Wenyi ShangMar 7, 2023
My article with
@TedUnderwood
for the special issue of #IJDH on digital humanities and East Asia studies is available at: https://rdcu.be/cXhLQ. The article in the journal website can be found at: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s42803-022-00054-7.
We discussed the relationship between civil service examination records and political independence in Tang China (755–907 C.E.) 1/7
Civil service examination records and political independence in the autonomous northeastern region during the second half of the Tang dynasty (755–907 C.E.)

Show threadWenyi ShangMar 7, 2023
We assembled a list of "hometowns" (further explained below) of each degree holder in the civil service examinations, and tracked the geographical distribution of their hometowns. We found the center of examination success moved away from the autonomous northeastern region. 2/7
Show threadWenyi ShangMar 7, 2023
The center of examination success within the northeastern region shifted southwestward from the northeastern part of the region, where many great
clans originated from but became highly independent in the late Tang. This result corresponds to the decline of the great clans. 3/7
Show threadWenyi Shang
The detailed temporal variation of the proportion of degree holders shows that fewer of them had a northeastern hometown when the region was more politically independent. Only one "changepoint" was detected, so that the downward tendency was the only significant tendency. 4/7
Mar 7, 2023 at 7:36pmWeb
Show threadWenyi ShangMar 7, 2023
The "hometown" of a person mostly didn't refer to his actual birthplace, but "choronym", an indicator of his elite status as a member of a great clan originated there. Then why fewer degree holders had a northeastern hometown when the region was more politically independent? 5/7
Show threadWenyi ShangMar 7, 2023
We proposed this interpretation: the autonomous provincial governments offered office-holding opportunities to distract elites from non-prominent clans from the civil service examination, and the growing political independence of the region prompted elites from great clans to leave the region, accelerating the decline of the great clans with choronyms in the northeastern region. These contributed to the cultivation of a distinctive meritocratic culture in the region. 6/7
Show threadWenyi ShangMar 7, 2023
Our special thanks to the editors @hildedeweerdt and @alizhorvathaliz and the anonymous reviewers! 7/7