Ancient Chinese Examination System Made Relevant

April 30, 2010 at 12:00 am (Chinese Culture, Current Affairs, History)

This article first appeared in the Singapore Straits Times on 16 March 1996.

There are few countries that can surpass China in its long tradition of according the highest respect and honour to scholars. The epitome of this tradition is the awe and reverence in which China’s premier sage and scholar, Confucius (551-479 BC), is held by successive generations of Chinese everywhere. His teachings permeate every aspect of Chinese life, 2,500 years after they were first enunciated.

In its long recorded history that spans over 5,000 years, China had traditionally placed scholars at the top of the social hierarchy. This was followed by farmers and labourers, with the merchants occupying the bottom rung. In Imperial China, the most worthwhile calling was to be a civil servant, which was dominated by men of letters steeped in the Confucian tradition. On the other hand, the merchant class was despised as money-making was equated with exploitation and therefore anathema to the Confucian value system.

While Chinese history is replete with instances of military adventurers and other “lesser breeds” mounting the dragon throne through military successes, it was inevitably the scholar-bureaucrat who was called upon to administer the affairs of state and to formulate policies in the emperor’s name for compliance throughout the extensive empire. They were recruited primarily from amongst the literati – men with a classical education who became the custodians of the Confucian value system. It requires its adherents to have moral rectitude and integrity. In a society where every facet of community life came under the state purview, civil servants enjoyed more powers and prestige than corresponding positions in the armed forces and the private sector.

The story is often told of Liu Bang, Founder of the Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD), who once boasted that, as he had conquered China on horseback, he could rule the country without the help of Confucian scholars. He was promptly cautioned that this would mean disaster; and that, to govern China effectively, the services of Confucian scholars were indispensable. This sentiment is echoed in the Doctrine of the Mean, one of the Confucian classics: “When men of right calibre are available, government flourishes; and when they are not, it declines.”

As early as the Zhou Dynasty (1026-221 BC) rudimentary methods already existed for selecting talents for the state bureaucracy. However, recruitment based solely on competitive written examination was first introduced during the Sui Dynasty (581-618 AD) and became well established during the Tang Dynasty (618-906 AD). According to historian Northcote Parkinson, author of the famous book called Parkinson’s Law and one-time Professor of History at the University of Malaya in Singapore, the Chinese examination system was once so extensively copied by the other nations, including the West, that few people realised its Chinese origin. It predated the beginning of the European competitive written examination system by more than 1200 years. France was the first to study the Chinese system and introduce it in 1791. Germany followed in 1800, Britain in 1855 and United States in 1883. It was adopted in Korea, Thailand and Vietnam even earlier.

The principal advantage of the Chinese system was that it enabled the selection of civil servants on merit, rather than on the nepotic or corrupt basis that is usually a tempting alternative. Prof Parkinson contended that, whatever the faults of the competitive written examination, it certainly produced better results than any other method that had been attempted since. The competitive examination system had gripped the imagination and excitement of the Chinese people since its inception.

Many parents would make great sacrifices in order to ensure that their children have a good education which would prepare them adequately for the Civil Service. Such a practice would, of course, not appear strange to today’s East Asian parents, many of whom are firm believers in the Confucianist emphasis on education. What better testimony to this than the flourishing tuition industry, one of the most dynamic throughout East Asia?

The passing of competitive examinations was crucial to success in officialdom. It was not uncommon for candidates to spend years, sometimes even decades, in order to pass these examinations. Those in dire financial circumstances were supported by their families, or even by the entire village. A succesful scholar would bring great honour to his family and village.

The traditional Chinese regard for scholarship percolates beyond China, and has spread to the homes of the Overseas Chinese and to other East Asian countries. In Singapore, Chinese Singaporeans’ benefactions to education abound. Among those who will always be remembered for their munificence include Tan Kah Kee, Tan Lark Sye, Aw Boon Haw, Lee Kong Chian and Runme Shaw. The latter two were also founders of the Lee and Shaw Foundations, which still actively support education in Singapore today.

As in many other East Asian countries, the Singapore Government and people are imbued with the Confucian respect for education. A large amount of public funds have been expended on improving the education system. Schemes are developed to encourage continual educational improvement, such as the ability to withdraw the Government CPF funds for the purpose of further education.

