In Taishan stays my dear sweetheart,
But Liangfu keeps us long apart;
Looking east, I find tears start.
She gives me a sword to my delight;
A jade I give her as requite.
I'm at a loss as she is out of sight;
Why should I trouble myself all night?

In another poem of his called "Stabilizing the Passions" ( Dìng qíng fù 定情賦)-preserved in a Tang dynasty (618-907) encyclopedia, but referred to earlier by Tao Qian (365-427) in praise of Zhang's lyrical minimalism-Zhang displays his admiration for an attractive and exemplary woman. This simpler type of fu poem influenced later works by the prominent official and scholar Cai Yong (132-192). Zhang wrote:

Ah, the chaste beauty of this alluring woman!
She shines with flowery charms and blooming face.
She is unique among all her contemporaries.
She is without a peer among her comrades.

Zhang's long lyrical poems also revealed a great amount of information on urban layout and basic geography. His rhapsody "Sir Based-On-Nothing" provides details on terrain, palaces, hunting parks, markets, and prominent buildings of Chang'an, the Western Han capital. Exemplifying his attention to detail, his rhapsody on Nanyang described gardens filled with spring garlic, summer bamboo shoots, autumn leeks, winter rape-turnips, perilla, evodia, and purple ginger. Zhang Heng's writing confirms the size of the imperial hunting park in the suburbs of Chang'an, as his estimate for the circumference of the park's encircling wall agrees with the historian Ban Gu's estimate of roughly 400 (one li in Han times was equal to 415.8 m, or 1,364 ft, making the circumference of the park wall 166,320 m, or 545,600 ft). Along with Sima Xiangru (179-117 BC), Zhang listed a variety of animals and hunting game inhabiting the park, which were divided in the northern and southern portions of the park according to where the animals had originally come from: northern or southern China. Somewhat similar to the description of Sima Xiangru, Zhang described the Western Han emperors and their entourage enjoying boat outings, water plays, fishing, and displays of archery targeting birds and other animals with stringed arrows from the tops of tall towers along Chang'an's Kunming Lake. The focus of Zhang's writing on specific places and their terrain, society, people, and their customs could also be seen as early attempts of ethnographic categorization. In his poem "Xijing fu", Zhang shows that he was aware of the new foreign religion of Buddhism, introduced via the Silk Road, as well as the legend of the birth of Buddha with the vision of the white elephant bringing about conception. In his "Western Metropolis Rhapsody" (), Zhang described court entertainments such as juedi (), a form of theatrical wrestling accompanied by music in which participants butted heads with bull horn masks.

With his "Responding to Criticism" ( Ying jian ), a work modeled on Yang Xiong's "Justification Against Ridicule", Zhang was an early writer and proponent of the Chinese literary genre shelun, or hypothetical discourse. Authors of this genre created a written dialogue between themselves and an imaginary person (or a real person of their entourage or association); the latter poses questions to the author on how to lead a successful life. He also used it as a means to criticize himself for failing to obtain high office, but coming to the conclusion that the true gentleman displays virtue instead of greed for power. In this work, Dominik Declercq asserts that the person urging Zhang to advance his career in a time of government corruption most likely represented the eunuchs or Empress Liang's (116-150) powerful relatives in the Liang clan. Declercq states that these two groups would have been "anxious to know whether this famous scholar could be lured over to their side", but Zhang flatly rejected such an alignment by declaring in this politically charged piece of literature that his gentlemanly quest for virtue trumped any desire of his for power.

Zhang wrote about the various love affairs of emperors dissatisfied with the imperial harem, going out into the city incognito to seek out prostitutes and sing-song girls. This was seen as a general criticism of the Eastern Han emperors and their imperial favorites, guised in the criticism of earlier Western Han emperors. Besides criticizing the Western Han emperors for lavish decadence, Zhang also pointed out that their behavior and ceremonies did not properly conform with the Chinese cyclical beliefs in yin and yang. In a poem criticizing the previous Western Han dynasty, Zhang wrote:

Those who won this territory were strong;
Those who depended on it endured.
When a stream is long, its water is not easily exhausted.
When roots are deep, they do not rot easily.
Therefore, as extravagance and ostentation were given free rein,
The odor became pungent and increasingly fulsome.

For centuries the Chinese approximated pi as 3; Liu Xin (d. AD 23) made the first known Chinese attempt at a more accurate calculation of 3.1457,[52] but there is no record detailing the method he used to obtain this figure.[53][54] In his work around 130,[55] Zhang Heng compared the celestial circle to the diameter of the earth, proportioning the former as 736 and the latter as 232, thus calculating pi as 3.1724.[56] In Zhang's day, the ratio 4:3 was given for the area of a square to the area of its inscribed circle and the volume of a cube and volume of the inscribed sphere should also be 4 ²:3 ².[56] In formula, with D as diameter and V as volume, D ³:V = 16:9 or V= D ³; Zhang realized that the value for diameter in this formula was inaccurate, noting the discrepancy as the value taken for the ratio.[54][56] Zhang then attempted to remedy this by amending the formula with an additional D ³, hence V= D ³ + D ³ = D ³.[56] With the ratio of the volume of the cube to the inscribed sphere at 8:5, the implied ratio of the area of the square to the circle is √8:√5.[56][57] From this formula, Zhang calculated pi as the square root of 10 (or approximately 3.162).[17][18][56][57][58] Zhang also calculated pi as Ling Xian ( = 3.1466 in his book 靈憲 ).[59] In the 3rd century, Liu Hui made the calculation more accurate with his π algorithm, which allowed him to obtain the value 3.14159.[60] Later, Zu Chongzhi (429-500) approximated pi as [61] or 3.141592, the most accurate calculation for pi the ancient Chinese would achieve.

In his publication of AD 120 called The Spiritual Constitution of the Universe (靈憲, Ling Xian, lit. "Sublime Model"), Zhang Heng theorized that the universe was like an egg "as round as a crossbow pellet" with the stars on the shell and the Earth as the central yolk. This universe theory is congruent with the geocentric model as opposed to the heliocentric model. Although the ancient Warring States (403-221 BC) Chinese astronomers Shi Shen and Gan De had compiled China's first star catalogue in the 4th century BC, Zhang nonetheless catalogued 2,500 stars which he placed in a "brightly shining" category (the Chinese estimated the total to be 14,000), and he recognized 124 constellations. In comparison, this star catalogue featured many more stars than the 850 documented by the Greek astronomer Hipparchus (c. 190-c.120 BC) in his catalogue, and more than Ptolemy (AD 83-161), who catalogued over 1,000. Zhang supported the "radiating influence" theory to explain solar and lunar eclipses, a theory which was opposed by Wang Chong (AD 27-97). In the Ling Xian, Zhang wrote:

夫日譬猶火，月譬猶水，火則外光，水則含景。故月光生於日之所照，魄生於日之所蔽，當日則光盈，就日則光盡也。
The Sun is like fire and the Moon like water. The fire gives out light and the water reflects it. Thus the moon's brightness is produced from the radiance of the Sun, and the Moon's darkness is due to (the light of) the sun being obstructed. The side which faces the Sun is fully lit, and the side which is away from it is dark.

衆星被燿，因水轉光。當日之衝，光常不合者，蔽於地也。是謂闇虛。在星星微，月過則食。
The planets (as well as the Moon) have the nature of water and reflect light. The light pouring forth from the Sun does not always reach the moon owing to the obstruction of the earth itself-this is called " ànxū", a lunar eclipse. When (a similar effect) happens with a planet (we call it) an occultation; when the Moon passes across (the Sun's path) then there is a solar eclipse.

Zhang Heng viewed these astronomical phenomena in supernatural terms as well. The signs of comets, eclipses, and movements of heavenly bodies could all be interpreted by him as heavenly guides on how to conduct affairs of state. Contemporary writers also wrote about eclipses and the sphericity of heavenly bodies. The music theorist and mathematician Jing Fang (78-37 BC) wrote about the spherical shape of the Sun and Moon while discussing eclipses:

The Moon and the planets are Yin; they have shape but no light. This they receive only when the Sun illuminates them. The former masters regarded the Sun as round like a crossbow bullet, and they thought the Moon had the nature of a mirror. Some of them recognized the Moon as a ball too. Those parts of the Moon which the Sun illuminates look bright, those parts which it does not, remain dark.

The theory posited by Zhang and Jing was supported by later pre-modern scientists such as Shen Kuo (1031-1095), who expanded on the reasoning of why the Sun and Moon were spherical. The theory of the celestial sphere surrounding a flat, square Earth was later criticized by the Jin-dynasty scholar-official Yu Xi (fl. 307-345). He suggested that the Earth could be round like the heavens, a spherical Earth theory fully accepted by mathematician Li Ye (1192-1279) but not by mainstream Chinese science until European influence in the 17th century.

The outflow clepsydra was a timekeeping device used in China as long ago as the Shang dynasty (c. 1600-c. 1050 BC), and certainly by the Zhou dynasty (1122-256 BC). The inflow clepsydra with an indicator rod on a float had been known in China since the beginning of the Han dynasty in 202 BC and had replaced the outflow type. The Han Chinese noted the problem with the falling pressure head in the reservoir, which slowed the timekeeping of the device as the inflow vessel was filled. Zhang Heng was the first to address this problem, indicated in his writings from 117, by adding an extra compensating tank between the reservoir and the inflow vessel. Zhang also mounted two statuettes of a Chinese immortal and a heavenly guard on the top of the inflow clepsydra, the two of which would guide the indicator rod with their left hand and point out the graduations with their right. Joseph Needham states that this was perhaps the ancestor of all clock jacks that would later sound the hours found in mechanical clocks by the 8th century, but he notes that these figures did not actually move like clock jack figurines or sound the hours. Many additional compensation tanks were added to later clepsydras in the tradition of Zhang Heng. In 610 the Sui dynasty (581-618) engineers Geng Xun and Yuwen Kai crafted an unequal-armed steelyard balance able to make seasonal adjustments in the pressure head of the compensating tank, so that it could control the rate of water flow for different lengths of day and night during the year. Zhang mentioned a "jade dragon's neck", which in later times meant a siphon. He wrote of the floats and indicator-rods of the inflow clepsydra as follows:

以銅為器，再疊差置，實以清水，下各開孔，以玉虯吐漏水入兩壺。右為夜，左為晝。
Bronze vessels are made and placed one above the other at different levels; they are filled with pure water. Each has at the bottom a small opening in the form of a 'jade dragon's neck'. The water dripping (from above) enters two inflow receivers (alternately), the left one being for the night and the right one for the day.

蓋上又鑄金銅仙人，居左壺；為胥徒，居右壺。皆以左手抱箭，右手指刻，以別天時早晚。
On the covers of each (inflow receiver) there are small cast statuettes in gilt bronze; the left (night) one is an immortal and the right (day) one is a policeman. These figures guide the indicator-rod (lit. arrow) with their left hands, and indicate the graduations on it with their right hands, thus giving the time.

Zhang Heng is the first person known to have applied hydraulic motive power (i.e. by employing a waterwheel and clepsydra) to rotate an armillary sphere, an astronomical instrument representing the celestial sphere. The Greek astronomer Eratosthenes (276-194 BC) invented the first armillary sphere in 255 BC. The Chinese armillary sphere was fully developed by 52 BC, with the astronomer Geng Shouchang's addition of a permanently fixed equatorial ring. In AD 84 the astronomers Fu An and Jia Kui added the ecliptic ring, and finally Zhang Heng added the horizon and meridian rings. This invention is described and attributed to Zhang in quotations by Hsu Chen and Li Shan, referencing his book Lou Shui Chuan Hun Thien I Chieh (Apparatus for Rotating an Armillary Sphere by Clepsydra Water). It was likely not an actual book by Zhang, but a chapter from his Hun I or Hun I Thu Chu, written in 117 AD. His water-powered armillary influenced the design of later Chinese water clocks and led to the discovery of the escapement mechanism by the 8th century. The historian Joseph Needham (1900-1995) states:

What were the factors leading to the first escapement clock in China? The chief tradition leading to Yi Xing (AD 725 ) was of course the succession of 'pre-clocks' which had started with Zhang Heng about 125. Reason has been given for believing that these applied power to the slow turning movement of computational armillary spheres and celestial globes by means of a water-wheel using clepsydra drip, which intermittently exerted the force of a lug to act on the teeth of a wheel on a polar-axis shaft. Zhang Heng in his turn had composed this arrangement by uniting the armillary rings of his predecessors into the equatorial armillary sphere, and combining it with the principles of the water-mills and hydraulic trip-hammers which had become so widespread in Chinese culture in the previous century.

Zhang did not initiate the Chinese tradition of hydraulic engineering, which began during the mid Zhou dynasty (c. 6th century BC), through the work of engineers such as Sunshu Ao and Ximen Bao. Zhang's contemporary, Du Shi, (d. AD 38) was the first to apply the motive power of waterwheels to operate the bellows of a blast furnace to make pig iron, and the cupola furnace to make cast iron. Zhang provided a valuable description of his water-powered armillary sphere in the treatise of 125, stating:

The equatorial ring goes around the belly of the armillary sphere 91 and 5/19 (degrees) away from the pole. The circle of the ecliptic also goes round the belly of the instrument at an angle of 24 (degrees) with the equator. Thus at the summer solstice the ecliptic is 67 (degrees) and a fraction away from the pole, while at the winter solstice it is 115 (degrees) and a fraction away. Hence (the points) where the ecliptic and the equator intersect should give the north polar distances of the spring and autumn equinoxes. But now (it has been recorded that) the spring equinox is 90 and 1/4 (degrees) away from the pole, and the autumn equinox is 92 and 1/4 (degrees) away. The former figure is adopted only because it agrees with the (results obtained by the) method of measuring solstitial sun shadows as embodied in the Xia (dynasty) calendar.

Zhang Heng's water-powered armillary sphere had profound effects on Chinese astronomy and mechanical engineering in later generations. His model and its complex use of gears greatly influenced the water-powered instruments of later astronomers such as Yi Xing (683-727), Zhang Sixun (fl. 10th century), Su Song (1020-1101), Guo Shoujing (1231-1316), and many others. Water-powered armillary spheres in the tradition of Zhang Heng's were used in the eras of the Three Kingdoms (220-280) and Jin dynasty (266-420), yet the design for it was temporarily out of use between 317 and 418, due to invasions of northern Xiongnu nomads. Zhang Heng's old instruments were recovered in 418, when Emperor Wu of Liu Song (r. 420-422) captured the ancient capital of Chang'an. Although still intact, the graduation marks and the representations of the stars, Moon, Sun, and planets were quite worn down by time and rust. In 436, the emperor ordered Qian Luozhi, the Secretary of the Bureau of Astronomy and Calendar, to recreate Zhang's device, which he managed to do successfully. Qian's water-powered celestial globe was still in use at the time of the Liang dynasty (502-557), and successive models of water-powered armillary spheres were designed in subsequent dynasties.

Zhang's seismoscope

From the earliest times, the Chinese were concerned with the destructive force of earthquakes. It was recorded in Sima Qian's Records of the Grand Historian of 91 BC that in 780 BC an earthquake had been powerful enough to divert the courses of three rivers. It was not known at the time that earthquakes were caused by the shifting of tectonic plates in the Earth's crust; instead, the people of the ancient Zhou dynasty explained them as disturbances with cosmic yin and yang, along with the heavens' displeasure with acts committed (or the common peoples' grievances ignored) by the current ruling dynasty. These theories were ultimately derived from the ancient text of the (Book of Changes), in its fifty-first hexagram. There were other early theories about earthquakes, developed by those such as the ancient Greeks. Anaxagoras (c. 500-428 BC) believed that they were caused by excess water near the surface crust of the earth bursting into the Earth's hollows; Democritus (c. 460-370 BC) believed that the saturation of the Earth with water caused them; Anaximenes (c. 585-c. 525 BC) believed they were the result of massive pieces of the Earth falling into the cavernous hollows due to drying; and Aristotle (384-322 BC) believed they were caused by instability of vapor ( pneuma) caused by the drying of the moist Earth by the Sun's rays.

During the Han dynasty, many learned scholars-including Zhang Heng-believed in the " oracles of the winds". These oracles of the occult observed the direction, force, and timing of the winds, to speculate about the operation of the cosmos and to predict events on Earth. These ideas influenced Zhang Heng's views on the cause of earthquakes.

In 132, Zhang Heng presented to the Han court what many historians consider to be his most impressive invention, the first seismoscope. A seismoscope records the motions of Earth's shaking, but unlike a seismometer, it does not retain a time record of those motions. It was named "earthquake weathervane" ( hòufēng dìdòngyí ), and it was able to roughly determine the direction (out of eight directions) where the earthquake came from. According to the Book of Later Han (compiled by Fan Ye in the 5th century), his bronze urn-shaped device, with a swinging pendulum inside, was able to detect the direction of an earthquake hundreds of miles/kilometers away. This was essential for the Han government in sending quick aid and relief to regions devastated by this type of natural disaster. The Book of Later Han records that, on one occasion, Zhang's device was triggered, though no observer had felt any seismic disturbance; several days later a messenger arrived from the west and reported that an earthquake had occurred in Longxi (modern Gansu Province), the same direction that Zhang's device had indicated, and thus the court was forced to admit the efficacy of the device.

To indicate the direction of a distant earthquake, Zhang's device dropped a bronze ball from one of eight tubed projections shaped as dragon heads; the ball fell into the mouth of a corresponding metal object shaped as a toad, each representing a direction like the points on a compass rose. His device had eight mobile arms (for all eight directions) connected with cranks having catch mechanisms at the periphery. When tripped, a crank and right angle lever would raise a dragon head and release a ball which had been supported by the lower jaw of the dragon head. His device also included a vertical pin passing through a slot in the crank, a catch device, a pivot on a projection, a sling suspending the pendulum, an attachment for the sling, and a horizontal bar supporting the pendulum. Wang Zhenduo (王振鐸) argued that the technology of the Eastern Han era was sophisticated enough to produce such a device, as evidenced by contemporary levers and cranks used in other devices such as crossbow triggers.

Later Chinese of subsequent periods were able to reinvent Zhang's seismoscope. They included the 6th-century mathematician and surveyor Xindu Fang of the Northern Qi dynasty (550-577) and the astronomer and mathematician Lin Xiaogong of the Sui dynasty (581-618). Like Zhang, Xindu Fang and Lin Xiaogong were given imperial patronage for their services in craftsmanship of devices for the court. By the time of the Yuan dynasty (1271-1368), it was acknowledged that all devices previously made were preserved, except for that of the seismoscope. This was discussed by the scholar Zhou Mi around 1290, who remarked that the books of Xindu Fang and Lin Xiaogong detailing their seismological devices were no longer to be found. Horwitz, Kreitner, and Needham speculate if Tang dynasty (618-907) era seismographs found their way to contemporary Japan; according to Needham, "instruments of apparently traditional type there in which a pendulum carries pins projecting in many directions and able to pierce a surrounding paper cylinder, have been described."

Hong-sen Yan states that modern replicas of Zhang's device have failed to reach the level of accuracy and sensitivity described in Chinese historical records. Wang Zhenduo presented two different models of the seismoscope based on the ancient descriptions of Zhang's device. In his 1936 reconstruction, the central pillar ( du zhu) of the device was a suspended pendulum acting as a movement sensor, while the central pillar of his second model in 1963 was an inverted pendulum. According to Needham, while working in the Seismological Observatory of Tokyo University in 1939, Akitsune Imamura and Hagiwara made a reconstruction of Zhang's device. While it was John Milne and Wang Zhenduo who argued early on that Zhang's "central pillar" was a suspended pendulum, Imamura was the first to propose an inverted model. He argued that transverse shock would have rendered Wang's immobilization mechanism ineffective, as it would not have prevented further motion that could knock other balls out of their position. On June 13, 2005, modern Chinese seismologists announced that they had successfully created a replica of the instrument.

