精华区文章阅读

发信人: samuel (孔雀翎), 信区: English
标  题: History of China
发信站: 哈工大紫丁香 (2003年07月19日16:30:11 星期六), 站内信件

China's History since the early days
Archaeological evidence suggests that China is one of the cradles of the human
race. The earliest known human in China, whose fossilized skull was unearthed
in Shanxi Province in 1963, is believed to date back to 600,000 BC. The
remains of Sinanthropus pekinensis, known as Peking Man and dating back to
400,000 BC, were excavated in 1923 at Zhoukoudianzhen near Peking. Peking Man
was closely related to Pithecanthropus of Java and lived during the Old Stone
Age. In the upper caves of Zhoukoudianzhen are found artifacts of a late Old
Stone Age man (50,000-35,000 BC), who ranks in age with the Cro-Magnon of
Europe. This was an early form of Homo sapiens, or modern man, who made tools
out of bones as well as stones, made clothes out of animal hides, and knew
how to make fire.
Around the 4th or 3rd millennium BC, in the New Stone Age, great changes
occurred in the lives of the ancient Chinese. Larger numbers of people began
living together at settled places, cultivating land, and domesticating
animals. These people made polished stone tools and built shelters in pit
dwellings and beehive huts that were covered with reed roofs. Such villages
were found mostly in the area of the great bend of the Huang He on the North
China Plain. Despite its severe winters, this area was well suited to
agriculture. In fact, it closely resembled the other cradles of ancient
civilizations, such as the valley of the Nile in Egypt.

The people of this period (3000-2000 BC) also developed the art of making
pottery for storing food and drink. Two distinct types have been discovered:
red clay pots with swirling black designs in the northwest near Yangshao
village, and smooth black pottery in northeast China near Lungshan, a site in
Shandong Province.

The Shang Dynasty (1766-1122 BC)
Before the Shang, Chinese tradition mentions a Hsia Dynasty, but for lack of
evidence, the Hsia is still considered a legendary period. Until the late
1920s the Shang Dynasty too was thought to be legendary but discoveries made
near the modern city of Anyang (the site of the Shang capital) in Henan
Province proved that the dynasty existed. The most important of these
discoveries was the finding of over 100,000 bones and shells with
still-recognizable characters inscribed on them. These oracle bones and
shells, originally used as religious objects, represent the earliest form of
the Chinese writing system. In addition to the oracle bones and shells, the
superb Shang bronzes and the tombs of the Shang rulers reveal a highly
developed society. The Shang are distinguished from the New Stone Age people
by their settled life-style and their highly developed bronze-making
technique. The Shang used bronze to make weapons, daily tools, and
elaborately decorated sacrificial vessels.

The last Shang ruler was reportedly evil and tyrannical. He was overthrown by
a revolt of the people, who were aided by the neighboring Chou people. The
leader of the Chou was named Wu. With his brother's help, he defeated the
Shang and founded the Chou Dynasty.

The Chou Dynasty (1122-221 BC)
The Chou conquest of the Shang was given an important meaning by later
moralistic interpretations of the event. The Chou kings, whose chief deity
was heaven, called themselves "Sons of Heaven," and their success in
overcoming the Shang was seen as the "mandate of heaven." From this time on,
Chinese rulers were called "Sons of Heaven" and the Chinese Empire, the
"Celestial Empire." The transfer of power from one dynasty to the next was
based on the mandate of heaven.

Chou rule in China continued for nearly nine centuries. During that time
great advances were made. The long period of the Chou Dynasty is divided into
two subperiods: Western (Early) and Eastern (Later) Chou, named for the
locations of the capitals.

Western (Early) Chou (1122-771 BC)
Western Chou territory covered most of the North China Plain. It was divided
into about 200 princely domains. The Chou political system was similar to the
feudal system of medieval Europe.

The Chou people combined hunting and agriculture for a living. Associating
the success or failure of crops with the disposition of nature, the people
prayed to numerous nature gods for good harvests. One of the ruler's duties
was to placate heaven and Earth for all people. Failure to do so deprived him
of the right to rule. Such beliefs are still widely held today among the
Chinese people. Ancestor worship also developed during the Chou period and
has been important in East Asia for the last 2,000 years.

