Overview

Forming the Early Chinese Court builds on new directions in comparative studies of royal courts in the ancient world to present a pioneering study of early Chinese court culture. Rejecting divides between literary, political, and administrative texts, Luke Habberstad examines sources from the Qin, Western Han, and Xin periods (221 BCE-23 CE) for insights into court society and ritual, rank, the development of the bureaucracy, and the role of the emperor. These diverse sources show that a large, but not necessarily cohesive, body of courtiers drove the consolidation, distribution, and representation of power in court institutions. Forming the Early Chinese Court encourages us to see China's imperial unification as a surprisingly idiosyncratic process that allowed different actors to stake claims in a world of increasing population, wealth, and power.

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Forming the Early Chinese Court will be an informative and thought-provoking read not only to more specialized readers already acquainted with aspects of Han political culture, but also to students of Han government and the bureaucracy in Chinese history more generally. * China Review International: A Journal of Reviews of Scholarly Literature in Chinese Studies *

Forming the Early Chinese Court will be an informative and thought-provoking read not only to more specialized readers already acquainted with aspects of Han political culture, but also to students of Han government and the bureaucracy in Chinese history more generally. * China Review International: A Journal of Reviews of Scholarly Literature in Chinese Studies * Habberstad approaches the court not as a thing . . . but as a complex set of evolving relations. The result is an adventurous account of the history of the Han that brings to light heretofore little-noted conversations, contention, and anxiety that were very much constitutive of the history of the Han empire. * Journal of Chinese History * Habberstad should be congratulated for his book. Scholars of early Han history will surely benefit from his manifold astute observations. * Journal of the American Oriental Society (JAOS) * Forming the Early Chinese Court is an original, lucid, and insightful consideration of developments in Western Han governance. * Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies * [P]roduced with great care and reads well, with interesting descriptions of the interconnection between sumptuary regulations and rank and the togetherness of imperial living quarters, audience halls, amusement parks, and official workspace. The book is an important contribution to the study of Chinese early imperial history. * Religious Studies Review *

Forming the Early Chinese Court will be an informative and thought-provoking read not only to more specialized readers already acquainted with aspects of Han political culture, but also to students of Han government and the bureaucracy in Chinese history more generally. * China Review International: A Journal of Reviews of Scholarly Literature in Chinese Studies * Habberstad approaches the “court” not as a thing . . . but as a complex set of evolving relations. The result is an adventurous account of the history of the Han that brings to light heretofore little-noted conversations, contention, and anxiety that were very much constitutive of the history of the Han empire. * Journal of Chinese History * Habberstad should be congratulated for his book. Scholars of early Han history will surely benefit from his manifold astute observations. * Journal of the American Oriental Society (JAOS) * Forming the Early Chinese Court is an original, lucid, and insightful consideration of developments in Western Han governance. * Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies * [P]roduced with great care and reads well, with interesting descriptions of the interconnection between sumptuary regulations and rank and the togetherness of imperial living quarters, audience halls, amusement parks, and official workspace. The book is an important contribution to the study of Chinese early imperial history. * Religious Studies Review *

Author Information

Luke Habberstad is assistant professor of Chinese literature at the University of Oregon.

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