early china

Longshan culture

Where burials and walled settlements are found, spearheads/weapons, middle north China, 2500 BCE, more social organizations

Wang Mang

Scholar from powerful empress family, took over and established a short lived dynasty

Decentralization

Began 184 with religious uprising, gave autonomy to local leaders who became warlords, Cao Pi established Wei dynasty 220

3 kingdoms

Lots of conflict, Wei falls due to betrayal, new dynasty that collapses due to northern cultures that become Chinese, 4 different dynasties in the south

Eunuchs

Typically slaves captured, influenced emperors and were looked down upon

Buddhist influence

During 3 kingdoms, took and gave to Daoist ideas, heavy on lack of desire, lack of reincarnation, self reflection, humbleness, ways to live, many different schools

Silk Road

Trade route that connected China with the world, goods and ideas moved

Tributary system

Non military diplomacy, gift - no invasion- better gift, major power play

External threats

Rival Xiongnu/Hun empire, leader Maodun, extends empire into Vietnam

Internal turmoils

Major succession disputes, empresses get involved

Empress Lu

GAOs widow, takes control behind the scenes, demonized

Emperor Wu

Came to throne as teen, into arts, smarts, occult, daoism, military conquest, taxes, sold gov positions, monopolized products

Records of the grand historians

By poor castrated Sima Qian, very influential with knowledge

Scholar official system

Important test, nobles relied on them, ideally virtuous and a blueprint for other dynasties

5 Confucian classics

Part of a large library, changes, documents, odes, spring/autumn, rights

Confucian family

Patrilineal, filial piety, bridal price, women can’t divorce

Confucian women

Stay at home, be mothers and wives, loyalty, 7 virtues: humility, resignation, subservient, self abasement, obedience, cleanliness, industry

Emperor GAO

Originally Liu Bang, from common background and rose to be emperor via military

Han Dynasty

206-220 CE, capital in Changan, used Qin structure, made laws less strict

Bureaucracy/officials

9 types of gov, especially on local level, graded by rank, poll tax system, mandatory service

Xia dynasty

Bronze Age sites from 2000 BCE, debate over existence, likely non existent

Erlitou culture

Bronze Age site/culture, suggests urban palaces, central ish China 1900-1500 BCE

Shang dynasty

Fuzzy beginning, 1600-1045 BCE, military chieftains, cities (An Yang), battles, bronze weapons, religion with Di god/ancestors, elaborate tombs

Lady Fu Hao

Well preserved tomb of head wife, 2000 items, involved in religion and military

Oracle Bones

Bones of animals inscribed with different characters used for divination

Sanxingdui

Different Bronze Age society with masks

Western Zhou

Frontier state that took over Shang in 1045, until 771, 3 rulers: king wen, wu, and Duke of Zhou

Book of documents

First written oral history, some parts verified

Mandate of Heaven

King has right to rule because of heaven god, as long as he’s a good ruler

Zhou rule

Quasi feudal system, family rules country, act like nobles, move to east post takeover

Eastern Zhou 770-256

Dynasty moved, no strong central rule, chaos, spring and autumn/warring states

Eastern zhou politics

more symbolic zhou king, under the rule of diff states, chunks of territory evolve, hegemons, forced alliances

Sources of tension

State shapes shift, succession disputes, marriage politics, state power imbalances, “barbarian” states

war spring autumn

Led by elite, strict codes, Duke of song story

War warring states

No more honor, strategy, massive armies, conscription, social mobility

Commoner

More important, wanted more people, census, land survey, canals, family names, tech development

Economics

Rapid growth, more cities, trade, new merchant class, currency, every leader wants an advantage

100 schools of thought

New ideas emerge for more advantages

Confucius

Real name Kong Fuzi, 551-479, from state of Lu, became a low ranking official who quit his job due to frustration of unethical, wandered around and was unsuccessful

Confucius books

Obsessed with western zhou and books of documents and odes, analects written post mortem by followers, obsessed with ethics, family, and filial piety

5 relationships

Ruler-subject, husband-wife, father-son, older brother-younger brother, friend-friend

Gentlemen

Cultivate smarts, reject money, rulers should be virtuous benevolent, rituals important

Mencius

370-300, emphasis on good gov and good people, against military

Xunzi

Employed, rational thinking, humans are bad and laws are important

Mozi

Rival school, not elite, rejected social hierarchy embraced merit and utility

Daoism

Umbrella term, Laozi text: sayings and stories, Zhuangzi: paradoxes against Confucius, don’t fix things, spiritual and chill

