LIU SONG, CHEN, SUI, TANG AND LIAO
 |
| with thanks for the map to this website |
Note: The green, or for some titles red, text is the original Wikipedia timeline, frequently corrected by me for grammar and spelling errors. The blue text is my gradual development of the timeline into a fuller history and commentary (with follow-up notes in amber). Because I am interested in the positives of human history, and can only find negatives in most of the politics, I have reduced most of the political history from green to grey, so it is still there, and you are obviously free to follow the links and find out more, but I honestly cannot imagine why you would want to.
THE LIU
SONG DYNASTY [overview here]
[
421 CE: The Western Liang prince Li Xun committed suicide during the
siege of his capital Dunhuang by Northern Liang
431 CE: Summer: The Western Qin prince Qifu Mumo was executed along
with his nobility by the Xia emperor Helian Ding
Helian Ding was captured by the khan of Tuyuhun
436 CE: 4 June: The Northern Yan emperor Feng Hong fled the capital
Helong in the face of an attack by Northern Wei
460 CE: Juqu Anzhou, the prince of Northern Liang in exile in
Gaochang, was killed with his family by the Rouran Khaganate
475 CE: Bodhidharma arrived in
China [and taught the Chinese Kung Fu! for his bio click here]; his
sculpture here
477 CE: The oldest known painted depiction of a horse collar was made in the Mogao Caves [is it still there? is there a photo? UNESCO page here; this goes with the stirrups at 322 CE]
479 CE: The Liu Song emperor Emperor Shun of Liu Song was deposed by
his general Gao of Southern Qi
485 CE: The Northern Wei emperor
Emperor Xiaowen of Northern Wei introduced the equal-field system [does
that constitute socialism or communism? see under 9 CE and 12 CE where Wang already tried to do this]
496 CE: Change of Xianbei names
to Han names: Xianbei names were converted to Han names in Northern Wei [why?
was this an aspect of conquest in the way that all place-names in Eireland were
converted to Anglo-Saxon names after the Cromwellian conquest? click here for who they were]
502 CE: The young Southern Qi emperor Emperor He of Southern Qi was deposed by his general Wu of Liang
523 CE: The Songyue Pagoda was
built [here,
and/or here]
534 CE: The Northern Wei emperor Emperor Xiaowu of Northern Wei fled
the capital Luoyang to Chang'an at the advance of his general Gao Huan
Gao Huan appointed
Emperor Xiaojing of Eastern Wei emperor of Eastern Wei with his
capital at Ye [need to make a list of all the cities that served as capitals,
even the tribal ones]
535-536 CE: Extreme weather events.
Snow reportedly falls in August, which caused harvests to be delayed (yes,
but then three harvests came at once, so it really wasn’t newsworthy; oh, and
for the historical information, it is 68 degrees Fahrenheit and slightly cloudy as I write
this, rain not forecast – though the forecasts are usually wrong]
543 CE: The Yupian was completed [what
was it? yet another dictionary. click here]
550 CE: 5 June: The Eastern Wei general Emperor Wenxuan of Northern Qi
deposed Xiaojing and established the state of Northern Qi
557 CE: The Liang general Emperor Wu of Chen deposed the emperor
Emperor Jing of Liang, establishing the Chen dynasty
*
THE CHEN DYNASTY [brief overview with the map on the right, here]
557 CE: 15 February: The Western Wei general Yuwen Hu deposed Emperor Gong of Western Wei in favour of his own cousin Emperor Xiaomin of Northern Zhou, establishing the successor state of Northern Zhou [for a parallel situation, worth looking at my page on early Eirish history, before the Anglo-Saxon conquest, when there was never really a single land, but five counties...]
