Notes
1. THIS Book brings us to the closing act of the life of
king Khang, whose reign, according to the current chronology, lasted
thirty-seven years, ending in B.C. 1079. From the appointment of Kü-khan to his
death, the king's history is almost a blank. The only events chronicled by
Sze-mâ Khien are a coinage of round money with a square hole in the
centre,--the prototype of the present cash; and an enactment about the width
and length in which pieces of silk and cloth were to be manufactured. King Khang, feeling that his end is near, calls
his
principal ministers and other officers around his bed, and commits his son Kâo
to their care and guidance. The record of all these things and the dying charge
form a chapter that ends with the statement of the king's death. The rest of
the Book forms a second chapter, in which we have a detailed account of the
ceremonies connected with the publication of the charge, and the accession of
Kâo to the throne. It is an interesting account of the ways of that distant
time on such occasions.
2.
The king's caps or crowns and robes were many, and for each there was the
appropriate occasion. His attendants, no doubt, now dressed king Khang, as the
rules of court fashions required.
3.
In those days they sat on the ground upon mats; and for the old or infirm
benches or stools were placed, in front of them, to lean forward on. The king
had five kinds of stools variously adorned. That with gems was the most
honourable.
4.
The Grand-Guardian Shih, or the duke of Shâo, and the other five dignitaries
were, no doubt, the six ministers of the 20th Book. Zui is referred to the
present district of Kâo-yî, department Hsî-an; and Thung to Hwâ Kâu, department
Thung-kâu;--both in Shen-hsî. The earl of Zui, it is supposed, was Minister of
Instruction, and he of Thung Minister of Religion. Pi corresponded to the
present district of Khang-an, department Hsî-an. The duke of Pî was Minister of
War, called Duke or Kung, as Grand-Master. It is not known where Mâo was. The
lord of it was Minister of Works, and Grand-Assistant. The marquis of Wei,--see
on Book ix. He was now, it is supposed, Minister of Crime.
5. The tent had been prepared when the king sent for
his ministers and officers to give them his last charge, and set up outside his
chamber in the hall where he was accustomed to hold 'the audience of
government.' He had walked or been carried to it, and then returned to his
apartment when he had expressed his last wishes, while the tent--the curtains
and canopy--was carried out into the courtyard. The palace was much more long or deep than wide,
consisting of five series of buildings continued one after another, so that, if
all the gates were thrown open, one could walk in a direct line from the first
gate to the last. The different parts of it were separated by courts that
embraced a large space of ground, and were partly open overhead. The gates
leading to the different parts had their particular names, and were all
fronting the south. Outside the second was held 'the outer levee,' where the
king received the princes and officers generally. Outside the fifth was held
'the audience of government,' when he met his ministers to consult with them on
the business of the state. Inside this gate were the buildings which formed the
private apartments, in the hall leading to which was held 'the inner audience,'
and where the sovereign feasted those whom he designed specially to honour.
Such is the general idea of the ancient palace given by Kû Hsî. The gateways
included a large space, covered by a roof, supported on pillars.
6.
We know nothing more of these officers but what is here related.
7.
The marquis of Khî was the son of Thaî-kung, a friend and minister of king Wan,
who had been enfeoffed by king Wû with the state of Khî, embracing the present
department of Khing-Kâu, in Shan-tung, and other territory. His place at court
was that of master of the guards.
8.
The marquis of Khî was the son of Thaî-kung, a friend and minister of king Wan,
who had been enfeoffed by king Wû with the state of Khî, embracing the present
department of Khing-Kâu, in Shan-tung, and other territory. His place at court
was that of master of the guards.
9.
All the gates might be called 'south gates.' It is not certain whether that
intended here was the outer gate of all, or the last, immediately in front of
the hall, where the king had given his charge. Whichever it was, the meeting
Kâo in the way described was a public declaration that he had been appointed
successor to the throne.
10.
