Abstract
The military garrison system was established in the early Ming and was removed or modified in the early Qing period. As an empire-wide institution, the system had a profound influence upon local administration and social structure during the Ming and Qing dynasties. Based on a detailed case study of Yu Subprefecture (present-day Yu county, Hebei) and drawing upon a variety of different local documents, this article explores how the system was instituted in a concrete local setting and how the system influenced local administrative divisions, social structure, tax-collection, and inter-village networks.
Yu Subprefecture was a relatively complete administrative unit before the Ming. Following the establishment of the Yu Guard in the early Ming, it was divided into civil and military systems. This did not change until the early Qing when the Yu Guard was removed and military households and their descendants were converted to civilians. As a result, the natural villages were divided and transformed into military fortresses. The removal of the Yu Guard was not followed by the disappearance of the dual-administrative system. The system remained in operation in important dimensions of social and economic life such as tax collection, corvée labor assignment and the formation of inter-village alliances. This article thus provides an analysis of the dynamics of the institutional history of the garrison system, and represents an attempt to bridge the gap between institutional and social history.
Keywords
Ming and Qing periods, garrisons, Yu Subprefecture, local administrative system, villages
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