After the collapse of the Han dynasty in the third century CE,
China divided along a north-south line. Mark Lewis traces the
changes that both underlay and resulted from this split in a period
that saw the geographic redefinition of China, more engagement with
the outside world, significant changes to family life, developments
in the literary and social arenas, and the introduction of new
religions.
The Yangzi River valley arose as the rice-producing center of
the country. Literature moved beyond the court and capital to
depict local culture, and newly emerging social spaces included the
garden, temple, salon, and country villa. The growth of
self-defined genteel families expanded the notion of the elite,
moving it away from the traditional great Han families identified
mostly by material wealth. Trailing the rebel movements that
toppled the Han, the new faiths of Daoism and Buddhism altered
every aspect of life, including the state, kinship structures, and
the economy.
By the time China was reunited by the Sui dynasty in 589 ce,
the elite had been drawn into the state order, and imperial power
had assumed a more transcendent nature. The Chinese were
incorporated into a new world system in which they exchanged goods
and ideas with states that shared a common Buddhist religion. The
centuries between the Han and the Tang thus had a profound and
permanent impact on the Chinese world.
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