EARLY IMPERIAL CHINA

Tiancháo (Pinyin, "Celestial Empire")

Zhongguó (Pinyin, "Central State")

Qin/Ch'in Dynasty (Pinyin, Qíncháo ) (221 - 202 BCE)

Han Dynasty (Pinyin, Hàncháo) (202 BCE - 222 CE)

Three Kingdoms—Wei (220 - 265 CE), Shu (221 - 263 CE), Wu (229 - 280 CE)

Jin/T'sin Dynasty (Pinyin, Jìncháo) (265 - 420 CE)

 

The gallery for Early Imperial China covers the period beginning with the accession of Zhou Zheng (also called Ying Zheng) as First Emperor of China (Qín Shǐ Huángdi) and ending with the abdication of Emperor Gong of Jin (Jin Gongdì). The figures pictured above best represent those of the Western Han Dynasty, although they could be used to represent those of the Qin, Xin, Eastern Han, and Jin with minimal anachronism. During this period, the Central State (Zhongguó) of China was created and consolidated from formerly disparate kingdoms and tribes, eventually encompassing a broad swathe of territory centered on the three great river systems of China—the Yellow River (Huang Ha) in the north, the Yangzi/Yangtze River (Dajiang) in the center, and the Pearl River (Zhujiang) in the south. To these alluvial lands were appended the North China Plain, the Guangdong/Canton Basin, the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau, and the Sichuan/Szechwan/Szechuan Basin. For the next 2,000 years, these geographical boundaries would delimit, for the Chinese, the boundaries between the civilized (wénmíng) and the barbarians (yi). The Early Imperial period is marked by the building of common institutions and ethnic identities (i.e., ethnogenesis), weaving the many cultural threads of ancient China into a complex, but coherent, tapestry. Ironically, the first state to unify China, Qin/Ch’in, from which we get the modern English word, “China,” had its homeland on the North China Plain, outside the core alluvial territories of China, but for the remainder of the Early Imperial Period, the locus of imperial power lay in the eastern alluvial lands. The Early Imperial Period encompasses the Qin/Ch'in Dynasty (221-202 BCE), the Western Han Dynasty (202 BCE-8 CE), the Xin Dynasty (9-23 CE), the Eastern Han Dynasty (9-222 CE), the Three Kingdoms Period (220-280 CE), and the Jin/T'sin Dynasty (265-420 CE). This period of political, social, cultural, and military continuity ended when the Jin/T'sin Dynasty collapsed in a series of civil wars. Most of northern China was then conquered by nomad peoples from the Mongolian and Manchurian steppes, setting off a mass migration of ethnic Han Chinese to the provinces south of the Yangzi River, which then formed the border between the Sinicized barbarian kingdoms of the north and the Sinicized Han-Yue successor states of the south (hence, the succeeding period is known as the Northern & Southern Dynasties Period, ca. 420-580 CE).

 

Tactically, the armies of the Early Imperial Period (221 BCE-420 CE) were the product of the evolution of Chinese military doctrines during the Warring States Period (403-222 BCE), which broke with the aristocratic-heroic traditions of Archaic China (1200-404 BCE). This evolution led away from armies composed primarily of kings and nobles and their retainers dueling from chariots and dismounting to fight in single combat to armies composed primarily of professionals (volunteer career soldiers) and conscripts trained to a standard and equipped by the state. This led to much larger armies that could stay in the field for prolonged campaigns, to garrison permanent frontier outposts, and to carry out group maneuvers (aristocratic armies put a high premium on individual martial prowess, not group maneuver). It also saw the gradual abandonment of chariots (zhanche) as a fighting platform—during the Western Han, generals and other commanders sometimes used chariots as a kind of observation post behind the battle lines, but they were usually not used for combat; and by the beginning of the Eastern Han they were absent from battlefields altogether, having been replaced by cavalry. Finally, Early Imperial Chinese armies saw the emergence of crossbows (nu) as the dominant missile weapon, bows (gong) generally being relegated to the use of skirmishers (mounted or on foot) or barbarian auxiliaries (slings were unknown, and thrown spears/javelins/darts were weapons for barbarians). The core of most Early Imperial Chinese armies (jun) was usually close-order infantry fighting in phalanx-like formations (bu) of between five and ten ranks (commanders' preference), although during the Western Han several all-cavalry armies were mustered to carry out campaigns on the steppe against the nomadic Xiōngnú of the Mongolian Plateau (although this was achieved by supplementing the relatively small domestic cavalry corps with large numbers of nomad auxiliaries). Tactical manuals dating from this period put a heavy emphasis on prolonged crossbow fire (often using a rank rotation system that allowed for more-or-less continuous fire), followed by an advance into close combat by specialist close combat infantry. Cavalry, infantry skirmishers, barbarian auxiliaries, and picked units of elite infantry were all used to maneuver around the flanks of the main battle formation to attempt to gain a tactical advantage or to achieve strategic objectives.

