the household forces of local powerful families, led by a member of the
imperial clan and bolstered by the militia, defeated him. After the reest-
ablishment of Han rule, militia service was abolished to prevent future
would-be rebels from gathering significant bodies of trained soldiers
from among the farmers.^2 The average farmer was demilitarized, though
of course powerful families continued to maintain their own household
security forces as before. Indeed, as we shall see again and again through-
out Chinese history, powerful families, merchants, and religious insti-
tutions always maintained considerable military force at their disposal.
All of those forces were trained in martial arts and well armed.
As Han society evolved away from widespread military service, atti-
tudes about the place of martial arts changed as well. The significance of
the changes in government policy, specifically the demilitarization of the
Han farmers after Wang Mang was defeated, have been overstated by
some.^3 Chinese society as a whole likely became less militarized as farmers
were no longer expected to demonstrate certain minimal martial skills.
Fighting became less of a skill and more of a profession; that is, martial arts
were skills learned by people who intended to make their living practicing
those skills. Society became more specialized, leaving farmers to farm
and soldiers tofight. This should not be taken too far, however, as most
of these central government policies were imposed slowly, incompletely,
and in dramatically different ways in different parts of China. Local
circumstances–living near the border, for example–might override the
government’s general interest in demilitarizing farmers.
Powerful local families continued to raise, train, and arm their own
forces. Many of these forces were primarily their tenant farmers, with some
additional professionalfighters to train and lead those men in emergencies.
People with land and goods to protect hired their own security forces, since
one could not rely upon the government for protection.
The Qin and Han dynasties responded to the problem of widespread
martial arts knowledge in Chinese society in different ways. Both dynasties
recognized that it was unwise and functionally impossible to abolish
martial arts entirely among the commoners–unwise because both dynas-
ties recognized that the populace as a whole was a vast reservoir of military
power when properly drafted, trained, and directed. The dynasties could
not give up access to that power or allow it to drift into the hands of local
elites and power holders. Yet even if they had wanted to remove the martial
arts from the populace, it would have been impossible. The government’s
tools of control were insufficient to the task, its reach very limited; there
were too many groups with exceptions to the prohibitions, and the martial
The Qin and Han Dynasties 55