Download EAST ASIAN EMPIRES

EAST ASIAN EMPIRES
The Tang and Song
The two Golden Ages
of China
I. The Tang Dynasty reunifies
China
• After the Han dynasty collapsed in 220
AD, China was divided into rival regions
for nearly 400 years
• But it escaped the decay that Europe
suffered after the fall of Rome. . .
1. Farm production was still good
2. Technology advanced
3. Buddhism spread
4. Learning/arts flourished
5. Cities survived
6. Invaders stormed north china, but?
Invaders often adopted Chinese civilization
rather than demolishing it!
A. Sui Dynasty (589-618)
Emperor Sui Wendi reunited the north &
south
B. The Tang Build An Empire
• Li Yuan – was a general in the Sui dynasty
• His 16-year-old son Li Shimin promotes a revolt
against the Sui dynasty
• They win the revolt and establish the Tang
Dynasty in 618!
• Li Shimin then takes over his father’s rule and
takes the name Tang Taizong (ty dzung)
• Tang Taizong was a brilliant general,
government reformer, historian, and master of
calligraphy
• He becomes China’s most admired emperor!!
• Later Tang rulers expand the Chinese empire
in a major way—Central Asian and . . .
Vietnam, Tibet, and Korea become tributary
states. They remain self-governing, but rulers
had to acknowledge Chinese supremacy and
send tributes (money) to the Tang emperor.
• Students from Korea and Japan traveled to
China’s Tang capital to learn about Chinese
government, art, and laws.
C. Government and Economy Grow
• In the late 600s, Wu Zhao becomes the only
WOMAN to rule China!
• She enthusiastically restored the Han system
of unified government:
Bureaucracy, civil service system to recruit
talented officials trained with Confucian
philosophy
• Empress Wu Zhao also set up schools to
prepare male students for the civil service
exams
• Flexible law code
Economics—The Land Reform system
• Broke up large land owners and redistricted
land to peasants
• Strengthened the central government by
weakening the power of large landowners
• Increased government’s money, because
peasants who farmed their own land could
pay taxes
D. Tang Dynasty Decline
• Later Tang emperors lost territory in
Central Asia to Arabs
• Corruption—high taxes, drought, famine,
rebellions lead to end of Tang
• In 907 a rebel general overthrew the
Tang emperor
II. The Song Dynasty
• In 960 a scholarly general named Zhao Khangyin
reunited much of China under the Song (sung)
dynasty
• Song ruled 319 years, longer than Tang, but
controlled less territory than Tang
• Constant threat of invaders in north
• In early 1100s, Song retreated south of Huang
river and continued to rule for 150 years
* But, in the late 1200s Mongols attack
and overthrow the Song!
We’ll get to that later. . .
A. Achievements of the Song Dynasty
• Song China’s economy expanded
• Rice grown and traded
• More money allowed more commerce,
learning, and arts!
• Canals
The Grand Canal (originally built during
the Sui dynasty) linked Huang River to
Chang River
• And during Song Dynasty, the Grand Canal
reached its peak!
• Thousands of tons of grain shipped from the
southern region to northern china each year
• Tang and Song Economic Success!
Foreign trade flourished and the Song
actually made paper money.
III. China’s Ordered Society
G
E
N
T
R
Y
Emperor
Land-owning wealthy men
Court, Aristocratic families
Bureocracy – Officials all over
China
Peasants
MERCHANTS
WHAT?!
Wow, that’s an interesting and unusual social
pyramid! Let’s look it over in detail. . .
GENTRY – land owning wealthy men who pass
the civil service exam, value education, revival
of Confucian thought ranking people based on
rank, duty, and PROPER BEHAVIOR.
1. Emperor – in charge OBVI
2. Courts and Bureocrats – Officials in charge of
local regions
3. Peasants Work the Land
Most Chinese were peasants working the
land
* Drought and famine a constant threat
but
new tools and crops improved the
lived
of many peasants
* Lived in small, self-sufficient villages
Famous quote:
“Heaven is high and the emperor far away.”
