Book 7, Part 6

CHAPTER 26

Regulations on Dress

Section 26.1¹

Let clothing be regulated according to gradations in rank.

Let wealth be expended according to gradations in salaries.

Let there be restraints governing food and drink.

Let there be regulations governing garments and clothes.

Let there be gradations governing dwellings and halls.

Let there be quotas governing animals and retainers.

Let there be prohibitions governing boats and chariots, armor and weapons.

In life, let there be distinctions governing carriages and official caps, clothing and positions, honors and salaries, and fields and dwellings. In death, let there be gradations in coffins, shrouds, and tombs.

Even if someone possesses worthy capabilities or a handsome physique, let him not dare wear clothing that does not befit his rank.

Even if someone possesses a wealthy household and extensive property, let him not spend wealth that exceeds his salary.

Let the clothing of the Son of Heaven be decorated with insignia.

Do not permit the Principal Wife to wear informal dress when at a banquet and when at the ancestral temple.2

Do not permit the generals and great officers to wear informal dress when at a banquet, at the ancestral temple, or at an audience.

Limit the official administrators and instructed functionaries to [wearing] decorations on their belts and on the hems [of their robes].

Never let the common people dare to wear mixed colors.

Never let the various artisans, merchants, and traders dare to wear fox and raccoon [fur].

Never let [criminals] who have undergone castration and people who have undergone mutilation as punishment dare to wear silk, [wear] black and red [clothes in place of the usual ones made of undyed [hemp], or ride horses.

These are what are called “regulations of dress.” [26/34/24–29]

 

This text also appears in the Guanzi. See W. Allyn Rickett, trans., Guanzi: Political, Economic, and Philosophical Essays from Early China (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1985), 1:108–9.

  1.  The first eleven characters of the chapter are problematic and have been omitted from this translation. They read 率得十六萬國三分之則各. They do not appear in the Guanzi version of the text. Su Yu (CQFLYZ 221–22) quotes the earlier commentator Qian Tang, who suggests that characters are missing from these opening sentences and that their content is not commensurate with the text that follows. The first nine characters resemble very closely a line from chapter 28 [28/37/13], which reads 率得十六萬口三分之 ([This farmland] could sustain a population of 160,000. [This population] was divided into three [groups]). The doubtful opening sentence of chapter 26 thus could be an intrusive repetition from chapter 28.

  2.  We have emended the text at this point, following and revising Su Yu’s reconstruction as follows: 夫人不得以燕［服］餐，以廟。將軍大夫不得以燕［服］餐，以廟，［以］朝，官吏命士至於帶緣. For Rickett’s reconstruction, see Guanzi, 1:109; for Su Yu, see CQFLYZ 224.