The Chou were invaded in 771 BC by a less cultured, more militaristic people
from the northwest. The capital was moved east to Luoyang. From this point
on, the dates are considered reliable. The manner in which the Western Chou
fell followed a pattern that was repeated throughout Chinese history. People
who led a nomadic, or wandering, life in the northern steppe land would
invade settled agricultural communities to solve periodic food shortages.

Eastern (Later) Chou (771-221 BC)
The Eastern Chou is also two periods. The first is Ch'un Ch'iu, the Spring
and Autumn period (771-481 BC), named for a book credited to Confucius. The
second is Chan-kuo, the Warring States period (481-221 BC).

In the Spring and Autumn period, iron replaced bronze for tools and weapons.
The use of iron led to an increase in agricultural output, growth of the
population, and warfare among the states. By the 4th century BC the number of
states had shrunk to seven. In 256 BC the princes of those states assumed the
title of king, stopped paying homage to the Chou king, and continued to fight
for supremacy. The strongest of the seven states was Ch'in.

The Ch'in Empire (221-206 BC)
After nearly 900 years, the Chou Dynasty came to an end when the state of
Ch'in, the strongest of the seven surviving states, unified China and
established the first empire in 221 BC. The Ch'in empire did not last long,
but it left two enduring legacies: the name China and the idea and structure
of the empire. This heritage outlasted the Ch'in Dynasty itself by more than
2,000 years.

The first Ch'in emperor was called Ch'in Shih Huang Ti. The title of emperor
was used for the first time in Chinese history to set the Ch'in ruler
apart--as the ruler of the unified land--from the kings, the heads of the
earlier, smaller states. The construction of massive palaces and the ceremony
of the court further enhanced the power of the emperor by inspiring awe in
the people.

A centralized bureaucracy replaced the old feudal system. The empire was
divided into provinces and counties, which were governed by centrally
appointed governors and magistrates. The former ruling families who had
inherited their places in the aristocracy were uprooted and forced to live in
the capital of Xianyang. Other centralizing policies included census taking
and standardization of the writing system and weights and measures.

The Ch'in army conducted massive military campaigns to complete the
unification of the empire and expand its territory. The Ch'in empire
stretched from the Mongolian plateau in the north to Vietnam in the south. As
with rulers before and after him, the first emperor was preoccupied with
defending his territory against northern nomads. After waging several
successful campaigns, the emperor ordered the building of the wall of "ten
thousand li" (a li is a Chinese unit of distance) to protect the empire. This
task involved connecting the separate walls that were built by former
northern states to form the famous Great Wall. The Ten Thousand Li Wall, as
it is known in China, is 1,500 miles (2,400 kilometers) long, from 15 to 50
feet (5 to 15 meters) high, and from 15 to 25 feet (5 to 8 meters) wide.
Although closely linked with the first ruler of the Ch'in Empire, the wall as
it stands today dates mainly from the later Ming Dynasty.

Ch'in Shih Huang Ti's harsh rule provoked much opposition. The emperor feared
the scholars most. He had them rounded up and put them to death or sent them
into exile. Many went into hiding. Moreover, all books, except technical
ones, were confiscated and burned. In the last years of his life, Ch'in Shih
Huang Ti became fearful of threats on his life and lived in complete secrecy.
He also became obsessed with obtaining immortality. He died in 210 BC in
Shandong Province, far from the capital of Xianyang, during one of his long
quests to find the elixir of life.

The Ch'in empire disintegrated rapidly after the death of the first emperor.
The legitimate heir was killed in a palace intrigue, and a less able prince
was put on the throne. Conditions worsened throughout the empire. In 209 BC,
rebellions erupted all over China. Two men had the largest following. Hsiang
Yu was a general of aristocratic background; Liu Pang was a minor official
from a peasant family. By 206 BC rebels had subdued the Ch'in army and
destroyed the capital. The struggle between Hsiang Yu and Liu Pang continued
for the next four years, however, until Liu Pang emerged as the victor in 202
BC. Taking the title of Kao Tsu, High Progenitor, he established the Han
Dynasty.

