2. But first – the Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368)
• The leaders of the Yuan Dynasty in China were not ethnically Chinese,
who were they?
• Unified the Northern and Southern kingdoms, adopted Chinese dress and
culture, but subjugated the Han and other Chinese ethnicities under other
Turkic peoples.
• The first state to use paper money
• Made Beijing the capital
• Reigned during the black death (which started in this area and spread to
Europe)
• Suffered due to natural disaster (floods) and famine/drought
• In 1351, a religious sect (The Red Turbans) began a revolt against the foreign
rulers
• One of the leaders of The Red Turbans (Zhu Yuanzhang) approached the
capital of Beijing and took the city as the Yuan leaders fled north
3. The Ming Dynasty 1368-1644
• Zhu Yuanzhang takes Beijing and declares himself the emperor of the
Ming (“Bright”) Dynasty, he moves the capital to Nanjing and goes by
the name Taizu, the Hongwu Emperor
• Instituted a census and accounting of all land and people, and reduced
government taxes
• Became increasingly paranoid, and (like in Russia) began killing anyone he
suspected of disloyalty
• Had 26 sons before his death, chose his favorite son as his successor
• But that son died before Taizu, so his grandson inherited the throne
• It did not make his other sons happy that their nephew took the throne, and
one of them, Chengzu (the Yongle Emperor) took control in 1402 by force
• The Yongle Emperor moved the capital back to Beijing
• Rebuilt the city in concentric squares, and built the Forbidden City in the
center
4. The Yongle Emperor’s projects
The Forbidden City, the Imperial Residence at the
center of the Imperial City (government buildings
and housing)
5. The Yongle Emperor’s projects
Statue of the Yongle Emperor in
Beijing
The Yongle Emperor revamped, and expanded the
Grand Canal (built by the Yuan), this better helped
internal trade and supplied the capital with grain
Admiral Zheng He
6. Ming Dynasty (cont.)
• Developed an extensive eunuch bureaucracy, directly loyal to the emperor
(70,000 at its height)
• Civil service with exams for placement, based on Confucian/Neo-Confucian
teachings (in theory open to anyone, but still dominated by the wealthy)
• Revamped, rebuilt, and
manned the Great Wall
• Most of what still stands today
was built/rebuilt by the Ming
• Constantly feared Mongol
resurgence
• Mongols did raid, but when
trade relations normalized, they
didn’t need to any longer
• Mongols develop closer ties
with Tibet
7. Ming Dynasty (cont.)
• Life in the Ming Dynasty
• Printing and publishing was widespread
• Novels, short stories, and plays were written and spread throughout, increasingly in the
vernacular language
• Tobacco from the Americas begins influencing Ming culture (pipe smoking)
• Sugar cane, cotton, and indigo all come to China and are farmed in this period
• Trees were planted for lumber production and fruit farming (over a billion)
• Towns and cities grew alongside a growing population
• Decline (1590-1644)
• China helped defend Korea against Japanese invasion (cost a lot of money)
• Another period of floods/disasters/droughts
• The Little Ice Age devastated this area of the world, too
• Suffered deflation when silver (from the New World) stopped coming in
• Was the last Han (ethnic Chinese) Dynasty
8. The Qing Dynasty
• The Manchu people
inhabited the area to the
north of Korea under the
Yuan and Ming dynasties
many had been brought
under Mongol/Chinese
rule
• By 1644 they had begun to
take land away from the
waning Ming Dynasty and
eventually took Beijing
• Later expanded to take
Mongolia, Uighur areas,
Tibet, and Southern China
9. Japan 1400-1800
• The Ashikaga Shogunate (1338-1573)
• Government capital in Kyoto
• Centered on Muromachi Street, came to be known as Muromachi
Culture
• Heavily influenced by Zen Buddhism which highlighted imperfection and
simplicity
• Beginning in 1476 civil war erupted over control of the shogunate,
with most actual power reverting to local Daimyo (warlords)
• The Tokugawa Shogunate (1603-1867)
• In the chaos of civil war, Oda Nobunaga, a samurai, began unifying
other landless samurai and daimyo (1559-1582)
• After an attempted coup, he committed suicide and his closest general
took over, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and unified almost all of Japan by
1590, ruling until 1598, leaving his son as heir under the control of
regents
• The strongest regent, Tokugawa Ieyasu, took control for himself,
moved the capital to Edo (Tokyo) and began the Edo period, lasting
until 1867
Both Japan
and Korea
used coins
minted in
China
10. Japan 1400-1800
• The Tokugawa Shogunate (1603-1867)
• Similar to how Louis XIV created Versailles as a way to control the nobles of
France, the Tokugawa Shogun required all nobles to live in Edo (Tokyo) every
other year, and for their wives and children to live there permanently
• Samurai served in a number of functions, not just military, but were all unpaid,
not allowed to own land, and dependent on their lords
• After Spanish conquest of the Philippines, Japan stopped trade with
Portugal/Spain, and limited European trade, but still maintained trade with
Korea and China
• Many cities began to develop in this period (Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Osaka, Nagoya,
etc.)
• Plays become important culturally, both Kabuki and Puppet, Geisha culture
begins to develop
• Women become less important in court life, but in middle and lower classes
were on much more equal footing with men, divorce was even commonplace
11. Final Thoughts
• What popular green drink
today became much more
culturally significant during
the Ashikaga and Tokugawa
Shogunates?
• Next Week:
• Review and Exam #1
