China
China refers to a number of states and cultures that have existed in continental East Asia for the last 4000 years.
Depending on one's point of view, modern China can be
described as a single civilization or multiple  civilizations, as a single state or multiple states, and as a
single nation or
multiple nations. Chinese people tend to stress unity of a singular Chinese
nation and unbroken continuity of a single Chinese civilization throughout
history, while other observers tend to point out profound changes to Chinese
civilization throughout history and internal diversity within modern China.With one of the world's lengthiest periods
of uninterrupted civilization.
China's history has been
largely characterized by repeated divisions and reunifications amid alternating
periods of peace and war, as well as
violent imperial dynastic change and
successive incursions from outside. From the 2nd millennium BC onwards, the Chinese civilization(s) and states expanded outwards from a core
area in the North China Plain,
conquering, influencing, and assimilating foreign peoples, or being conquered,
influenced and assimilated in turn. The extent of successive Chinese empires
varied according to their moving fortunes.For centuries, China was also one of the world's most technologically advanced
civilizations, and East Asia's dominant cultural influence. However, by
the nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries, China stagnated and fell behind, and was too weak militarily to
repel European interference or invasion by the Empire of Japan.
erial monarchy in China ended with the establishment of the Republic of China (ROC) in 1912;
however, the next 4 decades of ROC rule were marred by warlordism, the Second
Sino-Japanese War, and the Chinese Civil War.After its victory in the Chinese Civil War, the Communist Party of
China established the People's Republic
of China (PRC) in 1949, forcing the Republic of China (ROC) to retreat to Taiwan, which it had governed since the end of World War
II. Since then, the ROC has maintained control over Taiwan, the Pescadores,
several islands off the coast of Fujian, and some islands in the South China Sea. In the
meantime, the United Kingdom and Portugal handed
their colonies of Hong Kong and Macau on the Chinese coast to the
PRC in 1997 and 1999, respectively.
"China" used in a modern context often refers to just the territory of the PRC,
or to "Mainland China", which
refers to the territory of the PRC excluding Hong Kong and Macau.The PRC does not recognize the ROC, as it claims to have succeeded the ROC in
its legitimacy to govern all of China including Taiwan. On the other hand, the
ROC, while never formally surrendering its claims to all of China, has moved
away from its former identity as the ruler of China, and increasingly
characterizes itself as Taiwan. The debate
surrounding the nature and extent of China continue to fuel ongoing
political disputes on Chinese
reunification/Taiwan independence issues, described in greater detail in Political status
of Taiwan.
Terminology
"Zhongguo"
The Chinese call their country Zhongguo or Jhongguo, which is
usually translated as "Middle Kingdom", but perhaps could also be translated as,
"Central State". It literally means "middle (or center) land," referring to the
historic position of China at the centre of her known world, surrounded by
lesser tributary states.The term has not been used consistently throughout Chinese history, however,
and carries certain cultural and political connotations. During the Spring and Autumn
P riod, it was used only to describe the states politically descended from
the Western Zhou, in the Yellow
River (Huang He) valley, to the exclusion of states such as Chu and Qin.
The "Chinese" thus defined their nation as culturally and politically distinct
from - and as the axis mundi of surrounding
nations; a concept that continued well into the Qing dynasty, although
being continually redefined while the central political influence expanded
territorially, and its culture assimilated alien influences.Thus "Zhongguo" quickly came to include areas farther south, including the Yangtze
River and Pearl River systems, and by
the Tang Dynasty it even
included "barbarian" regimes such as the Xianbei and Xiongnu. As the
PRC now governs Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, and Tibet, and the ROC now
governs Taiwan (also claimed by the PRC), these regions are also often included as a part of
"Zhongguo", though acceptance or denial of such claims remains politically
controversial, especially where Zhongguo means PRC.During the Han Dynasty and before, Zhongguo had three distinctive meanings:
The area around the capital or imperial domain. The Book
of Poetry explicitly gives this definition.
Territories under the direct authority of central authorities. The Historical
Records states: "Eight mountains are famed in the empire. Three are
with the Man and Yi barbarians. Five are in Zhongguo." The area now called the North China Plain.
The Sanguo Zhi records the
following monologue: "If we can lead the host of Wu and Yue (the area of southern Jiangsu and
northern Zhejiang) to oppose Zhongguo, then we should break off relations with them soon." In this
sense, the term is synonymous with Hua (?) and Xia (?).