 

The bu was a relatively dense phalanx-like formation that seems to have been used for close combat cavalry (tuqi), crossbowmen (qiangnu), and close combat infantry (bing). Bu is usually translated as “regiment” in English, due to the fact that the corresponding Chinese formation does not seem to have been as densely populated as the Greco-Macedonian phalanx, and the size, command structure, and operational parameters are roughly analogous to the modern regimental system. Regiments of crossbowmen and regiments of close combat infantrymen were usually deployed in support of one-another. The crossbow and close combat regiments were either deployed side-by-side, alternating between regiments of crossbowmen and regiments of close combat infantrymen, or the crossbowmen were deployed in front of the close combat infantrymen, with the intention that they would retreat through the ranks of the close combat infantrymen if they needed to seek refuge behind them (for this to work, the close combat regiment could not have been too densely populated). The bu was normally arranged into five or ten ranks (each rank being a parallel line of infantrymen). Most of the close combat infantrymen carried shields of at least three different designs—the most popular was the "double-arc" shield (shuang hu), a tombstone-shaped body shield with scalloped edges, followed by the rectangular body shield with a sharply tapered top edge (dun), and finally there was also an all-iron or bronze parrying buckler (gou rang) that was a small rectangular shield with a prominent spike for punching and a hooked iron bar projecting from the top and bottom edge that was designed to aid in hooking sword, dagger-axe, and spear/pike blades and pulling them aside or even breaking them. The close combat infantry carried a variety of weapons that gave the Han phalanx some tactical nuance. There were swordsmen (liren or jianshi) armed either with a double-edged sword (jian) or a single-edged sword (dao), spearmen (changmao) armed with a thrusting spear or pike (mao), and polearm fighters (changzu) armed with either a dagger-axe (ji) or a swordstaff (gun). The dagger-axe had a small scythe-like blade attached at a right angle beneath the spear-point on a spear-shaft that was used for chopping downward at the heads and shoulders of enemy fighters, for hooking shields and trying to pry them away from enemy fighters, or for reaching under the shields to attempt to hamstring enemy fighters. At this period in history, the swordstaff was just what you would expect—a sword blade attached to a short spear shaft in order to increase the wielder's reach—although in later centuries this weapon would evolve into a glaive-like weapon. We do not know for certain, but it is likely that the dedicated swordsmen were officers, although most early imperial soldiers carried a sword and/or dagger as a sidearm. Unfortunately, the use of terms for edged weapons in Middle Chinese generally lacked specificity, and both jian and dao could refer to a range of edged weapons from small knives to two-handed swords (the name simply refers to whether the blade had one or two edges). However, archeological finds have revealed at least two general types of jian and five types of dao (many of these styles remained in use in succeeding centuries and later acquired more specific names). Jian could have a blade about 18 inches in length (a dagger) or 31 inches in length (a one-handed sword), while dao was the same, although there were types that were much longer (a two-handed sword), that were gently curved (like a saber), or that had a broad profile (like a machete). Body armor (jia or kai)—worn by crossbowmen, close combat infantrymen, and close combat cavalrymen—consisted mainly of a corselet of lamellar (tiny rectangular plates called lamellae sewn in overlapping rows onto a leather shirt) or a coat-of-plates (larger rectangular plates sewn in rows that did not overlap), with a front torso and back torso piece connected by silk cords at the shoulders and waist. Sometimes shoulder pieces were added that extended protection down to the elbow, and sometimes extensions were added to the hips that provided protection to the hips and upper thighs. The corselet with hardened leather lamellae/plates was standard issue, while junior officers (junhou and tunzhang), picked cavalry (yueqi), and picked infantry (yuebing) seem most often to have been able to upgrade their armor with metal lamellae/plates (bronze or iron), while the most elaborate armor (with upper arm, hip, and thigh protection as well as metal lamellae/plates) was often reserved for senior officers (jiangjun, pian-jiangjun, and xiaowei)(see below for a discussion of these ranks). Similarly, most crossbowmen, close combat infantrymen, and cavalrymen seem to have fought without helmets (toukui)—using a padded felt cap or thick topknot of hair as minimal protection—although elites, once again, could upgrade their panoply with lamellar helmets, sometimes with lamellar protection for the neck (junior officers), or conical caste-bronze or iron helmets, often with a lamellar neck-guard (senior officers). As mentioned above, regiments of elite close combat infantrymen were often created, including the 2,000-man imperial guard regiment (nanjun-bu). Picked regiments of elite close combat fighters (yuebing) were sometimes formed as an elite strike force. They were usually better equipped than average close combat regiments, although they seem to have been even less densely populated formations that were intended to be more mobile.

