| Summary: | This article takes Fu Chang’s Precedents of Ritual Protocol for Jin’s Imperial Ministers and Xun Chuo’s Annotations to the Report on Jin’s Official Posts as a means to observe the interactions between books and political processes during the Western and Eastern Jin dynasties. Both Fu Chang and Xun Chuo were employed as high-ranking officials, with a background of being from the Central Plain, by the regime of the Later Zhao founded by Shi Le. Their purpose for writing the two books was to provide guidance for the regime’s institutional establishment. The collapse of Shi Le’s regime led to the flow of people and their possessions to the south. During these movements, the two books along with other materials and records were brought to Jiankang and then contributed to the institutional and cultural development in the middle and late Eastern Jin Dynasty. As historical facts and references for political reformation, these books revealed the duality of institutional writings. The collection and dispersion of books after the Disaster of Yongjia, as well as the social and cultural changes, should be placed in a wider political process for further examination.
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