White Jade Design Int'l

Chinese Dynasties and Kingdoms, a Overview.

By Juru Biya/Jin Ming-yue aka Laurel A. Rockefeller

So you've decided to pursue this Asian persona thing. That's great. You've just landed yourself into the biggest ocean of history and possible confusion that anyone can undertake. Even for a dedicated Chinese historian (or at least part time historian), the early periods of Chinese history can be and are confusing. While Qin She-Huang ("First Emperor"-the vicious warlord from Zhong Guo, the Middle Kingdom) was the one who conquered all the lands Zhong Guo was aware of and inaugurated Imperial China, China itself struggled to make it work, breaking up and reuniting again under different rulers. At the end of it, China became a single, permanently united nation. It is that period of unity, the "modern Chinese period" that I know best, so these SCAdian efforts to create a persona from the late Jin period are attempts to put order from chaos. Most dates for Dynasties derived from ABC Chinese-English Dictionary, ISBN 08248-1744-3.

Here is a basic breakdown of the dynasties and major achievements of each. Many of these are common knowledge events/peoples but not commonly known chronology for. (Due to length constraints, the Tang Dynasty was edited out and in its place "Empress Wu and Poetry Too" was written.)

Qin Dynasty-221-207 BCE
Reign of Qin She Huang. First Chinese dictionary for all Chinese ethnicities under conquest by Qin She Huang's "Middle Kingdom." Capital in Chang An (modern Xi An). Huge tomb-city constructed for Qin She Huang included the famous terra cotta warriors. Beginnings of the earth mound "great wall." Great book burnings destroy most of Chinese literature with only a few copies of Kongzi's preferred titles (collectively known as the Confucian Classics) surviving. Daoism nearly extinguished, countless historical and literary records from the several thousands of years before hand perish forever. Han domination of most Chinese peoples. Western word "china" is from this dynasty's name, Qin. Nomadic peoples like Qitans (Khitans) remain independent.

Han Dynasty-206 BCE - 220 CE
Founded by peasant, Liu Bang, in rebellion against Qin She Huang's burnings, mass murder, and other acts of vicious depotism. Struggled to stay united and failed. Han period is divided into Western Han (206 BCE to 23 CE) and Eastern Han (25 CE to 220 CE). Han ethnicity still dominates over China. Nomadic peoples still independent.

Three Kingdoms-220-280 CE
After the fall of the Han, China fell into feudalism. Three kingdoms was just part one of the chaos after the fall of the Han. The three kingdoms were: Wei (220-265 CE), Shu Han (221-263 CE), and Wu (222-280). Han ethnicity still controls the other peoples of China, except the nomads.

Jin Dynasty-1115 to 1234 CE.
This is the Jurchen dynasty that finally succeeded in taking all of China north of the Chang Jiang (Long river, often known as the Yang tze, the name of one of its tributaries). Its origins is a great story of politics and double crosses, but the story of the Jin does not stop there. The Jurchens succeeded in the Jin where the Mongols would fail in their empires: to retain both their own nomadic culture and lifestyle while adapting to the needs of the greater population and allowing the ethnicities and cultures under their control to keep their way of life. Only the Jurchen Jin under the Wanyan clan and the Qing under the Aisin clan succeeded in that task.

Song Dynasty-960 to 1269 CE
Ever written a check or used paper money as currency? While the Song was a military disaster and lost most of their original lands to the superiority of the Jurchens, the Song is responsible for much of the economic institutions we take for granted today. The first banks for the common people were founded in Song dynasty China only to be disbanded for centuries and restored in the early 19th century. Where would capitalism be without these and other economic developments from the Song?

Yuan Dynasty-1279 to 1369
While the Hordes could have easily taken out the Song dynasty at the same time Yanjing fell in 1215, it wasn't a Mongol priority. It was the 5th Khan, Kublai, whose reign began in 1260, who decided that the hordes should finish the job and take out the Song. In 1279, Kublai Khan declared the Yuan dynasty officially, attempting to adapt to the Han imperial system that most Chinese were used to. Unfortunately, the Mongols lacked Jurchen imagination and failed to understand just how to rule the huge, diverse Chinese population.

Ming Dynasty-1369 to 1644
A probably overhyped dynasty, the Ming was full of social experiments, notably: 1) 50 years of primogeniture for the imperial succession (bad idea--Chinese emperors had always been ELECTED, a system that took advantage of the pool of dozens to hundreds of princes fathered by the reigning emperor to find the most meritorious emperor for the throne-after all, what did birth order have to do with IQ or personality?) and 2) moving the capital briefly to Nan Jing (southern capital). Neither experiment worked. Ancient sensibilities and traditions of merit based rank quickly showed that first born was often a rotten emperor and Beijing was simply a better site for a capital than Nanjing. The Ming dynasty is also remembered for frivolous imperial exploits that left the poor starving in favor of a lavish lifestyle for the royal family. But of course there was one truly remarkable achievement of the Ming: the treasure fleet of Zheng He which journeyed to and won alliance from several African nations.

Qing Dynasty-1644 to 1912 officially
Jurchens were renamed Manchus and struggled to keep China alive in face of European and American conquests into Chinese territory. But Qing was not a total disaster. Under the Kangxi Emperor, the Yellow River finally was controlled and scholarship flourished. The Qing is the only dynasty with emperors who wrote autobiographies: the Kangxi (1662 to 1722) and the Xuan Tong (1908 to 1912).