While Singapore’s civil service is a legacy of colonial rule, the Confucian heritage has played an important role in making it among the finest in the world. Today, it attracts a good proportion of Singapore’s top talent pool into its fold. Much that is hailed, and at the same time controversial, about the Singapore scholarship system, has antecedents in the Chinese imperial Examination system. For instance, Singapore’s elite civilian Government service, the Administrative service, is today selected primarily from among Scholars. Administrative officers, some 200-strong, occupy key positions at Ministry headquarters such as permanent Secretary, deputy Secretary, divisional Directors and deputy Directors. A scholar fresh from University could begin his career as an Assistant or Deputy Director, whose views would be considered by his Permanent Secretary and Minister. By his late thirties or early forties, the most able administrative officers would have made it to permanent secretary. A few have even been picked for political office and elevated to ministerial positions.

On the positive side, such an accelerated track enables the Government to motivate and retain the best and most ambitious of the annual crop, thus assuring political leaders the continual availability of top quality advice and implementation. The counter argument has, however, always been the unfairness and elitism of selecting so many of the nation’s top civil servants largely on the basis of academic results early in life.

Whichever side one falls on this debate, one cannot help but see the striking similarity between Singapore’s system of scholar-administrators and the Chinese imperial Examination system. The latter was clearly also a system where the top office-holders in government were selected on the basis of examination performance. Another common thread was social mobility.  Just as top positions in the Singapore Civil Service are open to all eligible candidates regardless of their social background, religion or race, top candidates in Imperial China also came from all regions and walks of life. Just as many of Singapore’s prominent civil servants are sons of clerks, shopkeepers and taxi drivers, many of the emperor’s leading advisers had similarly modest antecedents.

What are the special features of the Chinese examination system?  The Chinese competitive examination system had undergone changes in each dynasty. The system described below is that of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911).

  • First, the would-be scholar must pass a County Examination and earn the title of Xiu Cai (Cultured Talent), probably comparable to a Bachelor’s degree.
  • The next hurdle would be to get through the Provincial Examination.  The successful candidates would then become a Ju Ren (Exalted Man), corresponding to a Master’s degree.
  • The Metropolitan Examination was conducted in the Chinese capital, Beijing, triennially. It was spread over three days of three sessions each.  The candidates must be knowledgeable in Confucian classics and the works of the other sages such as Mencius.  They would write a total of fifteen essays of classical themes including the art of government and current political problems. In addition, they would also compose a poem of eight couplets.
  • The examination would be held in a gigantic examination complex, with a tiny cell allocated to each candidate. He would write, eat and sleep in it until the ordeal was over.
  • Those successful (about three per cent of the candidates) would be conferred the title of Jin Shi (Finished Scholar), equivalent to a Doctorate degree.
  • The final lap was for all Finished Scholars to be invited to sit a Palace Examination, to be conducted with aplomb and ceremony in the august presence of the Son of Heaven. They would compose an essay in a single session, on a political or administrative subject to be personally selected by the Emperor.
  • The examination scripts of the top ten candidates would be submitted to the Emperor, who had the ultimate prerogative to either confirm or alter the examiners’ recommended rankings.

There had been isolated instances where the emperor did revise the rankings, sometimes for whimsical reasons. The Emperor would personally announce the names of the top three candidates. They would be conferred the most coveted titles of Zhuangyuan (Premier Scholar), Bangyan (Second Scholar) and Tanhua (Third Scholar) respectively. They would be groomed for the highest civil offices in the land. All the other Finished Scholars would be offered a variety of lesser appointments in the various provinces.

Two Southern Chinese provinces, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, had the distinction of having produced the highest number of Zhuangyuans than any other province. Among the Zhuangyuans who had become household names in China are:

  • Guo Zhiyi (a renowned Tang Dynasty general who combined brains with brawn)
  • Wang Wei ( a celebrated Tang Dynasty poet)
  • Liu Gongquan (a leading Tang Dynasty calligrapher)
  • Wen Tian-xiang (the revered Song Dynasty Prime Minister and patriot)
  • Shen Kun (a high-ranking official of the Ming Dynasty who hailed from Xiuning County in Anhui province)
  • Vung Tunghe (a Qing Dynasty high official and personal tutor to two emperors)
  • Liu Chunlin (the last Qing Zhuangyuan who died a pauper but was highly venerated)

The Chinese Competitive examination system was abolished in 1905. What brought about its demise?

