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Chapter 9 POSITION OF ENVOYS

Word Count: 1957    |    Released on: 29/11/2017

nd that their persons should be held sacred, whether at residential courts, in durb

irely cut off" together with the loss of imperial sway. In the year 595 B.C. Sung went so far as to put a Ts'u envoy to death, naturally much to the wrath of the rising southern power. Ts'u in turn arrested the Tsin envoy on his way to Sung, and tried in vain to force him to betray his trust. In 582 Tsin, in a fit of anger, detained the CHêNG envoy, and finally put him to death for his impudence in coming officially to visit Tsin after coquetting with Tsin's rival Ts'u. All these irregular cases are severely blamed by the historians. In 562 Ts'u turned the tables upon Tsin by putting the CHêNG envoy to death after the latter had concluded a treaty with Tsin. Confucius joins, retrospectively of course, in the chorus of universal reprobation. In 560 Ts'u tried to play upon the Ts'i envoy a trick which in its futility reminds us strongly of the analogous petty humiliations until recently imposed by China, whenever convenient occasion offered, upon foreign officials accredited to her. The Ts'i envoy, who was somewhat deformed in person, was no less an individual than the celebrated philosopher Yen-tsz, a respected acquaintance of Confucius (though, of course, much his senior), and second only to Kwan-tsz amongst the great administrative statesmen of Ts'i. The half-barbarous King of Ts'u concocted with his obsequious courtiers a nice little scheme for humiliating the northern envo

and philosopher, deeply lamented on his death alike by the people of CHêNG, and by his friend or correspondent Confucius of Lu state. The Chinese diplomats then, as now, had the most roundabout ways of pointing a moral or delicately insinuating an innuendo. On arrival at the outskirts of the capital, instead of building the usual da?s for formalities and sacrifices, Tsz-ch'an threw up a mean hut for the accommodation of his mission, saying: "Altars are built by great states when they visit small ones as a symbol of benefits accorded, and

eing himself of eastern barbarian descent) a princess of Wu. The following year, when two very distinguished statesmen from the territory of his secular enemy Tsin came on a political mission, the King of Ts'u consulted his premier about the advisability of castrating the one for a harem eunuch, and cutting of

, had very great pressure put upon him by a covetous Tsin minister who wanted the girdle. The envoy offered to give some silk instead, but he said that not even to save his life would he give up the girdle. The Tsin mag

e rising indignation of the other powers and representatives present by pooh-poohing the clumsy artifice on the ground that by such treachery Ts'u simply injured her own reputation in the federation to the manifest advantage of Tsin: it did not suit Tsin to continue the struggle with Ts'u just then. Then there was a squabble as to precedence at the same Peace Conference; that

nce saw through the menacing appearance of the barbarian "dances" (introduced here, again, as a "variety entertainment"), and by his firm behaviour not only saved the person of his prince, but shamed the ruler of Ts'i into disclaiming and disavowing his obsequious fellow- practical jokers. Yen-tsz was

tratio

River Sz, down to its junction with the Hwai. The River I starts still from I-shui (also a cross in circle; means "River I"), passes I-thou, and used to join the Sz (now the Canal) at the lower cross in a circle. Th

part of the River Wei bed, left it and took possession of the River Chang bed. Up to 602 B.C. the secondary branch took the more easterly dotted line (the present Yellow River, once the Riv

the capital of Lu, is marked with a small circle. In 278 B.C. the Ts'u capital was moved east to Ch'en. In 241 B.C.,

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Contents

Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 1 OPENING SCENES
29/11/2017
Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 2 SHIFTING SCENES
29/11/2017
Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 3 THE NORTHERN POWERS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 4 THE SOUTHERN POWER
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 5 EVIDENCE OF ECLIPSES
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 6 THE ARMY
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 7 THE COAST STATES
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 8 FIRST PROTECTOR OF CHINA
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 9 POSITION OF ENVOYS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 10 THE SECOND PROTECTOR
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 11 RELIGION
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 12 ANCESTRAL WORSHIP
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 13 ANCIENT DOCUMENTS FOUND
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 14 MORE ON PROTECTORS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 15 STATE INTERCOURSE
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 16 LAND AND PEOPLE
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 17 EDUCATION AND LITERARY
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 18 TREATIES AND VOWS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 19 CONFUCIUS AND LITERATURE
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 20 LAW
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 21 PUBLIC WORKS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 22 CITIES AND TOWNS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 23 BREAK-UP OF CHINA
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 24 KINGS AND NOBLES
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 25 VASSALS AND EMPEROR
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 26 FIGHTING STATE PERIOD
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 27 FOREIGN BLOOD
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 28 BARBARIANS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 29 CURIOUS CUSTOMS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 30 LITERARY RELATIONS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 31 ORIGIN OF THE CHINESE
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 32 THE CALENDAR
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 33 NAMES
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 34 EUNUCHS, HUMAN SACRIFICES, FOOD
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 35 KNOWLEDGE OF THE WEST
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 36 ANCIENT JAPAN
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 37 ETHICS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 38 WOMEN AND MORALS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 39 GEOGRAPHICAL KNOWLEDGE
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 40 TOMBS AND REMAINS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 41 THE TARTARS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 42 MUSIC
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 43 WEALTH, SPORTS, ETC.
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 44 CONFUCIUS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 45 CONFUCIUS AND LAO-TSZ
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 46 ORACLES AND OMENS
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Ancient China Simplified
Chapter 47 RULERS AND PEOPLE
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