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143-550: The Four-goat Square Zun is 58.3-centimetre (23.0 in) high and weighs 34.5-kilogram (76 lb), the biggest square zun from the Shang dynasty ( c. 1600–1046 BC) so far. The mouth of its vessel extends outwards forming an extremely big square mouth. The bottom is supported by ring feet ( 圈足支座 ) and the middle part was skillfully engraved with four goats with big curly horns. The four goats stand facing in four directions, looking serene and calm. Four high relief entwining dragons are on

286-501: A Chenggu -style dagger-axe at Xiaohenan demonstrates that even at this early stage of Chinese history, there were some ties between the distant areas of north China. The Panlongcheng site in the middle Yangtze valley was an important regional centre of the Erligang culture. Accidental finds elsewhere in China have revealed advanced civilisations contemporaneous with but culturally unlike

429-673: A Chinese Communist cell. Zhou was recruited by Zhang Shenfu , whom he had met in August of the previous year in connection with Li Dazhao . He also knew Zhang through Zhang's wife, Liu Qingyang, a member of the Awakening Society. Zhou has sometimes been portrayed at this time as uncertain in his politics, but his swift move to Communism suggests otherwise. The cell Zhou belonged to was based in Paris; in addition to Zhou, Zhang, and Liu it included two other students, Zhao Shiyan and Chen Gongpei. Over

572-704: A black bird and subsequently gave birth miraculously to Xie . Xie is said to have helped Yu the Great to control the Great Flood and for his service to have been granted a place called Shang as a fief. The period before the Shang dynasty was established is known as the " Predynastic Shang " (or "Proto-Shang"). In the Annals of the Yin , Sima Qian writes that the dynasty was founded 13 generations after Xie, when Xie's descendant Tang overthrew

715-502: A date first established by Sima Qian . Attempts to establish earlier dates have been plagued by doubts about the origin and transmission of traditional texts and the difficulties in their interpretation. More recent attempts have compared the traditional histories with archaeological and astronomical data. At least 44 dates for the end of the dynasty have been proposed, ranging from 1130 to 1018 BC. The oldest extant direct records date from c.  1250 BC at Anyang, covering

858-587: A deep interest in politics and current events, in particular, the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the Bolsheviks' new policies. He began to read avidly Chen Duxiu 's progressive and left-leaning magazine, New Youth . He read early Japanese works on Marx, and it has been claimed that he even attended Kawakami Hajime 's lectures at Kyoto University. Kawakami was an important figure in the early history of Japanese Marxism, and his translations and articles influenced

1001-431: A few hundred humans and horses as well to accompany the king into the afterlife, in some cases even numbering four hundred. Finally, tombs included ornaments such as jade, which the Shang may have believed to protect against decay or confer immortality. The Shang religion was highly bureaucratic and meticulously ordered. Oracle bones contained descriptions of the date, ritual, person, ancestor, and questions associated with

1144-479: A force of about a thousand troops at his capital and would personally lead this force into battle. A rudimentary military bureaucracy was also needed in order to muster forces ranging from three to five thousand troops for border campaigns to thirteen thousand troops for suppressing rebellions. The earliest records are the oracle bones inscribed during the reigns of the Shang kings from Wu Ding . Oracle bone inscriptions do not contain king lists, but they do record

1287-648: A generation of Chinese communists. However, it now seems unlikely that Zhou met him or heard any of his lectures. Zhou's diaries also show his interest in Chinese student protests in opposition to the Sino-Japanese Joint Defense Agreement in May 1918, but he did not actively participate in them or return to China as part of the "Returning Home Movement". His active role in political movements began after his return to China. Zhou returned to Tianjin sometime in

1430-609: A great impression on him. His participation in debates and stage performances contributed to his eloquence and skills of persuasion. Zhou left Nankai with a great desire to pursue public service, and to acquire the skills required to do so. Following many of his classmates, Zhou went to Japan in July 1917 for further studies. During his two years in Japan, Zhou spent most of his time in the East Asian Higher Preparatory School,

1573-523: A gunboat with a mostly Communist crew moved from Whampoa to Guangzhou without Chiang's knowledge or approval. This event led to Chiang's exclusion of Communists from the academy by May 1926, and the removal of numerous Communists from high positions in the Nationalist Party. In his memoirs, Nie Rongzhen suggested that the gunboat had moved in protest of Zhou Enlai's (brief) arrest. Zhou's time in Whampoa

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1716-457: A height of 8 m (26 ft), and formed a roughly rectangular wall 7 km (4 mi) around the ancient city. The rammed earth construction of these walls was an inherited tradition, since much older fortifications of this type have been found at Chinese Neolithic sites of the Longshan culture ( c.  3000  – c.  2000 BC }. In 2022, excavation of an elite tomb inside

1859-605: A language school for Chinese students. Zhou's studies were supported by his uncles, and apparently Nankai founder Yan Xiu as well, but their funds were limited; during this period, Japan suffered from severe inflation. Zhou originally planned to win one of the scholarships offered by the Chinese government; these scholarships, however, required Chinese students to pass entrance examinations in Japanese universities. Zhou took entrance examinations for at least two schools but failed to gain admission. Zhou's reported anxieties were compounded by

2002-473: A large labour force that could handle the mining, refining, and transportation of the necessary copper, tin, and lead ores. This in turn created a need for official managers that could oversee both labourers and skilled artisans and craftsmen. The Shang royal court and aristocrats required a vast number of different bronze vessels for various ceremonial purposes and events of religious divination. Ceremonial rules even decreed how many bronze containers of each type

2145-776: A leading master of cultural relics restoration in China to restore the square zun to its original appearance. In 1959, the Four-goat Square Zun was transferred to National Museum of Chinese History for exhibition to celebrate the 10th year of the National Day . Later, the National Museum of Chinese History gave the relic to the National Museum of China . The Four-goat Square Zun has been kept there since that time. Shang dynasty The Shang dynasty ( Chinese : 商朝 ; pinyin : Shāng cháo ), also known as

2288-746: A leading role in the Communists' first major military action, the Nanchang Revolt . In July 1926, the Nationalists began the Northern Expedition , a massive military attempt to unify China. The Expedition was led by Chiang Kai-shek and the National Revolutionary Army (NRA), an amalgam of earlier military forces with significant guidance from Russian military advisors and numerous Communists as both commanding and political officers. With

2431-473: A low price for such a valuable piece of art: 10,000 silver dollars. However, Zhao couldn't get so much money in such a short period. So he consulted with the owner of Wanlishan Shop whether he could leave the square zun for him and he would go back to raise money at once. The owner of Wanlishan Shop agreed with him, but the period was only three days. When Zhao returned to Changsha, exactly three people came round, they were all connoisseurs of antiques and were in

2574-620: A member of the Provincial Committee's Military Section. Zhou vigorously extended Communist influence at the academy. He soon arranged for a number of other prominent Communists to join the Political Department, including Chen Yi , Nie Rongzhen , Yun Daiying , and Xiong Xiong. Zhou played an important role in establishing the Young Soldiers Association, a youth group which was dominated by the Communists, and Sparks,

