As a most common means to settle disputes in Chinese ancient society, mediation focally represented the conception of “noncharge”, a essential factor of Chinese traditional legal culture, whose power of life is rooted in every aspect of Chinese society. The social structure, social culture and social values which embodied the primary relations of Chinese traditional society had decisive influences in the introduction and growth of mediation. The rulers helped a great deal enhance popularity of mediation by developing a consciousness of “noncharge” or “denouncing charge” ideologically, restricting people’s right of charge in legal system, preferring the strategy of mediation to calm down charge and encouraging folk mediation. The darkness in the judicial system in ancient China, which resulted only from the special character and institutions of political power in Chinese ancient society, judicial composition and status quo of officialdom, made mediation a necessary option by which the persecutor could avoid hazardous effects to most degree.

folk mediation； conception of noncharge； legal culture