A Study Of Chu People’s Identity From The Perspective Of The Spring And Autumn Period’s Hegemonic Politics

During the Spring and Autumn Period,the identity of the Chu people,that is,whether they were the Hans or the barbarians,was not fixed.Instead,it was often linked to different political situations and changed accordingly in due course.The existing materials are difficult to scale,and scholars also hold different ideas in terms of the issue,so it is still difficult to ascertain the origin of the Chu people.According to the concept of “political body”,it should be considered that it is the relatively close internal unity and the political actions taken externally with a more unified attitude that facilitate the formation of the Chu people and Chu culture with the political body as the carrier.The formation took shape when Xiong Yi was appointed to establish Chu state at the beginning of Zhou Dynasty.In the early days,the relationship between Zhou and its enfeoffment Chu was harmonious,and the influence of the Zhou royal court on the Jianghan River Basin was relatively profound.The Huaiyi forces around the Chu border rebelled in the middle and late Western Zhou Dynasty,which led to a joint attack by the Zhou royal court and the Chu people.And based on this situation,it was hard for Huaiyi forces to form a stable and unified political body.On this basis,the people of Chu controlled the south more than Zhu Xia,and politically played the role of Fang Bo in the political space of the Zhou people with the enhanced active consciousness and the expanded scope of functions.Assuming the responsibilities of Fang Bo is a manifestation of the efforts of Chu people and Zhou people to blend together.At the same time,Chu state continued to accelerate the differentiation with the surrounding barbarians,making Chu culture become a diversified culture that embraced both Han and barbarian cultures.The formation of the consciousness of the times needs a specific political environment.The popularity of the debate between Hua and Yi during the Spring and Autumn Period can largely be attributed to the hegemony of the Spring and Autumn Period.After Duke Huan of Qi and Duke Wen of Jin,the hegemony system and its competition mechanism were basically formed.Under this system,the strive for hegemony among great powers is not only a political behavior,but also a dominant trend in society at that time.The integration of resources like military and morality are undoubtedly the top priorities.From the perspective of the concept of “Mandate of Heaven” in the Spring and Autumn Period,it can be seen that people at that time believed that the overlord in reality was not restricted by the “distinctions between Hua and Barbarians” in some speeches but was consistent with the “Mandate of Heaven” in the spiritual world.The outward expansion of Han culture is not a simple linear gradual process.Under the hegemony system,the princes are good at shaping cultural identity based on the region.Uniting the princes of the Zhou Dynasty in competitions becomes a necessity,and the actual process will not be changed by the so-called distinctions between Hua and Yi.In this context,the consciousness of “Zhu Xia” that transcends regional cultures is continuously manifested.Defining Chu culture is far less objective than describing Chu culture.While the boundaries and changes between Chu culture and Zhuxia culture has a clearer context.Many indications manifested that there were indeed many remains of Zhou culture in the Hanyang area during the Spring and Autumn Period.Scholars’ misunderstandings based on geographical perspectives should not be a cover for Confucian classics and historiography.For people who lived in the Spring and Autumn Period,“enfeoffments in Hanyang area” did exist with historical support and political symbol.Later,taking the period of King Mu of Chu as an example,Chu State’s strategy and conquest of the Ru,Ying,and Huai River Valley states indicated that Chu’s forces continued to exert pressure and infiltrate in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River where the ethnic compositions were complex.This behavior deepened the political connection among the Jianghan Plain and the Eastern Henan and Jianghuai Plain,and at the same time gather the dispersed forces of Huaiyi into a whole to enhance regional cultural identity.In the middle and late Spring and Autumn Period,Wu state and Yue state in the southeast rose successively.With the strive for regime,Wu state and Yue state also successively established the ancestral system after Taibo and Dayu under the demand of building up momentum.Although this kind of attachment was more or less based on certain historical facts,the countries of the Central Plains still regarded Wu state and Yue state as “barbarians” on many occasions,thus pushing forward Chu’s“Chineseization” in the process of geographical vision from near to far.