Anthony J. Barbieri-Low, a professor of early Chinese history at the University of California, Santa Barbara, names Zhang Heng as one of several high-ranking Eastern-Han officials who engaged in crafts that were traditionally reserved for artisans ( gong 工), such as mechanical engineering. Barbieri-Low speculates that Zhang only designed his seismoscope, but did not actually craft the device himself. He asserts that this would most likely have been the job of artisans commissioned by Zhang. He writes: "Zhang Heng was an official of moderately high rank and could not be seen sweating in the foundries with the gong artisans and the government slaves. Most likely, he worked collaboratively with the professional casters and mold makers in the imperial workshops."

The Wei (220-265) and Jin dynasty (266-420) cartographer and official Pei Xiu (224-271) was the first in China to describe in full the geometric grid reference for maps that allowed for precise measurements using a graduated scale, as well as topographical elevation. However, map-making in China had existed since at least the 4th century BC with the Qin state maps found in Gansu in 1986. Pinpointed accuracy of the winding courses of rivers and familiarity with scaled distance had been known since the Qin and Han dynasty, respectively, as evidenced by their existing maps, while the use of a rectangular grid had been known in China since the Han as well. Historian Howard Nelson states that, although the accounts of Zhang Heng's work in cartography are somewhat vague and sketchy, there is ample written evidence that Pei Xiu derived the use of the rectangular grid reference from the maps of Zhang Heng. Rafe de Crespigny asserts that it was Zhang who established the rectangular grid system in Chinese cartography. Needham points out that the title of his book Flying Bird Calendar may have been a mistake, and that the book is more accurately entitled Bird's Eye Map. Historian Florian C. Reiter notes that Zhang's narrative "Guitian fu" contains a phrase about applauding the maps and documents of Confucius of the Zhou dynasty, which Reiter suggests places maps ( tu) on a same level of importance with documents ( shu). It is documented that a physical geography map was first presented by Zhang Heng in 116 AD, called a Ti Hsing Thu.

Zhang Heng is often credited with inventing the first odometer, an achievement also attributed to Archimedes (c. 287-212 BC) and Heron of Alexandria (fl. AD 10-70). Similar devices were used by the Roman and Han-Chinese empires at about the same period. By the 3rd century, the Chinese had termed the device the jili guche (, " li-recording drum carriage" (the modern measurement of li = 500 m/1640 ft).

Ancient Chinese texts describe the mechanical carriage's functions; after one li was traversed, a mechanically driven wooden figure struck a drum, and after ten li had been covered, another wooden figure struck a gong or a bell with its mechanically operated arm. However, there is evidence to suggest that the invention of the odometer was a gradual process in Han dynasty China that centered on the "huang men"-court people (i.e. eunuchs, palace officials, attendants and familiars, actors, acrobats, etc.) who followed the musical procession of the royal "drum-chariot". There is speculation that at some time during the 1st century BC the beating of drums and gongs was mechanically driven by the rotation of the road wheels. This might have actually been the design of Luoxia Hong (c. 110 BC), yet by at least 125 the mechanical odometer carriage was already known, as it was depicted in a mural of the Xiao Tang Shan Tomb.

The south-pointing chariot was another mechanical device credited to Zhang Heng. It was a non-magnetic compass vehicle in the form of a two-wheeled chariot. Differential gears driven by the chariot's wheels allowed a wooden figurine (in the shape of a Chinese state minister) to constantly point to the south, hence its name. The Song Shu (c. AD 500 ) records that Zhang Heng re-invented it from a model used in the Zhou dynasty era, but the violent collapse of the Han dynasty unfortunately did not allow it to be preserved. Whether Zhang Heng invented it or not, Ma Jun (200-265) succeeded in creating the chariot in the following century.

Zhang Heng's mechanical inventions influenced later Chinese inventors such as Yi Xing, Zhang Sixun, Su Song, and Guo Shoujing. Su Song directly named Zhang's water-powered armillary sphere as the inspiration for his 11th-century clock tower. The cosmic model of nine points of Heaven corresponding with nine regions of earth conceived in the work of the scholar-official Chen Hongmou (1696-1771) followed in the tradition of Zhang's book Spiritual Constitution of the Universe. The seismologist John Milne, who created the modern seismograph in 1876 alongside Thomas Gray and James A. Ewing at the Imperial College of Engineering in Tokyo, commented in 1886 on Zhang Heng's contributions to seismology. The historian Joseph Needham emphasized his contributions to pre-modern Chinese technology, stating that Zhang was noted even in his day for being able to "make three wheels rotate as if they were one." More than one scholar has described Zhang as a polymath. However, some scholars also point out that Zhang's writing lacks concrete scientific theories. Comparing Zhang with his contemporary, Ptolemy (83-161) of Roman Egypt, Jin Guantao, Fan Hongye, and Liu Qingfeng state:

Based on the theories of his predecessors, Zhang Heng systematically developed the celestial sphere theory. An armillary constructed on the basis of his hypotheses bears a remarkable similarity to Ptolemy's earth-centered theory. However, Zhang Heng did not definitely propose a theoretical model like Ptolemy's earth-centered one. It is astonishing that the celestial model Zhang Heng constructed was almost a physical model of Ptolemy's earth-centered theory. Only a single step separates the celestial globe from the earth-centered theory, but Chinese astronomers never took that step.

Here we can see how important the exemplary function of the primitive scientific structure is. In order to use the Euclidean system of geometry as a model for the development of astronomical theory, Ptolemy first had to select hypotheses which could serve as axioms. He naturally regarded circular motion as fundamental and then used the circular motion of deferents and epicycles in his earth-centered theory. Although Zhang Heng understood that the sun, moon and planets move in circles, he lacked a model for a logically structured theory and so could not establish a corresponding astronomical theory. Chinese astronomy was most interested in extracting the algebraic features of planetary motion (that is, the length of the cyclic periods) to establish astronomical theories. Thus astronomy was reduced to arithmetic operations, extracting common multiples and divisors from the observed cyclic motions of the heavenly bodies.

Zhang's poetry was widely read during his life and after his death. In addition to the compilation of Xiao Tong mentioned above, the Eastern Wu official Xue Zong (d. 237) wrote commentary on Zhang's poems "Dongjing fu" and "Xijing fu". The influential poet Tao Qian wrote that he admired the poetry of Zhang Heng for its "curbing extravagant diction and aiming at simplicity", in regards to perceived tranquility and rectitude correlating with the simple but effective language of the poet. Tao wrote that both Zhang Heng and Cai Yong "avoided inflated language, aiming chiefly at simplicity", and adding that their "compositions begin by giving free expression to their fancies but end on a note of quiet, serving admirably to restrain undisciplined and passionate nature".

Zhang was given great honors in life and in death. The philosopher and poet Fu Xuan (217-278) of the Wei and Jin dynasties once lamented in an essay over the fact that Zhang Heng was never placed in the Ministry of Works. Writing highly of Zhang and the 3rd-century mechanical engineer Ma Jun, Fu Xuan wrote, "Neither of them was ever an official of the Ministry of Works, and their ingenuity did not benefit the world. When (authorities) employ personnel with no regard to special talent, and having heard of genius neglect even to test it-is this not hateful and disastrous?"

In honor of Zhang's achievements in science and technology, his friend Cui Ziyu (Cui Yuan) wrote a memorial inscription on his burial stele, which has been preserved in the Guwen yuan. Cui stated, "[Zhang Heng's] mathematical computations exhausted (the riddles of) the heavens and the earth. His inventions were comparable even to those of the Author of Change. The excellence of his talent and the splendour of his art were one with those of the gods." The minor official Xiahou Zhan (243-291) of the Wei dynasty made an inscription for his own commemorative stele to be placed at Zhang Heng's tomb. It read: "Ever since gentlemen have composed literary texts, none has been as skillful as the Master [Zhang Heng] in choosing his words well ... if only the dead could rise, oh I could then turn to him for a teacher!"

Several things have been named after Zhang in modern times, including the lunar crater Chang Heng, the asteroid 1802 Zhang Heng, and the mineral zhanghengite. In 2018, China launched a research satellite called China Seismo-Electromagnetic Satellite (CSES) which is also named Zhangheng-1 (ZH-1).

Arndt, Jörg; Haenel, Christoph (2001). Pi - Unleashed. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-56735-3. ISBN 978-3-540-66572-4. S2CID 46515097.

Declercq, Dominik (1998). Writings Against the State: Political Rhetorics in Third and Fourth Century China. Leiden: Koninklijke Brill NV.

Hsu, Mei-Ling (1993). "The Qin maps: A clue to later Chinese cartographic development". Imago Mundi. 45: 90-100. doi:10.1080/03085699308592766.

Huang, Ray (1997). China: A Macro History. New York: An East Gate Book, M. E. SHARPE Inc.

Knechtges, David R. (2014). "Zhang Heng 張衡". In Knechtges, David R.; Chang, Taiping (eds.). Ancient and Early Medieval Chinese Literature: A Reference Guide, Part Four. Leiden: Brill. pp. 2141-55. ISBN 978-90-04-27217-0.

Loewe, Michael. (1968). Everyday Life in Early Imperial China during the Han Period 202 BC-AD 220. London: B.T. Batsford Ltd.; New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons.

Morton, W. Scott and Charlton M. Lewis (2005). China: Its History and Culture. New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc.

Needham, Joseph (1986). Science and Civilization in China: Volume 3, Mathematics and the Sciences of the Heavens and the Earth. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. reprinted: Taipei: Caves Books, Ltd.

Needham, Joseph (1965). Science and Civilization in China: Volume 4, Part 1: Physics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Needham, Joseph (1986). Science and Civilization in China: Volume 4, Physics and Physical Technology, Part 2: Mechanical Engineering. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. reprinted: Taipei: Caves Books, Ltd.

Reiter, Florian C. (1990). "Some Remarks on the Chinese Word t'u "Chart, Plan, Design"". Oriens. 32: 308-327. doi:10.2307/1580636. JSTOR 1580636.

Schmadel, Lutz D. (2003). Dictionary of Minor Planet Names. doi:10.1007/978-3-540-29925-7. ISBN 978-3-540-00238-3.

Stein, S., and M. E. Wysession. (2002). An Introduction to Seismology, Earthquakes, and Earth Structure. London: Wiley-Blackwell. ASIN B010WFPEOO.

Wilson, Robin J. (2001). Stamping Through Mathematics. New York: Springer-Verlag New York, Inc.

Wright, David Curtis (2001) The History of China. Westport: Greenwood Press.

Lien, Y. Edmund (2011). Zhang Heng, Eastern Han Polymath, His Life and Works (PhD thesis). University of Washington.

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Zhang Heng ( Chinese: ; AD 78-139), formerly romanized as Chang Heng, was a Chinese polymathic scientist and statesman who lived during the Han dynasty. Educated in the capital cities of Luoyang and Chang'an, he achieved success as an astronomer, mathematician, seismologist, hydraulic engineer, inventor, geographer, cartographer, ethnographer, artist, poet, philosopher, politician, and literary scholar.

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Understand the causes and effects of this devastating natural disaster that affected many Asian countries.

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An aerial view of Batticaloa, Sri Lanka, shows a debris-littered landscape after a tsunami swept the coastline on December 26, 2004. The devastating tsunami, triggered by the underwater Sumatra-Andaman earthquake in Indonesia, hit coastal areas throughout the Indian Ocean.

The Indian Ocean tsunami in December 2004 struck without warning and killed thousands. See photos of the devastating destruction left in its wake.

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Sri Lanka Tsunami, Tsunami Damage, Tsunami Photos - National Geographic

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An aerial view of Batticaloa, Sri Lanka, shows a debris-littered landscape after a tsunami swept the coastline on December 26, 2004. The devastating tsunami, triggered by the underwater Sumatra-Andaman earthquake in Indonesia, hit coastal areas throughout the Indian Ocean. The Indian Ocean tsunami in December 2004 struck without warning and killed thousands.

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Learn about the Song Dynasty scientist who made discoveries in astronomy, mathematics, and geology.

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Shen Kuo ( Chinese: 沈括; 1031-1095) or Shen Gua, courtesy name Cunzhong (存中) and pseudonym Mengqi (now usually given as Mengxi) Weng (夢溪翁), was a Chinese polymath, scientist, and statesman of the Song dynasty (960-1279). Shen was a master in many fields of study including mathematics, optics, and horology. In his career as a civil servant, he became a finance minister, governmental state inspector, head official for the Bureau of Astronomy in the Song court, Assistant Minister of Imperial Hospitality, and also served as an academic chancellor. At court his political allegiance was to the Reformist faction known as the New Policies Group, headed by Chancellor Wang Anshi (1021-1085).

In his Dream Pool Essays or Dream Torrent Essays (; Mengxi Bitan) of 1088, Shen was the first to describe the magnetic needle compass, which would be used for navigation (first described in Europe by Alexander Neckam in 1187). Shen discovered the concept of true north in terms of magnetic declination towards the north pole, with experimentation of suspended magnetic needles and "the improved meridian determined by Shen's [astronomical] measurement of the distance between the pole star and true north". This was the decisive step in human history to make compasses more useful for navigation, and may have been a concept unknown in Europe for another four hundred years (evidence of German sundials made circa 1450 show markings similar to Chinese geomancers' compasses in regard to declination).

Alongside his colleague Wei Pu, Shen planned to map the orbital paths of the Moon and the planets in an intensive five-year project involving daily observations, yet this was thwarted by political opponents at court. To aid his work in astronomy, Shen Kuo made improved designs of the armillary sphere, gnomon, sighting tube, and invented a new type of inflow water clock. Shen Kuo devised a geological hypothesis for land formation ( geomorphology), based upon findings of inland marine fossils, knowledge of soil erosion, and the deposition of silt. He also proposed a hypothesis of gradual climate change, after observing ancient petrified bamboos that were preserved underground in a dry northern habitat that would not support bamboo growth in his time. He was the first literary figure in China to mention the use of the drydock to repair boats suspended out of water, and also wrote of the effectiveness of the relatively new invention of the canal pound lock. Although not the first to invent camera obscura, Shen noted the relation of the focal point of a concave mirror and that of the pinhole. Shen wrote extensively about movable type printing invented by Bi Sheng (990-1051), and because of his written works the legacy of Bi Sheng and the modern understanding of the earliest movable type has been handed down to later generations. Following an old tradition in China, Shen created a raised-relief map while inspecting borderlands. His description of an ancient crossbow mechanism he unearthed as an amateur archaeologist proved to be a Jacob's staff, a surveying tool which wasn't known in Europe until described by Levi ben Gerson in 1321.

Shen Kuo wrote several other books besides the Dream Pool Essays, yet much of the writing in his other books has not survived. Some of Shen's poetry was preserved in posthumous written works. Although much of his focus was on technical and scientific issues, he had an interest in divination and the supernatural, the latter including his vivid description of unidentified flying objects from eyewitness testimony. He also wrote commentary on ancient Daoist and Confucian texts.

The Bencao on traditional Chinese medicine; printed with woodblock printing press in 1249; Shen grew ill often as a child, and so developed an interest in medicinal cures.

Shen Kuo was born in Qiantang (modern-day Hangzhou) in the year 1031. His father Shen Zhou (; 978-1052) was a somewhat lower-class gentry figure serving in official posts on the provincial level; his mother was from a family of equal status in Suzhou, with her maiden name being Xu (). Shen Kuo received his initial childhood education from his mother, which was a common practice in China during this period. She was very educated herself, teaching Kuo and his brother Pi () the military doctrines of her own elder brother Xu Dong (; 975-1016). Since Shen was unable to boast of a prominent familial clan history like many of his elite peers born in the north, he was forced to rely on his wit and stern determination to achieve in his studies, subsequently passing the imperial examinations and enter the challenging and sophisticated life of an exam-drafted state bureaucrat.

From about 1040 AD, Shen's family moved around Sichuan province and finally to the international seaport at Xiamen, where Shen's father accepted minor provincial posts in each new location. Shen Zhou also served several years in the prestigious capital judiciary, the equivalent of a national supreme court. Shen Kuo took notice of the various towns and rural features of China as his family traveled, while he became interested during his youth in the diverse topography of the land. He also observed the intriguing aspects of his father's engagement in administrative governance and the managerial problems involved; these experiences had a deep impact on him as he later became a government official. Since he often became ill as a child, Shen Kuo also developed a natural curiosity about medicine and pharmaceutics.

Shen Zhou died in the late winter of 1051 (or early 1052), when his son Shen Kuo was 21 years old. Shen Kuo grieved for his father, and following Confucian ethics, remained inactive in a state of mourning for three years until 1054 (or early 1055). As of 1054, Shen began serving in minor local governmental posts. However, his natural abilities to plan, organize, and design were proven early in life; one example is his design and supervision of the hydraulic drainage of an embankment system, which converted some one hundred thousand acres (400 km ²) of swampland into prime farmland. Shen Kuo noted that the success of the silt fertilization method relied upon the effective operation of sluice gates of irrigation canals.

In 1063 Shen Kuo successfully passed the imperial examinations, the difficult national-level standard test that every high official was required to pass in order to enter the governmental system. He not only passed the exam however, but was placed into the higher category of the best and brightest students. While serving at Yangzhou, Shen's brilliance and dutiful character caught the attention of Zhang Chu (; 1015-1080), the Fiscal Intendant of the region. Shen made a lasting impression upon Zhang, who recommended Shen for a court appointment in the financial administration of the central court. Shen would also eventually marry Zhang's daughter, who became his second wife.

In his career as a scholar-official for the central government, Shen Kuo was also an ambassador to the Western Xia dynasty and Liao dynasty, a military commander, a director of hydraulic works, and the leading chancellor of the Hanlin Academy. By 1072, Shen was appointed as the head official of the Bureau of Astronomy. With his leadership position in the bureau, Shen was responsible for projects in improving calendrical science, and proposed many reforms to the Chinese calendar alongside the work of his colleague Wei Pu. With his impressive skills and aptitude for matters of economy and finance, Shen was appointed as the Finance Commissioner at the central court.

As written by Li Zhiyi, a man married to Hu Wenrou (granddaughter of Hu Su, a famous minister of the Song dynasty), Shen Kuo was Li's mentor while Shen served as an official. According to Li's epitaph for his wife, Shen would sometimes relay questions via Li to Hu when he needed clarification for his mathematical work, as Hu Wenrou was esteemed by Shen as a remarkable female mathematician. Shen lamented: "If only she were a man, Wenrou would be my friend."

While employed by the central government, Shen Kuo was also sent out with others to inspect the granary system of the empire, investigating problems of illegal tax-collection, negligence, ineffective disaster relief, and inadequate water-conservancy projects. While Shen was appointed as the regional inspector of Zhejiang in 1073, the Emperor requested that Shen pay a visit to the famous poet Su Shi (1037-1101), then an administrator in Hangzhou. Shen took advantage of this meeting to copy some of Su's poetry, which he presented to the Emperor indicating that it expressed "abusive and hateful" speech against the Song court; these poems were later politicized by Li Ding and Shu Dan in order to level a court case against Su. (The Crow Terrace Poetry Trial, of 1079.) With his demonstrations of loyalty and ability, Shen Kuo was awarded the honorary title of a State Foundation Viscount by Emperor Shenzong of Song (r. 1067-1085), who placed a great amount of trust in Shen Kuo. He was even made 'companion to the heir apparent' (太子中允; 'Taizi zhongyun').

At court Shen was a political favorite of the Chancellor Wang Anshi (1021-1086), who was the leader of the political faction of Reformers, also known as the New Policies Group (, Xin Fa). Shen Kuo had a previous history with Wang Anshi, since it was Wang who had composed the funerary epitaph for Shen's father, Zhou. Shen Kuo soon impressed Wang Anshi with his skills and abilities as an administrator and government agent. In 1072, Shen was sent to supervise Wang's program of surveying the building of silt deposits in the Bian Canal outside the capital city. Using an original technique, Shen successfully dredged the canal and demonstrated the formidable value of the silt gathered as a fertilizer. He gained further reputation at court once he was dispatched as an envoy to the Khitan Liao dynasty in the summer of 1075. The Khitans had made several aggressive negotiations of pushing their borders south, while manipulating several incompetent Song ambassadors who conceded to the Liao Kingdom's demands. In a brilliant display of diplomacy, Shen Kuo came to the camp of the Khitan monarch at Mt. Yongan (near modern Pingquan, Hebei), armed with copies of previously archived diplomatic negotiations between the Song and Liao dynasties. Shen Kuo refuted Emperor Daozong's bluffs point for point, while the Song reestablished their rightful border line. In regard to the Lý dynasty of Đại Việt (in modern northern Vietnam), Shen demonstrated in his Dream Pool Essays that he was familiar with the key players (on the Vietnamese side) in the prelude to the Sino-Vietnamese War of 1075-1077. With his reputable achievements, Shen became a trusted member of Wang Anshi's elite circle of eighteen unofficial core political loyalists to the New Policies Group.