577 CE: 4 February: The Northern Qi emperor Gao Heng and his father, the
Taishang Huang Gao Wei, were executed with their family by Northern Zhou
581 CE: The Northern Zhou emperor Jing was forced to abdicate in
favour of his regent Emperor Wen of Sui, initiating the Sui dynasty
*
THE SUI DYNASTY [“581-618 was a relatively
short-lived house that reunited China after long centuries of division known in
history as the period of the Southern and Northern Dynasties” – more here, map on the right here]
582 CE: Compilation began of the
Jingdian Shiwen [try here,
better here, and
with a pdf to download]
589 CE: Yan Zhitui first referred to toilet paper [someone should write a PhD thesis: “From Yan Zhitui to the Sun newspaper: a history of toilet paper”: bio here]
10 February: Sui forces captured the Chen capital Jiankang and its emperor Chen Shubao
598 CE: Goguryeo–Sui War: A Sui army of some three hundred thousand,
led by the general Yang Liang, invaded Goguryeo
601 CE: The Qieyun was published [what was it? still one more dictionary; you can tell how sophisticatedly brain-oriented a civilisation is becoming from stuff like this: imagine what would happen to a Christian scholar who suggested there should be a dictionary of Hebrew and Aramaic for Latin and Aenglish readers, so they could understand the Bible and the teachings of Jesus better: they'd lock him up (click here) - as to this one: who wrote it? pdf explaining it in detail here; general website here]
602 CE: Sui-Former Lý War: Sui conquered and annexed the Early Lý dynasty [that’s a very different way of writing a name; is it a different language, or alphabet, or just the phonetics? or is it the name itself that’s different? or maybe the new dynasty does Chinese differently? and naming it "Former Lý takes us back to a question I asked earlier, and still have not been able to answer for certain, when there was a land called Later Zhao, at 319 CE, and a reference to Later Yan in 384 CE]
604 CE: 13 August: Wen died. He was succeeded by his son Yang as emperor of Sui
605 CE: The imperial examination
was first used as the sole criterion for appointing local officials in Sui [what
did it involve? history here, details here]
The Zhaozhou Bridge was completed [where?
here] and don't you just love this as an exemplary of the difference between western and oriental culture: to the Americans it is "an open-spandrel arch bridge"; to the Chinese it is "a crescent moon rising from the clouds" or a "rainbow in the sky": simile versus metaphor!
607 CE: Japanese missions to Sui China: The Wa emissary Ono no Imoko arrived in Sui [missions for what? culture, sporting ties, town-twinning, peace-arbitration? or maybe they sent Madame Butterfly to insist on open trade?]
609 CE: The Grand Canal was completed [I thought that was in Venice; Bei-Jing apparently, click here]
And anyway the name is wrong: see this site, which will explain that it is a "balance clepsydra," and with
"standard positions for the steelyard balance".
Apparently it looked like this ä
Yang ordered his commanderies to submit maps and gazetteers to
the central government
611 CE: The Four Gates Pagoda was completed [20 miles southeast of Jinan city at the foot of Qinglong Mountain: click here]
612 CE: Battle of Salsu: Goguryeo routed a Sui invasion force at the
Chongchon River, inflicting some three hundred thousand casualties
616 CE: Sa'd ibn Abi Waqqas first visited China (who was he? one of the first followers of the Prophet; this is way before ibn-Battuta or Benjamin of Tudela though it probably needs a mention there: click here for a full history of Islam in China)
617 CE: 18 December: The rebel Emperor Gaozu of Tang, in control of the Sui capital Chang'an, declared Yang Taishang Huang and his grandson Yang You emperor
*
THE TANG DYNASTY [full account here; the adjacent map and more background here]: but all agree that this was about to be the Golden Age of Chinese Art and Literature
618 CE: 12 June: Transition from Sui to Tang: Gaozu deposed Yang You
621 CE: 28 May: Battle of Hulao: Tang forces defeated and captured the
warlord Dou Jiande at Hulao Pass
624 CE: Ouyang Xun, the great calligrapher [557-641, also named Ouyang Xinben, was a native of today's Changshaof in Middle China's Hunan Province: click here and here] completed the Yiwen Leiju [click here for the encyclopedia, here for some of Ouyang’s calligraphics]
"The Yiwen Leiju (Chinese: 藝文類聚; pinyin: Yìwén Lèijù; literally 'Collection of Literature Arranged by Categories') is a Chinese encyclopedia completed during the Tang Dynasty by the calligrapher Ouyang Xun. It was divided into 47 sections and many subsections. It covered all subjects and contains many quotations from older works, many long lost. It also cites its sources. It was completed by Ouyang Xun in 624. Other contributors were Linghu Defen and Chen Shuda."
