Maxim Korolkov

2017–              Assistant Professor, Institute of Chinese Studies, Heidelberg University

2016–2017      Guest Researcher, Wuhan University

2015–2017      Research Associate, Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences

2015                Guest Researcher, Kyoto University

2011–2012      Research Associate, Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences

Maxim Korolkov studied history and sinology at Moscow State University, Peking University, and Columbia University. His PhD dissertation “Empire-Building and Market-Making at the Qin Frontier: Imperial Expansion and Economic Change, 221–207 BCE” explores the economic aspects of imperial state formation in China during the Warring States, Qin, and Han periods. Before joining the Heidelberg University’s Institute of Chinese Studies, Maxim taught and conducted research at Columbia University, Russian Academy of Sciences, Kyoto University, and Wuhan University. 

His book, The Imperial Network in Ancient China: The Foundation of Sinitic Empire in Southern East Asia (Routledge, 2022), seeks to re-define the geographical frameworks of East Asian history through re-visiting the expansion of Sinitic polities south of the Yangzi River in the first millennium BCE. His second book, Institutions and Environment in Ancient Southern East Asia, 3000 BCE to 300 CE (Cambridge Elements, Cambridge University Press, 2024), builds upon the insights from institutional economics and political anthropology to understand the divergence in the long-term historical trajectories of East Asian regions from the Late Neolithic to the medieval period. Maxim is currently pursuing the research project “Inventing the Chinese Economy: Economic Change in the Formative Period of Chinese Empires,” funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG).

2024    Lecture series “Economic History of Early China.” Peking University (in Chinese).

2023    Empire Marches South: New Evidence on How Southern East Asia Became Chinese. Ludwig Maximillian University of Munich.

2022    Inventing East Asia, 1000–200 BCE: From Interaction Sphere to Empire. Peking University (online lecture, in Chinese).

2022    Southern Sea Ports of the Han Empire: Urbanization and Trade in Coastal Lingnan, 300 BCE – 300 CE. Freiburg University (online lecture).

2022    Human Migrations in the Formation of Early Chinese Empires. Lecture series “New Perspectives on the Old World,” Hong Kong Baptist University (online lecture).

2021    The Imperial Network in Ancient China: The Foundation of Sinitic Empire in Southern East Asia. University of Pennsylvania (online lecture).

2018    From Dependent Labor to Labor Market: Credit, Labor, and Accounting in Early Chinese Empires. Freiburg University.

2017    Fiscal Sociology and New Fiscal History: A Comparative Investigation of Pre-modern Fiscal Regimes and its Implications for the Study of Fiscal History of the Qin and Han Empires. Central China Normal University, Wuhan (in Chinese).

Monographs

Institutions and Environment in Ancient Southern East Asia, 3000 BCE to 300 CE. Cambridge Elements Series. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2024.

The Imperial Network in Ancient China: The Foundation of Sinitic Empire in Southern East Asia. London and New York: Routledge, 2022.

(Chinese translation: Ma Shuo 馬碩 (Maxim Korolkov). Gudai Zhongguo de diguo wangluo: Zhonghua diguo zai Dongya nanbu de jianli 古代中國的帝國網絡——中華帝國在東亞南部的建立. Shanghai: Zhongguo chuban jituan, 2024.)

Zouyanshu: A Collection of Dubious Legal Cases from the Beginning of the Han Period. A Study with Critical Edition and Annotated Translation. Moscow: Nauka–Vostochnaya Literatura, 2013. (in Russian)

Other Publications

“(Political) Community: Grassroots Social Units in Ideology and Practice of the Early Chinese Empires.” Bochumer Jahrbuch zur Ostasienforschung 2023 (2024): 155–182.

“State, Local Communities, and Water Management at the Dawn of China’s Imperial Era in the Light of Newly Excavated Documents.” Bamboo and Silk 7 (2024): 219–250.

“Southern Sea Ports of the Han Empire: Urbanization and Trade in Coastal Lingnan.” In Sitta von Reden, ed. Handbook of Ancient Afro-Eurasian Economies. Vol. 3. Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, 2023. 295–337.

“Building Empire, Creating Markets: Commercial Policies and Practices in Imperial Qin (221–207 BCE).” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 66 (2023): 206–236.

“Between Command and Market: Credit, Labor and Accounting in the Qin Empire (221-207 B.C.E.).” In Elisa Sabattini and Christian Schwermann, eds. Between Command and Market: Economic Thought and Practice in Early China. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2022. 162–243.

“Fiscal Transformation During the Formative Period of Ancient Chinese Empire (Late Fourth to First Century B.C.).” In Jonathan Valk and Irene Soto Marín, eds. Ancient Taxation: The Mechanics of Extraction in Comparative Perspective. New York: State University of New York Press, 2022. 203–271.

“State-Induced Migration and the Creation of State Spaces in Early Chinese Empires: Perspectives from Archaeology and History.” Journal of Chinese History 5 (2021): 203–225. (co-authored with Anke Hein)

“Greeting tablets” in Early China: Some Aspects of the Communicative Ritual of Officialdom in Light of Newly Excavated Inscriptions.” T’oung Pao 98 (2012): 295–348.

“Arguing About Law: Interrogation Procedure Under the Qin and Former Han Dynasties.” Études Chinoises XXX (2021): 37–71.