A Study on the Political Structure in Sung China, Employing Official Records of Administrative Affairs and Private Diavies

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Progress in analyzing the political structure of the Sung Dynasty over the past three years has been driven by the political diaries of the period. The following are the results of this analysis. (1) The official histories of Sung consist of a daily calendar that was compiled based on court diaries and records of administrative affairs, while veritable records were compiled based on the daily calendar, thus forming the compilation process upon which the national histories drew. Among these are the records of administrative affairs, where political conversations the grand councilors and executive officials had with the emperor, command the most important position. (2) Personal accounts were added along with the records of administrative affairs by grand councilors and executive officials. These accounts were created mainly to record the political discussions the emperor had, of which many were submitted to the government in order to create the official history. (3) The records of not on … More ly the records of administrative affairs and diaries but me emperor's conversations as well were treated with importance, and these historical records were brought together by the government. The result was that a far-reaching system of 'Equality' developed during the Sung Dynasty in which government officials met with the emperor and related their opinions directly to him. (4) When the 'Diaries of Wang An Shin' of Northern Sung are compared with the 'Chronicles of Silu ***' written by 'Zhoubita ***' from Southern Sung, we discover that both of them had the same characteristics in their diaries, which are mainly records of conversations between the grand councilors & executive officials that were held with the emperor. Despite limitations inherent in diaries based on the viewpoint of grand councilors and executive officials, they provide a vivid depiction of the decision-making process in the Sung Dynasty at various bureaucratic levels from the emperor, grand councilors and executive officials, attendants, censors & remonstrators as well as eunuchs. (5) Nevertheless, Zhoubita wrote the 'Chronicles of Feng Zhao ***' at the same time. The 'Chronicles of Feng Zhao' is a digest of replies to 'Imperial Correspondences' sent directly from the emperor to government officials in a diary-style format. When the development of these 'Imperial Correspondences' is considered in terms of actual events that occurred at the end of Northern Sung, the preserving of these records along with the conversations held with the emperor demonstrates the importance placed on them. Changes in the descriptive style of the diaries are skillfully brought into agreement as-is with the adjustments in the political structure at the time. Less