ed from father to
son and was not redistributed. Incidentally we know many similar
regulations for trees in the Near East and Central Asia. As the tax was
levied upon the personal land in form of grain, and on the tree land in
form of silk, this regulation stimulated the cultivation of diversified
crops on the tree land which then was not taxable. The basic idea behind
this law was, that all land belonged to the state, a concept for which
the Toba could point to the ancient Chou but which also fitted well for
a dynasty of conquest. The new "_chuen-t'ien_" system required a complete
land and population survey which was done in the next years. We know
from much later census fragments that the government tried to enforce
this equalization law, but did not always succeed; we read statements
such as "X has so and so much land; he has a claim on so and so much
land and, therefore, has to get so and so much"; but there are no
records that X ever received the land due to him.

One consequence of the new land law was a legal fixation of the social
classes. Already during Han time (and perhaps even earlier) a
distinction had been made between "free burghers" (_liang-min_) and
"commoners" (_ch'ien-min_). This distinction had continued as informal
tradition until, now, it became a legal concept. Only "burghers", i.e.
gentry and free farmers, were real citizens with all rights of a free
man. The "commoners" were completely or partly unfree and fell under
several heads. Ranking as the lowest class were the real slaves (_nu_),
divided into state and private slaves. By law, slaves were regarded as
pieces of property, not as members of human society. They were, however,
forced to marry and thus, as a class, were probably reproducing at a
rate similar to that of the normal population, while slaves in Europe
reproduced at a lower rate than the population. The next higher class
were serfs (_fan-hu_), hereditary state servants, usually descendants of
state slaves. They were obliged to work three months during the year for
the state and were paid for this service. They were not registered in
their place of residence but under the control of the Ministry of
Agriculture which distributed them to other offices, but did not use
them for farm work. Similar in status to them were the private bondsmen
(_pu-ch'ue_), hereditarily attached to gentry families. These serfs
received only 50 per cent of the land which a free burgher received
under the lan