Although much of Wang Anshi's reforms outlined in the New Policies centered on state finance, land tax reform, and the Imperial examinations, there were also military concerns. This included policies of raising militias to lessen the expense of upholding a million soldiers, putting government monopolies on saltpetre and sulphur production and distribution in 1076 (to ensure that gunpowder solutions would not fall into the hands of enemies), and aggressive military policy towards Song's northern rivals of the Western Xia and Liao dynasties. A few years after Song dynasty military forces had made victorious territorial gains against the Tanguts of the Western Xia, in 1080 Shen Kuo was entrusted as a military officer in defense of Yanzhou (modern-day Yan'an, Shaanxi province). During the autumn months of 1081, Shen was successful in defending Song dynasty territory while capturing several fortified towns of the Western Xia. The Emperor Shenzong of Song rewarded Shen with numerous titles for his merit in these battles, and in the sixteen months of Shen's military campaign, he received 273 letters from the Emperor. However, Emperor Shenzong trusted an arrogant military officer who disobeyed the emperor and Shen's proposal for strategic fortifications, instead fortifying what Shen considered useless strategic locations. Furthermore, this officer expelled Shen from his commanding post at the main citadel, so as to deny him any glory in chance of victory. The result of this was nearly catastrophic, as the forces of the arrogant officer were decimated; Xinzhong Yao states that the death toll was 60,000. Nonetheless, Shen was successful in defending his fortifications and the only possible Tangut invasion-route to Yanzhou.

Painting of a Buddhist luohan, by Liu Songnian, painted in 1207; Shen Kuo not only listed literati painting as one of his cherished pastimes, but also Buddhist meditation.[29]

The new Chancellor Cai Que (; 1036-1093) held Shen responsible for the disaster and loss of life. Along with abandoning the territory which Shen Kuo had fought for, Cai ousted Shen from his seat of office. Shen's life was now forever changed, as he lost his once reputable career in state governance and the military. Shen was then put under probation in a fixed residence for the next six years. However, as he was isolated from governance, he decided to pick up the ink brush and dedicate himself to intensive scholarly studies. After completing two geographical atlases for a state-sponsored program, Shen was rewarded by having his sentence of probation lifted, allowing him to live in a place of his choice. Shen was also pardoned by the court for any previous faults or crimes that were claimed against him.

In his more idle years removed from court affairs, Shen Kuo enjoyed pastimes of the Chinese gentry and literati that would indicate his intellectual level and cultural taste to others. As described in his Dream Pool Essays, Shen Kuo enjoyed the company of the "nine guests" (九客, jiuke), a figure of speech for the Chinese zither, the older 17x17 line variant of weiqi (known today as go), Zen Buddhist meditation, ink ( calligraphy and painting), tea drinking, alchemy, chanting poetry, conversation, and drinking wine. These nine activities were an extension to the older so-called Four Arts of the Chinese Scholar.

In the 1070s, Shen had purchased a lavish garden estate on the outskirts of modern-day Zhenjiang, Jiangsu province, a place of great beauty which he named "Dream Brook" ("Mengxi") after he visited it for the first time in 1086. Shen Kuo permanently moved to the Dream Brook Estate in 1088, and in that same year he completed his life's written work of the Dream Pool Essays, naming the book after his garden-estate property. It was there that Shen Kuo spent the last several years of his life in leisure, isolation, and illness, until his death in 1095.

Shen Kuo wrote extensively on a wide range of different subjects. His written work included two geographical atlases, a treatise on music with mathematical harmonics, governmental administration, mathematical astronomy, astronomical instruments, martial defensive tactics and fortifications, painting, tea, medicine, and much poetry. His scientific writings have been praised by sinologists such as Joseph Needham and Nathan Sivin, and he has been compared by Sivin to polymaths such as his Song dynasty Chinese contemporary Su Song, as well as to Gottfried Leibniz and Mikhail Lomonosov.

A Han dynasty incense burner, showing artificial mountains as a lid decoration, which may have influenced the invention.[33]

Joseph Needham suggests that certain pottery vessels of the Han dynasty (202 BC - 220 AD) showing artificial mountains as lid decorations may have influenced the development of the raised-relief map in China. The Han dynasty general Ma Yuan (14 BC - 49 AD) is recorded as having made a raised-relief map of valleys and mountains in a rice-constructed model of 32 AD. Shen Kuo's largest atlas included twenty three maps of China and foreign regions that were drawn at a uniform scale of 1:900,000. Shen also created a raised-relief map using sawdust, wood, beeswax, and wheat paste. Zhu Xi (1130-1200) was inspired by the raised-relief map of Huang Shang and so made his own portable map made of wood and clay which could be folded up from eight hinged pieces.

For pharmacology, Shen wrote of the difficulties of adequate diagnosis and therapy, as well as the proper selection, preparation, and administration of drugs. He held great concern for detail and philological accuracy in identification, use and cultivation of different types of medicinal herbs, such as in which months medicinal plants should be gathered, their exact ripening times, which parts should be used for therapy; for domesticated herbs he wrote about planting times, fertilization, and other matters of horticulture. In the realms of botany, zoology, and mineralogy, Shen Kuo documented and systematically described hundreds of different plants, agricultural crops, rare vegetation, animals, and minerals found in China. For example, Shen noted that the mineral orpiment was used to quickly erase writing errors on paper.

Five bracket arm bases and two cantilever arms, from the Yingzao Fashi of 1103.

The writing of Shen Kuo is the only source for the date when the drydock was first used in China. Shen Kuo wrote that during the Xi-Ning reign (1068-1077), the court official Huang Huaixin devised a plan for repairing 60 m (200 ft) long palatial boats that were a century old; essentially, Huang Huaixin devised the first Chinese drydock for suspending boats out of water. These boats were then placed in a roof-covered dock warehouse to protect them from weathering. Shen also wrote about the effectiveness of the new invention (i.e. by the 10th century engineer Qiao Weiyo) of the pound lock to replace the old flash lock design used in canals. He wrote that it saved the work of five hundred annual labors, annual costs of up to 1,250,000 strings of cash, and increased the size limit of boats accommodated from 21 tons/21000 kg to 113 tons/115000 kg.

If it were not for Shen Kuo's analysis and quoting in his Dream Pool Essays of the writings of the architect Yu Hao ( fl. 970), the latter's work would have been lost to history. Yu designed a famous wooden pagoda that burned down in 1044 and was replaced in 1049 by a brick pagoda (the ' Iron Pagoda') of similar height, but not of his design. From Shen's quotation-or perhaps Shen's own paraphrasing of Yu Hao's Timberwork Manual (木經; Mujing)-shows that already in the 10th century there was a graded system of building unit proportions, a system which Shen states had become more precise in his time but stating no one could possibly reproduce such a sound work. However, he did not anticipate the more complex and matured system of unit proportions embodied in the extensive written work by scholar-official Li Jie (1065-1110), the Treatise on Architectural Methods (營造法式; Yingzao Fashi) of 1103. Klaas Ruitenbeek states that the version of the Timberwork Manual quoted by Shen is most likely Shen's summarization of Yu's work or a corrupted passage of the original by Yu Hao, as Shen writes: "According to some, the work was written by Yu Hao."

The Chinese had long taken an interest in examining the human body. For example, in 16 AD, the Xin dynasty usurper Wang Mang called for the dissection of an executed man, to examine his arteries and viscera in order to discover cures for illnesses. Shen also took interest in human anatomy, dispelling the long-held Chinese theory that the throat contained three valves, writing, "When liquid and solid are imbibed together, how can it be that in one's mouth they sort themselves into two throat channels?" Shen maintained that the larynx was the beginning of a system that distributed vital from the air throughout the body, and that the esophagus was a simple tube that dropped food into the stomach. Following Shen's reasoning and correcting the findings of the dissection of executed bandits in 1045, an early 12th-century Chinese account of a bodily dissection finally supported Shen's belief in two throat valves, not three. Also, the later Song dynasty judge and early forensic expert Song Ci (1186-1249) would promote the use of autopsy in order to solve homicide cases, as written in his Collected Cases of Injustice Rectified.

Yang Hui triangle (Pascal's triangle) using rod numerals, from a book by mathematician Zhu Shijie, 1303

In the broad field of mathematics, Shen Kuo mastered many practical mathematical problems, including many complex formulas for geometry, circle packing, and chords and arcs problems employing trigonometry. Shen addressed problems of writing out very large numbers, as large as (10 ⁴) ⁴³. Shen's "technique of small increments" laid the foundation in Chinese mathematics for packing problems involving equal difference series. Sal Restivo writes that Shen used summation of higher series to ascertain the number of kegs which could be piled in layers in a space shaped like the frustum of a rectangular pyramid. In his formula "technique of intersecting circles", he created an approximation of the arc of a circle s given the diameter d, sagitta v, and length of the chord c subtending the arc, the length of which he approximated as s = c + 2v ²/d. Restivo writes that Shen's work in the lengths of arcs of circles provided the basis for spherical trigonometry developed in the 13th century by Guo Shoujing (1231-1316). He also simplified the counting rods technique by outlining short cuts in algorithm procedures used on the counting board, an idea expanded on by the mathematician Yang Hui (1238-1298). Victor J. Katz asserts that Shen's method of "dividing by 9, increase by 1; dividing by 8, increase by 2," was a direct forerunner to the rhyme scheme method of repeated addition "9, 1, bottom add 1; 9, 2, bottom add 2".

Shen wrote extensively about what he had learned while working for the state treasury, including mathematical problems posed by computing land tax, estimating requirements, currency issues, metrology, and so forth. Shen once computed the amount of terrain space required for battle formations in military strategy, and also computed the longest possible military campaign given the limits of human carriers who would bring their own food and food for other soldiers. Shen wrote about the earlier Yi Xing (672-717), a Buddhist monk who applied an early escapement mechanism to a water-powered celestial globe. By using mathematical permutations, Shen described Yi Xing's calculation of possible positions on a go board game. Shen calculated the total number for this using up to five rows and twenty five game pieces, which yielded the number 847,288,609,443.

Shen Kuo experimented with the pinhole camera and burning mirror as the ancient Chinese Mohists had done in the 4th century BC, as Mozi of China's Warring States period was perhaps the first to describe the concept of camera obscura, if not his Greek contemporary Aristotle. The Iraqi Muslim scientist Ibn al-Haytham (965-1039) further experimented with camera obscura and was the first to attribute geometrical and quantitative properties to it, but Shen was first to note the relationship of the three separate radiation phenomena: the focal point, burning point, and pinhole. Using a fitting metaphor, Shen compared optical image inversion to an oarlock and waisted drum. Along with focal points, he also noted that the image in a concave mirror is inverted. Shen, who never asserted that he was the first to experiment with camera obscura, hints in his writing that camera obscura was dealt with in the Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang written by Duan Chengshi (d. 863) during the Tang dynasty (618-907), in regard to the inverted image of a Chinese pagoda by a seashore. Chinese authors from the 12th to 17th centuries would discuss the optical observations made by Shen Kuo but not advance them further, while Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) would be the first in Europe to make a similar observation about the focal point and pinhole in camera obscura.

Since the time of the engineer and inventor Ma Jun (c. 200-265), the Chinese had used the south-pointing chariot, which did not employ magnetism, as a compass. In 1044 the Collection of the Most Important Military Techniques (; Wujing Zongyao) recorded that fish-shaped objects cut from sheet iron, magnetized by thermoremanence (essentially, heating that produced weak magnetic force), and placed in a water-filled bowl enclosed by a box were used for directional pathfinding alongside the south-pointing chariot.

A Han dynasty (202 BC-220 AD) ladle-and-basin lodestone south-pointing compass, used by ancient Chinese geomancers, but not for navigation.

However, it was not until the time of Shen Kuo that the earliest magnetic compasses would be used for navigation. In his written work, Shen Kuo made the first known explicit reference to the magnetic compass-needle and the concept of true north. He wrote that steel needles were magnetized once they were rubbed with lodestone, and that they were put in floating position or in mountings; he described the suspended compass as the best form to be used, and noted that the magnetic needle of compasses pointed either south or north. Shen Kuo asserted that the needle will point south but with a deviation, stating "[the magnetic needles] are always displaced slightly east rather than pointing due south."

Shen Kuo wrote that it was preferable to use the twenty-four-point rose instead of the old eight compass cardinal points - and the former was recorded in use for navigation shortly after Shen's death. The preference of use for the twenty-four-point-rose compass may have arisen from Shen's finding of a more accurate astronomical meridian, determined by his measurement between the pole star and true north; however, it could also have been inspired by geomantic beliefs and practices. The book of the author Zhu Yu, the Pingzhou Table Talks published in 1119 (written from 1111 to 1117), was the first record of use of a compass for seafaring navigation. However, Zhu Yu's book recounts events back to 1086, when Shen Kuo was writing the Dream Pool Essays; this meant that in Shen's time the compass might have already been in navigational use. In any case, Shen Kuo's writing on magnetic compasses has proved invaluable for understanding China's earliest use of the compass for seafaring navigation.

Bronzeware from the Shang dynasty (1600-1046 BC); Song era antiquarians and archeologists in search of antiques for reviving ancient rituals claimed to have found bronzewares dated as far back as the Shang era, which contained written inscriptions.[79]

Many of Shen Kuo's contemporaries were interested in antiquarian pursuits of collecting old artworks. They were also interested in archaeological pursuits, although for rather different reasons than why Shen Kuo held an interest in archaeology. While Shen's educated Confucian contemporaries were interested in obtaining ancient relics and antiques in order to revive their use in rituals, Shen was more concerned with how items from archeological finds were originally manufactured and what their functionality would have been, based on empirical evidence. Shen Kuo criticized those in his day who reconstructed ancient ritual objects using only their imagination and not the tangible evidence from archeological digs or finds. Shen also disdained the notion of others that these objects were products of the "sages" or the aristocratic class of antiquity, rightfully crediting the items' manufacture and production to the common working people and artisans of previous eras. Some author writes that Shen Kuo "advocated the use of an interdisciplinary approach to archaeology and practiced such an approach himself through his work in metallurgy, optics, and geometry in the study of ancient measures."

While working in the Bureau of Astronomy, Shen Kuo's interest in archaeology and old relics led him to reconstruct an armillary sphere from existing models as well as from ancient texts that could provide additional information. Shen used ancient mirrors while conducting his optics experiments. He observed ancient weaponry, describing the scaled sight devices on ancient crossbows and the ancients' production of swords with composite blades that had a midrib of wrought iron and low-carbon steel while having two sharp edges of high-carbon steel. Being a knowledgeable musician, Shen also suggested suspending an ancient bell by using a hollow handle. In his assessment of the carved reliefs of the ancient Zhuwei Tomb, Shen stated that the reliefs demonstrate genuine Han dynasty era clothing.

After unearthing an ancient crossbow device from a house's garden in Haichow, Jiangsu, Shen discovered that the cross-wire grid sighting device, marked in graduated measurements on the stock, could be used to calculate the height of a distant mountain in the same way that mathematicians could apply right-angle triangles to measure height. Needham asserts Shen had discovered the survey device known as Jacob's staff, which was not described elsewhere until the Provençal Jewish mathematician Levi ben Gerson (1288-1344) wrote of it in 1321. Shen wrote that while viewing the whole of a mountain, the distance on the instrument was long, but while viewing a small part of the mountainside the distance was short due to the device's cross piece that had to be pushed further away from the observer's eye, with the graduation starting on the further end. He wrote that if one placed an arrow on the device and looked past its end, the degree of the mountain could be measured and thus its height could be calculated.

The ancient Greek Aristotle (384 BC-322 BC) wrote in his Meteorology of how the earth had the potential for physical change, including the belief that all rivers and seas at one time did not exist where they were, and were dry. The Greek writer Xenophanes (570 BC-480 BC) wrote of how inland marine fossils were evidence that massive periodic flooding had wiped out mankind several times in the past, but never wrote of land formation or shifting seashores. Du Yu (222-285) a Chinese Jin dynasty officer, believed that the land of hills would eventually be leveled into valleys and valleys would gradually rise to form hills. The Daoist alchemist Ge Hong (284-364) wrote of the legendary immortal Magu; in a written dialogue by Ge, Ma Gu described how what was once the Eastern Sea (i.e. East China Sea) had transformed into solid land where mulberry trees grew, and would one day be filled with mountains and dry, dusty lands. The later Persian Muslim scholar Abū Rayhān al-Bīrūnī (973-1048) hypothesized that India was once covered by the Indian Ocean while observing rock formations at the mouths of rivers.

Bamboo and rocks by Li Kan (1244-1320); using evidence of fossilized bamboo within China's dry northwestern climate zone, Shen Kuo hypothesized that climates naturally shifted geographically over time.

It was Shen Kuo who formulated a hypothesis about the process of land formation ( geomorphology) based upon several observations as evidence. This included his observation of fossil shells in a geological stratum of a mountain hundreds of miles from the ocean. He inferred that the land was reshaped and formed by erosion of the mountains, uplift, and the deposition of silt, after observing strange natural erosions of the Taihang Mountains and the Yandang Mountain near Wenzhou. He hypothesized that, with the inundation of silt, the land of the continent must have been formed over an enormous span of time. While visiting the Taihang Mountains in 1074, Shen Kuo noticed strata of bivalve shells and ovoid rocks in a horizontal-running span through a cliff like a large belt. Shen proposed that the cliff was once the location of an ancient seashore that by his time had shifted hundreds of miles east. Shen wrote that in the Zhiping reign period (1064-1067) a man of Zezhou unearthed an object in his garden that looked like a serpent or dragon, and after examining it, concluded the dead animal had apparently turned to "stone". The magistrate of Jincheng, Zheng Boshun, examined the creature as well, and noted the same scale-like markings that were seen on other marine animals. Shen Kuo likened this to the "stone crabs" found in China.

Shen also wrote that since petrified bamboos were found underground in a climatic area where they had never been known to be grown, the climate there must have shifted geographically over time. Around the year 1080, Shen Kuo noted that a landslide on the bank of a large river near Yanzhou (modern Yan'an) had revealed an open space several dozens of feet under the ground once the bank collapsed. This underground space contained hundreds of petrified bamboos still intact with roots and trunks, "all turned to stone" as Shen Kuo wrote. Shen Kuo noted that bamboos do not grow in Yanzhou, located in northern China, and he was puzzled during which previous dynasty the bamboos could have grown. Considering that damp and gloomy low places provide suitable conditions for the growth of bamboo, Shen deduced that the climate of Yanzhou must have fit that description in very ancient times. Although this would have intrigued many of his readers, the study of paleoclimatology in medieval China did not develop into an established discipline.

The Song dynasty philosopher Zhu Xi (1130-1200) wrote of this curious natural phenomenon of fossils as well. He was known to have read the works of Shen Kuo. Shen's description of soil erosion and weathering predated that of Georgius Agricola in his book of 1546, De veteribus et novis metallis. Furthermore, Shen's theory of sedimentary deposition predated that of James Hutton, whose groundbreaking work was published in 1802 (considered the foundation of modern geology). Historian Joseph Needham likened Shen's account to that of the Scottish scientist Roderick Murchison (1792-1871), who was inspired to become a geologist after observing a providential landslide.

