Tang Empire Research Articles

The problem of interpretation of war between the Tang Empire and Bohai in period 732 - 735

Bohai kingdom (698 -926) was the first state in the history of the Russian Far East. This article considers the most discussed period of the history of Bohai – its war against Chinese Empire Tang. This military conflict changed the political situation not only on the Korean Peninsula, but in East Asia in general. This war also influenced political contacts in the Far East significantly. On the basis of different materials and studies of events in the neighboring states and tribes, the authors have analyzed events leading up to the war, the military operations in the war itself and the results of this conflict.

The rebellion of Zhang Yuxian 張遇賢 (942–943)

AbstractThis paper is about a rebellion in southern China in the first half of the tenth century and its depiction in historical sources from the tenth to the seventeenth centuries. At the core of this study is Zhang Yuxian, the rebel leader, and his allegiance to a spirit. The latter suggested moving from Guangdong, the territory of the Southern Han empire (917–971), and the original area of the rebellion, to Jiangxi, the territory of the Southern Tang empire (937–976). The approach of the paper is twofold: first, it examines the historical setting and context; and second, through a close reading of some of the major features of the sources, such as the labelling of Zhang as ayaozei, the adoption of red clothes by the rebels, and so forth, the essay makes evident the close relationship and dependency between successive historical texts.

Visualizing Everyday Life in the City

Chang’an, the capital of the Tang Empire, was built from scratch in 582 CE. Its layout became the paradigm for many East Asian cities. Its residential wards have not been closely studied. Heng Chye Kiang’sVisualizing Everyday Life in the City: A Categorization System for Residential Wards in Tang Chang’an builds on the author’s research on the structure of a typical ward, its parcellation of residential land, residential density, the layout of houses, and a digital reconstruction of Yongning ward based on the theoretical framework the author established. The current study proposes that Chang’an’s wards be categorized according to their form, size, and content to construct a framework that offers a better understanding of their sociospatial complexity. After establishing a system of categorization, the author chose three representative wards—Taiping, Liquan, and Pingkang—for digital reconstruction, taking into account the road networks, estimated population density, size of residential plots, and type of residential compound, according to their owners’ social status, as found in historical records.

The problem of understanding of the political status of Bohai state

The problem of understanding of the political status of Bohai state. Bohai (698 – 926) was a medieval state in East Asia. Tang Empire in 713 recognized Bohai as dukedom and considered this state as kingdom from the 760s. However, status of Bohai was unclear. Although Bohai was a formal vassal of the Tang Empire, it followed its own independent path, not only in its internal policies, but also in its foreign relations. Furthermore, it regarded itself as an empire. The aim of this article is to consider and analyze specifics, changes of political status of the Bohai state and its influence to international relation and position of Bohai population in East Asia at medieval period.

Orality and the Transmission of Interpretations in Two Versions of Huang Kan'sLunyu Yishu: TeachingLunyufrom the National University of the Liang to the Periphery of the Tang Empire

This article explores the received version of Huang Kan's (488–545) Lunyu Yishu and a Tang manuscript fragment that stems from it, with a view to investigating residues of the oral transmission of glosses and interpretations of the Lunyu (the Analects). The discussion is based on close readings of passages that display remnants of the oral transmission of interpretations and attest to pedagogical techniques applied by Huang Kan during the Liang Dynasty (502–557) and by an unknown tutor in Dunhuang toward the end of the Tang Dynasty (618–907). The two versions of the Lunyu Yishu are read as texts of oral utterances that bear evidence of two distinct layers of recognizable oral vestiges.

The Demise of Silk on the Silk Road: Textiles as Money at Dunhuang from the Late Eighth Century to the Thirteenth Century

The extensive documentary evidence collected and analysed in the previous studies in this issue suggest a preliminary conclusion that can be summarised as follows: from the collapse of the Han dynasty to the glorious days of the Tang dynasty, the peoples living in the Western Regions along the Silk Road used multiple co-existing forms of money – grain, cloth and coins – with one of these three items becoming predominant according to changes in political and/or economic circumstances. However, this multicurrency system did not outlive the political, economic and fiscal upheavals that shook the Tang empire from the mid-eighth century onwards. As far as the materials from Turfan and Dunhuang are concerned, the latest evidence for this monetary system is provided by a manuscript found at Dunhuang (P 3348 V°), already quoted in Arakawa Masaharu's article, which permits us to see how such a complex monetary system worked in real life once the silk shipped by the Tang government arrived in the Western Regions. In particular, a subsidiary account (P 3348 V°2 B) inscribed in this accounting report reveals how a local official called Li Jingyu 李景玉, who was vice-commissioner in the army stationed in that region, received his salary for the first semester of the year 745 ce.

