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4000 BC
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2500 BC
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2100 BC
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Xia Dynasty was the first dynasty of China. Xia dynasty can be dated back to 1600 B.C. The region of Xia dynasty was near Henan and Shaanxi province. Thesere two provinces are civilization cradle of Chinese. Henan and Shaanxi are rich in historical sites and cultural sites of China. Chinese culture and history are originated from these areas
There were 13 generations and 16 kings in Xia dynasty. The capital area of Xia dynasty was located in the western part of Henan and the northern part of Shanxi. It was said that the regime of the Xia has been stoped at some time. It was Shaokang to rebuild Xia dynasty. After that, Xia declined continuously and was replaced by Shang dynasty finishing its 400 years of existing.
Because there were no words to record the events of Xia dynasty, most of the information of Xia was learned from some ancient record, including the remains of the king, officials and the prison conditions. In recent years, many huge palace, mausoleum and bronze have been unearthed. They also reflected from another side the politics, economic, cultural and life. This help people learn more about the first and special age in China's history. As the first prehistoric country in China mainland, Xia dynasty is an important dinasty with great history research. It's rich culture plays a important role in the culture of China and the whole history of China.
2100 BC
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Zi Qi became the ruler & Xia Dynasty was found.
2000 bc
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The long period of the Bronze Age in China, which began around 2000 B.C., saw the growth and maturity of a civilization that would be sustained in its essential aspects for another 2,000 years. In the early stages of this development, the process of urbanization went hand in hand with the establishment of a social order. In China, as in other societies, the mechanism that generated social cohesion, and at a later stage statecraft, was ritualization. As most of the paraphernalia for early rituals were made in bronze and as rituals carried such an important social function, it is perhaps possible to read into the forms and decorations of these objects some of the central concerns of the societies (at least the upper sectors of the societies) that produced them.
1970 BC
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1966 BC
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1850 BC
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1839 BC
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1784 BC
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1760 BC
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1700 BC
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1600 bc
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The long period of the Bronze Age in China, which began around 2000 B.C., saw the growth and maturity of a civilization that would be sustained in its essential aspects for another 2,000 years. In the early stages of this development, the process of urbanization went hand in hand with the establishment of a social order. In China, as in other societies, the mechanism that generated social cohesion, and at a later stage statecraft, was ritualization. As most of the paraphernalia for early rituals were made in bronze and as rituals carried such an important social function, it is perhaps possible to read into the forms and decorations of these objects some of the central concerns of the societies (at least the upper sectors of the societies) that produced them.
1600 BC
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Shang Tang defeated Xia.
1400 BC
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Pan Geng, moved the capital to Yin.
1368 BC
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1300 BC
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China was the first to discover this fine thread !
1275 BC
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1100 BC
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1100 BC
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1046 bc
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They defeated shang dynasty. Emporess Wu came to power. A piece of historical art was made.
1000 BC
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1000 BC
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960 BC
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841 BC
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771 BC
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Quan Rong, a barbarian tribe, sacked Hao Jin, the capital of Western Zhou. Western Zhou dynasty ended
770 BC
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750 BC
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700 BC
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700 BC
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618 BC
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The Tang is widely regarded as the height of imperial China.Economically, territorially, and socially, the Tang was firing on all cylinders. China reached its largest size up to this point in history, reaching Korea, Vietnam and much of Central Asia. Trade flourished by land and sea.Some of China’s finest arts and literature also came out of the Tang. The Tang also holds the unique distinction of having China’s only female to hold the title of emperor (Empress, Wu), who historians regard as brilliant but ruthless
594 BC
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581 BC
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Often compared to the Qin, since they were both short-lived with iron-fisted rules who forced huge chunks of the population into massive project. The Sui dynasty sets up their capital at Chang'an, which has been preferred capital for last 16 centuries by almost a dozon dynasties up to this point. One persistent problem with Chang'an: it's poorly located, requiring food and suppiles to be transported far from the South. An ambitious project rivaling the Great Wall in magnitude, the Great Canal provided an unbroken inland transport between the Yellow and Yangzi rivers. At it's peak, it was over 2,000km long, linking five rivers systems and extended from Beijing and Hangzhou. Many parts are still in use today. Although the canal network would increase trade, wealth, and integration, it sowed the seeds of the Sui’s downfall.Apparently they didn’t learn from the Qin. Some 5.5 million were conscripted to work on it.Another million or so were sent to restore the Great Wall.Not surprisingly, the people were NOT happy.
