Han Dynasty Handicraft business peak
The Han Dynasty was a historical period that attracted the attention of the world. During this period, China's social economy experienced rapid recovery and development, showing a prosperous scene.
The handicraft industry, in particular, reached an unprecedented height and became the first peak period of handicraft commerce in Chinese history. The prosperity and development of handicrafts in the Han Dynasty is of great significance to the history of China's ancient industrial and commercial development.
In the early period of the Western Han Dynasty, it was the first period of the development of privately operated handicraft business. The production and exchange of goods produced by handicrafts is very active. During the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the establishment of the salt and iron government made the state directly monopolize the operation of industry and commerce, and this system lasted for a hundred years.
At the same time, the Han Dynasty also set up special institutions to manage handicraft industry and commerce, which had a profound impact on future generations. The handicraft industry in the Han Dynasty was mainly divided into two parts: government and private.
Both the government handicraft industry and the government-run handicraft industry are known for their large scale and the large number of practitioners. There are also many small-scale craft workshops, which are more specialized and sometimes employ some skilled workers.
Some small workshops can also make a fortune if they are run properly. The emergence of large handicraft workshop owners and wealthy merchants was also due to the laissez-faire policy of industry and commerce adopted before Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, thus accumulating a large amount of wealth.
The silk weaving industry occupied an important position in the Western Han Dynasty, and most of the farmers' daily necessities were provided by the cottage industry. The textile industry, in particular, has grown rapidly to unprecedented levels.
The textile industry of the Han Dynasty, both in terms of scale and skill, reached the world's leading level at that time. In general, the development of handicraft industry in the Han Dynasty not only promoted social and economic prosperity, but also had a profound impact on the development of industry and commerce in ancient China.
The textile portraits in the Hanshu Food and Goods Chronicle reveal the phenomenon of women in the Han Dynasty who did not spin enough clothes, and Wang Chong's "On Heng and Cheng Cai" also records the family handicraft owners who have made a living from embroidery and brocade in Zibo in Shandong Province and Sui County in Henan Province for generations.
These embroidery, brocade family handicraft owners, whose livelihood is entirely dependent on weaving, lack the ability to cultivate food. It can be said that the phrase "a husband who does not plow or suffer from hunger, and a woman who does not weave or suffer from cold" is a true portrayal in ancient society.
1. "Plain yarn Zen clothes"During the Han Dynasty, the silk weaving industry flourished, and one of the important handicraft sectors in the government was the silk weaving industry. Silk fabrics of the time were usually made of:"Silk Tape"The two words are representative.
The silk weaving varieties unearthed from the Mawangdui Han Tomb are rich, including silk, Luo yarn, brocade, embroidery, Qi and so on. The state-run silk weaving industry mainly served the ruling class and the aristocracy. Before Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the government-run silk weaving industry was small in scale, because the emperor and the princely kingdoms did not have much demand for silk fabrics.
After Emperor Wu, due to the increased demand of the emperor and nobles, the production scale of the official silk weaving industry continued to expand. 2. "Wine shop workshop": In the Han Dynasty, with the development of agriculture, winemaking also arose.
The winemaking industry was a large-scale handicraft sector during the Han and Han dynasties. Wine shops and workshops are widely distributed, and the trend of drinking is prevalent. Banquets, daily life, rituals and other activities were closely related to wine, and wine became almost a necessity of life at that time.
The picture vividly reproduces the scene of winemaking in the Han Dynasty, and the portrait brick "Winemaking" unearthed in Xindu, Sichuan Province shows that in the winemaking workshop, a woman is brewing wine, and someone next to her throws koji and loads the car, ready to transport the wine.
The lacquerware industry has also developed rapidly in the Western Han Dynasty, and it is an important handicraft sector in the Han Dynasty, with high products, representing the highest level of handicraft in the Han Dynasty.
Sima Qian's account also confirms the prosperity of the lacquerware industry at that time. The main production areas of lacquerware are in Shu County and Guanghan County, where there are court workers to supervise the manufacture of lacquerware, and the division of labor in the workshop is also very fine, including tire makers, gilder workers, painters and finishers.
Moire lacquer box lacquerware is a time-honored craft, which has attracted the attention of countless people with its unique design and exquisite craftsmanship. Whether it is a large lacquer coffin, lacquer bed, lacquer case, weapon rack, or small cups, plates, pots, boxes, basins, spoons, pillows, coffins, etc., moire lacquer box lacquerware can show its unique charm.
