The clarification of the social structural characteristics of the Shang and Zhou Dynasties is an important topic in the discussion of the formation of the ancient Chinese state. For example, regarding the Spring and Autumn Period, which marked the latter half of the Zhou Dynasty Period, attention has been drawn to family institutions in urban (yi 邑) society ; namely, the existence of guoren 国人 and guohaoren 国号人 mentioned in Chunqiu Zuoshizhuan 春秋左氏伝 (左伝). In contrast to the conventional wisdom that the two designations are synonymous, the author of the present paper cites items in the Zuozhuan 左伝 that make distinctions between the two. The author begins with the term guoren during the early Spring and Autumn Period, which indicated an aristocrat belonging to the former or present emperor’s clan, but not a member of the immediate imperial family. It was then gradually expanded to indicate even persons with different clan names, then by the end of the period it was again limited to fundamentally residents of the capital city. Regarding the term guohaoren, its usage during the early period was broader than guoren, including those with clan names different from the emperors’, and then while gradually indicating any resident of the capital, it also described a certain group of folk (min 民) subjected to corvee labor. The author then turns to his examination of the use of ren 人 in the bamboo document collection Jinian 繫年 compiled by Jinhua University, which yielded not one item containing guoren, but only items inscribed with guohaoren. The author attributes the absence of guoren in the collection to either the fact that its compilation focussed mainly on sources related to international relations or that in contrast to guohaoren designating a specific group in Zuozhuan, the term found in the Jinian sources merely means “a member of a dynasty (guohao)”. The author argues that this meaning is related to Zuozhuan referring at the end of the period to persons not residing in the capital also as guohaoren. The author concludes that assuming guoren and guohaoren as different designations will certainly give rise to many points of discussion on the research to date; and with the excavation of any new sources from the period, new perspectives, which the traditional histories have been unable to provide, will be revealed.