An outline, era by era

Qin dynasty

first unified empire (221 BCE)

Classical Antiquity · ~500 BCE – ~500 CE

The Qin dynasty ruled China from 221 to 207 BCE and created the first unified empire in Chinese history. The state of Qin, in the Wei river valley in the west, had grown strong during the Warring States period. Between 230 and 221 BCE its armies conquered the six other major states. Its king, Ying Zheng, then took the new title Shi Huangdi, meaning First Emperor.

The Qin replaced the old system of hereditary lords with commanderies and counties run by appointed officials. They standardised writing, weights, measures, coinage and cart axle widths, and linked their lands with roads and canals. They also joined older walls on the northern frontier and demanded heavy labour and taxes. After the First Emperor died in 210 BCE the dynasty fell quickly to revolt, and the Han dynasty later inherited much of its system of government.

Things happened, and the rest is history

  1. Shang Yang's reforms in Qin

    Event

    What happened

    From about 356 BCE, Shang Yang, chief minister to Duke Xiao of Qin, introduces sweeping reforms. Rank and reward are tied to service in war and to farming, not to birth. The population is organised into registered groups that share responsibility for crimes, and counties under appointed officials are created.

    The rest is history

    These reforms are widely seen as the base of Qin's later strength, giving it a large army and a tax-paying peasantry. Shang Yang was executed after Duke Xiao died, but his system stayed in place. The Qin's later empire used the same ideas of strict law, rewards and county administration. Legal texts found in a Qin tomb at Shuihudi in 1975 show these laws in daily use.

    Sources

    1. PrimarySima Qian. Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), ch. 68, Biography of Lord Shang. Chinese history, c. 100 BCE.Account of Shang Yang's reforms and death.
    2. BookPines, Yuri. Shang Yang, The Book of Lord Shang: Apologetics of State Power in Early China. New York: Columbia University Press, 2017.
    3. BookHulsewé, A. F. P. Remnants of Ch'in Law. Leiden: Brill, 1985.Translation of the Shuihudi legal texts.

  2. Qin conquers the six states

    Event

    What happened

    Between 230 and 221 BCE, King Zheng of Qin conquers Han, Zhao, Wei, Chu, Yan and finally Qi in turn. In 221 BCE the last state falls and he declares himself First Emperor of Qin. He sets his capital at Xianyang.

    The rest is history

    The conquests ended about two and a half centuries of division, though historians still debate how far Qin's military power and organisation explain its victory. The new empire covered much of the area of present-day eastern and central China. Qin leaders at once faced the problem of ruling former states with different customs. The answer was a single centralised administration, which shaped Chinese government for centuries.

    Sources

    1. PrimarySima Qian. Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), ch. 6, Basic Annals of the First Emperor of Qin. Chinese history, c. 100 BCE.
    2. BookLewis, Mark Edward. The Early Chinese Empires: Qin and Han. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007.

  3. Standardisation and the commandery system

    Event

    What happened

    After 221 BCE the Qin divide the empire into commanderies, each run by officials the court appoints and can dismiss. They set one script, one system of weights and measures and one coinage, and build roads and canals. Surviving Qin standard weights carry inscriptions of the imperial edict.

    The rest is history

    These measures made taxes, trade and records easier across the empire. The standard script came from Qin's own clerical writing and later developed into the forms used in Han China. Thousands of Qin administrative documents on bamboo, found at Liye in 2002, show officials sending orders and reports across far-off districts. The Han kept the commandery structure while softening some Qin practices.

    Sources

    1. PrimarySima Qian. Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), ch. 6, Basic Annals of the First Emperor of Qin. Chinese history, c. 100 BCE.
    2. BookBodde, Derk. China's First Unifier: A Study of the Ch'in Dynasty as Seen in the Life of Li Ssu. Leiden: Brill, 1938.

  4. The Great Wall and the Meng Tian campaigns

    Event

    What happened

    Around 215 BCE the First Emperor sends the general Meng Tian with a large army against the Xiongnu on the northern frontier. Meng Tian takes land in the Ordos region and oversees the linking of older frontier walls and forts. Conscripted soldiers and labourers do the work.

    The rest is history

    The Qin work joined and extended earlier walls, so the Great Wall was not built in a single stroke. What survives today is mostly from the later Ming dynasty. The campaigns also began a long contest with the steppe peoples that continued under the Han. Heavy demands for labour on such projects added to resentment of Qin rule.