2717-602: A mistake. Fleeing Shanghai, Zhou made his way to Hankou (now part of Wuhan ) and was a participant at the CCP's 5th National Congress there from 27 April to 9 May. At the end of the Congress, Zhou was elected to the Party's Central Committee, again heading the military department. After Chiang Kai-shek's suppression of the Communists, the Nationalist Party split in two, with the Nationalist Party's "left-wing" (led by Wang Jingwei ) controlling

2860-425: A national treasure that had been sleeping soundly underground for more than 3,000 years gradually showed its magnificent appearance. The object was later named "Four-goat Square Zun". After Jiang Jingshu and his brothers unearthed the square zun, they didn't take it home until it was dark in order not to be found by others. However, although it was dark then, the big and heavy square zun still drew people's attention all

3003-518: A nationwide boycott of Japanese goods. As the boycott became more effective, the national government, under pressure from Japan, attempted to suppress it. On 23 January 1920, a confrontation over boycott activities in Tianjin led to the arrest of a number of people, including several Awakening Society members, and on 29 January Zhou led a march on the Governor's Office in Tianjin to present a petition calling for

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3146-521: A noble of a certain rank could own. With the increased amount of bronze available, the army could also better equip itself with an assortment of bronze weaponry. Bronze was also used for the fittings of spoke-wheeled chariots , which appeared in China around 1200 BC. The Shang dynasty entered into prolonged conflicts with northern frontier tribes called the Guifang . Bronze weapons were an integral part of Shang society. Shang infantry were armed with

3289-516: A number of essays and articles written by Zhou at this time, and these reflect the discipline, training, and concern for country that Nankai's founders attempted to instill in their students. At the school's tenth commencement in June 1917, Zhou was one of five graduating students honored at the ceremony, and one of the two valedictorians. By the time that he graduated from Nankai, Zhang Boling's teachings of gong (public spirit) and neng (ability) had made

3432-635: A plane crash . Amid these events, Zhou was designated as Mao's successor in 1973, but struggled internally against the Gang of Four . In 1975, he fell out of the public eye for medical treatment and died one year later. The outpouring of public grief which his death provoked in Beijing turned to anger at the Gang of Four, leading to the 1976 Tiananmen incident . Though Zhou was succeeded by Hua Guofeng as premier and designated successor, after Mao's death Zhou's ally Deng Xiaoping

3575-467: A quintessential part of the late Shang ritual complex. Chinese historians were accustomed to the notion of one dynasty succeeding another, and readily identified the Erligang and Erlitou sites with the early Shang and Xia dynasty of traditional histories. The actual political situation in early China may have been more complicated, with the Xia and Shang being political entities that existed concurrently, just as

3718-557: A result, Zhou was a prominent figure at most Academy meetings, often addressing the school immediately after commandant Chiang Kai-shek . He was extremely influential in establishing the political department/party representative (commissar) system which was adopted in Nationalist armed forces in 1925. Concurrent with his Whampoa appointment, Zhou became secretary of the Communist Party's Guangdong Provincial Committee, and at some point

3861-428: A short-lived Communist front group. He thus recruited numerous new Communist party members from cadet ranks, and eventually set up a covert Communist Party branch at the academy to direct the new members. When Nationalists concerned with the increasing number of Communist members and organizations at Whampoa set up a "Society for Sun Yat-senism ", Zhou attempted to squelch it; the conflict between these student groups set

4004-601: A small army. According to these legends, he founded a state known as Gija Joseon in northwest Korea during the Gojoseon period of ancient Korean history. However, scholars debate the historical accuracy of these legends. Before the 20th century, the Zhou dynasty (1046–256 BC) was the earliest that could be verified from its own records. However, during the Song dynasty (960–1279), antiquarians collected bronze ritual vessels attributed to

4147-431: A stone. Unexpectedly, they felt it with their hoes again that day. Therefore, they decided to move away the stones in the way. When they first hoed it, they heard a crash, then a sheet of rusty copper about 10-centimetre (3.9 in) long and 8-centimetre (3.1 in) wide flew out of the soil. One side of it was fresh, while the other side was rusty with some dim lines and patterns on its surface. They continued digging and

4290-848: A student Zhou was involved in the 1919 May Fourth Movement , and in the early 1920s studied in France, where he joined the newly-founded CCP. During the party's alliance with the Kuomintang (KMT), he worked in the political department of the Whampoa Military Academy . In 1927, Zhou led the worker uprising which was crushed by the KMT in the Shanghai massacre , after which he helped lead the Nanchang uprising . Zhou worked underground in Shanghai before being transferred to

4433-490: A university in August 1919, Zhou was in the first class, but was an activist full-time. His political activities continued to expand, and in September, he and several other students agreed to establish the "Awakening Society", a small group, never numbering more than 25. In explaining the goals and purpose of the Awakening Society, Zhou declared that "anything that is incompatible with progress in current times, such as militarism,

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4576-533: A variety of stone and bronze weaponry, including spears, pole-axes, pole-based dagger-axes, composite bows, and bronze or leather helmets. Although the Shang depended upon the military skills of their nobility, Shang rulers could mobilise the masses of town-dwelling and rural commoners as conscript labourers and soldiers for both campaigns of defence and conquest. Aristocrats and other state rulers were obligated to furnish their local garrisons with all necessary equipment, armour, and armaments. The Shang king maintained

4719-410: Is unknown what criteria the diviners used to determine the response, but it is believed to be the sound or pattern of the cracks on the bone. The Shang also seem to have believed in an afterlife, as evidenced by the elaborate burial tombs built for deceased rulers. Often "carriages, utensils, sacrificial vessels, [and] weapons" would be included in the tomb. A king's burial involved the burial of up to

4862-690: The Diligent Work-Frugal Study Movement . Zhou returned to Paris by June 1922, where he was one of the twenty two participants present at the organization of the Communist Youth League of China , established as the European Branch of the Chinese Communist Party. Zhou helped draft the party's charter and was elected to the three member executive committee as director of propaganda. He also wrote for and helped edit

5005-641: The Green Gang and soldiers under the command of Nationalist general Pai Ch'ung-hsi attacked the Communists and quickly overcame them. On the eve of the Nationalist attack, Wang Shouhua, who was both the head of the CCP Labor Committee and the Chairman of the General Labor Committee, accepted a dinner invitation from "Big-eared Du" (a Shanghai gangster) and was strangled after he arrived. Zhou himself

5148-594: The Jiangxi Soviet , and after the soviet's defeat was a member of the party's top leadership during its Long March . Zhou came to support Mao Zedong , who became leader of the CCP in 1935. During the Xi'an Incident in 1936, Zhou successfully persuaded KMT leader Chiang Kai-shek to agree to form a Second United Front against the Japanese. During the Second Sino-Japanese War , Zhou was the resident representative of

