The Huizhou Documents a Newl Y Found, Rich And

Zhang Xuehui 5K ~ !, THE HUIZHOU DOCUMENTS A NEWL Y FOUND, RICH AND PRECIOUS SOURCE FOR THE STUDY OF CHINESE HIS TORY Jixi, Shexian, Xiuning, Yixian, Qimen and Wuyuan are six counties located from the southem Anlmi to the northern Jiangxi province. The first five are within the jurisdiction of the modern Anhui Province and the last one, of Jiangxi Province. During Ming and Qing Dynasties in Chinese history, they aB belonged to the Huizhou f*,t 1i'l Prefecture, horne to the renowned scenie spot Huangshan Mountain. Huizhou has been the hometown of many literary figures who played important roles in the development of Chinese culture like Zhu Xi, the founder of Neo-Confucianism, and Hu Shi, the famous modem scholar. Huizhou is now attracting new attention from scholars aB over the world for the diseovery of local documents, whieh cover a span of ab out one thousand years from the Song Dynasty to the 38th year of the Republie of China. The earliest doeument found so far is "Land Sale Contract by Wu Gong in Qimen County in the 8th year of Jiading Reign (1215 AD) in the Song Dynasty" (Songdai Jiading banian Qimen Wu Gong diqi *1~ ~ ;t ;\~~~ n ~A#±1!!.~). The materials in the documents graphicaBy cover not only the six eounties l11entioned above, but also l11any other regions in China as weIl as overseas. There are more than twenty thousand itel11s of Huizhou Doeul11ents eollected l11ainly by the Institute of History and the Institute of Eeonomy of Chinese Aeademy of Social Scienees in Beijing, Animi Province, Nanjing University, Tianjin, and Shandong Provinee. These docUlllents are entirely different from other well-known historieal archives. They are loeal Zhang Xuehui government documents issued in fonner Huizhou Prefecture, a famous developed area in the old Chinese Empire, and private contractual papers about people' s economic and social life. These historical records were kept intact from generation to generation and are of unique value for the study of politics, society, economy, culture, education and folk customs. These comprehensive and original materials with links to many provinces allow scholars to understand not only how the local government ran under the feudal imperial court and the daily life of ancient Chinese people, but also the evolution and development of Chinese society. The Huizhou Documents are of unpredictable importance for the study of Chinese history and will undoubtedly be a great contribution. To make the study of the documents more systematic, researchers of the Institute of History at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) have catalogued them. The following is abrief introduction to the documents. Part One: Private Documents Land Papers 1. Land Tenant ContTaets During the Ming and Qing times tenants were the main managers of land in Huizhou, hence there were a great number öf contracts concerning various tenant forms of land. They pointed out the high rental cost and drew a vivid picture of the complex tenant relations with other classes. 2. The ContTaets ofLand Tenant Right Changing In Huizhou a tenant had partial ownership of the rental land due to its cultivation and amelioration. This transferable right is called "surface of land (tian pi lf1 Jt: right of use)", «the land of labour (li Jen tian :h 7t lf1)>> or «the land of manure (jen eao tian ~ 1P- lf1 )>>. The tenant could seil his surface of land. In the Ming Dynasty, this kind of deal was titled the «sale of land surface (xiao mai tian IJ\ tE lf1 »). If the landowner wanted to change tenants, he had to pay the former tenant to redeem the surface of land. The surface of land could be mortgaged also as a means of tenant transfer. For example, if the tenant of a forest land planted trees during his lease term, when the trees 218 .

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