Ancient China Simplified | Page 8

the Chinese records.
CHAPTER XXXIII
NAMES The difficulty of proper names--Instances-Clans and detached
families--Surnames and personal names--Strange personal
appellations--Interchange of names by all states--Eunuchs and
priests-Minute rules about "naming" individuals--Confucius conveys
praise or censure by "naming" persons--The principles upon which
several names are applied to one person--Tabu-Instances, and Roman

parallel--The Duke of Chou virtual founder of posthumous name
system--Dying king and posthumous choice of name--Incestuous
marriages in own clan--Hushing up incest in high places--
Complication of names connected--Bearing of names upon the political
events connected therewith.
CHAPTER XXXIV
_EUNUCHS, HUMAN SACRIFICES, FOOD_
Eunuchs and their origin--criminals with feet chopped off as
keepers--Noseless criminals for isolated picket duty--The branded were
gate-keepers--Eunuchs for the harem--"Purified men"-- Comparative
antiquity of Persia and China--Eunuchs in Tsin--Ts'i eunuchs and
Confucius--Eunuchs in Wu--Ts'u's uses for eunuchs-- Eunuch intrigues
in connection with the First August Emperor--The First Emperor's
putative father--His works--Eunuch witnesses assassination of Second
August Emperor--General employ of eunuchs in China--Human
sacrifices in Ts'in and Ts'u: also in Ts'i--Doubts as to its existence in
orthodox China--Han Emperor's prohibition-- No fruit wine in ancient
China--Spirits universal--Vice around ancient China rather than in
it--Instances of heavy drinking in Ts'i and Ts'u--Tsin
drinking--Confucius and liquor--Drinking in Ts'in--Ancient Chinese
were meat-eaters--Horse-flesh and Tartars-- Horse-liver in
Prussia--Anecdote of Duke Muh and the hippophagi-- Bears' paws as
food--Elephants in Ts'u--Dogs as food.
CHAPTER XXXV
KNOWLEDGE OF THE WEST The Emperor Muh's voyages to the
West in 984 B.C.--The question of destroyed state annals-Exaggerated
importance of the expedition, even if facts true--King Muh's father was
killed in a similar expedition--Discovery of the Bamboo Books of 299
B.C. in 281 A.D.-- Imaginary interpretations put upon King Muh's
expedition by European critics--The Queen of Sheba--Professor
Chavannes attributes the travels of Duke Muh of Ts'in 650
B.C.--Description of first journey--Along the great road to Lob

Nor-Modern evidence that he got as far as Urumtsi--Six hundred days,
or 12,000 miles-- Specific evidence as to distance travelled each
day--Various Tartar incidents of the journey--The Emperor's
infatuation on the second journey--Lieh-tsz, the Taoist philosopher, on
the Emperor Muh's travels--Arguments qualifying M. Chavannes' view
that Duke Muh, and not the Emperor Muh, undertook the journeys.
CHAPTER XXXVI
ANCIENT JAPAN Wu kingdom--Name begins 585 B.C.--This is the
year Japanese "history" begins--The first king and his four sons--Prince
Ki- chah--War with Ts'u and sacking of its capital--King Fu-ch'ai and
his wars against Yiieh--Offered an asylum in Chusan--Suicide of
Fu-ch'ai--Escape of his family across the seas to Japan--China knew
nothing of Japan, even if Wu did--Story reduced to its true
proportions--Traces of prehistoric men in Japan--Possible movements
of original inhabitants--Existing evidence better than none at all--East
from Ningpo must be Japan--Like early Greeks and Egyptian
colonists--Natural impulses to emigration--Refugees from China
compared to Will Adams--Natural desire to improve pedigrees-- No
shame to Japan's ruling caste to hail from China--European
comparisons--How the Japanese manufactured their past history--
Imagination must be kept separate from evidence.
CHAPTER XXXVII
ETHICS Peculiar customs--Formalities of surrender--A number of
instances of succession rules--Status of wives-Cases where the
Emperor himself breaks the rules--Instances of irregular succession in
various states--Customs of war--Cutting off the left ear as
trophy--Rewards for heads--Principles of facing north and south--
Turning towards Mecca--Left and Right princes--Modern instances of
official seating--North and south facing houses--Chivalrous rules about
mourning--Funeral missions--The feudal yearnings of Confucius
explained--Respect even of barbarians for mourning--Many other
quaint instances of funeral and mourning rules--Promises made to a
dying non compos of no avail--Mencius and the diplomatists.

CHAPTER XXXVIII
WOMEN AND MORALS Rights of women in ancient China--The legal
rule and the actual fact--Instances of irregularity in female status, both
in ancient and modern China--Instances of incest and irregular marriage
even in orthodox states-Women, once married, not to come back--The
much-married Second Protector--Hun and Turk customs about taking
over Wives--Clan marriages of doubtful legality--Succession rules--
Ts'u irregularities and caprice--Elder brothers by inferior
wives--Paranymphs, or under-studies of the wife--Women always
under some man's power--Incestuous fathers--Lex Julia introduced into
Yiieh by its vengeful King--The evil morals of the Shanghai-Ningpo
region of ancient Yiieh--No prostitution in ancient China, except
perhaps in Ts'i--No infanticide--Incest and names.
CHAPTER XXXIX
GEOGRAPHICAL KNOWLEDGE Orthodox China compared with
orthodox Greece--Our persistent "traditions" about the Tower of Babel
and the Tarim Valley-Wu, Yiieh, and ancient traditions--The "Tribute
of Yii" says nothing of Western origin of Chinese--No ancient
knowledge of the West, nor of South China--The Blackwater River and
the Emperor Muh--The "Tribute of Yii" says nothing of the supposed
Western emigration of the Chinese--Some traditions of Chinese
migrations from the south--Traditions of enfeoffment of vassals in
Corea, about 1122 B.C.--Knowledge of China as defined by the First
Protector, and as visited by the Second in the seventh century
B.C.--Evidence of the Emperor's limited knowledge of China in 670
B.C.--Yiieh first appears in 536 B.C.--Tsin never saw the sea till 589
B.C.--Ts'i's ignorance of the south-u, Yiieh, and Ts'u