Tang/History

After almost four centuries of disunity, the Tang dynasty (618 to 907) saw the resurgence of Confucian ideals after centuries of realpolitik and civil war which characterised the period between the Wei and the Sui dynasties, and the introduction of Buddhism into China by way of India. This period is considered the high point in Chinese cultural development when printing spread literature and art to vast numbers of the population. However, through steady decline in military power the dynasty ended with fragmentation of the empire for the next half century until the Song dynasty reunited the country in 960.

China in the Middle Ages
While China's influence on its neighbors was great and its inventions and culture inspired others throughout the Middle Ages, China was also attacked by many barbarians. First to successfully invade China were the many Turkic tribes who from the end of the Jin would colonise northern China, followed by the Mongols who first managed to successfully invade China and then again by the Manchurians (a tribe from Northern China) four centuries later. However, time and again China inevitably assimilated the invaders, eventually overthrowing them.

Even during these times, however, China never stopped expanding and developing her culture — and sometimes, the invaders themselves also enriched both Chinese civil and military culture, thanks to their connections to the West and beyond - if they themselves did not become fully assimilated as mentioned before. It was during the Middle Ages that China truly began making her mark felt politically. Although the Han were the first to put China on the global stage, it was the Tang who first made China's influence truly felt all across Asia.

"Gold and Jade Fill the Halls": The Zenith
The Tang ruled China for three centuries, from A.D. 618 to 907. This is known as the golden age of art and poetry. New territories were acquired, including Manchuria, Tibet, and northern Vietnam. This territory drew wealth from surrounding states through a ritualistic kowtow, such that diplomats from surrounding states were expected to pay homage to the emperor by touching their forehead repeatedly to the ground beneath the emperor. The Tang dynasty accumulated vast wealth for China during this period.

Many roads were built at that time, along with inns, post offices and stables for the horses of travelers. The roads were used for trade and communication in a manner similar to the Persian Royal Road and the roads of the Roman empire. Foreign music, religion (Buddhism, primarily), clothes and even languages became popular in China at this time. Importantly, everything in the big cities of China at this time was somewhat state-controlled; curfews were imposed on the citizens, trade was conducted in government approved situations, using government-approved measures and weights.

Government offices were filled with the Confucian civil service system that valued education. The three requirements were to learn the writings of Confucius, study the Chinese classics, and pass the civil service exam. Land was distributed based on fertility of the soil and the needs of the farmers, but eventually powerful families and Buddhist monasteries gained control of much of the land.

The success of the Tang can be seen from how far Tang influence spread. China was one of the most globalised areas in the world (apart from Byzantium in the Middle East and Andalus in Europe). There were Tang commanderies in present-day North Korea and Central Asia; Manchuria was brought under the sway of the emperor at Chang'an; Vietnam too was subjugated for a while. It was this time that Chinese culture developed via multicultural cross-pollination. Turkic and Middle Eastern influences would be absorbed into Chinese culture and customs, even as Chinese goods such as the blue porcelain favoured by African and Muslim rulers flowed west and south. One example of this was just how China exerted great cultural influence on Northern Asia. The popular wrestling style of xiangpu developed into Japanese sumo, while Chinese musical instruments of the period became the Japanese shamisen and koto, and Chinese classics and interpretations of the classics of the Tang became the official standards in Japanese society, as well as the kingdom of Goryeo. Similarly, the Chinese forms of Buddhism developing in this period - notably, chan, or, in Japanese, Zen, which came from a fusion of Daoist ideas and Buddhist ones in court-sponsored debates - became the more popular forms of Buddhism in Japan. "Karate", as well, originally used the Chinese characters for "Tang hand" (it was changed in the 1930s to mean "empty hand", both "Tang" and "empty" being homophones in modern Japanese in that context), implying not necessarily that Karate developed from Tang-era Chinese martial arts, but that it developed from Chinese martial arts at a later stage and that the word "Tang" was simply a common term when referring to China as a whole.

The Rulers
The most powerful ruler during the Tang dynasty was Tang Taichung (A.D. 627-649). He gained power by killing his opponents, but then ruled in a benevolent or fair manner, keeping taxes low.

An Lushan's Rebellion
One of the most prominent figures of the Tang dynasty was a general known as An Lushan - his name indicates that he was a Soghdian ("An" indicates his place of origin), and that his given name in Soghdia was "Rokhan", the male form of Roxanna, the name of Alexander the Great's wife. An Lushan is famous for the An Shi Rebellion; the most favoured concubine of the Tang Xuanzong Emperor, Yang Guifei, was in love with Lushan, and betrayed the Emperor by recommending Lushan to high military command. Lushan's troops entered Chang'an in 755 and forced the emperor on the run into Sichuan province with Guifei in tow. She was executed by Xuanzong's troops in 756 whilst on the run, as she was blamed for the rebellion. On reclaiming control of the Chinese state, Xuanzong wrote of his sorrow at her death in a famous poem; and the Tang state never regained the supremacy it had once had. Culturally, the late Tang was quite inferior to the high Tang period, although the fashions for foreign clothes and music remained the same. The curfews put in place were violated frequently, the weights and measures became forged and improperly regulated. Tax registers, an important method of adjusting tax so as to remain fair, but also to keep track of the population, were no longer kept up to date, as they had been every few years in the high Tang. The breakdown of the Tang took quite a while longer - from 756 to 907, government control was extremely lax, rebellions were reasonably frequent, and tax returns became less and less. The Li family was only nominally in charge.

Ultimately the peasants rebelled over the misuse of funds by the government. In A.D. 907 the last Tang emperor gave up. Regional rule by warlords then prevailed over China for more than 50 years, in a period known as the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms. Unification by the first Song emperor came in 960 AD.