Shang History

Shang Society

Shang society was composed primarily of numerous peasant communities, dominated by a strong noble class and headed by a well-organized monarchy. The class structure of the society is undoubted and its cleavages are sharp and distinct. But it is more than likely that the majority of the peasants were still mainly free members of peasant communes, though owing taxes and labor service to their noble overlords. The degree of their dependence on the ruling class was related to their location. The nobility were the organizers of the tribute system drawn from the peasants and primarily a warrior caste. They fought with the use of the two-horse chariot and were armed with bronze weapons, for example, spears, axes, and knives. Their main sport was hunting. The towns must have had a considerable artisan population, by the material culture of the age, with work done in the making of clothes, pottery, metal, bone, ivory, weaving and so on.
The nobility as a warrior caste had a monopoly on weapons and chariots and in this lay one of the main sources of power. Their military strength was used for two-fold purposes: to wage war against the neighbors of the Shang and to keep their own population under control. "The Shang were an aggressive power conducting many campaigns and foraging to faraway regions in their search for more tribute, cattle, horses, slaves, copper and tin, furs and ivory."(Witold 1979)

The Shang monarchy was a well-organized institution with an expanded bureaucracy of officials, titles of their positions being known. The Shang king, wang, at the top of the pyramid of the Shang society had considerable personal power and great wealth. He had an important religious role as the high priest who offered sacrifices to the supreme beings. The nobility doubled as priests, especially because of the conduct of ancestor worship, which was later to become one of the most imporatnt components of popular worship, was their privilege and monopoly.

"While the towns of the Shang revealed a high level of development of material culture with skilled crafts, and also the existence of trade with the use of cowries as currency, the economy, was still based on a quite primitive agriculture."(Witold 1979) This was the main pursuit of the majority of the population. The economy was based on agriculture. The hoe, mattock and the foot plow were the main agricultural implements. Some irrigation, on a small scale, was used. Millet, wheat, barley, and possibly, some rice were grown. Millet was the main crop. Silkworms were cultivated, and pigs, dogs, sheep, and oxen were raised. Silk cloth was made only for the nobility, while the peasants used hemp for their clothing. Cotton was introduced in the 12 century A.D.

"The Shang developed a calendar, reconciling the solar year of 365 days and the lunar one of 354 or 355 days with the periodic interjection of short intercalary months. Days were grouped into ten-day weeks, and each day of the week had a royal designation with the rites to be performed on that day by those associated with the symbol or name."(Milton 1994)

Shang Culture

The most significant achievement of Chinese civilization in the Shang period was, the extensive practice of writing which is attested for the first time in this era. "Most of the Shang writing are derived from the oracle bone inscriptions though some also come from bronzes; the bronze inscriptions of the Shang age are usually much shorter than those of later periods and a more primitive script is used than that on the oracle bones"(Milton 1994). It is more than probable that the Shang wrote also on wood, bamboo and silk, but all of these are perishable materials, so none have survived. The Shang writing as represented by the oracle inscriptions is a highly developed and sophisticated form. There is no doubt that the language is Chinese, and one author state that this is a striking proof of the correctness of the Chinese feeling of identity with the ancient inhabitants of their land. While Chinese script is not the oldest in the world, it is the one that has been in use continuously for the longest period of time. The Shang inscriptions provide over 3,000 characters and of these over 1,000 have been deciphered. Many of these characters are quite the same as the present ones. "The stage of writing reached by the Shang was already of considerable stylization and it leads one to assume that and earlier development of the script must have necessarily taken place with a duration of at least a few hundred years"(Milton 1994). This could have occurred either during the Hsia or at the very beginning he the Shang. Ancient Chinese, from the Chou period on, shows that while its basic structure was similar to modern Chinese it was much less homophonic than the modern language.
The Shang was especially a bronze civilization. Bronze in China was an indigenous development. Its beginnings were more than likely placed in the early Shang period, and it is very probable that its use developed independently at this time in different parts of China. Shang casters in bronze produced primarily ritual vessels of many various types, weapons and equipment for chariots and horses. Practically the production was for the use of the Shang nobility.

The Shang vessels were richly ornamented with patterns of geometric, anthropomorphic and zoomorphic designs. These were especially the mythical dragons and the mysterious animal mask. The ritual vessels were used to contain food, wine and water and employed for sacrifices in ancestor worship. They were preserved with the greatest of care. This was due not only to their sacral nature but also to the fact that they were of great intrinsic value due to the scarcity of metal. In a way the bronze vessels could also be regarded as a form of accumulation of wealth. Bronze production was also one of the symbol of the Shang.

The Shang crafts men were also fine workers in stone. They were good in what was the oldest of Chinese art forms, definitely reaching back to the Neolithic, working in jade. This stone was prized by the Chinese from the earliest times for its purity and beauty and extensively used for ritual purposes.