Orality and the Transmission of Interpretations in Two Versions of Huang Kan’s Lunyu Yishu: Teaching Lunyu from the National University of the Liang to the Periphery of the Tang Empire

This article explores the received version of Huang Kan’s (488–545) Lunyu Yishu and a Tang manuscript fragment that stems from it, with a view to investigating residues of the oral transmission of glosses and interpretations of the Lunyu (the Analects). The discussion is based on close readings of passages that display remnants of the oral transmission of interpretations and attest to pedagogical techniques applied by Huang Kan during the Liang Dynasty (502–557) and by an unknown tutor in Dunhuang toward the end of the Tang Dynasty (618–907). The two versions of the Lunyu Yishu are read as texts of oral utterances that bear evidence of two distinct layers of recognizable oral vestiges.

Multi-cultural Society of Tang Empire through Zhao Mausoleum of Emperor Taizong

Multi-cultural Society of Tang Empire through Zhao Mausoleum of Emperor Taizong

Poetic Reflections on Sustainability at the Peak of the Tang Empire

Poetic Reflections on Sustainability at the Peak of the Tang Empire

The Civil Pursuits of a Military Man in Tenth-Century China

The Civil Pursuits of a Military Man in Tenth-Century China Hongjie Wang The dynamic interplay between the military (wu 武) and the civil (wen 文) is one of the most notable characteristics of the political history of late medieval China. The predominance of wu over wen has long been regarded as one of the major factors that led to the disintegration of the Tang empire (618–907) and the turbulence in the following decades known as the Five Dynasties and Ten States (Wudai shiguo 五代十國, 907–979).1 During the [End Page 7] period of division in the first half of the tenth century, warlords erected five short-lived dynasties that succeeded one another in the North China Plains and about a dozen of smaller autonomous regimes that occupied, though not concurrently, the rest of the country, mostly in the south. Only in the year 979 did the second emperor of the Song dynasty (960–1279) bring an end to political division in China proper through military conquest.2 Understandably, the military formed a vital part in the political tumult during this Tang–Song transition, in which the regional rulers of Five Dynasties—both in the north and in the south—relied on military capacity in building and maintaining their powers.3 As Song historian Ouyang Xiu 歐陽脩 (1007–72) remarked in the New History of the Five Dynasties (Xin Wudai shi 新五代史), “The rise [End Page 8] and fall of the regimes in the Five Dynasties emanated entirely from armaments” (五代為國, 興亡以兵).4 No wonder that a military governor of the day declared that, “Any man with sufficient puissant soldiers and fine horses can be Son of Heaven; pedigree is hardly necessary” (天子, 兵強馬壯者當為之, 寧有種耶).5 Under such circumstances, arrogant military men usually showed contempt for literati, some even purging them brutally, as represented by the notorious Zhu Wen 朱溫 (852–912, r. 907–912), the founder of the Later Liang 後梁 dynasty (907–923), who murdered more than thirty Tang civil officials at one night and trashed their bodies into the Yellow River in the incident known as “Disaster of White Horse” (Baima zhi huo 白馬之禍).6 Eight centuries later the eminent scholar Zhao Yi 趙翼 (1727–1814) indignantly commented that “All the governors were martial men who became capricious after seizing power; they often bullied the literati, sometimes even slaying them without just cause” (藩鎮皆武夫, 持權任氣, 又往往淩蔑文人, 或至非理戕害).7 Yet this image of tenth-century China does not tell the full story of the complicated relationship that existed between the martial men and the literati during this period known for its military dimension and the imbalance of wen and wu. Recent scholarship has pointed out that from the very beginning, as the military men without prestigious backgrounds rose in the eclipse of the Tang, they intentionally hired large numbers of educated men as advisors in their provincial military governments, and this trend expedited later as their military regimes achieved political stability with the support of literati in search of employment in the chaos.8 More explicitly, in the freshly [End Page 9] published volume 5 of The Cambridge History of China, Hugh Clark in his chapter dealing with the southern kingdoms of tenth century documents a shift from military prowess to political effectiveness as the chief measure of governance in the states whose rulers formed stable demilitarized governments with the help of civilian officials, arguing that these new recruits “began to change the character of their states.”9 While such examinations provide us a balanced understanding of the civil-military relations of tenth century, more in-depth reassessments of the interactions of the two groups are still needed, considering the undeniable great variety in the personalities of different rulers and the political cultures in the different regimes of the day. A great diversity, we may presume, existed in both the process of a specific martial ruler’s civil pursuits and the individual experiences of his literati recruits during their dynamic exchanges. As an attempt to reveal the nuance and complexity of the attitudes and manners of military rulers in dealing with their civil aides and the literati’s responses in this transitional period, this article aims to explore the dynamics between the wen and wu by focusing on the case of Wang Jian 王建 (847...

