Bao Zheng

Song Dynasty Chinese judge and magistrate Bao Zheng (Bao Qingtian) writes a memorial to the throne, warning about governmental corruption and a foreseeable bankruptcy of the Chinese iron industry, if increasingly poorer families continue to be listed on the register for iron-smelting households (while more rich households avoid being listed for fear of financial calamity).

Apparently the government heeds the warning, and by 1078 will produce more iron than China ever had before.

Bao Zheng, according to the History of Song, was born into a scholar family in Luzhou District (now Hefei District, Anhui Province).

Bao's family was middle class, and although Bao's parents could afford to send him to school, his mother had to climb up mountains to collect firewood just before she gave birth to him.

As Bao had grown up among low working class, he well understands people's hardships, hates corruption and strongly desires justice.

At the age of twenty-nine, Bao had passed the highest-level imperial examination and became qualified as a Jinshi.

Appointed as Magistrate of Jianchang County he had deferred embarking on his official career for a decade in order to care for his elderly parents and faithfully observe proper mourning rites after their deaths.

During the time Bao looked after his parents at home, Liu Yun, Magistrate of Luzhou, who was renowned as an excellent poetic and fair-minded officer, usually visited Bao.

Because the two got along well, Bao obtained great influence from Liu Yun in respect of the love for people.

After his parents' demise, Bao, now forty, had been reappointed as Magistrate of Tianchang District.

Since Bao had proved to be a good public officer, he has been promoted to higher offices successively.

While at the post in Duanzhou, famous for its inkstones, Bao had discovered that previous magistrates always collected more inkstones than allowed.

Bao had stopped the practice and left without a single inkstone in his possession once his tenure was over.

During his years in the government service, Bao has had thirty high officials demoted or dismissed for corruption, bribery, or dereliction of duty.

He also had had Zhang Yaozhuo, the uncle of a highly ranked imperial concubine, impeached for six offenses.

In addition, as the imperial censor, Bao has avoided punishment despite having many other contemporary imperial censors punished for minor statements.

Bao had been appointed the Magistrate of the Capital City of Bian (now Kaifeng) in 1057.

Bao holds the position for a merely a year, but he initiates several material administrative reforms, including allowing the citizens to directly lodge complaints with the city administrators, thereby bypassing the city clerks who are believed to be corrupt and in the pay of local powerful families.

Although Bao gains much fame and popularity from his reforms, his service after his tenure as Magistrate of Bian is controversial.

For example, when Bao dismisses Zhang Fangping, who concurrently holds three important offices, Bao is appointed to these offices as Zhang's successor.

Ouyang Xiu then files a rebuke against Bao.

Bao had also been the Minister of Finance.

Despite his high rank in the government, Bao leads a modest life like a commoner.

Apart from his intolerance of injustice and corruption, Bao is well-known for his filial piety and his stern demeanor.

In his lifetime, Bao gains he name "Iron-Faced Judge" and it is also said among the public that his smile is "rarer than clear waters in the Yellow River".

Due to his fame and the strength of his reputation, Bao's name will become synonymous with the idealized "honest and upright official" (qing guan), and will quickly become a popular subject of early vernacular drama and literature.

Bao will also be associated with the god Yanluo (Yama) and the "Infernal Bureaucracy" of the Eastern Marchmount, on account of his supposed ability to judge affairs in the afterlife as well as he judged them in the realm of the living.