Yellow River

(noun)

Huang He in Chinese. A river of northern China which flows for 5,463 km (3,000 miles) to the Yellow Sea.

Related Terms

Examples of Yellow River in the following topics:

  • Introduction to the Shang Dynasty

    • The Shang Dynasty existed in the Yellow River Valley during the second millennium BCE.
    • It was located in the Yellow River valley during the second millennium BCE.
    • This map shows the location of the Shang Dynasty in the Yellow River valley.

  • Society Under the Shang Dynasty

    • The Shang Dynasty was located in the Yellow River valley in China during the second millennium BCE.
    • It was located in the Yellow River valley during the second millennium BCE.

  • The Mythical Period

    • As in Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Indus River valley, civilization in China developed around a great river.
    • The Yellow River and the Huai and Yangtze Rivers, created fertile land, ripe for experimentation with agriculture.
    • These phenomena took place in China about 1000 years later than in Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Indus River valley.
    • The Five Emperors began with Huangdi, or the Yellow Emperor, whose reign is believed to be from 2698-2599 BCE.

  • The Eastern Han Period

    • A series of major floods on the Yellow River, however, displaced thousands of peasants, which caused massive unrest.
    • A series of rebellions, including the Yellow Turban and Five Pecks of Rice, began in 184 CE.

  • Rise of the Ming Dynasty

    • Alongside institutionalized ethnic discrimination against Han Chinese that stirred resentment and rebellion, other explanations for the Yuan's demise included overtaxing areas hard-hit by crop failure, inflation, and massive flooding of the Yellow River as a result of the abandonment of irrigation projects.
    • Consequently, agriculture and the economy were in shambles and rebellion broke out among the hundreds of thousands of peasants called upon to work on repairing the dikes of the Yellow River.
    • Zhu was a born into a desperately poor peasant tenant farmer family in Zhongli Village in the Huai River plain, which is in present-day Fengyang, Anhui Province.
    • When he was 16, the Huai River broke its banks and flooded the lands where his family lived.

  • River Valley Civilizations

    • The first civilizations formed in river valleys, and were characterized by a caste system and a strong government that controlled water access and resources.
    • The first civilizations formed on the banks of rivers.
    • The most notable examples are the Ancient Egyptians, who were based on the Nile, the Mesopotamians in the Fertile Crescent on the Tigris/Euphrates rivers, the Ancient Chinese on the Yellow River, and the Ancient India on the Indus.
    • Though each civilization was uniquely different, we can see common patterns amongst these first civilizations since they were all based around rivers.
    • The only hydraulic empire to exist in Africa was under the Ajuran State near the Jubba and Shebelle Rivers in the 15th century CE.

  • Origins of the Song Dynasty

    • Although the Song dynasty had lost control of the traditional "birthplace of Chinese civilization" along the Yellow River, the Song economy was still strong, as the Southern Song Empire contained a large population and productive agricultural land.
    • Innovative military tactics, such as defending supply lines across floating pontoon bridges led to success in battle such as the Song assault against the Southern Tang state while crossing the Yangzi River in 974.

  • The Southern Song Era

    • Jin forces halted at the Yangzi River, but staged continual raids south of the river until a later boundary was fixed at the Huai River further north.
    • Although weakened and pushed south beyond the Huai River, the Southern Song found new ways to bolster its strong economy and defend itself against the Jin dynasty.
    • To protect and support the multitude of ships sailing for maritime interests into the waters of the East China Sea and Yellow Sea (to Korea and Japan), Southeast Asia, the Indian Ocean, and the Red Sea, it was necessary to establish an official standing navy.
    • From 1268 to 1273, Kublai blockaded the Yangtze River with his navy and besieged Xiangyang, the last obstacle in his way to invading the rich Yangtze River basin.
    • In the Battle of Yamen on the Pearl River Delta in 1279, the Yuan army, led by the general Zhang Hongfan, finally crushed the Song resistance.

  • The Moche

    • These ornate canals diverted river water to crops across the region.
    • During the Spanish occupation of Peru in the early 17th century, colonists redirected the waters of the Moche River to run past the base of the Huaca del Sol in order to facilitate the looting of gold artifacts from the temple, which caused massive erosion.
    • When this structure was originally completed it would have been covered in brightly painted murals in yellows, blues, reds, and black.

  • Ancient Egyptian Art

    • Blue and gold indicated divinity because they were rare and were associated with precious materials, while black expressed the fertility of the Nile River.
    • The side view of the person or animal was generally shown, and paintings were often done in red, blue, green, gold, black and yellow.
    • Houses were made of mud from the Nile River that hardened in the sun.