5291-818: The University of the Toilers of the East in Moscow, and the establishment of the Chinese Nationalist Party ( Kuomintang or KMT) European branch. In June 1923, the Third Congress of the Chinese Communist Party accepted the Comintern's instructions to ally with the KMT, led at the time by Sun Yat-sen . These instructions called for CCP members to join the Nationalist Party as "individuals", while still retaining their association with

5434-708: The Yin dynasty ( 殷代 ; Yīn dài ), was a Chinese royal dynasty that ruled in the Yellow River valley during the second millennium BC, traditionally succeeding the Xia dynasty and followed by the Western Zhou dynasty. The classic account of the Shang comes from texts such as the Book of Documents , Bamboo Annals and Shiji . Modern scholarship dates the dynasty between the 16th and 11th centuries BC, with more agreement surrounding

5577-427: The 3rd century AD, "Yin" has been frequently used to refer specifically to the latter half of the Shang. It is also the name predominantly used for the dynasty in Japan, Korea, and Vietnam, being rendered as In , Eun and Ân in Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese respectively. The name seems to have originated during the subsequent Zhou dynasty ; it does not appear in oracle bone inscriptions—which refer to

5720-504: The Awakening Society met with several Beijing organizations and agreed to form a "Reform Federation"; during these activities Zhou became more familiar with Li Dazhao and met Zhang Shenfu, who was the contact between Li in Beijing and Chen Duxiu in Shanghai. Both men were organizing underground Communist cells in cooperation with Grigori Voitinsky , a Comintern agent, but Zhou apparently did not meet Voitinsky at this point. Soon after his release, Zhou decided to go to Europe to study. (He

5863-679: The CCP in Chongqing , and during the renewed civil war from 1946 assisted Mao in commanding military campaigns. After the establishment of the PRC in 1949, Zhou was appointed head of government and foreign minister. Advocating peaceful coexistence with the West after the Korean War , he participated in the 1954 Geneva Conference and 1955 Bandung Conference and helped orchestrate Richard Nixon's 1972 visit to China . He helped devise policies regarding disputes with

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6006-803: The CCP. After joining the KMT, they would work to lead and direct it, transforming it into a vehicle of revolution. Within several years, this strategy would become the source of serious conflict between the KMT and the CCP. As well as joining the KMT, Zhou helped organize the founding of the Nationalist Party European branch in November 1923. Under Zhou's influence, most of the European branch's officers were in fact communists. Zhou's wide-ranging contacts and personal relationships formed during this period were central to his career. Important party leaders, such as Zhu De and Nie Rongzhen , were first admitted to

6149-589: The Communist head in Shanghai, Chen Duxiu , the Party's general secretary, with a special committee of eight party officials coordinating Communist actions. The committee also consulted closely on decisions with the Comintern representatives in Shanghai, headed by Grigori Voitinsky . The partial documentation available for this period shows that Zhou headed the Communist Party Central Committee's Military Commission in Shanghai. He participated in both

6292-568: The Duke of Song , with its capital at Shangqiu . This practice was known as 'enfeoffment of three generations for two kings'. The dukes of Song would maintain rites honouring the Shang kings until Qi conquered Song in 286 BC. Confucius was possibly a descendant of the Shang Kings through the Dukes of Song. The Eastern Han dynasty bestowed the title of Duke of Song and 'Duke Who Continues and Honours

6435-659: The February and March actions, but was not the guiding hand in either event, instead working with A. P. Appen, the Soviet military advisor to the Central Committee, training the pickets of the General Labor Union, the Communist controlled labor organization in Shanghai. He also worked to make union strong arm squads more effective when the Communists declared a "Red Terror" after the failed February uprising; this action resulted in

6578-635: The First Corps Political Department. Soon after, the Nationalist Party's Central Executive Committee appointed Zhou Nationalist Party party representative, making Zhou chief commissar of the First Corps. The first major battle of expedition saw the capture of Chen's base in Huizhou on 15 October. Shantou was taken on 6 November, and by the end of 1925, the Nationalists controlled all of Guangdong province. Zhou's appointment as chief commissar of

6721-437: The First Corps allowed him to appoint Communists as commissars in four of the Corps' five divisions. Following the conclusion of the Expedition, Zhou was appointed special commissioner for the East River District, which placed him in temporary administrative control of several counties; he apparently used this opportunity to establish a Communist party branch in Shantou and strengthen the CCP's control of local unions. This marked

6864-414: The Grand Historian . According to the Records of the Grand Historian , the Shang moved their capital five times, with the final move to Yin in the reign of Pan Geng inaugurating the golden age of the dynasty. Di Xin, the last Shang king, is said to have committed suicide after his army was defeated by Wu of Zhou . Legends say that his army and his equipped slaves betrayed him by joining the Zhou rebels in

7007-409: The Guangdong Army under Xu Chongzhix, and two training regiments of the Nationalist Party Army, led by Chiang Kai-shek and staffed by Academy officers and cadets. The fighting lasted through May 1925, with the defeat, but not destruction, of Chen's forces. Zhou accompanied the Whampoa cadets on the expedition as a political officer. When Chen regrouped and attacked Guangzhou again in September 1925,

7150-442: The Hunan Branch of People's Bank of China . The Cultural Relics Management Committee of Hunan sent expert Cai Jixiang ( 蔡季襄 ) and others to the scene. Cai checked and accepted the cultural relics found hidden in the waste products. Suddenly, he noticed a big wooden box in the corner of a wall. When he opened the wooden box carefully with the help of several people, he saw a big bronze goat head. Cai contacted expert Zhang Xinru ( 张欣如 ),

7293-599: The May Fourth incident seem to have been crucial to his Communist career. Zhou's friends in the Awakening Society were similarly affected. 15 of the group's members became Communists for at least some time, and the group remained close later on. Zhou and six other group members travelled to Europe in the next two years, and Zhou eventually married Deng Yingchao , the group's youngest member. Zhou's group arrived in Marseille on 13 December 1920. Unlike most other Chinese students, who went to Europe on work-study programs, Zhou's scholarship and position with Yishi bao meant that he

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7436-407: The NRA and defections from his army, Sun reduced his forces in Shanghai, and the Communists, whose party headquarters was located in Shanghai, made three attempts to seize control of the city, later called "the three Shanghai Uprisings", in October 1926, February 1927 and March 1927. Zhou was transferred to Shanghai to assist in these activities, probably in late 1926. It seems he was not present for

7579-435: The Nationalist party). Zhou's talents also attracted the attention of Yan Xiu and Zhang Boling. Yan in particular thought highly of Zhou, helping to pay for his studies in Japan and later France. Yan was so impressed with Zhou that he encouraged Zhou to marry his daughter, but Zhou declined. Zhou later expressed the reasons for his decision not to marry Yan's daughter to his classmate, Zhang Honghao. Zhou said that he declined

