Compare and Contrast the Shang and Zhou Dynasty Research Paper

Compare and Contrast the Shang and Zhou Dynasty - Research Paper Example The Shang and Zhou dynasties cover the era between 1700 and 250 BC. They were famously known for their use of bronze and jade, and for their well-trained armies and constant use of human sacrifice. One may wonder: what made the two communities rich, strong and powerful? What still make these communities to be heard in the society? These two dynasties of China are the first dynasties for which there are several historical records. Historically, Shang is the first dynasty in China. Shang dynasty emerged after the Xia dynasty of which history slightly touches on and before the Zhou dynasty. This discourse will try find out the historical background of Shang and Zhou dynasties while exploring several happenings during their dynasties. These two dynasties started as semi nomadic tribes that habituated the western side of Shang kingdom. Their nomadic lifestyle prepared them to work with different people who had different cultures. Somewhere around 1040 B.C Zhou conquered Shang during a war fare. To their advantage, Zhou got loyalty of the disaffected cities. Therefore, the Shang collapsed their morals; Zhou took advantage of this and took over Shang dynasty. This made Zhou adopt Shang lifestyle to an extent of applying Shang artisan techniques. Due to their nature of artistic lifestyle, Shang dynasty was well known to practice their art work in a distinctive manner. They majorly got engaged in bronze casting where ceramics were modeled and were used to serve food and wine to their ancestors back in those days. Another distinctive lifestyle is their fully developed writing structure. The state of development and complexity in most of their writings explicitly portrayed early development period which is not attested up to today (Dani 1996). The most discussed distinctive and characteristic image was decoration which was majorly done to the bronze vessel known as taotie. Based on ancient dynasties, the Zhou who had adopted Shang lifestyles and dynasty devised