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History of China History of China can reveal many interesting facts to learn. It is full of wars and political challenges, revolutions and tortures. Chinas civilization is one of the most ancient that has great cultural values. Empress Cixi was born on November 29, 1835. Her clan name was Yehonala. Like the emperor and most other prominent people in China at that time, Yehonala and her family were Manchu, and had little contact with Chinese people.
Cixi was a strong ruler who suppressed many rebellions, but she failed on the Boxer Rebellion. On November 15, 1908 she died at the age of 73 after enduring her downfall. Chu Shih-China was born about 1270 in China. Known as Zhu She-jie, in 1299 and 1303 he wrote two important texts.
The first Introduction to Mathematical Studies was intended for beginners. The second book Precious Mirror of the Four Elements marks the peak of Chinese mathematics and it was a long time before further progress was made in China. The book contains a transformation method for solving equations. 2 Yung-Le was a famous commander, who is well known for his maritime expeditions which revealed, at the beginning of the fifteenth century, the technical superiority of China and its lead over Spain and Portugal, whose ships did not undertake longs voyages on the high seas until the very end of the same century. Cheng Ho (1371 - 1435), or Zheng He, is arguably China's most famous navigator. Starting from the beginning of the 15 th Century, he traveled to the West seven times.
For 28 years, he traveled more than 50, 000 km and visited over 30 countries, including Singapore. Zheng he constructed many wooden ships, some of which are the largest in the histor. Three Feudatories grew out of the three chief economic areas of the Han Dynasty. The leaders of the kingdoms were tried to reunite the empire and were therefore at constant warfare. These three kingdoms were the Wei, in northern China, the Shu to the west, and the Wu in the east. The Three Kingdoms existed from 220 - 265 A.
D. Kang-hsi (16541722), was the second emperor of the Ch " ing dynasty of China (16611722). He extended Manchu control and promoted learning in the arts and sciences. K'ang-hsi conquered the feudatories of China (167381), took Taiwan (1683), established China's first diplomatic relations with Russia (1689). Black Flag Army was formed during the war resisting the invasion of developed countries.
Since 1873, Black Flag Army leaded by Liu Yongfu in Vietnam has fought with French Army for more than 10 years. He received the empire decree and is repatriated after Sino-French War. With a lot of relatives, thousands of officers and soldiers of Black Flag Army stayed in Vietnam as overseas Chinese, suffering continuously the Anti-French War with the local people. Yuan Shih-Kai (18591916), was the president of China (191216). From 1885 to 1894 he was the Chinese resident in Korea, then under Chinese suzerainty. In 1898 he supported the dowager empress Cixi against the reform movement of Emperor Kuang Hsu, and she rewarded him with the vice regency of Zhili (now Hebei).
As governor he suppressed the Boxer Uprising. In 1914 he dissolved the parliament and on January 1 st, 1916, he assumed the title of emperor. A rebellion in Yunnan forced him almost immediately to restore the Republic. Long March was started by the Red Army to oppose KMT, Nationalists Koumingtong led by Chiang Kaishek in October 19, 1935. Ogodej was the son of Genghis Khan who took control of the Mongols in 1227 when the great Khan died.
Under Ogodei, the Mongols completed the conquest of northern China in 1230. Manchus were a stock of the Jurched tribe who lived in Manchuria. In the twelfth century, they founded a dynasty in Manchuria called the Chin ("Gold") dynasty; this dynasty was the first major threat to China as the Chin challenged the supremacy of the Southern Sung. After conquering the whole China, they began the last imperial dynasty of China, the "Ch " ing" or "Pure" dynasty. It was to last over two hundred and fifty years. The last imperial dynasty of China was not Chinese.
Sun Yat-sen is considered to be a father of' modern China. He began his political career by attempting to organize reform groups of Chinese exiles in Hong Kong. After numerous exiles he returned to China and headed the revolutionary movement. In 1923 he finally emerged as president of China.
Little Red Book is the collection of Mao Zedong's quotes. During the Chinese Cultural Revolution, this red book was popularly used by the Little Red Guard, which created the cult of Mao... The Opium War, also called the Anglo-Chinese War, was the most humiliating defeat China ever suffered. By the 1830 's, the English had become the major drug-trafficking criminal organization in the world.
The most serious bone of contention involved treaty relations; because the British refused to submit to the emperor, there were no formal treaty relations between the two countries. The treaty imposed on the Chinese was weighted entirely to the British side. The key player in the prelude to war was a brilliant and highly moral official named Lin Tse-hsu. The Chinese, equally principled, demanded that all foreigners who were accused of committing crimes on Chinese soil were to be dealt with solely by Chinese officials.