During the period of division after the fall of the Han Dynasty, the term Zhongguo was subjected to transformation as a result of the surge of
nomadic peoples from the northern frontier. This was doubly so after the loss of
the Yellow River valley, the cradle of Chinese civilization, to these peoples.
For example, the Xianbei called their Northern Wei regime Zhongguo, contrasting it with the Southern Dynasties,
which they called the Yi (?), meaning "barbarian". The southern
dynasties, for their part, recently exiled from the north, called the Northern
Wei Lu (?), meaning "criminal" or "prisoner". In this way Zhongguo came to represent political legitimacy. It was used in this manner from the
tenth century onwards by the competing dynasties of Liao, Jin and Song. The term Zhongguo came to be related to geographic, cultural and political
identity and less to ethnic origin.The Republic of China as it controlled mainland China, and later, the
People's Republic of China, have used Zhongguo to mean all the
territories and peoples within their political control (people in the Republic
of China now usually uses Zhongguo to refer to the PRC and Taiwan to refer to
itself). Thus it is asserted that all 56 officially recognized ethnic groups are Zhongguo ren (???), or Zhongguo people. Their disparate histories
are collectively the history of Zhongguo.
"China"
The most commonly accepted theory as to the origin of the English word "China" (and the prefix "Sino-") is
that they came from the "Qin" dynasty that first
unified the country. Despite the fact that
the Qin dynasty was short-lived and was often regarded as overly tyrannical it
unified the written language in China and gave the supreme ruler of China the
title of "Emperor", hence, the subsequent Silk Road traders would identify
themselves by that name.In any circumstance, the word China passed through many languages
along the Silk Road before it finally
reached Europe and England. The Western "China", transliterated to Shina (??) has also been used by Japanese since the nineteenth
century, and has since evolved into a derogatory term in that language.The term "China" can narrowly mean China proper, or, often,
China proper and Manchuria, Inner
Mongolia, Tibet, and Xinjiang; the boundaries
between these regions do not necessarily follow provincial
boundaries. In many contexts, "China" is commonly used to refer to the
People's Republic of China or mainland China, while "Taiwan" is used to refer to
the Republic of China. Informally, in economic or business contexts, "the Greater
China region" (?????) refers to Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan.Sinologists usually use
"Chinese" in a more restricted sense, more akin to the classical usage of Zhongguo, or to the meaning of the "Han ethnic group", who make
up the bulk of Mainland China.In many contexts it may be more appropriate to speak of "mainland China"), especially when contrasting it with
other, politically different regions like Hong Kong, Macau, and territories
administered by the Republic of China
(Taiwan).
Geography and climate
China has many very different landscapes, with mostly plateaus and mountains in the west, and
lower lands on the east. As a result, principal rivers flow from west to east,
including the Yangtze (Chang Jiang), the Huang He (central-east), the Amur (northeast), etc), sometimes
toward the south (Pearl River, Mekong
River, Brahmaputra, etc). Due to
the landscape, most Chinese rivers
empty into the Pacific.
Most of China's arable lands lie along the two major rivers, the Yangtze and
the Huang He, and each are the centers around which are founded China's major,
ancient civilizations.In the east, along the shores of the Yellow Sea and the East
China Sea are found extensive and densely populated alluvial plains; the shore of
the South China Sea is more
mountainous and southern China is dominated by hill
country and lower mountain ranges.To the west, the north has a great alluvial plain, and the south
has a vast calcareous tableland traversed by hill ranges of moderate elevation, with the Himalayas, containing the
highest point Mount Everest. The
northwest also has high plateaus among more arid desert landscapes such as the Takla-Makan and the Gobi
Desert, which has been expanding. Due to a prolonged drought and perhaps poor
agricultural practices, dust storms have become usual
in the spring in China. Dust blows all the way to southern China, Taiwan, and
has even been measured on the West Coast of the United States. 
During many dynasties, the southwestern border of China has been the high mountains and
deep valleys of Yunnan, which separate modern
China from Burma, Laos and Vietnam.The climate of China varies greatly. The northern zone (within which lies Beijing) has a climate with
winters of Arctic severity. The central zone (within which Shanghai is situated) has a
generally temperate climate. The
southern zone (within which lies Guangzhou) has a generally subtropical climate.The Palaeozoic formations of
China, excepting only the upper part of the Carboniferous system, are marine, while the Mesozoic and Tertiary deposits are estuarine and freshwater or else of terrestrial origin. Groups
of volcanic cones occur in the Great Plain of north China. In the Liaodong and Shandong Peninsulas, there are
basaltic plateaux.