626 CE: 2 July: Xuanwu Gate Incident: Gaozu's son Emperor Taizong of
Tang assassinated his brothers Li Yuanji and the crown prince Li Jiancheng
4 September: Gaozu retired. Taizong succeeded him
630 CE: Tang campaign against the
Eastern Turks: Tang forces captured the khan of the Eastern Turkic Khaganate in
the Yin Mountains
635 CE: The first Christian
missionaries arrived in China
Nestorian monks from Anatolia and the Sasanian Empire built the Daqin Pagoda [click here]
Alopen wrote the Jesus Sutras [click here]
Emperor Taizong's campaign against Tuyuhun: The Tuyuhun khan Murong Fuyun, in flight from Tang forces and with much of his army destroyed, was killed by his officers
The Book of Liang [Liangshu] was published [what was it? history: click here]
636 CE: The Xumi Pagoda was
completed [where? as part of, or perhaps converted into, the Kaiyuan monastery:
click here. Also
for a general page about pagodas try here]
The Book of Chen, Book of Northern Qi, Book of Zhou, and Book of Sui were compiled [what are they? more history books, responses to the Book of Liang, above, recounting and probably glorifying all the hideous monstrosities already listed above, each one offering a different kingdom's view of why it was all good, heroic and moral, and the others responsible for all the crime and economic failure: and therefore I shall overlook this listing]
638 CE: Tibetan attack on Songzhou: Tibetan forces raided the city of Songzhou, in modern Songpan County
640 CE: The Protectorate General
to Pacify the West was established [didn’t work though,
did it! click here and here]
Tang campaign against Karakhoja: Tang defeated and annexed Gaochang
641 CE: Emperor Taizong's campaign against Xueyantuo: Taizong sent
his general Li Shiji to support the restoration of the Eastern Turkic Khaganate
under Qilibi Khan against Xueyantuo
643 CE: Taizong commissioned Yan Liben to paint portraits of his officials at Lingyan Pavilion [some here, but better here, and better still here: I have montaged several of the latter's, below]
644 CE: Tang campaigns against Karasahr: A Tang army captured
Karasahr and installed a friendly king
645 CE: 20 July: First campaign in the Goguryeo–Tang War: Tang forces
dispersed a Goguryeo army which had arrived in defense of Ansi City
646 CE: Bianji compiled the Great Tang Records on the Western Regions [still more history I presume; the need of SuperIds to control posterity while simultaneously providing their people with a false identity that enables them to feel good about themselves, and therefore support the ruling power: Ezra, Geoffrey of Monmouth, the Reagan Ftn...] but click here, to see if I may be wrong on this occasion; and then here, because I am, entirely, completely and totally wrong, pure speculation without any evidence, which is why we historians have to verify, have to verify, have to verify...
"Tang Xiyu Records (大唐西域記 Da Tang Xiyu Ji) is a historical record written during the Tang dynasty on Xuanzang's travels to the Xiyu, India, Central Asia, and beyond. It was compiled in 646 by Xuanzang and later edited by his disciple Bianji. The text is one of the primary sources of inspiration for Wu Cheng'en's novel Journey to the West."
Almost a thousand years later, translated as "Monkey" in the English version; and actually I knew that, but wanted to make my point anyway. I knew, because I wrote a piece about Wu Cheng'en many years ago, for my Private Collection: click here
647 CE: The Protectorate General to Pacify the North was established
648 CE: The Book of Jin was compiled [what was it? my comment at 646 CE appears to apply here: click here]
Tang campaigns against
Karasahr: Tang forces captured the king of Karasahr
649 CE: The four arts were first
written of as skills required of a Chinese scholar-official [what
did they consist of? you must assume literacy and numeracy were taken for
granted, so guess before you click here; the
answer in Chinese is qin, qi, shu and hua]
19 January: Tang campaign against Kucha: Kucha surrendered to Tang forces
10 July: Taizong died
15 July: Taizong's son Gaozong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
657 CE: Gaozong commissioned the compilation of a materia medica [what did it involve? was it scientifically original? click here, and especially here for what it says about the culture of the period: in the Christian world at this time all sickness was a consequence of sin, and curable by taking two tablets twice daily after meals: the tablets were the ones on which Moses had written the Ten Commandments]
Battle of Irtysh River: Tang forces ambushed and largely destroyed the army of the Western Turkic Khaganate at the Irtysh River
659 CE: The History of the
Southern Dynasties and the History of the Northern Dynasties were completed
663 CE: Battle of Baekgang: The allied navies of Silla and the Tang
dynasty defeated a combined Baekje restorationist and Japanese force in the
lower reaches of the Geum River
666 CE: The Chinese Buddhist
monks Zhiyu and Zhiyou crafted a mechanical south-pointing chariot for the
Japanese emperor Emperor Tenji [we had that
south-pointing chariot earlier: 255 CE; was this one different in any way?]
