62
HERBERT FRANKE
gols and in China merchants were more powerful and influential than under previous dynasties. The Mongol rulers in China followed in their attitude towards trade and private enterprise a policy of compromise between non-interference and the traditional Chinese bureaucratic hostility to free trade. It was normal for the Chinese scholar-literati class to view the rise of merchants with misgivings and whenever they could they tried to curb the activities of the merchant class. Some of these traditional features can be found in Yuan Dynasty legislation. Yet rich merchants, mostly foreigners, found access to offices in great numbers. Tax-farming became a common practice, and some Westerners rose to positions of power and prestige by their activities in tax-collecting and in the state monopolies. The best known among these careerists is the famous or rather infamous Ahmed who became a minister of state under Kublai Khan and whose assassination is described with many colorful details both in Marco Polo's book and in the Chinese sources.13 As late as the 1350's we find foreigners mentioned as office holders in the state monopolies administration. A text published in 1360 tells us that the officers of the Hangchow Sugar Bureau were all "wealthy merchants of Jewish and Mohammedan extraction".14 It is not surprising that the Chinese historical sources for the Mongol period have not many friendly things to say on these foreigners and their techniques of money-making. At best tax-collectors are not popular in any country, and if they happen to be foreigners some additional venom is apt to appear. Historiography under the Mongols remained firmly in the hands of the Chinese, and therefore the picture that they give is inevitably distorted and biased.
It cannot be denied that international and transcontinental trade and relations on a non-official level contributed greatly to cultural contacts. Yet these contacts remained marginal and did not affect the basic features of Chinese civilization. The spread of Western music in China under the Mongols is a repetition of what had happened in the Six Dynasties and T'ang periods (third to ninth centuries) when dances, musical instruments, melodies and whole music bands were introduced from Central Asia and had a lasting effect on Eastern Asiatic music. Exotic music has, it seems, always found acceptance in high civilizations and been more easily integrated than other cultural elements. Europe is no exception — some of the names of our most common instruments
62
HERBERT FRANKE
gols and in China merchants were more powerful and influential than under previous dynasties. The Mongol rulers in China followed in their attitude towards trade and private enterprise a policy of compromise between non-interference and the traditional Chinese bureaucratic hostility to free trade. It was normal for the Chinese scholar-literati class to view the rise of merchants with misgivings and whenever they could they tried to curb the activi ties of the merchant class. Some of these traditional features can be found in Yuan Dynasty legislation. Yet rich merchants, mostly foreigners, found access to offices in great numbers. Tax-farming became a common practice, and some Westerners rose to positions of power and prestige by their activities in tax-collecting and in the state monopolies. The best known among these careerists is the famous or rather infamous Ahmed who became a minister of state under Kublai Khan and whose assassination is described with many colorful details both in Marco Polo's book and in the Chinese sources.13 As late as the 1350's we find foreigners men- tioned as office holders in the state monopolies administration. A text published in 1360 tells us that the officers of the Hangchow Sugar Bureau were all "wealthy merchants of Jewish and Moham- medan extraction".14 It is not surprising that the Chinese his- torical sources for the Mongol period have not many friendly things to say on these foreigners and their techniques of money- making. At best tax-collectors are not popular in any country, and if they happen to be foreigners some additional venom is apt to appear. Historiography under the Mongols remained firmly in the hands of the Chinese, and therefore the picture that they give is inevitably distorted and biased.
It cannot be denied that international and transcontinental trade and relations on a non-official level contributed greatly to cultural contacts. Yet these contacts remained marginal and did not affect the basic features of Chinese civilization. The spread of Western music in China under the Mongols is a repetition of what had happened in the Six Dynasties and T'ang periods (third to ninth centuries) when dances, musical instruments, melodies and whole music bands were introduced from Central Asia and had a lasting effect on Eastern Asiatic music. Exotic music has, it seems, always found acceptance in high civilizations and been more easily integrated than other cultural elements. Europe is no exception — some of the names of our most common instruments
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