4.1.3. Class Analysis of the Artist Groups

From the historical materials we known that the Han writers of the grand rhapsodies were a small group of literati elites at the service of the emperors. They enjoyed high social status, and even had their biographies written into the official histories. In sharp contrast are Han stone carvers, about whom no mention whatsoever is found in the dynastic histories. They were commoners—a group of nobodies with no official records about them. In alignment with the difference in social statues between the poets of grand rhapsodies and the engravers of stone reliefs is the difference in the level of esteem accorded to the two forms of art, the rhapsody and stone carving in the Han period. Generally speaking, the former was a high form of art created by and for members of the upper class, and the latter a lower form of art created by and for commoners.

Han China was a strictly hierarchical society, in which there was little social interaction between members of different classes, and social mobility for commoners was limited. The theme and subject matter, motifs, images, symbols, and stories presented in these two forms of art, we may safely say, reflect the distinctive tastes, beliefs, imaginations, views, and needs of their creators and particularly of their audiences/patrons. In his study of Han stone carved tombs, Chen Li (2018, p. 91) correctly points out, "Though not necessarily from their own experiences, it is within the society that people generally acquire and locate their memories. The carved images and their combinations of objects preserve a social context in which the story of the tomb occupants and general trends are placed.".
