Abstract: In homicides of spouse killing, how should surviving children mourn their lost parent remained a difficult issue in traditional China. This study examines how the mourning rituals and legal codes were debated by Confucian scholar-bureaucrats in imperial China from Han to Tang. The debates were mainly focused on the interpretation of Confucian classics such as “Mourning Apparel Codes”offering different views on ideal social order and lawfulness. For instance, in debating cases of stepmother killing father, Kong Jiyan derived his view from the principles in the Spring and Autumn and concluded that severance of relationship should be equally applied whether it was step-mothers or birth-mothers. Emperor Wu of Han described “stepmother” from Confucian doctrines as “for father's love, stepmother is like mother”. Scholars in Wei and Jin reached a conclusion that a stepmother became a stranger if she had killed her husband but a birthmother would continue her blood bond with her children. In debating cases of mother killing father, Dou Yuan argued that sons had duty to turn mothers in as under the Confucian patriarchal order, fathers were superior to mothers. In opposition, Fen Junyi believed that filial piety required an equal obligation towards father and mother, therefore, children should remain silence. These different views on the relationship between mother and child provided grounds for varied practices and legal codes on the mourning rituals in homicides of mother killing father under the Confucian patriarchal order of the imperial China.

Key words: the mourning apparel system, mother killed father, stepmother is just like mother, interpretation of Confucian classics, legal order