- What are the similarities or essential differences between the British Magna Carta incident in modern Britian and the event to restore the aristocaritic status to Zhao family’s by the king of Jin state in ancient China?
- The British Magna Carta was essentially a complex process of nobility limiting king’s power. There was a very similar historical event took place in ancient China over 2000 years ago.
In the Spring and Autumn dynasties, the nobles under the king were mainly from the same family as the king. But the state of Jin was different in that the king of Jin relied on guest nobles. It excluded nobles of the same family. Later on, the guest nobles grew so large that they in fact threatened the king’s governing authority. On one occasion, when an important noble family rebelled, the king led the other nobles to exterminate this noble family. As a rule, when the king destroyed that noble, he took possession of all the land and population from that noble. If the king repeatedly did this, he would be able to increase his power by destroying the nobles over and over again. The other nobles must have seen the risk and, through a number of complicated manoeuvres, these guest nobles eventually forced the king to restore the nobility to that family and return the population and land to the nobles. Eventually, these guest nobles divided up all the king’s land and population and exterminated the king.
Are there any other famous historical events in which the nobility limited and divided the king’s power?
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