Reviewed by: The Men Who Governed Han China: Companion to A Biographical Dictionary of the Qin, Former Han and Xin Periods R.R.C. de Crespigny (bio) Michael Loewe . The Men Who Governed Han China: Companion to A Biographical Dictionary of the Qin, Former Han and Xin Periods. Handbuch der Orientalistik / Handbook of Oriental Studies, Section Four: China, vol. 17. Leiden and Boston: E. J. Brill, 2004. xv, 666 pp. Hardcover €109.00, U.S. $147.00, ISBN 9-004-13845-5. In his 2000 publication A Biographical Dictionary of the Qin, Former Han and Xin Periods (221 B.C.-A.D. 24) (Leiden: Brill, 2000), Michael Loewe presents accounts of the lives of men and women who are recorded as citizens or neighbors of China in the last two centuries B.C. Almost nine hundred pages long, with ancillary maps, tables, and indexes, the work provides essential information for anyone concerned with the first empires in East Asia. As Loewe explains in his introduction to the present volume, when he was dealing with the history and texts of the period he encountered a number of problems and topics of interest, and from his research he prepared papers to support his interpretations. Many of these now appear in this companion volume. [End Page 487] The collection is eclectic, dealing with such matters as names, styles, and titles, followed by an account of documents found by archaeologists relating to the administration of the Donghai commandery in present-day Shandong, accompanied by a discussion of the Han history of Donghai. Several chapters on the official system discuss the essentials of recruitment at the lowest level, the role of the Imperial Counsellor (yushi dafu) at the highest, and the appointments of military commanders, while a further group deals with kings and other nobility. There are studies on the philosophical and procedural underpinning of the imperial regime: the significance of the Mandate of Heaven and the theories of the wuxing or "Five Powers"; the formalities of imperial decrees and the concept of sovereignty; and, at the end, in a chapter on "The Emperors and the Powers that Lay behind the Throne," thumbnail sketches of the rulers, their leading officials, consorts, and other associates, and the effects of their interactions upon the dynastic government. One problem in dealing with the Qin and early Han is the comparison of information provided by the Shiji of Sima Qian , compiled in the first half of the first century B.C., with that of the Hanshu of Ban Gu and others from the late first century A.D. In several places the two contradict each other, and scholars have debated which version is the more reliable. A chapter of Loewe's work presents a detailed discussion of the tables from the two histories, discussing the information provided and also the likely sources. Loewe argues that despite intervening opportunities for destruction, Ban Gu and his contemporaries had access to many of the same records that had been available to Sima Qian and that they interpreted, edited, and used the archives independently (pp. 249-250). In their present-day form both histories contain errors and contradictions—some of which may be the result of mistakes in transmission—and neither can be taken as fully reliable. Even classical historians may have prejudices: in a telling passage Loewe notes how both Sima Qian and his father Sima Tan suffered frustration from the intervention of the Imperial Counsellor Ni Kuan in the affairs of their Bureau of Astronomy, and suggests that this may have affected the manner in which Ni Kuan is described by the Shiji. In sum, after considering two faulty passages in the tables the author observes that when modern scholars are faced with contradictions "it is all too often not possible to call on evidence to corroborate the one and to eliminate the other; and we are left in the end to make an arbitrary choice or to leave a question unresolved." Given such a varied collection of papers, it is a pity to discuss only a few of their many topics, but some concentration on particular areas may indicate the style of Loewe's work and suggest further questions for...