• Peasants relied on each other rather than the
government.
• In disputes, peasants relied on one another to
resolve it. Only if such efforts failed, did
villages take their disputes to the emperors’
bureocratic representatives
• Peasants could move up in society through
education and government service
• If a bright peasant boy got an education, and
passed civil service exam, he and his family
rose in status!
Lowest class?
4. Merchants!
• Many merchants were very rich,
but because of Confucian
tradition they had lower status.
Why? Their wealth came from
the labor of others. SNAP!
And what about the status of women?
• Women had higher status in Tang and
early Song times than they did later.
• Ran the home and family affairs,
managed servants and family finances.
But?
• boys were still valued more than girls by
their families, and
• When a young woman married she
became part of her husband’s family
FOOT BINDING
• Foot binding started in the late Song
times. Women’s feet were supposed to be
small (½ normal size)
• Feet were bound with strips of cloth to limit
their size—it was very painful but large feet
were considered ugly and no one would marry
someone with big feet.
•
• Some peasant girls didn’t bind their feet
because they had to work in the fields
• Women with bound feet often couldn’t walk
without help, so foot binding reinforced the
Confucian tradition that women should
remain inside the home
IV. The Tang and Song develop
a Rich Culture
1) Artists paint “Harmony”, the love of life.
• Poetry, painting and calligraphy were essential
skills for the scholar gentry
• Chinese landscape painting—Daoist traditions
• Painters tried to capture spiritual essence of the
natural world
• “When you are planning to paint, you must
always create a harmonious relationship between
heaven and earth.”
2) Architecture and Porcelain
• Buddhist themes dominated sculpture and
architecture
• Indian Stupa evolved into
the Chinese Pagoda, a temple
with eaves that curve up the corners of the
roof
• Chinese sculptors made statues of Buddhas
• Perfected techniques for making porcelain.
Shiny, hard pottery considered finest in the
world
• Glazes, tea service
(chinaware)
• Figures of camels, court
ladies playing polo, bearded
foreigners arriving on the Silk Road.
HOMES
• All homes were built facing south so
they received warmth from the sun in
winter!
3. Chinese writing
• Prose and poetry by Tang/Song writers:
philosophy, religion, and history
• Short stories—blended fantasy, romance
and adventure
• The world’s first short stories were first
started in Chinese literature!
More on literature?
• Gentry poetry was most respected,
Confucian scholars had to master poetry
• Li Bo, the greatest Tang poet wrote 2000
poems celebrating harmony with nature
or lamenting the passage of time
• Legend has it that he drowned trying to
embrace the reflection of the moon in a
lake. Awww. . .
• Du Fu, a friend of Li Bo, wrote poetry
about the horrors of war and criticizing
the court system.
• Li Qingzhao, a female poet, wrote poetry
about women who were left behind
when loved ones went off to war,
reflecting the time when invasions
threatened to end the brilliant Song
dynasty.
So THAT was the history of the Tang
and Song Dynasties in China!
What do you think were their biggest
achievements?
1. Political?
2. Economic?
3. Social?
4. Cultural?
ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE TANG & SONG DYNASTIES
Political
•
•
•
•
•
Strong emperors
Revival of
bureaucracy & civil
service system
Emphasis on
Confucianism
Tang followed a
policy of expansion –
acquired tributary
states (Korea,
Vietnam, Tibet)
Land reforms (Tang)
Economic
Social
•
•
Prosperity
Agricultural
improvements: land
reform & double-crop
rice (population )
• Foreign trade
 Silk Roads
 Ocean trade
(compass)
• Colonies in Southeast
Asia (tea)
Scholar-Gentry
Peasants
Merchants & Soldiers
•
Women: foot-binding
(Song)
•
Peasants’ work highly
valued=influence of
Confucianism
Cultural
•
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Technological
Advancements
Moveable type
Compass
Clock
Porcelain
Gunpowder
Paper money
Buddhism=cultural
diffusion (Japan)
Art & architecture
Poetry (Li Bo)
Calligraphy
Pagodas
Landscape painting
(influence of Daoism)