Zhou Dynasty's Society

81. The rats in the poem from the Book of Songs are referring to the higher class people, such as the aristocratic land owners. Life for the Chinese peasants during the Zhou dynasty was cruel and unfair. The peasants were exploited and the higher class was taking advantages of the low class people. A way the nobles have been taking advantage of the peasants are that the peasants spent a few years growing millet, but the land owners just ate all the grain without showing the low class any regard. The peasants have also been treated unfairly. A way they have been treated with disrespect is that the aristocratic people have not been showing the peasants any kindness and have not been acknowledging their toil. This kind of peasants’ protest was very common of the ancient world. It was very common that the high class land owners treated their peasant tenants unfairly and took advantage of them because they were poor and they had the power. In this protest of the peasants, they referred the lords as the rats and that the rats eat away their agricultural production. Also, the peasants threaten to abandon the land that they were supposed to tend to go to a happier state where the conditions for them to live were better. Just by looking at the poem, there was a definite class struggle between the wealthy and the poor.
94. Ways that the Zhou dynasty was the foundation of Chinese though and society were that Chinese philosophy is written in the Chinese tradition of thought. Mostly, the philosophy of China originates in the Spring and Autumn and Warring States era, which was a period called the “Hundred Schools of Thought.” It characterized many intellectually and cultural advancements. During this time, the major philosophies of China such as Confucianism, Daoism, Mohism, and Legalism developed. Cultural advancements of China spread throughout a large geographical region in eastern Asia. Some cultural features that spread were literature, music, cuisine, and martial arts.