An Analysis Of The System Of The Ming Dynasty

TingZhang, as its name implies, is a kind of penalty implemented by the emperor as a punishment to the officials who have infuriated him or made mistakes right in the court. It had been seen before Ming Dynasty, yet being frequently used in this particular dynasty, especially during its middle and late stages. TingZhang, as a typical represent of ruling the officials by strict law, which was a main principal of Ming Dynasty, and a penalty outside the law, which covered all Ming history, had some contribution to the cleaning of political, but it made much more negative influences. How could such a penalty being so frequently used in this dynasty is a phenomenon worth deep thinking. In this article, I tried to figure out the reason of Tingzhang by studying all the cases from "the history of Ming dynasty", in order to get a deeper and more comprehensive realization to this special phenomenon. My analysis will be from two angles. Fisrtly from those who carry out this penalty presented by the emperor himself; andalso from the angle of the being punished officials. I’ll be focuse on the the second reason, because former researchers hasn’t put much effort to it.