250 Part IV: East Asian Civilization
collective worship of ancestors, commoners did not have these mechanisms by
which to maintain the memory of long-term kinship connections. Their fami-
lies were small and their ancestors forgotten after a few generations. Few grave
goods accompanied their dead; the elegant bronze vessels for giving libations
to ancestors were too expensive for commoners and probably restricted in any
case as a prerogative of great families. Patricia Ebrey writes:
Kings were obliged to offer sacrifices of several kinds of meat to their
founding ancestor and four most recent ancestors each month; lords, offi-
cials, and officers (shih) could make progressively fewer and less varied
offerings to progressively fewer ancestors. Commoners were not to make
sacrifices of meat, but they could offer vegetables to deceased fathers once
each season. (1991:52)Idealized Zhou Feudalism
To the west of the major Shang centers were a number of tribal chiefdoms
that at times fought and at other times tolerated each other. They made alli-
ances with the powerful Shang through tribute and vassalage. The Zhou tribes
were among these groups. But Shang rulers gradually became weaker, while
the Zhou became stronger, and in about 1045 B.C.E., the Zhou conquered the
Shang and established a new capital in the west at Chang’an (now Xi’an).
Where Shang kings had justified their rule through worship of their own
divine ancestors, the Zhou invented the Mandate of Heaven (tianming).
Although Heaven was not imagined as a creator god or as a divine personality,
Heaven was on the side of righteousness and good government. According to
Zhou revisionism, Heaven had withdrawn its support from the decadent Shang
and bestowed it on them, thus creating the motif of the wicked last emperor of
a dynasty gone bad and the virtuous founder-emperor of a new dynasty. In the
case of the Shang, the last emperor (Di Xin) embodied all imaginable evils that
would become commonplace in dynastic histories for centuries to come. He
neglected the affairs of state in favor of the pleasures of his harem, and one wife
in particular demanded his attention and matched him in wickedness. Orgies
in the palace were hosted with boats floated on pools of wine, as the guests
enjoyed the spectacle of diabolical and novel torture methods. These moral
transgressions were funded by higher taxes, which led to unrest and eventually
the overthrow of the Shang and the founding of the Zhou.
With this strong moral element (perhaps embellished by later historians),
Heaven’s favor thus made the new Zhou king the “Son of Heaven.” In his
mediating role between Heaven and earth, he represented Heaven on earth in
his obligation to provide good government, and he represented earth to Heaven
in annual imperial rituals. He worshipped in the “threefold kneeling and nine-
fold prostration” to Heaven. Twice a year, at the summer and winter solstices,
the king gave a feast for Heaven of wine, soup, various delicious dishes, and
animal sacrifice. In the spring he sacrificed on the Altar of Agriculture and