Research On Four Issues Of Song History

After Zhou Dynasty replaced the Shang Dynasty, Weizi found Song to inherit Shang. The Song existed seven hundred years from the first monarch Weizi to the last monarch Yan, almost simultaneously with Zhou Dynasty. Actually, Weizi’s transition from the aristocracy of Shang Dynasty to the monarch of Zhou Dynasty was a miniature of the transition for people from Shang to Zhou. Weizi quite humbled to exposed arm and tied hands. It can be said that the Song tried to assimilate into the ritual culture of Zhou Dynasty since Weizi so that it was constrained and influenced by Zhou’s ritual at every aspect such as the inheritance system of throne, the funeral system and the bureaucracy system. Duke Xiang of Song had an intention to revive Shang Dynasty. He struggled for hegemony with Chu so that received a fiasco in the battle of Hong. Song failed to avoid the trend that ritual conquest from Qingtai Fu in Warring States Period. Although the Dai was on behalf of Song, they failed to revive Song. The monarch Yan’s failure of revive Shang was equal the perish of Song.This article is a research on some major issues in the historical development of Song. It has four chapters. The first chapter is the comprehensive study to the first monarch Weizi of Song. It’s a comb and research on Weizi’s identity in Shang Dynasty,departing Shang and surrendering to Zhou Dynasty and the foundation of Song. The second chapter is the preliminary study to ritual culture of Song. It well distinguish the distinctive of the Song ritual and Yin ritual from the inheritance system of throne, the funeral system and the bureaucracy system. The third chapter is the further understanding to Duke Xiang of Song and the battle of Hong. This part analyzed his way of struggling for hegemony and the reason of his failure from the angle of revive Shang, giving him a new evaluation. The fourth chapter is the research on some issues of Song in Warring States Period, mainly about Dai’s behalf of Song and the monarch Yan’s deeds. Besides, the genealogy and years of Song’s monarch in Warring States Period are researched according to the related record from Bamboo Annals and Tsinghua Bamboo Slips.