By the late 19th Century the Qing Dynasty was already on the verge of collapse because of rampant corruption and incompetence. It had refused to introduce political, educational and other reforms that were badly needed to make China strong again. This led to aggressive foreign military interventions and the imposition of unequal treaties on China by the victorious powers. They also carved China into their respective spheres of influence with extra-territorial privileges.

The Qing Government then began to introduce the necessary reforms in a desperate attempt to prevent the disintegration of China. Scholars were sent abroad to study in western and Japanese universities. Upon their return, some were given important positions at Court in preference to Confucian scholars. Chinese universities, with syllabi based upon the western model, were established in large cities to cater to the emerging needs of China. Consequently, the importance and prestige of the Imperial Examination system declined as it had become outmoded, leading to its abolition.

How would one appraise the contributions of the Chinese examination system? In its more than 1,300 years of history, it had, on the whole, served China well, despite its many shortcomings. It enabled the nation to recruit the best talents into government administration, more than any other alternative systems could perhaps have achieved. However, because of its inability to adapt to the changing needs of China in the 20th Century, an era of industrial and technological revolution, it had outlived its usefulness and had to be replaced.

What implications does the demise of the Chinese examination system have on Singapore’s system of scholar-administrators? In one word, the answer is probably “relevance”. The imperial system declined because it continued to adhere rigidly to a syllabus of classical texts, when the world clearly required administrators who knew more than that. Similarly, Singapore’s system of scholar-administrators will continue to work well (charges of elitism and unfairness notwithstanding) as long as there continues to be a high correlation between academic performance and success in administration. The Government’s present system of awarding scholarships for a variety of academic disciplines and broadening their exposure through further scholarships in public and business administration at Masters level, is an excellent means of ensuring that Singapore has scholar-administrators who are exposed to the latest ideas in the governance of complex institutions and whole countries. It is unlikely that Singapore’s scholar-administrator system would follow the demise of the Chinese imperial system. As Singapore moves into the information age, the ability to grasp and analyse information would become all the more critical. These skills are the precinct of the scholar. Like it or not, many of these skills do become apparent by the time students are in their late teens.

There is, however, such a thing as a late developer. The challenge for the system would thus be one of fine tuning, of finding ways to identify those who might not have excelled at a crucial examination at 18 or 21, but who can nevertheless make a vital contribution to Singapore’s governance.

Lam Pin Foo

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China’s Immense Wealth of Buried Cultural Treasures

February 24, 2010 at 1:00 am (Chinese Culture, History)

The December 2009 discovery of the mausoleum of the celebrated Cao Cao in Henan province’s Anyang City excited everyone in China and created a stir among foreign historians and archaeologists too. This is hardly surprising because Cao, one of China’s most controversial statesmen and brilliant military strategists of the Three-Kingdom era (184-280 AD), is reputed to have constructed 72 decoy tombs in order to thwart any future attempts by any grave raiders to desecrate his final resting place and to steal the treasures buried with him for his needs in the afterlife. His very colourful life and famous exploits have been vividly captured and romanticised in one of  China’s best known classical novels, the 14th century Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and he became a household name in China. This discovery has been proclaimed by the media and some cultural experts as the greatest archaeological find since the unearthing of the terracotta  army in 1974 in Xian, which protects the yet to be excavated burial chamber of the First Emperor, who built China’s Great Wall more than 2200 years ago. Even before Cao’s 740 sq. m mausoleum, with an assortment of 250 artifacts found therein, has been officially authenticated and opened to the public, the province’s government officials and tourism authorities are optimistic that his tomb will soon become a cash-tree, as it were, and will generate up to an annual windfall of 420 million yuan, in close competition with the revenue created by the terracotta army in Xian.

Despite the national rejoicing over the discovery of the elusive Cao burial chamber, many well-known historians, scholars, archaeologists and anthropologists have cast doubts as to its genuineness. Their main dissenting views can be summed up as follows:

The tomb was earlier raided by tomb robbers before the archaeologists found it, and some of the artifacts in it had already been removed by them. It is possible that some of the remaining artifacts could have been tampered with, including the stone tablets bearing Cao’s posthumous title, King Wu of Wei,  which could have been forged ingeniously so as to deceive even the experts as had happened in some disturbed tombs of other prominent people. These stone tablets are said to offer the strongest evidence that the tomb must belong to Cao himself.

