Dawn Patrols and Nightfall Dismissals: Ancient China’s Civil Service Schedule

Long before the term “996” entered modern Chinese workplace vocabulary – referring to the grueling 9am to 9pm, six-day workweek prevalent in tech companies – imperial bureaucrats faced similarly demanding schedules. The concept of “going to work” (上班) originated in court rituals where officials formed orderly queues (班) for morning assemblies. During the Zhou dynasty (1046-256 BCE), The Book of Songs describes officials already assembled at court when roosters crowed at dawn, with government business in full swing by sunrise.

Ming dynasty (1368-1644) records from the Official Admonitions Compendium reveal an even more precise timetable. Officials made brushstroke signatures (画卯) on attendance registers during the mao hour (5-7am) and repeated the process at you hour (5-7pm) when departing. This “point mao” (点卯) system created a standardized 6am to 6pm workday – a proto-industrial twelve-hour shift that would make modern office workers blanch.

The Evolution of Rest Days Through Imperial Dynasties

Ancient China’s approach to weekends would shock modern labor advocates. Han dynasty (206 BCE-220 CE) officials enjoyed meager five-day cycles between rest days, while Tang dynasty (618-907) bureaucrats waited ten days between breaks. The Ming founder Zhu Yuanzhang instituted perhaps the harshest policy in 1373, decreeing just one monthly holiday on the fifth day – effectively creating a “666” system (6am-6pm, six days weekly) that eerily parallels today’s controversial “996” model.

Punishments for tardiness or absenteeism could be draconian. Tang records show officials forfeiting a month’s salary for one missed day. The Yuan dynasty brought corporal punishment – the renowned painter Zhao Meng once received a paddling from Mongolian administrators for lateness. Ming emperors institutionalized court beatings (廷杖) for attendance violations, leading to tragicomic extremes. One panicked official drowned in the palace moat while sprinting to avoid tardy punishment during the eunuch Wei Zhongxian’s regency.

The Human Cost of Pre-Industrial Overwork

Beyond the scholar-officials, China’s underclasses endured even more brutal schedules. Qing dynasty writer Fang Bao memorialized a maidservant named Yin who followed a “247” routine – rising at cockcrow after barely three hours’ sleep, with no holidays until her death at seventeen. This relentless cycle prompted Fang’s bitter observation that while modern workers joke about “996 sending you to ICU,” premodern laborers faced conditions where overwork led straight to the grave.

Artisans and craftsmen under the匠籍 (artisan household) system faced generational indentured servitude. The 1620 Gazetteer of Suzhou Prefecture records imperial kiln workers laboring “through the night when palace commissions demanded,” with overseers whipping those who faltered. Such accounts reveal how China’s tradition of intensive labor predates industrialization by millennia.

Paperwork and Productivity in the Pre-Digital Age

The sheer volume of bureaucratic work in imperial China would overwhelm modern administrators. A single Ming county magistrate might review 200-300 documents daily, from tax records to legal petitions, all processed by hand with brush and ink. The 18th-century memoir A Small Measure of Relief describes governors-general working by lamplight until the night watch’s third drum (around 1am), only to rise again for the dawn audience.

This culture of overwork produced its own dissenting voices. Song dynasty statesman Ouyang Xiu’s poem “Thanksgiving for Rain at Jixi Temple” wistfully contrasts his muddy predawn commutes with leisurely mornings in Chu prefecture. Ming novelist Wu Jingzi satirized workaholic officials in The Scholars, depicting a magistrate who collapses from exhaustion while drafting memorials.

From Agrarian Rhythms to Industrial Time Discipline

Premodern China’s labor patterns reflected its agrarian foundations. Farmers followed seasonal cycles rather than fixed schedules, working from “when you can see the lines in your palm at dawn until you can’t see the lines in your palm at dusk,” as a Qing agricultural manual notes. The real “996” parallel emerged with late imperial commercialization, as textile workshops in Songjiang or Jingdezhen kilns adopted regimented hours to meet production targets.

The Treaty Port era (1842-1943) introduced Western factory discipline. Shanghai cotton mill workers in the 1920s averaged 10-12 hour days, with monthly workdays ranging from 20 in textiles to 28 in shipbuilding – figures comparable to today’s most demanding tech companies. Not until 1995 would China adopt the five-day workweek, though vestiges of the “666” mentality persist in certain sectors.

The Enduring Legacy of China’s Work Ethic

Contemporary debates about work-life balance gain historical perspective when viewed against China’s three-millennia struggle with overwork. The same dynasties that produced exhaustive administrative systems also gave us the Daoist ideal of wuwei (non-action) and the pastoral poetry of Tao Yuanming. Perhaps the most telling artifact is a Tang dynasty water clock in the Shaanxi History Museum, its intricate gears designed to ensure not a minute of official time went unaccounted for – a bronze-age precursor to today’s productivity tracking apps.

As China grapples with the human costs of economic modernization, the ghosts of Ming clerks and Qing factory girls remind us that the tension between productivity and wellbeing is no contemporary invention, but rather the latest chapter in an ancient story. The roosters that once governed Zhou officials’ schedules may be gone, but their symbolic wake-up call continues to echo through China’s evolving workplace culture.