551 BC
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475 BC
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420 BC
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Ancient China comes into a disunity country which lasted for 169 years. China was divided to the northern part and the southern part in Dong Jin dynasty. The northern was apposed by the southern for a long time. There were four dynasties in the south, Song, Qi, Liang, Chen. They replaced each other from the begin to the end. The dynasties in the south sharing one capital in Jiang Kang( Nan Jing in today) besides Jiang Ling, which is the capital city of Liang Yuan Di.
420 BC
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China was reunited under the rule of Han dynasty.. Liu Bang becomes emperor and Han state loosens opposition to Confucianism. Dong Zhongshu revises Confucianism as state scholar, with new emphasis on yin/yang cosmology.
403 BC
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382 BC
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359 BC
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299 BC
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King Zhao Wu Ling of Zhao State carried out military reform by adopting steppe cavalry warfare tactics of the “hu” people in the so-called “Hu Fu Qi She”
First adoption of cavalry in Chinese army
278 BC
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Qin State sacked Chu’s capital, Ying (郢). Qu Yuan (屈原), the patriotic official of Chu state, committed suicide by drowning himself at Luo river
265 BC
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The Jin Dynasty was founded in what would become northern Manchuria by the Jurchen tribal chieftan Wányán Āgǔdǎ in 1115. In 1125, it successfully annihilated the Liao Dynasty which had held sway over northern China, including Manchuria and part of the Mongol region for several centuries. Also at this time, the Jin made overtures to the Korean kingdom of Goryeo, which Emperor Yejong refused.
On January 9, 1127, Jin forces ransacked Kaifeng, capital of the Northern Song Dynasty, capturing both Emperor Qinzong, and his father, Emperor Huizong, who had abdicated in panic in the face of Jin forces. Following the fall of Kaifeng, Song forces under the leadership of the succeeding Southern Song Dynasty continued to fight for over a decade with Jin forces, eventually signing the Treaty of Shaoxing in 1141, calling for the cessation of all Song land north of the Huai River to the Jin and the execution of Song General Yue Fei in return for peace. [edit] The migration south Jade ornament with flower design, Jin Dynasty, Shanghai Museum. After taking over Northern China, the Jin Dynasty became increasingly Sinicized. About three million people, half of them Jurchens, migrated south into northern China over two decades, and this minority governed about thirty million people. The Jurchens were given land grants and organized society into 1,000 households and 100 household. Many married Hans, although the ban on Jurchen nobles marrying Hans was not lifted until 1191.
250 BC
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240 bc
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The Chinese started planting crops in rows sometime in the 6th century BC. This technique allows the crops to grow faster and stronger. It facilitates more efficient planting, watering, weeding and harvesting. There is also documentation that they realized that as the wind travels over rows of plants there is less damage. This obvious development was not instituted in the western world for another 2200 years. Master Lu wrote in the “Spring and Autumn Annals”: ‘If the crops are grown in rows they will mature rapidly because they will not interfere with each other’s growth. The horizontal rows must be well drawn, the vertical rows made with skill, for if the lines are straight the wind will pass gently through.’
221 bc
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Feudalism abolished on reccomendation of Li Si, who becomes prime minister. The great book proscription was written. First emperor dies.
221 BC
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221 bc
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The building of the Great Wall of China, one of the legendary seven wonders of the world, began in 221 BC in an effort to keep Mongol invaders out. In the 600's AD, the Sui Emperor Yang Di began a huge project of repairing the ancient wall. The costs of rebuilding the wall were enormous. The construction involved the forced labor of hundreds of thousands of people, many of whom died from the harsh working conditions and were buried in the wall itself. Costs were also increased by the frequent robbery of supply wagons. 15,000 defense towers and forts were constructed along the walls. It remains the largest structure ever built anywhere in the world, and is the only human made work on earth visible from orbit.