Circa a.d. 626 volcanic eruption, climatic cooling, and the collapse of the Eastern Turkic Empire

During the late sixth century and early seventh century, the Eastern Turkic Empire (i.e., the Eastern Turkic Khanate) was the most powerful country in the Northeast Asia. It collapsed suddenly in A.D. 630, and historians concluded that the combination of social, political and economic factors, as well as the invasion of the Tang Empire, would be the root cause. Here we suggest that a climatic cooling event ca. A.D. 627-629 could be the direct cause. In A.D. 627-629, the Eastern Turkic Empire experienced severe disasters of snow and frost. Many of the sheep and horses died. People suffered great famine and massive deaths. The Empire fell into severe national crisis and collapsed in A.D. 630. Simultaneously, the Tang Empire also experienced three successive years of frost disasters. Climatic cooling possibly also occurred in other regions. Our investigation of the ca. A.D. 627-629 climatic cooling event also improved our understanding of another problem: was the climatic event due to the impact of a ca. A.D. 626 volcanic eruption?

The Possible Climatic Impact in China of Iceland's Eldgjá Eruption Inferred from Historical Sources

Based on Chinese historical sources, the possible climatic impact in China of the prolonged Eldgja eruption starting around 934 AD was investigated. An extremely hot summer was reported in 934 AD; hundreds of people died of the intense heat of this summer in Luoyang, the capital of the Later Tang Empire (923–936 AD). Snowless (and possibly also mild) winters probably occurred successively following the Eldgja eruption until 938 AD. In 939 AD, cold weather set in abruptly and lasted for about 3 years; whereas peak cooling occurred in 939AD. In the summer of 939 AD, it snowed in the southeast of the Inner Mongolia Plateau (about 40–44∘N, 113–123∘E). From 939AD to 941 AD, hard winters occurred successively in China. Worse, unprecedented drought and plague of locusts broke out in 942 AD and persisted in 943 AD. More than several hundred thousand people were starved to death. This catastrophe was at least partly responsible for the collapse of the Later Jin Dynasty in China. By comparison with the tree-ring evidence and uncovered European historical evidence, the spatial response to the Eldgja eruption appeared to be complex, whereas hemispheric or global cooling occurred in 939–942 AD.

Two Shilla Intellectuals in Tang: Cases of Early Sino-Korean Cultural Connections

