Download Imperial China -- Qin to Ming Dynasties

February 2, 2017
In religion, India is the only millionaire……the One land
that all men desire to see, and having seen once, by even
a glimpse, would not give that glimpse for all the shows of
all the rest of the globe combined.
- Mark Twain
Warm-Up: Practice
Test review
• Students will take a Mini-Quiz on the
Chinese Dynasties
• Take out your Practice test for Ch16
from your Winter Break Packets
“Ch16- India and Indian Ocean Basin”
- Students will be selected at random to answer
practice test questions for Participation points.
Sui Dynasty
China’s One Hit Wonder...
Dynasty only lasted 36 years
The Backstory
 Han Dynasty 220 → long period of division and civil war
 Seen as a rejection of Confucian beliefs
- Commoners returned to mystical beliefs
- Intellectuals turned to Daoism
 Buddhism became the main belief system
 Daoists and Confucianists called it “foreign”
- Stupas
Sui Dynasty: The Heroes
After centuries of war and disunity- Sui Dynasty unified China
- Capital = Chang’an
- Founder: Sui Wendi
- Unifying Force: Buddhism & Daoism
Sui Wendi killed by his son Yangdi
- Sui Yangdi = tyrannical ruler, dynasty is over after his death
Biggest Accomplishment: Grand Canal
Completed 605 CE
- 1,104 miles
Goal = link the rice-rich South
to the population rich North
Features = increased
communication, eased troop
movements, imperial
highway for emperor to
patrol his empire
The Downsides to Success
With great building projects came great deaths - over
400K lives
Grand Canal, Building capital city, Rebuilding Great
Wall of China
Great Wall = “longest
cemetery”
Ruling Style In A Nutshell
 Very harsh- think Qin dynasty
 Peasants worked off debt through the army
 greedy/egotistical
 Agrarian society = rice is VERY
CRUCIAL
 Rice growing regions = South →
importance of Grand Canal
 Buddhism/Daoism
Reunification
 For over 400 years when China was divided into
three separate states, the Wei in the north,
Wu in the south, and Shu in the west, the ideal
of Chinese unification was not.
 Chinese language, ideology, culture, and
administration had remained virtually intact.
 Unification was achieved under the Sui Dynasty
who provided the restoration of military power,
economic productivity, and administrative
integrity but massive public works led to the
disintegration of the Sui in a very short time.
The Rise of the Tang
 The leading general (Tang Taizong) of the Sui seized
control and established the new
Tang Dynasty in 618 C.E.
 When the Sui Dynasty fell the Tang continued some of
its policies and even expanded the empire.


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Maintaining Transportation/Communication
Distributing land with equal-field principle
Relying on a bureaucracy of merit
 The state expanded into Mongolia, Central Asia,
Pakistan, and Iran. China also expanded into northern
Vietnam, Korea, and culturally into Japan.
Tang Dynasty, 618-907
 New technologies:
Printing  moveable print 
 Porcelain
 Gunpowder

 More cosmopolitan culture.
 Reestablished the safety of the
Silk Road.
 Tea comes into China from Southeast
Asia.

Empress Wu Zetian, 624-705
 The only female Empress in China’s
history who ruled alone. 
 Searched for outstanding individuals
to attract to her court.
 Construction of new irrigation
systems.
 Buddhism was the favored state
religion.
 Financed the building of many
Buddhist temples.
 BUT… She appointed cruel and sadistic
ministers to seek out her enemies.
Tang Decline
 Weakened by internal rebellion
 Invited Uighurs, Turkish nomads, to help destroy
rebels in the empire

They were successful but ended up destroying the
capital cities of Chang’an and Luoyang.
Song Dynasty 960-1279
 Following the Tang collapse, warlords ruled China until
the Song Dynasty reimposed centralized imperial rule.
 The Song gained control with a strong army after
winning many battles Song Taizu convinced his
generals to retire.

Adopted a strong Confucian government based on merit
 Civil servants would go onto to control all aspects of
Chinese society including the military and large sums
and salaries were levied to encourage others to
adapt.
Song [Sung] Dynasty, 960-1279 C.E.

Creation of an urban, merchant, middle class.

Increased emphasis on education & cheaper
availability of printed books.

Magnetic compass
makes China a great
sea power! 
Song Peasant Family
Rice Cultivation Began Under the Song fm.
SE Asia
Song Rice Cultivation
Song Decline
 The Song approach to a more centralized imperial
government led to its eventual split and fall:
Financial and Military
 During the first half of the Song Dynasty,
Manchuria demanded and received large tribute
payments of silk and silver.
 The Song Dynasty in time with the incursion from
the north would move its empire to Hangzhou and
survived only in southern China.
 The Southern Song would remain until 1279 when
the Mongol forces ended the dynasty and
incorporated southern China into their empire.
Chinese Dynasties
 Shang 1600-1100




BCE
Zhou 1100-256
Qin 221-206
Han 202 BCE - 220
CE
Three Kingdoms 22065

Shu, Wei, and Wu
 Northern and






Southern Dynasties
265-598
Sui 581-618
Tang 618-907
Song 960-1279
Yuan 1279-1368
Ming 1368-1644
Manchu (Qing) 16441912
Objectives
Students will
Todays Schedule
- Warm-up & Mini-Quiz
- East Asia Lecture and SAQ
- Spice Chart for Tang and Song
- Review Unit III Study Guide
HW:
- Prepare for Socratic Seminar (Annotate&Questions)
- Study for Vocabulary Quiz tomorrow
– Continue studying for Unit III Test
Any student who didn’t do/did their Outlines wrong tomorrow is your
last chance to submit