The Study Of Bo-hai Feng Family During The Period Of Sixteen-state And Northern Dynasty

The purpose of this article is discussing the overall outlook of the Bo-hai Feng family during the period of Sixteen-state and Northern Dynasty. The forefathers of Feng ancestry were descendant of Feng-fu with family name called jiang. It was so named because their privileged territory. Since the Feng family moved into the area of Bo-hai in the period of Western Zhou Dynasty or Eastern Han Dynasty, they lived there.The Feng family had developed into a big local family which had a greater influence in the region of Bo-hai at least at the end of the Western Jin Dynasty. The Feng family had its’ characteristics in political, marriage and culture in Sixteen-state and Northern Dynasty. In political, in the war at the end of the Western Jin Dynasty, the members in the Feng family cooperated with the Murong-Xianbei family’s regime, they made a huge contribution to the regime and acquired illustrious official career. After the political accumulation of Sixteen-state Dynasty, the Feng family became prominent at early Northern Dynasty. At the early stage of the Northern Wei Dynasty, the members in Bo-hai Feng family met a heavy blow, only a few members with officialdom which is not significant. After the reform of the Emperor Xiaowen,the Bo-hai Feng family members of each branch went into the Northern Wei Dynasty to be an official one by one, especially some members went into the centrality of the regime and hold the real power.The members of Feng family seized the chance to rise in the war at the end of the Northern Wei Dynasty, they helped Gao-huan established the overlord enterprise, afterwards they got high status in the Eastern Wei and Northern Qi Dynasty. As one of the heroes for the Gao family, some important members of the Feng family were reused by the rulers and enjoyed very high status, at the same time, other members also had a high officialdom in the imperial court of Eastern Wei and Northern Qi Dynasty. Because of the emperor’s stupidity and the traitor in power, the official status of most members in the Feng family became lower at the late stage of the Eastern Wei Dynasty. In regard to marriage, the marriage ring of Bo-hai Feng family basically maintained within the scope of the scholar-official families in Northern Dynasty. Bo-hai Feng family built marital relation with the scholar-official families of lower status mainly in the Northern Wei Dynasty. But in Eastern Wei and Northern Qi Dynasty, Bo-hai Feng family built marital relation with several big families with fame:Cui family in Qing-he, Cui family in Bo-ling, Lu family in Fan-yang, Li family in the west of Long and Wang family in Tai-yuan, added by the royalty of Gao-qi and the Xianbei nobleman of the Lou family and the Hulv family. As to the cultural tradition, most members of the Bo-hai Feng family regarded Confucianism as the basic knowledge, they made remarkable achievements in law literature, history at the same time, and their beautiful doctrines was also conducive to improve the political and social status of the Bo-hai Feng family during the period of Northern Wei Dynasty.The literature and doctrines of Bo-hai Feng family changed in Eastern Wei and Northern Qi Dynasty. Not only we can insight the survival status and evolution of scholar-official families of lower status in the period of Sixteen-state and Northern Dynasty, but also can learn more about the history of Sixteen-state and Northern Dynasty from the development of Bo-hai Feng family.