Chapter 7 China 249was the key to this difference in wealth. The Shang state sponsored copper and tin
mining, and royal establishments monopolized bronze manufactures that, with
jade and silk, were the main items of prestige accumulation. Bronze was used for
two principal purposes: Weapons, in the form of swords, arrow tips, spears, and
execution axes enabled the elite to dominate militarily, maintaining internal con-
trol and prosecuting offensive action against external enemies. And bronze was
the material for manufacturing the objects necessary to communicate with the
ancestors, the spirits, and Heaven; heavily ornamented bronze vessels with tripod
feet were used to offer them wine, meat, and other specialties from human society
and thus tie them in continuing reciprocal relations with living people. These, too,
were the prerogative of the ruling class. A third logical use of bronze comes to
mind: bronze tools, like adzes, axes, chisels, and plows, for use in agricultural pro-
duction. However, surprisingly few such tools have been found, and those that
have were mostly found in royal graves. Keightley believes that even bronze tools
were used for ceremonial purposes, such as ritual plowing of the first fields (or the
king’s fields) in spring, and for digging royal graves and constructing the coffins
and inner walls of the tomb. Thus, the use of bronze was the monopoly of the
state, and particularly of the king, who already was known as the Son of Heaven.
Communicating with Heaven
The king’s legitimacy rested on his unique capacity to communicate with
Heaven. His own royal ancestors resided there, where their de, their mystical
store of power and virtue, remained available to shower blessings on their liv-
ing descendants. These ancestors also had access to other heavenly powers that
could assure well-being and harmony for all living members of the state. These
heavenly powers were sometimes projected into a vaguely conceived “Heav-
enly Emperor,” Shangdi (Shang-ti), but conceptions of Shangdi never con-
gealed into a single, high, creator god as known in the West. When Shang
kings died, they became themselves ancestors who would henceforth rule from
heaven. Thus their tombs had to be filled with all the treasures a newly arrived
king-ancestor would need, the first of centuries of gifts they would regularly
receive from their living descendants. Their obligations to earth and their pow-
ers now were greater than ever.
The record of Shang kings’ communications with Heaven can be read on
the oracle bones in inscriptions up to 50 characters long. Most tended to be
practical questions: “Will we get anything when we hunt at Gui? Will we not
get anything when we hunt at Gui?” The heated metal prod was applied to the
reverse side; with a “plop” the crackle-response would appear, and later, per-
haps, the end result was reported: “On that day we hunted and killed one tiger,
40 deer, 164 wolves, 150 fawns, and a couple of foxes” (Chou 1979). Such
accounts give an indirect glimpse of the life of the king and the nobility; it
would have been quite a hunting party that killed so much wildlife.
Of course ordinary people did not live like this. Although the nobility was
organized in large patrilineal clans held together by wealth, high status, and