HIS280Y1 Chapter Notes - Chapter 5: Taoism, Li Si, Shang Yang
Document Summary
Ordering the natural world: yin yang, stick divination / predictions, five phases/ elements. Fire, water, wood, earth, metal: heavenly stems, earthly branches, sexagenary- sixty unit cycle used to count years in time, the twelve chinese animal zodiacs also used as a way to tell time. Each animal takes an hour: chinese very interested in repetition and cycles- relationships dynamically related. Five elements corresponds with five colors and five organs and five planets they knew about. Imperial china has a lot of knowledge sharing from top to bottom in hierarchy. Legalists: lots of legalists not from qin, saw themselves as the great oppositions of the confucius followers. Everyone is out to get you except for you: believed all people are bad, shang yang (gongsun yang) King make qin into districts and choose people of merit to look over the land so nobility cannot inherit. After shang yang"s advice, even nobility and royalty had no titles besides the king.
