From Individual to Lineage Identity: Huizhou Merchants and the Rise of Genealogies in Ming China

This article examines how Huizhou merchants shaped their identities during their economic ascent from the fifteenth century onward. Because commerce carried a stigma in Confucian ideology, they shifted the basis of self-presentation from mercantile success to moral excellence. This produced a competition in virtue, where the moral capital accumulated in a single lifetime could not rival that amassed across generations. Merchants therefore redirected identity claims from personal virtue to membership in lineages where virtue had been cultivated over generations. In doing so, they moved the foundation of identity from individual achievement to collective lineage affiliation. This shift provides a new explanation for the rise of lineages and genealogies from the perspective of identity formation. By underscoring the initiative, creativity, and adaptability of merchants in driving these changes, the article also repositions them from the cultural margins to the center of identity-making in late imperial China.