试论中国古代王朝宗室的构造特征

Probe into the Structural Features of the Imperial Clan of Different Dynasties in Ancient China

宗室是皇权专制的产物,研究宗室的构造特征对于研究东方封建主义和中华帝国现象具有重要的学术意义。从汉晋到明清,宗室族群的构造遵循大体相同的原则,即尊奉开国皇帝之上的某位先祖,向下突破五服框架开放边际,服属远近只是配置利益的尺度,绝非辨族的基准。历朝大举扩张宗室规模,旨在"广帝宗,重磐石",求得江山社稷千秋万代。

The imperial clan is the product of autocratic monarchy and is of vast importance to the research of oriental despotism and the empire phenomenon in China.The imperial clan members and relatives were structured approximately with the same principle from the Han and Jin Dynasties to the Ming and Qing Dynasties.That is,with the veneration of a certain forefather of the founding emperor,the clan includes its kin members far below the subsequent five generations(Wu Fu) due to the break-through of the five-generation framework,and the fact that whether one is within the forth-coming five generations or not is not a benchmark for determining the imperial clan membership,but a scale for distributing interests.The aim of the large-scale expansion of the imperial clan in the past dynasties was to 'multiply the kin relatives of the emperor so as to consolidate the basis of his reign',thus perpetuating the rule over the state by his descendants.