History.
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Image: Edgard Hörz |
Beijing, as the current capital of China, finds itself as the harbor of discoveries and riches from this nation’s culturally diverse and rich past. Traces of numerous dynastic periods can be seen in the art, architecture, and various cultural elements of the urban landscape.
Chinese civilization has a history that spans nearly 5000 years, and much of this history has been recorded in terms of the different ruling dynasties. Reference sources have divided up Chinese history into various numbers of dynastic periods. The exact number of dynasties is still debated by historians, with divisions between the dynasties being numbered anywhere from 23 to 48.
Below are listed some of the major periods of China’s dynastic history:
- Xia Dynasty (2100-1600 BC)
- Shang Dynasty (1600-1046 BC)
- Zhou (Eastern and Western) (1122-256 BC)
- Qin Dynasty (221-206 BC)
- Han Dynasty(206 BC-206 AD)
- Turbulent Period (featuring Jin, Sui, and southern/northern Dynasties) (207-618 AD)
- Tang (618-907 AD)
- Second Turbulent Period (including concurrent Liao, Song, Jin and W. Xia dynasties) (907-1271AD)
- Yuan (1271-1368AD)
- Ming (1368-1644AD)
- Qing (1644-1911AD)
Archaeological finds across China continue to fuel debate and speculation concerning the origins of Chinese Civilization, and provide us with windows into the fascinating past of China.
China, or Zhong Guo - the Middle Kingdom - as it is called in Chinese, came into existence when the Qin Dynasty emperor Qin Shi Huangdi unified seven warring states and founded a centralized Chinese state in 221 BC. During his reign, he standardized the character writing system for all of China and built the famous Terracotta Army near Xi'an.
The following Han Dynasty saw the opening of the Silk Road, allowing trade with Central Asia and beyond, and the establishment of the Confucian examination system for bureaucrats, which prevailed for the majority of China's history. During this time, Buddhism was also introduced to China.
It was during the prosperous, relatively stable, and culturally rich Tang Dynasty - China's "golden age" - that gunpowder was invented. At the time, the Tang capital, Chang'an (now Xi'an), was the largest city in the world. Because it was the end of the Silk Road, the city was extremely cosmopolitan.
In the 13th century, the Mongols, under Kublai Khan, gained control over China and established the Yuan Dynasty, with Dadu (now Beijing) as its capital. It was during this time that Marco Polo purportedly spent 17 years traveling through China.
The Ming Dynasty at first had its capital at Nanjing, but later moved it back to Beijing (which at that time was named Beiping, or "northern peace"). In contrast to the Yuan Dynasty, during which maritime commerce was readily supported, the Ming isolated China, stopping all expeditions and relying heavily on a tribute system for contact with foreign states. During this period the Forbidden City in Beijing was built, parts of the Great Wall were restored, and China's military was expanded.
In 1644, the Manchus conquered China and established China's last imperial dynasty, the Qing Dynasty. Two centuries later, the "Opium Wars", fought against European powers, severely weakened the empire, until the Japanese defeated China at the end of the 19th century during the Sino-Japanese war. In 1912, a rebellion was led by Nationalist Dr. Sun Yatsen which resulted in the formal end of the Qing Dynasty and the establishment of the Chinese Republic.
After a period of turmoil and warfare, the Communists defeated the Nationalist (Kuomintang) Party, which led to the birth of Mao Zedong's People's Republic of China in 1949. This period of Chinese history is particularly well-known for the Great Leap Forward, which caused a nationwide famine, killing approximately 20 million people, and the Cultural Revolution, through which China should be cleansed of "liberal bourgeoisie" and which led to the destruction of many cultural artifacts and the persecution of intellectuals and other "imperialists".
China's economy suffered from these events until Deng Xiaoping opened China to the world in 1979, declaring his goal to develop "socialism with Chinese characteristics", a form of socialist market economy. In the 1990s, both Hong Kong and Macau were returned to China from Britain and Portugal, respectively, and China was admitted to the World Trade Organization. Since then, China has seen the emergence of a growing middle class, and by 2006 China's economy had become the 4th largest in the world.