Tuesday September 14, 2010

CHINA

• China had dynasties from 221 BC- 1911.
• Gobi means “desert”.
• The “barbarians” of the North could ride horses and shoot a bow and arrow, horseback.
• The barbarians were Huns, Turks, Mongols and Manchu’s.
• In the 1200’s, Khublai Khan attempted to conquer Japan. He failed. This was the only time anyone has tried to invade Japan.
• Chinese culture goes into Japan through Korea.
• Korea is the “diving board” from which ideas bounce off of.

China- The outlaying area & China “Proper”

• China is one of the great river valley civilizations.
• The most isolated of the 4 river civilizations. The 4 were: Egypt, Mesopotamia, Indus (India and Pakistan) and China.
• China is one of the oldest civilizations in the world.
• Civilizations have 3 defining characteristics.

1. Farming.

• The source of food is established, fixed.
• Animals are domesticated.
• The beginning of Agriculture is signaled by: Planting and the domestication of animals; usually dogs, pigs and sheep.
• People can discover agriculture independently.
• Agricultural societies have much greater populations.
• People don't make big pots if they have to carry them around. The discovery of pots usually signifies remnants of villages and towns.
• Roads that go away from urban concentrations also signify traces of villages.

1. Buildings.

• Buildings mean stability.

1. Writing systems

• The himalayas are the division between India and China.
• China was never threatened by the south, only the North.
• Historically, 90% of the populations lived in China “proper”, that is, mainland China. This does not include Taiwan etc..
• In 1644, the Manchus’s (Manchuria) conquered China. They (the Manchu’s) established China’s last dynasty.
• North of Gobi, there is outer Mongolia which is now independent today.
• In the 10th and 11th centuries, Uighurs were converted into the muslim faith from Buddhism and they remain muslim today. A high concentration of uighurs live in Xinjiang today.
• Tibet is a part of China today and was also a part of it historically. This is true for Taiwan as well.
• In 1684, Taiwan was incorporated into China.
• In 1895, China gives Taiwan away to Japan after losing a war with it. After the II World War, Japan relinquishes its ties to Taiwan.

North and South

• Are divided according to where and into which river the water drains.
• Xinling mountains make the divide as well.
• Yellow river is yellow because of the loess soil that is at the bottom.
• Loess is very fertile. However, this river is China’s blessing and curse- it used to flood constantly. Now a days, China would be lucky if the yellow river even flowed.
• A job of the government was to to ensure that the yellow river did not flood.
• The water of the yellow river is now used up by industry and agriculture and doesn't even run into the sea anymore. It will, unfortunately, dry up eventually.
• Water in China is rare and is a scarce resource.
• Historically, going up the Yangtze was possible and it IS navigable.
• Wheat and millet were dominant crops that grew in Northern China but rice grew better in Southern China.
• An acre of rice could feed up to 4x the amount of people that dry crops can.
• The people in the South say that Northerners are dumb and simple.
• Northerners say that the southerners are lower than they are because they can’t fight or ride horses.
• Both the North and South agree on one thing- the women are, apparently, better looking in the South.

Thursday September 16, 2010

• Sima Qian was a famous chinese historian that wrote during the Han dynasty in the 2nd century.
• He was not interested in creation myths. He preferred writing about the origins of chinese culture.
• He wrote about cultural heroes (often referred to, as the 3 Rulers and 5 Emperors).
• These were a group of people who enabled chinese people to live distinctly from animals.
• Cang Jie -> accredited with inventing writing. Writing, simply just appears.
• Fu xi and Nu Wa -> Originators of the chinese people.
• Shan Nong -> Accredited with the basic discovery of agriculture. However, it could have been a women who discovered agriculture as well.
• Xue Ren -> discovered fire.
• Huang Di -> Also accredited with being the originator of the chinese people. Also responsible for the inventing of the bow and arrow.
• Huang Di’s wife was discovered sericulture- the art of weaving silk.
• Yao was the paradigm for good rulers in China. He comes up with a good calendar, and it was the solar calendar consisting of 366 days. It was, a very accurate and similar to the calendar that we use today. The lunar calendar, however, was the one that the chinese people adopted, and it consisted of only 360 days.
• Yao grows old and does not want to give his throne to his son. He looks for the best man and runs a simple test. He gives his ministers 2 wives each. Yao concludes that if you can handle 2 wives, you can rule a country. Xuen, wins.
• Regarding his 2 wives, Xuen restrains himself and does little.
• Xuen was also the earliest inventor of the government bureaucratic system.
• Xuen comes up with a proper system of punishment as well. The order, was as follows:

1. Fines
2. Beatings (physical harm)
3. Banishment
4. Death.

• This system of punishment remains until 1912, when the last dynasty collapses.
• During Xuen’s reign, the yellow river floods and he looks for a solution among his ministers. He hires Yu.
• Yu successfully channels the flood waters into ditches and is selected as Xuen’s successor.
• With Yu, the 1st dynasty is established. It is called Xia (Hsia).
• Yu rules for a time and his son succeeds him.
• There are many reasons as to why. Why his son?
• Dynasty: Where a line is passed from father to son or sometimes, brother to brother. This is what is known as China’s dynastic system.