668 CE: The Protectorate General
to Pacify the East was established [why did it take 21
years? see 647 CE]
683 CE: 27 December: Gaozong died
684 CE: The Qianling Mausoleum
was completed [what is it? where is it? who is in it?
click here]
Luo Binwang died [who was he? a poet: bio here, “Chanting Cicadas” here]
690 CE: 16 October: Gaozong's wife Wu Zetian became emperor of the Tang dynasty. She was the only generally recognized female emperor in Chinese history [but at least one has been named previously (no, that turned out to be a man who the Wikipedia writer mis-spelled as a Marquess: see 125 CE), and surely she was Empress, not Emperor?]
692 CE: Tang forces reconquered the Four Garrisons of Anxi from
Tibet
700CE: The Dunhuang map was created [what was it? – this may well lead to an essay in TheBibleNet, to go alongside the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls: click here and here for the star maps, here for the earth-map]
704 CE: The Giant Wild Goose
Pagoda was rebuilt [where? when was it first built? southern Xi'an,
Shaanxi, click here and
then see 709 CE, below]
705CE: 22 February: Wu Zetian was forced to abdicate the Tang throne in favour of her son Zhongzong
23 February: Zhongzong became emperor of Tang
709 CE: The Small Wild Goose Pagoda was completed [Google tells me that “The Small Wild Goose Pagoda is located next to the Big Wild Goose Pagoda. It is 55 years younger than its “sister”. Its architecture follows the one of the Big Wild Goose Pagoda, but 21m shorter. Each of its 13 tiers is connected by a spiral stair with the entrances from north and south” - but it can’t be 55, if the dates are 704 and 709. Yes it can: the keyword is “completed”. Click here and here, and it turns out that Jorge-Luis Borges was absolutely right when he commented that everything in the human world has a purpose, even chasing wild geese]
710 CE: Liu Zhiji compiled the
Shitong [what was it? why, the endorsement of the comment I made under
646 CE and the reason for his banishment for daring to say so: click here; and
then here for
the text in Chinese (no, sadly I can't read it either), or here for a
full account]
[and I do like its definition: “Historiography is the study of the
history and methodology of history as a discipline. Briefly, it is the history
of history. When you study historiography, you are not studying the past
directly. Instead, you are studying the changing interpretations of past events
through historians' eyes.” Sounds like an excellent blurb for this Book of
Days]
Shangguan Wan'er died [who was she? China's First Female Prime Minister “She served under Empress Wu Zetian and Emperor Zhongzhong as a stateswoman who conducted important military and civil business. After Wu's death she was also taken in as Zhongzhong's Consort...She was taken into the palace as a slave girl after her father and grandfather were executed after trying to get rid of Wu. Shangguan eventually became Wu's aide after Wu noticed how brilliant Shangguan was. Shangguan was also an accomplished poet and some of her works have survived.”] click here for her bio, here for the tomb, and here for her poems
3 July: Zhongzong died after being poisoned, probably by his wife Empress Wei
8 July: Zhongzong's son Shang became emperor of Tang, with Wei acting as regent
25 July: A coup led by Gaozong's daughter Princess Taiping and grandson Xuanzong of Tang killed Wei and deposed Shang in favour of his uncle, Gaozong's son Ruizong
The Pear Garden was established - "Emperor Xuanzong (712-755) founded the first known opera troupe and musical academy in China called Liyuan (or The Pear Garden), which is why operatic performers are called 'Disciples of the Pear Garden'" [click here for that quote, and also more on the Peony Pavillion, for which see 1598 CE]. And then still more on the opera and the troupes, as well as the picture on the left, here
713 CE: The Kaiyuan Za Bao was first published [what was it? possibly the world’s first magazine: click here and here: the latter is more about the silk than the magazine, though it provides this important datum: "In the 8th century, the first Chinese official newspaper and also the world’s first magazine was written on silk. Kaiyuan Za Bao, or Kaiyuan Chao Bao, Bulletin of the Court, was addressed to imperial officials, recounting political and domestic news to the provinces. Hand printed on silk, this gazette appeared between 713 and 734 AD."]
