摘要
清帝国依托庞大的邮驿体系,建构了从中央到地方垂直的帝国权力网络。集权国家需要克服距离越远对地方控制越难的问题,因而在长期保持对里程信息收集整理、补充校正与记录存储的传统,驿程的记录与实际运行与之互为表里。《大清会典》及《则例》中的驿程信息主要有三类:节点(包括原点)、路线和数据,其记载有着复杂而又一以贯之的结构与模式,用“链条状”和“树状”两种方式呈现了驿路的分布结构,其向心性和层级性表达了古代王朝国家中央顶层设计“中心—边缘”的地理格局、空间秩序与特定的政治思维。道路里程信息既是日常邮驿工作开展的实用资料,也是国家持续掌握交通权力的知识来源。由于交通“用时间置换空间”的特殊属性,交通史的研究也应重视时间—空间的关系。驿置里程不仅仅是空间距离的一个重要指标,在实际的运行和操作中,“到京日期”就是时间信息与地理信息对应的产物,是“距离时间化”的表达方式,能直观反映交通对空间和时间的控制。驿程空间可以作为邮驿时间的参考标准,反过来,时间也是空间的一种表达方式,是计量距离可重复的实际经验的总结,在实际邮驿事务运行中,里程距离是固定的,但运行时间是变动的,这种变动带来不确定性体现了邮驿网络的动态变化和帝国权力的伸缩与强弱。传统驿站已有的突破限于地域上的向外扩张和向内深入,以及中央集权之下向心性的强化;而时间上的突破很小,时效困境也成为清末驿站体系僵化最为突出的问题,影响着国家对既定空间秩序维持的效力。
With the support of a vast postal system,the Qing Empire constructed a vertical network of imperial power from the central to local levels.As a centralized state,it needed to overcome the difficulty of controlling distant areas,and thus maintained a tradition of collecting,organizing,supplementing,correcting,and storing information on mileage,with the records of travel and actual operations being interdependent.The postal information in the The Comprehensive Statutes of the Great Qing Dynasty and the“Regulations”mainly comprises three categories:nodes(including origins),routes,and data,which have a complex and consistent structure and pattern,presenting the distribution structure of postal roads in both chain and tree formats.Their centripetal and hierarchical nature reflects the central-to-edge geographic pattern,spatial order,and specific political thinking of ancient dynastic states.Information of road mileage is not only practical data for daily postal work,but also the basis for the state to continuously exercise its transportation power.Given that transportation trades space for time,the relationship between time and space should be emphasized in the study of transportation history.Postal mileage is not only an important indicator of spatial distance,but also the product of the correspondence between time information and geographic information.“Arrival date in the capital”(到京时间)represents the“time can measure the distance”and intuitively reflects the control of transportation over space and time.Postal road space can serve as a reference standard for postal time,and conversely,time is a way of expressing space,summarizing experiences of measurable distance repetition.In actual postal affairs,while mileage remains fixed,operating time varies,making it difficult to maintain the effectiveness of the postal network’s dynamic changes and the strength and weakness of imperial power.Traditional postal stations had already expanded and intensified their centripetal force under centralization,but made little progress in terms of time.The timeliness predicament became the most significant obstacle to the rigid Qing postal system in maintaining the established spatial order.
作者
王含梅
WANG Hanmei(School of History and Culture,Central China Normal University,Wuhan 430070,P.R.China)
出处
《重庆大学学报(社会科学版)》
北大核心
2023年第4期153-165,共13页
Journal of Chongqing University(Social Science Edition)
基金
教育部人文社会科学研究项目“晚清邮驿转型与政治信息传播研究”(22YJC770020)。
关键词
《大清会典》
驿程
排单
邮驿体系
时—空关系
The Comprehensive Statutes of the Great Qing Dynasty
postal station miles
schedule
post system
space-time relationship