The state of Ch'in, a Chinese Prussia, attained overwhelming hegemony in the third century before Christ. Its power rested on universal registration of the inhabitants, conscription, heavy policing, taxation involving constant intervention in economic matters, and legalistic administration. In its warfare there was little of the ritual which characterized the military period when chariots were dominant; codes did not amount to much. The immediate end of war was slaughter for political and economic purposes, not the hazardous parade of a feudal class. The Ch'in monarch who finally established a centralized empire took the vainglorious title of Shih Huang Ti (The First Emperor), and set himself the task of eradicating the regionalist ideologies of his conquered rivals by suppressing all political history but that of his native state. Proceeding from innovation to innovation, he ended by becoming one of the historic figures detested by later epochs. One of the practices which he extended throughout the Empire of China was the regularization of military service. He is also known as the originator of the grandiose project of the Great Wall; it is less well known that he forbade the erection of walls around cities within the Empire. His system of conscription involved three years of compulsory military service for all young men, and a corvee of three days' service each year at the frontier for every citizen; the former came to depend for its inclusiveness upon administrative integrity, while the latter was soon replaced by a money tax. Although the First Empire established by the Ch'in did not last long, the Han dynasty (202 B. C. to A. D. 220) continued its military system[6] and kept standing armies at the northern frontier and at the imperial capital. The frontier forces were composed of militia augmented for special campaigns by volunteers and criminals. The Chinese fought the barbarians with the tactics of mounted archers, devices learned from the nomads. Away from the northern steppes, infantry seems to have gained constantly in importance. By the time of Christ the chivalry of the religious-social-military class of charioteers was ancient history, and mass armies had taken their place. _Military Elements in Chinese Imperial History_