ABSTRACT
The founder of the Song dynasty, Zhao Kuangyin, was an army officer. The Song was the only major dynasty in Chinese history to rely on recruited soldiers to fill out army ranks. The Song army was organized into three tiers. The 'forbidden army' was superior to the 'suburban army', which in turn was above the 'country army'. The shifting of administrative emphasis from orthodox abstractions to reality, from a preoccupation with agriculture to a new interest in commerce, and from a passive to a dynamic management, gave the Song a new image, which in many respects marked a breaking away from the doldrums of traditional China. This new trend was also confirmed by governmental organizations to maintain outward continuity; the Song revived virtually all the departments and bureaus of the Tang. In the area of the national economy, the Song witnessed the most spectacular expansion ever in Chinese history.