Early speculation and hypothesis pertaining to what is now known as meteorology had a long tradition in China before Shen Kuo. For example, the Han dynasty scholar Wang Chong (27-97) accurately described the process of the water cycle. However, Shen made some observations that were not found elsewhere in Chinese literature. For instance, Shen was the first in East Asia to describe tornadoes, which were thought to exist only in the Western hemisphere until their observation in China during the first decade of the 20th century.

Shen gave reasoning (earlier proposed by Sun Sikong, 1015-1076) that rainbows were formed by the shadow of the sun in rain, occurring when the sun would shine upon it. Paul Dong writes that Shen's explanation of the rainbow as a phenomenon of atmospheric refraction "is basically in accord with modern scientific principles." In Europe, Roger Bacon (1214-1294) was the first to suggest that the colors of the rainbow were caused by the reflection and refraction of sunlight through rain drops.

Shen hypothesized that rays of sunlight refract before reaching the surface of the earth, hence people on earth observing the sun are not viewing it in its exact position, in other words, the altitude of the apparent sun is higher than the actual altitude of the sun. Dong writes that "at the time, this discovery was remarkably original." Ibn al-Haytham, in his Book of Optics (1021), also discussed atmospheric refraction in regard to twilight.

Being the head official for the Bureau of Astronomy, Shen Kuo was an avid scholar of medieval astronomy, and improved the designs of several astronomical instruments. Shen is credited with making improved designs of the gnomon, armillary sphere, and clepsydra clock. For the clepsydra he designed a new overflow-tank type, and argued for a more efficient higher-order interpolation instead of linear interpolation in calibrating the measure of time. Improving the 5th century model of the astronomical sighting tube, Shen Kuo widened its diameter so that the new calibration could observe the pole star indefinitely. This came about due to the position of the pole star shifting in position since the time of Zu Geng in the 5th century, hence Shen Kuo diligently observed the course of the pole star for three months, plotting the data of its course and coming to the conclusion that it had shifted slightly over three degrees. Apparently this astronomical finding had an impact upon the intellectual community in China at the time. Even Shen's political rival and contemporary astronomer Su Song featured Shen's corrected position of the pole star (halfway between Tian shu, at −350 degrees, and the current Polaris) in the fourth star map of his celestial atlas.

The astronomical phenomena of the solar eclipse and lunar eclipse had been observed in the 4th century BC by astronomers Gan De and Shi Shen; the latter gave instructions on predicting the eclipses based on the relative position of the Moon to the Sun. The philosopher Wang Chong argued against the 'radiating influence' theory of Jing Fang's writing in the 1st century BC and that of Zhang Heng (78-139); the latter two correctly hypothesized that the brightness of the Moon was merely light reflected from the Sun. Jing Fang had written in the 1st century BC of how it was long accepted in China that the Sun and Moon were spherical in shape ('like a crossbow bullet'), not flat. Shen Kuo also wrote of solar and lunar eclipses in this manner, yet expanded upon this to explain why the celestial bodies were spherical, going against the ' flat earth' theory for celestial bodies. However, there is no evidence to suggest that Shen Kuo supported a round earth theory, which was introduced into Chinese science by Matteo Ricci and Xu Guangqi in the 17th century. When the Director of the Astronomical Observatory asked Shen Kuo if the shapes of the Sun and Moon were round like balls or flat like fans, Shen Kuo explained that celestial bodies were spherical because of knowledge of waxing and waning of the Moon. Much like what Zhang Heng had said, Shen Kuo likened the Moon to a ball of silver, which does not produce light, but simply reflects light if provided from another source (the Sun). He explained that when the Sun's light is slanting, the Moon appears full. He then explained if one were to cover any sort of sphere with white powder, and then viewed from the side it would appear to be a crescent, hence he reasoned that celestial bodies were spherical. He also wrote that, although the Sun and Moon were in conjunction and opposition with each other once a month, this did not mean the Sun would be eclipsed every time their paths met, because of the small obliquity of their orbital paths.

The original diagram of Su Song's book of 1092 showing the inner workings of his clocktower; a mechanically rotated armillary sphere crowns the top.

Shen is also known for his cosmological hypotheses in explaining the variations of planetary motions, including retrogradation. His colleague Wei Pu realized that the old calculation technique for the mean Sun was inaccurate compared to the apparent Sun, since the latter was ahead of it in the accelerated phase of motion, and behind it in the retarded phase. Shen's hypotheses were similar to the concept of the epicycle in the Greco-Roman tradition, only Shen compared the side-section of orbital paths of planets and variations of planetary speeds to points in the tips of a willow leaf. In a similar rudimentary physical analogy of celestial motions, as John B. Henderson describes it, Shen likened the relationship of the Moon's path to the ecliptic, the path of the Sun, "to the figure of a rope coiled about a tree."

Along with his colleague Wei Pu in the Bureau of Astronomy, Shen Kuo planned to plot out the exact coordinates of planetary and lunar movements by recording their astronomical observations three times a night for a continuum of five years. The Song astronomers of Shen's day still retained the lunar theory and coordinates of the earlier Yi Xing, which after 350 years had devolved into a state of considerable error. Shen criticized earlier Chinese astronomers for failing to describe celestial movement in spatial terms, yet he did not attempt to provide any reasoning for the motive power of the planets or other celestial movements. Shen and Wei began astronomical observations for the Moon and planets by plotting their locations three times a night for what should have been five successive years. The officials and astronomers at court were deeply opposed to Wei and Shen's work, offended by their insistence that the coordinates of the renowned Yi Xing were inaccurate. They also slandered Wei Pu, out of resentment that a commoner had expertise exceeding theirs. When Wei and Shen made a public demonstration using the gnomon to prove the doubtful wrong, the other ministers reluctantly agreed to correct the lunar and solar errors. Despite this success, they eventually dismissed Wei and Shen's tables of planetary motions. Therefore, only the worst and most obvious planetary errors were corrected, and many inaccuracies remained.

The Chinese Diamond Sutra, the oldest known printed book in world history (868), using woodblock printing.

Shen Kuo wrote that during the Qingli reign period (1041-1048), under Emperor Renzong of Song (1022-1063), an obscure commoner and artisan known as Bi Sheng (990-1051) invented ceramic movable type printing. Although the use of assembling individual characters to compose a piece of text had its origins in antiquity, Bi Sheng's methodical innovation was something completely revolutionary for his time. Shen Kuo noted that the process was tedious if one only wanted to print a few copies of a book, but if one desired to make hundreds or thousands of copies, the process was incredibly fast and efficient. Beyond Shen Kuo's writing, however, nothing is known of Bi Sheng's life or the influence of movable type in his lifetime. Although the details of Bi Sheng's life were scarcely known, Shen Kuo wrote:

When Bi Sheng died, his fount of type passed into the possession of my followers (i.e. one of Shen's nephews), among whom it has been kept as a precious possession until now.

A revolving table typecase with individual movable type characters arranged primarily by rhyming scheme, from Wang Zhen's book of agriculture published in 1313.

There are a few surviving examples of books printed in the late Song dynasty using movable type printing. This includes Zhou Bida's Notes of The Jade Hall () printed in 1193 using the method of baked-clay movable type characters outlined in the Dream Pool Essays. Yao Shu (1201-1278), an advisor to Kublai Khan, once persuaded a disciple Yang Gu to print philological primers and Neo-Confucian texts by using what he termed the "movable type of Shen Kuo". Wang Zhen (fl. 1290-1333), who wrote the valuable agricultural, scientific, and technological treatise of the Nong Shu, mentioned an alternative method of baking earthenware type with earthenware frames in order to make whole blocks. Wang Zhen also improved its use by inventing wooden movable type in the years 1297 or 1298, while he was a magistrate of Jingde, Anhui province. The earlier Bi Sheng had experimented with wooden movable type, but Wang's main contribution was improving the speed of typesetting with simple mechanical devices, along with the complex, systematic arrangement of wooden movable type involving the use of revolving tables. Although later metal movable type would be used in China, Wang Zhen experimented with tin metal movable type, but found its use to be inefficient.

By the 15th century, metal movable type printing was developed in Ming dynasty China (and earlier in Goryeo Korea, by the mid 13th century), and was widely applied in China by at least the 16th century. In Jiangsu and Fujian, wealthy Ming era families sponsored the use of metal type printing (mostly using bronze). This included the printing works of Hua Sui (1439-1513), who pioneered the first Chinese bronze-type movable printing in the year 1490. In 1718, during the mid Qing dynasty (1644-1912), the scholar of Tai'an known as Xu Zhiding developed movable type with enamelware instead of earthenware. There was also Zhai Jinsheng (b. 1784), a teacher of Jingxian, Anhui, who spent thirty years making a font of earthenware movable type, and by 1844 he had over 100,000 Chinese writing characters in five sizes.

Despite these advances, movable type printing never gained the amount of widespread use in East Asia that woodblock printing had achieved since the Chinese Tang dynasty in the 9th century. With written Chinese, the vast amount of written morpheme characters impeded movable type's acceptance and practical use, and was therefore seen as largely unsatisfactory. Furthermore, the European printing press, first invented by Johannes Gutenberg (1398-1468), was eventually wholly adopted as the standard in China, yet the tradition of woodblock printing remains popular in East Asian countries.

Shen Kuo described the phenomena of natural predator insects controlling the population of pests, the latter of which had the potential to wreak havoc upon the agricultural base of China.

Shen also wrote about advancements in metallurgy. While visiting the iron-producing district at Cizhou in 1075, Shen described the "partial decarburization" method of reforging cast iron under a cold blast, which Hartwell, Needham, and Wertime state is the predecessor of the Bessemer process. Shen was worried about deforestation due to the needs of the iron industry and ink makers using pine soot in the production process, so he suggested for the latter an alternative of petroleum, which he believed was "produced inexhaustibly within the earth". Shen used the soot from the smoke of burned petroleum fuel (石油 Shíyóu, "rock oil" as Shen called it) to invent a new, more durable type of writing ink; the Ming dynasty pharmacologist Li Shizhen (1518-1593) wrote that Shen's ink was "lustrous like lacquer, and superior to that made from pinewood lamp-black," or the soot from pinewood.

Shen Kuo was much in favor of philosophical Daoist notions which challenged the authority of empirical science in his day. Although much could be discerned through empirical observation and recorded study, Daoism asserted that the secrets of the universe were boundless, something that scientific investigation could merely express in fragments and partial understandings. Shen Kuo referred to the ancient Daoist in explaining the spiritual processes and attainment of foreknowledge that cannot be attained through "crude traces", which he likens to mathematical astronomy. Nathan Sivin proposes that Shen was the first in history to "make a clear distinction between our unconnected experiences and the unitary causal world we postulate to explain them," which Biderman and Scharfstein state is arguably inherent in the works of Heraclitus, Plato, and Democritus as well. Shen was a firm believer in destiny and prognostication, and made rational explanations for the relations between them. Shen held a special interest in fate, mystical divination, bizarre phenomena, yet warned against the tendency to believe that all matters in life were preordained. When describing an event where lightning had struck a house and all the wooden walls did not burn (but simply turned black) and lacquerwares inside were fine, yet metal objects had melted into liquid, Shen Kuo wrote:

Most people can only judge of things by the experiences of ordinary life, but phenomena outside the scope of this are really quite numerous. How insecure it is to investigate natural principles using only the light of common knowledge, and subjective ideas.

In his commentary on the ancient Confucian philosopher Mencius (372-289 BC), Shen wrote of the importance of choosing to follow what one knew to be a true path, yet the heart and mind could not attain full knowledge of truth through mere sensory experience. In his own unique way but using terms influenced by the ideas of Mencius, Shen wrote of an autonomous inner authority that formed the basis for one's inclination towards moral choices, a concept linked to Shen's life experiences of surviving and obtaining success through self-reliance. Along with his commentary on the Chinese classic texts, Shen Kuo also wrote extensively on the topics of supernatural divination and Buddhist meditation.

In the "Strange Happenings" passage of the Dream Pool Essays, Shen offered accounts of an unidentified flying object that occurred during the reign of Emperor Renzong (1022-1063). An object as bright as a pearl was said to occasionally hover over the city of Yangzhou at night, and was previously described by local inhabitants of eastern Anhui and then in Jiangsu. A man near Xingkai Lake observed the same object, alleging that it emitted powerful lights from its interior like sunbeams illuminating the woods over a ten mile radius before departing at tremendous speeds. Shen recorded that Yibo, a poet of Gaoyou, wrote a poem about this "pearl" after witnessing it and that locals around Fanliang in Yangzhou erected a "Pearl Pavilion" where spectators on boats hoped to spot the mysterious flying object again.

As an art critic, Shen criticized the paintings of Li Cheng (919-967) for failing to observe the principle of " seeing the small from the viewpoint of the large" in portraying buildings and the like. He praised the works of Dong Yuan (c. 934-c. 962); he noted that although a close-up view of Dong's work would create the impression that his brush techniques were cursory, seen from afar his landscape paintings would give the impression of grand, resplendent, and realistic scenery. In addition, Shen's writing on Dong's artworks represents the earliest known reference to the Jiangnan style of painting. In his "Song on Painting" and in his Dream Pool Essays, Shen praised the creative artworks of the Tang painter Wang Wei (701-761); Shen noted that Wang was unique in that he "penetrated into the mysterious reason and depth of creative activity," but was criticized by others for not conforming his paintings to reality, such as his painting with a banana tree growing in a snowy, wintry landscape.

Much of Shen Kuo's written work was probably purged under the leadership of minister Cai Jing (1046-1126), who revived the New Policies of Wang Anshi, although he set out on a campaign of attrition to destroy or radically alter the written work of his predecessors and especially Conservative enemies. For example, only six of Shen's books remain, and four of these have been significantly altered since the time they were penned by the author.

In modern times, the best attempt at a complete list and summary of Shen's writing was an appendix written by Hu Daojing in his standard edition of Brush Talks, written in 1956.

Shen Kuo's Dream Pool Essays consists of some 507 separate essays exploring a wide range of subjects. It was Shen's ultimate attempt to comprehend and describe a multitude of various aspects of nature, science, and reality, and all the practical and profound curiosities found in the world. The literal translation of the title, Dream Brook Brush Talks, refers to his Dream Brook estate, where he spent the last years of his life. About the title, he is quoted as saying: "Because I had only my writing brush and ink slab to converse with, I call it Brush Talks."

The book was originally 30 chapters long, yet an unknown Chinese author's edition of 1166 edited and reorganized the work into 26 chapters.

Although the Dream Pool Essays is certainly his most extensive and important work, Shen Kuo wrote other books as well. In 1075, Shen Kuo wrote the Xining Fengyuan Li (; The Oblatory Epoch astronomical system of the Splendid Peace reign period), which was lost, but listed in a 7th chapter of a Song dynasty bibliography. This was the official report of Shen Kuo on his reforms of the Chinese calendar, which were only partially adopted by the Song court's official calendar system. During his years of retirement from governmental service, Shen Kuo compiled a formulary known as the Liang Fang (; Good medicinal formulas). Around the year 1126 it was combined with a similar collection by the famous Su Shi (1037-1101), who was ironically a political opponent to Shen Kuo's faction of Reformers and New Policies supporters at court, yet it was known that Shen Kuo and Su Shi were nonetheless friends and associates. Shen wrote the Mengqi Wanghuai Lu (; Record of longings forgotten at Dream Brook), which was also compiled during Shen's retirement. This book was a treatise in the working since his youth on rural life and ethnographic accounts of living conditions in the isolated mountain regions of China. Only quotations of it survive in the Shuo Fu () collection, which mostly describe the agricultural implements and tools used by rural people in high mountain regions. Shen Kuo also wrote the Changxing Ji (; Collected Literary Works of [the Viscount of] Changxing). However, this book was without much doubt a posthumous collection, including various poems, prose, and administrative documents written by Shen. By the 15th century (during the Ming dynasty), this book was reprinted, yet only the 19th chapter remained. This chapter was reprinted in 1718, yet poorly edited. Finally, in the 1950s the author Hu Daojing supplemented this small yet valuable work with additions of other scattered poems written by Shen, in the former's Collection of Shen Kua's Extant Poetry (Shanghai: Shang-hai Shu-tian, 1958). In the tradition of the popular Song era literary category of 'travel record literature' ('youji wenxue'), Shen Kuo also wrote the Register of What Not to Forget, a traveler's guide to what type of carriage is suitable for a journey, the proper foods one should bring, the special clothing one should bring, and many other items.

In his Sequel to Numerous Things Revealed, the Song author Cheng Dachang (1123-1195) noted that stanzas prepared by Shen Kuo for military victory celebrations were later written down and published by Shen. This includes a short poem "Song of Triumph" by Shen Kuo, who uses the musical instrument mawei huqin ('horse-tail barbarian stringed instrument' or 'horse-tail fiddle') of the northwestern Inner Asian nomads as a metaphor for prisoners-of-war led by Song troops:

:The mawei huqin followed the Han chariot,

Its music sounding of complaint to the Khan.

Do not bend the bow to shoot the goose within the clouds,

The returning goose bears no letter.

Historian Jonathan Stock notes that the bent bow described in the poem above represents the arched bow used to play the huqin, while the sound of the instrument itself represented the discontent expressed by the prisoners-of-war with their defeated khan.

Praise, critique, and criticism

In the Routledge Curzon Encyclopedia of Confucianism, Xinzhong Yao states that Shen Kuo's legacy was tainted by his eager involvement in Wang Anshi's New Policies reforms, his actions criticized in the later traditional histories. However, Shen's reputation as a polymath has been well regarded. Joseph Needham stated that Shen Kuo was "one of the greatest scientific minds in Chinese history." The French sinologist Jacques Gernet is of the opinion that Shen possessed an "amazingly modern mind." Yao states of Shen's thorough recording of natural sciences in his Dream Pool Essays:

We must regard Shen Kuo's collection as an indispensable primary source attesting to the unmatched level of attainment achieved by Chinese science prior to the twelfth century.

However, Toby E. Huff writes that Shen Kuo's "scattered set" of writings lacks clear-cut organization and "theoretical acuteness," that is, scientific theory. Nathan Sivin wrote that Shen's originality stands "cheek by jowl with trivial didacticism, court anecdotes, and ephemeral curiosities" that provide little insight. Donald Holzman writes that Shen "has nowhere organized his observations into anything like a general theory." Huff writes that this was a systemic problem of early Chinese science, which lacked systematic treatment that could be found in European works such as the Concordance and Discordant Canons by the lawyer Gratian of Bologna (fl. 12th century). In regard to an overarching concept of science which could branch together all the various sciences studied by the Chinese, Sivin asserts that the writings of Shen Kuo "do not indicate that he achieved, or even sought, an integrated framework for his diverse knowledge; the one common thread is the varied responsibilities of his career as a high civil servant."

Upon his death, Shen Kuo was interred in a tomb in Yuhang District of Hangzhou, at the foot of the Taiping Hill. His tomb was eventually destroyed, yet Ming dynasty records indicated its location, which was found in 1983 and protected by the government in 1986. The remnants of the tomb's brick structure remained, along with Song dynasty glasswares and coins. The Hangzhou Municipal Committee completed a restoration of Shen's tomb in September 2001.

In addition to his tomb, Shen Kuo's Mengxi garden estate, his former two-acre (8,000 m ²) property in Zhenjiang, was restored by the government in 1985. However, the renovated Mengxi Garden is only part of the original of Shen Kuo's time. A Qing dynasty-era hall built on the site is now used as the main admissions gate. In the Memorial Hall of the gardens, there is a large painting depicting the original garden of Shen Kuo's time, including wells, green bamboo groves, stone-paved paths, and decorated walls of the original halls. In this exhibition hall there stands a 1.4 m (4.6 ft) tall statue of Shen Kuo sitting on a platform, along with centuries-old published copies of his Dream Pool Essays in glass cabinets, one of which is from Japan. At the garden estate there are also displayed marble banners, statues of Shen Kuo, and a model of an armillary sphere; a small museum gallery depicts Shen's various achievements.

The Purple Mountain Observatory in Nanjing discovered a new asteroid in 1964 and named it after Shen Kuo ( 2027 Shen Guo).

