Research On The System Of Succession In Tang Dynasty

After a long period of time's development, Chinese ancient Family Law system had come into a ripe and perfect one till Sui and Tang Dynasty. Taking law as the core, the Family Law system of Tang Dynasty contained law article,policy,habitude and law of succession was being perfected at that time.The law of succession in Tang Dynasty was divided into two parts: one was to inherit capacity, the other was to inherit property. As for the essence of it, the former is the shift of political interest and honor, the latter is the shift of right in economy. As for the way of shift, the former couldn't be cut apart and the later could. The inheritance of capacity contained the inheritance of patriarchal clan and the rank of nobility. It was rather important part at that time and people valued it greatly at that time. The inheritance of property could be divided into two parts in Tang Dynasty: one was intestate succession, the other was testate succession. But during the course of the inheritance, dispute might occur.In this article, I'll mainly discuss about the inheritance of capacity,testate succession,intestate succession,the occurrence of the disputes and how to solve them. This essay still involves women's inheritance conditions in Tang Dynasty,descendants' inheritance,how to deal with the property in the childless family,the stepchildren's inheritance and how to inherit property as for the children born before marriage. It also analyses the social causes of all these problems.The essay is divided into three parts: introduction,the text and conclusion. The text contains three parts:The first part mainly expounds the inheritance of capacity in Tang Dynasty. The capacity of Tang people generally refers to their capacity at home and the capacity in the social and political system. The former would last by way of blood rotations while the latter by way of the confer a title of nobility.The second part expounds the laws for inheritance of property. Firstly, by quoting a great amount of historical materials, this part explains the characters of inheritance by law in Tang Dynasty. Secondly, it also expounds the specific stipulation for the inheritance right of the children born before marriage,stepchildren and the children born by the raped mothers. This part also expounds and proves the stipulations for the property inheritance in childless families,died businessmen and representation.The third part expounds the testate succession system in Tang Dynasty. First, it gives a detailed explanation for the survey of will inheritance in Tang Dynasty; Then, it gives a further explanation for it on the historical materials recorded in the secretarial documents found in Dunhuang. So it gives a further concrete explanation for the testate succession in Tang Dynasty.According to the discussions above, we could come to the conclusions as follows:It is a mandatory rule in Tang Dynasty's law to share out the property equally among the children and then comes into China's inheritance system. It has important specific characters compared with the inheritance systems of Japan and western countries, greatly affected the Chinese society.By researching the inheritance system of Tang Dynasty, we could know the genetic connection is the basis of gaining proprietorship. Inheritance in Tang Dynasty is divided the inheritance of property and the inheritance of capacity, while the general principle is to define it by the genetic connection. To research the connection between the inheritance system of Tang Dynasty and the genetic connection, it will be of great benefit to construct the law system of Chinese characteristic socialism ,to manage state affairs according to law and to bring forth new ideas to our law system.By researching the inheritance system of Tang Dynasty, we also know no matter the inheritance of property or the inheritance of capacity, the inheritance system is based on the inheritance of eldest child. This system has a deep effect on the autocratic monarchy of Tang Dynasty.