 

The domestic cavalry arm was divided into close combat cavalry regiments (tuqi) and skirmisher regiments (qingqi). As with the infantry, generals also sometimes formed picked regiments of close combat cavalrymen (yueqi). The armor and weapons of the close combat cavalry—including upgrades for officers—was virtually identical to those of the infantry, although cavalrymen do not seem to have carried shields, and the cavalry lance (pi) seems to have generally been longer than the infantry spear/pike (mao). Horse armor did not appear in China until near the end of the Eastern Han, at which time an evolutionary process began that would culminate in the development of fully armored (man and horse) shock cavalry by the end of the Northern & Southern Dynasties Period (beyond the scope of this gallery). Close combat cavalry regiments also often included some ultimately unknown proportion of mounted crossbowmen that used a lighter crossbow. These crossbowmen seem to have been an integral part of the close combat cavalry regiment (i.e., they did not form a separate regiment), although we may presume that they likely formed the front rank(s) of the cavalry regiment, and when close combat was imminent, the other cavalrymen probably charged past them. There is no evidence that Chinese close combat cavalry of this period fought in anything like the densely populated formations of Central Asian, Western Asian, and Mediterranean cataphracts. Like the close combat infantry regiment, the close combat cavalry regiment was not nearly so densely populated, leaving room for both the aforementioned maneuver and the effective wielding of polearms like the dagger-axe and swordstaff. At least some close combat cavalry regiments seem to have been devoted to a tactical stance I would characterize as skirmishers (usually lightly equipped fighters operating in low-density formations), although the majority of skirmisher cavalry regiments consisted of horse archers (there were never very many of either, the Chinese preferring to use barbarian auxiliaries to fill these roles). It is my suspicion that the skirmishers that carried close combat weapons were actually ad hoc sub-units of a close combat cavalry regiment that were detailed to act as scouts and skirmishers when no other such fighters were available, while we know that the horse archer regiments were specifically designed to mimic the hordes of the steppe nomads. Although the crossbow reigned supreme as the ranged weapon of choice, thrown spears/javelins were considered weapons for barbarians (particularly the Qiang and Yue), and slings were almost completely unknown, there were small numbers of domestic (i.e., non-barbarian) infantry skirmishers armed with a bow (jisheshi). Infantry bow-armed skirmishers do not seem to have been organized into regiments—the most reasonable theory I’ve read is that they were likely conscripts recruited on an ad hoc basis (perhaps in commanderies where there was a strong tradition of archery), and that they were likely organized into companies (see below) that were brigaded with close combat infantry regiments to serve as auxiliaries. There were never very many of them. For unknown reasons, despite the relative ubiquity of crossbows—even being used by some close combat cavalrymen—both mounted and infantry skirmishers in the Early Imperial Chinese military system seem primarily to have been armed with bows, the bow apparently being considered a weapon particularly well-suited to skirmishing. The best theoretical explanation I've read is that the more rapid rate of fire of a bow in relation to a crossbow might have had something to do with this viewpoint, but like I said, we ultimately do not know. As stated above, Han armies continued to include chariotry (zhanche) until the end of the Western Han, although they seem to have been used as a command platform for senior officers (jiangjun, pian-jiangjun, and xiaowei), they did not generally form a distinct corps, and they do not seem to have had an overt combat role. There were two types of chariot—heavy chariots drawn by four horses and light chariots drawn by one or two horses. The heavy chariots could be quite large—with a crew of 3-5 (driver, commander, and two or three bodyguards)—although unarmored (they occasionally had an oversized parasol to protect the crew from arrows/bolts), and the light chariots generally only had a crew of 1-3 (driver, commander, and possibly a bodyguard). We may assume that senior officers used the heavy chariots and junior officers the