[ { "id": 204271, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1961", "page_number": 39, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch\n\nORASHKB and author\n\nVol. 1 (1961)\n\nISSN 1991-7295\n\n35\n\nTo begin with a few examples in poetry: the poet Ts'ao Chih (A.D. 192-232), son of Ts'ao Ts'ao and younger brother of the first Emperor of Wei, wrote about the knight errant in \"The White Steed\", also known as \"The Knight Errant\":\n\nA white steed decked with a golden halter\nGalloped past towards the north west.\n\n\"Who is the rider?' I enquired from a by-stander.\n'A knight errant from the north' was the reply.\n'He left his native district when he was young,\nAnd spread his fame across the distant desert.\nHe always carries a fine sturdy bow\nWith arrows of bramble wood, long and short.\nPulling the string, he hits the target on the left;\nShooting from the right, he hits it again.\nLooking up, he shoots an ape in flight;\nBending down, he hits the bull's-eye once more.\nHe is more agile than a monkey,\nAnd as fierce as a leopard or dragon.\n\nWhen alarms came from the frontier\nThat barbarian troops had made repeated raids,\nAnd when a call to arms was heard from the north,\nHe mounted his steed and reached the frontier fort.\nHe rode on right into the land of the Huns,\nHolding the Mongol tribes in high disdain.\nHe threw himself before the pointed swords\nWithout giving a thought to his own life.\nHe did not even worry about his parents,\nLet alone his children and his wife.\nHis name entered the register of heroes;\nHis heart had no room for personal feelings.\n\nHe risked his life at a time of national disaster,\nAnd regarded death merely as coming home'.10\n\nThis portrait of a knight errant may be a little idealized, for the poet is, in all probability, using the subject as an excuse to express his own frustrated patriotic wishes and military ambitions, being prevented from fulfilling these by his elder brother. Nevertheless, the poem remains a good illustration of some of the ideals of knight errantry. Notice, in particular, that the knight errant did not allow filial devotion to deter him from his heroic task.\n\n10 Ts'ao Tzu-chien shih-chu (with notes by Huang Chieh, Peking, 1957), pp. 69-70.\n\n2000", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206985, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1974", "page_number": 56, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "H. J. LETHBRIDGE\n\nEuropean expansion and domination that ended in 1914 provided a more richly fertile environment for this social type. Adventurers do not compose a social group held together by common beliefs or ideology like anarchists, bolsheviks or suffragettes; rather they are supreme individualists and their individualism and egomania asserts itself most brutally in periods of rapid social change, in periods of social dislocation, fluid social boundaries, disorder and political ambiguity. Adventurers surface in greater numbers, then, under particular social conditions; they can impose their will, in the short run at least, by force, bluff, imposture or sheer physical courage,56 either because their social audience is credulous or because their victims desire victimisation, as a martyr seeks martyrdom; for the need to be dominated is as strong sometimes as the urge to dominate. Domination means accepting constraints, and constraint may bring a measure of psychic security and peace.\n\nSouth-East Asia, Central and South America, the Wild West and the Pacific, all provided an ideal terrain for the adventurers' individual obsessions, whether it was the pursuit of power, wealth, status, excitement, luxury or sensuality. And these were areas, of course, where the white man increasingly exercised control, by means of his advanced technology and dominant culture. Mayréna in the land of the Moï and Morès in the Bad Lands of North Dakota, a frontier area only recently cleared of Sioux, lived outpost lives on the margin of civilisation—one became, briefly, the King of the Sedangs, the other, likewise, the Emperor of the Bad Lands. Conditions in these places were perfect for the seigneurial role they sought to play. Such conditions would not be found easily today.