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Zhang, Yunming (1986). Isis: The History of Science Society: Ancient Chinese Sulfur Manufacturing Processes. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. According to Sivin (1995), III, 49-historian Nathan Sivin-Zhang's biography on Shen is of great importance as it contains the fullest and most accurate account of Shen Kuo's life.

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Shen Kuo ( Chinese: 沈括; 1031-1095) or Shen Gua, courtesy name Cunzhong (存中) and pseudonym Mengqi (now usually given as Mengxi) Weng (夢溪翁), was a Chinese polymath, scientist, and statesman of the Song dynasty (960-1279). Shen was a master in many fields of study including mathematics, optics, and horology.

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Explore how the Mongols conquered China and established the Yuan Dynasty, bringing cultural exchange.

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Kublai Khan - Biography, Death & Achievements | HISTORY

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Kublai Khan was the grandson of Genghis Khan and the founder of the Yuan Dynasty in 13th-century China. He was the fi…

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Detailed account of how Cai Lun invented paper during the Han Dynasty, revolutionizing communication.

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Paper is a thin nonwoven material traditionally made from a combination of milled plant and textile fibres. The first paper-like plant-based writing sheet was papyrus in Egypt, but the first true papermaking process was documented in China during the Eastern Han period (25–220 AD), traditionally att…

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Scientific analysis of one of the deadliest earthquakes in recorded history and its impact on China.

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The Tangshan earthquake of 1976 was one of the largest earthquakes in recent years. It occurred on July 28 at 3:42 a.m, Beijing (Peking) local time, and had magnitude 7.8, focal depth of 15 kilometers, and an epicentral intensity of XI on the New Chinese Seismic Intensity Scale; it caused serious damage and loss of life in this densely populated industrial city. Now, with the help of people from a

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Comprehensive overview of how the Silk Road facilitated trade and cultural exchange between East and West.

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The Silk Road: Ancient Trade Routes and Cultural Exchange

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Upon my first encounter with a historical map of the Silk Road, I was immediately captivated by its vast and intricate nature. The network…

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Learn about the influential Song Dynasty philosopher who shaped Chinese thought for centuries.

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Zhu Xi (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

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Zhu Xi, the preeminent Neo-Confucian ( daoxue) master of the Southern Song (1126-1271), is generally ranked as second only to Confucius (551-479 BCE) in influence and as rivaling Zhuangzi (fourth century BCE) in philosophic acumen in the Chinese philosophical tradition.

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Discover the engineering marvel that connects Hong Kong, Zhuhai, and Macao across the Pearl River.

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Island & Tunnel Project of Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge
Zhuhai City, China
Best Projects

Owner Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge Authority
Lead Design Firm China Communications Construction Co.
General Contractor China Communications Construction Co. Project Management Dept.
Engineers AECOM Asia Co. and COWI A/S Denmark

The concept of connecting Zhuhai, Hong Kong and Macao has been talked about since the 1980s. The islands, bridge and tunnel will slash travel times by roughly three hours and 30 minutes, but crossing the physical barriers of the Pearl River Delta and the South China Sea is an engineering challenge like no other.

The 4.1-mile tunnel is the world's longest immersed road tunnel and carries six lanes of traffic to artificial islands between Hong Kong and the bridge that leads to Zhuhai and Macao, all of which crosses a portion of the South China Sea. The island and tunnel portion of the project is a marvel of pre-cast concrete construction, with 33 tunnel elements (hollow concrete and steel shells) built in a factory.

Each tunnel piece measures 590 ft by 125 ft by 37 ft and weighs a staggering 80,000 tons. At its deepest point, the tunnel is immersed 157 ft beneath the South China Sea.

Construction crews precast each element on Guishan Island, near Zhuhai, and transported them to the site by tugboats. A foundation trench in the seabed was created by general contractor China Communications Construction Co., and the massive elements-including five curved ones-arrived and were immersed into place. Gao Xinglin, assistant director and senior engineer for owner Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge Authority, said the concrete exteriors of the elements are "proactive water sealing closure joints," meaning that, upon installation, all connections become waterproof. There is a 7,165-ton butt joint in the middle of the tunnel.

China Communications Construction led the joint venture engineering effort with Denmark's COWI providing immersed tunnel expertise. Challenges included soft soil that complicated the placement of the rock bed and the sheer scale.

Artificial islands were built on each end of the tunnel in shallower waters.

China Communications Construction used a structural frame built from 120 hollow steel caissons 165 ft high and weighing 550 tons each. They were prefabricated in Hong Kong and hammered into place on site, with the islands and the buildings on them built around the supports.

Back to "ENR Global Best Projects Awards Winners 2018"

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Best Project, Bridge/Tunnel: Island & Tunnel Project of Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge

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The concept of connecting Zhuhai, Hong Kong and Macao has been talked about since the 1980s.

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Mo Tzu: The Philosopher of Universal Love

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Mo Tzu: The Philosopher of Universal Love

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Explore the teachings of Mo Tzu, who advocated for universal love and non-aggression in ancient China.

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Mo Di ( Mo Ti), better known as Mozi ( Mo-tzu) or "Master Mo," was a Chinese thinker active from the late 5th to the early 4th centuries B.C.E. He is best remembered for being the first major intellectual rival to Confucius and his followers. Mozi's teaching is summed up in ten theses extensively argued for in the text that bears his name, although he himself is unlikely to have been its author. The most famous of these theses is the injunction that one ought to be concerned for the welfare of people in a spirit of "impartial concern" (jian'ai) that does not make distinctions between self and other, associates and strangers, a doctrine often described more simplistically as "universal love." Mozi founded a quasi-religious and paramilitary community that, apart from propagating the ten theses, lent aid to small states under threat from military aggressors with their expertise in counter-siege technology. Along with the Confucians, the Mohists were one of the two most prominent schools of thought during the Warring States period (403-221 B.C.E.), although contemporary sources such as the Hanfeizi and the Zhuangzi indicate that the Mohists had divided into rival sects by this time. While Mohist communities probably did not survive into the Qin dynasty (221-206 B.C.E.), Mohist ideas exerted a decisive influence upon the thinkers of early China. Between the late 4th and late 3rd centuries B.C.E., later Mohists wrote the earliest extant Chinese treatise on logic, as well as works on geometry, optics and mechanics. Mohist logic appears to have influenced the argumentative techniques of early Chinese thinkers, while Mohist visions of meritocracy and the public good helped to shape the political philosophies and policy decisions of both the Qin and Han (202 B.C.E.-220 C.E.) imperial regimes. In these ways, Mohist ideas survived well into the early imperial era, albeit by being absorbed into other Chinese philosophical traditions.

Table of Contents

1. Historical Background

The details of Mozi's life are uncertain. Early sources identify him variously as a contemporary of Confucius or as living after Confucius' time. Modern scholars generally believe that Mozi was active from the late 5th to the early 4th centuries B.C.E., before the time of the Confucian philosopher Mencius, which places him in the early Warring States period (403-221 B.C.E.) of ancient Chinese history. Little can be known of his personal life. Some early sources say that he, like Confucius, was a native of the state of Lu (in modern Shandong) and at one point served as a minister in the state of Song (in modern Henan). According to tradition, he studied with Confucian teachers but later rebelled against their ideas. As was the case with Confucius, Mozi probably traveled among the various contending states to present his ideas before their rulers in the hope of obtaining political employment, with an equal lack of success.

Mozi founded a highly organized quasi-religious and military community, with considerable geographical reach. Overseen by a "Grand Master" ( juzi), members of the community - "Mohists" ( mozhe) - were characterized by their commitment to ten theses ascribed to "Our Teacher Master Mo" ( zimozi), versions of which are articulated in the "Core Chapters" of the eponymous text. Quite apart from propagating the teachings of Mozi, the Mohist community also functioned as an international rescue organization that dispatched members versed in the arts of defensive military techniques to the aid of small states under threat from military aggressors. This outreach presumably stemmed from the Mohists' opposition to all forms of military aggression.

Some scholars speculate that Mozi and the Mohists probably came from a lower social class than, for instance, the Confucians, but the evidence is inconclusive and at best suggestive. Nevertheless, if the conjecture is true, it could well explain the often repetitive and artless style in which much of the Mozi is composed and the anti-aristocratic stance of much Mohist doctrine, as well as why the Mohists paid such attention to the basic economic livelihood of the common people.

2. The Core Chapters of the Mozi

The text known as the Mozi traditionally is divided into seventy-one "chapters," some of which are marked "missing" in the received text. Most scholars believe that the Mozi was probably not written by Master Mo himself, but by successive groups of disciples and their followers. No part of the text actually claims to be written by Mozi, although many parts purport to record his doctrines and conversations.

While there remain intense and complicated scholarly disputes over the exact dating and provenance of different parts of the Mohist corpus, it is probable that chapters 8-37 (the so-called "core chapters") derive either from the teachings of Mozi himself or from the formative period of the Mohist community and contain doctrines that were nominally adhered to by its members throughout much of the community's existence. The core chapters are replete with the formula "the doctrine of Our Teacher Master Mo says" ( zimozi yan yue), prefixed to sayings presented as records of Master Mo's teaching. (However, since the text most likely was not written by Mozi himself, this entry will refer to the doctrine presented in the core chapters in terms of "the Mohists" and "Mohist doctrine" rather than "Mozi" and "Mozi's doctrine.")

The core chapters consist of ten triads of essays, with seven chapters marked "missing." Each triad of chapters correlates with one of the ten Mohist theses. Traditionally, these triads correspond to the "upper" ( shang), "middle" ( zhong) and "lower" ( xia) versions of the thesis in question; in Western scholarship, they are usually referred to as versions "A," "B," and "C" of the corresponding thesis. Intriguingly, the chapters that make up each triad often are very close to each other in wording without being exactly identical, thus raising questions about the precise relationship between them and with how the text assumed its present shape. One influential theory in recent times is Angus C. Graham's proposal that the triads correspond to oral traditions of Mohist doctrine transmitted by the three Mohist sects mentioned in the Hanfeizi, a third century B.C.E. philosophical text associated with a student of the Confucian thinker Xunzi.

Much of the core chapters is written in a style that is not calculated to please. As Burton Watson puts it, the style is "marked by a singular monotony of sentence pattern, and a lack of wit or grace that is atypical of Chinese literature in general." But Watson also concedes that the Mohists' arguments "are almost always presented in an orderly and lucid, if not logically convincing fashion." Whether or not the arguments of the core chapters are logically convincing can only be determined on a case-by-case basis, but it is at least possible that the artless style is the consequence of a deliberate choice to prioritize clarity of argumentation.

3. The Ten Core Theses of Mohism

The contents of the ten triads and thus the outlines of the ten core theses are briefly described below:

Chapters 8-10, "Elevating the Worthy" ( shangxian), argue that the policy of elevating worthy and capable people to office in government whatever their social origin is a fundamental principle of good governance. The proper implementation of such a policy requires that the rulers attract the talented to service by the conferring of honor, the reward of wealth and the delegation of responsibility (and thus power). On the other hand, the rulers' practice of appointing kinsmen and favorites to office without regard to their abilities is condemned.

Chapters 11-13, "Exalting Unity" ( shangtong), contain a state-of-nature argument on the basis of which it is concluded that a unified conception of what is morally right ( yi) consistently enforced by a hierarchy of rulers and leaders is a necessary condition for social and political order. The thesis applies to the world community as a whole, conceived as a single moral-political hierarchy with the common people at the bottom, the feudal princes in the middle, and the emperor at the summit, above whom is Heaven itself.

Chapters 14-16, "Impartial Concern" ( jian'ai), argue that the cause of the world's troubles lies in people's tendency to act out of a greater regard for their own welfare than that of others, and that of associates over that of strangers, with the consequence that they often have no qualms about benefiting themselves or their own associates at the expense of others. The conclusion is that people ought to be concerned for the welfare of others without making distinctions between self, associates and strangers.

Chapters 17-19, "Against Military Aggression" ( feigong), condemn military aggression as both unprofitable (even for the aggressors) and immoral. Version C introduces a distinction between justified and unjustified warfare, claiming that the former was waged by the righteous ancient sage rulers to overthrow evil tyrants.

Chapters 20-21 (22 is listed as "missing"), "Frugality in Expenditures" ( jieyong), argue that good governance requires thrift in the ruler's expenditures. Useless luxuries are condemned. The chapters also argue for the clear priority of functionality over form in the making of various human artifacts (clothing, buildings, armor and weapons, boats and other vehicles).

Chapter 25 (23-24 are listed as "missing"), "Frugality in Funerals" ( jiezang), has the same theme as "Frugality in Expenditures," but applies it to the specific case of funeral rituals. The aristocratic practices of elaborate funerals and prolonged mourning are condemned as "not morally right" ( buyi) because they are not only useless to solving the world's problems, but add to the people's burdens. Here, the Mohists target practices beloved by their Confucian contemporaries, for whom the maintenance of harmonious moral order in society is best accomplished through strict fidelity to ritual codes.

Chapters 26-28, "Heaven's Will" ( Tianzhi), argue that the will of Heaven ( Tian) - portrayed as if it is a personal deity and providential agent who rewards the good and punishes the wicked - is the criterion of what is morally right. Here again, the Mohists contrast themselves with the Confucians, who regard Heaven as a moral but mysterious force that does not intervene directly in human affairs.

Chapter 31 (29-30 are listed as "missing"), "Elucidating the Spirits" ( minggui), claims that a loss of belief in the existence, power and providential character of spirits - supernatural agents of Tian tasked with enforcing its sanctions - has led to widespread immorality and social and political chaos. The chapter consists of an exchange with certain skeptics, whom Mozi answers with arguments purporting to prove that providential spirits exist, but also that widespread belief in their existence brings great social and political benefit.

Chapter 32 (33-34 are listed as "missing"), "Against Music" ( feiyue), condemns the musical displays of the aristocracy as immoralon the same basis according to which elaborate funerals and prolonged mourning are condemned in "Frugality in Funerals." Just as in that chapter, here again the Mohists attack practices that are particularly dear to their Confucian rivals, who believe that music, if properly performed according to ancient canons, can play a vital role in the regulation of moral order and the cultivation of virtue.

Chapters 35-37, "Against Fatalism" ( feiming), argue against the doctrine of fatalism (the thesis that human wisdom and effort have no effect on the outcomes of human endeavor) as pernicious and harmful in that widespread belief in it will lead to indolence and chaos. The chapters also contain crucial discussions on the general conditions or criteria (traditionally called the "Three Tests of Doctrine") that must be met by any doctrine if it is to be considered sound. (See Section 5: "Moral Epistemology" below.)

4. The Aims and Character of Mohist Doctrine

As in the case of many other philosophical conceptions in early China, Mohist doctrine is deeply rooted in the thinkers' response to the social and political problems that are perceived to beset the world ( tianxia, "all beneath Heaven"). In particular, the Mohists are concerned to offer a practical solution to the chaos ( luan) of the world so as to restore it to good order ( zhi). A way to characterize the Mohists' concern is to say that they (like many early Chinese philosophers) seek and to put the Way ( dao, the right way to live and to conduct the community's affairs) into practice rather than merely to discover and state the Truth about the universe. But there are also several more distinctively Mohist twists to this underlying concern.

First, the Mohists tend to equate the Way with a conception of what is morally right ( yi or renyi ). For them, good order obtains when "right rules" ( yizheng) rather than "might rules" ( lizheng) in the world, and "right rules" when agents (both individual and groups) conduct themselves in a manner that is morally right. A way by which we might make sense of the Mohists' project is to see it as concerned with promoting the public good, where the public good is defined in terms of social and political justice.

Second, Mohist doctrine is almost exclusively concerned with moral behavior rather than moral character although, to be more precise, the main object of moral evaluation in Mohist doctrine is usually a way of conduct (for the individual) or a policy (for the state), rather than individual acts. In line with this focus on behavior, concepts that are naturally understood to be virtues or desirable qualities of agents (e.g., benevolence and filial piety) in Confucian texts often are discussed as if they are reducible to the moral rightness of conduct. In "Frugality in Funerals," for instance, "the business of the filial son" is defined in terms of conduct that benefits the world, which is in turn, a criterion of moral rightness (see the next section).

Third, the Mohists see the morally right as conceptually distinct from the customary or traditional. An argument that appeals to the distinction can be found in "Frugality in Funerals." The Mohists point to the variety between burial customs among the tribal peoples on the periphery of the Chinese world and note that, although what the tribes practice is customary within their communities, these practices also are all understood by an elite Chinese audience to be barbaric and immoral. The Mohists thus urge that, just because elaborate funerals and lengthy mourning are customary practices among the gentlemen of the central states, this fact alone will not secure their consistency with moral rightness.

Fourth, for the Mohists, the Way is the subject of explicit expression in the form of "doctrine" ( yan). Before proceeding with this point, it must be stressed that the term yan in the core chapters and other texts contemporary to the period ( the Mencius for instance) is often not best taken as "language" or "speech" in any generic sense. Rather, it often means "doctrine" or "maxim of conduct," a verbal package meant to guide individual conduct and state policy. In other words, we can take yan in the core chapters as the verbal counterpart to a conception of the Way, a linguistic formula that identifies a Way of life and guiding the conduct of those who hold to it.

Not only are Mozi and the Mohists concerned to advance a Way, they are explicit in verbalizing their Way as doctrine, offering arguments for it and defending it against rival doctrines. In disputation, they often first formulate their rivals' positions as opposing doctrines before attempting to refute them. They also often identify rivals by the doctrines they supposedly "hold to" (for instance, they speak of "the doctrine of those who hold to [the thesis that] ("fate exists'" in "Against Fatalism"). There is even a tendency to see the problematic conduct of people as largely springing from wrong doctrine, quite apart from the concern to offer arguments against various opponent positions. In addition, when the Mohists evaluate a practice or way of conduct, they sometimes speak in terms of evaluating the doctrinethat (putatively) corresponds to that practice (see, for instance, "Frugality in Funerals").

The "Ten Theses" as a whole can thus be taken as presenting the sum of Mohist doctrine, which is itself the verbal or linguistic counterpart to their Way, their conception of what is morally right. The characteristically Mohist tendency to see the Way as open to linguistic formulation puts them in sharp contrast with "Daoist" traditions such as those associated with Laozi and Zhuangzi. In fact, as Robert Eno has argued, the Mohist focus on doctrine very likely forms the polemical background to the critique against language in texts such as the "Discourse on Making Things Equal" chapter in the Zhuangzi.

5. Moral Epistemology

One of the philosophically most interesting aspects of the Mohist concern with doctrine is their explicit discussion of criteria for evaluating doctrine in the "Against Fatalism" chapters. The "Three Tests of Doctrine" are introduced as the "standards" or "gnomons" ( yi) without which doctrinal disputes become futile. As version C puts it: "To expound doctrine without first establishing standards ( yi) is like telling time using a sundial that has been placed on a spinning potter's wheel." The consequence is that the dispute will be interminable.

Although each version of "Against Fatalism" lists three "Tests," the lists differ and a total of four distinct "Tests" can be identified:

1. Conformity to the Will of Heaven and the Spirits - this criterion is mentioned only in "Against Fatalism" B but forms the subject matter of the "Heaven's Will" chapters. In those chapters, we can also find the claim that Heaven's will is to Mozi like as "the compass is to a wheelwright or the setsquare is to a carpenter." Just as the wheelwright and carpenter use these tools to evaluate if some object is properly considered round or square, so Mozi is said to lay down Heaven's will as a model (fa) and establish it as a standard (yi) by which conduct and doctrines can be evaluated.

2. Conformity to the teaching and practice of the ancient sage kings - Varieties of this "Test" are reported in all versions of "Against Fatalism" and its application can be seen throughout the core chapters.

3. Good consequences for the welfare of the world (especially the material wellbeing of the common people understood in terms of them having food, shelter and rest) - Varieties of this "Test" are also reported in all versions of "Against Fatalism" and a lengthy elaboration can also be found in "Frugality in Funerals."

4. Confirmation by the testimony of the masses' sense of sight and hearing - This "Test" is listed in "Against Fatalism" A and C, and there are only two certain applications" in the core chapters: in the "Elucidating Ghosts" chapter as part of the proof that providential ghosts exist, and in "Against Fatalism" B as part of the argument against the doctrine of fatalism.