• For all confucian scholars, the above history is what they talked about. They did not enjoy discussing creation theories. To them, those questions are unanswerable.
• Pan Gu, is said to be China’s first man. This myth however, is probably NOT native chinese- Maybe, Vietnamese.

Archaeology

• Archaeology, looks for hard evidence.
• There are 4 main questions that archaeologists attempt to answer.

1. When and where is the first appearance of human beings in China?
2. When and where is the first emergence of farming in China?P:

• Where? North Chinap; Plane. All of the loess soil make it easy to farm. When? About 7000 years ago, 5000 B.C. Evidence? Pottery.

Question 3 answered-

• Where? North China. When? 2200= 3000 B.C, or so. This date, more than any other, is subject to revision. Evidence? Domestication of pigs & dogs. More evidence? Architecture and pots.

Question 4 answered-

• In Anyang, a farmer plowing his land found the foundation of a house. Inside the house, he had broken a pot that held cattle shoulder blades with writing carved into them.
• The farmer assumes many things. He concludes that he has found Dragon bones. He comes up with this conclusion because he believes that only dragons would have writing on their bones.
• He has them ground into powder to drink as medicine.
• A scholar who happened to be in the neighborhood hears about these bones and he has a look at them. The news spreads and scholars all over the word have a look at these bones.
• In the pots, the bones have been arranged in chronological order.
• Engraved on the bones are the names of every single Shang dynasty ruler. This is considered a huge discovery because of the fact that Sima Qian had written about these rulers but scholars considered them a myth.

*** The Xong Nu people- Sima Qian goes into detail about these people and in the
1930’s, Japanese scholars find tombs exactly where Sima Qian had placed them.
Many of the things Sima Qian has written about were not considered credible, but
archaeological findings have proven otherwise.

• Graves are also discovered along with the pots. Findings have proven that the Shang used chariots for the purpose of war.
• Bronze vessels are found and many had traces of rice grains and alcohol.
• The fancier bronze pots have traces of human blood. Scholars believe that this could have a religious connotation associated with it.
• Pits full of dead people and skeletons have been unearthed. Many of these skeletons have been mangled horribly and may have possibly died traumatically.
• K.C Chang, a professor at Harvard, puts together a very complex model of Shang China together.
• He concludes that Shang China was very religious.
• These bones, better known as “Oracle bones” were used for divination.
• This form of divination required a yes or no answer.
• The Chinese people were polytheistic. Ti/ Di was on top- much like Zeus was for the ancient greeks. Below Di, there were nature spirits and then, ancestors, which were on the bottom. ORDER: TI/DI ---> NATURE SPIRITS ---> ANCESTORS
• Questions written on the oracle bones were mostly directed to the ancestors. This could be because the chinese people felt a connection to the ancestors- they were once human.

*** Oracle: A means or medium in which communication with the “other world” is made.

• China’s earliest writing is quite religious in nature.
• Human blood was the way to pay the ancestors for answers. They believed that if they gave blood to the ancestors, the ancestors would give them the answers they were looking for.
• The Shang dynasty believed whole heartedly in what they did.
• There were people living during that era (during the Shang dynasty) who couldn’t stand the Shang, but no one dared to overthrow it.
• 1100- 200 BC --> The Shang to Zhou transition period. Zhou overthrew the Shang.
• Some historical records tell of King Wen and King Wu.
• King Wen was loyal but could not stand the last few Shang rulers. They were, to him, immorally unacceptable.
• They (the Zhou), needed a concept to overthrow the Shang and wanted a sign (from Heaven), telling them that they could rebel. The 5 planets lined up and King Wen interpreted that, as a sign that even the universe was asking him to rebel.
• Mandate of Heaven- Mandate: Permission, command and approval. Heaven, is looking down towards earth, looking for a man worthy enough to rule the dynasty. Shang’s approval is removed and given to the leader of the Zhou.
• The overthrow of the Shang is a political and religious revolution.
• The Zhou put human sacrifice to an end, but, do not turn away Shang religion. They decide to let the Shang rulers live, so that the Shang rulers could help keep the religion alive.
• The Mandate of heaven theory, was a very political one. No dynasty has the right to rule forever. Dynasties are permitted to continue to rule until heaven takes that permission away.
• Removal of power is seen in natural disasters.
• In the 1970’s, communist leaders were worried about people continuing to believe in the mandate of Heaven.
• Each dynasty is conscious of the fact that the last dynasty blew it.
• Zhou lasts until 256 B.C
• The barbarians attack Zhou and the Zhou flee. The Zhou then proceed to set up their capital city somewhere else. This becomes known as western Zhou.
• Confucius idealizes western Zhou.
• King Wen, Wu and the duke of Zhou were his ideal leaders.
• Confucius dreams of them constantly and begins to worry when he DOESN’T dream of them.
• Confucius lived during very tumultuous times, when Chinese states began to start wars amongst themselves.
• 221 BC- Qin puts China together again. Qin, was the last of the warring states left standing.