Demographics
Over a hundred ethnic groups have existed in
China. In terms of numbers, however, the pre-eminent ethnic group in China is
the Han, which is a group so
diverse in its culture and language that some conceive of it as a larger
overarching group bringing together many smaller, distinct ethnic groups sharing
common traits in language and culture. Throughout history, many ethnic groups
have been assimilated into neighbouring ethnicities or disappeared without a
trace. Several previously distinct ethnic groups have been Sinicized into the Han,
causing its population to increase dramatically; at the same time, many within
the Han identity have maintained distinct linguistic and cultural traditions,
though still identifying as Han. The term Zhonghua Minzu sometimes
is being used also, to describes a notion of a "Chinese nationality"
transcending ethnic divisions.The government of the People's Republic
of China now officially recognizes a total of 56 ethnic
groups, of which the largest is the Han Chinese. China's overall
population, the largest in the world, is 1.3 billion. With the global human
population currently estimated at about 6.4 billion, China is home to
approximately 20%, or one-fifth of the human species, homo sapiens.The lack of birth control and promotion of population growth during the rule
of Mao
Zedong resulted in a demographic explosion, culminating in over 1.5 billion
people today. As a response to the problems this is causing, the government of
the PRC has enacted a birth control policy,
commonly known as the One-child policy.The Han speak several mutually unintelligible tongues, classified by modern
linguists a being separate languages, but regarded within the Chinese languages
as "dialects" or "area languages" within a single Chinese language. The
various spoken varieties of Chinese share a common written standard, "Vernacular Chinese"
or "baihua", which has been used since the early 20th Century and is
based on Standard Mandarin, the
standard spoken language, in grammar and vocabulary. In addition, another, more
ancient written standard, Classical Chinese, was
used for writing Chinese by the literati for thousands of years before the 20th
Century. Classical Chinese is
no longer the predominant form of written Chinese, though it continues to be a
part of high school curricula and is hence intelligible to some degree to many
Chinese people. Other than Standard Mandarin, spoken variants are usually not
written; the exception is Standard Cantonese,
which is sometimes written as Written Cantonese in
informal contexts.
History
China was one of the earliest centers of human civilization. The Chinese
language was also one of the few languages to invent writing independently, the
other languages being that of ancient Mesopotamia (Sumerians), India (Sanskrit-Devanagiri), the Mayans and
Egypt.The first dynasty according to Chinese
historical sources was the Xia dynasty; however there
is no archaeological evidence definitively attesting a Xia dynasty (although
some neolithic sites have been suggested to be such). The first confirmed
dynasty is the Shang, who settled along the Huang He river, dating from the 18th to the 12th centuries BC. The Shang were in turn
invaded by the Zhou (12th to 5th centuries
BC), whose centralized authority was slowly eroded by the ceding of state-like
authority to warlords ruling small states; eventually, in the Spring and Autumn
period, many strong independent states, in continuous war, paid but nominal
deference to the Zhou
state as the erial centre. They were all unified under one emperor in 221 BC by Qin Shi
Huang, ushering in the Qin Dynasty, the first
unified centralized Chinese state.After the fall of authoritarian Qin Dynasty in 207 BC came the Han
Dynasty which lasted until 220 AD. A period of disunion followed again. In
580, China was reunited under the Sui. Under the succeeding Tang and Song dynasties, China reached its
golden age. For a long period of time, especially between the 7th and 14th
centuries, China was one of the most advanced civilizations in the world
in technology, literature, and art. The Song Dynasty fell to the invading Mongols in 1279.