221 BC
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220 bc
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Period of disunity and instability following the fall of the Han; Buddhism introduced to China
220 bc
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Cao Wei, Shu Han, Dong Wu
206 BC
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202 bc
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By the first century BC the Chinese had developed the technology for deep drilling boreholes. Some of these reached depths of 4800 feet (about 1.5 km). They used technology that would be easily recognizable to a modern engineer and lay person alike. Derricks would rise as much as 180 feet above the borehole. They stacked rocks with center holes (tube or doughnut shaped) from the surface to the deep stone layer as a guide for their drills (similar to today’s guide tubes). With hemp ropes and bamboo cables reaching deep into the ground, they employed cast iron drills to reach the natural gas they used as a fuel to evaporate water from brine to produce salt. The natural gas was carried via bamboo pipes to where it was needed. There is also some evidence that the gas was used for light. While I could not find exactly when deep drilling was first used by the Europeans, I did not find any evidence prior to the early industrial revolution
202 bc
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One of the major developments of the ancient Chinese agriculture was the use of the iron moldboard plows. Though probably first developed in the 4th century BC and promoted by the central government, they were popular and common by the Han Dynasty. (So I am using the more conservative date). A major invention was the adjustable strut which, by altering the distance of the blade and the beam, could precisely set the depth of the plow. This technology was not instituted into England and Holland until the 17th century, sparking an abundance of food which some experts say was a necessary prerequisite for the industrial revolution.
200 BC
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140 BC
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The Silk Road was used to travel throughout China. It was used for commerce.
105 BC
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100 BC
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100 ad
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Chinese naval developments occurred far earlier than similar western technology. The first recorded use of rudder technology in the West was in 1180. Chinese pottery models of sophisticated slung axial rudders (enabling the rudder to be lifted in shallow waters) dating from the 1st century have been found. Early rudder technology (c 100 AD) also included the easier to use balanced rudder (where part of the blade was in front of the steering post), first adopted by England in 1843 – some 1700 years later. In another naval development, fenestrated rudders were common on Chinese ships by the 13th century which were not introduced to the west until 1901. Fenestration is the adding of holes to the rudder where it does not affect the steering, yet make the rudder easy to turn. This innovation finally enabled European torpedo boats to use their rudders while traveling at high speed (about 30 knots).
105 AD
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Paper was invented in China.
264 AD
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Tea leaves were first used to make tea starting in 264 AD. Tea was brought to the West during the 1600s.
549 AD
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The kite was also invented in China. It wasn't until 1589 that the west got ahold of the kite.
581 ad
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Porcelain is a very specific kind of ceramic produced by the extreme temperatures of a kiln. The materials fuse and form a glass and mineral compound known for its strength, translucence and beauty. Invented during the Sui Dynasty (but possibly earlier) and perfected during the Tang Dynasty (618-906), most notably by Tao-Yue (c. 608 – c. 676), Chinese porcelain was highly prized throughout the world. The porcelain of Tao-Yue used a ‘white clay’ that was found on the edge of the Yangtze River, where he lived. By the time of the Sung Dynasty (960-1279) the art of porcelain had reached its peak. In 1708 the German Physicist Tschirnhausen invented European porcelain, thus ending the Chinese monopoly. The picture above is a teabowl with black glaze and leaf pattern from the Southern Sung Dynasty (1127-1279).
801
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The Chinese invented paper money in the 9th century AD. Its original name was 'flying money' because it was so light it could blow out of one's hand. As exchange certificates used by merchants, paper money was quickly adopted by the government for forwarding tax payments. In 1024, the Song government took over the printing of paper money and used it as a medium of exchange backed by deposited "cash" (a Chinese term for metal coins). The first Muslim bankers used a checking system by the 1200's, followed by Italian bankers in the 1400's. Paper money is still the most common form of currency around the world.
850 ad
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Ancient alchemists in China spent centuries trying to discover an elixir of life that would render the user immortal. One important ingredient in many of the failed elixirs was saltpeter, also known as potassium nitrate.
