Edict: examinations once every three years
The Song shi basic annals record that in the tenth lunar month of Zhiping 3 (AD 1066) on the dinghai day an edict ordered that the Ministry of Rites (禮部) hold the examinations (gongju, 貢舉) once every three years.
What this does and does not establish
The Song shi is a Yuan-compiled (1343-45) official history drawing on Song court records; the English is an AI working translation. The entry states only the new interval; it does not say what the previous interval was.
- Read through an AI working translation.
- Region
- East Asia
- Theme
- Culture and knowledge
- Kind of record
- Placed in a year. A source places this in one year. It is listed under that year; no day precision is invented.
How it is dated
- Date reference
- 治平 3 (治平三年 as numbered by the annals), lunar month 10
- How we use it
- Year assigned from the lunar month under which the annals enter the item; the sexagenary day was not converted to a Julian day.
The date reference is this project’s reading of the source’s date. It may give an era name, a reign or a calendar in a normalised form rather than in the source’s own words; the dating notes say what the source prints.
Dating notes from the research record
Lunar month 10 of 治平 3 = Julian 1066-10-22 to 1066-11-19, per Academia Sinica 兩千年中西曆轉換 year table(s) 治平3.html (sha256 7096d028e669…); the whole month lies in AD 1066.
File names and line numbers in these notes, and in the limits above, refer to the project’s retained copies of the cited sources. Names such as calendar_headers are the project’s calendar look-ups, and “the investigator” is the research step that prepared the record.
Sources and quoted text
Line and character numbers under “Location” refer to the project’s retained copy of the source. For database rows, “Edition” names the batch of rows that was fetched together.
Source 1 · Supports the statement
Song shi (History of Song), basic annals
Toghto (脫脫) et al., Yuan court historiographers
The credit or link shown here was corrected after an audit of the retained source.
Quoted text (Classical Chinese)
丁亥，詔禮部三歲一貢舉。AI working translation into English; not official or authoritative
On the dinghai day, an edict [ordered] the Ministry of Rites to hold the examinations once every three years.
Source credit and reuse conditions recorded for this source: Source: Song shi, juan 13, zh.wikisource transcription (revision 2285057). English renderings are AI working translations, not published translations.
Exact source version
8c500372aab2f54b22cdca3cc8f7f45cd1dbd9d5ab85f39d7fe60df2967abb4dChecks and changes
Source checked 2026-11-04. An independent AI evidence review supports this bounded, attributed wording. That review does not guarantee historical truth. How records are checked
No correction has been made to this record’s statement or limits.
Revision s1p_1066_song_2
Exact revision fingerprint
9d7fa32ae9114b7439f63ce7f0710e5b56509d860fe3929dac8e861938d4fc25