From the 184 pieces of lacquerware in the ** soil of the Mawangdui Han Tomb in Changsha, we can see that its colors are bright, the luster is shining, the shape is vivid, the production is fine, the color painting method on the lacquerware is vivid, and the lines are fluent, which undoubtedly shows the superb manufacturing technology in ancient times.
In addition, the development of official salt and iron during the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty also played a role in promoting the development of lacquerware, especially in the boiling salt industry.
Boiling salt and iron smelting industry in the Han DynastyIn addition to manufacturing important items such as bronze and weapons, the government-run handicraft industry in the Han Dynasty also produced and advanced the salt and iron needed for daily use. Salt was an essential necessity in people's lives, and iron was regarded as a strategic commodity in the Han Dynasty, which was the lifeblood of the country.
During the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the great peasants Cheng Kong Zhi and Dongguo Xianyang proposed that the state monopoly of salt and iron could provide economic security for the war. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty adopted their suggestion and in 110 BC set up 50 salt and iron officials in 40 counties and counties across the country, and implemented salt and iron official camps.
In government-run production, salt officials recruit people to cook salt, and the government provides the tools for production and pays them according to the output. The finished products of salt are transported by the salt officials to various places for sale. There are four kinds of salt in the Han Dynasty, such as sea salt, pool salt, well salt, rock salt, etc., and well salt is also produced in Ba, Shu and other places.
Among the excavated Sichuan portrait bricks, two pictures of boiling salt reveal the production of salt from wells in the government-run boiled salt industry. With the increase in salt-producing areas, the production scale of the government-run boiled salt industry has been expanding.
The large demand and necessity of salt made it possible to monopolize the production of boiled salt and to monopolize salt, which not only helped to solve the financial difficulties, but also found a solution to the problem of anti-business in the economic system.
The iron smelting industry was another important part of the government-run handicraft industry in the Han Dynasty.
The iron ware of the Han and Han dynasties, with its tough quality and unique style, shows the iron and Han style of the Chinese nation. During this period, iron production was on a large scale, and private family casters were quite numerous, and their iron products were widely popular in the market.
The iron industry developed significantly during the Han Dynasty, and improvements in iron-smelting technology greatly increased the yield and quality of iron. Iron tools gradually replaced traditional bronze tools in agriculture and handicrafts and became the dominant tools.
Home-cast ironware can be transported to the field**, which greatly meets the needs of farmers. However, during the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the right to produce iron was mastered, and 49 iron officials were set up across the country, and large-scale government-run iron industry began to appear.
The site of Tieshenggou in Gong County, Henan Province is a strong proof of the prosperity of the iron industry during this period. Eighteen iron-smelting furnaces have been found at the site, with a diameter and residual height of about one meter, and a very large furnace capacity.
In addition to the sheer scale, there have been some astonishing incidents in the state-run iron industry. For example, in the first month of the second year of Emperor Cheng's reign, when the iron officials of Peijun cast iron tools, the iron did not fall, but rumbled, like thunder and drums, which frightened the workers into panic.
When the sound stopped, they found that the ground had sunk several feet deep, and the furnace had been divided into ten parts, one of which still had unmelted iron, scattered like meteors. This incident illustrates the scale of the government-run iron industry, the large number of workers, and the large capacity of the furnaces.
However, although the development model of handicraft commerce in the Han Dynasty has an important position in the history of ancient industrial and commercial development, its impact on people's livelihood and economic development is not entirely positive.
During the period of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, in order to curb the development of private industry and commerce, a series of policies were adopted, which made the government-run handicraft industry swell, and the private handicraft industry was greatly hit.
This government-run model of the handicraft economy was mainly to meet the needs of the rulers, but its negative effect was also obvious, it disrupted the natural laws of industrial and commercial development, and plunged the commodity economy into a trough.
Therefore, from the perspective of social livelihood and economic development, the official management of the handicraft industry in the Han Dynasty did more harm than good. Although this model was developed in the Han Dynasty, its negative impact had an important impact on the long-term stagnation of China's feudal social economy, and the capitalist commodity economy has always been "sprouting" rather than "budding".