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{{Short description|Late 1st/early 2nd century Chinese historian, philosopher and scholar}}
{{distinguish|text=her brother [[Ban Chao]]}}
{{family name hatnote|[[Ban (Chinese surname)|Ban]]|lang=Chinese}}
{{Infobox person
|image=File:Famous Women, 1799 (L).jpg
|caption=Ban Zhao, as painted by [[Gai Qi]], 1799
|birth_date=AD 45 or 49
|birth_place=Anling, near [[Xianyang]], [[Han dynasty|Han China]]
|death_date={{death year and age|120|49}}
|death_place=China
|spouse=[[Cao Shishu]]
|parents=[[Ban Biao]]
|relations=[[Ban Chao]] (brother) <br> [[Ban Gu]] (brother)
}}

{{infobox Chinese
| c = {{linktext|班|昭}}
| p = Bān Zhāo
| w = Pan<sup>1</sup> Chao<sup>1</sup>
| j = Baan<sup>1</sup> Ciu<sup>1</sup>
| y = Bāan Chīu
|mi={{IPAc-cmn|b|an|1|-|zh|ao|1}} 
|mc={{IPA|/pˠan t͡ɕiᴇu/ }}
|p2=Huìbān|l2=Ban the Kind|w2=Hui<sup>4</sup>-Pan<sup>1</sup>|c2={{linktext|惠|班}}|mc2={{IPA|/ɦwei<sup>H</sup> pˠan/}} |mi2={{IPAc-cmn|h|ui|4|.|b|an|1|}} 
|c3={{linktext|曹|大家}}|p3=Cáo Dàgū|l3=Venerable Madame Cao|mc3={{IPA|/d͡zɑu dɑi<sup>H</sup> kuo/}}
}}

'''Ban Zhao''' ({{zh|c=班昭}}; 45 or 49 – c. 117/120 CE), [[courtesy name]] '''Huiban''' ({{zh|c=惠班}}), was a [[Chinese historiography|Chinese historian]], philosopher, and politician. She was the first known female Chinese historian and, along with [[Pamphile of Epidaurus]], [[List of historians|one of the first known female historians]]. She completed her brother [[Ban Gu]]'s work on the history of the [[Western Han]], the ''[[Book of Han]]''. She also wrote ''[[Lessons for Women]]'', an influential work on women's conduct. She also had great interest in astronomy and mathematics and wrote poems, commemorative writings, argumentations, commentaries, essays and several longer works,<ref>{{harvnb|Wang|2003|p=177}}</ref> not all of which survive. She became China's most famous female scholar<ref>{{harvnb|Perkins|2000|p=25}}</ref> and an instructor of [[Taoist sexual practices]] for the imperial family.<ref>Gender and Sexuality in Modern Chinese History By Susan L. Mann page 88</ref> Ban Zhao is depicted in the [[Wu Shuang Pu]] (無雙譜, Table of Peerless Heroes) by Jin Guliang.

==Family==
[[File: Ban Zhao - Wushuang Pu (pref 1690, 1961).jpg|thumb|Ban Zhao as depicted in the ''[[Wu Shuang Pu]]'' (無雙譜, preface 1690) by Jin Guliang]]
Ban Zhao was born in Anling, near modern [[Xianyang]], [[Shaanxi]] province. At age fourteen, she married a local resident named Cao Shishu and was called in the court by the name as '''Venerable Madame Cao''' ({{lang|zh|曹大家}}). Her husband died when she was still young. She never remarried, instead devoting her life to scholarship.<ref>{{harvnb|Bennet Peterson|2000|p=99}}</ref> She was the daughter of the famous historian [[Ban Biao]] and younger sister of the general [[Ban Chao]] and of historian [[Ban Gu]]. She was also the grandniece of the notable scholar and poet [[Consort Ban]].