7722-405: The Nationalists launched a second expedition. Nationalist forces by this time had been reorganized into five corps (or armies) and adopted the commissar system with Political Departments and Nationalist party representatives in most divisions. The First Corps, made up of the Nationalist Party Army, was led by Whampoa graduates and commanded by Chiang Kai-shek, who personally appointed Zhou director of

7865-449: The Red Chamber . Zhou's birth mother Wan died in 1907 when Zhou was 9, and his adoptive mother Chen in 1908 when Zhou was 10. Zhou's father was working in Hubei, far from Jiangsu, so Zhou and his two younger brothers returned to Huai'an and lived with his father's remaining younger brother Yikui for the next two years. In 1910, Zhou's uncle Yigeng, his father's older brother, offered to care for Zhou. The family in Huai'an agreed, and Zhou

8008-443: The Russian or the British way... I would prefer something in-between, rather than one of these two extremes". Still interested in academic programs, Zhou traveled to Britain in January 1921 to visit Edinburgh University . Concerned by financial problems and language requirements, he did not enroll, returning to France at the end of January. There are no records of Zhou entering any academic program in France. In spring 1921, he joined

8151-432: The Shang King in exchange for military aid and augury services. However these alliances were unstable, as indicated by the frequent royal divinations about the sustainability of such relations. The existence of records regarding enemy kills, prisoners and booty taken point to the existence of a proto-bureaucracy of written documents. Shang religious rituals featured divination and sacrifice. The degree to which shamanism

8294-432: The Shang era, some of which bore inscriptions. In 1899, several scholars noticed that Chinese pharmacists were selling "dragon bones" marked with curious and archaic characters. These were finally traced back in 1928 to what is now called Yinxu , north of the Yellow River near Anyang , where the Academia Sinica undertook archaeological excavation until the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937. Archaeologists focused on

8437-425: The Shang joined the Rebellion of the Three Guards against the Duke of Zhou , but the rebellion collapsed after three years, leaving Zhou in control of Shang territory. After the collapse of the Shang dynasty, Zhou's rulers forcibly relocated "Yin diehards" and scattered them throughout Zhou territory. Some surviving members of the Shang royal family collectively changed their surname from the ancestral name Zi to

8580-414: The Shang kings were viewed as the best qualified members of society to offer sacrifices to their royal ancestors and to the high god Di, who in their beliefs was responsible for the rain, wind, and thunder. The King appointed officials to manage certain activities, usually in a specified region. These included agricultural official, pastors, dog officers, and guards. These officers led their own retinues in

8723-401: The Shanghai Communists were highly secretive at the time, and that his execution would have been noticed as a violation of the cooperation agreement between the CCP and the KMT (which was technically still in effect). Zhou was finally only released after the intervention of a representative of the Twenty-sixth Army, Zhao Shu, who was able to convince his commanders that the arrest of Zhou had been

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8866-584: The United States, Taiwan, the Soviet Union ( after 1960 ), India, Korea, and Vietnam. Zhou survived the purges of other top officials during the Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976, and was one of the main driving forces behind affairs of state as Mao dedicated much of his later years to political struggle and ideological work. Zhou's attempts at mitigating the Red Guards ' damage and his efforts to protect others from their wrath made him immensely popular in its later stages. Mao's health began to decline in 1971, and Lin Biao fell into disgrace and later died in

9009-414: The Yellow River valley in Henan as the most likely site of the states described in the traditional histories. After 1950, the remnants of the earlier walled settlement of Zhengzhou Shang City were discovered within the modern city of Zhengzhou . It has been determined that the earth walls at Zhengzhou, erected in the 15th century BC, would have been 20 m (66 ft) wide at the base, rising to

9152-402: The Yin' upon Kong An, because he was part of the legacy of the Shang. This branch of the Confucius family is a separate branch from the line that held the title of Marquis of Fengsheng village and later Duke Yansheng. Another remnant of the Shang established the vassal state of Guzhu (present-day Tangshan ), which Duke Huan of Qi destroyed. Many Shang clans that migrated northeast after

9295-399: The afterlife. Perhaps for the same reason, hundreds of commoners, who may have been slaves, were buried alive with the royal corpse. A line of hereditary Shang kings ruled over much of northern China, and Shang troops fought frequent wars with neighbouring settlements and nomadic herdsmen from the inner Asian steppes. The Shang king, in his oracular divinations, repeatedly showed concern about

9438-410: The age of fourteen, Zhou declared that his motivation for pursuing education was to "become a great man who will take up the heavy responsibilities of the country in the future." In 1913, Zhou's uncle was transferred to Tianjin, where Zhou entered the famous Nankai Middle School . Nankai Middle School was founded by Yan Xiu , a prominent scholar and philanthropist, and headed by Zhang Boling , one of

9581-400: The antique industry of Changsha. When he saw the three people, a good idea suddenly struck him, he could buy the square zun with their help. So he showed the square zun to them in detail. The four came to an agreement to buy the square zun together. It was said that soon after they sent the square zun back to Changsha, they secretly spread the news that they planned to resell the square zun with

9724-416: The arrestees' release. Zhou and three other leaders were themselves arrested. The arrestees were held for over six months; during their detention, Zhou supposedly organized discussions on Marxism. At their trial in July, Zhou and six others were sentenced to two months; the rest were found not guilty. All were immediately released since they had already been held over six months. After Zhou's release, he and

9867-447: The background for Zhou's removal from the academy. Zhou participated in two military operations conducted by the Nationalist regime in 1925, later known as the first and second Eastern Expeditions. The first was in January 1925 when Chen Jiongming , an important Cantonese military leader previously driven out of Guangzhou by Sun Yat-sen, attempted to retake Guangzhou. The Nationalist regime's campaign against Chen consisted of forces from

10010-427: The barbarians living outside of the civilised regions, which made up the centre of Shang territory. In particular, the group living in the Yan Mountains were regularly mentioned as hostile to the Shang. Apart from their role as the head military commanders, Shang kings also asserted their social supremacy by acting as the high priests of society and leading the divination ceremonies. As the oracle bone texts reveal,

10153-471: The bourgeoisie, partylords, bureaucrats, inequality between men and women, obstinate ideas, obsolete morals, old ethics... should be abolished or reformed", and affirmed that it was the purpose of the Society to spread this awareness among the Chinese people. It was in this society that Zhou first met his future wife, Deng Yingchao . In some ways, the Awakening Society resembled the clandestine Marxist study group at Peking University headed by Li Dazhao , with

10296-651: The city walls yielded over 200 artefacts, including a gold face covering measuring 18.3 by 14.5 cm (7.2 by 5.7 in). In 1959, the site of the Erlitou culture was found in Yanshi, south of the Yellow River near Luoyang . Radiocarbon dating suggests that the Erlitou culture flourished c.  2100 BC to 1800 BC. They built large palaces, suggesting the existence of an organised state. In 1983, Yanshi Shang City

