Dynasties in Chinese history

The dynasties in Chinese history were periods of hereditary rulership that stretched from the nation’s mythological past into the early twentieth century. Depending on how a dynasty is defined, China had anywhere from twelve to more than eighty dynasties in its nearly four-thousand-year-old history. Generally, historians recognize thirteen dynastic periods, with the earliest considered quasi-mythical and some later periods divided into short-lived kingdoms or competing dynasties. For most of its dynastic history, China was an influential economic and military power, at the same time contributing significantly to advances in science, religion, and literature. While China’s impact on the world continued into the twenty-first century, the last Chinese dynasty ended in 1912 with the overthrow of the emperor and the establishment of the Republic of China.

Background

The earliest evidence of human-like ancestors in China dates back to about 1.7 million years, with the first signs of agriculture and permanent settlements appearing about 8,500 years ago. By about 4500 to 3500 BCE, larger farming communities began springing up in the Yellow River Valley. These Neolithic cultures were predominantly agricultural and had developed distinctive artistic, architectural, and religious traditions by about 4000 BCE.

According to Chinese myth, the father of Chinese civilization was a tribal leader who took the name Huangdi, or the Yellow Emperor. Huangdi was said to have conquered the neighboring tribes in the Yellow River Valley and then united them about 2700 BCE. He was viewed as a culture hero who invented writing, medicine, and science and taught people how to grow corn and make silk. Huangdi was considered to be both a human and a god and said to have been taken into the heavens by a dragon in his old age.

Huangdi, and the mythological rulers who followed him, came from a time before written records, leading scholars to believe that he was never a true historical figure. They speculate that stories of the Yellow Emperor may have originated from ancient myths of a thunder deity; or he could have been a real leader whose accomplishments evolved into legendary, divine feats after centuries of storytelling.

Overview

Xia dynasty: c.2070–c.1600 BCE. According to Chinese myth, Huangdi was one of the legendary Five Emperors and Three Great Sovereigns who ruled China throughout the third millennium BCE. During their rule, the people often experienced devastating flooding from the Yellow River, prompting China’s rulers to seek out someone who could devise a solution to the problem. About 2100 BCE, the emperor hired a man named Gun to stop the flooding by building a series of dams, but these proved ineffective. After Gun was either executed or exiled, the emperor hired Gun’s son, Yu, to stop the flooding.

Yu dedicated thirteen years of his life to solve the problem and was eventually successful. The emperor was so impressed that he appointed Yu as his successor. As emperor, Yu was said to have further stabilized the government and united China into nine provinces. For his own successor, Yu decided to pass the reins of power on to his son, Qi. According to legend, the Xia dynasty began with Yu, and the succession of Qi began the line of Chinese dynasties.

For many years, archaeologists believed the stories of the Xia dynasty were nothing more than myths invented by later dynasties to justify their grip on power. However, beginning in the 1960s, archaeologists unearthed a number of sites that seemed to support the accounts of the Xia dynasty. The lack of written evidence tying these sites to the Xia still raises doubts among experts, leaving the historical existence of the dynasty a mystery.

Shang dynasty: c.1600–c.1046 BCE. The Shang dynasty is the first Chinese dynasty that can be definitively established through historical record. According to legend, the dynasty was founded by a tribal leader named Tang who overthrew the evil and corrupt Emperor Jie, the last ruler of the Xia. During the Shang period, the Chinese began using bronze weapons, an early calendar, and their first written language, an early version of Chinese inscribed on bone and turtle shell.

Zhou dynasty: c.1046–256 BCE. The Zhou dynasty was the longest-ruling dynasty in Chinese history and one of the most influential in the formation of ancient China. The dynasty began about 1046 BCE when Wu Wang, the leader of the Zhou kingdom, defeated the last Shang emperor at the Battle of Muye. Like the Xia leaders before him, the Shang emperor was seen as a corrupt and cruel tyrant who no longer deserved to rule. From this belief, the Zhou developed the concept of the Mandate of Heaven, the ideal that the emperor is the son of heaven and is granted the right to rule by the gods. If a ruler was evil, the gods would show their displeasure by sending disasters such as earthquakes or famines. These signs were a signal that the gods wanted the people to remove the ruler from power.

Under the Zhou, China developed into a stratified feudal society, with merchants, laborers, and peasants serving wealthy nobles. These nobles in turn pledged their loyalty and military allegiance to the emperor in exchange for land. Writing, science, and philosophy continued to develop during the Zhou dynasty with two of China’s main religious traditions—Confucianism and Taoism—originating in this period. The states under the Zhou’s control existed in relative peace from the dynasty’s founding to about 475 BCE when the influence of the Zhou ruler began to weaken and the kingdom devolved into a group of rival states vying with one another for control.

Qin dynasty: 221–206 BCE. During the Warring States Period, as the era was called, the seven most powerful states consolidated their territories by absorbing smaller states. After nearly two centuries of fighting, Ying Zheng, the leader of the Qin state, emerged victorious from the chaos by completing his conquest of the other states in 221 BCE. Zheng took the name Qin Shi Huang and became the first emperor of a now-unified China. Shi Huang ordered the construction of a defensive fortification on the kingdom’s northern borders, beginning work on what would become the Great Wall of China.

Shi Huang believed in an absolute implementation of the law and ruled China with an iron fist. He stripped the nation of its long-held freedoms and increasingly angered the population with his tyrannical actions. When he died in 210 BCE, he was buried in a grand tomb that included eight thousand terra cotta warriors designed to accompany him into the afterlife. His advisors named his son, Hu-Hai, to be the next emperor, hoping to use him as a puppet ruler. However, within four years, trust in the Qin government had completely evaporated, and the dynasty was overthrown. Although the dynasty was the shortest in Chinese history, it provided the nation with its modern name, as China originated from the pronunciation of Qin (chin).

