G5260 – REPARACIÓN DE EFECTOS PERSONALES Y ENSERES

Several statutes in the Shuihudi slips mention the protection and management of natural resources. Among them is one interesting example that advises people and officials to protect resources according to the seasonal cycle. This example from the “Statutes on Agriculture” addresses several natural resources, including forests, animals, and eggs or young animals:

In the second month of spring, one should not venture to cut timber in the forests or block watercourses. Except in the months of summer, one should not venture to burn weeds to make ashes, to collect [indigo], young animals, eggs or fledglings. One

should not [multiple unidentifiable graphs] poison fish or tortoises or arrange pitfalls and nets. In the seventh month, (these prohibitions) are lifted. Only when someone has unfortunately died should one fell (wood for) the inner and outer coffins; this work is not done according to the seasons. . . . When dogs of the common people enter forbidden parks without chasing and catching animals, one should not venture to kill them; those that pursue and catch animals are to be killed. Dogs killed by the wardens are to be handed over to the authorities intact; those that are killed in other

forbidden parks may be eaten, but the skin is to be handed over.184

春二月, 毋敢伐材木山林及雍(壅)隄水。不夏月, 毋敢夜草為灰, 取生荔、麛𠨫(

卵)鷇, 毋□□□□□□毒魚鱉, 置穽罔(網), 到七月而縱之。唯不幸死而伐綰(棺

)享(槨)者, 是不用時。… 百姓犬入禁苑中而不追獸及捕獸者, 勿敢殺; 其追獸及 捕獸者, 殺之。河(呵)禁所殺犬, 皆完入公; 其它禁苑殺者, 食其肉而入皮。

This lengthy statute, which is adopted almost identically in the Han legal slips from

Zhangjiashan,185 _{reflects the well-known concept of “responding to the times” (yingshi應}

時) noted in transmitted manuscripts such as the Lüshi chunqiu and “Yueling 月令”

[Monthly Ordinances] from the Liji. As Martin Kern explained, this notion of

“responding to the times” in the transmitted texts has a two-dimensional meaning: (a) to explain the seasonal duties of a ruler “in order to synchronize the agricultural and ritual

                                                                                                                184 _{Shuihudi, 20, slips 4-7; Hulsewé, 22, A2.}

185 _{For a study comparing the two “Statutes on Agriculture” of Qin and Han, see Li Xueqin and Xing Wen,}

“New Light on the Early-Han Code: A Reappraisal of the Zhangjiashan Bamboo-slip Legal Texts,” Asia Major, Third Series 14, no. 1 (2001): 139-46.

activities with the natural cycle of time” and (b) to synchronize the ruler’s “political

actions with the present time” and reject ancient rulership models.186

Such seasonal restrictions also appear on a wall inscription found in 1990 in Xuanquan

懸泉 district, Dunhuang. Scholars have titled this inscription “Yueling zhao tiao 月令詔

條” [Monthly Ordinance Decrees], which dates back to around 5 C.E. The ordinances are

concisely written in short passages but have more quotations than the one above from the Shuihudi. The difference between this wall inscription and the two transmitted

manuscripts is that, according to Fujita Katsuhisa 藤田勝久, the “The Four Seasons and

Monthly Ordinances” has no notion regarding the ruler and central government, but only

notions for local officials.187

None of the transmitted or excavated Han wall inscriptions exactly matches the Qin law above. Yet there are several conclusions we can draw. First, seasonal restrictions for “responding to the times” constituted informed legal codes for officials and ordinary people. This code is different from the Dunhuang “decree” and other transmitted texts because the latter do not convey legal authority. On the other hand, discerning whether this Qin statute was followed like any other legal restriction is difficult. It was definitely a law, for this example is written under the “Statue on Agriculture,” but there is no clear punishment, either physical or monetary, for transgressing it; only the poor dog who kills another animal is to be killed, not the owner. Second, in accordance with Fujita’s

186 _{Martin Kern, The Stele Inscriptions of Ch’in Shih-huang: Text and Ritual in Early Chinese Imperial}

Representation, American oriental series (New Haven, CT: American Oriental Society, 2000). 29, n5.

187 _{Fujita Katsuhisa, Chūgoku kodai kokka to gunken shakai, 484-508. He also provides a detailed chart}

comparing the seasonal restritions in the Lüshi chunqiu, Liji, and “Sishi yueling.” For a full English translation and explanation of the wall inscription found at Xuanquan, see Charles Sanft, “Edict of Monthly Ordinances for the Four Seasons in Fifty Articles from 5 C.E.: Introduction to the Wall Inscription Discovered at Xuanquanzhi with Annotated Translation,” Early China 32(2008-2009); Liu Tseng-Kuei, “Taboos: An Aspect of Belief in the Qin and Han,” 886-87.

argument, harmonizing and restricting human activities to the natural cycle of time applied not only to the ruler and central officials but also to Qin officials and probably to ordinary people.

The reason the Qin government wanted to protect natural resources according to monthly or seasonal cycles is not mentioned in the Shuihudi slips or any other set of Qin slips. We can assume the government wanted to extend the notion of “responding to the times” to the entire nation and not only the ruler or certain officials. But restrictions on the extraction of natural resources might have been an initiative to prevent reckless development and exploitation of scarce and valuable resources.