715 CE: First encounter between
the Tang dynasty and the Umayyad Arabs. Tang dynasty defeats the Arab
occupation force in Fergana Valley, reinstalls Ikhshid on the throne [who was the Caliph that led this? I
presume it was still al-Walīd (born 668? reigned 705-715, throne in Damascus; the
sixth caliph, best known for the mosques constructed during his reign; though
the date might make it the first act of his successor Sulayman, who spent his
less than two year reign doing little more than warring in the Byzantine empire:
click here for
him.]
[I also need to point out the use of the term "occupation force" in the Wikipedia timeline; in the "Nashrat al-Mahkama" (that's "Bulletin of the Court" in Arabic) issued by the Caliph (I am assuming there was such a bulletin), it would have been decribed either as a "liberation force", or as "the vanguard of the Moslem crusaders bringing al-Lah to the polytheists"]
717 CE: Arabs attack Transoxiana hoping to capture the Tang
dynasty's Four Garrisons of Anxi district, but are routed in the Battle of Aksu
725 CE: Yi Xing invented a water-powered armillary sphere [this website explains it, but attributes it to Su Song, who lived 300 years later and made a water-tower clock, for which see 610 CE and here]. However, this site, and my entry for "125 CE: Zhang invented the first hydraulic-powered armillary sphere", have another armillary sphere from the time of the Han dynasty, centuries earlier, so what was special about Yi Xing’s?]
729 CE: Gautama Siddha completed the compilation of the Treatise on Astrology of the Kaiyuan Era [is that how the Chinese say his name? or just yet another textual error? No, he was genuine: “Gautama Siddha was born sometime after 650 AD. He was the head of the Bureau of Astronomy from 712 to 718 AD. Between 712 and 713 AD he was in charge of repairing the armillary sphere. In 718 AD he translated the Navagraha Siddhānta - Jiuzhili into Chinese.” from this website]. As to the name, from the same link: "Gautama Siddha belonged to one of the three prominent Indian families of expert-astronomers settled in China during Tang dynasty (618-906 AD)", so presumably a Buddhist and the family-name was an equivalent of Khan or Cohen, the designation of priesthood
740 CE: Wu Daozi died [also known as Daoxuan and Wu Tao Tzu, a Chinese painter of the Tang dynasty: click here]. Also Meng Haoran died [the Wordsworth of his day: click here] Are we beginning to get the impression of a seriously advanced and sophistticated Chinese culture, replete with art and poetry and calligraphy at the arts end, but serious astronomy and engineering and medicine at the scientific. 100 years and more ahead of Haroun al-Rashid. About 1000 ahead of Christian Europe which at this time had the Venerable Bede and Alcuin but not much more
 |
| Wu Daozi "Eighty-seven Immortals" |
744 CE: Du Fu and Li Bai first met [who are they? this from OxfordAcademic’s website “Li Bai and Du Fu (hereinafter Li and Du, respectively), honored as Shixian 诗仙 (Poet-Immortal) and Shisheng 诗圣 (Poet-Sage), are two of the most accomplished poets in Chinese literary history. They lived in the Tang dynasty (618–907), a golden age of Chinese poetry.”] Click here for a full account that doesn’t require logging in (and then see Ouyang Xiu in 1060 CE)
751 CE: July: Battle of Talas: After the defection of their Karluk mercenaries, a Tang force was defeated by a vastly superior Abbasid-Tibetan allied army on the Talas River, probably near modern Talas
755 CE: 16 December: An Lushan Rebellion: The Tang jiedushi [A jiedushi (節度使) was a regional military
governor of China: click here] An Lushan declared himself emperor of
Yan
Zhang Xuan died [is this the same Zhang as in my 725 CE entry? No, he was Zhang Heng, and 500 years earlier! For this Zhang's bio click here; for the Silk Ladies, below, click here]
756 CE: Spring: Battle of Yongqiu: Yan forces retreated from their siege of a Tang fortress in Yongqiu, in modern Kaifeng
12 August: The Tang army declared Xuanzong's son Emperor Suzong of Tang emperor at Lingwu
10 September: Xuanzong recognized Suzong as emperor
757 CE: Battle of Suiyang: Yan forces finally conquered Suiyang, in
modern Suiyang District, after a siege that cost the lives of some sixty
thousand Yan soldiers and thirty thousand Tang civilians were lost to
starvation and cannibalism [but no doubt some future
despot will issue their descendants a formal pardon: see my note at 320 CE]