10439-425: The conduct of their duties, and some grew more independent and emerged as rulers of their own. There was a basic system of bureaucracy in place, with references to positions such as the "Many Dog officers", "Many horse officers", the "Many Artisans", the "Many Archers" or court titles like "Junior Servitor for Cultivation" or "Junior Servitor for labourers". Members of the royal family would be assigned personal estates;

10582-519: The death of his uncle, Zhou Yikui, his inability to master Japanese, and the acute Japanese cultural chauvinism that discriminated against Chinese. By the time that Zhou returned to China in the spring of 1919, he had become deeply disenchanted with Japanese culture, rejecting the idea that the Japanese political model was relevant to China and disdaining the values of elitism and militarism that he observed. Zhou's diaries and letters from his time in Tokyo show

10725-631: The decisive Battle of Muye . According to the Yi Zhou Shu and Mencius the battle was very bloody. The classic Ming dynasty novel Investiture of the Gods retells the story of the war between Shang and Zhou as a conflict with rival factions of gods supporting different sides in the war. After the Shang were defeated, King Wu allowed Di Xin's son Wu Geng to rule the Shang as a vassal kingdom. However, Zhou Wu sent three of his brothers and an army to ensure that Wu Geng would not rebel. After Zhou Wu's death,

10868-454: The divination. Tombs displayed highly ordered arrangements of bones, with groups of skeletons laid out facing the same direction. Chinese bronze casting and pottery advanced during the Shang, with bronze typically being used for ritually significant, rather than primarily utilitarian, items. As early as c.  1500 BC , the early Shang dynasty engaged in large-scale production of bronzeware vessels and weapons. This production required

11011-519: The dynasty's collapse were integrated into Yan culture during the Western Zhou period. These clans maintained an elite status and continued practising the sacrificial and burial traditions of the Shang. Both Korean and Chinese legends, including reports in the Book of Documents and Bamboo Annals , state that a disgruntled Shang prince named Jizi , who had refused to cede power to the Zhou, left China with

11154-422: The earliest known body of Chinese writing , mostly divinations inscribed on oracle bones —usually turtle shells or ox scapulae . More than 20,000 were discovered in the initial scientific excavations during the 1920s and 1930s, and over four times as many have been found since. The inscriptions provide critical insight into many topics from the politics, economy, and religious practices to the art and medicine of

11297-519: The earliest layers of the Wucheng culture predating Anyang have yielded pottery fragments containing short sequences of symbols, suggesting that they may be a form of writing quite different in form from oracle bone characters, but the sample is too small for decipherment. The earliest securely dated event in Chinese history is the start of the Gonghe Regency in 841 BC, early in the Zhou dynasty,

11440-594: The early Zhou , who established the successor state of the Shang, are known to have existed at the same time as the Shang. It has also been suggested the Xia legend originated as a Shang myth of an earlier people who were their opposites. The Erligang culture centred on the Zhengzhou site is found across a wide area of China, even as far northeast as the area of modern Beijing, where at least one burial in this region during this period contained both Erligang-style bronze utensils and local-style gold jewellery. The discovery of

11583-717: The early stages of Chinese history. Several of the Chinese classics discuss the history of the Shang, including the Book of Documents , the Mencius and the Zuo Zhuan . From the sources available to him, the Han dynasty historian Sima Qian assembled a chronological account of the Shang as part of the Shiji ( c.  91 BC ) official history. Sima describes some Shang-era events in detail, while others are only mentioned as taking place during

11726-551: The early successes of the Expedition, there was soon a race between Chiang Kai-shek leading the "right-wing" of the Nationalist Party and the Communists, running inside the "left-wing" of the Nationalists, for control of major southern cities such as Nanjing and Shanghai. At this point the Chinese portion of Shanghai was controlled by Sun Chuanfang , one of the militarists targeted by the North Expedition. Distracted by fighting with

11869-507: The end date than beginning date. The Shang dynasty is the earliest dynasty of traditional Chinese history firmly supported by archaeological evidence. Excavation at the last Shang capital Yinxu , near modern-day Anyang , uncovered eleven major royal tombs and the foundations of palaces and ritual sites, containing weapons of war and remains from both animal and human sacrifices. Tens of thousands of bronze, jade , stone, bone, and ceramic artefacts have been found. The Anyang site has yielded

12012-631: The final separation of the Nationalist and Communist parties and the end of the Soviet-Nationalist alliance in 1927. Zhou's activities immediately after his removal from his positions at Whampoa are uncertain. An earlier biographer claims that Chiang Kai-shek put Zhou in charge of "an advanced training center for the CCP members and commissars withdrawn from the army". More recent Chinese Communist sources claim that Zhou had an important role at this time in securing Communist control of Ye Ting 's Independent Regiment. The regiment and Ye Ting later played

12155-485: The first uprising on 23–24 October, but he was certainly in Shanghai by December 1926. Early accounts credit Zhou with labor organizing activities in Shanghai after his arrival, or, more credibly, working to "strengthen the indoctrination of political workers in labor unions and smuggle arms for the strikers." Reports that Zhou "organized" or "ordered" the second and third uprisings on 20 February and 21 March exaggerate his role. Major decisions during this period were made by

12298-632: The government in Hankou, and the party "right-wing" (led by Chiang Kai-shek) establishing a rival government in Nanjing. Still following Comintern instructions, the Communists remained as a "bloc inside" the Nationalist Party, hoping to continue expanding their influence through the Nationalists. After being attacked by a warlord friendly to Chiang, Wang's leftist government disintegrated later in May 1927, and Chiang's troops began an organized purge of Communists in territories formerly controlled by Wang. In mid-July Zhou

12441-402: The group members using numbers instead of names for "secrecy". (Zhou was "Number Five", a pseudonym which he continued to use in later years.) Indeed, immediately after the group was established, it invited Li Dazhao to give a lecture on Marxism. Zhou assumed a more prominent active role in political activities over the next few months. The largest of these activities were rallies in support of

12584-553: The haste, the square zun was transferred to the warehouse of waste products and was left there. Over time, the matter was forgotten. After the founding of the Communist State, Premier Zhou Enlai gave an instruction to look for the square zun, but no information about it was found. One day in 1952, the Cultural Relics Management Committee of Hunan received a report that some cultural relics had been found in

12727-628: The high point of Zhou's time at Whampoa. In personal terms, 1925 was also an important year for Zhou. Zhou had kept in touch with Deng Yingchao , whom he had met in the Awakening Society while in Tianjin; and, in January 1925, Zhou asked for and received permission from CCP authorities to marry Deng. The two married in Guangzhou on 8 August 1925. Zhou's work at Whampoa came to an end with the Zhongshan Warship Incident of 20 March 1926, in which

12870-595: The impious and cruel final Xia ruler in the Battle of Mingtiao . The Records of the Grand Historian recount events from the reigns of Tang, Tai Jia , Tai Wu , Pan Geng , Wu Ding , Wu Yi and the depraved final king Di Xin , but the rest of the Shang rulers are merely mentioned by name. In the last century, Wang Guowei demonstrated that the succession to the Shang throne matched the list of kings in Sima Qian's Records of