light chariots, although the light chariots were also used in the dispatch corps and in the imperial post (the latter role continuing well past the time when chariots ceased to be used in combat, and civilian usage continued throughout the Early Imperial Period). The reason for their demise as a battlefield vehicle, even as an observation post, was that during the first Han-Xiongnu War (ca. 133 BCE-89 CE), it was discovered that the chariotry found it impossible to keep up with, and effectively maneuver with, the all-cavalry army, which caused commanders to often lose touch with the units in their command. For those historical strategy gamers that insist on having a unit of Han chariotry, there is a possibility that during the early decades of the Han consolidation of power (ca. 202-157 BCE), before the Han established the three-tiered bureaucracy throughout the empire, that there may have been some vassal kings and their nobles that still chose to fight as combat chariotry. Artillery came in two general types—bed crossbows and traction catapults. Bed crossbows were basically just very large crossbows that had to be mounted on a wheeled platform (i.e., on its bed) in order to be maneuvered on a battlefield (otherwise, they were mounted onto a static fortification or the deck of a ship). The Han referred to the wheeled field mounts as "army strong carts" (jun de dache). Like the terms for knife/dagger and sword (discussed above), Middle Chinese lacked specific terms for these large crossbows (generally referred to by modern historians as ballistae), simply using the same term for an ordinary crossbow (nu). The largest of army strong carts usually had a crew of 4-7 men and fired bolts that were up to ten feet long (basically a spear or lance), although there were also smaller versions with a crew of 2-3 that fired smaller bolts. Traction catapults, also sometimes called traction trebuchets, are so called because they were operated by men that pulled ropes attached to one end of the throwing arm to power the machine and launch shot, and they required traction to give them enough leverage to do so. As with so many things regarding the military history of Early Imperial China, the terminology used in reference to catapults/trebuchets lacks specificity, although the term pao seems most often to be associated with catapults/trebuchets. Pao is sometimes used to refer to tension/torsion artillery in general, but herein I will use it only in reference to catapults/trebuchets. Larger versions used primarily in siege and naval warfare had the colorful name of "Crouching Tiger" (Hun Dao) because the design reminded observers of a tiger crouching in preparation to leap and pounce, but the smaller two-wheeled version that was used in the field seems to have been referred to simply as pao. The field catapult was attached to an oversized wheelbarrow-like conveyance with a single upright column support for the throwing arm. The pillar could be pivoted in order to better aim the catapult without need of moving the entire conveyance, although of course the entire machine could be moved and re-positioned. It had a crew of between 4 and 10 men, and fired 15-pound shot or flaming pots (see below). There were repeating, rapid-fire crossbows of both the hand-held (lian nu) and mounted varieties. The hand-held repeating crossbow could fire 28-48 bolts per minute, while the mounted version could fire 6-12 ten-foot bolts per minute! However, as you might expect, the manufacture of such complicated weapons was difficult, the number of men capable of producing and maintaining such weapons was small, and modern reproductions of the design of the hand-held Chinese repeating crossbow have been tested and showed significantly lower bolt velocity (the mechanisms were also prone to jamming). Neither weapon seems to have gained widespread use. Gunpowder was not invented by the Chinese until the tenth century CE (Tang Dynasty), although other incendiaries were used in combat in the Early Imperial Period. Archers (jisheshi) sometimes used fire-arrows (with a cloth soaked in a mixture of mineral oil and sulfur wrapped around the arrow shaft just behind the arrowhead that would be lit immediately prior to loosing), and catapults (pao) sometimes launched pots full of the mineral oil-sulfur mixture that were likewise lit prior to launch. Such weapons, however, were sometimes as dangerous to the users as they were to the enemy, and so they too were generally not widespread, except perhaps in sieges and naval warfare.