758 CE: Arab and Persian pirates looted and burned the Tang seaport
of Guangzhou
759 CE: Wang Wei died [who was
he? ciick here; but
then click here, and here, and here, and
why not here as
well, because each will tell you something different: that he was the greatest
artist of his day, no poet, no creative genius... or is that simply a
definition of the Court Official? [I strongly suspect this will end up as an essay in my Private Collection though, there already is some Chinese and Japanese poetry there]
760 CE: Lu Yu composed The Classic of Tea [need more detail? make a cuppa first, then click here]
Yangzhou massacre: Arab and Persian merchants are killed by Chinese rebels
762 CE: 16 May: Suzong died of a heart attack
18 May: Suzong's son Daizong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
Du Huan wrote the Jingxingji [I need to make a list of all these Chinese travellers who went west, and include them in the 3 Travellers book, but also give them a page of their own in The Book of Days: click here and here for this one, and a massive pdf here]
763 CE: An Lushan Rebellion: The Yan emperor Shi Chaoyi committed suicide in flight from Tang forces
779 CE: 23 May: Daizong died
12 June: Daizong's son Dezong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
781 CE: The Nestorian Stele was composed [how do you “compose” a stele? Click here for the tortoise pedestal, which is the best thing about it; here for the Xtian version and the basis for another essay that I shall leave it to someone else to write: depictions of Jesus around the world, making him look like he's one of you so that you will believe in him: European blonde-and-blue-eyed Jesuses aplenty: I have a piece in my travel essays about the Geronimo version in Bogota: now this one. Has anyone ever painted or sculpted him as he would have looked: decidedly Semitic, a cross between Yassir Arafat and Gamul Abdul Nassir, but Jewish?]
783 CE: Han Gan died [who was he? the Banksy of his day, though he is mostly remembered now for his horses: click here]
785 CE: The Tang official Jia Dan began work on a map of Tang and its former colonies [click here]
794 CE: Prince Li Gao ordered the construction of the first Chinese paddle-wheel ships [click here, or here for the picture]
801 CE: Du You completed the Tongdian [which is what? and who was he? click here and here for this crucial quote: “This chapter discusses how the full emergence of the centralized, aristocratic state in the seventh century brought about an official historiography that was part of the bureaucracy of that state. Beginning in the Tang, each dynastic court maintained an office of historiography. Over time, a regularized process evolved that, in theory and often in reality, turned the daily production of court bureaucratic documents into an official history of the dynasty. Although this process was ongoing throughout the dynasty, the final, standard ‘dynastic history’ was usually completed after the dynasty's demise by its successor state. Indeed, the very concept of a series of dynastic histories that, taken together, would present an official history of successive, legitimate Chinese states, dates from the eleventh century.” Which rather endorses the quote at 710 CE, and validates my comments at 636 CE and 646 CE, and especially at 659 CE]
805 CE: 25 February: Dezong died
28 February: Dezong's son Shunzong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
31 August: Shunzong abdicated in favour of his son Xianzong
806 CE: Xianzong launched the first of a series of military
campaigns against the provinces
820 CE: 14 February: Xianzong died, possibly after being poisoned by one of
his eunuch officers
20 February: Xianzong's son Muzong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
824 CE: 25 February: Muzong died
29 February: Muzong's young son Jingzong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
Han Yu died [who was he? prose and poetry: click here]
827 CE: 9 January: Jingzong was assassinated
13 January: Jingzong's brother Wenzong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
831 CE: An Uyghur sued the son of
a Tang general for failure to repay a debt [why is
this in the annals? was the person important? or is it just that
wiki/historians are grateful for anything that their trawlnet happens to pick
up, even sea-weed, even the bones of dead seagulls, even plastic bottles? or is
this a caste-class matter: as if some indentured Bengali working on the East
India Docks had sued the son of Lord Nelson?]
