Have you ever wondered what's the difference between a king and an emperor in ancient China? This video explains how the fengjian system works. Let us know if you have any questions of other historical things you want us to explain.
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In concept, a king in the Western world might be similar to an emperor in China,
but there are also kings in China, and many kings serve the same emperor.
Hence, there's a huge difference between kings and emperors in China,
and I'm going to explain all of this in this video.
In ancient China, there's a political ideology called Feng Jian,
meaning decentralized system of government.
Many people compare it to feudalism in Europe.
It started around Zhou Dynasty.
There's only one person who is Tianzi, son of the heaven,
Tian Xia, land underneath heaven,
and this person is the emperor.
And when the emperor passed away,
his oldest legitimate son will become the next emperor.
Then what happened to his younger brothers?
As you know, emperors usually have many concubines,
besides his wife, the empress,
and they often bear many offsprings as for the emperor.
The emperor will divide his land into many fields and assign them to his brothers.
So they become Zhu Hou, kings of their own country,
Fang Guo.
When these kings pass away,
their first legitimate son will become the next king,
and his brothers will each get a piece of land from the country.
They are called Dafu, and the land they rule is called Caiyi.
When Dafu passed away,
his first legitimate son becomes the next Dafu,
and the rest of his sons each get a piece of land from Caiyi and become a Shi.
The land he owns is called Lutian.
Emperor, king, Dafu, and Shi all belong to the noble class,
and they have the right to be educated.
But kings have to bow and listen to their emperor,
though he has power within his own land.
After the Warring States period, the end of Zhou dynasty,
this system was abandoned by Qing dynasty.
But after the end of the Qing dynasty,
emperor of the Han dynasty revived it,
and for the next thousands of years until the last dynasty, Qing dynasty,
this system has been continuously used in their own way in each dynasty.
Well, I hope this explains the difference between emperors and kings in ancient China.
Let us know if you have any questions
or want to learn more about Chinese culture and history.
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