The first major reassessment of ancient Chinese religion to appear in recent years, this book presents the religious mentality of the period through personal and daily experiences.

This book is the first major reassessment of ancient Chinese religion to appear in recent years. It provides a historical investigation of broadly shared religious beliefs and goals in ancient China from the earliest period to the end of the Han Dynasty. The author makes use of recently acquired archeological data, traditional texts, and modern scholarly work from China, Japan, and the West. The overall concern of this book is to try to reach the religious mentality of the ancient Chinese in the context of personal and daily experiences. Poo deals with such problems as the definition of religion, the popular/elite controversy in methodology, and the use of "elite" documents in the study of ordinary life.

"In many ways, this is a revolutionary book—in terms of its focus on the 'common' religion of everyday life and its discussion of the overlap and interaction between the 'elite' and 'common' levels of religion in early imperial China—and will be controversial in the best sense of the expression. There is nothing on ancient Chinese religion (in any language) that is quite like Poo's book. It is truly pioneering in this respect." — N. J. Girardot, Lehigh University

"One of the most illuminating studies on early Chinese religion I have read in a long time, it is well written, cogently argued, and based upon impeccable research. Poo has been able to make use of the great mass of new archaeological material that has been accumulating through the last two or three decades in China and Japan, and he has also mastered the best Western scholarship on Chinese religion. His grasp of both sets of materials is pertinent, accurate, and fascinating. I frankly think that anyone interested in Chinese religion would want to buy this book. I believe it will become something of a standard reference." — John Berthrong, author of All Under Heaven: Transforming Paradigms in Confucian-Christian Dialogue

Mu-chou Poo is Research Fellow and Professor at the Institute of History and Philology, Academia Sinica, Taiwan. He is the author of several works, including Wine and Wine Offering in the Religion of Ancient Egypt; Literature by the Nile: An Anthology of Ancient Egyptian Literature; and Burial Styles and Ideas of Life and Death.