13013-638: The inaugural premier of the People's Republic of China (PRC) from 1949 until his death in 1976, and concurrently as the inaugural Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1949 to 1958. Zhou was a key figure in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and ally of Mao Zedong during the Chinese Civil War , later helping consolidate its control, form its foreign policy , and develop the economy . Born in Jiangsu , as

13156-491: The influence of Zhang Shenfu, who had previously worked there. Zhou was Whampoa's chief political officer. While he was serving in Whampoa, Zhou was also made the secretary of the Communist Party of Guangdong-Guangxi, and served as the CCP representative with the rank of major-general. The island of Whampoa, ten miles downriver from Guangzhou, was at the heart of the Soviet-Nationalist Party alliance. Conceived as

13299-463: The insurrectionists were under strict orders not to harm foreigners, which they obeyed. The forces of Sun Chuanfang withdrew and the uprising was successful, despite the small number of armed forces available. The first Nationalist troops entered the city the next day. As the Communists attempted to install a soviet municipal government, conflict began between the Nationalists and Communists, and on 12 April Nationalist forces, including both members of

13442-447: The invention of many musical instruments and celestial observations of Mars and various comets by Shang astronomers. Their civilisation was based on agriculture and augmented by hunting and animal husbandry. In addition to war, the Shang practised human sacrifice . The majority of human sacrifice victims mentioned in Shang writings were war captives taken from the Qiang people, who lived to

13585-417: The king provided them with pre-determined public works such as walling cities in their regions, distributed materials and issued commands to them. In turn, their estates belonged ultimately to the king's land, and they paid tribute to the king as well as reporting to him about conquered lands. More distant rulers were known by titles translated as marquess or count, who sometimes provided tribute and support to

13728-470: The ladder in civil service, the men in these families often had to be transferred, and in the late years of the Qing dynasty, Zhou Enlai's branch of the family moved to Huai'an. Even after the move, however, the family continued to view Shaoxing as its ancestral home. Zhou's grandfather, Zhou Panlong, and his granduncle, Zhou Jun'ang, were the first members of the family to move to Huai'an. Panlong apparently passed

13871-567: The late 19th century. Zhou Yineng had a reputation for honesty, gentleness, intelligence and concern for others, but was also considered "weak" and "lacking in discipline and determination". He was unsuccessful in his personal life, and drifted across China doing various occupations, working in Beijing , Shandong , Anhui , Shenyang , Inner Mongolia and Sichuan . Zhou Enlai later remembered his father as being always away from home and generally unable to support his family. Soon after birth, Zhou Enlai

14014-563: The main palatial complex, there were underground pits used for storage, servants' quarters, and housing quarters. Many Shang royal tombs had been tunnelled into and ravaged by grave robbers in ancient times, but in the spring of 1976, the discovery of Tomb 5 at Yinxu revealed a tomb that was not only undisturbed, but one of the most richly furnished Shang tombs that archaeologists had yet come across. With over 200 bronze ritual vessels and 109 inscriptions of Fu Hao 's name, Zheng Zhenxiang and other archaeologists realised they had stumbled across

14157-509: The marriage because he feared that his financial prospects would not be promising, and that Yan would, as his father-in-law, later dominate his life. Zhou did well in his studies at Nankai; he excelled in Chinese, won several awards in the school speech club, and became editor of the school newspaper in his final year. Zhou was also very active in acting and producing dramas and plays at Nankai; many students who were not otherwise acquainted with him knew of him through his acting. Nankai preserves

14300-605: The miners) examining the conflict between workers and employers, and the conflict's resolution. After five weeks in London he moved to Paris, where interest in Russia's 1917 October Revolution was high. In a letter to his cousin, Zhou identified two broad paths of reform for China: "gradual reform" (as in England) or "violent means" (as in Russia). Zhou wrote that "I do not have a preference for either

14443-701: The most important Chinese educators of the 20th century. Nankai's teaching methods were unusual by contemporary Chinese standards. By the time Zhou began attending, it had adopted the educational model used at the Phillips Academy in the United States. The school's reputation, with its "highly disciplined" daily routine and "strict moral code", attracted many students who later became prominent in public life. Zhou's friends and classmates there ranged from Ma Jun (an early communist leader executed in 1927) to K. C. Wu (later mayor of Shanghai and governor of Taiwan under

14586-409: The murder of twenty "anti-union" figures, and the kidnapping, beating, and intimidation of others associated with anti-union activities. The third Communist uprising in Shanghai took place from 20 to 21 March. Approximately 600,000 rioting workers cut power and telephone lines and seized the city's post office, police headquarters, and railway stations, often after heavy fighting. During this uprising,

14729-510: The name of their fallen dynasty, Yin. The family retained an aristocratic standing and often provided needed administrative services to the succeeding Zhou dynasty. King Wu of Zhou ennobled Lin Jian ( 林堅 ), the son of Prince Bigan , as the Duke of Bo'ling. The Shiji states that King Cheng of Zhou , with the support of his regent and uncle, the Duke of Zhou , enfeoffed Weiziqi ( 微子啟 ), a brother of Di Xin, as

14872-471: The next several months, this group eventually formed a united organization with a group of Chinese radicals from Hunan, who were living in Montargis south of Paris. This group included such later prominent figures as Cai Hesen , Li Lisan , Chen Yi , Nie Rongzhen , Deng Xiaoping , and also Guo Longzhen, another member of the Awakening Society. Unlike Zhou, most of the students in this group were participants in

15015-469: The northwest of the Shang. Using skeletal isotope analysis, a group of Shang sacrifice victims at the Zhengzhou site was also found to most likely have been war captives. Skulls of sacrificial victims have been found to be similar to modern Chinese ones (based on comparisons with remains from Hainan and Taiwan ). Cowry shells were also excavated at Anyang, suggesting trade with coast-dwellers, but there

15158-500: The oracle bones by posthumous names . The last character of each name is one of the 10 celestial stems , which also denoted the day of the 10-day Shang week on which sacrifices would be offered to that ancestor within the ritual schedule. There were more kings than stems, so the names have distinguishing prefixes such as da ('greater', 大 ), zhong ('middle', 中 ), xiao ('lesser', 小 ), bu ('outer', 卜 ), and zu ('ancestor', 祖 ), as well as other, more obscure ones. The kings, in

15301-407: The order of succession derived from the oracle bones, are here grouped by generation. Later reigns were assigned to oracle bone diviner groups by Dong Zuobin . Zhou Enlai Zhou Enlai ( Chinese : 周恩来 ; pinyin : Zhōu Ēnlái ; Wade–Giles : Chou Ên -lai ; 5 March 1898 – 8 January 1976) was a Chinese statesman, diplomat, and revolutionary who served as

