Confucius (his real name was Master Kong, but the Jesuits named his thinking "confucianism") believed that the evils of the time he lived in (6th and 5th centuries BC) could only be solved by training a class of professional, learned and kind civil servants. The first Han emperor, Gaozu, unlike his Qin predecessor, organized his government around this principle called meritocracy. The empire was divided in a series of areas governed by bureaucrats, who had been appointed mostly as a result of their merit and their talent. The so-called <em>Keju</em> os system of imperial exams was established in the year 606 and candidates spent an average of twenty years preparing for them and memorizing the Confucian texts. Those who passed the tests had a brilliant future ahead of them, and their families also benefited from this circumstance. These civil servants granted stability and efficiency to the administration and the society as a whole.
The profession that grew substantially with women’s participation during the Civil War was nursing. The women were not directly involved in the war, but they were definitely required to treat the wounded of the war.