'The mourning shed,' spoken of in Part IV, viii, ch. I, had not yet been set
up, and the apartment here indicated---on the east of the hall of audience--was
the proper one for the prince to occupy in the mean time.
11.
On the seventh day after his death the king had been shrouded and put into his
coffin. But there were still the shell or outer coffin, & c., to be
provided.
12.
These 'salvage men' were, I suppose, natives of the wild Tî tribes, employed to
perform the more servile offices about the court. Some of them, we know, were
enrolled among the guards.
13.
The screens were ornamented with figures of axe-heads, and placed behind the
king, under the canopy that overshadowed him.
14.
All these arrangements seem to have been made in the hall where king Khang had
delivered his charge. He had been accustomed to receive his guests at all the
places where the tents, screens, and mats were now set. It was presumed he
would be present in spirit at the ceremony of proclaiming his son, and making
known to him his dying charge; and as they could not tell at what particular
spot the spirit would be, they made all the places ready for it.
15.
The western and eastern apartments were two rooms, east and west of the hall,
forming part of the private apartments, behind the side rooms, and of large
dimensions. The various articles enumerated were precious relics, and had been
favourites with king Khang. They were now displayed to keep up the illusion of
the king's still being present in spirit. 'They were set forth,' it is said,
'at the ancestral sacrifices to show that the king could preserve them, and at
the ceremony of announcing a testamentary charge to show that he could transmit
them.' About the articles themselves it is not necessary to append particular
notes. They perished thousands of years ago, and the accounts of them by the
best scholars are little more than conjectural.
16.
The royal carriages were of five kinds, and four of them at least were now set
forth inside the last gate, that everything might again be done, as when the
king was alive. On the west side of the hall were the guests' steps (or
staircase), by which visitors ascended, and on the east were those used by the
host himself. If one of the royal carriages was absent on this occasion, it
must have been that used in war, as not being appropriate at such a time.
17.
All was now ready for the grand ceremony, and the performers, in their
appropriate mourning and sacrificial array, take their places in the hall. Kâo
is here for the first time styled 'king;' but still he goes up by the guests'
steps, not presuming to ascend by the others, while his father's corpse was in
the hall.
18.
The Grand-Guardian and the Minister of Religion ascended by the eastern steps,
because the authority of king Khang was in their persons, to be conveyed by the
present ceremony to his son. 'The great mace' was one of the emblems of the
royal sovereignty, and 'the cup' also must have been one that only the king
could use. 'The mace-cover' was an instrument by which the genuineness of the
symbols of their rank conferred on the different princes was tested.
19.
According to Khung Ying-tâ, when the king received the record of the charge, he
was standing at the top of the eastern steps, a little eastwards, with his face
to the north. The Historiographer stood by king Khang's coffin, on the
south-west of it, with his face to the east. There he read the charge, after
which the king bowed twice, and the Minister of Religion, on the south-west of
the king, presented the cup and mace-cover. The king took them, and, having
given the cover in charge to an attendant, advanced with the cup to the place
between the pillars where the sacrificial spirits were placed. Having filled a
cup, he advanced to the east of the coffin, and stood with his face to the
west; then going to the spot where his father's spirit was supposed to be, he
sacrificed, pouring out the spirits on the ground, and then he put the cup on
the bench appropriated for it. This he repeated three times. At the conclusion
the Minister of Religion conveyed to him a message from the spirit of his
father, that his offering was accepted.
20.
Preparatory, that is, to his offering a sacrifice.
21.
That is, probably, repeated the sacrifice to the spirit of king Khang, as if to
inform him that his charge had been communicated to his son. The half-mace was
used as a handle for the sacrificial cup. This ceremony appears to have been
gone through twice. The Grand-Guardian's bowing was to the spirit of king
Khang, and the new king returned the obeisance for his father.
22.
Meaning the fifth or last gate of the palace. The private apartments had for
the time, through the presence of the coffin and by the sacrifices, been
converted into a sort of ancestral temple.