Download Qin and Han Dynasties - Libertyville High School

Qin and Han Dynasties
Libertyville High School
The Qin (Chin) Dynasty (242-202 BC)
• Arose out of the Time of
Warring States
• Took title of Shi Huangdi
(First Emperor)
• Applied legalist
philosophical methods to
run state
Qin Dynasty
• Strategy
– Destroy power of other
warlords
– “Strengthen the trunk,
weaken the branches”
– Commanded nobility to live in
capital city
– Confiscated lands, weapons
of nobility
Qin Dynasty
• Silenced criticism
– Murdered hundreds of
Confucian scholars
– Burned books NOT about
medicine and farming
• Centralized government
power
– Massive forced labor on
road building project
– Strict regulation of currency,
law – even length of wagon
axis
Qin Dynasty: Results
• Unified virtually all of
modern day China
• Building projects
– Great Wall
– Massive tomb
Great Wall of China
• Zhou rulers had built many
small walls vs. nomads
• Shi Huangdi was
determined to link walls
• Built by forced labor of
100,000s of peasants
– Choice: work or die
– Many who died became
“fill” for wall
– Over 1,400 miles long (long
way to go around!)
Huangdi’s Tomb
• Terra Cotta soldiers
created to serve
emperor in death
– Individualized faces,
based on real soldiers of
army
• Location lost until 1974
Fall of Qin Dynasty
• Regime was horribly
unpopular
– High taxes & repressive
government
– Scholars were either killed or
forced into hiding
– Poor were worked to death on
public projects
• Shi Huangdi died and a
peasants revolt broke out;
Han Dynasty set up in 202
BC
Han Dynasty (202 BC-220 AD)
• Considered the greatest
period of Chinese history
• Liu Bang, a former Qin
policeman, became leader of
peasant revolt
• 202 BC: revolt successful,
Bang set self up as emperor
Han Government
Han Officials (above); nobles (below)
• Based on Confucian
principles
• Goal was the unification of
China
• Accomplishments
– Lowered taxes
– Established civil service
Han Government
• Civil service created
– Jobs no longer depended on
who you knew
– Initiated civil service exam,
based on Confucian ideas
– Now, best person got job,
not best connected
• Today, Chinese refer to
selves as “People of Han”
Han Technology
• Paper, based on wood pulp
(105 AD)
• Hydraulic power (bellows of
steel mill)
• Steel, combining wrought
and cast iron
• Scientific explanations of
lunar & solar eclipses
Silk Road
• From 138 BC, Han
emperors ordered patrols
of trade routes into Central
Asia
• Began sending diplomats
to other states
• Received envoys from
Romans!
• Trade route reached
Mediterranean shore
Fall of Han Dynasty
• Emperors became weak,
disinterested in fairness
• Peasant rebellions, nobles
joined in
• Han lost control
• Civil war for next 350 years