| dc.description.abstract | Zhu Yuan-Zhang unseated prime minister and carried out dictatorial rule during his reign. However, at the early stage of the founding of the Ming Dynasty, he had deeply realized the importance of education to reassure the public so he set up schools in every mansion, prefecture and county. Meanwhile, based on the National Academy in the Yuan Dynasty, he established the Imperial Academy to meet talent’s requirements, hoping that the central top educational institution could cultivate officials needed by the country. In order to achieve this purpose, the Imperial Academy issued strict school regulations, added a great number of laws and rules in the teaching materials, and strongly carried out Confucianism, hoping that these curriculums could educate students to show respect to the emperor and abide by the laws. Moreover, in order to successfully implement curriculums and monitoring, it also paid much attention to teachers’ quality in the Imperial Academy, especially the knowledge and behaviors of the libationers.
Besides the regular worship to Confucius and management of the teachers in the Imperial Academy, the libationers were responsible to make timely reports to the government about their demands and carry out reforms and eliminate disadvantages. Furthermore, they often gave lectures to the emperor at his educational inspection period. Therefore, most libationers were Confucian scholars or imperial scholars, and many were recommended by Hanlin Academy.
Although there was no specific channel for the libationers in promotion, most of them would serve as an official in the Ministry of Rites, Taichang Temple, etc. Furthermore, due to their recognized knowledge and behaviors, they would probably become ministers in the future. At the initial stage of the establishment of the Imperial Academy, the libationers were stably replaced. However, it was no longer regarded as the institution where official candidates were cultivated because of the corruption of the selection system and the selling of official posts, thus the appointment of libationer was gradually ignored.
During the reign of Emperor Jiajing in the Ming Dynasty, the libationer was often replaced by other posts within one year and this post was served concurrently by Taichang Temple Qing. Moreover, several libationers in Nanjing Imperial Academy were transferred to serve as the libationers in Beijing Imperial Academy. Even so, libationers in the reign from Emperor Zhu Yuan-Zhaung (Hongwu Years) to Emperor Zhu Hou-Cong (Jiajing Years) had indeed made contributions to the style of study and administrative reform of the Imperial Academy.
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