\n\nAt this time, two other factors favoured the adventurer class: respect for titles and poor communications. Mayréna succeeded in making dupes of several influential and wealthy persons because they were deeply impressed by his assumed rank—the 'King of the Sedangs' or 'le comte de Drey'. Morès was a nobleman and a grand seigneur by birth; the fact that his name and that of his noble house could be found enshrined in print in the Almanach de Gotha seduced people of lesser rank. The European bourgeoisie achieved economic and a larger degree of political power in the nineteenth century; this parvenu class, ostensibly resentful of social distinctions was, on the other hand, often mesmerised by titles of any kind. This was true even in democratic America: the shady thespians who", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206995, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1974", "page_number": 66, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "60\n\nCAROLE MORGAN\n\nOther ceremonies involving dogs are mentioned in the Chou Li, the Chou Book of Rites (a utopian picture of Chou society compiled from late Chou, Chin and Han sources in the 1st Century B.C.). In the nu (（）) sacrifice to drive away pestilence, a dog was dismembered and his remains buried in front of the main gates of the capital.10\n\nThe ba (*) sacrifice to ward off evil required the participation of the Emperor himself. Riding in a jade chariot it was his duty to crush a dog under the wheels of his carriage. An analysis of the character ba clearly shows what took place in the ceremony. The term ba is written with the radical for cart and a phonetic element (（）) which originally meant an animal whose legs had been bound. It was the duty of a specially appointed official to supply a dog of one colour and without blemishes for the sacrifice.12\n\nAccording to one author, Schindler, the origin of using dogs as sacrificial animals dates back to a primitive cult in honour of a dog-shaped god of vegetation whose worship later became amalgamated with that of Shang Ti, god of agricultural production and reigning deity of the Shang pantheon.13 The fact that alone among domestic animals dogs and horses were buried (dogs being wrapped in reed mats and horses in sheets) gives some support to this theory.14\n\nIn Chou times, horses too were used as sacrificial victims. In the ma (（）) ceremony horses were used as chthonic sacrifices to the Earth Goddess;15 and Ssu Ma Ch'ien tells us that Duke Hsiang of Ch'in (776-766 B.C.) sacrificed a red colt to the White Emperor of the West.16 In such cases the horse to be sacrificed was first shot with an arrow and then buried.17\n\nBut as horses became more valuable the practice of using them as sacrificial victims gradually died out. By 103 B.C. Ssu-Ma Ch'ien informs us all live horses had been replaced by wooden statuettes except in cases such as the chiao (*) sacrifice, celebrated by the Emperor himself, during which he informed his ancestors that he was about to undertake a punitive expedition.18\n\nHorses, however, were not only used as sacrificial animals, they were also entitled to a cult of their own.\n\nAccording to the Chou Li it was the duty of an official, the Hsiao Jen, to sacrifice in Spring to the ma tsu (（马祖）), the ancestors of horses. It was the duty of the same official to honour the \"tamer", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211641, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1989", "page_number": 56, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "31\n\naides and guardians. His two major aides, according to a Taiwanese temple keeper, are major deities in their own right:\n\nT'ai I Chiu K'u T'ien Tsun (AZREF) and Lei Yin P'u Hua T'ien Tsun (LEO).\n\nHe has a senior deity as his personal messenger, Teh Chih Chiangchun (特赤將軍)\n\nA Buddhist priest guiding a visitor around his temple in Chia I county in Taiwan, in which the Jade Emperor was the main deity on a side altar in a side hall pointed out that he had four bodyguards:\n\nThe Marshals Wen (溫), Ma (馬), K'ang (康) and Chao (趙) with blue, white, red and black faces respectively.\n\nThe full title of the Jade Emperor is:\n\nHao T'ien Chin Kuan Yu Huang Shang Ti (昊天金阙玉皇上帝) or T'ien Ti San Chieh Shih Fang Wan Ling Chen Tsai (天帝三界十方万灵真宰). This is possibly best translated as The True Lord of Heaven, Earth and Mankind, in all areas and of the Mystical Spirits.