Jiuzhou
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jiuzhou (Chinese: 九州; pinyin: Jiǔzhōu, literally The Nine Provinces) is a term used in ancient Chinese histories to refer to territorial divisions during the Xia and Shang dynasties, and has now come to symbolically represent China. However, the current definition of the nine zhou may be that of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States Period, as it was not until the Eastern Han Dynasty that the nine zhou were treated as actual administrative regions.
[edit] Different interpretations of Jiuzhou
Before the Tang Dynasty, a zhou was equivalent to a province, the largest division at the time. After the Tang Dynasty however, zhou were much smaller and the term was used for prefectures. (See Zhou for details.)
According to the "夏书·禹贡" section of the Classic of History, Yu the Great divided the world into nine provinces, namely Jizhou (冀州), Yanzhou (兖州), Qingzhou, Xuzhou, Yangzhou, Jingzhou, Yuzhou (豫州), Liangzhou (梁州) and Yongzhou (雍州). The geography section ("释地") of the ancient encyclopedia Erya also has nine provinces, but with Youzhou (幽州) and Yingzhou (营州) instead of Qingzhou and Liangzhou. In the Rituals of Zhou ("职方" section), the provinces include Youzhou and Bingzhou (并州) but not Xuzhou and Liangzhou. Lü Family's Spring and Autumn Annals ("有始览" section) mentions Youzhuo but not Liangzhou.
Traditionally, the Classics is thought to represent the divisions during the Xia Dynasty, and Erya the Shang Dynasty; Rituals the Zhou Dynasty, and Lü's Annals the concept and actual territorial distribution of the Nine Prefectures during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States Period. The Annals provided the following passage on the location of the nine provinces and their general correspondence with the states of the time:
| Yuzhou, ie. Zhou, lies between the He River and Han River. Jin in Jizhou is between the two rivers. Yanzhou is between the He River and Ji River, and is Wei. Qingzhou, ie. Qi is in the east. Lu is at Xuzhou, on the Si River. Yangzhou, or Yue, is to the southwest. Jinzhou is in the south and forms Chu. Yongzhou, that is Qin, is to the west. Yan occupies Youzhou in the north. |
Later on, an adherent of the Ying Yang School (阴阳家), Zou Yan (邹衍), proposed a brand-new theory of the "Greater Nine Provinces." According to him, the nine provinces in Classics were only "minor" provinces, which combined together to form the "Red County/Divine Province" (赤县神州), ie. China (cf. Shenzhou). Nine such provinces then form another "medium" Jiuzhou surrounded by a sea. There are nine such medium provinces, which were surrounded by a Great Ocean, forming the Greater Jiuzhou. Therefore, according to this theory, China would comprise only 1/81 of the entire world, markedly different from the Sinocentrist point of view that was prevalent at the time.