840 CE: 10 February: Wenzong died
20 February: Wenzong's brother Wuzong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
843 CE: The Great Fire of
Chang’an. A large fire consumed four
thousand buildings in an eastern neighborhood of the Tang capital Chang'an [is
that like the Great Fire of London? Is there a Monument? apparently Chang’an
was the most densely populated city in the world at that time, and the nation‘s
capital – it’s called Xi-an today]
845 CE: The Great Anti-Buddhist Persecution: Wuzong abolished Buddhist monasteries as well as establishments of Zoroastrianism and Christianity, which were thought to be Buddhist heresies
846 CE: 22 April: Wuzong died [died? or did Angra Mainyu combine with Judas Iscariot to...?]
25 April: Wuzong's uncle, Xianzong's son Xuānzong, became emperor of
the Tang dynasty
Bai Juyi died [who was he? musician and poet; click here and here]
851 CE: The Arab merchant
Sulaiman al-Tajir visited Guangzhou [who was he? are we about to start the silk
trade? because that actually began in 851 BCE, or even earlier, as we know from
Hiram of Tyre in the Book of Samuel, and several other Bible quotes (click here) – it also sounds very much like the Xtians,
the Moslems and the Buddhists are competing very hard for both spiritual and
commercial inlfluence/power in China: I hope it doesn’t come to war because the
Buddhists will be slaughtered]. Buy his book here for a
mere 28,000 Euros. I also need to observe another wikipedia error: he was
Persian, or we might reluctantly say Iranian, and the Persians are not Arabs.
More on the man here (and another name for the ibn Battuta book) click here and here
852 CE: Du Mu died [who
was he? a poet – click here and here for
the man, here to buy
a translation of the poems, here, here and here to read some for free,
and that latter also has a list of links to other major Chinese poets]
853 CE: Duan Chengshi published the Miscellaneous Morsels from Youyang [who was he and what were they? click here; Youyang refers to Mount Xiao You, which according to legend, had a thousand volumes of books stored in the caves at the foot of the mountain, though I think it was mostly stuff for kids: click here.]
858 CE: A flood along the Grand Canal and on the North China Plain killed tens of thousands
859 CE: 7 September: Xuānzong died
13 September: Xuānzong's son Yizong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
863 CE: Duan Chengshi published a work describing the slave trade, ivory trade and ambergris trade in Bobali, probably modern Berbera [which is Somalia, Africa: click here] [same man as the Morsels, above: click here for this: and was he for it or against it?]
868 CE: 11 May: The Diamond
Sutra was printed [Mahayana Buddhism, original
text in Sanskrit, this one was a woodblock printing folio, which therefore
pre-empts the Gutenberg Press by fully 500 years: click here and here]
873 CE: 15 August: Yizong died
16 August: Yizong's son Xizong became emperor of the Tang dynasty
874 CE: Wang Xianzhi launched a rebellion against the Tang
government
879 CE: Guangzhou massacre: The rebel Huang Chao burned and looted
Guangzhou and killed as many as two hundred thousand foreigners, mainly Arabs
and Persians
884 CE: 13 July: Huang was murdered with his immediate family while in
flight from Tang forces
888 CE: 20 April: Xizong died. He was succeeded by his brother Zhaozong
of Tang
904 CE: 22 September: Zhaozong was killed on the orders of the warlord Zhu
Wen, then in control of the Tang capital Chang'an
26 September: Zhu Wen appointed Zhaozong's young son Ai as emperor
of the Tang dynasty
907 CE: 27 February: The Khitan chieftain Abaoji became emperor of the Liao
dynasty
12 May: Zhu Wen deposed Ai and declared himself emperor of Later
Liang. The princes Yang Wo and Wang Jian, who did not recognize Zhu Wen, became
de facto independent, as did their states Wu and Former Shu, respectively
Zhu Wen created Qian Liu the prince of Wuyue
Zhu Wen created Ma Yin, the jiedushi of the Wu'an Circuit, prince of Chu
909 CE: 27 April: Zhu Wen created Wang Shenzhi prince of Min
*
(aka Kitan or Khitan) –
click here
917 CE: The earliest Chinese reference to "Greek fire" appeared [where? as what? oh, it’s a
form of flamethrower; military equipment; not interested]
5 September: Liu Yan declared himself emperor of Southern Han
919 CE: The flamethrower was first described in China [what is the difference between
this and the "Greek fire", above? and why two years apart if they are the same thing?]
