AcknowledgementsChronologyList of maps and illustrationsIntroduction by John Lagerwey and Marc KalinowskiShang and Western Zhou (1250-771 BC): Robert Eno - Shang state religion and the pantheon of the oracle textsAlain Thote - Shang and Zhou funeral practices: interpretation of material vestigesMartin Kern - Bronze inscriptions, the Shijing and the Shangshu: the evolution of the ancestral sacrifice during the Western ZhouKominami Ichiro - Rituals for the EarthEastern Zhou (770-256 BC):Constance Cook - Ancestor worship during the Eastern ZhouMu-chou Poo - Ritual and ritual texts in early ChinaYuri Pines - Chinese history writing between the sacred and the secularMarc Kalinowski - Diviners and astrologers under the Eastern Zhou (770-256 BC): transmitted texts and recent archaeological discoveriesFu-shih Lin - The image and status of shamans in ancient ChinaRomain Graziani - The subject and the sovereign: exploring the self in early Chinese self-cultivationMark Csikszentmihàlyi - Ethics and self-cultivation practice in early ChinaMark Edward Lewis - The mythology of early China Vera Dorofeeva-Lichtmann - Ritual practices for constructing terrestrial space (Warring States-early Han)Jean Levi - The rite, the norm, and the Dao: philosophy of sacrifice and transcendence of power in ancient ChinaQin and Han (221 BC-220 AD):Michael Puett - Combining the ghosts and spirits, centering the realm: mortuary ritual and political organization in the ritual compendia of early ChinaMichael Nylan - Classics without canonization, learning and authority in Qin (221-210 BC) and Han (206 BC-AD 220)Marianne Bujard - State and local cults in Han religionJoachim Gentz - Language of Heaven, exegetical skepticism and the reinsertion of religious concepts in the Gongyang traditionRoel Sterckx - The economics of religion in Warring States and early imperial ChinaLiu Tseng-kue -, Taboos: an aspect of belief in the Qin and HanMichèle Pirazzoli-t'Serstevens - Death and the dead: practices and images in the Qin and HanKen Brashier - Eastern Han commemorative stelae: laying the cornerstones of public memoryGrégoire Espesset - Eastern Han religious mass movements and the early Daoist churchLi Jianmin - They shall expel demons: etiology, the medical canon and the transformation of medical techniques before the TangList of authorsBibliographyIndex.