The Context

Ever since 1912 after the end of China’s last imperial dynasty in 1911, Chinese people have been celebrating the turn of two calendars: One is the Gregorian calendar on January 1, as most people around the world do, and the other on the first day of the lunar calendar. Chinese New Year’s Day changes annually according to the Gregorian calendar.
Indeed, the lunar calendar we use today is also a result of the exchange between China and the West.
Some say that China’s first calendar was created about 4,000 years ago during the Xia Dynasty. It is still called the Xia calendar today. Most Chinese historians consider the Xia civilization as China’s first dynasty. During China’s last dynasty, the Qing, the calendar was based in Western astronomy and technology. The introduction and adoption of the technology in calendar making is an amazing story of early exchanges between China and the West. 

The xia that possess martial arts skills are called wuxia, “wu” meaning “martial arts”. These fictional figures first appeared in a unique genre of literature from the Tang dynasty called “legend novels”. They usually feature youxia. Similar to the later ronin of feudal Japan, youxia are wandering warriors that travel the world and live by their own moral code. However, unlike the ronin, many possessed magical kungfu abilities. Some were immortal swordsmen. These novels featured legendary figures and storylines based in mythology.   Wuxia's  jianghu world took shape in Ming and Qing literature. Readers are more attracted to the jianghu world for the way wuxia use their magic kungfu to mete out vigilante justice, their sense of brotherhood and other actions that are otherwise impossible for people in regular society. Jianghu figures sometimes reject mainstream values. Some wuxia figures find pride in not following social norms. Traditional cultural elements attenuate the thrill of fights and weapons, but accentuate the ethereal taste of the stories.

On November 14, 2020, Stephen Ellison, the newly appointed British consul-general in Chongqing, was visiting a nearby tourist attraction when he saw a young woman drowning in the river. Without hesitation, he dived in and saved her life. The video clip of his brave action went viral and he received copious praise. He was presented with the Chongqing Special Award for Justice and Courage and 50,000 yuan ($7,600) by The Chongqing Foundation for Justice and Courage. He donated the money to a local charity. 

Justice and courage are probably the core of Chinese values with a long history, referred to as xia (侠), or chivalry. A chivalrous hero is expected to be willing and strong enough to help people where official justice or relief is not accessible. Xia, especially wuxia（武侠）which means xia with martial arts like kung fu, is a very popular part of Chinese culture. It would be too late to wait for the police to come to the rescue of the drowning woman. The 61-year old gentleman did not hesitate to save her life. He was the champion for his age group at the Beijing International Triathlon in 2019, which involved swimming, running and cycling. His willingness and a sort of “kung fu” of saving a stranger in danger no doubt fits the image of a chivalrous person among the Chinese public. Kung fu in modern Chinese is also used as a metaphor, referring to a skill. 

Records of chivalrous people in China can be found in books written more than 2,300 years ago. But in the early years they were people that defied the imperial authorities or mainstream values in society. They were marginalized or even cracked down on. They did not have magic kung fu. Their image and the attitude toward them changed later. Given this, over thousands of years, chivalry, as a spirit or a value, is present in different groups in different ways during different times in China’s history. Chivalrous people were real or fictional in the process. It is a story about how people projected their expectations for life and justice on something they could not get in the real world.

For most of its history, China was not isolationist. For nearly 1,500 years up to the 14th century, China was a major trading nation. Maritime trade boomed during the Southern Song and Yuan dynasties from the early 12th century to late 14th century, making the Southern Song the wealthiest of all Chinese dynasties. 

So why did China’s last two dynasties, the Ming and Qing, turn their backs on openness and the wealth it brought? Why did they shift to a strict policy of isolation? 

People today have good reason to criticize the narrow-minded ruling class of the Ming and Qing. But among their reasons is that the enormous wealth generated from foreign trade also was the downfall of the powerful family, the world’s largest port city, and dynasties that underwrote it. 

For most of time since the establishment of the Ming Dynasty in the second half of the 14th century till the early 1980s, trading with the rest of the world was banned or restricted in China. By contrast, right before Ming’s closed door policy, China had already been involved in an enormous maritime trade for hundreds of years. And before it explored trade on the sea, its trade with Europe via West Asia and the Arabian Peninsula on the Silk Road had been going on for hundreds of years.   The Southern Song was a smaller, weaker dynasty than the Tang or Northern Song, but it was the richest dynasty in China’s history. It ruled the Yangtze River and Pearl River areas, the most prosperous regions in China. Maritime trade reached its peak in this period, contributing a lot to the prosperity of the dynasty. 

China’s total fertility rate has been below 2.1 for nearly three decades, the necessary number of children born to every woman to maintain current population levels. Families valued having children more in ancient China than today. As a Chinese saying goes: “emperors love their eldest son most, while ordinary people love their youngest son most.”  In addition, The link between prosperity and population is prevalent in Chinese history. In ancient China, prioritizing agriculture provided incentive to have more children.  And how changes in genetics and environment affect human fertility has been an increasingly important focus of study over the past 20 years. 

Anything in today’s toolbox for care for the elderly can be found in ancient China.  The question is how old was regarded as old enough to be entitled to State-guaranteed elderly care measures.  The consensus among researchers is that a typical family consisted of about five members since the Warring States period between the 5th and 3rd centuries. It was not as big as people think.  Imperial rulers were implementing a tax policy contradictory with the values they themselves advocated. The taxation system was disintegrating families. The longest history of any non-government charity organization in China was the 800 years operation of the estate built to provide for patriarchal clan members of a famous literati and politician in the Northern Song dynasty.  

 No other scholar in China’s history has had such a deep influence on popular culture as Su Dongpo, one of the brightest stars in the vast galaxy of China’s literary past. Indeed, if you only have time to learn about one ancient Chinese scholar, Su Shi is the right choice. Why is he loved so much? He was both admired and hated in his time.  But for about 1,000 years, Su’s attitude toward life has been admired by Chinese intellectuals. For both scholars and ordinary people, he is a real person who can always find the fun and meaning in life, no matter what comes his way. 

The anticipated listing and the unexpected suspension put the microloan business of Alibaba's fintech arm Ant Group in the media spotlight. Chinese people seem to have long impressed the world for their preference for saving. Their enthusiasm for borrowing is apparently a new phenomenon. But did ancient Chinese borrow? If they did, how?  Why was the "square hole the big brother" so important for more than 2,000 years in China? How can ancient rich people keep 10 million copper coins in their house?  

Do people travel just because they got rich enough to afford a trip? “The world is so big, and I want to look at it,” says  a middle school teacher from Central China’s Henan Province, in her letter of resignation in 2015.  “A person has to be impulsive twice in their life: to fall head over heals in love and to go on a trip without any hesitation,”said another popular online post in 2016. So do we really need a good reason to travel? For ancient Chinese scholars, they did need a good reason to travel. But the most famous ventures in ancient China happened in the dreams of China's great poet and a young lady in a classic drama.