 

Strategically, the Western Han army was divided into regulars and conscripts. Most of the regulars (buqu) were military colonists (tun-tian) that served as the garrisons of fortresses in the commanderies (i.e., military provinces) and the forts of the system of static defenses along the northern frontier (precursors of the Great Wall that dates to the Ming Dynasty), as well as the imperial guard (nanjun). These men were usually allotted plots of land near their posting that were intended to allow them to maintain themselves—some worked their own land in addition to their military service, others had serfs that worked their plot. Career soldiers/regulars were supplemented with conscripts (junguo). Every male commoner between the ages of 23 and 56 was eligible to be called up for military service (after 155 BCE, the minimum age was reduced to 20)—they underwent one year of training and served one year in either the infantry, the cavalry, or the navy, although once their term was up they could either enlist as a regular or return to civilian life (in times of need, they could be called up again until they reached age 56). Nobles were exempt from conscription—although many chose to sign on as officers—the cavalry corps gave preference to recruits from families with a history of horse rearing/riding (especially those that could bring their own horse(s)), and convicts were often given the option of commuting their sentence in return for a stint as a penal conscript (chi xing). After their training, conscripts were rotated into service alongside the regulars at their particular posting. Conscripts seem to have been intended to fill in for the regulars on garrison duty at their postings, thus freeing the regulars to take the field for campaigns, although the almost constant state of war during the Qin, Han,  and Xin dynasties—including numerous civil wars and rebellions—meant that conscripts were sometimes forced to take the field alongside their professional counterparts (by the dawn of the Jin Dynasty, the formal conscription system had been abandoned). I have yet to find direct evidence that conscripts or penal conscripts were ever formed into distinct units on anything other than an ad hoc basis. They normally seem to have been brigaded alongside the regulars, which is why the size of each constituent unit of the Han army (see below) varied greatly in size (i.e., the lower numbers probably account for regulars only, while the larger numbers account for the swelling of the size of the unit with conscripts). The overall commander of an army was a general (jiangjun), each regiment (bu) was commanded by a lieutenant-general (pian-jiangjun), each battalion (hou-kuan) was commanded by a colonel (xiaowei), each company (hou) was commanded by a captain (junhou), and each squad (sui) by a chief (tunzhang). Each squad (sui) had 8-12 soldiers, each company (hou) had 6-7 squads (48-84 men), each battalion (hou-kuan) had 4-6 companies (192-504 men), and each regiment (bu) had two battalions (384-1008 men). Armies were assembled by brigading regiments together, and thus they too varied widely in size. Sometimes huge numbers are given for the size of various early imperial armies (like 400-600,000 men), although these are usually discounted by modern historians as gross exaggerations that would not have been possible considering the logistical and command-and-control limitations of the time period (not to mention the fact that the size of the entire standing army of the empire is estimated to have hovered around 500,000 men during the Han Dynasty, and population loss during the Three Kingdoms would have made that a much smaller number both then and during the Jin Dynasty). The largest of early imperial armies probably numbered no more than 150,000 men, but this would have been a campaign strength that was not present together on any battlefield at any time (every ancient army being subject to attrition from sickness, injury, and death, and men were needed to guard the camp, guard the supply lines, forage, and garrison captured strong-points). It is likely that battlefield numbers were probably more in-line with those of other contemporary civilizations (40-60,000 men). Approximately 50-60,000 men were needed to man the walls and forts of the northern frontier, 8-10,000 men served in the capital (as palace guards and police), and the remainder were spread across the commanderies of the empire and/or serving in wars of conquest (primarily in the south versus the Yue tribes and states, in the west versus the Qiang tribes and states, in the north versus the Xiongnu and Xianbei, and in the northeast versus the Korean kingdoms). Most of the empire's cavalry regiments were based in the northern provinces, while most of the empire's fleet was stationed in the south.

