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History  > The Sui Dynasty, the Tang Dynasty

  Reunification Under the Sui Dynasty (581-618). The division of the north and south, although largely following natural geographic divisions, was never stable, and there were repeated efforts at reunification. In the 570s and 580s, the long period of division was brought to an end. The successors of the Xianbei Northern Wei (whose dynastic names changed from Western Wei, to Northern Zhou, to Sui because of palace coups) took the area around modern-day Sichuan in 553, the northeast in 577, and the south in 589.

  The founder of the Sui dynasty was Yang Jian, also known as Wendi or Emperor Wen. He was ethnically Chinese but had married into a non-Chinese military family. In 581 Wendi deposed the child emperor of the Northern Zhou dynasty and secured his position by killing 59 princes of the Zhou royal house. He then sought to legitimate his position by presenting himself as a Buddhist cakravartin king, a monarch who uses force to defend the Buddhist faith.
  In 604 Wendi was succeeded by his son, Yang Guang. The new emperor, known as Yangdi or Emperor Yang, launched several ambitious projects, including construction of the section of the Grand Canal from the city of Yangzhou on the Yangtze River to Luoyang, near the Huang He. The canal made it much easier to transport the rich agricultural products of the Yangtze Valley to the north, and it also fostered increased north-south communication. The Sui strengthened the power of the central government by curtailing the power of local officials to appoint their own subordinates. Some civil service posts were filled through a new method called the Examination System, which was designed to be free of favoritism by allowing all men, regardless of status, to compete in tests on the Confucian classics.
  Yangdi pursued an aggressive foreign policy. He reasserted imperial Chinese control over what is now northern Vietnam, which the Han dynasty had conquered in the 2nd century BC, and undertook campaigns against Central Asian tribes to the north and west. Yangdi also twice launched campaigns against the Korean state of Koguryo (Goguryeo), although both ended disastrously for his armies.
  The Sui dynasty lasted only two reigns. Yangdis ambitious projects and military campaigns led to exhaustion and unrest, and in 617 a Sui general, Li Yuan, captured the capital. After the emperors death in 618, Li Yuan declared himself emperor of a new dynasty, the Tang.

