A Study On Marriage Relationship Of Military Officials In Ming Dynasty

In the record of ritual Li-chi, marriage was very important, which will combine one male and one female. Also, marriage will combine two families. In ancient China, when one people wanted to elect his/her spouse, he/she must abide by parents’ requirements or arrangement. Therefore, we can say that, the purpose of marriage, to a certain degree, are families’ interests. At the beginning of Ming Dynasty, in order to strengthen his political power, Chu Yuan-chang set up a lot of wei and suo. Many military officers obtained the right of inheriting. The family members of military officers which had inheritance grew very quickly. The main aim of writing this thesis is to study different family members of military officers how to elect his/her spouse and the effect of this kind of marriage.The first chapter is to discuss the sources of military officers which had inheritance in Ming Dynasty. There are three main sources, military exploits, en yin and other channels. Military officers had military exploits were most important. Some military officers followed Chu Yuan-chang to seize power form Yuan Dynasty, some military officers followed Chu Ti to seize power form Chu Yun-wen. Also,there some military officers get military exploits in some other wars. In additions, there were some military officers get their officers by en yin or selling or martial art examination.The second chapter is to discuss the selection criteria of marriage. The selection criteria was different between military officers. The senior military officers can marriage with royal family, however, this kind of marriage were effected by emperor. In the period of Chu Yuan-chang and Chu Ti, there were many different senior military officers can marriage with royal family. After that, this phenomenon was very rare. Compare to the senior military officers, emperor and political nearly had no effects to the junior military officers’ marriage.In this chapter, we can draw one conclusion, political, economy,culture and geographical relationship can effect the selection criteria of military officers. Among these factors, political was most important.The third chapter is to discuss the effects of the marriage of military officers. To the senior military officers, marriage was one important political tool. Emperor wanted to strengthen his political power, therefore, he was will to marriage with senior military officers. By this, senior military officers had high position and great wealth, however, this kind of marriage may made senior military officers very miserable. To the junior military officers, their marriages had important effects to local political, also caused a series of changes to the member of one family.