Description

8vo, pp. 276. Contests long-standing claims that Confucianism came to prominence under Chinas Emperor Wu. When did Confucianism become the reigning political ideology of imperial China? A pervasive narrative holds it was during the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han dynasty (141- 87 BCE). In this book, Liang Cai maintains that such a date would have been too early and provides a new account of this transformation. A hidden narrative in Sima Qians The Grand Scribes Records (Shi ji) shows that Confucians were a powerless minority in the political realm of this period. Cai argues that the notorious witchcraft scandal of 91 - 87 BCE reshuffled the power structure of the Western Han bureaucracy and provided Confucians an opportune moment to seize power, evolve into a new elite class, and set the tenor of political discourse for centuries to come. Through a detailed analysis of the surviving textual evidence, Witchcraft and the Rise of the First Confucian Empire provides a powerful image of the destruction of one order in the last years of the reign of Emperor Wu and the creation of a new elite under Huo Guang. Though these events have already been the subject of at least one detailed English-language study the narrower time-frame and more focused narrative in Liang Cais study provides an even more powerful picture of the enduring aftermath of Emperor Wus witchcraft trials. Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society