The Mongols, under Kublai Khan, established the Yuan
Dynasty. A peasant named Zhu Yuanzhang overthrew
the Mongols in 1368 and founded the Ming Dynasty, which lasted
until 1644. After the Ming dynasty, came the Qing (Manchu) dynasty, which lasted
until the overthrow of Puyi in 1911.Often times regime change was violent and strongly opposed and the ruler
class needed to take special measures to ensure their rule and the loyalty of
the overthrown dynasty. For example, after the foreign Qing (Manchus) conquered China,
because they were ever suspicious of Han Chinese, the Qing rulers
put into effect measures aimed at preventing the absorption of the Manchus into
the dominant Han Chinese population. However, these restrictions proved
ineffective against the assimilation of Manchus into the Chinese identity and
culture.In the 18th century, China achieved a decisive technological advantage over
the peoples of Central Asia, which it had
been at war with for several decades, while simultaneously falling behind Europe
in that respect. This set the stage for the 19th century, in which China adopted
a defensive posture against European imperialism while itself
engaging in imperialistic expansion into Central Asia.However the primary cause of the decline of the Chinese empire was not
European and American interference, as the ethnocentric Western
historians would lead many to believe. On the contrary it was a series of
internal upheavals. Most prominent of these was the Taiping Civil War which lasted from 1851 to 1862. The civil war was started by
an extremist believer in a school of thought partly influenced by Christianity
who believed himself to be the son of God and the younger brother of Jesus. Although the
imperial forces were eventually victorious, the civil war was one of the
bloodiest in human history - costing at least twenty million lives (more than
the total number of fatalities in the First World War). Prior
to this conflict a number of Islamic Rebellions, especially in Central Asia, had
occurred. Later, a second major rebellion took place, although this latter
uprising was considerably smaller than the cataclysmic Taiping Civil War. This
second conflict was the Boxer Rebellion which
aimed to repel Westerners. Although secretly supporting the rebels, the Empress, Ci Xi, aided
foreign forces in suppressing the uprising.In 1912, after a
prolonged period of decline, the institution of the Emperor of China disappeared and the Republic of China was
established. The following three decades were a period of disunion the Warlord
Era, the Sino-Japanese
War, and the Chinese Civil War. The
latter ended in 1949 with the Communist Party of
China in control of mainland China. The CPC
established a communist state the
People's Republic of Chinathat laid claim to be the successor state of the
Republic of China. Meanwhile, the ROC government of the Kuomintang fled to Taiwan,
where it continued to be recognized as the legitimate government of all China by
the Western bloc and the United
Nations until the 1970s, when most nations and the
UN switched recognition to the PRC.
Political history
Before unification by the Qin Dynasty in 221 BC, "China"
did not exist as a coherent entity. The Chinese civilization consisted of a
patchwork of several states, each ruled by a king (?), duke (?), marquess (?), or earl (?). Although there was a
central king who held nominal power, and powerful hegemons sometimes held
considerable influence, each state was ruled as an independent
political entity.This ended with the Qin Dynasty unification, during which the office of the emperor was set
up, and a system of bureaucratic administration
established. After the Qin, China experienced about 13 more dynasties, many of
which continued the extensive system of kingdoms, dukedoms, earldoms, and marquisates.
The territory varied with several expansions and contractions depending on the
strength of each emperor and dynasty. However the emperor had ultimate,
supreme, and unquestionable authority as the political and religious leader of
China. The emperor also consulted civil and martial ministers, especially the prime
minister. Political power sometimes fell into the hands of powerful
officials, eunuchs, or imperial relatives, often
at the expense of a child heriditary emperor.Political relations with dependencies (tributary kingdoms) were maintained by international marriages, military aids, treaties,
and gifts. (see section "Geography, Political" below for examples),Luoyang, Chang'an (today's Xi'an), Nanjing, and Beijing are the
four cities most commonly designated as capitals of China over
the course of history. Chinese was the
official language, though periods of Mongol and Manchu conquest saw the arrival
of Mongol and Manchu as alternate official
languages.On January
1, 1912, the
Republic of China (ROC) was established, signaling the end of the
Manchu-dominated Qing Empire. Sun Yat-sen of the Kuomintang (KMT or Nationalist Party), was proclaimed provisional president of the
republic. However, Yuan Shikai, a former Qing
general who had defected to the revolutionary cause, soon forced Sun to step
aside and took the presidency for himself (formally it was a negotiation where
Sun agreed to step aside for what was then perceived as a strong reformer,
Yuan). Before long, Yuan attempted to have himself proclaimed emperor of a new
dynasty; however, he died soon of natural causes before fully taking power over
all of the Chinese empire.After Yuan's downfall, China was politically fragmented, with an
internationally-recognized, but virtually powerless, national government seated
in Beijing (thus failing to fit the definition of a state). Warlords in various
regions exercised actual control over their respective territories.In the late 1920s, the Kuomintang, under Chiang Kai-shek, was
able to reunify the country under its own control, moving the nation's capital
to Nanjing and implementing "political
tutelage", an intermediate stage of political development outlined in Sun
Yat-sen's program for transforming China into a modern, democratic state.