  The Tang Dynasty (618-907). The Tang dynasty was one of the high periods of traditional Chinese civilization. During the period of Tang rule, but especially during the dynastys first hundred years, China was the cultural center of East Asia. Merchants, pilgrims, missionaries, and students traveled to Changan, the Tang capital, in numbers never seen before or after in imperial China. Under the Tang, China enjoyed a more cosmopolitan culture than in any other period before the 20th century.
  The first two Tang monarchsLi Yuan, who ruled as Emperor Gaozu, and his son Li Shimin, who ruled as Emperor Taizongwere able rulers who strengthened the state. The empire was divided into about 300 prefectures under direct central control, with none large enough to challenge Tang rule. Tax revenue was based on the so-called equal-field system of allotting equal amounts of land to all adult males, a system originally begun by the Northern Wei. Similarly, like the armies of the northern dynasties, the early Tang armies were composed of volunteer farmer-soldiers. In return for allotments of farmland, men served in rotation in armies at the capital or on the frontiers. Using this army, as well as auxiliary troops composed of Turks, Tanguts, Khitans, and other non-Chinese, and led by their own chiefs, the Tang rulers extended their control beyond China proper.
  In 630 the Tang turned against their former allies the Turks, gained territory from them, and won for Tang emperor Taizong the additional title of Great Khan. Over the next several decades, the Tang continued their westward expansion. By allying with Central Asian city-states, the Tang gained dominance over the Tarim Pendi (Tarim Basin) and eventually made their influence felt as far west as present-day Afghanistan. The early Tang also succeeded in extending their influence to the northeast and allying with the Korean kingdom of Silla.
  The third Tang ruler, Emperor Gaozong (646-683), was sickly and a weak monarch, and his consort Empress Wu soon dominated the court. She took full charge when Gaozong suffered a stroke in 660. Gaozong died in 683, but Empress Wu maintained power during the reigns of her two sons. Then, in 690, she proclaimed herself emperor of a new dynasty, the Zhou. To gain support, she circulated the Great Cloud Sutra, which predicted the imminent reincarnation of the Buddha Maitreya as a female monarch, under whom the entire world would be free of illness, worry, and disaster. Empress Wu is the only woman in Chinese history who took the title of monarch. Later historians judged her as an evil usurper, and she was without question a forceful ruler. She moved quickly to eliminate rivals and opponents, suppressed rebellions of Tang princes, and maintained an aggressive foreign policy. Her hold on the government was so strong that she was not deposed until 705, when she was more than 80 years old and ailing.
  Empress Wus death was followed by a power struggle. In 712 her grandson Xuanzong became emperor. Xuanzong presided over a dazzling court and patronized some of the greatest poets and painters in Chinese history. In Chinese folklore, Xuanzongs passions led to his downfall, for in his older years he became infatuated with his favorite concubine Yang Guifei and neglected his duties. Yang was allowed to place her friends and relatives in important positions in the government. One of her favorites was the able general An Lushan, who after getting into a quarrel with Yangs brother over control of the government, rebelled in 755. Xuanzong had to flee the capital, and the troops who accompanied the emperor forced him to have Yang Guifei executed.
  More lay behind this crisis than imperial foolishness. The Tang had outgrown the institutions of the northern dynasties. In many areas of the empire, men received only a fraction of the land they were promised because population growth had exceeded the supply of land. However, each allotment holder still had to pay the standard per capita tax, so many peasants fled their allotments, which reduced government income. Moreover, as problems of defending the empire grew, especially warfare with the Turks and Tibetans, the militia system proved inadequate. The government had to establish military-run provinces along the borders and entrust defense to professional armies and non-Chinese auxiliary troops. It was because An Lushan commanded one of these armies that he was able to launch an attack on the central government.
  The rebellion of An Lushan was devastating to the Tang. Peace was restored only by calling on the Uygurs, a Turkic people allied with the Tang, who reclaimed the capital from the rebels but then looted it. After the rebellion was finally suppressed in 763, the central government never regained control of the military provinces on the frontiers. Abandoning the equal-field system and instituting taxes based on actual land holdings helped restore the governments finances, but many military governors came to treat their provinces as hereditary kingdoms and withheld tax returns from the central government.
  Tang Culture. The Tang created a vibrant, outward-looking culture. The main capital of Changan, and the secondary capital of Luoyang, became great metropolises. Changan and its suburbs grew to house more than 2 million inhabitants. Knowledge of the outside world was stimulated by the presence of envoys, merchants, and travelers who came from Central Asian tributary states and from Chinas neighboring states such as Japan, Korea, and Tibet. Because of the presence of many foreign merchants, a number of religions were practiced in Tang China, including Nestorian Christianity (see Nestorian Church), Manichaeism, Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and Islam, although none spread among the Chinese population the way Buddhism had a few centuries earlier. Foreign fashions in hair and clothing were often copied, and foreign pastimes, such as the sport of polo, found followings among wealthy Tang subjects. Musical instruments and melodies from India, Iran, and Central Asia brought about a major transformation in Chinese music.
  The Tang was the great age of Chinese poetry. Skill in composing poetry was tested in the civil service examinations, and educated men were expected to compose poems at social gatherings. Among the most famous of the great poets of this age were Wang Wei, Li Bo, Du Fu, and Bo Juyi. In the late Tang period, courtesans in the entertainment quarters helped popularize a new verse form called ci by singing lyrics written by famous poets and composing lyrics themselves.
  In Tang times, Buddhism fully penetrated Chinese daily life. Buddhist monasteries ran schools for children. In remote areas, monasteries provided lodging for travelers, and in towns they offered places for educated people to gather for social occasions. Monasteries held huge tracts of land worked by serfs, which gave them the financial resources to establish enterprises like lumber mills and oil presses. Buddhist tales became widely known, and Buddhist festivals, like the summer festival for feeding hungry ghosts (known by its Sanskrit name, Ullambana), became among the most popular holidays. Another important feature of the period was the growth of Chinese schools of Buddhism. Adherents of Pure Land Buddhism, for example, honored the Buddha Amitabha in order to be reborn in his paradise, the Pure Land. Pure Land Buddhism became the dominant form of Buddhism in China. Among the educated elite, Chan (known in Japan as Zen) gained popularity. Chan teachings rejected the authority of the sutra writings as the words of the Buddha and claimed the superiority of mind-to-mind transmission of Buddhist truth. According to Chan Buddhism, enlightenment could be achieved suddenly through insight into ones own true nature.
  During the late Tang dynasty, when Chinas international position weakened and the court faced financial difficulties, opposition to Buddhism as a foreign religion emerged among influential intellectuals. In 845 the Tang emperor began a full-scale persecution of the Buddhist establishment. More than 4,600 monasteries and 40,000 temples and shrines were destroyed, and more than 260,000 Buddhist monks and nuns were forced to return to secular life. Although the suppression was lifted a few years later, the monastic establishment never fully recovered.
  In the mid-9th century the Tang government began losing control of the country. Like the Han before it, the Tang was finally destroyed by ambitious generals who suppressed peasant rebellions and then fought one another for control. A brief period of disunion known as the Five Dynasties period followed. From 907 to 959, five short-lived military regimes quickly succeeded one another in North China, and most of the rest of the former Tang domain was split into ten independent states.

 
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