In many ways, this was the real cause of the Opium War. In addition to enforcing the opium laws, Lin aggressively pursued foreign nationals accused of crimes. The English refused to back down from the opium trade. In response, Lin threatened to cut off all trade with England and expel all English from China.
Thus began the Opium War. As a result, there was a second conflict with England the Chinese, for their part, were angered at the wholesale export of Chinese nationals to America and the Caribbean to work at what was no better than slave labour. These conflicts came to a head in 1856 in a series of skirmishes that ended in 1860. A second set of treaties further humiliated and weakened the imperial government. The most ignominious of the provisions in these treaties was the complete legalization of opium and the humiliating provision that allowed for the free and unrestricted propagation of Christianity in all regions of China.
While the Chinese entered into conflict with Europe and European culture during the Opium War and after, a number of rebellions also convulsed it in mid-century. With rebellion in New (1853 - 1868), several Muslim rebellions in the southwest (1855 - 1873) and northwest (1862 - 1877), and, especially, the Taiping rebellion, the consequences for China during this period were devastating. The leader of the rebellion was Hung His-ch " us (1813 - 1864), who organized the anti-Manchu movement, based on religious sect, the God Worshippers. In the late 1840 's, Hung reorganized his movement into a military organization. It was founded on a radical economic reform program in which all wealth was equally distributed to all members of society. Taiping believers became fanatically disciplined and devoted soldiers.
After they occupied the considerable territory, they established Heavenly Kingdom of Peace, governed by Hung. Believing that the Heavenly King should rule only by his divine virtue and not by active engagement in politics, Hung grew steadily more unbalanced. After his withdrawal and poisoning himself, at a cost of nearly thirty million lives over a period of twenty years, the Heavenly Peace ended its existence. Two leading personality Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong contributed much in the development of events in China. Chiang Kai-shek, 18871975, Chinese Nationalist leader, like Mao Zedong, had dreams of national glory informed by the harsh realities of his youth. Both these persons acted while Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, that was designed to destroy the culture of pre-Communist China.
Mao Zedong led the Communist Party against Chiang Kai-shek who was a leader of Kuomintang. The last one tried to negotiate a truce with the Communists, but talks failed, and in 1949 year Chiang resumed leadership of the Kuomintang to oppose the Communists. He tried and failed to unify a divided nation. However, Chiang Kai-shek left behind a prosperous economy that grew into a genuine democracy. Mao was another kind of leader, whos power reached its apogee during this period when he created a cult of personality in terms of symbolism of a Little Red Book consisting of his quotations. The Mongols were great cultural patrons.
They conceived, for example, the idea of a new written language that could be used to transcribe a number of the languages within the Mongol domains. The Mongol rulers were also ardent patrons of the theater, and the Yuan Dynasty witnessed a golden age of Chinese theater. The theater in this period was full of spectacles, all of which appealed greatly to the Mongols. The art of painting also flourished under Mongol governing. The greatest painters received much support and encouragement from the Mongols and also court position from Khubilai Khan. Though Chinese culture was valued and supported in many ways, as discussed above, this support was not at the expense of the Mongols' own native culture.
That is, the Mongols did not abandon their own heritage, even as they adopted many of the values and political structures of the people they conquered and governed. The Boxer Rebellion was started by a society called the "Righteous and Harmonious Fists. " American, English, Japanese, Russian people were coming into China at that time. Businessmen came to make money; missionaries came to convert the Chinese to Christianity. The Chinese saw foreigners as a threat to their way of life.
The Boxers were mainly poor people who blamed foreigners for their problems. In 1900 year Boxers roved through northeast China, killing foreigners and destroying their property. They also attacked Chinese people who had become Christians. Empress Cixi, who was a ruler of China in that period was afraid of the situation when the foreigners can take over Peking and force her to retire.
At her orders, Chinese troops turned back the foreigners. In retaliation, the foreigners seized Chinese coastal forts. Furious, Empress Cixi ordered that all foreigners in China be put to death. These events were mainly the beginning of the Boxer Rebellion that played a major role in Empress Cixi's downfall. Bibliography Jonathan Spence's Search for Modern China [book on-line] (Norton, 1990) Accessed 9 th December 2002); available from web Internet. Jacques Gene, A History of Chinese Civilization, (New York, Cambridge University Press, 1982).
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