==Work==
[[File:Ban Zhao.jpg|thumb|Image of Ban Zhao by Shangguan Zhou (上官周, b. 1665)]]
Ban Zhao contributed greatly to the completion and transmission of ''[[Book of Han|Hanshu]]'' (漢書, literally the "Book of the [Former] Han"), the official dynastic history of the [[Western Han]]. After Ban Gu was imprisoned and died in 92 because of his association with the family of [[Empress Dou (Zhang)|Empress Dowager Dou]], Ban Zhao helped finish the work by making up for the missing part of the ''Babiao'' (八表 Eight Tables). She added the genealogy of the mother of the emperor, providing much information which was not usually kept. Later, Ma Xu added a treatise on [[astronomy]] ({{lang|zh|天文志}}), making ''Hanshu'' a complete work.

Ban Zhao also wrote the ''[[Lessons for Women]]''. This treatise on the education of women was dedicated to the daughters in Ban Zhao's family but was circulated immediately at court. It was popular for centuries in China as a guide for [[Women in ancient and imperial China|women's conduct]].<ref>{{harvnb|Donawerth|2002|p=14 }}</ref>

Some modern interpretations of ''[[Lessons for Women]]'' claim that it is a founding text of [[Confucian feminism]].<ref>{{cite journal | title=Kongzi as Feminist: Confucian Self-Cultivation in a Contemporary Context | last=Wawrytko | first=Sandra | year=2002 | journal=Journal of Chinese Philosophy | volume=27 | issue=2 | pages=171–186 | doi=10.1111/0301-8121.00011 }}</ref> One study asserts that it establishes a "different concept of agency ... forged out of the powerlessness of individual women, which is familial, communal, indirect, and conferred by others."<ref>{{cite journal | title=Inventing Familial Agency from Powerlessness: Ban Zhao's Lessons for Women | last=Lee | first=Lin-Lee | year=2009 | journal=Western Journal of Communication | volume=73 | pages=47–66 | doi=10.1080/10570310802636318 | s2cid=144813841 }}</ref> Others, however, have argued that Ban Zhao's assertions of the value of a woman's mediocrity and servile behavior in ''Lessons for Women'' are incompatible with feminism and that attempts to present her as a feminist are misplaced.<ref>{{cite book |last=Goldin |first=Paul R. |chapter=Ban Zhao in Her Time and in Ours |title=After Confucius: Studies in Early Chinese Philosophy |publisher=University of Hawai'i Press |location=Honolulu |date=2005 |pages=112–118 |jstor=j.ctt1wn0qtj.11 |isbn=978-0-8248-2842-4}}</ref> Since her text presents a woman's main task as submission to a husband or father and dismisses the significance of women's intelligence or talent, this has been seen as a Confucian endorsement of injustice against women.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Gao |first=Xiongya |title=Women Existing for Men: Confucianism and Social Injustice against Women in China |journal=Race, Gender & Class |volume=10 |issue=3 |year=2003 |pages=114–125 |jstor=41675091}}</ref>

She taught [[Empress Deng Sui]] and members of the court in the royal library, which gained her political influence.<ref name="Bennet Peterson 2000 102">{{harvnb|Bennet Peterson|2000|p=102}}</ref> The Empress and concubines gave her the title ''Gifted one'' and the empress made her a [[Lady-in-waiting]]. As the Empress became regent for the infant [[Emperor Shang of Han]], she often sought the advice of Ban Zhao. In gratitude, the Empress gave both Ban Zhao's sons appointments as officials.<ref name="Bennet Peterson 2000 102"/> Ban Zhao was also a librarian at court, supervising the editorial labors of a staff of assistants and training other scholars in her work. In this capacity, she rearranged and enlarged the ''Biographies of Eminent Women'' by [[Liu Xiang (scholar)|Liu Xiang]]. It is possible that she supervised the copying of manuscripts from [[bamboo slips]] and silk onto a recently invented material, paper.<ref>{{harvnb|Donawerth|2002|p=14}}</ref>