The Han Empire (202 BC-AD 220)
The four-century-long Han rule is divided into two periods: the Earlier or
Western Han and the Later or Eastern Han. In between these two was the
short-lived Hsin Dynasty (AD 9-23).

Earlier (Western) Han (202 BC-AD 9)
The Han Kao Tsu preserved many features of the Ch'in imperial system, such as
the administrative division of the country and the central bureaucracy. But
the Han rulers lifted the Ch'in ban on philosophical and historical writings.
Han Kao Tsu called for the services of men of talent, not only to restore the
destroyed classics but to serve as officials in the government. From that
time, the Chinese Empire was governed by a body of officials theoretically
selected on merit. Such a practice has few parallels elsewhere at this early
date in human history.

In 124 BC, during the reign of Wu Ti (140-87, the Martial Emperor), an
imperial university was set up for the study of Confucian classics. The
university recruited talented students, and the state supported them.
Starting with 50 when the university first opened, the number of
government-supported students reached 30,000 by the end of the Han Dynasty.
Emperor Wu also established Confucianism as the official doctrine of the
state. This designation lasted until the end of the Chinese Empire.

The Early Han faced two major difficulties: invasions by the barbarian Huns
and the influence of the imperial consort families. In the Han Dynasty, the
Huns (known as Hsiung-nu by the Chinese) threatened the expanding Chinese
Empire from the north. Starting in Wu Ti's reign, costly, almost century-long
campaigns had to be carried out to establish Chinese sovereignty along the
northern and northwestern borders. Wu Ti also waged aggressive campaigns to
incorporate northern Korea in 108 BC and northern Annam in 111 BC into the
Han empire. The Early Han's other difficulty started soon after the first
emperor's death. The widowed Empress Lu dominated politics and almost
succeeded in taking the throne for her family. Thereafter, families of the
empresses exerted great political influence. In AD 9 Wang Mang, a nephew of
the empress, seized the throne and founded a new dynasty of Hsin.

Wang Mang's overambitious reform program alienated him from the landlords. At
the same time the peasants, disappointed with Wang's inability to push
through the reform, rose in rebellion. In AD 17 a rebel group in Shandong
painted their faces red (hence their name, Red Eyebrows) and adopted
religious symbols, a practice later repeated by peasants who rebelled in
times of extreme difficulty. Wang Mang's force was defeated, and he was
killed in AD 23.

Later (Eastern) Han (AD 23-220)
The new ruler who restored peace and order was a member of the house of Han,
the original Liu family. His title was Kuang Wu Ti, "Shining Martial
Emperor," from AD 25 to 57. During the Later Han, which lasted another 200
years, a concerted but unsuccessful effort was made to restore the glory of
the former Han. The Later Han scored considerable success in recovering lost
territories, however. Sent to befriend the tribes on the northwestern
frontier in AD 73, a great diplomat-general, Pan Ch'ao, eventually led an
army of 70,000 almost to the borders of eastern Europe. Pan Ch'ao returned to
China in 101 and brought back information about the Roman Empire. The Romans
also knew about China, but they thought of it only as the land where silk was
produced.

The Period of Disunity (220-581)
After the fall of the Later Han, the Chinese Empire remained divided for
three and a half centuries. The first half-century began with the domination
of the Three Kingdoms: Wei under the Ts'ao family in the north, Shu Han under
Liu Pei in the southwest, and Wu under Sun Ch'uan in the southeast. Invaders
from the north soon overran the kingdoms and set up their own states, but the
Northern Wei Dynasty (386-534), established by one of the barbarian tribes,
the Toba, was the only one to last. Four dynasties established by the Chinese
ruled in the south during the 4th and 5th centuries. The Three Kingdoms
period was made famous by the novel 'Romance of the Three Kingdoms', which
glamorized the period as an age of chivalry.

The Sui Dynasty (581-618)
The prolonged period of disunity finally ended when a general from the
northwest united China by establishing the new dynasty of Sui. A second great
period of imperial unity was begun. The relationship of the Sui to the
succeeding T'ang Dynasty was much like that of the Ch'in to the Han. It
served as the unifying foundation on which its successor could build. The
first Sui emperor, Wen Ti, introduced a series of economic reforms, such as
reduction of the peasants' taxes, a careful census for equitable tax
collection, and restoration of the equal allocation system used in the
Northern Wei. Every taxable male received a grant of land, part of which was
returnable when he ceased to be a taxpayer at age 60 and part of which he
could pass on to his heirs. He also revived the Han system of examinations
based on Confucian classics.

