Five thousand years of Chinese history and culture

China has a long and ancient history, more than 5,000 years since the period of Ji Xuanyuan of the Yellow Emperor Dynasty.

It is generally believed that there are two direct sources of Chinese civilization, namely, the Yellow River civilization and the Yangtze River civilization, and that Chinese civilization is mainly the fruit of the exchange, fusion and sublimation of these two regional civilizations. Some history scholars believe that in the history of human civilization, the definition of "historical era" is counted from the production of writing, and the period before that is called "prehistoric era". Chinese history, there is a legend "Fuxi create gossip", the Yellow Emperor period of "Cangjie invented writing" and so on, but there is no evidence to test. Modern archaeology found more than 3350 years ago (1350 years ago) the Shang dynasty of oracle bone writing, about 4000 years ago to 5000 years ago pottery, about 5000 years ago to 7000 years ago with the nature of the written tortoise bone carved symbols.

China is one of the earliest civilizations in the world, with nearly 4,000 years of written history.

A fossilized ape-man found in Yuanmou, Yunnan Province, shows that the Yuanmou Man, who lived 1.7 million years ago, is the earliest known primitive human in China. Nearly 600,000 years ago, living in Beijing Zhoukoudian area of the "Beijing man", can walk upright, can make, use simple tools, and know the use of fire. Neolithic sites dating back to around 10,000 years ago are found all over China. In the six or seven thousand years ago in Zhejiang Yuyao Hemudu and Xi'an half-slope site, the discovery of artificial cultivation of rice and corn and farming tools.

The oldest dynasty, the Xia Dynasty, began in 2070 BC. The center of the Xia Dynasty, in the area of present-day western Henan Province and southern Shanxi, its power and influence had reached the north and south of the Yellow River, and began to enter the slave society. The Shang and Western Zhou, which emerged after the Xia, further developed the slave system. This was followed by the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, when royal power declined and the vassals fought for supremacy, which is considered to be the stage of transition from a slave society to a feudal society.

About 5,000 years ago, the Chinese already knew the technology of smelting copper. 3,000 years ago, during the Shang Dynasty, iron tools began to be used; in the production of pottery, there were white and colored potteries; and the production of silk weaving was quite advanced, resulting in the world's earliest jacquard silk weaving technology. By the Spring and Autumn Period, steel-making technology had already appeared. Spring and Autumn and Warring States period of thought and academic unprecedented activity, emerged on the later generations have a far-reaching impact on the famous philosopher Laozi, Confucius, Mencius and military scientists Sun Wu and other characters.

In 221 B.C., Qin Shihuang ended the Warring States period, which had lasted for more than 250 years, and established Qin, the first unified, centralized, multi-ethnic feudal state in Chinese history. Qin Shihuang unified writing, weights and measures, currency, and the county system. The framework of the feudal state laid down by him was extended by the people for the next 2,000 years. He organized more than 300,000 people to build the 5,000-kilometer Great Wall in northern China in a dozen years and began building huge tombs while he was still alive, and the discovery of the Terracotta Warriors and Horses guarding the Mausoleum of the First Emperor of Qin, discovered in 1974, shocked the world. 8,000 life-size terracotta warriors, horses, and chariots were brought to life, and it has been hailed as the "Eighth Wonder of the World". ".

The Han Dynasty (206 B.C.-220 A.D.) and the Silk Road

In 206 B.C.E., Liu Bang established the powerful Han Dynasty. Agriculture, handicrafts, and commerce developed greatly during the Han Dynasty, and the population reached 50 million. During the reign of Liu Che, Emperor Wu of Han (140-87 B.C.), the strongest period of the Han dynasty, he made the centralized power extend its actual control from the Central Plains to the Western Regions (the area around present-day Xinjiang and Central Asia). He sent his envoy Zhang Qian on two missions to the Western Regions, opening up the road from Chang'an (present-day Xi'an, Shaanxi Province) to the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea via Xinjiang and Central Asia, known as the Silk Road, through which China's splendid silk fabrics were transported westward. With the close interaction between East and West, Buddhism was also introduced to China in the first century AD. In 105 A.D., the official Cai Lun summarized the experience of folk papermaking and invented the art of papermaking, which led to a fundamental change in the writing materials of human beings.

After the Han Dynasty, through the Three Kingdoms, Jin, Northern and Southern Dynasties, and Sui Dynasty, Li Yuan founded the Tang Dynasty in 618 AD. Li Yuan's son, Tang Emperor Li Shimin (reigned 626-649), implemented a series of enlightened policies that brought China's feudal prosperity to its peak: there was well-developed agriculture, handicrafts, and commerce, and the technologies of textile, dyeing, ceramics, smelting, and shipbuilding were further developed, and the country was crisscrossed by water and land transportation. In the seventies and sixties, China's power was firmly entrenched not only in the Tarim Basin, the Junggar Basin, and the Ili River Basin, but even extended to many city-states in Central Asia. China established extensive economic and cultural ties with Japan, Korea, India, Persia, Arabia and many other countries.

Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing (960-1911)

After the fall of the Tang, it went through a period of frequent wars during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms. In 960 AD, Zhao Kuangyin, a general of the Later Zhou Dynasty, established the Song Dynasty (960-1279). The Song Dynasty had a succession of Northern Song and Southern Song, with the regime moving south during the Southern Song, promoting the advanced economy and culture of the north to the south and facilitating the economic development of the region. Astronomy, science and technology, as well as printing in the Song Dynasty were among the world's foremost, and Bi Sheng's invention of movable type printing is considered a major revolution in the history of human printing.

In 1206, Genghis Khan established the Mongol Khanate. His grandson, Kublai, established the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) in 1271, with the capital at Dadu (present-day Beijing). Kublai put an end to the centuries-long situation of multiple regimes and realized the unification of the country, including Xinjiang, Tibet and Yunnan. Paper, printing, compass and gunpowder are the four great inventions of ancient Chinese science and technology, which were introduced to the world during the Song and Yuan dynasties and made great contributions to world civilization.

In 1368, Zhu Yuanzhang, the founder of the Ming dynasty, founded the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) in Nanjing. After his son Zhu Di (1360-1424) assumed the throne, he began the large-scale construction of the city of Beijing and its palaces, and officially moved the capital to Beijing in 1421. 1405 to 1433, he sent the eunuch Zheng He to lead a huge fleet of ships to carry out seven large-scale sea voyages through the countries of South-East Asia, the Indian Ocean, the Persian Gulf, the Maldives Islands, and as far as the east coast of Africa, Somalia and Kenya, which was the first time that he made a voyage to Africa, and the first time that he made a voyage to the United States. Somalia and Kenya on the east coast of Africa, which was the largest and farthest sea expedition in the world before the Columbus era.

In the late Ming Dynasty, the Manchus of northeastern China rose rapidly to power, establishing the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) with its capital in Beijing in 1644. The Qing's most famous emperor, Kangxi (reigned 1661-1722), unified Taiwan and stemmed the invasion of Tsarist Russia. He also strengthened his authority over Tibet, instituting a set of rules and regulations under which the central government ultimately decided on local Tibetan leaders. Under his rule, China's territory covered more than 11 million square kilometers.