Research On Traditional Garden History Of The Eastern Han Dynasty

In the current researches of the Chinese garden history, researches on the Eastern Han Dynasty is deficient comparing to the Western Han Dynasty, neither the achievements in aspect of general history nor the periodization.there are several reasons that result in the overlook of the Eastern Han Dynasty garden, such as its age-old, limited historical materials, jerky ancient scripts, the abundant literatures of the Western Han Dynasty compared to the Eastern Han Dynasty.The author proceeds to supplement and discuss the following four parts, by arrangement, summary and analysis the literatures of the Eastern Han Dynasty.(1) Complements the Han imperial gardens data;(2) Systematically organized the situation of private garden in the Eastern Han Dynasty, explore the XI JIA CHI garden in detail which is rare appear in scholars works(3) Exploration the relationships between the development of reclusive thought in the Eastern Han Dynasty and grange garden and production of literati gardens in Wei Jin Dynasty;(4) Data compilation on other types gardens of the Eastern Han Dynasty, such as the cemetery garden, temple garden, public garden.In the Eastern Han Dynasty, one of the reasons that the imperial gardens construction is less frequent and smaller scale the Western Han Dynasty is the weak national power, cultivation preferred and the thrift advocated in the court that reducing the number of massive construction times in the early the Eastern Han Dynasty.the other reason is the summit of the imperial garden appear in the late period of the dynasty due to extravagant and dissipated the governing class satisfy their selfish desire by imperial palaces and gardens construction. Unlike the gardens which seek to be magnificent, the scale become smaller and the functions turned to be entertainment and sight seen, the function of seeking immorality remained as a symbol. The third reason is that the design thought was not outstanding in the imperial gardens construction, only had some improvements left in the aspects of element arrangement and construction technique.The records of private gardens construction in the Eastern Han Dynasty is more that in the Western Han Dynasty.It had great improvement in technique of Mountain piling and water settling.In the Eastern Han Dynasty, it appears to piling rockery and the forms and the relationship between waters are more complicated.The author believes that the private gardens of the Eastern Han Dynasty can be explored by divided into three parts. The first is the gardens constructed by nobility, eunuchs, seigneur, which are seeking for magnificent and recognized as the symbol of wealth and power. The second is the gardens created by scholars, such as the XI JIA CHI. with their participation in design and construction process, the gardens turned to be literati style and combined with the natural environment perfectly, which is seemly like the spiritual place in the dream of the lateral literati. The third is the grange garden combined by the recluse and country estate, which evolve into the scholar garden of Wei Jin Dynasty. This type of garden had not appeared formally in the historical material of the Eastern Han Dynasty, but it can be detect in the thoughts of ZHONG CHANGTONG and ZHANG HENG in later Eastern Han Dynasty. Although XI YU is not a recluse actually, XI JIACHI can be recognized the beginning of the grange garden.During the Eastern Han Dynasty, the other types of gardens have appeared.with the completion of the first official temple---the White Horse Temple, Buddhism began to spread rapidly. And rapid development of temple gardens and private gardens continue to influence each other. Public garden has been produced since The Western Han Dynasty. The FU XI activities, which are turn to party and travel evolved from witchcraft and sacrifice, which promote the development of public gardens. The cemetery management are more orderly in the Eastern Han Dynasty.Generally speaking,’Han dynasty garden’ is the presentation which confuse the gardens of the Eastern Han Dynasty and the Western Han Dynasty as a whole one. However, as the transitional phase between generated stage and the turning stage, the Eastern Han Dynasty act as the link role which can be traced to the Qin Dynasty and the Western Han Dynasty and have a strong link with the Wei Jin Dynasty. Compared to the Western Han Dynasty, people in the Eastern Han Dynasty are more focused on real life. Through the experiences such as usurpation by Wang Mang, peaceful years, eunuchs’ dictatorship and peasant uprising, the wakefulness of individual independent consciousness, enhancement of the status of scholars and the sublimation of garden aesthetic contribute the advent of turning stage of Wei Jin and the Northern and Southern Dynasty garden...