The Chen-jen 鎮人 of the Northern Wei 北魏 Dynasty

Naoe Naoko

doi:10.24471/shigaku.92.2_137

The Northern Chen 北鎮 during the Northern Wei period has been by now studied from the view point of its military system. Accordingly the Chen-jen who were listed in the Chen's registration were regarded as the soldiers of the Northern Wei army. We suppose, however, that the Chen-jen means the people under the Chen's civil administration, and that there was no crucial difference between the soldiers and the people in the Northern Chen, unlike the obvious difference between the "Ch'eng-jen" 城人 and the "Chou-min" 州民 in the interior regions. If we compare the "Ch'eng-jen" and the "Chen-jen" in the Northern Chen, it can be understood that the fixed "Ch'eng-jen" were only the ones who were exiled to the Chen, and that the "Chen-jen" were originally the producers who settled in the "Hsiang-li" 郷里 or the "Pu-lo" 部落, and when necessary, were conscripted as soldiers. Their main occupations were agriculture and stock-farming. Concerning the revenue and the land-holding system, they seemed not soldier-farmers (屯田) but the land-hold farmers who were registered in the "Chun-t'ien" 均田 system. They were also independent stock farmers, though they must have differed from the agricultural Chen-jen as the social system. Therefore the "Hsiang-li" and the "Pu-lo" were the societies which the independent producers, that is, the Chen-jen formed spontaneously. In the end of the Northern Wei, there became created the differentiation between the powerful "Hao-ch'iang" 豪強 and the poor "Hsi-min" 細民 in the Northern Chen society. When the Chen-jen served as the soldiers, they were used to destroy their own society, for they were under the control of the Chen officials who tended to appreciate the Hao-ch'iang to dominate the Hsi-min. This was the circumstance of the Liu-Chen 六鎮 Rebellion. In this situation, the "Hao-chieh" 豪傑 and the "Hao-hsia" 豪侠, who became the political leaders of the Later Northern Dynasty, formed the core to unify the people in the Hsiang-li society.

The Chen-jen 鎮人 of the Northern Wei 北魏 Dynasty

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