The discovered burial chamber does not correspond with the descriptions of Cao’s in historical records. Also, none of the stone tablets mentions his name and no memorial mourning album was found, which would have been the practice for such an important figure of that period.

While one of the skeletons in the tomb is claimed to be of Cao’s age and of the period, experts believe that as the remains are not in good condition because of long burial, it would be extremely difficult to extract DNA samples from them. Furthermore, it is not known that there are living lineal descendants of his who could undergo DNA tests to either confirm or reject the authenticity of this discovery. To trace any possible descendants that Cao might still have will be an uphill, if not impossible, task.

These experts also have reasons to believe that Cao was not buried in Anyang, but in Bozhou in Anhui province, where he was born. Some experts are convinced that the discovery has been hyped up prematurely by sensational media publicity and by the opportunistic local government authorities in order to promote the expected increased tourism and the revenue windfall this will bring.

Finally, it is significant that China’s authoritative Institute of Archaeology has maintained a guarded stand that it is too early to confirm that the unearthed tomb is truly Cao’s until all the available evidence have been exhaustively analysed and firmly established.

Despite China having the longest continuous civilisation in the world dating back to 5000 years, there are not that many truly ancient monuments and other historical edifices in their original state of preservation left in this vast country. This is because most of these were either destroyed by ravages of nature, frequent wars or due to human neglect in the course of time. Be that as it may, the saving grace for China and that of mankind is that its immense wealth of historical cultural heritage has been largely preserved beneath the ground awaiting discovery to see the light of day again. For the record, the most extravagant mausoleums are those of its numerous reigning monarchs and others belonging to lesser royalties and prominent personages throughout the ages. All of these would have contained valuable funerary items. However, not that many of these prominent tombs have, to date, been found  and for  those that have already been located, the Chinese government is in no hurry to excavate them until the state of technology has become sufficiently advanced for them to undertake such a task so as to ensure the safe preservation of the artifacts in these tombs for the benefit of all.

Take the tombs of the emperors and various kings as an example. China’s First Emperor’s burial place, with its inestimable wealth of funerary treasures, has not yet been opened up. Neither have those of the rulers of the Han Dynasty (202 BC – 220 AD), when China was at its peak of prosperity and was probably the richest and most powerful nation on earth. The experts are of the view that, based on the grandeur and artifacts-rich tombs of minor royalties that surround the not yet excavated mausoleum of the 6th Han emperor Jindi, his mausoleum, and that of his successor, Emperor Wudi, could well match the First Emperor’s in scale and extravagance. Of the emperors’ tombs of the nation’s last two dynasties, namely Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911), only that of the 13th Ming Emperor Wanli’s has already been dug up and has since become one of the top tourist attractions in China. The array of high quality and rare artifacts in this tomb had long ago been removed to a museum for display, but the replicas of these can still be seen on site. Situated in the outskirts of Beijing, it is one of the thirteen royal mausoleums crisscrossing a vast expanse of land, all with grand structures surrounding each of these tombs. Needless to say, they were all constructed strictly in accordance with the best fengshui principles, China’s art of geomancy.

The worldwide interest created by the discovery of the tomb of Cao reminds me of a related article that I wrote in 2002, which was published in Singapore’s Sunday Times, under the caption, “What lies beneath”, and I should like to share it with my readers. It is posted immediately after this article.

Lam Pin Foo

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What Lies Beneath

February 24, 2010 at 12:00 am (Chinese Culture, History)

This article first appeared in the Singapore Sunday Times on 2 June 2002.

Five thousand years of  civilisation is a powerful magnet that draws visitors from across the world to China.

As the oldest continuous civilisation on earth, the attraction is undeniable. Yet a discerning visitor seeking a profound cultural experience in China may well leave disappointed. Why? The ancient monuments in the Middle East and Europe have survived well because they were built of stone. But in China, palaces, temples and other major buildings were generally constructed of timber. Most had succumbed to the ravages of nature and human conflict. Examples include the historic Buddhist temples that are spread in Chinese cities and sacred mountains. Hordes of devotees flocked there in their heyday.

