Tang China (Entry #8)

One of the things that interested me about Tang China was the high importance placed on security. Protection was placed on China’s culture and also the community. For example, there were gates and curfews placed in order to keep everyone under strict guard under the government. The curfew was obeyed that not even money could be used to extend one’s curfew. It seems like the people in Tang China were confined. Culturally and religiously they had a bit more freedom. Tang China was diverse as there were many religions and “foreigners” that existed within the same walls.

Although every tradition was allowed to practice their own rituals amongst other things, they were still under the government’s control. For example, some were not allowed to wear their cultural clothing or marry any Chinese women. This reminded me of my mother’s village back in India, where people don’t take it too lightly when outsiders come in and wear Western clothes. It’s because they want to protect and preserve their culture from disappearing. Similarly, the rules enforced on foreigners were probably a result of the Chinese trying to safeguard the purity of their culture.

I was also amazed at how organized Tang China was. Politically, there were Six Boards that looked after different areas of the community, such as revenue, war and punishment. There were also two markets that had separate “directors” that created and implemented their rules on the people. Moreover, the society was also organized into two predominant classes: scholars and merchants. The scholars obtained their positions through examinations that involved writing poems. Poems were important as it showed if the individual had any talent, which was more important than the person’s familial background in passing the exams. The merchants, on the other hand, lived in some luxury, whereas the poor struggled with unemployment and had to sell their possessions in order to survive.

I was also interested by “The Tale of Li Wa”, which depicts the lives of people in Tang China and ties in the notions surrounding social classes. It tells the story of a scholar who falls into poverty after spending his money on a prostitute that he falls in love with. However, he eventually regains his inherent status and the respect from his father, which he lost once he had become poor. The story suggests that one will always fall back into their status but that it is rare for anyone to change into a better status, like the prostitute did. This made me wonder how an individual would be treated if they went from being a commoner to a merchant or even a scholar. Would they be accepted or be seen as a commoner forever? Or would it even be possible for a commoner to achieve the status of officials?