During the Tang Dynasty, around 850 A.D., an enterprising alchemist (whose name has been lost to history) mixed 75 parts saltpeter with 15 parts charcoal and 10 parts sulfur. This mixture had no discernable life-lengthening properties, but it did explode with a flash and a bang when exposed to an open flame. According to a text from that era, "smoke and flames result, so that [the alchemists'] hands and faces have been burnt, and even the whole house where they were working burned down."
907 AD
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he Liao Dynasty was an empire in East Asia that ruled over the regions of Manchuria, Mongolia, and parts of northern China proper. t was founded by the Yelü clan (耶律 Yēlǜ, Khitan: Jalut, Jælut) of the Khitan people in the same year as Tang Dynasty collapsed (907), even though its first ruler, Yelü Abaoji, did not declare an era name until 916. Although it was originally known as the Empire of the Khitan, the Emperor Yelü Ruan officially adopted the name "Liao". The name "Liao" was dropped in 983, but readopted in 1066. Another name for China in English, Cathay, is derived from the name Khitan.
960 ad
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Many ways of living and acting that Westerners now see as most thoroughly “Chinese,” or even characteristically East Asian, did not appear before the Song.
The Chinese, we know, are rice eaters and tea drinkers; but most Chinese in the Tang and before at wheat and millet and drank wine, in that respect looking perhaps more “Western” than “Eastern”; rice and tea became dominant food and drink in the Song.
Chinese women, we may know, bound their feet; but they did not bind them until the Song.
Even the “Chinese” roof with its turned-up corners is by origin a Song Chinese roof
China’s population, we know, is huge, and tends to “explode”; its first explosion occurred in the Song.
1279 AD
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The Yuan dynasty was collapsed in the rivalry among the Mongo imperial heirs, natural disasters, and numerous peasants uprising. With its capital first at Nanjing which means Southern Capital) and later at Beijing (or Northern Capital), the Ming reached the zenith of power during the first quarter of the fifteenth century.
1368 ad
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Re-establishment of rule by Han ruling house; Capitals: Nanjing and Beijing
1644 AD
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Qing Dynasty, with its captial Beijing, was the last ruling of China from 1644 to 1912. Although the Manchus were not Han Chinese and were strongly resisted, especially in the south, they had assimilated a great deal of Chinese culture before conquering China Proper. Realizing that to dominate the empire they would have to do things the Chinese way, the Manchus retained many institutions of Ming and earlier Chinese derivation.
1900
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The Eight-Power Allied Forces (aggressive troops sent by Britain, the United States, Germany, France, Tsarist Russia, Japan, Italy and Austria in 1900, to suppress the anti-imperialist Yihetuan Movement) invaded China and forced the Qing court to sign the International Protocol of 1901 in the ninth lunar month of 1901 with 11 countries, which turned China into a semi-colonial and -feudalist society.
1911
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The Revolution of 1911, the Chinese bourgeois democratic revolution led by Dr. Sun Yat-sen, led to the founding of the Republic of China on January 1, 1912, and the fall of the Qing Dynasty on February 12, 1912, ending the 2,000-year-old feudalist society in China.
1912
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Capitals: Beijing, Wuhan, Nanjing.
1921
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The founding of the Communist Party of China (CPC) on July 1, 1921, opened a new chapter in the Chinese revolution.
1926
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The Northern Expeditionary War in 1926 dealt a heavy blow to the reactionary rule of the Northern Warlords and the imperialist powers in China.
1927
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The Nanchang Uprising, which occurred on August 1, 1927, marked the beginning of the CPC-led armed revolution against the Kuomintang regime.
1935
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The CPC Central Committee Political Bureau held an enlarged meeting in Zunyi, southwestern Guizhou Province, from January 15- 17, 1935. The meeting elected Mao Zedong a member of the Political Bureau Standing Committee and established Mao's leading position in both the Red Army and the Party Central Committee. The meeting saved the Party, the Red Army and the Chinese Revolution at a critical juncture.
1937
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The War of Resistance Against Japan (1937-45) was the first time that China won a complete victory in the fight against foreign invasion in its modern history
1945
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The CPC held its Seventh National Congress in 1945, which made Mao Zedong Thought the guiding theory for the Party.
1949
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Capital: Beijing.
This includes China today.
1950
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1952
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1956
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1964
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1967
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1970
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