\n\nThe following are the short titles by which the Jade Emperor is known:\n\nYu Ti (玉帝)\n\nYu Huang T'ien Kung (玉皇天公)\n\nT'ien Kung (天公)\n\nT'ien Kung Tsu (天公祖)\n\nT'ien Kung Yeh Yeh (天公爷爷)\n\nT'ien Shang Ti (天上帝)\n\nTien Ti (天帝)\n\nHe is also known as:\n\nYu Huang Ta T'ien Tsun Hsuan Ch'iung Kao Shang Ti (玉皇大天尊玄穹高上帝)\n\nYu Ch'ing Shang Ti (玉清上帝)\n\nHao T'ien Shang Ti (昊天上帝)\n\nShang Ti (上帝)\n\nLao T'ien Yeh (老天爷) North China", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212799, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1992", "page_number": 108, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "93\n\nthe first anti-foot binding societies in China.\n\nLovatt, W N\n\nEx-Royal Artillery serving in Honan Road in Shanghai. He, with Massagorra, taught Mesny the skills of guns and gunnery in 1864. He later became a Commissioner of Customs in Korea.\n\nMason, Charles H. A. W.\n\nA young Imperial Customs Assistant who was the main figure in the 'Mason case'. He joined the Customs in 1887 and after an involved plot was arrested for smuggling arms into China with the intention of providing foreign weapons for the Ko-lao Hui, a secret society whose aim was to overthrow the Imperial government.\n\nMassagorra, W\n\nFormerly Royal Navy and subsequently mate on one of the large lorchas plying the Yangtze: he, with Lovatt, taught Mesny gunnery.\n\nMayers, W F\n\nChinese Secretary at the British Legation in Peking in the mid-1870s. His best known work was the Chinese Reader's Manual. [Mesny culled a large number of items from Mayer's Manual and included them in his Miscellanies]\n\nRichard, Timothy\n\nBaptist missionary in Shantung and Shansi provinces. He met Mesny in Taiyuan Fu where Richard was superintending a branch of the English Baptist Mission. Richard was renowned for his humanitarian work during the great famine in Shansi in 1877-1878.\n\nSu Chin-wang\n\n[Shan-ch'i ## or Shan Ai-t’ang #E#: born ca 1865]\n\nThe Manchu Prince with whom Mesny had breakfast in Peking in 1892 when Su had not yet inherited his title and was then simply the captain of the Emperor's Bodyguard. A black and white photograph", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212803, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1992", "page_number": 112, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "97\n\nthe barrel resting on a second man's shoulder.\n\nKang sì: a baked mud or brick bed used in northern Chinese homes, warmed in winter by hot air from the kitchen flue passing through it.\n\nKo-ino Hul #₺★ : A powerful secret society; the Elder Brother Society, membership to which was strictly forbidden by the Ch’ing government and punishable by death.\n\nKowtow : 'knock the head': The ceremony of prostration common in China, chiefly performed before the emperor, in religious ceremonies, and by inferiors to superiors as an humble apology.\n\nInternational Settlement together with the French Concession [Shanghai]: Colonial enclaves where privileges but not political control were enjoyed. The Municipal Council of the International Settlement, against which Mesny occasionally railed, eventually regarded itself as independent even of the UK and US Governments. Most foreigners regarded their presence in Shanghai, despite increasing Chinese nationalism, as in the best interests of the Chinese. Foreigners were divided socially and economically into businessmen, officials of all kinds including police officers and customs officials, missionaries and others such as be-shored seamen, refugees, later mainly White Russians and German Jews, and 'stayed-on' westerners who had married Chinese women or had nowhere better to go.\n\nLartigue railway system: Mesny would appear to have been acting as the local agent for the Lartigue Railway Construction Company in China [in 1886] though whether authorised on a retainer or on commission we shall probably never know. The Lartigue system was invented during the 1880s by Charles Lartigue, a French inventor who, having observed how camel loads were balanced on either side of the animal, invented a monorail which after a tentative experiment in France was chosen as the system to be used for the Bally-Bunion to Lisowel Railway in a remote corner of Ireland in 1888.