The T'ang Dynasty (618-907)
The T'ang emperors set up a political system in which the emperor was supreme
and government officials were selected on the bases of merit and education.
The early T'ang rulers applied the equal allocation system rigorously to
bring about a greater equity in taxation and to insure the flow of taxes to
the government. A census was taken every three years to enforce the system,
which also involved drafting people to do labor. These measures led to an
agricultural surplus and the development of units of uniform value for the
principal commodities, two of the most important prerequisites for the growth
of commerce and cities.

The T'ang capital of Chang'an was one of the greatest commercial and
cosmopolitan cities in the world at that time. Like most capitals of China,
Chang'an was composed of three parts: the palace, the imperial city, and the
outer city, separated from each other by mighty walls.

The T'ang was a period of great imperial expansion, which reached its
greatest height in the first half of the 8th century. At that time, Chinese
control was recognized by people from Tibet and Central Asia in the west to
Mongolia, Manchuria (now the Northeast region of China), and Korea in the
north and Annam in the south.

The Sung Dynasty (960-1279)
Over 300 years of Sung history is divided into the two periods of Northern
and Southern Sung. Because of the barbarian occupation of northern China the
second half of the Sung rule was confined to the area south of the Huai
River.

Northern Sung (960-1126)
General Chao K'uang-yin, later known as Sung T'ai Tsu, was said to have been
coerced to become emperor in order to unify China. Wary of power-hungry
commanders, Sung T'ai Tsu made the military into a national army under his
direct control. Under his less capable successors, however, the military
increasingly lost prestige. Unfortunately for China, the weakening of the
military coincided with the rise of successive strong nomad nations on the
borders.

In contrast to the military's loss of prestige, the civil service rose in
dignity. The examination system that had been restored in the Sui and T'ang
was further elaborated and regularized. Selection examinations were held
every three years at the district, provincial, and metropolitan levels.

Only 200 out of thousands of applicants were granted the jinshi degree, the
highest degree, and appointed to government posts. From this time on, civil
servants became China's most envied elite, replacing the hereditary nobles
and landlords.

Sung dominion extended over only part of the territories of earlier Chinese
empires. The Khitans controlled the northeastern territories, and the Hsi
Hsia (Western Hsia) controlled the northwestern territories. Unable to
recover these lands, the Sung emperors were compelled to make peace with the
Khitans in 1004 and with the Hsi Hsia in 1044. Massive payments to the
barbarians under the peace terms depleted the state treasury, caused hardship
to taxpaying peasants, and gave rise to a conflict in the court among
advocates of war, those who favored peace, and reformers.

In 1069 Emperor Shen Tsung appointed Wang An-shih as chief minister. Wang
proposed a number of sweeping reforms based on the classical text of the
'Rites of Chou'. Many of his "new laws" were actually revivals of earlier
policies, but officials and landlords opposed his reforms. When the emperor
and Wang died within a year of each other, the new laws were withdrawn. For
the next several decades, until the fall of the Northern Sung in 1126, the
reformers and antireformers alternated in power, creating havoc and turmoil
in government.

In an effort to regain territory lost to the Khitans, the Sung sought an
alliance with the newly powerful Juchens from Manchuria. Once the alliance
had expelled the Khitans, however, the Juchens turned on the Sung and
occupied the capital of Kaifeng. The Juchens established the dynasty of Chin,
a name meaning "gold," which lasted from 1115 to 1234, in the north. They
took the emperor and his son prisoner, along with 3,000 others, and ordered
them to be held in Manchuria.

Southern Sung (1126-1279)
Another imperial son fled south and settled in 1127 at Hangzhou, where he
resumed the Sung rule as the emperor Kao Tsung. The Sung retained control
south of the Huai River, where they ruled for another one and a half
centuries.

