ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with political thought before the Philosophers, during the era between Tong Yti and the middle of Chun Chiu. This era presents three well-marked periods: The Nomadic Period; The Feudal Period; The Period of the Aggressors. In the Nomadic Period, the people lived in tribes or clans under the rule of nomadic leaders. Among the nomadic tribes the Hsia and Shang dynasties ruled the longest, while the three dynasties of Tong, Yu, and Chow were less important contemporary kingdoms for over a thousand years. It is not surprising that very little source material is available for the Nomadic period. It contains three hundred Odes, of which five bear on the Nomadic period, thirty or forty on the Aggressor period, while all the others are of the Feudal period. The Feudal period document is the sixty chapters of Yichow Shu, of which only half is authentic.