\n\nThere is no indication that the line Mesny proposed between Wu-sung and Shanghai, ever got beyond Mesny's fertile imagination. Wu-sung, the town at the junction of the Yangtze and the river which leads up to Shanghai, was where ships first berthed before sailing up the Wu-sung River to Shanghai,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213623, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1995", "page_number": 219, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "192\n\nAnother claim suggests that Ch'iu was the adviser to the Yuan emperor Shih Tsu [better known as the Great Kublai Khan] though as Ch'iu is said to have died in AD 1227 this would be impossible; yet another claim which is again fanciful, Ch'iu is said to have been the author of the dramatic version of the \"Journey to the West\" the well-known story in which Monkey [Ch'i-t'ien Ta-sheng] aids a famous monk to carry Buddhist scriptures to China from India.\n\nHis mausoleum was in the influential Taoist White Cloud Monastery, the Sect centre, in Peking. Temple records in the Pai-t'a Dagoba in the Pei Hai in Peking noted that he died at the age of 80 in AD 1227.\n\nHis image is to be seen on two altars in Hong Kong, both in Taoist monasteries where he is portrayed as a seated Taoist figure dressed in robes, blue in one monastery and golden in the other, with a black beard. He is wearing the tiny Taoist crown and holds a fly switch in his right hand. He has no unique identifying characteristics, though in private images he is often depicted with his blue robes decorated with pa-kua signs. His image, in both monasteries, is on a secondary altar in a main hall dedicated to Wang Ch'ung-yang, with Lu Tung-pin being the sole deity in the other secondary altar. These three Immortals are known collectively as the Three Generations, with Lü the eldest, Wang the second generation and Ch'iu the third generation and the junior.\n\nHis great weakness, which he had to overcome, was his impatience. He was renowned for his propensity to butt in and offer his opinion, often after reaching conclusions prematurely.\n\nIn Peking, his image in the Tan-chi Kung depicted him as a young man without eyebrows or whiskers and with a whey-coloured face. In Singapore, his old gilded image stands on an altar in an old temple in Telok Blangah where he shares a shrine on an altar with Lu Tung-pin, one of the Eight Immortals, with the other shrine occupied by images of Ho Hsien-ku, another of the Eight Immortals, and Sun Fu-jen, an unidentified matron.\n\nCh'iu was deified by the Yuan dynasty emperor Shih Tsu [Kublai Khan, ca AD 1260] as: Ch'ang-ch'un Yen-tao Chu-chiao Chen-jen (MIÈ3⁄4Ç^). Later, at the time of Yuan Wu Tsung [ca. AD 1308],", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214016, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1997", "page_number": 84, "title": "RAS-1997", "content_text": "50\n\nin pairs on Min [Fukienese] community altars as offerings to the Jade Emperor, whose birthday is celebrated the following day and who had persuaded Yang to call off the pursuit.\n\nAn image categorically identified as the Seventh Son, Yang Yen-ssu has only been observed in one temple, in Medan in Sumatra, where it stands alone on a separate side altar simply marked, Yang Ch'i Yeh. He is portrayed as a black-bearded general, standing dressed in long yellow robes and holding a long staff but without any unique features. In a temple near Taichung where he is depicted together with the rest of his brothers he is inexplicably portrayed with a ferocious, decorated face and a bird's beak mouth. His black skin is decorated with a white [opera-style] face pattern, whilst the beak with a red edging is under a human nose. His eyes are staring, round and bulging, and he is holding an unsheathed sword at the ready. All in all, an extraordinary image which, whilst accepted and labelled as the Seventh Son by the temple staff, is completely out of character.\n\nFinally, in Seremban in central Malaysia, the temple keeper of a small rural temple pointed out a small standing figure of a soldier in armour at the rear of a crowded secondary altar. The image has no unique characteristic and could be any soldier/deity. The temple keeper identified him as Yang Sung-pao, a T'ang general who had been the protector of a Sung emperor. In Seremban he was also known as the Venerable Golden Lion, Chin-shih Ta-jen, as well as the Great General, Ta Chiang-chün.\n\nThe Eighth Son, Yang Pa Yeh, has only been noted on two altars in northern China despite the two Yang Family Daughters being numbered Eight and Nine, Yang Pa Chie and Yang Chiu Mei. These two daughters were involved in several battles fighting alongside the Sixth Son.