There seems to be a widespread temptation to construe the different "Tests" in the following way: if a doctrine ( yan) passes a "Test," it is true. On this interpretation, the third "Test" might suggest a pragmatic conception of truth (or at least a pragmatic conception of the justification of truth claims). But such a reading is at best underdetermined by the text. It is also unnecessary as long as we keep in mind that the sort of yan at stake in the Core Chapters is usually such doctrine as is meant to guide conduct.

With that background in mind, we can at least see the first three "Tests" as being meant precisely for evaluating such yan as are naturally evaluated in terms of whether they correctly guide human conduct, rather than whether they make a true factual claim. This means that these "Tests" are best taken as criteria for assessing the soundness of normative rather than descriptive claims. Now given that Mohist doctrine is meant to be the verbal correlate of their conception of the Way, which in turn can be taken as their conception of what is morally right, it follows that "sound doctrine" in the context of Mohist thought is ultimately doctrine that enjoins morally right conduct and in this specific sense correctly guides human conduct. This also implies that each of these "Tests" can be understood as a criterion for moral rightness.

As for the fourth "Test," while it seems natural to take it as a criterion for evaluating factual, rather than normative claims, it should still be kept in mind that the Mohists appear to be primarily interested in the normative or policy implications of the (putatively factual) claims involved.

6. The Foundations of Mohist Morality

An intriguing question concerns how the different "Tests of Doctrine" (and thus the criterion of moral rightness to which each corresponds) relate to each other and whether any among them is the ultimate criterion to which the others can be reduced.

Of the three main "Tests," the second one (conformity to the teaching and practice of the ancient sage kings), is most easily shown to be derivative. The core chapters define the sage (and the related "benevolent man," which means roughly "ideal ruler" in context) as someone whose business it is to bring about order to the world ("Impartial Concern" A) or to promote the world's welfare and eliminate things that harm it ("Impartial Concern" B, C, "Frugality in Funerals," "Against Music"). In "Heaven's Will," on the other hand, the ancient sages are cited as examples of those who conducted themselves in accordance with Heaven's will. In summary, the ancient sages are presented by the Mohists as widely acknowledged exemplars of past rulers who successfully conducted themselves according to the Way, and the very reason why they are acknowledged to be sage kings is precisely because they taught sound doctrine and practiced the Way.

Given the wider cultural setting and prevailing rhetorical conventions, the Mohists' extensive appeal to the example and authority of the ancient sages is entirely understandable. Whatever their actual attitudes concerning the deeds and writings of the ancient sages as constituting a criterion of sound doctrine, the Mohists present themselves as addressing people who take the moral example of the ancient sages seriously. In this, their rhetorical practices do not differ from those of the Confucians. The two groups even share an overlapping taste in their choice of favored ancient sages: Yao, Shun, Yu, Tang, Wen, and Wu.

This leaves Heaven's Will and good consequences for the welfare of the world as criteria of sound doctrine. There is a strong tradition of modern interpreters, such as Fung Yu-lan, Angus C. Graham, and Benjamin Schwartz, who see the latter as primary and take Mohist doctrine to exemplify a form of utilitarianism. Other scholars, such as Dennis M. Ahren, David E. Soles, and Augustine Tseu, see the former as suggesting a divine command theory of morality, although this interpretation has been criticized by Kristopher Duda among others. This controversy is not well framed if it is stated purely in terms of the modern and somewhat alien categories of command theory and utilitarianism (or consequentialism). But this criticism aside, the genuine question remains as to how "Heaven's Will" and "good consequences" relate to each other as criteria of the morally right.

In favor of the position that the criterion of good consequences is ultimate, it may be pointed out that even within the "Heaven's Will" chapters, the Mohists argue on the basis that certain ways of conduct are in accordance with Heaven's Will because they promote the public good. It is further claimed that Heaven desires that people do certain sorts of things or conduct themselves in a certain manner because such conduct will promote the public good, an outcome that Heaven desires. These considerations suggest that the criterion of Heaven's Will might ultimately be reducible to that of good consequences.

In response, it is at least possible that while the question what ways of conduct are morally right? is always answerable in terms of whether or not a way of conduct promotes good consequences, the separate question of why these ways of conduct (picked out using the criterion of good consequences) are ultimately obligatory is answered with reference to Heaven's Will. If this is right, then there is a sense in which the two criteria neither reduce to each other nor potentially conflict, as they answer to different concerns altogether.

In any case, almost all of the Mohists' proposals are explicitly defended on the basis that adopting them will promote the public good. We might thus modestly conclude that whatever the final status of Heaven's Will as a criterion of the morally right, good consequences for the world is the operational criterion by which the Mohists evaluate various doctrines and the ways of conduct they verbalize. This conclusion is lent further support by the fact that Heaven's Will almost never features as an explicit part of the Mohists' arguments for their specific proposals outside of the "Heaven's Will" chapters.

7. Impartial Concern

Whether "Heaven's will" or "good consequences for the world" forms the ultimate criterion of the morally right, the most salient first-order ethical injunction in Mohist doctrine remains that of "impartial concern" ( jian'ai). This is an injunction that is argued for both on the basis that it exemplifies Heaven's Will (in the "Heaven's Will" triad) and that it is conducive to the order and welfare of the world (in the "Impartial Concern" triad). In addition, the presentation of the doctrine (in all versions of "Impartial Concern") strongly suggests that it is meant to be the panacea for all that is seriously wrong with the world and, to that extent, identifies the main substance of the Mohists' Way.

As earlier indicated, "impartial concern" might be stated as the injunction that people ought to be concerned for the welfare of others without making distinctions between self and others, associates and strangers. Scrutiny of the core chapters, however, suggests both more and less stringent interpretations of what it entails by way of conduct. At one extreme, the injunction seems to require that people ought (to seek) to benefit strangers as much as they do associates, and others, as much as they do themselves. At the other extreme, it only requires that people refrain from harming strangers as much as they do associates, and others, as much as they do themselves. A third, intermediate possibility says that people ought (to seek) to help strangers with urgent needs as much as they do associates, and others, as much as they do themselves.

The least stringent interpretation is implied by passages (in all versions of "Impartial Concern") where the injunction is argued for on the basis that adopting it will put a stop to the violent inter-personal and inter-group conflicts that beset the world, since on the Mohist account, it is people's tendency to act on the basis of a greater regard for their own welfare over that of others, and that of their associates over that of strangers, that led them to have no qualms about benefiting themselves or their own associates at the expense of others and even to do so using violent means. The injunction of "impartial concern" is meant to be a reversal of this tendency. On the other hand, the more demanding interpretations are suggested especially by "Impartial Concern C," in which it is said that if the doctrine is adopted b people, then not only will people not fight, the welfare of the weak and disadvantaged will be taken care of by those better endowed.

Whichever interpretation is taken, the basic injunction points toward an underlying notion of impartiality. We can take "impartial concern" as making explicit the notion that the common benefit of the world is, in some sense, impartially the benefit of everyone.

In "Impartial Concern" C, the Mohists put forward an interesting thought experiment ostensibly to show that even people who are committed to being more concerned for the welfare of self that for that of others, and associates than strangers have some reason to value impartial concern. They described a scenario in which the audience is asked to imagine that they are about to go on a long journey and need to put their family members in the care of another. The Mohists claim that the obvious and rational choice would be to put one's family members in the care of an impartialist rather than a partialist (that is, someone who is committed to "impartial concern" as opposed to someone who is committed to the opposite).

There are several problems with this argument. It seems to involve a false dilemma since the options of impartialist and partialist hardly exhaust the range of possible choices. Even if the Mohists were correct to claim that the impartialist is the obvious and rational choice, all it shows is that partialists have good reason to prefer that other people conduct themselves according to the dictates of impartial concern, rather than that they have reason to so conduct themselves, as Chad Hansen and Bryan W. Van Norden have pointed out. In defense of the Mohists, however, it might be the case that they are ultimately only concerned to establish that even partialists have reason to propagate the Mohists' doctrine of impartial concern, a conclusion that could follow from their argument.

8. Moral Psychology and Human Nature

Mohist doctrine as it is presented in the core chapters does not contain explicit discussions of the psychological aspects of the ethical life. "Human nature" ( xing), a term that plays an important role in the thinking of the Confucian thinkers Mencius and Xunzi, as well as Yang Zhu, does not even appear in the core chapters. Nonetheless, various aspects of Mohist doctrine might well entail commitments to potentially controversial positions in moral psychology and the theory of human nature.

Consider the Mohists' reply to the main objection raised against their doctrine of "impartial concern" - that the doctrine is overly demanding, given that people in general just do not have the motivational resources to act according to its dictates ("Impartial Concern" B and C). Citing historical accounts, the Mohists respond that the requirements of "impartial concern" are no harder than the sorts of things that rulers in the past had been able to demand and get from their subjects, such as reducing one's diet, wearing coarse clothing, and charging into flames at the ruler's command. It was because the rulers delighted in such actions and offered suitable incentives to encourage them that they were done, even on a regular basis. The Mohists conclude that people in general can be made to practice "impartial concern" as long as rulers delight in it and offer the right incentives to encourage it.

On the basis of passages such as this one, David S. Nivison and Bryan W. Van Norden argue that either the Mohists held the view that human nature is infinitely malleable or they thought that there is no human nature. Such a reading focuses on the extravagant claim made in the text that as long as the rulers delight in "impartial concern" and offer the right incentives, human beings (especially the structure of their motivations) can be radically changed "within a single generation." While this interpretation certainly is compatible with the tenor of the text, it is not necessarily the only possible interpretation. After all, all that is needed for the Mohists to make their reply is the thought that people - given their nature - can be made to practice "impartial concern" through offering them the right leadership and incentives. They hardly need the stronger (and less plausible) claim that people can be remolded in any fashion whatsoever given the right leadership and incentives. Furthermore, at least some of the historical examples cited by the Mohists suggest that they are thinking more of the people responding to incentives in the environment (e.g., the comfort-loving courtier wearing coarse clothing or going on a diet so as to please the ruler) rather than more radical changes to the structure of their motivations (as might be suggested by the story of the soldiers who have been conditioned to charge into flames on the ruler's command).

A weaker and to that extent more defensible interpretation is that the Mohists do not consider the Way in a Mencian sense - as "the realization of certain inclinations that human beings already share," as Shun Kwong-loi puts it. To be more precise, the Mohists do not appear to have considered the inclinations and predispositions that people already have as pointing to the contents of the Way. But they need not deny that these inclinations might, under suitable conditions (e.g., under a suitable regime of incentives), furnish the motivational resources for an agent to conduct himself well (the "Mohist" Yi Zhi in Mencius 3A5 seems to have taken a version of such a position) - as long as it is recalled that what counts as "conducting oneself well" is given by something else other than those inclinations or their development: sound doctrine established by rational arguments. Seen this way, the Mohists would be in direct opposition to Mencius, insofar as Mencius regards those "inclinations that human beings already share" (explicitly construed within the context of an account of human nature) as providing both the contents of morality and the motivational resources for moral cultivation.

9. Government

The Mohists' political ideal is most prominently stated in the "Elevating the Worthy" and "Exalting Unity" chapters, which include the only theses that are explicitly said to identify "fundamentals of governance" ( wei zheng zhi ben).

The "Exalting Unity" triad of chapters contains a "state of nature" argument that bears comparison both with ideas found in the Confucian philosopher Xunzi and perhaps more remotely, Thomas Hobbes' and the social contract tradition of early modern European thought. As with the latter, it is at least arguable that even though the account is couched as if making historical claims about how human beings were like in a distant past "before there were any laws and criminal punishment" (version A) or "before there were rulers or leaders" (versions B and C), its logic is better appreciated if taken as a thought experiment of what things would be like were certain hypothetical conditions to hold.

The most important implications of such a hypothesis, for the Mohists, is that people will hold to different and conflicting opinions about what is morally right ( yi), on the basis of which they will condemn each other. The end result is a state of violent conflict and chaos. This chaos is fully resolved only with the installment of a hierarchy of rulers and leaders consistently enforcing a unified conception of what is morally right through surveillance and incentives. The conclusion of the argument is that such a solution is a necessary condition for social and political order.

The "Elevating the Worthy" triad of chapters, on the other hand, proposes that good governance requires that the state cultivate worthy and capable people and employ them as officials, whatever their social origin. This doctrine opposes a form of meritocracy to the nepotism and cronyism prevalent among the rulers. It also insists that if the doctrine is to be successfully carried though, the rulers need to confer high rank, generous stipend and real power upon the worthy. Interestingly, in arguing for the doctrine, version B both traces it to the practices of the ancient sage kings and also says that the ancients were modeling their regime upon Heaven, thus suggesting that an application of the criterion of "Heaven's will" in involved. Nonetheless, the main thrust of all three versions remains that meritocracy will bring great benefits to the state.

10. Frugality

Three of the ten core Mohist theses are related to the virtue of frugality: "Frugality in Expenditures," "Frugality in Funerals," and "Against Music." For the most part, the arguments in these chapters are paradigmatic cases of "good consequences to the welfare of the world" as criterion of the morally right. (As mentioned earlier, a lengthy elaboration of the criterion can be found in the opening parts of "Frugality in Funerals.") In "Frugality in Expenditures," the criterion is applied positively through showing that the preferred policy of government thrift brings about beneficial consequences. In the other two triads, the criterion is applied negatively through detailing the harmful consequences that attend elaborate funerals and prolonged mourning, and extravagant music displays of the aristocracy.

One interesting feature of the arguments in these chapters is the weight given to the welfare of the common people in the Mohists' calculation of the benefit and harm that result from the policy under assessment. This aspect of Mohist doctrine is especially prominent in "Against Music," where a large part of what counts as the "good consequences" of a policy is articulated in terms of the common people receiving enough to eat, being protected from the elements and having sufficient rest. It thus seems that, despite their commitment to "impartial concern," the Mohists have a partisan concern for the interests of the lower social classes. The more charitable interpretation, however, is that they are accommodating concerns in the region of distributive justice. That is, the common benefit of the world is in some sense impartially and equally the benefit of everyone; but since the Mohists - like most thinkers in ancient China - do not envision a radical elimination of the vast social, economic and political inequalities that are simply a fact of life in Warring States China, the distributive concerns are met by giving extra weight to the interests of the disadvantaged. This reading is also consonant with their claim that were "impartial concern" to be widely practice, the welfare of the weak and disadvantaged will be taken care of by those better endowed (in "Impartial Concern C").

A more serious charge against the Mohists, however, is that their doctrine on frugality commits them to an overly restrictive and hence highly implausible conception of the good. The Confucian thinker Xunzi defends elaborate Confucian funeral rituals and musical displays against Mohist attacks by claiming that they given form to, and meet, the emotional needs of people. Conversely, Mohist doctrine simply fails to take into account aspects of the human good not reducible to material livelihood. Insofar as Mohist doctrine does imply such a reduced conception of the human good, this is a cogent objection.

But insofar as the main weight of the Mohist arguments lies in the thought that it is unjust of the aristocrats to provide for their own emotional needs (through elaborate funerals and prolonged mourning) or refined enjoyment (though elaborate musical displays) through an imposition upon the labor of the common people, the objection is not decisive. Interestingly enough, that this what the Mohists have in mind is indicated in "Against Music." The text apologizes for attacking the aristocracy's musical displays by conceding that while music and other refinements are "delightful," they bring no benefit to the common people and, in fact, harm their livelihood.

11. Just War

The Mohists reserved some of their most trenchant condemnations against military aggression, asserting that offensive war is harmful to the welfare of the world and contrary to Heaven's will. One argument (two variations of which can be found in "Against Military Aggression" A and "Heaven's Will" C) proceeds by claiming that there is an analogy between the actions of a military aggressor and those of people who steal or rob others or who murder. And since (as even the audience agrees) stealing, robbing and murdering are morally wrong, and since actions that cause greater harm to others are, to that extent, greater wrongs, military aggression is a great wrong indeed.

Another series of arguments (in "Against Military Aggression" B and C) proceeds by pointing out in some detail the economic and human cost of military aggression even to the aggressors. To the reply that some of the Warring States appear to have greatly profited from their aggressive ways, the Mohists point out that they are the rare exceptions and seeking profit by such means is tantamount to calling a medication effective that cured four or five out of myriads.

Perhaps as befits the difference in addressee, the second set of arguments appears more pragmatic as it appeals to the "war-loving" rulers' sense of self-interest. The earlier argument, on the other hand, appears to aim showing the gentlemen of the world that they ought to condemn military aggression if they are to be consistent with their own normative convictions - if they know that stealing, robbing and murdering is wrong and blameworthy, they ought also to consider military aggression wrong and blameworthy.

The objection is raised in "Against Military Aggression" C that the ancient sage kings waged war, and since they are supposed to be models of moral rectitude, it follows that war cannot be unqualifiedly wrong. In response, the Mohists introduce a distinction between justified and unjustified warfare, claiming that the former was waged by the righteous ancient sage rulers to overthrow evil tyrants. The precise criterion of the distinction between the two forms of warfare, however, is not explicitly spelled out in that chapter. Instead, justified warfare is associated with supernatural signs indicating that Heaven has given the ruler a mandate to wage war so as to visit condign punishment upon some wicked tyrant. This is surprising since elsewhere ("Impartial Concern" C), the Mohists present the sage Yu's military campaigns to pacify the unruly Miao tribes as an example of his "impartial concern" for the welfare of the people of the world. This suggests that there are ample resources within Mohist doctrine to spell out the distinction in less exotic terms. But since they did connect the distinction between justified and unjustified warfare to Heaven and the spirits, a discussion of the Mohists' religious views is in order.

12. Heaven and Spirits

Within the core chapters, the Mohists consistently portray Heaven as if it possesses personal characteristics and exists separately from human beings, though intervening in their affairs. In particular, they present Heaven if it is an entity having will and desire, and concerned about the welfare of the people of the world, even a providential agent that rewards the just and punishes the wicked through its control of natural phenomena or by means of its superhuman intermediaries, the spirits ( guishen). Finally, Heaven and the spirits are also portrayed as the objects of reverence, sacrificial offerings and supplication ("Heaven's Will" B).

Apart from the earlier mentioned role of Heaven's will in providing a criterion for what is morally right, the Mohists also blame people's loss of belief in the existence, power and providential character of spirits for the perceived immorality and chaos of their time. This motivates them to argue that such spirits do exist in "Elucidating the Spirits." But the Mohists' considered position with regards to the existence of providential spirits as opposed to the usefulness of a widespread belief in their existence is an ambiguous one at best. While the first parts of "Elucidating the Spirits" seem aimed at establishing that the spirits exist (by appealing to the testimony of people sense of sight and hearing), the bulk of the arguments in the chapter are better taken as attempts to show that it is socially and politically beneficial that people in general believe in the existence of providential spirits and that the government organize its affairs on the basis that they exist. As the text puts it:

If the fact that ghosts and spirits reward the worthy and punish the evil can be made a cornerstone of policy in the state and impressed upon the common people, it will provide a means to bring order to the state and benefit to the people.

In this regard, an argument that appears towards the end of the chapter is most telling. To the objection that the doctrine on spirits entails the need to sacrifice to them, which in turn interferes with one's duties towards one's living parents, the Mohists reply that if the spirits do exist, then the sacrifices cannot be considered a waste of resources; but if they do not exist, then the community can still come together to share in the communion of the sacrificial wine and millet and the sacrifice will still serve a socially useful function. The argument implies that what the Mohists are ultimately concerned to argue for is neutral with respect to whether or not providential spirits actually exist, as the author and Benjamin Wong have pointed out.

13. References and Further Reading

Ahern, Dennis M. "Is Mo Tzu a Utilitarian?" Journal of Chinese Philosophy 3 (1976): 185-193.

Duda, Kristopher. "Reconsidering Mo Tzu on the Foundations of Morality." Asian Philosophy 11/1 (2001): 23-31.

