position of their family. In Han time, local officials had the duty to
recommend young able men; if these men turned out to be good, the
officials were rewarded, if not they were blamed or even punished. An
official took less of a chance, if he recommended a son of an
influential family, and he obliged such a candidate so that he could
later count on his help if he himself should come into difficulties.
When, towards the end of the second century B.C., a kind of examination
system was introduced, this attitude was not basically changed.

The country branch of the family by the fact that it controlled large
tracts of land, supplied also the logical tax collectors: they had the
standing and power required for this job. Even if they were appointed in
areas other than their home country (a rule which later was usually
applied), they knew the gentry families of the other district or were
related to them and got their support by appointing their members as
their assistants.

Gentry society continued from Kao Tsu's time to 1948, but it went
through a number of phases of development and changed considerably in
time. We will later outline some of the most important changes. In
general the number of politically leading gentry families was around one
hundred (texts often speak of "the hundred families" in this time) and
they were concentrated in the capital; the most important home seats of
these families in Han time were close to the capital and east of it or
in the plains of eastern China, at that time the main centre of grain
production.

We regard roughly the first one thousand years of "Gentry Society" as
the period of the Chinese "Middle Ages", beginning with the Han dynasty;
the preceding time of the Ch'in was considered as a period of