\n\nPost Script\n\nChinese characters carved into a roadside rock beside the modern main road from the Fen River plain in northern Shansi to Inner Mongolia proclaimed that the nearby old temple had been dedicated to Wu Lang, the Fifth Son of the Yang. This was confirmed by a local peasant. The temple was in a col between two mountains, itself several thousand", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1997.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214257, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1998", "page_number": 115, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "78\n\nthe Twenty-four Heavenly Lords. The Four, said to be brothers, are believed to have been born during the 11th century BC and are now protectors of Mi-lo Fo. The 16th century novel, Feng-shen Yen-i, describes the popular myths surrounding the defeat of the four Mo-li brothers during the legendary wars of the 12th century BC who fought with their magical weapons but whose main weapon was the white rat which devoured all enemies. However, Yang Chien, the nephew of the Jade Emperor and son of Li Ching [the General with the Pagoda] was swallowed by the white rat but once inside it he ate the rat's heart and at the same time transformed himself into the white rat which was unsuspectingly put back into its bag by one of the Mo-li brothers. Yang Chien stole out whilst the Four brothers were in a drunken sleep and stole the magic umbrella, whilst Na-cha who had fought and defeated them broke their magic jade ring. The Four lost heart, were defeated and slain. The war was followed by their canonisation by Chiang Tzu-ya who appointed them to the posts of the Heavenly Kings, controllers of the elements, from whom people sought protection from calamities.\n\nThere are standard images of all four of the Great Celestial Kings in both the Ta Pei Ssu and the Pi-yun Ssu.\n\nThere has been a certain amount of confusion over the colours, names, and titles of these guardians; even their characteristics and attributes vary from monastery to monastery. Confusion has arisen over the centuries due to non-Buddhist and even pre-Buddhist factors, with every combination to be seen, such as the General of the North with the Umbrella, the General of the West with the Rat or Mongoose, and so on. The most frequently noted observations are as follows:\n\n \n Taoist Titles\n Symbol\n Characteristics\n Buddhist title\n Sanskrit title\n \n \n Mo-li Ch'ing\n Magic weapons or Sword/lance or Jade Ring or Parasol\n black face or black beard\n Ch'ih-kuo T'ien-wang\n Dhrtarastra 持國天王 or 東方大王\n \n \n \n [colours: blue/green] or Lyre/lute", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214707, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1999", "page_number": 122, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "86\n\nstep (Baker; 1981,15).\n\nThe matshed consisted of a light bamboo frame clad with thin metal sheets, which are more fire resistant than the old rattan mats that were used years ago (see Figure 1). A compartment at one end housed four henchmen and their god, called by the villagers Tai Wong Ye, sometimes translated as 'Great Ancient King' (Myers; 1975,19)(see Plate 3). The same god in urban Hong Kong is usually called Daai Si Wong (Baker; 1979,121). Different names for the same god can cause confusion. The matshed faced southeast (feng shui south), in the direction of the Kwan Yin Ancient Temple. The number of Taoist priests taking part in the ceremony inside the matshed, with some arriving late, fluctuated from five to seven. Even priests get caught in traffic jams. There was a small group of musicians in the matshed playing, between them, a trumpet, gongs, cymbals and a small drum. Percussion instruments took pride of place. The matshed also contained dishes of fruit, to be offered up to the gods, and paper offerings. Joss sticks were burned.\n\nThere was a great deal of incantation, much read from a book taken off the altar, and some kneeling. Rice wine was deliberately spilled on the floor in the process of purification and offering it up to the gods. The gods of east (the Green King), south (the Red King), west (the White King), north (the Black King) and centre (the Yellow Emperor) were beseeched, in rising and falling tones, to come down to protect the district in words that were not easy to link together and to understand. The Chinese animal sign of the year is said to represent a direction. There the planet Jupiter is located (Lo; 1992,162). This has important feng shui implications. One should not disturb the earth in this direction. The Taoist priests who perform such ceremonies are often called, in slang, naam moh lo.