Tang Studies 23-24 (2005-06) Two Shilla Intellectuals in Tang: Cases of Early Sino-Korean Cultural Connections YOUNG KYUN OH ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY The Tang Empire (618-907) established a visible territory under its military and political influence and, perhaps more importantly but less obviously, a cultural territory integrating its neighboring states into the sphere of Chinese civilization, sharing such Chinese cultural products as social system, thought, education, language, writing system, and so forth. Outside its cultural territory, Tang also emerged as one of the cultural centers of the world, by interacting and forming a network with other contemporaneous cultural institutions.! Shilla *JT:m (57 B.C.-A.D. 935), as one of Tang's immediate neighbors, was an active member of the institution, a voluntary participant in the Tang cultural territory. What does it mean, however, to live on the periphery of a powerful cultural center like the Tang Empire? How did Tang deal with her neighbors to incorporate them into her cultural territory? This paper will discuss some facets of the cultural interaction and exchange practiced between Tang and 1 The terms "network" and "institution" are employed here more loosely than they should be, but the conceptualization of these theoretical entities is described in more detail as "world institutions" and "world network" by Adshead, the former being defined to be more functionally cohesive than the latter; and the latter is the "coexistence of severalworld institutions and, depending on their strength, some interaction between them." See S. A. M. Adshead, Tang China: the Rise o/the East in WorldHistory (New York:PalgraveMacmillan, 2004),3-4. Rather specifically,the Tang "network" here denotes the interaction between Tang proper, its neighboring peoples outside the political territory or in the periphery-whose successrelied largelyon the voluntary affiliationwith Tangand the cultures residing in regions, such as India and Persia, more remote from Tang than the peripheral states but trying to be associated somehow with Tang society.I interject the notion of territoriality (as in "cultural territory") in what followssimply in order to bring out the senseof "encounter" between cultures of different memories and dispositions. 119 Oh: Two Shilla Intellectuals its neighbors-Tang and Shilla in particular-through the lives of two Shillans who went to Tang in an effort to gain some insight into the early stage of Sino-Korean cultural association. The rise of Tang roughly coincides with the end of Korea's Samguk shidae .=:~ffif1i; (Three Kingdoms Period, 57 B.C.-A.D. 668), during which the Korean peninsula was divided into Koguryo ~1:i]1I (37 B.C.-A.D. 668), Paekche Ef~ (18 B.C.-A.D. 660), and Shilla, and the beginning of the first unified monarchy occupying the main part of the peninsula, commonly referred to as UnifiedShilla m-*JT~ (668-935). For the next three centuries, Tang and Shilla enjoyed flourishing exchange in almost every aspect of their societies. 2 The most fundamental medium of cultural exchange has always been the exchange of people. Records of incidents involving people moving from the Korean peninsula to Tang China appear as early as the reign ofTaizong **(r. 626-649). For example, Taizong forcibly relocated 70,000 Koguryo people to Tang territory following his invasion ofKoguryo in 645,3and 28,200 households in 668 to various locations south of the Yangtze and Huai Rivers after conquering Koguryo in alliance with Shilla.4 Also, in 660, the Tang army arrested more than 12,000 people from Paekche and moved them to Tang lands after overthrowing their kingdom.5 Koreans also migrated from Shilla to Tang, but, unlike the cases of Koguryo and Paekche, Shillans moved to Tang voluntarily and their 2 The Unified Shilla period (676-935) is also called Northern and Southern Kingdoms Period (Nambukkuk shidae 1¥i::lt~[f,f{i;), which comprises Parhae m$ (698-926) occupying the northern part of the peninsula and Shilla in the south. In addition, criticism of the term "Unified Shilla" is gaining support, mainly for the reason that Shilla did not unifY the entire peninsula or the previous three kingdoms completely. 3 Sima Guang Cf]}i!~7\:; (1019-1086), Zizhi tongjian '~'i"§j$£.t (SKQS), 198.11a. 4 jiu Ttmgshu...

Peking and Hanoi: Anatomy of a Revolutionary Partnership

No single diplomatic relationship in the world has a longer historical tradition behind it than that between the current Chinese and North Vietnamese states. One Chinese anthropologist has even speculated that the word viet of Vietnam, originally meaning halberd or spear, may have stood for the name of a people resident in China about thirty-five centuries ago.1 At least it is certain that two thousand years ago, while Julius Caesar and his successors were incorporating the British Isles into the Roman world, Chinese armies were conquering the ancestors of the modern Vietnamese people, who then lived in the Red River delta of northern Vietnam, and incorporating them into the early Chinese empire. From the first century ad to the tenth century ad northern Vietnam was a Chinese province. And over this span of nine hundred years the Vietnamese people received a most comprehensive initiation into the scholarship, political theories, familial organization patterns, bureaucratic practices, and even the religious orientations of Chinese culture. Only in the tenth century, when the Tang empire dissolved, did the Vietnamese people break away from China and form their own kingdom with their own dynasties. After the tenth century this kingdom expanded south from the Red River delta to the Gulf of Siam. Yet until the Sino-French war of the 1880s, Vietnamese courts, like Korean courts, formally considered themselves the diplomatic vassals of the Chinese emperor.