In 113, Ban Zhao's son Cao Cheng ({{lang|zh|曹成}}) was appointed an official in [[Chenliu Commandery]]. Ban accompanied him to Chenliu and wrote about the journey in ''Dong Zheng Fu'' ({{lang|zh|東征賦)}}, which has survived. After her death, her daughter-in-law, née Ding, gathered her works in the three-volume ''Collected Works of Ban Zhao'', but most have been lost.<ref name="Lee">{{cite book|author=Lee|title=Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Women: Antiquity Through Sui, 1600 B.C.E.-618 C.E.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u7mLql4TAxoC&pg=PA104|publisher=M.E. Sharpe|isbn=978-0-7656-4182-3|page=104|year=1998}}</ref>

==Legacy==

[[Ban Zhao (crater)|Ban Zhao crater]] on [[Venus]] is named after her.

==Family==
* [[Ban Biao]] ([[:zh:班彪|班彪]]; 3-54; father)
** [[Ban Gu]] ([[:zh:班固|班固]]; 32–92; eldest brother)
** [[Ban Chao]] ([[:zh:班超|班超]]; 32–102; second brother)
*** Ban Xiong ([[:zh:班雄|班雄]]; ?-after 107; Ban Chao's eldest son)
*** Ban Shi ([[:zh:班始|班始]]; ?-130; Ban Chao's second son)
*** [[Ban Yong]] ([[:zh:班勇|班勇]]; ?-after 127; Ban Chao's youngest son)

==See also==
*[[Book of Han]]
*[[Pamphile of Epidaurus]], a contemporary female Greco-Roman historian of Roman Egypt

==Notes==
{{reflist|30em}}

==References==	
* {{cite book | title=Notable Women of China: Shang Dynasty to the Early Twentieth Century | last=Bennet Peterson | first=Barbara| year=2000 | publisher=M.E. Sharpe, Inc }}
* {{cite encyclopedia|title= Berkshire Dictionary of Chinese Biography|year= 2014|chapter= Ban Zhao|editor-last= Brown|editor-first=Kerry |last=Hinsch |first= Bret|volume= One |pages= 222–235|publisher= Berkshire|isbn=978-1933782-66-9}}
* {{cite book|last=Donawerth|first=Jane|title=Rhetorical Theory by Women Before 1900|year=2002|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers|location=Lanham, Maryland|isbn=978-0-7425-1717-2|pages=337}}
* {{cite book |last=Perkins |first=Dorothy |year=2000 |title=Encyclopedia of China: The Essential Reference to China, Its History and Culture  |publisher=Roundtable Press |location=New York, N.Y. |isbn=0-8160-2693-9 }}
* {{cite book | title=Images of women in Chinese thought and culture: writings from the pre-Qin | last=Wang | first=Robin| year=2003 | publisher=Hackett Publishing Company }}
* Zhao, Ban. "Excerpts From Admonitions for Women".

==External links==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20050405213037/http://home.infionline.net/~ddisse/banzhao.html Information on Ban Zhao and her family]

{{Subject bar|book=no|portal1=China|portal2=China/Categories|portal3=Literature|portal4=Books|portal5=|commons=yes|commons-search=Category:Ban Zhao|d=yes|d-search=Q177081}}

{{Han dynasty historians}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ban, Zhao}}
[[Category:49 births]]
[[Category:120 deaths]]
[[Category:1st-century Chinese historians]]
[[Category:1st-century Chinese philosophers]]
[[Category:1st-century Chinese women writers]]
[[Category:2nd-century Chinese people]]
[[Category:2nd-century Chinese philosophers]]
[[Category:2nd-century Chinese women writers]]
[[Category:2nd-century Chinese writers]]
[[Category:Chinese ladies-in-waiting]]
[[Category:Chinese women philosophers]]
[[Category:Han dynasty government officials]]
[[Category:Historians from Shaanxi]]
[[Category:Philosophers from Shaanxi]]
[[Category:Politicians from Xianyang]]
[[Category:Chinese women historians]]
[[Category:Writers from Xianyang]]
[[Category:2nd-century Chinese women]]
[[Category:1st-century Chinese women]]