Your Chinese guide would recite with eloquence their illustrious history dating back to Tang Dynasty or earlier, regaling you with stories about the long-gone relics and exquisite woodwork of the original buildings. But what greets you would likely be less refined buildings and art works of a much later dynasty, rebuilt on the same site. Some are recent replicas of the ancient works.

Brick-and-mortar structures like pagodas, watch-towers, city walls and bridges have fared better. However, most are dilapidated, or have been so extensively renovated over the centuries that they no longer resemble the original.

Aside from the ravages of time, the preservation of China’s historic monuments and artifacts suffered a further blow during the Cultural Revolution. Much of the country’s cultural heritage built up over the centuries were reduced to ruins in a few months of madness by fanatical Red Guards on the rampage. Fortunately, China’s foremost national treasures, including the sculptures and wall frescoes at the Dunhuang grottoes and the peerless imperial art collection at Beijing’s Gukung (Forbidden City) escaped the fury of the Red Guards, thanks to the timely intervention of the late Premier Zhou Enlai.

Even so, many of the choicest of these national treasures were long ago looted by rapacious foreigners and removed to their home museums.

Despite the scarcity of ancient monuments above ground, the real saving grace is the immense cultural wealth that lies hidden beneath China’s soil. In ancient times, it was the custom to bury precious, ornamental and household items with the departed for their use in the hereafter. This has resulted in major discoveries, the most widely publicised was the discovery in Xian in 1974 of some 8000 life-sized terracotta warriors. These earthen warriors guarded the outer tomb of the 2200-year old  mausoleum of Emperor Qin Shihuang, a man who unified China and built its Great Wall but who feared being harmed, even in death.

As the technology of archaeological excavation advances, more of China’s national heritage will again see the light of day.

Chinese cultural experts, including the Director of the renowned Shaanxi History museum, Mr Zhou Tian You, are convinced that what had been dug up so far constitute only a small portion of the nation’s heritage. For example, recent digs have thrown up evidence that verified the existence of the Xia Dynasty, which was founded in 2200 BC.

The tombs that have been unearthed so far have generally been those of minor royalties and high officials. Far grander in terms of construction and funerary contents would be the tombs of China’s monarchs. But most of the burial sites of China’s early rulers are not known, while those of later periods remain largely unexcavated.

How do the Chinese experts ascertain the identity of a tomb’s occupant? They rely mainly on the Muzhimin (inscribed stone memorial tablet), normally erected at the entrance to a burial chamber.

Usually written by someone of standing who was close to the deceased, it would set out his biography, highlighting his achievements and contributions to society. A copy of this written eulogy would be kept by his family. Only royalty and privileged people could afford one.

The formidable Han Emperor Wudi and the egotistical Empress Wu Zetian insisted that the inscriptions on their memorial tablets be different from the standard formulation. His invited posterity to judge whether his contributions outweighed his shortcomings. Hers was deliberately left blank, confident of history as her scribe.

Visitors to China looking for a profound cultural experience should tour selected excavation sites, especially those with quality museums nearby showcasing the artifacts recovered from the pits.

Many of these sites are scattered in the provinces of Shandong, Shaanxi, Shanxi, Hubei, Henan, Hebei, Sichuan and along the Silk Road. Some are accessible from the cities of Xian, Loyang, Beijing, Zibo, Qingzhou, Chengdu, Turpan and Yinchuan, to name a few.

As is said about true beauty, one has to look deeper to find the glory of China’s cultural heritage.

Lam Pin Foo

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Tracing One’s Roots Through the Family Tree

January 27, 2010 at 12:00 am (Chinese Culture, Current Affairs, History, Science & Technology)

This article first appeared in the Singapore Straits Times 19 October 1996.

It is a well-known fact that China is among the most family and history conscious of nations. Every dynasty compiled its own dynastic history documenting major events and outstanding achievements for posterity. In addition, all district governments also recorded important aspects of local histories that will be of interest to their inhabitants.

As family has always been of supreme importance in Chinese culture, hand written genealogical records of individual families and clans were produced painstakingly and methodically, and periodically updated, to keep track of their origins and subsequent development. These were preserved reverently and handed down from one generation to another.

