Talk:Qin dynasty

More complete family tree???
The current Qin Dynasty tree is incredibly bare bones, it doesn't help that the Imperial tree and the Kings of Qin tree exist but lack information shown in the other.

May I propose we merge/duplicate (at least some of) the information from one tree to the other (I recommend the Qin Dynasty page here, given that it's focused on this specific family, while the Kings of Qin tree only exists on a page compiling several families), and the use of colour to highlight which individuals were emperors and which were kings. It would also allow us to include a note about Ziying's possible alternate positions in the tree that would actually make sense, as the individuals related to him in other positions would then be present.

Qin Shi Huang has a father King Zhuangxiang of Qin and a paternal half-brother Chengjiao.

Qin Shi Huang's grandfather King Xiaowen is noted in the Family tree of Chinese monarchs (Warring States period) as having "~20 other sons" (although his page doesn't mention this, I'm not sure if a source for this claim exists, and the listing of "Prince Xi" on that tree links presumably incorrectly to a Qing Dynasty title, not a Qin Dynasty one).

Qin Shi Huang's great grandfather King Zhaoxiang of Qin was apparently instrumental in setting the Qin dynasty on a path to uniting China, so is perhaps a sensible start to this tree if we want to keep it concise. King Zhaoxiang had the sons King Xiaowen of Qin and the Crown Prince of Dao as well as a daughter ("who married King Kaolie of Chu (278–238 BC) in 271 BC, and had issue (Lord Changping)".

King Zhaoxiang's father, King Huiwen of Qin was someone more prolific, having 10 sons and at least one daughter who married King Yi of Yan, hes the first that seems to refer to himself as a King of Qin, prior rulers taking the title "Duke", thus being another key point one could cut off a larger tree at if wanted.

Also, on the existing tree, what does the "1" above Fusu and the "18 or 25 (disputed)" above Qin Er Shi mean? There's no explanation anywhere on any of the pages for this. 5.151.23.56 (talk) 11:16, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

"Today part of: Vietnam" in infobox
I've seen a lot of recent back and forth about whether to have this parameter in the infobox due to some military action by Zhao Tuo, who later rebelled anyway. I think given the small geographical area and brief duration of control, it makes sense to leave Vietnam out of the infobox. We can discuss it in some subsection if it's really important for encyclopaedic understanding, but putting it in the infobox seems unnecessary. Folly Mox (talk) 17:37, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

insufficcient reference information
Someone put this here: At least one school of thought, Mohism, was eradicated, though the reason is not known. Despite the Qin's state ideology and Mohism being similar in certain regards, it is possible that Mohists were sought and killed by the state's armies due to paramilitary activities. Readings in Classical Chinese Philosophy, p. 61

I didn't think it was enough source, if you don't agree, you can remove my added source dating back to graham. By the way, Mohism did not disappear, it was incorporated into Daoism and Confucianism.FourLights (talk) 03:08, 25 November 2023 (UTC)


 * User:FourLights, that source doesn't mention anything about "sought and killed". It says "could not survive during centralized and militarized regime". Your INS The sentence is purely speculative.Also, we can't in 2023 say in Wikivoice the grand anachronism the First Emperor conquered all of the states and governed with a single philosophy, Legalism. I have no idea who added the sentence, but the whole "neatly categorised schools of thought" model for early Chinese intellectual history was invented by Sima Tan, and isn't an appropriate heuristic for understanding the historical situation. There wasn't even the word 法家 during the Qin dynasty, and almost everything we knew about the Qin prior to modern archaeological discoveries was filtered through the perspective of their conquerors. I'd suggest sticking to the facts that reliable sources report. I'll dig up a few links to good modern sources relevant to this comment. Folly Mox (talk) 03:23, 25 November 2023 (UTC) INS emended with apologies 04:13, 25 November 2023 (UTC)
 * All of these are available through the Wikipedia Library (the last one is via Project Muse). Folly Mox (talk) 03:30, 25 November 2023 (UTC)
 * All of these are available through the Wikipedia Library (the last one is via Project Muse). Folly Mox (talk) 03:30, 25 November 2023 (UTC)
 * All of these are available through the Wikipedia Library (the last one is via Project Muse). Folly Mox (talk) 03:30, 25 November 2023 (UTC)
 * All of these are available through the Wikipedia Library (the last one is via Project Muse). Folly Mox (talk) 03:30, 25 November 2023 (UTC)
 * All of these are available through the Wikipedia Library (the last one is via Project Muse). Folly Mox (talk) 03:30, 25 November 2023 (UTC)


