A Simple Listing of Chinese Chronology (2002)
Contents (1)
Contents (2)
1. This is a book recommendation.
Traditional Chinese historians recorded dates by a combination of:
(1) dynastic name, an emperor’s assumed name (or aliases), the emperor's era name and year of the era, and
(2) years into a Sexagenary Cycle (or Stems-and-Branches).
To those of us who read a little bit of Chinese history but have not memorize the hundreds of Chinese emperors' names and their era names, A Simple Listing of Chinese Chronology ("中國歷史年代簡表") is a godsend.
This handy reference is just a listing of Chinese chronology by:
(1) Year in CE (Common Era) or BCE (Before Common Era) (Preface by a '-' sign in the book).
(2) Year in the Sexagenary Cycle.
(3) Emperor's name and assumed name.
(4) Emperor's era name and year of the era.
And it is an invaluable companion to reading traditional Chinese history.
2. One very common complaint by students in reading Chinese history is the very complicated Chinese chronology system.
But not so with Western calendar.
Western cultures, influenced by the Bible and Christianity, have a linear view of history.
So they record their history in a linear chronological fashion.
The common designations used to record history in western cultures are Anno Domini (AD or A.D.), which is Latin for "In the year of the Lord", and Before Christ (BC or B.C.). ("Anno Domini", Wikipedia.)
The secular counterparts of the two designations are Common Era (CE) and Before Common Era (BCE).
So western chronology can be enumerated simply by the positive integers:
...
year 3 BC (or BCE)
year 2 BC (or BCE)
year 1 BC (or BCE)
year 1 AD (or CE)
year 2 AD (or CE)
year 3 AD (or CE)
...
The advantages of this chronological system are that it is simple, linear ordered, unique and easy to count the years.
Reading history using this system, one always has a sense of one's absolute and relative position in time and history.
3. Not so with the traditional Chinese historical recording system.
Traditional Chinese historians recorded dates by a combination of:
(1) Dynastic name, an emperor’s assumed name (or aliases), the emperor's era name and year of the era, and
(2) Years into a Sexagenary Cycle (or Stems-and-Branches).
The four elements system is a linear system while the Sexagenary Cycle is a cyclical system that repeats the counting in 60 years cycle.
For the purpose of chronology, the Sexagenary Cycle is auxiliary and is mainly recorded because of its cultural significance; so I will say no more about it.
The main mean of determining chronology in Chinese history is by giving the four elements of:
(a) a dynastic name,
(b) an emperor’s assumed name (or aliases),
(c) the emperor's era name, and
(d) the year of the era.
By recording these four elements, a unique year is determined.
The weaknesses of this system are that there are many names to memorize and there are many complications.
As to memory work, to know every year in Chinese history corresponding to the Western calendar, a student has to memorize:
(a) 83 dynastic names ("中国皇帝", Wikipedia),
(b) 557 emperor's names just between Qin Dynasty and Qing Dynasty ("Emperor of China", Wikipedia),
(c) and for most emperors, between 1 to 5 era's name (some as much as 18 and 21),
(d) and the irregular length of each era of each emperor.
And there are many complications to this system of recording.
The complications resulted in one Western calendar year may have more than one reckoning in the Chinese four elements system.
4. A single year in the Western calendar can have two reckonings by the Chinese recording system because one emperor died and another emperor enthroned in the same year.
The year 827 CE has two reckonings in the Chinese recording system because of the death of an emperor.
page 124
(a) 827 CE = 唐敬宗李湛寶曆三年.
Sexagenary cycle: 丁未
Dynastic name: 唐
Emperor's assumed name: 敬宗
Emperor's family name: 李
Emperor's given name: 湛
Emperor's era name: 寶曆
Year of the era: 三年 (third year)
(b) 827 CE = 唐文宗李昂大和元年.
Sexagenary cycle: 丁未
Dynastic name: 唐
Emperor's assumed name: 文宗
Emperor's family name: 李
Emperor's given name: 昂
Emperor's era name: 大和
Year of the era: 元年 (first year)
Traditional Chinese histories did not refer to an emperor's family and given name.
A Simple Listing of Chinese Chronology gave that information only for our reference.
In traditional Chinese culture, it was considered rude and impolite to call a person by his family and given name; in the case of an emperor, it was an offence.
5. A single year in the Western calendar can have more than one reckoning in the Chinese recording system because an emperor might decree a new era in that year.
The year 692 CE has three reckonings in the Chinese recording system because Empress Wu Zetian changed her era name twice in that year.
page 116
(a) 692 CE = 周武則天天授三年.
Sexagenary cycle: 壬辰
Dynastic name: 周
Empress’s assumed name: 則天
Empress’s family name: 武
Empress’s era name: 天授
Year of the era: 三年 (third year)
(b) 692 CE = 周武則天如意元年.
