| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 105.1

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| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 105.1 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Asia

Howard L. Goodman. Ts'ao P'i Transcendent: The Political Culture of Dynasty-Founding in China at the End of the Han. Seattle: Scripta Serica; distributed by Curzon, Richmond, Surrey. 1998. Pp. 249. \P35.00.

In 189 A.D., four hundred years after the foundation of Han, the dynasty collapsed in ruins. Massacre at the capital was followed by warfare throughout the empire, and the disorders of conflict, famine, and refugee migration ground the political structures of China to destruction. 1

After ten years of chaos, in 200 the warlord Ts'ao Ts'ao defeated his chief rival in the north and gained a dominant position over the North China Plain. In 208, however, when he sought to expand his power across the Yangtze, he was defeated by Sun Ch'üan and Liu Pei, lesser rivals who yet established independence in the south and southwest. Despite repeated attacks, the smaller states of Wu and Shu maintained themselves against Ts'ao Ts'ao and his successors of Wei for over half a century. 2

Ts'ao Ts'ao held Emperor Hsien of Han as his puppet but did not take the imperial title himself. After his death in 220, however, his son Ts'ao P'i moved swiftly to obtain the abdication of Han and establish supreme authority. To do so, he combined arguments from various schools of belief in a delicate, part orchestrated set of maneuvers to justify a momentous change. . . .

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