A Study On The Successful Candidates In The Imperial Examination Of The Fifth Year Of Taipingxingguo In The Northern Sung

The imperial examinations caused major changes to the way of election in the Northern Sung dynasty. The imperial examinations were been completing gradually,and the successful candidates have also greatly expanded. Lots of intellectuals became officials through the imperial examinations. That has not only changed their destiny,but also evolved an unique political group—scholar-officials. They worked in the central and local government institutions,and had an adverse effect on politics and society in the Northern Sung dynasty. Because paying close attention to above-mentioned problems,this paper regarded the successful candidates in the imperial examinations of the fifth year of Taipingxingguo as research's objective. Through observing their birth's places, family background and marriage,we can study social changes in the Northern Sung dynasty,their political characteristics and important role on new scholar-officials'forming.Starting with data contrast and analysis,we have collected lots of informations and made a list about the elites of successful candidates in the fifth year of Taipingxingguo. After that, we collated with the successful candidates in the Tang dynasty,and sought the elites'features in the fifth year of Taipingxingguo. We still analysed the elites'marriage on the foundation of studying epitaphs and the connection between them and new scholar-officials.This paper is composed of seven chapters. The first chapter simply introduces research's objective,scope,foundation,information,chief content and new trail. From the second chapter to the sixth chapter, we discuss the elites'places of birth,family background,marriage, political morals,political ideas and political actions. The seventh chapter comes to some conclusions.Firstly,in early Northern Sung dynasty, because the influence of politics,military,economy,culture and education,birth's places of the successful candidates were the same as the changes in later Tang dynasty. Superiority of talent was continuing to decline at Guanzhong district,there still were lots of talent at Guandong district,and talent of the southern district was rising abruptly. But the Court's policy might change in early Northern Sung dynasty in order to bring about the Court's interest. One third of the elites in the fifth year of Taipingxingguo came from the west of Jingdong and the southeast of Hebei,where were appproaching capital. They belonged to Qi and Lu at Pre-Ch'in period.Age-old history and profound culture have led the groundwork for talent's growth,and they were important to capital's stablitity.Moreover,because they were between the Yellow River and the Ji River,floods were frequent. The Court attached importance to two districts in order to keep safety.Secondly,in early Northern Sung dynasty,social stratum of the successful candidates were changing. In Sui and Tang dynasty,many successful candidates were born from old and well-known families. If they wanted to become officials,their family background seemed very important. But the privileged positions of old and well-known families have disappeared in the Northern Sung dynasty. The intellectuals from intermediate-lower rank officials families and low station families were beginning to rise. They gradually became new-bom staff of bureaucratic stratum. That made the intellectuals from every stratum have chances to enter official career.This paper pays close attention to the successful candidates from intermediate-lower rank officials families. Their forefathers were local officials and civil servants in later Tang dynasty and Five Dynasties. Although their positions were lower,they were different from military families that occupied political superiority. Their families laid stress on culture and education. That established nice groundwork for later generations to follow in official career.Thirdly,the elites persisted in well-matched in social status for marriage. Of course its connotation has already changed. They attached importance to both official positions of the objectives' forefathers and ability of the objectives. For example,the elites from intermediate-lower rank officials families had got married with girls from intermediate-lower rank officials families before they succeeded. But after they succeeded,their political and social positions were raised.Therefore,they got remarried with girls from high-ranking officials families. The elites from humble origin could not become related by marriage with officials'families before they succeeded. But when they became the successful candidates,their status changed,and they could get married with girls from intermediate-lower rank and high-ranking officials families.Besides,when they selected the objectives for their daughters,they also thought over the objectives'family background. However,they thought that the objectives'ability and political positions were more important. So far as informations in stock, 100 per cent of the elites'sons-in-low were the successful candidates and officials. Fourthly,the elites had both ability and moral integrity. Some people's moral was noble,some people's literary talent was outstanding, and some people's political ability was excellent. Evidently,in early Northern Sung dynasty, emperors selected officials according to the criteria of moral,literary talent and political ability.Moreover, through the Court's advocating and the elites'utmost,new scholar-officials who were provided with moral,literary talent and political ability took shape at last in middle Northern Sung dynasty.Being worth mentioning,most of the elites thought that moral was not only own training but also idea of being loyal to emperor and sense of responsibility to society. That was rudiment of new scholar-officials'idea that they were masters of their own country. So we call it as "Major Moral".Under such idea guiding,they hoped that they could assist emperor in governing a country with their "Major Moral",lead social morals with their loyalty and form harmonious relations between emperor and officials.Fifthly,the elites had the reasonable and pragmatic style in political ideas and political actions.Moreover,they had built the centralization system that balanced the power. This system could also limited the power of the emperor and the ministers. It was evident that the elites were reasonable and mature in politics. They had been conscious of the important role of the unified and powerful emperor's power to the royal court and society. Therefore,they restrained their actions with political moral,and did not cast greedy eyes on the power.In short,this paper is a research about the elites of the successful candidates in the imperial examination of the fifth year of Taipingxingguo in early Northern Sung dynasty. Its emphases are two aspects.One aspect is to understand social and political changes in early Northern Sung dynasty through studying the elites'places of birth,family background and marriage. Another aspect is to discuss way of new scholar- officials'forming through studying the elites'political features.