$\n\nLooking at Figure 2, in the bottom right-hand corner one can see a metal container in which are situated the five bamboo talismans on which, during the ceremony, are written the respective entreaties to the appropriate gods. Also on the crudely framed timber altar (see Figure 2), draped with a red cloth, are bowls of fruit, three cups of tea, three cups of wine and various items used during the ceremony.\" They include a book of chants, a crown worn by the head priest, musical instruments and sticks for the musicians to strike the percussion", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215077, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2000", "page_number": 173, "title": "RAS-2000", "content_text": "130\n\nthousand or more years ago even if it had taken place either comparatively recently or a millennium ago. Again, various broad-brush replies to such questions might be 'during the Ming, Song or Tang' meaning simply a long, long time ago and again usually without any factual basis for such an assertion.\n\nThis highlights one of the problems which beset Chinese who tried to count the years between two events spaced many decades apart was that they did not have a continuous calendar as we do in the West. This created the problem of calculating intervals between two dated events when each of those dates involved a specific year in the reign of an emperor's reign. To do this one had to know in correct sequence not only each dynasty but also each emperor within each dynasty, and for how long the reigns lasted. Thus it was that the man-in-the-street might perhaps know which dynasty succeeded which but to expect them to know the length of each and to calculate the elapsed time, was more than one could possibly expect. Therefore to them events were regarded as 'a long time ago,' 'before the Ming,' or 'over a thousand years ago' when in practice the elapsed time might be no more than two to three hundred years.\n\nBefore the 1911 and the overthrow of the last imperial dynasty, the four annual markers considered most important were the spring and autumn equinoxes and the summer and winter solstices. The twelve months of the year were divided into twenty-four solar periods, each of which corresponded to the day on which the sun enters the first and fifteenth degree of the zodiacal sign. The 24 fifteen-day solar periods [known as jie - 'joints'] are referred to by meteorological terms, such as the Great Rain, Slight Snow, Great Heat and Lesser Heat, and the Excited Insects, the latter being the day best known by foreigners for its fanciful name. This last solar period is from March 5th to March 20th and, so children are told, if on the 5th of March you put your ear to the ground you can hear the insects stirring, even ‘marching,' after their winter hibernation. A number of the tall temple entrance doors in Taiwan bear paintings of the deities ruling each of the 24 solar periods, with each portrayed standing on clouds and with commonly accepted characteristics. These include, for example, the Dragon King for the Great Rain and the Tall White Demon for Qing Ming. These periods were the 24 seasonal energies providing a meteorological cycle of great value for the regulation of certain chronological dates, or periods in", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215341, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 118, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "66\n\nthe imperial troops defending Lingnan area. Madame Xian sent Feng Sheng to help them but as the rebel general and Feng Sheng were old friends, Feng Sheng delayed his attack on the rebels, Madame Xian was furious and had Feng Sheng cast into gaol. She then despatched Feng An but found it necessary for herself to don armour and lead the troops against the rebels. Within a couple of months it was all over. The rebels surrendered. The Sui emperor pardoned Feng Sheng and appointed him to be the Governor of Luzhou, and at the same time appointed Feng Huai to be Governor of Guangzhou and at the same time appointed Feng Huai to be Governor of Guangzhou and Feng An as Governor of Gaozhou. He also appointed Feng Bao, Madame Xian's long deceased husband, the posthumous Area Commander-in-Chief of Guangzhou and Marquis of Jiaoguo so that he could appoint Madame Xian as Duchess of Jiaoguo. He also granted her the seal of her title to enable her to administer six prefectures. The empress presented Madame Xian with a tiara, jewellery and robes which Madame Xian placed in a chest in the main hall to display them to the family as a reward for three generations of loyalty and filial piety. She then advised the future generations to continue to do their duty.