Legalism

Popular in Qin state, relies on law, no value on intellectualism, Han Feizi spokesperson, don’t trust anyone and put people against each other

The analects

Confuciuses main philosophical text

Qin dynasty

256-206, first central kingdom first emperor, rise due to legalism and massive army

Lu Buwei

Rich merchant became chancellor, contributed to military victory, very biased advice, tried to overthrow child king and poisoned himself

Li Si

Legalist chancellor, helped Qin become powerful

Huangdi

Formerly king Zheng, made massive reforms

Centralization

Cripple old nobility, no private weapons, standardized written Chinese, built part of Great Wall, conscripted people to bulld

Qin biblioclasm

Huangdi may have burned books, debated

Qin legal codes

Brutal, complex, mutual responsibility units, wide array of punishments

Tomb of first emperor

Massive, elaborate, thousands made to construct it, never seen, 6000 Terra cotta soldiers none alike discovered by farmers

Huangdis “death”

Huangdi died, chancellor and Eunuch pretended he was alive, incompetent younger soon seized throne

Yang Jian

581, seized control of northern Zhou, established Sui dynasty (581-618), chaos winded down, debated ethnicity, got into royalty via marriage politics, usurped his son on the throne, killed 59 princes and his grandson

Wendi

means the cultured emperor, relied on boats to reconquer China, captured Nanjing and leveled it, legal codes for everyone, devout Buddhist, oversaw construction of Grand Canal which connected 2 major rivers, returned to Han confucian trained scholar official system

Scholar officials Sui

important again, test invented, broke elite powers

Sui campaigns in Korea

Wendi wanted Korea back, massive campaigns 1 million troops, they lost multiple times, major loss of money in government, massive violence

Li Yuan/Tang Dynasty/Gaozu

Military strongman, re established order, established the Tang dynasty 618-907, provincial government official known as emperor Gaozu,

Emperor Taizong 626-649

Originally Li Shimin, son of Li Yuan, good military leader, gained himself and his father followers, killed 2 of his brothers, 10 brothers sons, dad abdicated, led military campaigns in west against Turks, war against Tibet and Koreans

Tang legal codes

regularly revised, supposed to address every aspect of life, model for other countries, developed Fubing, a “volunteer” militia who served in rotation

Equal fields system

divided all land into 2 categories: personal share/perpetual holdings, goal is to make sure all land is in use/being taxed effectively, perpetual holdings = crops, personal share = every household got a chunk of land based off how many people in household, personal share is given to gov when death, perpetual goes to family

Scholar officials Tang

copied Han, set up schools,

Civil service exam system

Test to become an official scholar, Required knowledge of Confucian classics, good at writing/calligraphy, maybe Daoist/Buddhist teachings, other tests for military/doctors, very prestigious,

Chang’an

capital of Tang dynasty, large 2nd capital named Luoyang, largest capital in Chinese history, 30 square miles, carefully planed, model for cities after Tang/other countries, 2 million people

Tang cosmpolitanism

very diverse, foreigners there for trade, massive markets, religiously diverse, Chen/zen buddhism emerged, literature, poems, humor, becomes Asia wide pop culture,

Wu Zhao

only female emperor, traditional story: not high birth, become low ranking consort, climbed the rank, became empress, supposedly framed og empress, poisoned emperor, killed son, supposed reign of terror, actually not so bad, used Confucius and Buddhism to ascend, big on arts and cultures

Tang decline

Tang considered peak of classical Chinese culture, somewhat fluid gender dynamics, Wu Zhao’s sons incompetent, empress had a lot of influence, bolstered her influence, possibly had an affair, tried to have her daughter as prince, son died (possibly poisoned), military coup via Taiping princess and Li dan is put on throne,

emperor Xuanzong 712-756

result of SECOND coup, famous military leader, new census/land system, reorganized military, greatest territory extent, culture promoter, too interested in culture and tantric buddhism, obsessed with consort Yang Guifei

An Lushan

originally ~favorite~ general of emperor and YG, mad because he didn’t get a promotion so started a rebellion, not ethnically Chinese, central Asian/Turkish, was a frontier army general,

An’s Rebellion 755

used his skills and troops to attack capital, emperor flees, YG is killed, emperor has to step down, hire foreign mercenaries to defeat An, bought rebellion leaders off, fragile alliances, Uighurs came to restore the capital but sacked capital

Military provinces

big empire = big challenges via rebellion, local leaders, lack of communication/travel, Turkish forces major threat, as well as Tibet and Khitan (in north), Tibet took trade routes, created frontier armies to deal with these threats, military cost skyrockets,

