‘Guidelines for judges’ in imperial China: finding a compromise between theory and practice of legal proceedings

The author provides a comparative analysis of individuals’ legal comments on criminal cases in China’s imperial period. These ‘guidelines for judges’ were very popular among Chinese officials and were a valuable tool to handle criminal and civil cases. In contrast to the official publications characterizing the judicial system functioning, these guides described the real situation in Chinese legal proceedings. The paper focuses on the studies of the 13th-century forensic medical examination: ‘Instructions to Coroners’ (Hsi yüan lu), ‘Magic Mirror for Deciding Cases’ (Zhe yu gui jian), the commentaries provided by the Song dynasty writer Zheng Ke, and ‘Record of Practical Administration’ (Shih-cheng lu) by the Ming dynasty writer Lü K’un. The authors of these works made practical recommendations on all stages of legal proceedings (inquiry, investigation, arrest, court hearing, interrogation, decision-making, reporting to higher authorities) exemplified by real or fake criminal cases. Analyzing the institution of torture in legal proceedings, the author concludes that the ‘guidelines for judges’ fail both to adhere to the so-called formal theory of evidence and to regard torture as the queen of evidence.