Tang Dynasty

Examples of Tang Dynasty in the following topics:

• Decline of the Tang Dynasty

  • After the difficult suppression of the An Lushan Rebellion, the jiedushi increased their powers and accelerated the disintegration of the Tang dynasty.
  • It significantly weakened the Tang dynasty and led to the loss of the Western Regions.
  • The An Lushan Rebellion and its aftermath greatly weakened the centralized bureaucracy of the Tang dynasty, especially in regards to its perimeters.
  • In 907 the Tang dynasty was ended when Zhu Wen, now a military governor, deposed the last emperor of Tang, Emperor Ai of Tang, and took the throne for himself.
  • Describe the reasons for the eventual fall of the Tang dynasty

• Rise of the Tang Dynasty

  • The Tang dynasty (Chinese: 唐朝) was an imperial dynasty of China preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period.
  • Decline of the Sui Dynasty and the Founding of the Tang
  • The Sui dynasty was succeeded by the Tang dynasty, which largely inherited its foundation.
  • Wu's rule was actually a short break in the Tang dynasty, as she established the short-lived Zhou dynasty; the Tang dynasty was restored after her rule.
  • Explain the events that led to the Tang dynasty coming to power

• Trade Under the Tang Dynasty

  • Songs, dances, and musical instruments from foreign regions became popular in China during the Tang dynasty.
  • Although the Silk Road from China to the West was initially formulated during the reign of Emperor Wu (141–87 BCE) during the Han dynasty, it was reopened by the Tang in 639 CE when Hou Junji (d. 643) conquered the West, and remained open for almost four decades.
  • The Tang dynasty established a second Pax Sinica and the Silk Road reached its golden age, whereby Persian and Sogdian merchants benefited from the commerce between East and West.
  • These lands contained crucial grazing areas and pastures for raising horses that the Tang dynasty desperately needed.
  • The Silk Road also affected Tang dynasty art.

• Religion Under the Tang Dynasty

  • Religion in the Tang dynasty was diverse, and emperors sought support and legitimation from some local religious leaders, but persecuted others.
  • The ruling Li family of the Tang dynasty actually claimed descent from the ancient Laozi.
  • This is reflected in Tang dynasty art and in many short stories written in the Tang about people accidentally winding up in the realm of the dead, only to come back and report their experiences.
  • The Tang dynasty also officially recognized various foreign religions.
  • Analyze why the emperors of the Tang dynasty were interested in the promotion of certain religions

• The Literati

  • The first half of the Tang dynasty was largely a period of progress and stability.
  • Like the previous Sui dynasty, the Tang dynasty maintained a civil service system by recruiting scholar-officials through standardized examinations and recommendations to office.
  • These scholar-officials, also known as the literati, performed the day-to-day governance of the state from the Han dynasty to the end of the Qing dynasty, China's last imperial dynasty, in 1912, but came to special prominence during the Tang period.
  • Although there were imperial exams as early as the Han dynasty, the system became the major path to office only in the mid-Tang dynasty, and remained so until its abolition in 1905.
  • Up until that point, the rulers of the Tang dynasty were all male members of the Li family.

• The Mongol Invasions

  • The Yuan dynasty was the ruling dynasty of China established by Kublai Khan, leader of the Mongolian Borjigin clan.
  • The Yuan dynasty is considered both a successor to the Mongol Empire and an imperial Chinese dynasty.
  • In official Chinese histories, the Yuan dynasty bore the Mandate of Heaven, following the Song dynasty and preceding the Ming dynasty.
  • In the Proclamation of the Dynastic Name, Kublai announced the name of the new dynasty as Great Yuan and claimed the succession of former Chinese dynasties from the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors to the Tang dynasty.
  • The Yuan dynasty is traditionally given credit for reuniting China after several hundred years of fragmentation following the fall of the Tang dynasty.

• The Xia Dynasty

  • After the final ruler became corrupt, he was overthrown by Cheng Tang, who founded the Shang Dynasty.
  • According to this history, the last of the great Five Emperors, Emperor Shun, left his throne to Yu the Great, who founded China's First Dynasty, the Xia Dynasty.
  • This led to his overthrow in c. 1760 BCE by Cheng Tang, who founded a new dynasty, the Shang Dynasty, in the Huang River Valley.
  • Many argue that the Zhou Dynasty, which ruled China much later, invented the idea of the Xia Dynasty to support their claim that China could only be, and had always been, ruled by one ruler.
  • This hanging scroll shows Yu the Great, as imagined by Song Dynasty painter Ma Lin.

• Origins of the Song Dynasty

  • It succeeded the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, and was followed by the Yuan dynasty.
  • The Later Zhou was the last of the Five Dynasties that had controlled northern China after the fall of the Tang dynasty in 907.
  • This included the conquests of Nanping, Wu-Yue, Southern Han, Later Shu, and Southern Tang in the south as well as the Northern Han and the Sixteen Prefectures in the north.
  • One such success was the Song assault against the Southern Tang state while crossing the Yangtze River in 974.
  • To the far northwest, the Tanguts had been in power over northern Shaanxi since 881, after the earlier Tang court appointed a Tangut chief as a military governor (jiedushi) over the region, a seat that became hereditary (forming the Xi-Xia dynasty).

• Introduction to the Shang Dynasty

  • The Shang Dynasty (also called the Yin Dynasty) succeeded the Xia Dynasty, and was followed by the Zhou Dynasty.
  • Jie, the last king of the Xia Dynasty (the first Chinese dynasty), was overthrown c. 1760 BCE by Cheng Tang.
  • The Shang Dynasty is, therefore, generally considered China's first historical dynasty.
  • The Shang Dynasty is the oldest Chinese dynasty supported by archaeological finds.
  • When Cheng Tang overthrew the last king of the Xia Dynasty, he supposedly founded a new capital for his dynasty at a town called Shang, near modern-day Zhengzhou.

• Art under the Ming Dynasty

  • Short fiction had been popular in China as far back as the Tang dynasty (618–907), and the works of contemporaneous Ming authors such as Xu Guangqi, Xu Xiake, and Song Yingxing were often technical and encyclopedic, but the most striking literary development during the Ming period was the vernacular novel.
  • In the later years of the dynasty, Feng Menglong and Ling Mengchu innovated with vernacular short fiction.
  • The most famous script, The Peony Pavilion, was written by Tang Xianzu (1550–1616), and had its first performance at the Pavilion of Prince Teng in 1598.
  • Famous painters included Ni Zan and Dong Qichang, as well as the Four Masters of the Ming dynasty, Shen Zhou, Tang Yin, Wen Zhengming, and Qiu Ying.
  • Ming dynasty Xuande mark and period (1426–35) imperial blue and white vase.