Effectively, political tutelage meant one-party rule by the Kuomintang with
heavy Leninist influences. Ironically, both the Kuomintang and the CCP have
heavy Leninist influences. In 1947,
constitutional rule was established, but because of the ongoing Chinese Civil War between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party of China (CPC), many provisions
of the 1947 ROC constitution were never put into actual practise on the
mainland.By early 1950, the CPC had defeated the Kuomintang on the mainland, and the
ROC government retreated to the island of Taiwan. Beginning in the late 1970s, Taiwan began the implementation
of full, multi-party, representative
democracy in the territories still under ROC control (i.e., Taiwan Province, Taipei, Kaohsiung and
some offshore islands of Fujian province). Today, the
political scene in the ROC is vibrant, with active participation by all sectors
of society. But rather than the usual conservative-liberal policy
distinctions that are the hallmarks of most democracies around the world, the
main cleavage in ROC politics is the unification with China in the long-run vs.
formal independence issue. However, Greens are generally more liberal (i.e. more environmentally
friendly) and Blues are generally regarded as more conservative.Meanwhile, Mao Zedong, the leader of the
communists, proclaimed the People's Republic
of China (PRC) on October 1, 1949 in Beijing. From the
beginning, the PRC has been a dictatorial one-party state under
the Communist Party. However, post-1978 reforms have led to the relaxation, in
varying degrees, of party control over many areas of society. Nonetheless, the
Communist Party still has absolute control over political aspects of society,
and it continuously seeks to eradicate threats to its rule. Examples of this
include the jailing of political opponents and journalists, general control of
the press, regulation of religions and other non-party organizations, censorship of the press, literature and film, and suppression of independence/secessionist
movements. In 1989, a
popular demonstration held in Beijing at Tiananmen Square was
violently put to an end by the Chinese government. The attempted eradication of the Falun Gong movement is also
held by its supporters to be motivated by fear of Falun Gong's growing
influence. Today, however, there is much more freedom in intellectual thought in
non-political areas and propaganda, while still
continuing, has lessened.
Territory
Historical overview
The Zhou Dynasty,  which
preceded the unification of China by Shi Huangdi, was originally
the region around the Yellow River. Since then,
the territory has expanded outward in all directions, and was largest during the Tang, Yuan,
and Qing dynasties. The Qing
Dynasty included parts of modern Russian Far East and Central
Asia (west of Xinjiang).Along with provincial administrators, some foreign monarchs sent envoys to offer gifts to the
Emperor of China and the Emperor returned compliments to them. The Chinese thought that the barbarians attached themselves to the virtue of the
Emperor, while the foreign governments sometimes disagreed. Since the end of the
19th century, China has tried to reinterpret this relationship as suzerainty or suzerainty-dependency,
but this no longer has any real conception in modern international political
t eories.The Qing Empire reduced the
territorial value of the Great Wall of China as a barrier of China proper after they
merged their homeland (Manchuria) north of the wall
with China proper south of it.
In 1683 after the surrender of the Kingdom of Tungning established by Koxinga, Taiwan including the Pescadores became a part of the Qing Empire, originally as one prefecture, then two, and
later a province. Taiwan was subsequently ceded to Japan after the first Sino-Japanese
War in 1895. At
the end of the second
Sino-Japanese War in 1945, Japan relinquished the sovereignty of the island in
the San Francisco
Peace Treaty, and the Republic of China took
over. Since then, the de jure sovereignty of
Taiwan has been under dispute between the PRC, and the now democratic ROC
and Taiwan independence
supporters.
See also: Tibet
Historical political divisions
Top-level political divisions of China have altered as the administration
changed. Top levels included circuits and provinces. Below that,
there have been prefectures, subprefectures, departments, commanderies, districts, and counties. Recent
divisions also include prefecture-level
cities, county-level cities, towns and townships (see below
for examples).Historically, most Chinese dynasties were based in the historical heartlands
of China, known by the politically-correct term of China proper. Various
dynasties also exhibited expansionism by engaging in
incursions into more peripheral territories like Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, Xinjiang, and Tibet. The Manchu-established Qing
Dynasty and its successors, the Republic of China and
the People's Republic
of China cemented the incorporation of these territories into China. These
territories are separated by borders that are vague at best, and do not
correspond well to contemporary political divisions. China proper is generally
thought to be bounded by the Great Wall and the edge of
the Tibetan plateau; Manchuria and Inner Mongolia are found
to the north of the Great Wall of China,
and the boundary between them can either be taken as the present border between Inner Mongolia and the northeast Chinese provinces, or the more historic border of the World War II-era puppet
state of Manchukuo; Xinjiang's borders correspond
to today's administrative Xinjiang; and historic Tibet is conceived as
occupying all of the Tibetan Plateau. China
is also traditionally thought of as comprising North China (??) and South
China (??), the geographic boundary between which north and south is largely
generalized as Huai River (??)
and Qinling Mountains (??).