Although militarily weak and limited in area, the Southern Sung represented
one of China's most brilliant periods of cultural, commercial, maritime, and
technological development. Despite the loss of the north, trade continued to
expand, enabling a commercial revolution to take place in the 13th century.
Cut off from the traditional overland trade routes, Sung merchants turned to
the ocean with the aid of such improvements as compasses and huge oceangoing
ships called junks. The development of a paper money economy stimulated
commercial growth and kept it going.

The Yuan (Mongol) Dynasty (1279-1368)
The Mongols were the first of the northern barbarians to rule all of China.
After creating an empire that stretched across the Eurasian continent and
occupying northern China and Korea in the first half of the 13th century, the
Mongols continued their assault on the Southern Sung. By 1276 the Southern
Sung capital of Hangzhou had fallen, and in 1279 the last of the Sung
loyalists perished.

Before this, Kublai Khan, the fifth "great khan" and grandson of Genghis
Khan, had moved the Mongol capital from Karakorum to Peking. In 1271 he
declared himself emperor of China and named the dynasty Yuan, meaning
"beginning," to signify that this was the beginning of a long era of Mongol
rule.

In Asia, Kublai Khan continued his grandfather's dream of world conquest. Two
unsuccessful naval expeditions were launched against Japan in 1274 and 1281.
Four land expeditions were sent against Annam and five against Burma.
However, the Mongol conquests overseas and in Southeast Asia were neither
spectacular nor were they long enduring.

Mongol rule in China lasted less than a century. The Mongols became the most
hated of the barbarian rulers because they did not allow the Chinese ruling
class to govern. Instead, they gave the task of governing to foreigners.
Distrusting the Chinese, the Mongol rulers placed the southern Chinese at the
lowest level of the four classes they created. The extent of this distrust
was reflected in their provincial administration. As conquerers, they
followed the Ch'in example and made the provincial governments into direct
extensions of the central chancellery. This practice was continued by
succeeding dynasties, resulting in a further concentration of power in the
central imperial government.

The Chinese despised the Mongols for refusing to adapt to Chinese culture.
The Mongols kept their own language and customs. The Mongol rulers were
tolerant about religions, however. Kublai Khan reportedly dabbled in many
religions.

The Ming Dynasty (1368-1644)
Having restored Chinese rule to China, the first Ming emperor tried to model
his rule after that of the Han, but the Ming fell far short of the Han's
accomplishments. The land under Ming domination was less than under either
the Han or the T'ang. The Ming dominion changed little after the first two
decades. It was confined mostly to what is known as China proper, south of
the Great Wall and east of Xinjiang and Tibet.

In culture, as well, the Ming lacked the Han's creativity and brilliance.
Coming after almost a century of foreign domination, the Ming was a period of
restoration and reorganization rather than a time of new discovery. In a
sense, the Ming followed a typical dynastic cycle: initial rehabilitation of
the economy and restoration of efficient government, followed by a time of
stability and then a gradual decline and fall.

The emperor Hung-wu modeled his government on the T'ang system, restoring the
doctrine and practices of Confucianism and continuing the trend toward
concentration of power in the imperial government, especially in the hands of
the emperor himself. He tried to conduct state affairs singlehandedly, but
the work load proved overwhelming. To assist him, he gathered around him
several loyal middle-level officials, thus creating an extra-governmental
organization, the Grand Secretariat. The central bureaucracy was restored and
filled by officials selected by the examination system. That system was
further formalized by the introduction of a special essay style called the
eight-legged essay, to be used in writing the examination. In addition, the
subject matter of the examinations was restricted to the Five Classics, said
to have been compiled, edited, or written by Confucius, and the Four Books,
published by Chu Hsi.

In the field of provincial government, the emperor Hung-wu continued the Yuan
practice of limiting the power of provincial governors and subjecting them
directly to the central government. The empire was divided into 15 provinces.
The first capital at Nanjing was in the economic heartland of China, but in
1421 the emperor Yung-Lo, who took the throne after a civil war, moved the
capital to Peking, where he began a massive construction project. The
imperial palace, which is also known as the Forbidden City, was built at this
time.