Fung Yu-lan. A History of Chinese Philosophy. 2 vols. Trans. Derk Bodde. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1952-53.

Graham, Angus C. Divisions in Early Mohism Reflected in the Core Chapters of Mo-tzu. Singapore: Institute of East Asian Philosophies, 1985.

Graham, Angus C. Later Mohist Logic, Ethics, and Science. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press / London: School of Oriental and African Studies, 1978; reprinted 2003.

Hansen, Chad. A Daoist Theory of Chinese Thought: A Philosophical Interpretation. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992.

Hsiao Kung-chuan. A History of Chinese Political Thought, Vol. 1: From the Beginnings to the Sixth Century A. D. Trans. F. W. Mote. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979.

Hu Shih. The Development of the Logical Method in Ancient China. 2nd edition. New York: Paragon Book Reprint Corp., 1963.

Ivanhoe, Philip J. "Mohist Philosophy." In Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward Craig (London and New York: Routledge, 1998), 6:451-458.

Knoblock, John, trans. Xunzi: A Translation and Study of the Complete Works. 3 vols. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988-94.

Lai, Whalen. "The Public Good that does the Public Good: A New Reading of Mohism." Asian Philosophy 3/2 (1993): 125-141.

Lowe, Scott. Mo Tzu's Religious Blueprint for a Chinese Utopia: The Will and the Way. Ontario: Edwin Mellen Press, 1992.

Loy, Hui-chieh. "On a Gedankenexperiment in the Mozi Core Chapters." Oriens Extremus 45 (2005): 141-158.

Maeder, Erik W. "Some Observations on the Composition of the €˜Core Chapters' of the Mozi." Early China 17 (1992): 27-82.

Mei, Yi-pao. Mo-tse, the Neglected Rival of Confucius. London: Arthur Probsthain, 1934.

Mei, Yi-pao. The Ethical and Political Works of Motse. London: Arthur Probsthain, 1929.

Nivison, David S. The Ways of Confucianism: Investigations in Chinese Philosophy. Ed. Bryan W. Van Norden. La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1996.

Pines, Yuri. Foundations of Confucian Thought: Intellectual life in the Chunqiu Period, 722-453 B.C.E. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2002.

Schwartz, Benjamin. The World of Thought in Ancient China. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 1985.

Shaughnessy, Edward L., and Michael Loewe, eds. The Cambridge History of Ancient China: From the Beginnings of Civilization to 221 b.c. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

Shun, Kwong-loi. Mencius and Early Chinese Thought. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997.

Soles, David E. "Mo Tzu and the foundations of Morality." Journal of Chinese Philosophy 26/1 (1999): 37-48.

Taylor, Rodney L. "Religion and utilitarianism: Mo Tzu on spirits and funerals." Philosophy East and West 29/3 (July 1979): 337-346.

Tseu, Augustine. The Moral Philosophy of Mozi. Taipei: China Printing Limited, 1965.

Van Norden, Bryan W. "A Response to the Mohist Arguments in €˜Impartial Caring.'" In The Moral Circle and the Self: Chinese and Western Approaches, eds. Kim-chong Chong, Sor-Hoon Tan and C. L. Ten (Chicago: Open Court, 2003), 41-58.

Vorenkamp, Dirck. "Another Look at Utilitarianism in Mo Tzu's Thought." Journal of Chinese Philosophy 19 (1992): 423-443.

Watson, Burton, trans. Mo Tzu: Basic Writings. Columbia University Press, 1963.

Wong, Benjamin, and Hui-chieh Loy. "War and Ghosts in Mozi's Political Philosophy." Philosophy East and West 54/3 (2004): 343-363.

Wong, David B. "Mohism: The Founder, Mozi (Mo Tzu)." In Encyclopedia of Chinese Philosophy, ed. Antonio S. Cua (London and New York: Routledge, 2003), 453-461.

Wong, David B. "Universalism versus Love with Distinctions: An Ancient Debate Revived." Journal of Chinese Philosophy 16/3-4 (September-December 1989): 251-272.

Yates, Robin D.S. "The Mohists on Warfare: Technology, Technique, and Justification." Journal of the American Academy of Religion 47 (1979): 549-603.

Author Information

Hui-chieh Loy
Email: philoyhc@nus.edu.sg
National University of Singapore
Singapore

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Mo Di ( Mo Ti), better known as Mozi ( Mo-tzu) or "Master Mo," was a Chinese thinker active from the late 5th to the early 4th centuries B.C.E. He is best remembered for being the first major intellectual rival to Confucius and his followers.

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Scientific study of the earthquake in Qinghai Province and the community's remarkable recovery efforts.

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2010 Yushu earthquake | Research Starters | EBSCO Research

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The 2010 Yushu earthquake was a devastating seismic event that struck Yushu, located in the Qinghai province of northwest China, on April 14, 2010. Registering 6.9 to 7.1 in magnitude, the earthquake caused extensive destruction, with estimates indicating that 85 to 90 percent of buildings were damaged or destroyed. The quake's epicenter was relatively shallow, intensifying the impact on the surface and resulting in significant casualties, including 2,698 confirmed deaths and over 12,000 injuries. Rescue and recovery efforts were complicated by the remote terrain, harsh weather, and inadequate infrastructure, with aid arriving slowly due to challenging access conditions.

In addition to immediate humanitarian crises, the earthquake severely affected local resources, including hospitals and schools, leaving many residents homeless and in dire need of assistance. Reconstruction efforts have been estimated to require between $4.7 billion and $7.2 billion, but funding challenges have often left many projects incomplete. Additionally, the region's economy was hit hard, particularly tourism, which suffered a decline as visitors were slow to return to the area known for its rich Tibetan culture. The aftermath of the disaster highlighted the vulnerabilities of the impoverished community and underscored the need for long-term recovery and support.

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Advanced analysis of Sima Qian's groundbreaking historical methodology and his comprehensive Records of the Grand Historian.

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Sima Qian (l. 145/135-86 BCE) was a court scribe, astrologer, and historian of the Han Dynasty (202 BCE - 220 CE) of ancient China, famous for his historical work Records of the Grand Historian for which he is remembered as the Father of Chinese History.

He lived and wrote during the reign of the emperor Wu Ti (also given as Wu, Wu Di, and Wu the Great, r. 141-87 BCE). He was the son of Sima Tan (l. c. 165-110 BCE), who had also been court astrologer and historian. The term 'historian' at this time did not have the same meaning it does today. A court historian in China at this time was expected to immortalize his emperor's reign and dynasty, often including elements of myth and fable. Sima Tan conceived of a new use for history - recording and preserving the past of the entire nation factually - and inspired this same vision in his son.

Sima Tan started work on what he saw as a great project but only completed a small part of it before he died. Sima Qian took up his father's work and finished the monumental work Records of the Grand Historian c. 94 BCE, enduring great personal suffering to do so. Records of the Grand Historian changed the way history in China was written as well as how it was understood.

Any later work of Chinese history has followed the same paradigm in drawing on Sima Qian's work as the model for historical writing.

It originally existed in two copies - one in the imperial archives and the other in Sima Qian's house - and sections of it may have been published shortly after it was completed. The house copy was published, presumably in full, by Sima Qian's grandson, Yang Yun, during the reign of Emperor Xuan (74-48 BCE) who encouraged literacy and the arts.

It is unclear how the work was initially received but it was known and used by the historians Ban Biao (l. 3-54 CE) and his son Ban Gu (l. 32-92 CE) in their work Hanshu (the ). Any later work of Chinese history has followed this same paradigm in drawing on Sima Qian's work as the model for historical writing. The Records established Sima Qian's reputation, posthumously, as the preeminent historian of China, just as he knew it would, and even with modernist criticism, the work and its author continue to be admired.

Early Life & Troubles

Sima Qian was born in either 145 or 135 BCE in the Shaanxi Province to well-off, but not upper-class, family. His father was the court astrologer who held the title "grand historian" but whose primary function was divination based on observation of the yearly calendar and writing accounts of the emperor's deeds, court life, and affairs of state. Sima was devoted to his father and acquired his same interests in scholarship. He was no doubt well-educated and most likely pursued his intellectual interests outside of class.

At what point Sima Tan first told his son of the grand project is unclear. According to Sima Qian's own account, it was only when his father was dying that he was asked to complete the work. It could have been earlier, however, because, in 126 BCE, he embarked on a tour of historical sites throughout China which could have simply been encouraged by his own interests or could have been in preparation for joining his father on writing the history. He is said to have visited many sites of historical and cultural significance, including Confucius' hometown of Qufu in the state of Lu where, as a Confucian, Sima Qian reports being moved deeply upon seeing the master's personal items and clothing still preserved.

He had returned home, married, and had at least one daughter (and possibly two sons), by c. 122 BCE when he accepted a position as attendant to Emperor Wu Ti. This position also involved travel as he followed the emperor to various parts of the realm on inspections and in performing rituals. Sima Qian was called home in 110 BCE when his father fell ill and was not expected to recover. Sima Qian claims, as noted, that it was at this point, as his father lay dying, that he was asked to complete the histories.

Sima Qian continued in his position as attendant for three years before he was promoted to his father's old post c. 107 BCE. He seems to have lived a comfortable life, working on the Records in his spare time, and was clearly valued by the emperor who, in 104 BCE, appointed him to the committee on reforming the calendar, a position of honor. He is also said to have composed poetry, prose works, and rhapsodies during this time and later of which only one has survived.

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He continued in the emperor's good graces until 99 BCE when he made the mistake of defending a friend, the general Li Ling (d. 74 BCE), against the charge of treason. Li Ling had been sent north to fight the Xiongnu, the fierce tribe who lived beyond the border of the Great Wall, along with the emperor Wu Ti's brother-in- law Li Guangli (d. 88 BCE), but not together; each general had their own front to face. Li Guangli was defeated on his front and Li Ling was also but on a much larger scale, losing most of his men and surrendering.

Emperor Wu Ti condemned Li Ling as a traitor because Li had promised him a resounding victory, had refused practical measures such as reinforcements to protect a supply line, and had wound up not only disappointing the emperor and losing almost 5,000 soldiers in battle but also surrendering and allowing himself to be taken prisoner. When Sima Qian defended Li Ling, the emperor took it as an insult to Li Guangli, who was also defeated but not referenced in Sima Qian's defense of Li Ling, and an insult to himself that a court astrologer should contradict the Chinese emperor's decree.

Sima Qian chose humiliation, dishonor, castration, & three years in prison in order to finish the work because he believed in its importance.

Emperor Wu ordered Sima Qian arrested and sentenced to death unless he could pay a large fine to have the sentence commuted. Sima did not have the money and so had to choose between execution or castration and three years in prison. The honorable decision, according to the understanding of the time, would have been death, which would have saved face and maintained his family's social standing, but Sima chose castration and imprisonment because he had not yet completed the Records.

He chose humiliation, dishonor, castration, and three years in prison in order to finish the work because he believed in its importance. He had noted, in his travels and his reading of the histories, that those who tried to do good often led painful and difficult lives and were thought of poorly while those who clearly did whatever they wanted and indulged every self-interest at other people's expense lived well. He understood that written history could reward the good, and punish the evil, by providing an account of their lives and deeds which would last as long as people could read.

Further, the stories of the past dynasties, of the philosophers and statesmen, of the common people of the farms and fields, might be manipulated by someone else who wrote their histories instead of being treated impartially and factually as he had been doing thus far. He decided to live, even though he would have to suffer, and this decision changed how history would be understood and written ever afterwards in China.

Histories Before the Records

In order to understand the importance of Sima Qian's work, one must understand the progression of history up until the time he wrote and what constituted "history". The Han Dynasty succeeded the Qin Dynasty (221-206 BCE) which had emerged triumphant from the era of chaos known as the Warring States Period (c. 481-221 BCE) and the earlier Spring and Autumn Period (c. 772-476 BCE) which saw the steady decline of the Zhou Dynasty (1046-256 BCE). The Zhou had succeeded the Shang Dynasty (c. 1600-1046) BCE which were the first to develop a system of writing.

Prior to Sima Qian's work, histories were restricted to the story of the dynasty, the ruling house, the monarch, or the state. During the Shang Dynasty, evidence of these types of accounts was found on oracle bones; during the Zhou, they were written and bound as bamboo books.

The foundational works of Chinese culture are known as The Four Books and Five Classics:

The Book of Rites

The Doctrine of the Mean

The Analects of Confucius

The Works of Mencius

The I-Ching

The Classics of Poetry

The Classics of Rites

The Classics of History

The Spring and Autumn Annals

During the Han Dynasty, all of these were believed to have been either written or edited by Confucius based on the claims made by the Confucian scholar Mencius (Mang-Tze, l. 372-289 BCE). Modern-day scholars largely reject Confucius' role in most of these works (except, of course, those clearly attributed to him), but this is a very recent shift in interpretation; the claim Confucius authored or edited all these works was accepted until the 20th century CE.

Many if not all of these works were informed by the era known as the Hundred Schools of Thought (or Contention of the Hundred Schools of Thought) of the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period when the decline of the Zhou Dynasty encouraged scholars and philosophers, previously working for the state, to found their own schools of thought, either officially or unofficially.

The designation Hundred Schools of Thought should be understood figuratively to mean there were many which contended with each other for adherents and acceptance. There were fourteen which later writers (Sima Qian among them) considered important enough to remember and these were:

The Qin Dynasty based its policies on Legalism and condemned all these other schools, ordering their books to be burned and their advocates executed. Confucian and other works only survived, for the most part, because people hid them from authorities at considerable risk to their lives and those of their families. Prior to the Qin's censorship, though, most of these schools had already been either stamped out or absorbed by the three which would go on to inform Chinese culture - Confucianism, Taoism, and Legalism - and the central concept of one school, the School of Names, was adopted by Confucianism.

The School of Names (also known as the School of Logicians or as The Logicians) was founded by the logician scholars Hui Shih (l. c. 380- c. 305 BCE) and Kung-sun Lung (b. c. 380 BCE) whose focus was the correlation between words and the objects/concepts they represented. Their school of thought concentrated on an examination of how closely the word for "desk" - as an example - correlated to an actual desk. This encouraged precision in the use of language which would become an important aspect of Confucian thought.

Sima Qian, a Confucian, drew upon the Four Books and Five Classics, which had been revived by the Han Dynasty, in his work and paid particular attention to the Spring and Autumn Annals which were said to have been composed by Confucius with special attention to the very concept developed by the School of Names: how well a word represented the reality it was supposed to convey. Accordingly, Sima Qian composed his work as precisely as possible in an attempt to express the realities of the stories he was telling as accurately as he could.

Records of the Grand Historian

The result of his efforts was his masterpiece, the Records of the Grand Historian which differed significantly from the "histories" of the past. Scholar Raymond Dawson comments:

In talking about the Chinese historical tradition, one has to be very careful to qualify this term. The development of a distinct body of literature separately recognized as history was only a very gradual process. The pre-Qin writings which we categorize as history consisted of works that had a very different aim from that of the modern historian. In remote antiquity, rulers needed to have in their entourage people who could place on record and preserve oracular responses concerning important state events and people who were expert at elucidating the links between natural phenomena and human events. (xxix)

Dawson is here describing the responsibilities of the position Sima Tan (and later Sima Qian) held which was the same as court "historians" before him: observing the calendar and various events and making a - hopefully - auspicious prediction for the emperor's coming year as well as recording what he did and other events of his reign. Sima Qian's work, as noted, differs significantly from earlier so-called historical works in providing a relatively objective account of the history of China from the time of the legendary Yellow Emperor (c. 2712-2599 BCE) to the time of his writing.

The Records is composed of 130 chapters which were originally written on bamboo slips of approximately 30 characters per slip which were then bound into thirty slips per bundle. In time, the work was reproduced on silk and finally, in the Song Dynasty (960-1279 CE), on paper. The work is divided into five sections:

Basic Annals - chronicles of the past dynasties of Xia, Shang, Zhou, and Qin up through the Han to Sima Qian's time

Chronological Tables - genealogies of ruling houses and chronology of reigns as well as major events

Treatises - on the development of important cultural advances such as music, rituals, the calendar and divination, matters of state, other matters of interest

Hereditary Houses - ruling houses of the Shang through Han dynasties

Biographies - stories of individuals most often written to convey some moral or culturally relevant point.

The Records of the Grand Historian is not only a more thorough treatment of the past than what was conceived of before, however, but is considered, overall, far more accurate. In addition to drawing on the written sources mentioned, Sima Qian also interviewed older people for first-hand accounts, visited famous (and not so famous) historical sites and spoke with people there, and seems to also have had access to other sources now lost. His attention to precision in language creates detailed images and characterizations which, coupled with his mastery of narrative form, produced a work of history which reads with the progression, and sometimes suspense, of a novel.

Conclusion

Sima Qian made one handwritten copy of the Records which was deposited in the imperial library at Chang'an and kept the original at his home. After his death, the work was kept safe by his daughter, Sima Ying, who feared it would be destroyed by the emperor Zhao (r. 87-74 BCE). It was first published by her son, Yang Yun, in the reign of Emperor Xuan who was more tolerant and encouraged the arts and literary expression. It was already in use as a reference work, as noted, during the Han Dynasty and continued to find an audience following the turbulence of the Period of the Three Kingdoms (220-280 CE) which succeeded the Han and on through the Tang Dynasty (618-907 CE) by which time it had become a foundational classic of Chinese literature almost on par with the Four Books and Five Classics. Its reputation has only grown since and it continues to attract an audience in the present day. Dawson comments on the unique character of the work:

What makes it particularly remarkable to the modern eye is the complexity of its construction. It is not a mere narrative history [but a detailed account of the past in five cohesive sections]. The whole massive work, of 130 chapters, is meant to contain a history of the Chinese world from the beginning down to about 100 BCE, the time when it was being written. (xxi)

Writing the Records of the Grand Historian must have seemed a daunting task at first as nothing like it had ever been attempted before. Some modern-day scholars have suggested that Sima Qian simply copied earlier histories or paraphrased events in his own words, but this is what historians do on a regular basis and have for centuries. What makes Sima Qian's work significant is that it was entirely unique in Chinese history when it was published. Earlier "historians" had only needed to record the deeds and past of the royal house they served; Sima Qian extended the scope of history to the distant past.

It is easy to criticize the work now that Sima Qian's techniques have become standard, but such criticism says far more about critical scholars than the work itself. Sima Qian endured the humiliation of imprisonment, castration, and loss of social rank because he knew that the work he was engaged in was more important than his personal comfort or the transient concept of honor. He valued the preservation of his country's past above any personal considerations and, in so doing, established his legacy as the Father of Chinese history.

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Introduction

The competition to host the Olympic Games (OG) represents an important opportunity for the chosen city to enjoy a greater presence on the global stage. The local government comes under pressure to increase its marketing and promotional activities and make physical and economic changes to attract investments, leading to symbolic reconstruction of the city.

The staging of major sports events provides an opportunity to make rapid urban transformations because of the availability of both public-sector and private-sector funds. Poynter (2008) notes that assessing the effects of mega events such as the OG is a complex task as the costs and social benefits for the host city are difficult to estimate. However, many cities that host the OG are not able to transform this temporary media exposure and the significant amount of funds available into something that is locally both positive and long-lasting. For citizens, the most important thing is how the funds were used and what benefits they will bring in the long term. In this context, the way in which interventions in the urban space are carried out has a significant impact socially.

In spite of this, few studies have investigated the results that the OG produce in host cities in terms of urban improvements, particularly physical ones. The city analyzed in this case study was Beijing Organising Committee for The Games of The XXIX Olympiad ( BOCOG, 2008) as it was the city that invested most in infrastructure. Once Beijing had been chosen as the host city for the 2008 OG, the authorities drew up a master plan in 2004 that not only addressed the requirements laid down by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) but also included guidelines to ensure that the legacy of the Games was a long-lasting one.

The aim of this article was to identify the physical dynamics of this OG host city resulting from improvements in the urban rail network by analyzing how these improvements helped to redirect city planning. The study focuses on the physical works for the OG that sought in some way to transform the broader urban environment rather than merely the venues where the competitions took place.

