Download China 500-1450

CHINESE DYNASTIES
From
581 - 1644
Sui (581 - 618 CE)
• Completed Grand
Canal
• High taxes, forced
labor
• Made repairs on the
Great Wall of China
• Rebels
assassinated the
Emperor
Tang (618 - 907 CE)
• Golden Age of China: Richest, most
powerful country in the world.
• Rebuilt bureaucracy
– Examination system
– Confucian education
– Limited social mobility
• Buddhism supported, then oppressed
• Invention of movable print, porcelain,
gun powder
Tang Dynasty (618-918)
Empress Wu
The Golden Age
Artistic, Technological and Industrial Developments
Gunpowder and Rockets
Porcelain Chinaware
Moveable Type
Chinese junks
Landscape art
Tang (618 - 907 CE)
Decline
• Weak emperors, nomadic incursions,
economic difficulties
• Warlords take control
Song (969 - 1279 CE)
• Large centralized bureaucracy (NeoConfucian)
• Mercantile class grows, increased trade –
silk and porcelain are big exports.
• Magnetic compass, paper currency,
growing sea power
• Weak military
Song Dynasty (960-1279)
Economic System:
•Rise of the Merchant
•The basic unit of payment was copper
coins strung on a string, but these were
heavy and cumbersome for use in largescale transactions. The Song solution was
to print paper money
Agricultural Advancements:
• New developments in rice cultivation,
especially the introduction of new strains
from what is now Central Vietnam,
spectacularly increased rice yields.
Paper Money
Yuan (1279 - 1368 CE)
• Mongol Khubilai Khan conquers China
• Economic stability and prosperity
• China more open to trade and travel (Marco
Polo)
• Ignored Chinese traditions, replaced
bureaucrats with non-Chinese
• Unsuccessful attacks on Japan, corruption
weakens dynasty
• Peasant rebellion ends Yuan
Ming (1368 - 1644 CE)
• Tried to erase all signs of Mongols
• Reinstated civil service, Confucian scholars
• Eunuchs play growing role - resented by
scholar gentry
• Rebuilt and extended Great Wall and built the
Forbidden City.
• Distant overseas exploration…(Zheng He)
• Collapsed after famines and riots