These efforts ensured that, in China’s 5000 years of history, there were no “Dark Ages” in the evolution of its society, as there were in Europe and elsewhere.

While every country has its own method of genealogy, the Chinese have developed theirs into a fine art, with distinctive characteristics and a flavour all its own. It is possible for many Chinese families, including those who have migrated overseas, to trace not only their roots, but also the fortunes of other family and clan members, wherever they might be.

The Chinese tradition of maintaining genealogy percolated to the other East Asian countries and to overseas Chinese communities in Southeast Asia.

To produce a continuous and updated family history requires good organisation and consistent management. It is much more difficult drawing up a clan history (Zong Pu) - those with same surname and descended from the common founding ancestor. Consequently, only prominent families and clans would have the resources to embark on such a project.

It is not surprising that most Chinese, like their counterparts elsewhere, would only be familiar with their immediate forebears.Those with incomplete genealogy are often only able to trace their family-tree for no more than 200 to 300 years. Professor Wolfram Eberhard, a sinologist of international repute, once observed that, in many countries in Asia, if a person could enumerate the siblings of his grandparents and their in-laws, he belongs invariably to the upper-class of that society. Ordinary people rarely know beyond the names of the brothers and sisters of their parents, their spouses and the names of their grandparents.

The tie of kinship is a hallmark of the Chinese social structure. The bond which binds its members is thicker than water and will remain with them for life. This is evident from the regular gathering of Chinese clans in Singapore or elsewhere, which is attended by their clansmen from all over the world, to renew ties and to discuss matters of common interest.

The genesis of the Zong Pu goes back to Zhou dynasty (1050-221 BC), with refinements by subsequent dynasties. Its scope and function is wider than the mere devising of tables of descent of its clan members. It aims to glorify successful clan members, to instil pride in one’s ancestors and, ultimately, to exhort future generations to emulate their worthy forebears.

In old China, the village ancestral hall was the focal point for all clan activities, including that of ancestor veneration, and where all decisions affecting the clan would be taken.

In its more than 3000 years’ history, genealogy has dominated the traditional Chinese society. It reached its full flowering from the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) to the earlier part of the Republic era (1911-1949).

What then are the main ingredients of the Zong Pu? Its format and manifold contents have undergone changes under different dynasties, but they became quite uniform from the Song dynasty (960-1276) onwards.

The family-tree would begin with the primogenitor who first settled in a particular location and started to raise his family there; and would end with the contemporary generation updating the genealogy, with all in-between ancestors duly recorded.

No margin of error was allowed in the compilation of the clan genealogy. All families within the clan were required to submit all births, deaths and marriages. Only brief bio-data were recorded: the person’s name, his parents’ names, his date of birth and death, names of his children and, finally, his burial place.

The place of entombment was of utmost importance. Often a detailed account of its selection in accordance with the time-honoured principles of fengshui, the Chinese art of geomancy, would be documented. Good fengshui would bring good fortunes to the family members. It would be the duty of the descendents to perform ancestor-worship rites at appropriate times and to keep the grave in good repair.

Frank Ching, author of 900 years in the life of a Chinese family, gives a fascinating account of how he, armed with his Zong Pu, succeeded in finding his founding ancestor’s long forgotten 900 year-old grave on Mount Hui in Wuxi.

Clansmen who achieved distinctions in life would earn honourable mention in the clan genealogy. In addition, their portraits would also be displayed in the clan hall. In old China, Confucian scholars were held in high esteem and often became top government officials through successes in imperial examinations. This would bring vicarious glory to their families and clans.

Today, this tradition is still being followed in some overseas Chinese communities. The Khoo clan of Penang, for example, still displays plaques of all members who hold university or professional qualifications, or have otherwise distinguished themselves in public life, in their clan hall of fame.

The inclusion of a clansman in the Zong Pu was generally regarded as testimony of his good character and acceptability. Conversely, one who became notorious or was deemed to have disgraced the clan, would have his name expunged.

Events of local and national importance, which affected the clan, would also be included. This would include wars, social upheavals, natural calamities and other significant occurences.

Another feature was the movements of clan people through migration to seek better life away from home. A case in point concerned the southward migration of the Hakkas, originally from North China, when their homelands were occupied by warlike nomadic tribes. They underwent five arduous trans-China migrations, the first of which predated Mao Zedong’s famous Long March by more than 1600 years.

