摘要
The agent profession is not new to Chinese. First appearing in the Western Zhou Dynasty, agents were called "Zhi Ren" then and "Ya Ren" from the Tang Dynasty onwards. In the Ming Dynasty, a certain amount of property and a license were required if one wanted to become an agent. In the late Qing Dynasty, Mai Ban (Chinese executives working in foreign firms), also a sort of agents, began to emerge in major cities of China.
