Great Ming Code

The Great Ming Code was the legal code of the Ming dynasty, focused primarily on criminal law. It was created at the direction of the dynasty’s founder, the Hongwu Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang, in the late 14th century, as part of broader social and political reforms.

From 1397 to the fall of Ming in 1644, the Great Ming Code served as the principal governing law of China. Under the Qing dynasty it was replaced by the Great Qing Legal Code, which borrowed heavily from it. Portions of the Great Ming Code were adopted into the legal systems of Joseon dynasty Korea, Edo period Japan, and Lê dynasty Vietnam.

The promulgation of the Great Ming Code in 1397 was the culmination of a series of efforts toward legal reform and codification spanning more than 30 years. No previous Chinese law code had gone through so many revisions in such a comparatively short time.

Work toward a new law code for what would become the Ming dynasty began in 1364, around the time that the future emperor captured Wuchang and began to call himself the Prince of Wu. In 1367 he ordered his Left Grand Councilor, Li Shanchang, to oversee and begin compiling a new code establishing principles of law and ritual with a focus on comparative lenience and simplicity. The resulting Ming Code was completed and promulgated at the end of 1367, consisting of 285 articles and based closely on the Tang Code. It was promulgated along with the Great Ming Commandment. No copies of this first Ming Code are extant.

On January 6, 1374, the emperor ordered Liu Weiqian, the Minister of Justice, to revise the Code, and this was completed in the spring of the same year. This new code, called for the first time the Great Ming Code, consisted of 606 articles (288 of which were taken from the first Ming Code). The text of the Great Ming Code of 1374 is also no longer extant.

In 1376, a new version of the Code was prepared at the emperor's direction in 1376 by Left Grand Councilor Hu Weiyong and Censor-in-Chief Wang Guangyang. Its text has also been lost, and it is unclear if there may have been minor revisions made at other times as well. In 1389, the Code was reorganized at the request of officials from the Ministry of Justice.

The final revision of the Code was officially promulgated in 1397, containing 460 articles, with only minor adjustments from the 1389 edition. The emperor ordered that the Code remain unchanged after 1397, and indeed the text of the Code remained unchanged throughout the dynasty, although emperors added their own ad hoc legislation and precedents to it. During the reign of the Wanli Emperor in 1585, 382 regulations or precedents were appended to the Code. In addition, scholarly commentaries circulated widely, providing interpretations of the Code's individual provisions.

The Great Ming Code consisted of 460 articles organized into 30 sections which were in turn organized into seven chapters. The Code was heavily concerned with public administration: of the 460 articles, 260 set forth the duties of imperial officials and corresponding punishments. For example, deceiving the throne could carry a penalty of strangulation or decapitation. Some provisions were also concerned with regulating private transactions, such as land sales.