The writing of Zong Pu would be entrusted to a committee of scholars, with necessary information given by individual families. It would be revised at regular intervals to take account of the changes that had occurred during the interim. Each family would receive a copy, and the remainder would be kept in the village clan hall.

The importance accorded the clan genealogy reflected the Chinese people’s immense pride in their civilisation and their abiding love for their family and clan. As the latter grew in number, more and more such genealogies were produced and reached their peak  during the Qing dynasty (1644-1911).

This pride was shattered during the 19th century when Chinese sovereignty was repeatedly violated by aggressive foreign powers who, for selfish reasons, brought the country to its heels under the threat of gunboat diplomacy.

Revulsion against China’s military backwardness set in, as reform-minded Chinese began to reject traditional values and turned to Western science and democracy as a panacea for China’s ills. The keeping of genealogical records was seen as a reflection of China’s feudal past and frowned upon. It was eradicated  completely with the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949.

The preservation of genealogy suffered its severest blow during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), a period of senseless destruction of cultural heritage, unprecedented in Chinese history. In response to the call “to sweep away all remnants of old habits, old customs, old culture and old ideas”, the fanatical Red Guards raided homes all over the country mindlessly, making bonfire of any genealogical records they could uncover as these were considered the symbols of the decadent rich. At the same time, many Chinese families, fearful of persecution, had to destroy these invaluable heirlooms which had been passed down from generation to generation.

The losses suffered, both on a personal and national scale, were incalculable and irreplaceable. Professor Luo Hsiang Lin, one of the foremost authorities on Chinese genealogy, lamented that the cultural accumulation of China in the past several thousand years was reduced to ruins in a few months of unmitigated  absolute madness.

The writer’s clan and family genealogical histories kept in the ancestral hall in China did not escape the ravages of the Red Guards. Fortunately, copies of these had been handed down by his grandfather in Singapore to remind him of his origins, which date back more than two millenia.

Despite the above outrage, a fair number of old Chinese genealogical records, both family and clan, have been preserved in libraries in China, Japan,  South Korea, Taiwan,  Hong Kong, United States and in private collections elsewhere.

The oldest Chinese genealogical works extant are  of Tang vintage (618-906), one is in China and and another two are abroad. One of the latter, along with many other Chinese national treasures, were removed from the world-renowned Dunhuang grottes by Sir Aurel Stein, a British archaeologist, and it is now kept in the British Museum in London.

Works of Song, Yuan (1276-1368) and Ming vintage are now rarities. Fortunately, a small number of these can still be found in Chinese institutions and elsewhere.

The Qing and the Republic genealogy are available in large numbers, especially in Taiwan, Hong Kong and among overseas Chinese communities in Southeast Asia. However, most of these are from South and Central China, where most Chinese first emigrated overseas.

One of the most complete clan histories belongs to the Kung clan, whose famous founding ancestor was none other than Confucius (551-479 BC) himself . His descendents, who number more than one million, now live in China, Taiwan,  South Korea and in other countries.

The practice of compiling and updating Zong Pu, though long past its heyday, is still being carried on in Taiwan and, to a lesser degree, in Hong Kong. It is hoped that, before long, it  will be revived in China itself.

How would one evaluate the contributions of Chinese genealogy? Historians and scholars generally share the view that it  is a useful vehicle for the studying and understanding of the evolution of the Chinese society. It often complements historical records by filling up gaps or by elaborating on details omitted by history. It is also an extremely valuable resource for researching aspects of  social and political developments which had helped shape China and its people.

Moreover, scholars and researchers have convincing evidence that China’s earliest  histories were derived from its genealogical sources.

Finally, because Chinese genealogies also provide detailed information on migration, they enable us to follow the fortunes of a given family over a considerable length of time, sometimes for as long as a millenium or more.

The increasing pride in one’s cultural heritage has made roots-tracing a worldwide phenomenon. This palpable fervour is felt especially in immigrant societies such as the United States, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Singapore.

A renewed interest in genealogy is also discernible among the more homogeneous communities which are, once again, devoting greater effort and resources to this important field of human endeavour, both for their own benefit and that of mankind.

Lam Pin Foo

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