Duke of Zhou's Regency, the Fengjian System and Ritual Order
- Date
- c. 1042–1036 BCE
- Category
- Politics & governance
- Region
- North China (Wei and Yellow River valleys)
- Era
- Ancient Civilizations
- Significance
When King Wu died only a few years after the conquest, his brother the Duke of Zhou (Zhou Gong) served as regent for the boy-king Cheng.
His own brothers, allied with the Shang heir Wu Geng, rose in the Rebellion of the Three Guards; the Duke crushed it in a three-year eastern campaign and consolidated Zhou control over the former Shang lands. To govern a realm far larger than the Zhou heartland, he greatly extended the fengjian system, parcelling out territories as fiefs to royal kinsmen and loyal allies — establishing lineage states such as Lu, Qi, Yan and Jin — bound to the king by ritual, kinship and military obligation. He is traditionally credited with codifying the rites and music (li) that ordered Zhou aristocratic society and with articulating the Mandate of Heaven as a moral charter of rule. Idealised by later Confucians (Confucius revered him as a model statesman), the Duke of Zhou's settlement shaped Chinese political culture, the decentralised order of the Western Zhou, and the ethical conception of legitimate kingship for centuries.
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Empires active in c. 1042–1036 BCE
- Zhou Dynasty1046 BCE – 256 BCE
- Kingdom of Kush1070 BCE – 350 CE
- Phoenician City-States1200 BCE – 539 BCE
- Elamite Kingdom2700 BCE – 539 BCE
Related politics & governance events
- Egyptian–Hittite peace treaty (the 'Eternal Treaty')c. 1259 BCE
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- Mycenaean Takeover of Knossos and the Linear B Archivesc. 1450 BCE
- Ahmose I expels the Hyksos and founds the New Kingdomc. 1550 BCE
- Code of Hammurabi inscribed on the basalt stelec. 1755 BCE
- Senusret III's Nubian campaigns and administrative centralisationc. 1850 BCE
Further reading
The wider story
The Cambridge Illustrated History of China
Accessible illustrated survey; good on Zhou China and Confucius.
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