December 11, 2026

Early China Seminar Lecture Series

The seminar will be in a hybrid mode. Remote attendees will be able to access seminar presentations online via Zoom. The Q&A sessions, however, will only be available to those who attend in person.

Title: “Unified Variations: Reproducing Qin Imperial Edicts on Weights and Measures”
Speaker: Yong-ha Kim, Columbia University
Time: December 11, 2026 (4:30-6:30 PM EST)
Venue: 403 Kent Hall and Zoom

**Please use the ‘Request Pre-circulated Paper’ link to RSVP by December 5 . All visitors without a CUID are required to receive pre-authorization to gain access to Morningside campus as per guidelines of Columbia Morningside campus access. Attendees must present a government-issued ID with their name matching exactly the name registered for the event, along with an one-time QR code (via email), for entry.

This talk focuses on variations in Qin emperors’ edicts on weights and measures, which were installed and reinstalled on these objects to commemorate unification, mandate standardization, eulogize the dynastic progenitor, and affirm his successor’s authority. It argues that subtle differences among surviving examples expose a tension between the imperial center’s ideal of uniformity and local implementation. Although models of standardization originated at the center, their reproduction depended on officials and artisans in particular sites; the very objects that proclaimed uniformity therefore preserve traces of variation.

Rather than treating these differences as irregularities, it asks what they reveal about the transmission and copying of imperial documents, artisanal production, and the literacy required to reproduce imperial commands. These objects thus offer a material gauge of how the “unified” empire performed on the ground: imperial models were replicated across localities, but divergences among their copies reveal the processes—and limits—through which central commands were translated into local practice.