Han dynasty: 206 BCE–220 CE. One of the rebel leaders of the uprising that overthrew the Qin was a former peasant farmer named Liu-Bang, who was eventually declared emperor. Liu-Bang founded the Han dynasty, a name taken from his home province of Hanzhong. Unlike Qin Shi Huang, Liu-Bang and other Han rulers practiced tolerance and respect for the population, ushering in a long period of political stability, cultural growth, and economic prosperity. Under the Han, the empire expanded westward and into northern Vietnam and Korea. Also during this period, China began a lucrative trade relationship with European nations, opening the trade routes known as the Silk Road about 130 BCE. The religious philosophy of Confucianism was fully embraced by the Han government and Buddhism was also introduced into China.

Three kingdoms and six dynasties: 220–589. By the late second century CE, the Han central government had been weakened by internal strife, corruption, and numerous rebellions. As the frontier armies grew more powerful than the central government, a local military commander seized the capital in 220 CE, fracturing the nation into three powerful kingdoms. For most of the next three-plus centuries, a series of short-lived dynasties battled for control of China. In 265 CE, the Jin dynasty briefly unified the nation, but that stability was tenuous and China soon descended back into civil war and split into competing kingdoms and dynasties.

Sui dynasty: 581–618. In 581, a general named Yang Jian began a series of conquests that ultimately unified China and created the Sui dynasty. Jian became emperor and initiated reforms that stabilized the nation and laid the foundation for a more centralized government. The Sui dynasty consisted of only two emperors before it was toppled by Li Yuan, founder of the Tang dynasty.

Tang dynasty: 618–906. The Tang dynasty is considered to be the greatest dynasty in Chinese history, ushering in centuries of prosperity, political stability, and artistic and scientific advancements. During this period, China became the wealthiest nation on Earth. Many of the governmental practices still used in China today originated under the Tang. The dynasty’s second ruler, Taizong, is considered the nation’s greatest emperor, instituting government and societal reforms and practicing religious tolerance that allowed Christianity and Buddhism to spread across China. Taizong was considered such a good ruler that he was forgiven for seizing power by murdering his brothers and father. One of his concubines, Wu Zetian, later went on to rule China as the only empress in the nation’s history.

Many of the greatest cultural and technological achievements in Chinese history occurred during the Tang dynasty. Woodblock printing was invented in Taizong’s reign and flourished under later rulers, allowing for more than fifty thousand literary works to be printed during the dynasty. The Tang also invented gunpowder, clocks, agricultural machines, and even a type of mechanical “robot.”

Five dynasties and ten kingdoms: 907–960. The Tang dynasty began to decline in the late eighth century and eventually ended in 907. The nation again fractured into civil war as warlords competed to fill the power vacuum. The era was marked by the rise and fall of five dynasties in the north and ten kingdoms in the south.

Song dynasty: 960–1279. In 1960, China was again reunified under the general Zhao Kuangyin, who took the name Emperor Taizu. Taizu’s reign began the Song dynasty, a period marked by scientific innovations and the continued expansion of Chinese wealth and influence. The period is sometimes referred to as the Chinese Renaissance, as scientific advances from earlier generations were improved upon and refined for more practical purposes. The first paper money was invented during this time, as was the world’s first system of movable type. Gunpowder, which was originally invented for medicinal purposes, was put to more military uses, leading to the invention of rockets, bombs, and cannons. Chinese sailors also adapted the compass for use in navigation for the first time.

Yuan dynasty: 1279–1368. The Song dynasty faced constant threats from outside forces and lost control of its northern territories in 1127. In the late thirteenth century, the dynasty faced an even more serious problem when Mongol forces under the leadership of Kublai Khan invaded and conquered China. Kublai Khan, who was the grandson of Mongol leader Genghis Khan, took the emperorship of China for himself and established the Yuan dynasty. Under the Yuan, China was part of the greater Mongol empire, which stretched from the Caspian Sea in the west to Korea in the east. It was during this time that Italian merchant Marco Polo visited China and wrote about his travels.

Ming dynasty: 1368–1644. Natural disasters and infighting among later Yuan leaders weakened the dynasty, eventually bringing about the collapse of Mongol rule. A former commoner, Zhu Yuanzhang, led the rebel forces that ousted the Yuan and established himself as the first Ming emperor. China expanded its trade with the west during this period, and the nation’s population nearly doubled. In 1421, the emperor moved the nation’s capital to Beijing, where it remains today, and built the Forbidden City to serve as his palace. Under Ming rule, work was completed on the Great Wall of China, which was rebuilt into its modern form.

Qing dynasty: 1644–1912. By 1644, the weakened Ming dynasty fell to another army of foreign invaders, the Manchus from the northeast region of Manchuria. They established the Qing dynasty, a Chinese term meaning “pure.” At first, the dynasty prospered, especially under Emperor Kangxi, who reigned for sixty-one years from 1661 to 1722—the longest serving emperor in Chinese history. However, by the nineteenth century, the isolationist Qing had become embroiled in conflicts with Western powers, primarily with Great Britain. After a series of humiliating defeats, the Qing were forced to surrender territory to the British. By the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, internal rebellions further weakened the empire. In 1911, China’s imperial government was toppled by a revolution, leading to the formation of the Republic of China. In February 1912, the last Qing emperor, six-year-old Pu Yi, was forced to abdicate his throne, bringing an end to China’s dynastic rule.

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