The lord’s serfs, on the other hand, tended to settle near the fields in villages of their own because, with growing urban population, the distances from the town to many of the fields became too great.  It was also at this time of new settlements that a more intensive cultivation with a fallow system began.  At latest from the sixth century B.C. on, the distinctions between both land systems became unclear; and the pure serf-cultivation, called by the old texts the “well-field system” because eight cultivating families used one common well, disappeared in practice.

The actual structure of early Chou administration is difficult to ascertain.  The “Duke of Chou”, brother of the first ruler, Wu Wang, later regent during the minority of Wu Wang’s son, and certainly one of the most influential persons of this time, was the alleged creator of the book Chou-li which contains a detailed table of the bureaucracy of the country.  However, we know now from inscriptions that the bureaucracy at the beginning of the Chou period was not much more developed than in late Shang time.  The Chou-li gave an ideal picture of a bureaucratic state, probably abstracted from actual conditions in feudal states several centuries later.

The Chou capital, at Sian, was a twin city.  In one part lived the master-race of the Chou with the imperial court, in the other the subjugated population.  At the same time, as previously mentioned, the Chou built a second capital, Loyang, in the present province of Honan.  Loyang was just in the middle of the new state, and for the purposes of Heaven-worship it was regarded as the centre of the universe, where it was essential that the emperor should reside.  Loyang was another twin city:  in one part were the rulers’ administrative buildings, in the other the transferred population of the Shang capital, probably artisans for the most part.  The valuable artisans seem all to have been taken over from the Shang, for the bronze vessels of the early Chou age are virtually identical with those of the Shang age.  The shapes of the houses also remained unaltered, and probably also the clothing, though the Chou brought with them the novelties of felt and woollen fabrics, old possessions of their earlier period.  The only fundamental material change was in the form of the graves:  in the Shang age house-like tombs were built underground; now great tumuli were constructed in the fashion preferred by all steppe peoples.

One professional class was severely hit by the changed circumstances—­the Shang priesthood.  The Chou had no priests.  As with all the races of the steppes, the head of the family himself performed the religious rites.  Beyond this there were only shamans for certain purposes of magic.  And very soon Heaven-worship was combined with the family system, the ruler being declared to be the Son of Heaven; the mutual relations within the family were thus extended to the religious relations with the deity.  If,