15444-529: The owner of Wanlishan Shop got the square zun, he secretly sent one of his servants to go to Changsha at once to contact Zhao Youxiang ( 赵佑湘 ), the owner of Yifengxiang Cow Leather Shop ( 怡丰祥牛皮商号 ) in Xipailou Street of Changsha city. Zhao opened a cow leather shop on the surface but he secretly engaged in reselling antiques at a profit. He invited Zhao to have a look. After he saw the square zun, he decided to buy it instantly. The owner of Wanlishan Shop offered

15587-469: The party by Zhou. By 1924, the Soviet-Nationalist alliance was expanding rapidly and Zhou was summoned back to China for further work. He left Europe probably in late July 1924, returning to China as one of the most senior Chinese Communist Party members in Europe. Zhou returned to China in late August or early September 1924 to join the Political Department of the Whampoa Military Academy , probably through

15730-490: The party magazine, Shaonian (Youth), later renamed Chiguang (Red Light). It was in Zhou's capacity as general editor of this magazine that Zhou first met Deng Xiaoping , only seventeen years old, whom Zhou hired to operate a mimeograph (copy) machine. The party went through several reorganizations and name changes, but Zhou remained a key member of the group throughout his stay in Europe. Other important activities Zhou undertook included recruiting and transporting students for

15873-611: The period. In July 1919, however, Zhou became editor of the Tianjin Student Union Bulletin, apparently at the request of his Nankai classmate, Ma Jun, a founder of the Union. During its brief existence from July 1919 to early 1920, the Bulletin was widely read by student groups around the country and suppressed on at least one occasion by the national government as "harmful to public safety and social order." When Nankai became

16016-430: The provincial examinations, and Zhou Enlai later claimed that Panlong served as magistrate governing Huai'an county. Zhou's father, Zhou Yineng, was the second of Zhou Panlong's four sons. Zhou's birth mother, surnamed Wan, was the daughter of a prominent Jiangsu official. Like many others, the economic fortunes of Zhou's large family of scholar-officials were decimated by a great economic recession that China suffered in

16159-605: The reign of a particular king. A slightly different account of the Shang is given in the Bamboo Annals , a text whose history is complex: while originally interred in 296 BC, the authenticity of the manuscripts that have survived is controversial. Throughout history, the Shang have also been referred to as "Yin" ( 殷 ). The Shiji and the Bamboo Annals each use this name for both the dynasty, as well as its final capital. Since Huangfu Mi 's Records of Emperors and Kings in

16302-421: The reigns of the last nine Shang kings. The Shang had a fully developed system of writing, preserved on bronze inscriptions and a small number of other writings on pottery, jade and other stones, horn, etc., but most prolifically on oracle bones. The complexity and sophistication of this writing system indicates an earlier period of development, but direct evidence of such is still lacking. Other advances included

16445-465: The revolt was a disaster, with the Communists' forces decimated and scattered. Zhou himself contracted malaria during the campaign and was secretly sent to Hong Kong for medical treatment by Nie Rongzhen and Ye Ting. After reaching Hong Kong, Zhou was disguised as a businessman named "Li" and entrusted to the care of local Communists. In a subsequent meeting of the CCP Central Committee, Zhou

16588-433: The sacrifices to previous kings and the ancestors of the current king, which follow a standard schedule that scholars have reconstructed. From this evidence, scholars have assembled the implied king list and genealogy, finding that it is in substantial agreement with the later accounts, especially for later kings. According to this implied king list, Wu Ding was the twenty-first Shang king. The Shang kings were referred to in

16731-465: The same letter, Zhou told his cousin that, regarding his adoption of a specific ideology, "I still have to make up my mind." While in Europe, Zhou, also named as John Knight, studied the differing approaches to resolving class conflict adopted by various European nations. In London in January 1921, Zhou witnessed a large miners' strike and wrote a series of articles for the Yishi bao (generally sympathetic to

16874-502: The settlement at Anyang, such as the walled city of Sanxingdui in Sichuan . Western scholars are hesitant to designate such settlements as belonging to the Shang. Also unlike the Shang, there is no known evidence that the Sanxingdui culture had a system of writing. The late Shang state at Anyang is thus generally considered the first verifiable civilisation in Chinese history. In contrast,

17017-603: The shoulders of the square zun. A pair of horns and heads of the dragons respectively extends out of the surface of the square zun. In April 1938, when Jiang Jingshu ( 姜景舒 ) and his brothers Jiang Jingqiao ( 姜景桥 ) and Jiang Xiqiao ( 姜喜桥 ) living in Yueshanpu ( 月山铺 ), Huangcai Town , Ningxiang County , Hunan Province were digging to plant sweet potatoes on the mountain, they felt something hard with their hoes. It occurred to them that they also felt something hard here last year. At that time, they ignored it as they thought it might be

17160-517: The spring of 1919. Historians disagree over his participation in the May Fourth Movement (May to June 1919). Zhou's "official" Chinese biography states that he was a leader of the Tianjin student protests in the May Fourth movement, but many modern scholars believe that it is highly unlikely that Zhou participated at all, based on the total lack of direct evidence among the surviving records from

17303-414: The starting price of 200,000 silver dollars though cultural relic vending channels. The Changsha County Government soon learned the news. In order to prevent the national treasure from being lost overseas and possibly destroyed, the government immediately sent police to investigate the matter and finally impounded the square zun. Soon after that the square zun was submitted to Hunan Provincial Government and

17446-445: The state as "Shang" ( 商 ), and to its capital as "Great Settlement of Shang" ( 大邑商 ; Dàyì Shāng ) —nor does it appear in any bronze inscriptions securely dated to the Western Zhou ( c.  1046  – 771 BC). The founding myth of the Shang is described by Sima Qian in the Annals of the Yin . In the text, a woman named Jiandi , who was the second wife of Emperor Ku , swallowed an egg dropped by

17589-469: The tomb of Fu Hao, Wu Ding's most famous consort also renowned as a military general, and mentioned in 170 to 180 oracle bone inscriptions. Along with bronze vessels, stoneware and pottery vessels, bronze weapons, jade figures and hair combs, and bone hairpins were found. The archaeological team argue that the large assortment of weapons and ritual vessels in her tomb correlate with the oracle bone accounts of her military and ritual activities. The capital

17732-520: The training center of the Nationalist Party Army, it was to provide the military base from which the Nationalists would launch their campaign to unify China, which was split into dozens of military satrapies . From its beginning, the school was funded, armed, and partly staffed by the Soviets. The Political Department, where Zhou worked, was responsible for political indoctrination and control. As

17875-486: The way through the night. The news spread like wildfire as news always does, and before long, many antique dealers cast covetous eyes on it. The owner of Wanlishan Shop ( 万利山货号 ) in Huangcai Town was one of them. When he heard the news, then he quickly took silver dollars and came to see the square zun with his servants that very night. He bought it with 400 silver dollars immediately and transferred it to his home. After