Sexagenary cycle: 壬辰
Dynastic name: 周
Empress’s assumed name: 則天
Empress’s family name: 武
Empress’s era name: 如意
Year of the era: 元年 (first year)
(c) 692 CE = 周武則天長壽元年.
Sexagenary cycle: 壬辰
Dynastic name: 周
Empress’s assumed name: 則天
Empress’s family name: 武
Empress’s era name: 長壽
Year of the era: 元年 (first year)
Although there were many powerful women in Chinese history, Empress Wu Zetian had the distinct honor of being the only Empress in Chinese history.
Not only was Empress Wu Zetian an empress of her husband's dynasty ("Tang"), she was also the only empress of a dynasty she founded ("Zhou").
The impossible situation she faced was that if she passed her dynasty to her sons, then the dynasty will revert back as Tang.
But if she passed her dynasty to her nephews the Wu's, then they were not her direct descendants.
What happened was that there was a palace coup in Empress Wu Zetian's old age and the dynasty reverted back to Tang.
6. A single year in the Western calendar can have more than one reckoning in the Chinese recording system because China was divided and there were more than one claimant as emperor.
The year 222 CE has three reckonings in the Chinese recording system because it was the Three Kingdoms period in China and there were three claimants as Emperor.
page 77
(a) 222 CE = 魏文帝曹丕黃初三年.
Sexagenary cycle: 壬寅
Dynastic name: 魏
Emperor's assumed name: 文帝
Emperor's family name: 曹
Emperor's given name: 丕
Emperor's era name: 黃初
Year of the era: 三年 (third year)
(b) 222 CE = 蜀漢昭烈帝劉備章武二年.
Sexagenary cycle: 壬寅
Dynastic name: 蜀漢
Emperor's assumed name: 昭烈帝
Emperor's family name: 劉
Emperor's given name: 備
Emperor's era name: 章武
Year of the era: 二年 (second year)
(c) 222 CE = 吳大帝孫權黃武元年.
Sexagenary cycle: 壬寅
Dynastic name: 吳
Emperor's assumed name: 大帝
Emperor's family name: 孫
Emperor's given name: 權
Emperor's era name: 黃武
Year of the era: 元年 (first year)
7. There are many more complications to the Chinese recording system, but the three samples above should give you a taste of the difficulties a student of Chinese history faces.
I have no doubt that some professional Chinese historians have memorized all 83 dynastic names, 557 emperors' names, the hundreds of era names and the length of each era.
But for us occasional dabbler in Chinese history, A Simple Listing of Chinese Chronology is a godsend.
8. Book details in Traditional Chinese:
書名: 中國歷史年代簡表
版別: 第二次修訂版
作者名稱: 文物出版社編輯部
出版社: 三聯書店(香港)有限公司
出版日期: 2002 (香港第一版)
ISBN: 962-04-2180-9
語言: 繁體中文版
頁數: 244頁
售價: HK$33.00
9. Names, Words and Phrases
Dynastic name (Traditional Chinese: 朝代名; Simplified Chinese: 朝代名).
Emperor's assumed name (Traditional: 帝王稱號; Simplified: 帝王称号).
Emperor's era name (Traditional: 帝王年號; Simplified: 帝王年号).
Qin Dynasty (Traditional: 秦朝; Simplified: 秦朝).
Qing Dynasty (Traditional: 清朝; Simplified: 清朝).
Sexagenary Cycle (Traditional: 六十花甲; Simplified: 六十花甲).
Stems-and-Branches (Traditional: 干支; Simplified: 干支).
Tang Dynasty (Traditional: 唐朝; Simplified: 唐朝).
Wu Zetian (Traditional: 武則天; Simplified: 武则天).
Zhou (Traditional: 周; Simplified: 周).
References:
"Anno Domini", Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anno_Domini
(accessed 2012-08-24).
"Chinese era name", Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_era_name
(accessed 2012-08-24).
"Emperor of China", Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_of_China
(accessed 2012-08-24).
"Sexagenary cycle", Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexagenary_cycle
(accessed 2012-08-24).
"Wu Zetian", Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wu_Zetian
(accessed 2012-08-24).
"中国皇帝", Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia,
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E4%B8%AD%E5%9B%BD%E7%9A%87%E5%B8%9D
(accessed 2012-08-24).
"干支", Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia,
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%B9%B2%E6%94%AF
(accessed 2012-08-24).
"年號", Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia,
http://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/%E5%B9%B4%E8%99%9F
(accessed 2012-08-24).
"武则天", Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia,
http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%AD%A6%E5%88%99%E5%A4%A9
(accessed 2012-08-24).
End.