 * Hello, I did not make the sentence itself. I added back-end information about descent of "Legalist" government from Mohist hermeneutics. Admittedly, Graham and Makeham predate Ivanhoe. I did not add information to this sentence, I simply questioned whether it was sufficient source. Although Graham is dated, this particular information is already accepted to my knowledge. But, maybe I can come back some time with more research to provide backing for what was already present in Ivanhoe.
 * Hello, although I would not have been so bold, I am happy to examine the source present in Ivanhoe, to try to make this sentence less speculative, which I did not write.FourLights (talk) 03:33, 25 November 2023 (UTC)
 * , please accept my apologies for blaming you for adding the speculative article prose. Indeed, your very first sentence above says . I'll strike the parts of my comment that refer to you as its author. I'm sorry about that. Folly Mox (talk) 04:11, 25 November 2023 (UTC)
 * By the way, thank you for reminding me of Kidder Smith. Look Hui Shi is also a statesmen now. Yes he was! It was an administrative tradition! Anyway thank you, I'll come back later. Hopefully one day we could have an actual page about a broad evolution that wouldn't be representable under Fajia, which together with Legalism don't mean anything.FourLights (talk) 04:54, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

More nonsense
I could certainly dig through the history to look for salvageable material, but what the heck is Borthwick, Mark (2006). Pacific Century: The Emergence of Modern Pacific Asia. Westview Press. ISBN 978-0-8133-4355-6. FourLights (talk) 14:47, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

Anyway, with Legalism not actually being a subject, apart from my integrating material with it's figures pages, I can otherwise work to clean this page up, but some of that would be deletions. I can certainly add material in the future. It wouldn't be at Folly Moxes level at the start of it, but it would certainly be more discriminating.FourLights (talk) 14:57, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

This source is too over-utilized to be removed currently.FourLights (talk) 15:32, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

Penal policy
The paragraph under "Penal policy" has sentences which are grammatically difficult or impossible to interpret, and may be fragments from two different sentences which have been wrongly conjoined by an insertion or deletion. For example,
 * "Only including penal law alongside li ritual, comparative model manuals in the Qin empire guided penal legal procedure and application based on real-life situations, with publicly named wrongs linked to punishments." Is this supposed to be "Comparative model manuals in the Qin empire guided penal legal procedure and application based on real-life situations, with publicly named wrongs linked to punishments. They included penal law alongside li ritual."?
 * "The Qin often expelled criminals to the new colonies, or pardoned them in exchange for fines, labor, or one to several aristocratic ranks, even up to the death penalty." What's that "or one to several aristocratic ranks" doing there?

It also joins sentences or clauses which don't go with each other. For example, in this paragraph the word "Regardless" implies a causal connection between the two sentences, but they aren't even on the same topic:
 * "The Book of Lord Shang prophecies a future sage of "benevolence and righteous",[43] which the First Emperor declares himself to be.[44] Regardless, in the Qin and early Han, criminals may be given amnesties, and then only punished if they did it again.[45]"

In this sentence, there seems to be no logical connection between the two clauses, or even any way to interpret the first clause:
 * "At the very least given Qin expansionism, penal law actually develops more in the Han dynasty."

Philgoetz (talk) 19:58, 25 April 2024 (UTC)

I will remove this bit and try to do a third review in the near future. I am of the opinion that a third review is needed anyway. Technically they are connected, because instead of punishing with something like jail or mutilation, the Qin could try simply sending people to the colonies, and then only punish them if they were a problem in the future. Therefore, because of it's colonization, there was less of a need for penal policy in the first place, which develops more in the Han dynasty.FourLights (talk) 10:21, 27 April 2024 (UTC)

nominate this article as a featured article
i would like this article nominated as a featured article. Minecraft812 (talk) 20:02, 27 December 2023 (UTC)


 * Articles need to go through the process to become Good articles before they can become featured articles, with the former having less strict rules than the latter. Generally, only people who have contributed significantly to an article are recommended to nominate it, because they are those who are likely to be able to answer questions from and work with the reviewer. Check out the link above if you want to learn a little bit more about the criteria and nomination process. Remsense  留  01:06, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
 * , the process is more involved than just proposing a nomination. You would have to shepherd the article through a thorough review by other editors, addressing all their concerns and ensuring the article meets the featured article criteria. I don't see that you've ever contributed to this article, but if you're interested in preparing it for a push towards FA, I'd suggest improving the sourcing to include information on the Qin legal system based on the discoveries at Liye, adding additional modern scholarship outside Lewis 2007 (I might suggest in particular Martin Kern's The Stone Drums of Qin), and clearing out inaccuracies, misleading statements, and the outdated last-century scholarship still rooted ultimately in the literature of the Han dynasty, with all its implicit and explicit biases. Folly Mox (talk) 10:41, 28 December 2023 (UTC)

I just posted on Qin penal law, but didn't know about this and was using older sources. I'll see about looking up "The Stone Drums of Qin", but let me know anything else.FourLights (talk) 04:20, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

Chinese character template should be added.
I think wikipedia's template for chinese should be added for characters? It is confusing because traditional and simplified chinese are mixed. User999055 (talk) 04:52, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress
There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Qing dynasty which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 16:11, 3 July 2024 (UTC)