Early Beginnings of Chinese Administration in Hainan Part II: Silver Seal of Ledong
In August 2026, six volunteer teachers from Haikou International Talent Home taught ‘English Appreciation Classes’ for primary school children who were attending extramural classes during the long August summer vacation in Ledong Li Autonomous County. We held these classes in the afternoon. Hence, we spent the morning visiting places of interest in Ledong County. Ledong is famous for its fruits. We had enough time to visit a fruit farm and the Ledong Li Autonomous County Museum (乐东黎族自治县博物馆). In future articles, I will tell you more about the English Appreciation Classes we have conducted for primary school children in different regions of Hainan, and about the fruit farms in Ledong County.
In the Ledong museum, a huge black square metal block, almost a metre long, has an animal like a ‘sea-snake’ grafted on it. I was intrigued by this display because it looked more like a recent creation instead of an ancient artwork. The museum guide explained that it was a replica of the ‘Zhulu Zhi Kui’ (朱庐执刲) silver seal, kept at the Hainan Provincial Museum (海南省博物馆) in Haikou, as a national first-class cultural relic. It is the earliest official seal ever discovered in Hainan and is designated a ‘treasure of the museum’ (镇馆之宝).
A local farmer, Liu Qinggao, in Ledong was planting rubber trees when he unearthed the seal buried 30 cm beneath the soil. It served for some time as a ‘toy seal’ for a card game in the village. Losers in the card game would have their faces stamped with the seal dipped in red ink. In 1984, a local cultural worker, doing a survey in the vicinity, noticed the strange red marks on the players’ faces and recognized the cultural relic.
The original seal is quite small. The square seal face is 2.4cm long on each side. Its height is 0.8cm. The overall height of the seal is 1.9cm, including the ‘sea snake’ knob cast on top. From the enlarged replica, I could see that the snake's head is slightly raised; it seems to have ears, its body is covered in fine scale patterns, and its tail is curled in a crawling posture. The distinctive beast-head, snake-body (兽首蛇身) knob, which serves as the seal’s handle, makes it unique among Chinese seals. This type of snake-knob seal (蛇钮印) is extremely rare. In Chinese archaeology, it is primarily associated with the Western Han Dynasty and was often used for seals granted to frontier leaders or high-ranking officials. Another famous example of a snake knob seal is the ‘Seal of the King of Dian’ (滇王之印) found in Yunnan. It is made of gold, and the knob is cast in the shape of a coiled snake, with scale patterns on its back and its head raised. The square seal face is also 2.4 cm per side, and the total height is about 2 cm, similar to the ‘Zhulu Zhi Kui’ seal.
The size of this seal is not random; it followed the strict standards of the Western Han dynasty. Official seals were required to be "one square inch" (方寸之印), and a Han dynasty inch was roughly equivalent to 2.35 cm. Hence, the seal's 2.4 cm side length fits this requirement, confirming its status as a standard official seal of the Western Han period (206 BC - 9 AD). This seal is extremely rare. It is one of only two known Western Han ‘Zhi Kui’ seals in existence, the other being an amber seal found in Guangxi.
The seal's inscription, "Zhulu Zhi Kui", confirms a crucial period in Hainan's administrative history. ‘Zhulu’ (朱庐) is a place’s name. After the Western Han court abolished the Zhuya Commandery in 46 BC, it did not abandon the island. Instead, they downgraded the administration to a single county named Zhulu County, placing it under the jurisdiction of Hepu Commandery on the mainland. ‘Zhi Kui’ (执刲) is the title bestowed upon a high-ranking noble (equivalent to "Marquis" or a senior military rank). The combination of the silver material (silver seals were reserved for officials with a salary of at least 2,000 dan) and the noble title ‘Zhi Kui’ indicates the seal’s owner was a high-ranking military governor stationed in Zhulu County, responsible for both civil administration and defense.
The seal is a physical ‘ID card’ proving that Hainan was an integral part of Chinese administration over 2,000 years ago. It is concrete evidence of the Western Han Dynasty's administrative and military presence on the island. Historically, many believed that when the Han court abolished the Zhuya Commandery in 46 BC, it meant the central Chinese administration had given up on Hainan entirely. The seal proves that a high-ranking military official continued to govern and defend the island, maintaining direct central control.
This seal is one of the Western Han official seals found across southern China, such as the famous ‘Seal of the King of Dian’ in Yunnan and the ‘Seal of Emperor Wen’ from the Nanyue King's tomb in Guangzhou. These artifacts indicate how the Western Han Dynasty integrated diverse southern frontier regions, including Hainan, into a unified imperial system through a consistent system of official seals, ranks, and titles.
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