ABSTRACT
The Northern Song was a pivotal period that witnessed a number of key transitions in Chinese history. The state adopted the principle of meritocracy and promoted scholar-officials to manage the bureaucracy. Its society benefited from agricultural growth, the expansion of handicraft industries, and the development of trade. The Song political system was probably the most complicated one in imperial Chinese history. Traditional narratives often criticize the Northern Song as a "poor and weak" dynasty. It is true that this regime, compared to its predecessors and successors, probably controlled the smallest territory of any dynasty which claimed the unification of China. Facing the intellectual challenges of Buddhism and Daoism, prominent Northern Song thinkers introduced innovative ideas to reform Confucianism in the eleventh century and laid a solid foundation for the establishment of the Neo-Confucian school. In Manchuria, the newly risen Jurchen established the Jin state in 1115, and quickly expanded into Liao territory.
