Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Still other historians and anthropologists have sought to explain
Sino-nomadic warfare in ecological terms. That is, they have examined
the differing ecologies and economies of pastoral nomadic and civi-
lized, agricultural societies and have concluded that an agricultural
economy is much more complex and productive than a pastoral
nomadic economy. Certain commodities desired or needed by pastoral
nomads can be produced only by civilized societies. When pastoral
nomads feel a need or desire for these commodities, they attack. Three
scholars have argued along these lines, but with different points of
emphasis: Sechin Jagchid, a native of Inner Mongolia; Thomas Barfield,
an American anthropologist; and A. M. Khazanov, a Russian
anthropologist who emigrated to the United States in the 1980s.
Jagchid argues that the pastoral nomads attacked China only when
the Chinese refused, for whatever reason, to trade with them in the
commodities they desperately needed: metals, textiles, and grain.
Barfield's perspective is that the attacks were made mainly for luxury
items (not subsistence commodities, as in Jagchid's theory), which were
used to finance nomadic empires. Khazanov argues that the nomads
simply did whatever they estimated was the easiest: trading or raiding.
The Xiongnu rose to power at about the same time the Qin unified
China. After establishing his dynasty, Liu Bang launched an attack
on the Xiongnu that turned out disastrously for him; he was badly
defeated and barely escaped with his life. For centuries after this, the
Han Chinese feared and respected the Xiongnu. Liu Bang decided that
the Xiongnu were there to stay, so he and the Xiongnu established a
framework called the “intermarriage system” for diplomatic relations
between the two states. This system entailed four basic elements:
1. Annual payments of silk, wine, and foodstuffs from Han to Xiongnu
2. Granting the shanyu (the leader of the Xiongnu) an imperial Han prin-
cess to wife
3. Equality between Han and Xiongnu
4. Defined borders between Han and Xiongnu
Border markets were also established between the two states, but not
as formal elements in the intermarriage system. According to Barfield,
wine and silk were luxury items and the payment of them to the
Xiongnu substantiates his thesis; Jagchid, on the other hand, considers
that the presence of border markets and the payments of food to the
Xiongnu are favorable to his theoretical perspective.
The intermarriage system of diplomacy is sometimes laconically
called the “brides and bribes” policy. Of course, it viewed women, in
