Four divisions of society

The four occupations or "four categories of the people" (simplified Chinese: 士农工商; traditional Chinese: 士農工商 ) was a hierarchic social class structure developed in ancient China by either Confucian or Legalist scholars as far back as the late Zhou Dynasty and is considered a central part of the Fengjian social structure (c. 1046–256 BC).

In descending order, these were the (gentry scholars), the (peasant farmers), the (artisans and craftsmen), and the (merchants and traders). In some manner this system of social order was adopted throughout the Chinese cultural sphere. In Japanese it is called mibunsei (身分制) and is sometimes stated as "Shi, nō, kō, shō" (士農工商,, shinōkōshō^?), in Korean as "Sa, nong, gong, sang" (사농공상), and in Vietnamese as "Sĩ, nông, công, thương (士農工商). The main difference in adaptation was the definition of the shi (士).

The system did not figure in all other social groups present in premodern Chinese society, and its broad categories were more an idealization than a practical reality. The commercialization of Chinese society in the Song and Ming periods further blurred the lines between these four hierarchic social distinctions. The definition of the identity of the shi class changed over time, from an ancient warrior caste, to an aristocratic scholarly elite, and finally to a bureaucratic scholarly elite with less emphasis on archaic noble lineage. There was also a gradual fusion of the wealthy merchant and landholding gentry classes, culminating in the late Ming Dynasty.

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