chin 66924 birthday missions to the Southern Sung court. That makes it pos-
sible to calculate the days elapsed from the orders to the events. On
the average, Southern Sung gave orders for the New Year missions 97
days before the events, Chin only 27 days. On the average, Southern
Sung gave orders for the birthday missions 50 days before the events,
Chin only 24 days. The discrepancy is hard to explain. Distance can-
not apply, since this affected both sides. All missions brought gifts,
and these had to be assembled. But the rule of reciprocity exludes the
possibility that Southern Sung offered substantially more goods and
therefore needed more time to bring them together. The same rule
also prevented Southern Sung missions from being larger than their
counterparts. The simple explanation may be that the Southern Sung
was more bureaucratic and therefore more inefficient and slower in
setting up its missions.
It is not known how long the missions stayed at the courts they
visited. The Chin mission for Hsiao-tsung’s birthday on Nov.28, 1173,
was still in Lin-an on Dec.4. The Southern Sung mission for the New
Year celebration at the Chin court on Feb.10, 1206, left four days later
on Feb.14. No conclusions can be drawn from these two instances.
It will have been noted that Southern Sung, like Koryo and Hsia,
sent missions to the Chin court in 1189, 1190, 1191, 1192, and 1193,
even though it knew that these would not be received because of state
mourning. As remarked before, the magnet must have been government
and private trade. Trade could take place in spite of mourning and
therefore was an opportunity not to be missed. It has also been seen
that in 1191, Emperor Chang-tsung allowed the envoys from Hsia to
remain and trade for three days. This was according to a precedent,
which must have applied to all foreign missions.
While the great majority of missions exchanged by Southern Sung
and Chin was for ritual purposes, there can be no question that the
concominant exchange of gifts was a form of trade and that the envoys
profited from the gifts they received and their own private enterprise.
In 1174, the chief Chin envoy to the Southern Sung court for the New
Year celebration was on his return sentenced for a crime to a bastinado
of more than 150 lashes and had all his presents confiscated. To be
a real punishment, these gifts had to have been considerable. Envoys
faced hazards, whether dishonest or honest. Wang Lun was detained by
the Jurchen in 1139 and executed in 1144. In 1144, another Southern
Sung envoy was executed by Chin. In 1143, the Jurchen released a
Southern Sung envoy whom they had detained under harsh conditions