Autumn queen is a famous word in ancient Chinese history, and it is mentioned in many film and television works.
Few people understand the word **, or why did the ancient executions of criminals usually choose to be carried out after autumn rather than after spring or winter? There are some little-known reasons behind this.
The primary reason for this is the influence of ancient Confucianism.
Ever since Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty exalted Confucianism, Confucianism has been the most important doctrine in all Chinese dynasties. Confucianism pays attention to etiquette and has strict etiquette standards for everything.
The change of seasons is no exception. The ancients believed that spring was the season of growth and autumn was the season of withering, so autumn became the season of execution. Second, this is to prevent the occurrence of unjust, false and wrongly decided cases.
Although it was a feudal society in ancient times, and it seemed that everything was decided by the emperor alone, in fact, our judicial system has also been improving in the long history of antiquity.
In general, post-autumn executions allow time for the perpetrator to complain. If the offender feels that he has a grievance, he can continue to appeal as he did today. If the execution is carried out immediately after the trial, once there is a wrongful conviction and it is later discovered that the verdict was wrong, but the person is already dead, it will have a bad social impact.
In ancient China, the characteristics of an agrarian society were obvious. In spring and autumn, people work hard until after the autumn harvest. At this time, the number of onlookers will also increase for the execution of mortals, which can have a better deterrent effect.
In ancient times, although wars and turmoil were frequent, it was not easy to legally kill people. The procedures are complicated, and the examination and approval are layered at various levels, and the prisoner's case file needs to be sent to **, and it can only be executed after approval.
As a result, murders in ancient times often had to wait for extremely long periods of time, and even a prisoner who was sentenced to death had to wait until the following year or even several years later in the autumn before being executed.