923 CE: 13 May: Prince Li Cunxu of Jin declared himself emperor of
Later Tang
18 November: The Later Liang emperor Zhu Youzhen was killed by one of his generals at the approach of Li Cunxu to his capital Daliang
924 CE: 14 April: Gao Jixing declared himself king of Jingnan
925 CE: 15 December: The Former Shu emperor Wang Zongyan surrendered to the
Later Tang army at his capital Chengdu
926 CE: 6 September: Abaoji died [apparently
she was the beloved pet cat of a rice farmer in the northern province of...no,
wrong Abaoji: this one was a leader of the nomadic Mongol-speaking Khitan
tribes who occupied the northern border of China: click here]
927 CE: 11 December: Abaoji's son Taizong of Liao became emperor of the
Liao dynasty
934 CE: 16 March: Meng Zhixiang, the Later Tang jiedushi of the
territory of the defunct Former Shu, declared himself emperor of Later Shu [what is a jiedushi? actually
we’ve had the word before; see 755 CE]
936 CE: 28 November: Taizong recognized the Shatuo Later Tang general Shi
Jingtang emperor of Later Jin in exchange for the promised cession of the
Sixteen Prefectures that formed a natural border around the North China Plain
937 CE: 11 January: The Later Tang emperor Li Congke burned himself to
death with his family and servants as the joint armies of Liao and Later Jin
approached his capital Luoyang
10 November: The Wu emperor Yang Pu was deposed by his general Li Bian,
who declared himself emperor of the Wu successor state of Southern Tang
945 CE: 2 October: Min was conquered and annexed by Southern Tang
947 CE: 11 January: The Later Jin emperor Shi Chonggui was deposed and his
territory annexed by the Liao dynasty [apparently
their land was Manchuria]
10 March: The Shatuo Liu Zhiyuan, a jiedushi of the defunct Later Jin,
declared himself emperor of Later Han
15 May: Taizong died
16 May: Taizong's nephew Shizong of Liao, whom he had raised, became
emperor of the Liao dynasty
950 CE: The earliest known
depiction of a fire lance and lobbed grenade appeared [where? how is this more
interesting than Greek fire? wasn't what the young David threw at Goliath a form of grenade?]
951 CE: 2 January: The Later Han emperor Liu Chengyou was killed by one
of his officers while attempting to escape the siege of the capital Ye by his
general Guo Wei
13 February: Guo Wei declared himself emperor of Later Zhou
7 October: Shizong was murdered by one of his officers
11 October: Shizong's cousin, Taizong's son Liao became emperor of the
Liao dynasty
Southern Tang conquered
and annexed Chu
Liu Zhiyuan's brother Liu
Chong declared himself declared himself emperor of Northern Han
960 CE: Gu Hongzhong painted the Night Revels of Han Xizai [this needs to be seen in its five sections so I’m hunting for a website that does that; otherwise here ... no found it, here; and a detail from it below]
3 February: Emperor Guo Zongxun of Later Zhou was overthrown by his
general Emperor Taizu of Song
4 February: Taizu became emperor of the Song dynasty
Taizu was presented with gunpowder-impregnated fire arrows [is
this the first mention of gunpowder? or did the Greek and grenade etc in the
above decades already infer that? click here]
The Hundred Family Surnames was composed [what
was this? click here]
No comments:
Post a Comment