End+of+the+Han+and+the+Second+Waring+States+Period

=The End of the Han and The Second Warring States Period=



A.D 265-280 three kingdoms Wu, Wei, Shu

Key Figures


 * Cao Pi- Emperor of the Wei Dynasty and ended the 400 year Han Dynasty


 * Liu Bei- claimed to be the real successor to the Han Dynasty and proclaimed himself Emperor of the Shu Dynasty


 * Sun Quan- established the Wu Dynasty


 * Sima Yan- was of the Wei Dynasty, formed the Jin Dynasty


 * Liang Wudi- known for being a Buddhist and for his poetry


 * The Three Kingdoms**
 * The Three Kingdoms were never able to come together and were only united with the formation of the Jin Dynasty


 * Jin Dynasty restored unity in A.D. 265-420 but they could not contain the invasion of the nomadic peoples.


 * Divided into two parts Western Jin and Eastern Jin


 * A.D. 317 Jin court was forced to flee from Luoyang and reestablished itself at Nanjing to the south


 * The change in capitals destroyed the political, social, and economic system of north China


 * Inner wars from nomadic peoples caused the downfall of the Sima family and caused a lot of the northern aristocracy to flee to the south


 * The Western Jin stayed in the tradition of the Han Dynasty where the Eastern Jin ruled over a part of China that was still in development. This caused it to develope a culture different from northern China


 * The transfer of the capital happened at the same time as China's political fragmentation into a succession of dynasties that lasted from A.D. 304 to A.D. 589
 * Sixteen Kingdoms of the Five Barbaian Peoples**
 * Sixteen Kingdoms of the Five Barbaian Peoples**


 * Sixteen Kingdoms of the Five Barbarian Peoples were the Di, Jie, Qiang, Xianbei, and Xiongnu


 * Three stages from A.D. 300-350 are the Former Liang, the two Zhao, and the Cheng-Han


 * They are not acknowledged as Dynasties although they followed Chinese customs


 * Some did not even last long enough to develop a working government


 * Harsh times for peasents


 * Permanent war campaigns


 * Dominating force from A.D 350-380 was the Former Qin


 * From A.D 380 many short lived empires formed until they are destroyed by the Tuoba empire of Northern Wei around A.D 430


 * Southern Dynasties**


 * The six dynasties which give their name to the period are the Liu-Song (A.D 420-479), Southern Qi(479-502), Liang(A.D. 502-557), Chen(A.D. 557-589), Wu(A.D. 222-280), and Eastern Jin(A.D. 317-420)
 * All weakened by bloody conflicts among ruling families


 * Only famous rules Emperor Liang Wudi known for being a Buddhist and for his poetry


 * Life of Aristocracy developed great literature and arts


 * Foreign Policy more peaceful


 * Chance for South to become important for Chinese economics


 * Northern Dynasties**


 * The Five Northern Dynasties were the Northern Wei(A.D. 386-5340, the Western Wei(A.D 553-556), Eastern Wei(A.D 534-550), Northern Zhuo(A.D. 557-581), and Northern Qi(A.D. 550-557)


 * Tuoba clan able to unite northern China


 * More like semi-civilized chieftains than emperors at first brutally resettled peasant population and made sporadic use of Chinese administration units


 * Tuoba forced everyone to learn Chinese


 * developed equal land distribution that would be adopted by the Sui and Tang Dynasties


 * Invention of gunpowder and the wheelbarrow in the sixth or seventh century.


