"Modern East: China's Renaissance" Author: [Japanese] Miyazaki Ichisada / [Japanese] Tonami Mamoru Translator: Zhang Xuefeng / Lu Shuai / Zhang Zihao

"The water flowing under the Nihon Bridge connects to the Thames; the air breathed in by the Edo men has the scent of Parisian girls." This book is the masterpiece of a famous Japanese historian and a master of the Kyoto School of History. The author's vision spans the East and the West, and he understands Oriental history from the perspective of world history, comprehensively revealing the characteristics of modern Chinese society from the Song Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty.

Miyazaki Ichidai discovered many parallel historical events between the Song Dynasty in China and the modern history of Europe, and believed that the Renaissance phenomenon began to appear in the Northern Song Dynasty in China, and this process was three centuries earlier than that in the West. He listed the characteristics of modern Chinese society from the Song Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty in a fairly comprehensive manner: large-scale cities, developed transportation, prosperous exchange economy, landlord-tenant relationship based on contracts, centralized bureaucratic state system, civil service system generated by the imperial examination system, and a huge central imperial army based on the mercenary system. All these characteristics, in summary, are the embodiment of the combination of a highly developed exchange economy and centralized state characteristics. Under such a system, the precursor of the pulsation of nationalism appeared in the new civilian culture of the Song Dynasty.

Editor's Recommendation:

★The pioneering work of "Theory of Song Dynasty Renaissance". China's "Renaissance" was 300 years earlier than Europe's and had a profound impact on the world.

★The academic masterpiece of Miyazaki Ichidai, winner of the "Nobel Prize in Sinology", the Julian Award and a master of history. It is the classic academic symbol of the Kyoto School of Oriental History in Japan and a coordinate system for studying ancient Chinese history.

★Rediscover the Song Dynasty through everyone's eyes. Large-scale cities, a prosperous exchange economy, landlord-tenant relations based on contracts, a civil service system that influenced the modern personnel system in Europe and the United States, and a huge mercenary army. A comprehensive interpretation of the modernity of the Song Dynasty!

Celebrity recommendation:

As a student and successor of the historical master Naito Konan at Kyoto University, Professor Miyazaki Ichidai developed his mentor's theory on the periodization of Chinese history in "The Modern Age of the East". Starting from the economy and social culture, he improved the foundation of the theory and extended it to the broader world history for verification and discussion.

——[Canada] Pulleyblank (Professor at the University of British Columbia)

When it was first published, The Modern Age of the East was a controversial book, but today it can undoubtedly be read as a reliable historical overview and quoted with confidence.

——[Japan] Tonami Mamoru (Professor of Kyoto University)

Miyazaki Ichidai inherited Naito Konan's theory of the Song Dynasty as the modern era. From the perspective of mutual exchanges between East Asia, West Asia, Europe and other places, he discovered various manifestations of the Song Dynasty as the "modern era" from historical materials and determined its historical status as an important part of world history.

——[Japan] Masubuchi Ryuo (Professor at Hitotsubashi University)

In his book "Modern Times in the East", Miyazaki supplemented the inadequacy of Naito's argument in terms of economics and listed the characteristics of modern Chinese society from the Song Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty in a fairly comprehensive manner. He found the precursor of the pulsation of modern Chinese nationalism in the newly born civilian culture of the Song Dynasty. The "people" had a sense of cultural subjectivity and were no longer loyal to the royal family like slaves.

—— Zhang Guangda (Academician of Academia Sinica, Taipei)

Through books such as "The Modern Age of the East", Miyazaki Ichidai improved Naito Konan's theory of periodization of Chinese history. From then on, the medieval aristocratic system, the modern age theory and the Tang and Song Dynasty transformation theory became the most classic academic symbols of the Kyoto School of Oriental History in Japan and the coordinate system for studying the entire ancient Chinese history.

——Liu Zheng (Professor at Renmin University of China)

Miyazaki Ichidai's "The Modern Age of the East" further developed Naito Konan's "Theory of the Transformation from Tang to Song". He not only inherited Naito's view that the transformation from Tang to Song was a transition from aristocratic politics to monarchical dictatorship, but also emphasized the significance of the Song Dynasty as the modern age, believing that compared with the West, the East entered the modern age earlier.

——Zhang Guogang (Professor at Tsinghua University)

Naito Konan once compared the Song Dynasty to the Renaissance in the West, and Miyazaki Ichidai made a comprehensive and systematic argument for this, believing that "the Renaissance in the East (Song Dynasty) was three centuries earlier than the Renaissance in the West", and even that the former "inspired and influenced" the latter. It can be said that Miyazaki Ichidai is not only the successor of his teacher Naito's theory of the Tang-Song transformation, but also the developer and defender of his teacher's theory. His contribution has been fully recognized by the entire academic community, so much so that the Western academic community may call Naito's theory of the Tang-Song transformation the Naito-Miyazaki theory.

——Mou Fasong (Professor at East China Normal University)

The most distinctive feature of Miyazaki's historiography is that he spans the East and the West, stands on the standpoint of world history, understands "Oriental history" from the perspective of world history, and explores the significance of Western history through the understanding of Oriental history.

——Zhang Xuefeng (Professor at Nanjing University)

Miyazaki Ichidai (1901-1995) is a Japanese historian, a master of Kyoto School of History, and a second-generation leader of the Kyoto School of Oriental History. He served as a professor at Kyoto University, and a visiting professor at the University of Paris, Harvard University, and the University of Hamburg. He has won the Rulian Prize, known as the "Nobel Prize in Sinology", the Japan Academy Prize, and the Cultural Merit Medal. His representative works include "A Study of the Nine-Rank System: Pre-History of the Imperial Examination", "Imperial Examination", and "Modern East Asia".

Tonami Mamoru is a Japanese expert on Oriental history and professor emeritus of Kyoto University. He specializes in Chinese history from the Three Kingdoms to the Sui and Tang dynasties. His representative works include "Buddhist States in the Sui and Tang Dynasties" and "Studies on the Political and Social History of the Tang Dynasty".

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