THE COUNTRY OF STREAMS AND GROTTOES: GEOGRAPHY, SETTLEMENT, AND THE CIVILIZING OF CHINA'S SOUTHWESTERN FRONTIER, 1000-1250 (SUNG DYNASTY).

摘要

The "medieval economic revolution" of Song China was in large part a spatial transformation--the shift of the center of gravity of Chinese civilization from the Yellow River valley to the Yangzi River Basin. Economic growth inaugurated an unprecedented phase of frontier expansion throughout South China. In the southwest the Song state and Han immigrants entered into direct competition with the indigenous peoples for lands and resources. This study explores the process of conquest, settlement, and economic exploitation of the frontier zones of Sichuan and Hunan provinces during this period of decisive and sustained colonization. The initial chapters describe the human and physical geography that shaped Han settlement of the frontier. Later chapters detail the history of frontier expansion, particularly during the period 1070-1120, when the Song state assumed the leading role in formulating frontier policy and sponsored an unprecedented wave of frontier settlement. The concluding chapters examine population movements, the introduction of the Han agrarian regime, and the reorganization of space by new towns, routes, and patterns of circulation to measure the extent to which the southwestern frontiers were transformed and "domesticated" by Han civilization. Particular emphasis is placed on the process whereby the role of the frontier as a supplier of raw materials and staple goods to rapidly expanding metropolitan centers of consumption facilitated the integration of frontier areas into the Han world.