 * Advances in medicine, astronomy, cartography

__Background__ __Key Figures__ __Economy__ __Philosophy__ __Society__ __War__ __Politics__ __Shortcomings__ __Maps!__
 * Later Han Dynasty (25 CE to 220 CE)**
 * The whole Han dynasty lasted about four centuries.
 * The Xin dynasty split it into Western and Eastern (Later) dynasties
 * Both were times of great social, economic, and technological progress for China
 * It is sometimes called the Eastern Han dynasty because the capital was moved east to Louyang
 * Liu Xiu- started the Eastern Han dynasty
 * Cao Cao- ended the Eastern Han dynasty
 * Overall the Eastern Han dynasty was more prosperous than the Western Han dynasty
 * The early part of the Eastern Han focused on irrigation
 * Much was done to turn some of the land flooded by the Yellow River into fertile farming land
 * This was part of an agricultural system adopted by the landowners call "Tiangzhuang"
 * It stressed that the Chinese people produce goods according to their resources. i.e. farmers farm, fisherman fish etc.
 * A flaw was that the landowners would often extract taxes from their people arbitrarily
 * In the time of Emperor He, the extraction of copper, bronze-ware manufacturing and silk-making industry were developed.
 * Another important developement was the pioneering of the silk road, a connecting route to the middle east and meditteranean areas
 * Orthodox Confucianists insisted on the divine nature of the emperor or empress, even though through most of the dynasty the power of the main ruler actually belonged to court eunuchs
 * the disappointments of the court prompted critical thinking in many scholars
 * Most applied Confucian teaching and slight variations of Confucianism to the political problems of the state
 * The majority of the disillusioned scholars were won over by Taoism in the later part of the dynasty
 * The Eastern Han dynasty saw huge social progress
 * Society was governed by Confucianism, but with traces of Taoism and Legalism
 * Society was divided into distinct classes, the lowest being a "Gentleman" and the highest being a "Full Marquis". The Emperor and his court were above the class system
 * These classes for commoners and nobles were spelled out in the "Twenty Ranks" by the Han rulers
 * Interstingly enough there was both and opportunity for and a limit to upward mobility within the ranks.
 * A LOT of life at the time (meals, punishment, status etc.) was affected by what class you were
 * Liu Xiu brought about the Later Han dynasty through victory in a war with Wang Mang
 * The fighting from that lasted a few years
 * The more prosperous China became, the more military campaigns it enacted to expand its borders
 * Fighting with the Xionghu continued, with a large measure of success
 * The dynasty ended in fighting, a fitting segway into the warring states period
 * The official description of the Han dynasty political system was that of an emperor sharing power with a beuracracy and semi-feudal nobility
 * Liu Xiu, a descendent of the Western Han, threw Wang Mang of the Xin dynasty out of the throne, thus establishing the Eastern Han dynasty
 * The most prosperous part of the Eastern Han came duing the first century CE
 * After that the politics began to unravel
 * The real power of the rulers shifted away from the emperor and those who were supposed to be in power and into the hands of relatives, court officials, and eunuchs of the court
 * Also, farmers started to lead uprisings against their rulers
 * Some examples are the Yellow Turban Uprising and the Five Pecks of Rice Rebellion
 * Chinese rebellions tend to have really weird names
 * Near the end of the Eastern Han power fell totally into the hands of the eunuchs
 * The dynasty came to an end when the warlord Cao Cao forced emperor Xian to abdicate in 220 CE.
 * Although the Later Han dynasty was one of the most prosperous of all of China's history, it did lack a significant amount of self-provided twang
 * It had Confucian music, which we all know to be quite twangy, but it lacked distinctive twang of its own
 * This inability to independently produce and sustain significant levels of twang was a dark chapter in an otherwise successful dynasty

Eastern Han Dynasty

Bibliography

"Era of Disunity." 7/1987.http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field(DOCID+cn0018) (accessed 2/23/10).

Morton, W. Scott. China It's History and Culture. Second Mc-Graw Hill, 1980.

 "Eastern Han Dynasty (25AD-220AD), Politics, Achievements." //China Travel Agency,China Tour,China Travel Tours,24/7 Trip Service // . Web. 24 Feb. 2010. .

"2. The Han Dynasty - All Empires." //All Empires: Online History Community // . Web. 24 Feb. 2010. .

"Chinese History - Han Dynasty 漢 literature, thought, and philosophy ." //Www.chinaknowledge.de // . Web. 24 Feb. 2010. 

"Eastern Han Dynasty." Web. 24 Feb. 2010. . 

"Chinese History- Three Kingdoms." Available from http://www.chinaknowledge.de/History/Division/sanguo.html. Internet; accessed 23 February 2010. "Chinese History- Jin Dynasty." Available from http://www.chinaknowledge.de/History/Division/jin.html. Internet; accessed 23 February 2010.

"Chinese History- Southern Dynasties." Available from http://www.chinaknowledge.de/History/Division/nanchao.html. Internet; accessed 23 February 2010.

"Chinese History- Northern Dynasties." Available from http://www.chinaknowledge.de/History/Division/beiwei.html. Internet; accessed 23 February 2010.