Religion
The major religions of China are:
Taoism -
exact numbers unknown
-
Buddhism - exact numbers
unknown [about 8%]
-
Christianity - 2 to 4%
(this is a US number, the Chinese official number is much smaller than 1%)
-
Islam - 1% to
2%
While the People's Republic of China is officially atheist it does allow religion
under strict supervision. Historically, Taoism and Buddhism has been the
dominant religion of Chinese societies, and continues to be so in Chinese
societies outside of direct PRC control.In recent years, Falun Gong, a spiritual
practice drawing upon Buddhism and Taoism, has attracted great
controversy after the government of the People's Republic of China labeled it an
evil cult and began
an attempt to eradicate it. The Falun Gong itself denies that it is a cult or a
religion. The Falun Gong says that it has
approximately 70-100 million followers, which is a bit higher than estimates by
outside groups, though exact numbers are unknown. They regularly protest against
their suppression, both domestically and internationally.
Arts, scholarship, and literature
Chinese literature has a long and prolific continuous history, in part because of the development
of printmaking during the Song
dynasty. Before that, manuscripts of the Classics and religious texts
(mainly Confucian, Taoist, and Buddhist) were manually written
by ink
brush (previously scratching shells) and distributed. Academies of scholars
sponsored by the empire were formed to comment on these works in both printed
and written form. Members of royalty frequently participated in these
discussions. Tens of thousands of ancient written documents are still extant and
more, from oracle bones to Qing
edicts, are discovered each day, which had been formally ground up for use in
Chinese medicine.For centuries, opportunity for economic and social advancement in China could
be provided by high performance on the imperial
examinations. This led to a meritocracy, though in
practice this was possible only among those who were not female or too poor to
afford test preparation, as doing well still required tutorship. Nevertheless it
was a system distinct from the European system of blood nobility. erial
examinations required applicants to write essays and demonstrate mastery of the
Confucian classics. Those who passed the highest level of the exam became elite
scholar-officials known as jinshi, a highly esteemed socio-economic
position.Chinese philosophers, writers, and poets have been, for the most part, highly
respected, and played a key role in preserving and promoting the culture of the
empire. Some classical scholars, however, were noted for their daring depictions
of lives of the common people, often to the displeasure of authorities.Chinese culture valued filiality, humility, generosity, and charity. Heidi
Chu is Chinese.The Chinese have created numerous musical instruments,
such as the zheng, xiao, and erhu, that have spread
throughout East and Southeast Asia, and
especially areas under its influence. The sheng is the basis
for several Western free-reed
instruments.Chinese characters have had many variants and styles throughout the Chinese history, and were "simplified"
in the mid-20th century on mainland
China. Calligraphy is a major
art-form in China, above that of painting and music. Because of its association
with elite scholar-official bosses, it later on became commercialized, where
works by famous artists became prized possessions.The great variation and beauty in the Chinese landscape is often the
inspiration for great works of Chinese art. See Chinese
landscape painting for more details.Calligraphy, sushi, and bonsai are all millennia-old art
that spread to Japan and Korea.
Science and technology
Areas of technological study:
The main applications of mathematics in traditional
China were architecture and geography.
Pi (p) was calculated
by 5th
century mathematician Zu Chongzhi to the seventh
digit. The decimal system was used
in China as early as 14 Century BC. "Pascal's" Triangle was discovered by mathematician Liu
Ju-Hsieh, long before Pascal was born.
-
Studies in biology have been extensive,
and historic records are consulted even today, such as pharmacopoeias of medicinal
plants.
-
Traditional medicine and surgery were highly advanced at various points in history, and in some fields are
still seen as innovative. They continue to play a growing role in the
international medical community, and have achieved recognition over the last
few decades in the West as alternative
and complementary therapies. An example is acupuncture, although it
is somewhat controversial in some quarters. However, autopsy was unacceptable,
because of the common belief that a corpse should not be violated.
Nevertheless, there were several doctors who have increased
the understanding of internal anatomy by violating this
autopsy taboo.
-
Alchemy was Taoist chemistry,
very different from modern chemistry.
-
Chinese astrology and constellations were often used for divination
-
Military innovations include the crossbow and the grid
sight, crossbow stirrup, repeating
crossbows, poison gas (smoke from
burning dried mustard), tear gas made from powdered
lime, relief
maps for battle planning, manned kites, fire lance, rockets,
gunpowder incendiaries, gunpowder grenades, proto-handguns, and the cannon.
Sources
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