​

One final note on the ubiquity of the system I have here outlined: The basic contours of this military system were developed by the Qin state during the Warring States Period of Chinese history (ca. 403-222 BCE), although some of the terms were different, and those terms continued to evolve. Qin emerged as the ultimate victor of this tumultuous period, establishing its hegemony over the other Warring States (ca. 230-221 BCE), although Qin's defeated opponents—the states of Han, Wei, Chu, Zhao, Yan, and Qi—were made into tributary states (zhuhou) of Qin and were not directly governed by Qin. This meant that the relatively small, although highly disciplined, army of Qin was supplemented by auxiliary contingents from its vassal states that showed varying levels of professionalization. Arguably, the states of Han, Chu, and Wei had begun to develop the same kind of bureaucratic-military system (fengjian) as Qin, and thus probably supplied auxiliaries that could match those of Qin, while Zhao, Yan, and Qi still had systems that reflected the quasi-feudal system (zhuhou). In 207 BCE, a widespread rebellion against the dominance of Qin led to the defeat and execution of the last Qin emperor, Ziying, by an alliance between Chu and Han. The Qin capital was razed, and its subject states declared independence (including a large number of minor states that had not existed before the rise of Qin), but the peasant leader that had led the forces of Han during the rebellion, named Liu Bang, attacked and defeated his erstwhile allies in Chu and declared himself emperor, taking the regnal name, Gaozu of Han (202-195 BCE). The Han then went on to attack the other states that had rebelled against Qin (the Yixing Wan states)(ca. 202-197 BCE). The major states of Chu, Wei, Zhou, Yan, and Qi were defeated and given to the sons of Gaozu to rule as princes/subordinate kings of Han (tóngxìng wáng), while the minor states were converted into military provinces called commanderies (jun). The centralization of the bureaucracy and professionalization of the military proceeded apace, throughout the empire, a process that was not completed until the reign of Emperor Wen of Han (180-157 BCE). As new territories were added, they were made into new commanderies, usually initially garrisoned by the forces that had conquered the region. By the time of the Eastern Han (9-222 CE), this system had been formalized into a three-tiered bureaucracy, with "provinces" (zhou), "commanderies" (jun), and "counties" (xian)—there were initially 13 provinces and 100 commanderies, although this number grew and shrank with the fortunes of the empire. Provinces were generally considered to be civil provinces—devoid of a permanent military presence—although provincial governors were tasked with raising conscripts for the army. Commanderies were military provinces (note that the name of these provinces, jun, was synonymous with the generic word for "army")—essentially militarized provinces whose commandant (taishou) also commanded his province's regiments during the ordinary course of events, although if those regiments were made part of a field army, the commandant was not guaranteed to be given a field command (i.e., he might be expected to stay at his post and command the garrison). Both provinces and commanderies were divided up into counties (xian), governed by a prefect (ling). The Eastern Han period also saw a formalization of the division between those troops stationed in or near the capital (Nanjun, "Southern Army"), and those stationed in the provinces (Beijun, "Northen Army)—in early imperial parlance, "northern" meant "furthest from the emperor," and "southern" meant "nearest to the emperor." The Three Kingdoms Period (220-280 CE) was an interregnum and/or three-way civil war between various warlords (despite the name of the period, there were actually four states that emerged in this period—Wei, Shu, Wu, and Yan—although Yan was peripheral), each of whom came to command a coalition of provincial governors and commandants, and although the Han Dynasty was overthrown and there were serious disruptions to the functioning of the government (not to mention a plummet in the empire's population due to famine, disease, and war), the military system of the Han period remained largely intact. The descendants of the regulars of the Han army (buqu) evolved into a kind of military caste, while the official conscript system disappeared (conscription to supplement the quasi-feudal buqu continued in an ad hoc fashion, although these devolved into peasant levies with little or no training). During this period, there was an increase in the use of more extensive body armor by the buqu, although the peasant levies that replaced the conscripts were never systematically equipped (i.e., they were mostly unarmored and wielded improvised weapons). There was a proliferation in the use of horse armor as well, an increase in the proportion of bowmen at the expense of crossbowmen, and the increased use of thrown spears/javelins by close combat troops. These developments can in part be attributed to an increasing reliance on barbarian mercenaries from the Xiongnu and Xianbei (steppe nomads from Mongolia and Manchuria), the Qiang (Tibetan mountain tribes from the west), and the Yue (forest and mountain peoples from the south), some of whom had been allowed to settle in border regions (waichén, "barbarian vassals"). The reunification of the empire under the Jin Dynasty (266-420 CE), formed by the ruling family of Wei after they defeated their opponents in Shu, Wu, and Yan, marked a return to the three-tiered bureaucracy, although the Jin Dynasty ruled a deeply troubled and fractured state in which provinces and commanderies had both developed into quasi-feudal domains (zhuhou), each with its own hereditary class of soldiers (buqu) that owed their primary loyalty to the lord of the province/commandery. Nevertheless, the armies of the Jin continued to operate according to the same tactical doctrines as the Qin and Han—with close order formations of crossbowmen and close combat infantrymen, supplemented with cavalry, peasant infantry skirmishers, and barbarian auxiliaries—and equipment remained largely the same as it had evolved during the Three Kingdoms Period, but the Jin military system never achieved the kind of systematic professionalism of the Han Dynasty. 

 

The figures I have used for this army are from Black Hat Miniatures and Essex Miniatures. Despite the lack of variation in poses, I love these figures (uniformity of pose can work well when depicting drilled formations of troops). While the shields are all hand-painted, I have used the flags of Little Big Men Studios to make these figures really pop. Two of the shield symbols I used are, in fact, directly associated with the Han Dynasty, although unfortunately we do not know the precise symbolism (the double-peak symbol was probably intended to represent mountains, a recurring theme in early imperial art and mythology, and the complex arrangement of triangles on one of the unit’s shields is believed to have been intended to look something like the patterns on a turtle’s shell, the turtle being important in early Chinese mythology as a symbol of strength and perseverance). The other two shield designs I created to riff on this symbolism, with a kind of double-arc that could represent the sun (once again, a recurring theme in period art), and a variation on the double-peak theme.