The Ch'ing Empire (1644-1911)
Like the Mongols in the 13th century, the Manchus (formerly the Juchen) were
barbarians who succeeded in ruling the whole of China, but, unlike the
13th-century conquerers, the sinicized Manchus made their rule more
acceptable to the Chinese. As a result, Ch'ing rule lasted 267 years,
compared with 89 years for the Yuan.

Pax Sinica (1683-1795)
The Manchus took Peking with relative ease in 1644, but they did not gain
control of the whole of China until 1683. Thereafter, the Manchus enjoyed
more than a century of peace and prosperity, a period that came to be called
Pax Sinica (Peace in China). By the end of that period the dynasty had
reached the height of its power.

The Republic of China (1912-1949)
Early in March 1912, Sun Yat-sen resigned from the presidency and, as
promised, Yuan Shih-kai was elected his successor at Nanjing. Inaugurated in
March 1912 in Beijing, the base of his power, Yuan established a republican
system of government with a premier, a cabinet, a draft constitution, and a
plan for parliamentary elections early in 1913. The Kuomintang (KMT, National
People's party), the successor to Sun Yat-sen's organization, was formed in
order to prepare for the election.

Despite his earlier pledges to support the republic, Yuan schemed to
assassinate his opponents and weaken the constitution and the parliament. By
the end of 1914 he had made himself president for life and even planned to
establish an imperial dynasty with himself as the first emperor. His dream
was thwarted by the serious crisis of the Twenty-one Demands for special
privileges presented by the Japanese in January 1915 and by vociferous
opposition from many sectors of Chinese society. He died in June 1916 a
broken man. After Yuan's death, a number of his proteges took positions of
power in the Beijing government or ruled as warlords in outlying regions. In
August 1917 the Beijing government joined the Allies and declared war on
Germany. At the peace conference in Versailles, France, the Chinese demand to
end foreign concessions in China was ignored.

The People's Republic of China
On Oct. 1, 1949, Mao Zedong proclaimed the establishment of the People's
Republic of China. The CCP hailed its takeover of China as a people's victory
over and liberation from imperial domination (especially that of the United
States) and the oppressive KMT regime. The Red Army was renamed the People's
Liberation Army. During the early days of the People's Republic, the troops
were restrained, foreign-educated Chinese returned to help the country, and
most local administrators remained in office.

The first Communist government, the People's Consultative Council, included
non-Communists among its 662 members. However, in the top committee, 31 out
of 56 seats were occupied by Communists, and the constitution of 1954
drastically curtailed the role of non-Communists. After 1954, more authority
was concentrated in the central government under the State Council. Real
power, however, lay with the Communist party, especially the Central
Committee, then composed of 94 members. This committee held together the
triad of power--army, government, and party. The inner circle of the Central
Committee was the 19-member Political Bureau and its seven-member Standing
Committee.

【在 samuel ( 孔雀翎) 的大作中提到: 】: History & Anthropology
(General)
:  1421: The Year China Discovered The World  Companion site to Gavin Menzies'
: book, which claims that "Chinese ships had reached America seventy years
: before Columbus and circumnavigated the globe a century before Magellan":
: evidence; maps
:  Ancient China  Part of Richard Hooker's "World Civilizations" site:
: antholology of essays & readings on ancient Chinese culture & history;
: Internet resources
: An Ancient Civilization  Section of The Eagle & the Dragon exhibition at
: Hoover Library: the Dragon Empire; Chinese belief systems; Chinese philosophy
: & medicine; the arts of China

--
三年硕士五年博，身变皮骨腰变驮。昨日豪情遭磨难，今朝两鬓见斑驳。
囊中通货常恨少，腹内草莽日渐多。墙上芦苇浅根底，山间竹笋空外壳。
有心飘洋求深造，无奈拦路有G 托。终日昏昏书中死，彻夜迷迷网上活。
人依电脑哥俩个，情寄足球心一颗。偶有红袖添香事，南柯梦醒愁更多。
不毛之地空求雨，梧桐树矮愧凤落。寄言诸位同窗友，莫效小子这般活。
轻浮小舟难下海，空虚岁月易蹉跎。此中言语皆肺腑，敬请大家细琢磨。

※ 来源:·哈工大紫丁香 bbs.hit.edu.cn·[FROM: 218.7.43.56]

English 版 (精华区)