18018-645: The work-study program. A series of conflicts with the Chinese administrators of the program over low pay and poor working conditions resulted in over a hundred students occupying the program's offices at the Sino-French Institute in Lyon in September 1921. The students, including several people from the Montargis group, were arrested and deported. Zhou was apparently not one of the occupying students and remained in France until February or March 1922, when he moved with Zhang and Liu from Paris to Berlin. Zhou's move to Berlin

18161-411: Was a central aspect of Shang religion is a subject of debate. There were six main recipients of sacrifice: The Shang believed that their ancestors held power over them and performed divination rituals to secure their approval for planned actions. Divination involved cracking a turtle carapace or ox scapula to answer a question, and to then record the response to that question on the bone itself. It

18304-596: Was a significant period in his career. His pioneering work as a political officer in the military made him an important Communist Party expert in this key area; much of his later career centered on the military. Zhou's work in the CCP Guangdong Regional Committee Military Section was typical of his covert activities in the period. The Section was a secret group consisting of three members of the Provincial Central Committee, and

18447-533: Was able to secure his place as paramount leader by 1978. Zhou Enlai was born on 5 March 1898 in Huai'an , located in the province of Jiangsu , as the first son of his branch of the Zhou family. The Zhou family was originally from Shaoxing in Zhejiang . During the late Qing dynasty , Shaoxing was famous as the home of families such as Zhou's, whose members worked as government clerks generation after generation. To move up

18590-423: Was adopted by his father's youngest brother, Zhou Yigan, who was ill with tuberculosis. Apparently, the adoption was arranged because the family feared Yigan would die without an heir. Zhou Yigan died soon after the adoption, and Zhou Enlai was raised by Yigan's widow, whose surname was Chen. Madame Chen was also from a scholarly family and received a traditional literary education. According to Zhou's own account, he

18733-547: Was apparently occupied for less than a century and destroyed shortly before the construction of the Yinxu complex. Between 1989 and 2000, an important Shang settlement was excavated near Xiaoshuangqiao , about 20 km (12 mi) northwest of Zhengzhou. Covering an intermediary period between the Zhengzhou site and the late capitals on the Huan River , it features most prominently sacrificial pits with articulated skeletons of cattle,

18876-503: Was discovered 6 km (3.7 mi) north-east of the Erlitou site in Yanshi's Shixianggou Township. This was a large walled city dating from 1600 BC. It had an area of nearly 200 ha (490 acres) and featured pottery characteristic of the Erligang culture . The remains of a walled city of about 470 ha (1,200 acres) were discovered in 1999 across the Huan River from the well explored Yinxu site. The city, now known as Huanbei ,

19019-474: Was expelled from Nankai University during his detention.) Although money was a problem, he received a scholarship from Yan Xiu . In order to gain greater funding, he successfully approached a Tianjin newspaper, Yishi bao (literally, Current Events Newspaper), for work as a "special correspondent" in Europe. Zhou left Shanghai for Europe on 7 November 1920 with a group of 196 work study students, including friends from Nankai and Tianjin. Zhou's experiences after

19162-437: Was first responsible for organizing and directing CCP nuclei in the army itself. These nuclei, organized at the regimental level and above, were "illegal", meaning they were formed without Nationalist knowledge or authorization. The Section was also responsible for organizing similar nuclei in other armed groups, including secret societies and key services such as railroads and waterways. Zhou did extensive work in these areas until

19305-443: Was forced to go underground. Pressured by their Comintern advisors, and themselves convinced that the "revolutionary high tide" had arrived, the Communists decided to launch a series of military revolts. The first of these was the Nanchang Revolt . Zhou was sent to oversee the event, but the moving figures seem to have been Tan Pingshan and Li Lisan , while the main military figures were Ye Ting and He Long . In military terms,

19448-438: Was nearly killed in a similar trap, when he was arrested after arriving at a dinner held at the headquarters of Si Lie, a Nationalist commander of Chiang's Twenty-sixth Army. Despite rumors that Chiang had put a high price on Zhou's head, he was quickly released by Pai Ch'ung-hsi's forces. The reasons for Zhou's sudden release may have been that Zhou was then the most senior Communist in Shanghai, that Chiang's efforts to exterminate

19591-613: Was perhaps because the relatively "lenient" political atmosphere in Berlin made it more favorable as a base for overall European organizing. In addition, the Western European Secretariat of the Comintern was located in Berlin and it is clear that Zhou had important Comintern connections, though the nature of these is disputed. After moving operations to Germany, Zhou regularly shuttled between Paris and Berlin. Zhou participated in

19734-595: Was sent to stay with his uncle in Manchuria at Fengtian (now Shenyang ), where Zhou Yigeng worked in a government office. In Fengtian, Zhou attended the Dongguan Model Academy, a modern-style school. His previous education consisted entirely of homeschooling. In addition to new subjects such as English and science, Zhou was also exposed to the writings of reformers and radicals such as Liang Qichao , Kang Youwei , Chen Tianhua , Zou Rong , and Zhang Binglin . At

19877-422: Was the centre of court life. Over time, court rituals to appease spirits developed, and in addition to his secular duties, the king would serve as the head of the ancestor worship cult. Often, the king would even perform oracle bone divinations himself, especially near the end of the dynasty. Evidence from excavations of the royal tombs indicates that royalty were buried with articles of value, presumably for use in

20020-563: Was transferred to Hunan Provincial Bank for safe keeping. In November 1938, the Imperial Japanese Army attacked Changsha, the Hunan Provincial Government and Hunan Provincial Bank were moved to Yuanling County . Before long, in a Japanese air attack, the bank was bombed by the aircraft. The building was razed to the ground. After the victory of the Second Sino-Japanese War , the bank was moved back to Changsha. Due to

20163-543: Was very close to his adoptive mother and acquired his lasting interest in Chinese literature and opera from her. Madame Chen taught Zhou to read and write at an early age, and Zhou later claimed to have read the famous vernacular novel Journey to the West at the age of six. By the age of eight, he was reading other traditional Chinese novels, including the Water Margin , Romance of the Three Kingdoms , and Dream of

20306-809: Was very limited sea trade since China was isolated from other large civilisations during the Shang period. Trade relations and diplomatic ties with other formidable powers via the Silk Road and Chinese voyages to the Indian Ocean did not exist until the reign of Emperor Wu during the Han dynasty (202 BC – 221 AD). At the excavated royal palace in Yinxu, large stone pillar bases were found along with rammed earth foundations and platforms, which according to Fairbank, were "as hard as cement". These foundations in turn originally supported 53 buildings of wooden post-and-beam construction. In close proximity to

20449-421: Was well provided for and did not have to do any work during his stay. Because of his financial position, he was able to devote himself full-time to revolutionary activities. In a letter to his cousin on 30 January 1921, Zhou said that his goals in Europe were to survey the social conditions in foreign countries and their methods of resolving social issues, in order to apply such lessons in China after his return. In

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