The Westernization Movement

The rude realities of the Opium War, the unequal treaties, and the mid-century mass uprisings caused Qing courtiers and officials to recognize the need to strengthen China. Chinese scholars and officials had been examining and translating "Western Learning" since the 1840s. Under the direction of modem-thinking Han officials, Western science and languages were studied, special schools were o...

Jiangtun Han Tombs Excavated at Pulandian, Liaoning

The excavation site is located on the hillside 500 meters south of Jiangtun village in the northwest of Pulandian, Dalian city, where Han tombs has been found early in 1970s. Archaeologists from Liaoning Provincial Institute of Archaeology and Cultural Relics have conducted investigation and excavation in March 2010, and the work is now over. A total of 207 tombs containing 2000 articles or ...

Zhangsun as Princess of Qin and Crown Princess

In 617, Li Yuan, aided by Li Shimin and Li Shimin's older brother Li Jiancheng, among others, rebelled at Taiyuan (太原, in modern Taiyuan, Shanxi), and later that year captured the capital Chang'an, declaring Emperor Yang's grandson Yang You the Prince of Dai emperor (as Emepror Gong). In 618, after news arrived that Emperor Yang had been killed in a coup at Jiangdu (江都, in modern Yangzhou, J...

Tragic Lives of the Ancient Beauties

Yu Ji (?-202 BC) was a concubine of Xiang Yu, a prominent general during the fall of the Qin Dynasty. Yu always accompanied Xiang on his battles. During a five-year war known as the Chu Han Contention, Xiang gradually lost his power to Liu Bang, Xiang's rival at the time and later the first Emperor of the Han Dynasty. Xiang's lack of political skills and his inability to listen to wise advisors...

Battle of Tai'erzhuang

The Battle of Tai'erzhuang (台儿庄会战) was a battle of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1938, between armies of Chinese Kuomintang and Japan, and is sometimes considered as a part of Battle of Xuzhou. Tai'erzhuang is located on the eastern bank of the Grand Canal of China and was a frontier garrison northeast of Xuzhou. It was also the terminus of a local branch railway from Lincheng. Xuzhou itsel...

Nanjing Decade

The Nanjing decade was the decade from 1927 (or 1928) to 1937 in the history of the Republic of China. It began when Nationalist Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek took the city from Zhili clique warlord Sun Chuanfang halfway through the Northern Expedition in 1927. He declared it to be the national capital despite the other Nationalists already having made Wuhan the capital. The Wuhan faction gave...

Ming Dynasty

Establishment Stone Camel on Sacred Way, Ming Xiaoling Mausoleum, Nanjing In the late period of the Yuan Dynasty (1271 - 1368), a peasant's uprising - Hongjinjun (army with red scarf in the head) uprising broke out against the Mongols. In 1352 when the rebel army captured Haozhou (currently Fengyang in Anhui Province), Zhu Yuanzhang, a local young man from a peasant family joined the army. Afte...

Five Dynasties & Ten States

After Zhu Quanzhong usurped the Tang Dynasty (618-907) and founded the Latter Liang Dynasty (907 - 923), there were sequentially four dynasties after that. All these five dynasties were called Five Dynasties in Chinese history. Meanwhile, there were also ten kingdoms originating from the former Jiedushi (regional military attachment) of Tang. Hereunder is the timeline of the Five Dynasties and T...

Goryeo–Khitan Wars

The Goryeo-Khitan Wars were a series of 10th- and 11th-century invasions of Korea's Goryeo Dynasty by the Khitan Liao Dynasty near the present-day border between China and North Korea. It resulted in the defeat of Liao Dynasty. Background During the Three Kingdoms of Korea period, Goguryeo occupied the northern Korean Peninsula and parts of Manchuria. With Goguryeo's fall in 668, Silla uni...

Book of Han (Book of Former Han)

Han Shu (汉书, the Book of Han), or, Qian Han Shu (前汉书, Book of Former Han) by Ban Gu of the Eastern Han Dynasty, records the history of the Western Han Dynasty. It is the first dynastic history written in biographical style. In total it contains twelve ji (biographic sketches of emperors), eight biao (records of historical events), ten zhi (the development records of a certain subject, such a...