Seventy Mu 'Occupied': A Ceiling, Not an Allocation

Both pages open the Western Jin figures with the same clause: 'after the conquest of Wu' (平吳之後). The Jinshu then adds the household levy ('again the rules for the household levy were made', 又制戶調之式), and then the figures: 'a man occupies seventy mu of land, a woman thirty' (男子一人占田七十畝，女子三十畝). And then, separately: 'besides that, an adult male is assessed on fifty mu, an adult female on twenty, a younger adult male at half, and women are not assessed' (其外丁男課田五十畝……女則不課). Seventy occupied, fifty assessed; the twenty mu between them is the blank that matters. If occupation were the state handing every person seventy mu, what would the other set be? The two sets are written apart, which is itself the hint that they are two things.

A Man Occupies Seventy Mu

Set the two sets side by side. Occupation: seventy mu for a man, thirty for a woman. Assessment: fifty for an adult male, twenty for an adult female, half for the younger tier, none for women. The page also fixes the tiers: 'men and women from sixteen up to sixty are full adults; from fifteen down to thirteen, and from sixty-one up to sixty-five, are the younger tier; from twelve down, and sixty-six up, are old or young, and do not serve' (男女年十六已上至六十為正丁……不事). In the Jinshu the assessment sentence begins 'besides that' (其外), putting it outside the occupation figure; the Tong Dian omits the 'besides'. The two texts agree closely, and their differences are of this size.

How are the sets to be read? Written apart, and with the Tang note below, the usual view is that occupation is a ceiling on how much may be held, and assessment is the base on which tax is figured. To merge them into 'seventy mu to farm, fifty of them taxable' is an interpretation, not the wording. Neither page says how the rules worked in practice or whether they were the same everywhere; the text gives rules only.

From the First Rank to the Ninth

The officials' figures are larger: 'the officials from the first rank to the ninth each occupy land according to noble and base' (其官品第一至於第九，各以貴賤占田) — first rank fifty qing, second forty-five, down to the ninth at ten qing. The Tong Dian compresses the table into one line: 'the first rank fifty qing, each rank reduced by five qing as the difference, the ninth ten qing' (每品減五頃以為差). A qing is a hundred mu; that is the usual reckoning, and neither page notes it. Behind the table come people: 'each according to the rank's height shelters his kin — the most reaching nine generations, the least three' (多者及九族，少者三世); members of the imperial house, state guests, descendants of former worthies and of scholars are treated the same.

Then the retainers in detail: from the sixth rank up, 'three food-and-clothing guests' (衣食客三人); seventh and eighth ranks two; the ninth one. Tenant households: 'officials of the first and second rank, no more than fifty households; third rank ten; fourth seven; fifth five; sixth three; seventh two; eighth and ninth one' (佃客無過五十戶……一戶). 'No more than' is again the language of a ceiling. The Tong Dian cuts the list to 'measured by rank as a descending scale', and Du You notes: 'from the Western Jin there was the system of sheltered retainers; by the Eastern Jin the numbers increased; see the chapter on taxes' (自西晉則有蔭客之制……). That is a Tang man's judgement of the development, quoted as his.

The Word 'Occupy'

The hardest evidence that 'occupy' means a limit is a Tang note. Under Dong Zhongshu's proposal to 'limit the people's name-land', Du You writes: 'name-land is occupied land: each is given a limit, so that the rich may not exceed the rule, and the households of the poor and weak may have enough' (名田，占田也。各為立限，不使富者過制). A Tang scholar explains 'name-land' by 'occupied land', and explains it with 'setting a limit', not with 'granting'.

The same word is used the same way elsewhere. Xun Yue, discussing the Han, says 'the powerful and rich occupy land beyond the limit, and their tax is more than half' (占田逾多); and 'when it came to Emperor Ai, occupation was limited so that it might not exceed thirty qing — though the rule existed, it was in the end hard to carry out' (限人占田不得過三十頃……). 'Beyond' is excess, 'not exceed' is a ceiling — the opposite syntax from 'grant'. In the Western Jin passage on these two pages the word used throughout is 'occupy'; 'grant' does not appear. Grant moves land down from above; occupation permits up to a point. Another limit in the same passage is phrased the same way: after the conquest of Wu the officials proposed, 'we may now limit it — princes and nobles may keep one residence in the capital; suburban land of fifteen qing for a great state, ten for the next, seven for a small one' (今可限之……).

A Full Adult's Household Pays Three Bolts

The household levy comes out of the same passage: 'again the rules for the household levy were made: a household with a full adult male pays each year three bolts of silk and three jin of floss-silk; a household headed by a woman or a younger adult male pays half' (丁男之戶，歲輸絹三匹，綿三斤……半輸). Border commanderies are reduced to two thirds or one third; non-Chinese households pay cloth; those too far to be assessed on land pay a rice levy, or at the far edge a poll payment of twenty-eight cash. That is taxation, background here, not developed.

There is also a difference between the pages. The Jinshu passage is plain text with no commentary, running levy, occupation, assessment, age tiers, official ranks, sheltered kin and retainers together; the Tong Dian is a Tang compilation, compressing the ranks to a line and the retainers to a clause, but adding two notes — 'name-land is occupied land' and 'from the Western Jin there was the system of sheltered retainers'. So when the Tong Dian is cited, it must be marked as a Tang compilation quoting earlier material.

Between the Two Pages

Neither page carries a year: the most specific time given is 'after the conquest of Wu', and no year is supplied here. Nor do the pages say how the rules were enforced, how they differed by region, what a mu yielded, or how occupation matched the registers. These are not the same rules as the pre-Qin well-field or the Northern Wei equal-field system, and this article does not join them into a line; the claim that equal-field 'began' with the Western Jin is disputed, and these two pages cannot support it. Figures are quoted in mu and qing, without conversion or yield estimates; the article gives the rules only.

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