Chinese Hegemony: The Tang

1
Chinese Hegemony The Tang Song Golden Age
2
Re-cap Important Dates
3
I. Early Dynasties

• Xia? (2200 B.C.E.)
• 1. Shang (1766-1122 B.C.E.)
• 2. Zhou (1122-221 B.C.E)
• 3. Qin (221 -206 B.C.E.)
• -first Emperor, coins
• 4. Han (206 B.C.E.-220 C.E.)
• -Confucianism, scholar-gentry, paper porcelain

4
(No Transcript)
5
II. Post-Han China

• 1. Period of the Six Dynasties (220-589 C.E.)
• - bureaucracy collapsed
• - Buddhism gained strength, replacing
  Confucianism for a time
• - nomads ruled much of Chinese territory

6
III. Sui Dynasty (589-618CE)

• lowered taxes
• established granaries
• reconstruction of bureaucracy
• reconstruction of Confucian scholar-gentry
• extension of Grand Canal

7
Sui Grand Canal
8
IV. Tang Dynasty (618-918)
9

• 1. Capital city Changan
• 2. Imperial power moral restraint
• 3. Cosmopolitan attitude towards religions
• Three Doctrines
• Buddhism, Confucianism, Daoism
• 4. Tang armies extend West
• used Turkic nomads in military (Uighurs)
• Great Wall is repaired
• loss to Arabs at Battle of Talas (751)

10
(No Transcript)
11
A. Empress Wu (625-705)

• ruled for 50 years (only female empress)
• began as imperial concubine
• 2. Imperial civil exam system
• blow to noble class
• social mobility of scholar-gentry
• Neo-Confucianism official philosophy
• increased literacy uniting China
• 4. BACKLASH AGAINST BUDDHISM

12
Tang Government Organization
13
B. New Technologies

• 1. re-established the safety of the Silk Road
  (tea from S.E. Asia)
• 2. Inventions
• moveable typeset printing
• porcelain
• GUNPOWDER
• mechanical clocks

14
C. East Asian Cultural Sphere

• 1. Chinese cultural diffusion throughout East
  Asia
• sinification
• Korea, Japan, Vietnam assimilate Chinese
  culture
• Confucianism
• Buddhism
• writing system

15
D. Tang Decline Losing the Mandate

• 1. Xuanzong
• Empress Wus grandson
• lack of morality?
• executed favorite consort during a rebellion

• 2. Causes for decline
• land distribution breaks down
• poor attention to canal irrigation systems
• NOMADIC INVASIONS

16
Tang Xuanzong (The Profound Emperor)
Consort Yang
17
V. Song Dynasty (960-1279)
18
A. Beginnings

• 1. followed the chaos of the Five Dynasty
  Period
• 2. based on Neo-Confucianism
• 3. civil examination system

19
B. Government

• 1. flying paper money (increased commerce)
• 2. government schools
• 3. Imperial civil service exams
• 4. replaced corvée labour with paid labor from
  taxes
• 5. trained militia supplied arms
• 6. paid Mongols in silk for protection

20
C. Increasing population

• 1. new developments in rice cultivation
• -champa (wet rice) production from Vietnam
• 2. Population grew from 60 to 100 million
• 3. Rice also used to brew wine

21
Champa wet rice production
22
D. Role of women

• 1. new ideal of the "willow-waisted woman
• 2. against widow remarriage
• 3. ability to inherit property control of
  family/budgets
• 4. upper-class female foot-binding

• Size 5 ½ shoe on the right

23
Foot-Binding in Tang Song China

• Broken toes by 3 years of age

24
http//www.teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?video_id
122772
25
E. Culture

• 1. Literature popularization of vernacular
  language
• 2. Poetry used to spark political reform
• 3. Paintings landscapes (harmony between humans
  and nature)

26

• Poem of Farewell to Liu Man by Yelu Chucai
  (1190-1244)
• "Despotic officials and shyster underofficials,
  may they feel ashamed!"

27
Travelers Among Mountains Streams by Fan Kuan
(ca. 1000)
A Chinese scholar in a meadow
28
12 Views from a Thatched Hut by Xia Gui, early
13th century
29
Spring Festival Along the River byZhang
Zeduan (1085-1145)
30

• Henan jar, Song Dynasty

31

• Jun ware Song Dynasty

32
F. Technology

• irrigation fertilizer
• large ships called junks
• compass
• waterwheels canal locks
• 5. gunpowder crouching tiger catapults
• 6. printing paper money

33
Junks the Compass
http//www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sultan/media/expl_01q
.html
34
Astronomical Clock
35
Paper Currency
36
Military Technology

37
First case of gun grenade (950 C.E.)
38
(No Transcript)
39
(No Transcript)
40
G. Commercial Growth

• 1. production of silk cash crops (tea)
• 2. Commerce improved farming cause Urbanization

41
H. Split of North South Song

• Weak military dependent on bureaucrats
• Song invaded by northern nomads (Jurchin)
• 2. Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279) allied w/
  Mongols for protection

42
I. Collapse of Southern Song

• 1. Invasion by Mongols (1279)
• start of Yuan Dynasty (Mongol Dynasty)