\n\nIn AD 591 a number of places rebelled against the dynasty due to the corruption and tyranny of the Area Commander-in-chief of Panyou. Madame Xian proposed that she should arbitrate, and listed the crimes of the Area Commander-in-Chief to the emperor and peace was restored.\n\nShe died at the age of 89 and was granted the posthumous title of Huguo Shengmu and given a state funeral. She was buried in Tianbai county, commonly known as Gaoling where a temple was raised in her honour leading to today's cult.\n\nb] A deity who, though not Hainanese, is revered by them in several temples in South-east Asia, is the Lord of the White Horse, Baima Laoshi Gong, possibly better known simply as Laoshi Gong. He has only been noted in three temples, in Singapore and Malaysia, though an image of him did appear on sale in a Kowloon curio shop some years ago. He is the main deity in two of the three temples, both on the west coast of central Malaysia, one north of Klang and the other to the south.\n\nApart from in the two temples in Malaysia, other temple keepers", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216034, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2002", "page_number": 333, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "267\n\nThe force despatched up the Yangzi in 1629 by Koxinga's father was led by Zheng Huigui, Koxinga's uncle. It arrived off Zhenjiang just as the Manchu army was crossing over to Jin Shan [Golden Island], causing the Manchus to pause, change their plans and move further upstream for their crossing. However, the Manchus, having taken Nanjing, upstream, they floated downstream on rafts and after coming under fire from Zheng's force, still went on to capture Zhenjiang. Zheng fled downstream and back down the coast to Fujian. It was just at that moment that Koxinga's father deserted to the Manchu side. With most of Fujian province within his power Zheng, despite his submission to the alien Manchus, welcomed the Ming emperor who was fleeing ahead of the southward advance of the Manchus as a means of augmenting his power. Despite his protestations of loyalty he failed to aid the emperor's restorationist cause by the simple expedient of inactivity.\n\nOur next episode begins fifteen years after the execution of Koxinga's father in Beijing where he had been held hostage, with Koxinga himself vigorously opposing the Manchus. In 1659, Koxinga hearing that the Manchu forces were preoccupied in Yunnan province sailed to the mouth of the Yangzi where he remained whilst a portion of his fleet commanded by Zhang Huangyan, sailed up the Great River, captured Zhenjiang before sailing on to Wuhu, far upstream beyond Nanjing. Koxinga, himself, landed on Congming island near the mouth of the Great River and having marched across country, he entered the old Ming capital of Nanjing in triumph, where he proclaimed the restoration of the Ming. However, he was promptly besieged in Nanjing for four long months before surrendering the city and being able to escape. The failure of the second raid up the Yangzi led the Manchus to install large garrisons within the major walled cities down the Yangzi, Zhenjiang being but one. In each city a special quarter was set aside for the Manchu garrison, members of which were forbidden to have too much intercourse with the native Chinese and quite categorically were forbidden to marry them. The Manchus at first were merely feared but as the years passed so they grew to be heartily disliked. And in their later years they were despised. There was a remnant of the Manchus still in Zhenjiang in the 1920s, whose poverty was a burden on local charities and the authorities and whose extensive burial grounds down the centuries of both the Manchu White and Yellow Banners were still standing in the city's south-west suburbs. It was claimed that Zhenjiang reflected typical Jiangbei culture with a dash of Peking from the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]