The lack of the historical documents for the Liao Dynasty made it very difficult to draw an overall picture of the culture of the Southern Capital, but its cultural prosperity can still be descried from the uncommon historical literature.
As other dynasties did, the Liao Dynasty lay importance on the Confucianism and set up the Supreme College (the highest seat of learning in ancient times in China̫ѧ) in the city of the Southern Capital and also Schools at the levels of prefecture and county. In the thirteenth year of Tonghe period (995 AD), a farm with a piece of paddy field was granted to the Supreme College in the city of the Southern Capital as subsidy to support the running of the education for there were too many students studying there. The system of the Imperial Examination also originated from the city of the Southern Capital. At the very beginning, few people passed the examination to be officials, but the number of the examinees increased greatly during the reign of the Liao emperor Shengzong, and quite a great number of learned people entered into the governing body in this way. Liu Sangu, Liu Siduan, Liu Liufu and other people from the above mentioned family of Liu all passed the examinations as Imperial Scholars (½øÊ¿). |