Post rebellion struggles

less silk road, rampant corruption, decentralization, crackdown on wealthy Buddhist monasteries, leaders not getting enough money, taxed via states and made local leaders figure it out, taxes didn’t go well, trade cut off, new cities gain power and trade, developed a palace army

Tang eunuchs

controlled palace military, dominated courts due to more power, eunuchs fought each other, bandit gangs roaming, Huang Chao famous gang leader, seized Changan, Tang implodes and falls apart in 907, 10 kingdoms by bandits fighting, fueled economic development out of competition, Kaifeng city emerges, south developed, northern cities in ruins

Zhao Kuangyin/Song dynasty 960-1279

military general who founds Song dynasty, placed on throne in 960 by soldiers, made it so that military was less powerful, Song dynasty smaller than others

civilian control of military

civilian bureaucracy/official in control, had generals who hated each other fight with each other, strategy not the best, million conscripts, set up a capital in Kaifeng (biggest city in north), not planned city

scholar official class (shi)

not interested in military might, special elite group of people gets bigger, less aristocratic, printing press invented and it makes things more equal

Song civil service exam

restructured, multi-level, super competitive, average passing age 30, 1/333 chances of passing state level, used exam to recruit, “meritocratic”, scholars were always competing against each other, led to intense factions between more diverse elites

Wang Anshi 1021-86

invented new laws, change taxes for less on farmers, introduce local militias, crop loans, back and forth between lawmakers who liked the laws and who hated them, looked to the past, emperor never blamed in law debates,

16 prefectures

not part of Song dynasty, they wanted it bad

Khitan

culture in the north in former Chinese territory, significant military threat, Songs bought off Khitan

Tangut

northwest culture that was also a military threat and former territory, controlled access point to the silk road, same strategy as Khitan

Jurchens/Jin Dynasty 1115-1234

group in northeast, semi-nomadic group, 1115 broke off from Khitan, Songs formed a Jurchen alliance to fight Khitan, Jurchen took over Kaifeng instead, Genghis Khan’s first conquering via human herding, was already in crisis,

Southern Song dynasty 1127-1279

where the Song set up after Jurchens took control, eventually gave up controlling Jurchens and just paid them off, Song dynasty all intentionally weak

Song culture/advances

worlds largest population, new types of food/agriculture, strong merchant class that created effective guilds, tech advances with paper, astronomical clock, gunpowder, major trade esp. maritime trade, major naval forces, poetry, calligraphy, arts, music, elites formed clubs

Neo-Confuciansim/Zhu Xi

Invented/advocated for by Zhu Xi, was a teacher, passed CSE at 18, intellectual development emphasized, codified confucian classics and 4 books: analects, mencius, doctrine of the mean and great learning - and Zhu Xi’s commentary ofc, 3 cardinal principles = loyalty of subjects, filial piety, and women/peasants are dumb, society naturally divided

Song gender roles

new emphasis to separate spheres, footbinding invented, bodily reinforcement

Genghis Khan

created a powerful Mongol nation by re organizing society into a military unit,

Fall of Jin

1234, Khan’s son crushed the remaining society, gave Khitan more independence to undermine Jurchen

Mongols and Chinese style gov

Used Chinese strategy so that the Mongols could establish greater control, use the people they conquer to govern the people they conquer, blow to Tangut as well

destruction of North China

early in Mongol campaigns, very destructive in north because they supposedly betrayed Genghis Khan, main goal was plundering, lots of territory left in ruins, ripe for bandits and other issues, North China is in tailspin, south becomes more dominant

Song military weakness

realized the Mongols were a threat, confiscated land from rich officials to get money, attempt to build up cavalry, prepared for an attack that wouldn’t happen for 40 ish years, South Song protected by geography

Kublai Khan

Genghis’s grandson, unexpected warrior because of weight/bumbles, used scholar official gov to govern north, claimed title of Khan after civil war, built a new capital Dadu-Beijing, became great Khan

Yuan Dynasty 1271-1368

conquered Song via a massive, diverse, army and new invention - navy, Mongols were the ultimate enemy, lost due to poor leadership, complete control in 1279

Mongol rule

not forced to speak/”become” Mongolian, records via Marco Polo, Kublai wanted a stable dynasty not a Mongol one, disliked social mobility

Occupational Categories

you have to do what your father did

population grades

caste system - Mongols, non-Chinese ethnic, Northern, Southern, Chinese had restriction on weapons and groups