Although measurement of the legacy in Beijing was limited to four years, this was sufficient to observe the impact of the OG given the rapid pace of economic and morphological change in the city. China as a whole has been expanding rapidly, with growth rates higher than those in developed Western economies. Had the analysis been carried out over a longer period after the event it would not have been possible to identify the impact of the OG as, just as occurred in Barcelona in 1996, a significant number of interventions were carried out after the event and these would have compromised the analysis.

To analyze whether the substantial investments in the urban rail system were successful in consolidating the 2004 Master Plan, it is important to understand how the urban layout of Beijing evolved over time, as it suffered significant political influence. According to Holanda (2011, p. 21), "[...] if conventions are not recognized, neither the meaning nor the configurational implications are fully interpreted".

The urban layout of Beijing in context

In the 1960s the Communist Party decided that the administrative capital of the New China would be Beijing and that it should be transformed into a productive city rather than a consumer one as there were known to be important springs and mineral resources there ( Friedmann, 2005). Fifty years later, the level of industrialization in the capital is reflected in the variety and extent of its manufacturing industry: China divides its industrial sectors into 130 different categories, of which 120 are found in Beijing. Heavy industry accounts for 63.7% of the city's economy ( Wang, 2011).

While industrial growth was the central authorities' main concern, issues related to housing were largely neglected. Policies governing property ownership underwent dramatic changes, and private property was confiscated as part of a nationalization process that lasted until 1978 ( Greco & Santoro, 2007). In that same year, permission was granted to build residential units on private property, leading to a major increase in housing density in central areas. Hutongs, neighborhoods with single-story houses and narrow pedestrian alleys, blocked thoroughfares and occupied public areas. Urban expansion occurred as a disorderly sprawl in all directions ( Greco & Santoro, 2007).

Under the command of Deng Xiaoping, reforms aimed at opening up the domestic market to the outside world were introduced in 1978. So that these reforms would not face resistance, the authorities formulated progressive narratives revolving around the notions of union, evolution from a position of subordination to one of independent development and a transition from relative isolation to inclusion in global flows ( Rong, 2006). These campaigns resulted in a significant increase in the urban Chinese population. In 1949 the urban population accounted for 10% of the total population, and by 1999 this figure had reached 36% ( Friedmann, 2005).

In 1980 there were more than 14,000 chimneys in Beijing, and air pollution affected a large proportion of the population ( Wang, 2011). In 1983 the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party recommended that manufacturing activities in the city be phased out and that the city redirect its efforts toward becoming a political and cultural capital in order to attract tourists. Measures were approved that prioritized conservation of historic sites in the central area, such as the designation of listed buildings and introduction of height restrictions.

In 1999 the municipal authorities decided to move 134 factories that were a source of pollution to outside the city walls by 2004. Over half the companies in Beijing are located in the old central area. This measure appears to have been influenced by the preparations for the 2008 OG. The urban transformations that occurred in Beijing over the centuries have left their mark on the city's current layout and can be summarized as follows: the central area of Beijing, where the old capital is located, was founded in 1267 and retains its original characteristics, including a dense street gridiron based on a central axis and rectangular blocks. The second ring follows the layout of the city walls, which were demolished in the 1950s, and has at its center the Imperial Palace opposite Tiananmen Square. A north-south axis and an east-west axis separate the four districts, as shown in Figure 1 ( Greco & Santoro, 2007).

This planning of the road system with constant reference to the center, where political power is located, has been the underlying principle determining the evolution of the city. The 1992-2010 Regulatory Plan provided for conservation of the historic center and controlled growth of sequential rings concentrating most of the state's investments, while the outskirts would be redeveloped with the aid of private investment ( Greco & Santoro, 2007). This led to a fragmented spatial configuration and a mixture of incompatible uses side by side.

The Beijing urban area grew rapidly, as shown in Figure 2. By 1994 it extended over an area equivalent to that forecast for 2006, and the population was 5.27 million, the figure estimated for 2010 ( Wang, 2011). The preparations to host the OG in accordance with the IOC's requirements involved making significant changes in the city as a whole and provided an opportunity to reformulate the existing plan.

The 2004-2010 Master Plan provided for an ecological belt and a development belt: the eastern section would be reorganized along environmental lines, and the western section would be planned as a production zone ( BICP, 2010; Song et al., 2006). The plan was intended to encourage the development of a multicenter system made up of Special Economic Zones (SEZs), as shown in Figure 3: Haidian Development Zone; the Central Business District (CBD); Sanlitun District; the Airport Line Zone; the Historic Center; and the Olympic Green (OGN).

The CBD and OGN were inspired by Western trends and sought to increase trade with member countries of the World Trade Organization. The authorities hoped to attract foreign businessmen to China with the introduction of various multifunctional complexes. Unlike Western CBDs, where there are only businesses, the CBD in Beijing would be mixed use, like other development zones in the city, so that the population working in the zone could also live and consume there, making it self-sufficient. This area was occupied by major multinationals, in offices next to the Forbidden City ( Greco & Santoro, 2007) and is characterized by densely packed skyscrapers with more than 30 floors.

The area between the CBD and the airport is known as Sanlitun District, a luxury residential district that is home to embassies and tourist bars. Soviet-style residential buildings with six floors have been replaced by tall towers and modern shopping malls. The express road corridor connecting the center of Beijing to the airport is the most advanced in the city. The historic center, which best reflects the city's identity, now has two thirds fewer old alleys and houses with internal courtyards than in the 1960s ( Yukata, 2004).

During the preparations for the OG, the planning bodies in the various districts started approving large parks and shopping areas, widening and paving roads that were a priority for the event, installing street lighting and setting up advertising displays to make the city more attractive for foreign tourists ( Pitts & Liao, 2009). The SEZ known as Olympic Green, where the most important interventions for the 2008 OG were carried out, was used for agricultural purposes until it was modernized in the 1990s, when the 11 th Asian Games were held there and a center for international congresses, three stadiums and various hotels, parks and museums were built ( Greco & Santoro, 2007).

The Beijing authorities proposed that a specific park be constructed for the event and concentrated most of the competitions in a single space. The idea of transforming the area into a central focal area required that the authorities draw up a program to review the existing infrastructure and transport services, reforest large areas that would be used as parks, refurbish existing buildings and build new ones.

The 2004 Master Plan showed that the city attributed less importance to the Olympic Green (OGN) than previous host cities, which considered the Olympic Park the main urban intervention during the preparations for the Games. Hence the OGN's position in the north of the city, close to universities, the airport and other SEZs, where it could help to ensure that the plan to decentralize Beijing was a success.

Unlike host cities such as Barcelona, which separated the sports facilities in order to make improvements in the city as a whole, Beijing, because of its very scale (Greater Barcelona covers 3,236 km ², while Greater Beijing extends over 16,807.8 km ²⁾ and the large distances separating the facilities, which would not meet IOC standards, was not able to use the same approach. The local authorities in Beijing therefore chose to concentrate the sports facilities in one location. Beijing was the host city that invested most in infrastructure.

According to Pitts & Liao (2009), by concentrating sports facilities on the outskirts of the host city, the Olympic Park can be built on a large piece of land and there tend to be fewer negative consequences for the surrounding areas because of the low population density. However, if large numbers of tourists are to visit a single venue on the outskirts of the city, then suitable infrastructure, particularly transport facilities, must be provided. Beijing was the host city that invested most in infrastructure.

Material and methods - Consolidation of the multicenter configuration

Urban expansion in Beijing, which has traditionally occurred around a single center, has recently become regional in scale and has started to affect access to the central areas. Because of this, the city authorities proposed a multicenter configuration in which each zone was oriented toward specific use so that the different SEZs did not compete with each other.

To analyze the extent to which this plan has been successful, the impact of the expansion of the urban rail network on the urban dynamics was investigated, as this was considered a proxy for measuring the effectiveness of the plan since it attracts large numbers of people and modifies the city's configuration.

The first subway line was built in 1965 for military purposes following the deterioration in relations with the Soviet Union, with which an armed conflict was increasingly likely. Although completed in 1969 and brought into operation in 1971, part of the present Line 1 underwent various changes and expansions and was only opened to the public in 1981. During this period, migration from the countryside to urban areas was increasing. Migrants from the countryside settled in poor-quality housing in the suburbs because of the low rents. The monocentric structure persisted for cultural and market-related reasons as the new population had to travel to the center, the main productive area in the city ( Huang, 2004; Song et al., 2006).

The significant urban expansion from the 1990s onwards led to a lack of integration between transport planning and land use. The sprawling urban growth that now characterized the city meant that urban mobility was dependent on private transport ( Huang, 2004). Consequently, the main roads were frequently congested, obliging the authorities to build five other ring roads by 2008. On some lines, buses took four times the normal time (160 min vs. 40 min) to cover the route ( Wang, 2011).

Faced with this situation, which spoke against the city that sought to host the 2008 OG, a new Master Plan (Beijing City Master Plan 2004-2020) was approved ( Huang, 2004; Li et al., 2005; Song et al., 2006). Beijing planned to expand its urban rail system by 87.1 km, to cover a total of 200 km. Although expansion of the system had been included in the financial package for the OG, only some of the lines would serve the locations where the events were to be held, as the rest of the lines would go to other parts of the city, particularly the south, to support transit oriented development ( Pitts & Liao, 2009).

According to the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games ( BOCOG, 2008), the expansion of the urban rail system planned for 2008 would serve 80% of the sports venues during the OG. Unlike most of the cities that hosted the OG (Sydney, Atlanta and Athens), where transport was geared toward a temporary system for spectators (500,000 to 700,000), athletes and organizers, Beijing introduced a permanent system that would support the long-term urban transformations planned for the city.

In 2001, before Beijing had been chosen as the host for the 2008 OG, there were only two lines, both in the central district. For the 2008 OG the network was extended by some 143.61 km and the rolling stock was increased to 1,420 vehicles, bringing passenger capacity to between 150,000 and 200,000, in line with the IOC requirements, as shown in Figure 4 ( BOCOG, 2008).

To determine whether the urban rail network helped to increase the physical dynamics of Beijing in the SEZs established in the 2004-2020 Master Plan, we chose to perform a spatial analysis of the stations in the SEZs as the dynamics of land occupancy are to a large extent determined by users of public transport who want to live or open a business near these stations. These are the people who establish the relationships between the urban rail network and the surrounding areas.

The rail lines were drawn on aerial photographs taken in 2001, 2004, 2008 and 2012 and the locations of the stations on the lines were marked. To analyze the extent to which the transport system contributed to the dynamics, the urban rail network was superimposed on the areas that underwent modifications in each of the SEZs. In this analysis we included areas where buildings had been knocked down, had been built, were being built or had been modified during the study period without making any distinction between them. These areas are shown in red in the maps below. The images used for this purpose were taken from Google Earth.

The study period was chosen so as to identify whether the changes were more significant during the period following the announcement that Beijing was to host the event (2001-2004), during the four years prior to the event (2004-2008) or during the four years following it (2008-2012). The rail lines are shown as either dotted lines (indicating that they were still being built) or solid lines (indicating that they were operational and being used by the public).

According to Torrens & Alberti (2000), 40 to 45% of rail users live up to 800 m from a station. Circles with this radius were therefore defined around all the stations, as any changes within these are more likely to be directly related to the presence of the subway lines.

In the case of the OGN, which was specifically planned for the OG, a second polygon was added. As changes in this zone between 2001 and 2008 were related exclusively to the event, analysis of the dynamics in this area would indicate not spontaneous occupation but occupation driven by the local authorities. To analyze the impact of the interventions for the OG on the area surrounding the OGN, an area extending two blocks beyond the edge of the OGN was defined and the dynamics of the changes in this area were observed.

After this, it was decided to investigate the transformations in the nine stations with the largest number of arriving and departing passengers in greater detail. Of the nine stations, two were chosen because they were cited in Greco & Santoro (2007) as being important, and seven had the greatest passenger flows. The stations were classified according to whether they were inside or outside an SEZ.

A circular coverage area with an 800 m radius was drawn in order to identify changes in urban land occupancy in areas close to these stations. The analysis was carried out in the periods 2001 to 2004, 2004 to 2008 and 2008 to 2012.

Results and discussion

Between 2001 and 2004, as shown in Figure 5, the changes occurred closer to the OGN, while between 2004 and 2008, with the inauguration of subway Lines 13, 5 and 8, the interventions extended to the north. Of particular note in 2008 are the areas surrounding Lisuiqiao station (Line 5) and Licunqiao station (Line 8), as well as the three stations in the extreme north (Line 13), which also influenced the dynamics, particularly between 2008 and 2012. Line 10 contributed in a smaller way to the dynamics of the area, as can be seen from the constant small changes during the study period. To the north of Forest Park, a significant number of green areas flanked by villages in the city (illegal, densely packed buildings, usually with six floors) that are not served by any subway station.

Although the Airport Zone is defined as an SEZ, not very many subway lines go through it, as shown in Figure 6. Only the Airport Express, which does not have any intermediate stations between Dongzhimen station (outside the SEZ) and the airport, cuts through the zone. Lines 10 and 15 pass through the edges of this zone, and it is precisely in these areas that a greater number of changes can be observed. The fact that the SEZ is poorly served by the subway makes access to the area difficult, preventing it becoming established as a central focal area. Because of this, higher population densities were observed in the western sector close to the OGN.

As the Historic Center has the most infrastructure in the city, the extensions to Lines 4 and 5 did not lead to concentrated changes near the stations, as shown in Figure 7. However, greater dynamics can be observed in the east between 2001 and 2003, when Line 5, which was completed in 2007, was being built. Later, changes also occurred in the west, when Line 4 was being completed. Between 2008 and 2012 there was a reduction in the dynamics in the area.

Even in an old, well-established part of the city there was significant real-estate activity in the period between the announcement of Beijing as the host city and the staging of the OG, probably because of the government's efforts to promote urban interventions aimed at making the city more appealing to foreign tourists attracted by the event.

In the Haidian SEZ the period following the announcement that the OG would be held in Beijing (2001-2004) was the most dynamic, as shown in Figure 8. The changes occurred independently of the introduction of the subway lines, for which planning and construction only started in 2004. The emergence of high-quality buildings in the west, closer to the OGN, may have been a result of the facilities planned for the event. This type of occupancy increased steadily between 2008 and 2012 even without any stations along Line 13, indicating that the population living in this area may not be rail users.

In contrast, changes in Sanlitun occurred more rapidly between 2005 and 2008, mainly within the coverage areas of the stations on Lines 10 and 2, as shown in Figure 9. The exception to this was the buildings in the west of this sector alongside Chaoyang Park next to the developments for the OG, which were being completed during that period.

As the Central Business District, like the OGN, is smaller than the other zones, an area of influence extending two blocks beyond its boundaries was defined, as shown in Figure 10. The pictures of this zone show that the changes extend beyond its perimeter. Because this SEZ is home to the most important business center in Beijing, there have been many changes throughout the zone since 2001, which would have occurred even if the rail system had not been expanded. However, it can be seen that the development of the transport facilities resulted in an increase in the dynamics between 2004 and 2008 along two axes: east-west, along Line 1, which was already in operation, and north-south, along Line 10. The dynamics along this new line increased from 2008 to 2012.

By superimposing the SEZs and the urban rail network, significant relationships between the dynamics of the changes in the various zones and the period when the subway lines were built could be identified. With the exception of Haidian ZES, which saw more significant growth in the period 2001 to 2004, the other zones underwent transformations between 2004 and 2008, when the subway system expanded. Significant change was observed along the lines within the SEZs. However, based on the analysis carried out in this study, it is not possible to state that these SEZs became central focal areas, as the changes were observed only within the SEZs and no attempt was made to compare each zone with the rest of the city. If the other areas underwent changes in the same proportions, then there was no difference in the dynamics between the SEZs. Because of this, it was decided to analyze some arriving and departing stations ( Figure 11) inside and outside an SEZ, and compare the changes in urban land occupancy in areas close to these stations. Figure 12 shows an example of the graphical analysis for one of the stations. The results of the analysis of the nine stations were used to compile the information in a table.

The aim in calculating the areas was not to arrive at exact figures but to compare the percentage of each area that had changed during the study periods. The darker colors correspond to the areas that changed most within an 800 m radius of the stations with the greatest number of departing and arriving passengers during the study period.

The areas of the city that appear to have had the greatest change in dynamics following the expansion of the subway system were the north and east. As shown in Table 1, this could be observed in the areas served by the stations with the greatest dynamics inside the SEZs (Dongzhimen, between the Historic Center and Sanlitun District, and Wangjing West, in the Airport Zone) and outside the SEZs (Lishuiqiao and Sihui East).

The elements of the 2004 Master Plan aimed at environmental protection of the western and southern areas of the city appear to have met with success. With regard to occupancy in the outskirts, one of the factors that appears to have contributed to this was government policies that made plots of land available to the private sector only on the outskirts of the city in an attempt to increase the supply of more affordable housing.

The areas outside the SEZs were quite stable before the stations were built. With the exception of Fuxingmen, the dynamics in most of the areas in SEZs increased before the lines were built (2001-2004). This change in dynamics occurred soon after Beijing had been chosen as the host city for the OG, indicating that the resulting optimism may have had physical consequences in the city. It was not possible to establish whether there had been announcements before the lines were built that they would pass through these locations.

When the stations in the SEZs are compared with those outside these areas, a significant difference in dynamics can be observed, which may be an indication that the policy of a multicenter configuration was becoming spatially consolidated.

Conclusion

Although we measured the transformations in Beijing, the host city for the 2008 OG, it was not possible to determine whether the changes were directly related to the OG. The city that is left after the games needs to be planned so that the legacy of the OG, which is associated with social, economic and political factors, is a positive one. Hence, the planning intentions need to be analyzed in a local context, making it important to take into account the city's past and its culture. In this sense, being familiar with the way urban planning and the layout of the city have evolved over the years acquires particular importance.

In the case of Beijing, a positive aspect is that, unlike many other host cities, it had an existing plan for the city that was not directly related to the OG. The contribution made by the OG to consolidating the multicenter structure was therefore to promote public and private interest in putting the planned urban transformations into practice. This was more noticeable in terms of the economy and the media rather than the physical environment and is reflected in the analyses, which show that among the SEZs set up, those directly related to the event (Airport and OGN), had unremarkable dynamics and therefore became less established as central focal areas than the Historic Center, the CBD and Sanlitun District.

Expansion of the urban rail system played an important role in consolidating the new central focal areas, but the layout of the lines reinforces the concentric nature of the city as it encourages people to change train in the stations in the Historic Center. Nevertheless, a positive consequence of this is that the flow of people through the center helped to prevent this area becoming deserted. With the exception of Haidian ZES, which saw more marked growth in the period 2001 to 2004, the other zones underwent transformations between 2004 and 2008, when the subway system was extended.

In both cases, once the preparations for the event had started, there was a more marked increase in construction activity in the years immediately following the announcement that Beijing was to be the host city than in the year of the event itself or subsequent years. This shows that the feeling of euphoria helped to boost local economic activity, particularly activities associated with increasing real-estate prices.

Financial investments in infrastructure are known to generate benefits for the host city. For example, an improved transport system has an impact over a much wider area, as it connects different parts of the city and so ensures more egalitarian access to goods, services and jobs.

The analytical methodology used here can be justified by the fact that the relevant laws are neither widely distributed nor available for consultation. According to Chen et al. (2002), this is one of the reasons why the rules for correct land use and occupancy are not always observed. It was also for this reason that an alternative approach based on indirect indicators was adopted to investigate the extent to which the multicenter structure in Beijing had become consolidated.

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Notes

How to cite: Yamawaki, Y., & Tomaz, J. (2019). The transport infraestructure contribution to the urban legacy of the Beijing Olympic Games. urbe. Revista Brasileira de Gestão Urbana, 11, e20180044. https://doi.org/10.1590/2175-3369.011.e20180044

Author notes

YY is PhD in Urban Management, e-mail: yumiy@utfpr.edu.br JT is master in Urban Management, e-mail: julianahbtomaz@gmail.com

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