    Sources

    1. PrimarySima Qian. Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), ch. 88, Biography of Meng Tian. Chinese history, c. 100 BCE.
    2. BookWaldron, Arthur. The Great Wall of China: From History to Myth. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.

  5. Death of the First Emperor and the fall of Qin

    Event

    What happened

    The First Emperor dies in 210 BCE while touring the east. The court officials Li Si and Zhao Gao hide the news and put his younger son Huhai on the throne as the Second Emperor. In 209 BCE conscripts led by Chen Sheng and Wu Guang rebel, and others join. In 207 BCE Zhao Gao forces the Second Emperor's death, and in 206 BCE Liu Bang's forces take the capital.

    The rest is history

    The Qin lasted only about fifteen years as an empire. Liu Bang later won the war against his rival Xiang Yu and founded the Han dynasty in 202 BCE. Han rulers criticised Qin harshness but kept much of its administration. Historians still debate how far the fall came from harsh rule and how far from a weak succession.

    Sources

    1. PrimarySima Qian. Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), ch. 6 and ch. 48. Chinese history, c. 100 BCE.
    2. BookLoewe, Michael, and Edward L. Shaughnessy, eds. The Cambridge History of Ancient China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999.

  6. The burning of the books and burying of the scholars

    Folk tale

    The legend

    In 213 BCE the First Emperor orders most books burned except those on medicine, divination and farming, and the Qin's own records. A year later he is said to bury 460 scholars alive for deceiving him. The tale is told as the cruellest act of a tyrant who tried to wipe out learning.

    The rest is history

    The book order is recorded in the Shiji and was likely real, aimed at texts that criticised the present by praising the past. Copies were kept in the imperial library, which was said to have burned when Xianyang fell. The burying of scholars is less certain, and some historians think the victims were fewer or were magicians and alchemists rather than Confucians. Later Han writers had reason to exaggerate Qin crimes. Texts on bamboo found in tombs show that many works survived.

    Sources

    1. PrimarySima Qian. Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), ch. 6. Chinese history, c. 100 BCE.
    2. BookBodde, Derk. China's First Unifier: A Study of the Ch'in Dynasty as Seen in the Life of Li Ssu. Leiden: Brill, 1938.

  7. The elixir of immortality and Xu Fu's voyage

    Folk tale

    The legend

    The First Emperor, afraid of death, sends the court magician Xu Fu with boys and girls and craftsmen to sea to find islands where immortals live. Xu Fu sails off and never returns. Later tales say he reached Japan and settled there.

    The rest is history

    The Shiji does record that Xu Fu led such an expedition, and that the emperor sought drugs of immortality. Its account says Xu Fu stayed away and found a land with a plain and a marsh where he made himself king, but gives no place. The Japan story appears much later, in Chinese texts of the Tang period and Japanese local tradition. No archaeology shows he reached Japan. Shrines to Xu Fu in Japan today honour the legend.

    Sources

    1. PrimarySima Qian. Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), ch. 6 and ch. 118. Chinese history, c. 100 BCE.
    2. BookLewis, Mark Edward. The Early Chinese Empires: Qin and Han. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007.

  8. The Terracotta Army and the tomb's rivers of mercury

    Popular belief

    The legend

    The First Emperor's tomb is said to hold a model of the world with rivers of flowing mercury, a ceiling of stars and traps to kill robbers. Beside it stands an army of life-size clay soldiers, each with a different face. Some say the tomb is untouched and cannot be opened.

    The rest is history

    Sima Qian describes the mercury rivers and the ceiling of stars, writing about a century later. Soil tests near the burial mound have found raised levels of mercury, which fits his account. Farmers digging a well found the first clay warriors in 1974, and several pits hold thousands of figures. The central tomb chamber has not been excavated. The faces vary, though the bodies were made from standard moulded parts.

    Sources

    1. PrimarySima Qian. Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), ch. 6. Chinese history, c. 100 BCE.
    2. BookPortal, Jane. The First Emperor: China's Terracotta Army. London: British Museum Press, 2007.

  9. The Great Wall as a Qin creation visible from space

    Popular belief

    The legend

    Many people believe the First Emperor built the Great Wall as one continuous structure, and that it is so large that it can be seen with the naked eye from space.

    The rest is history

    The Qin did link walls on the northern frontier, but they used and joined earlier walls from the Warring States, and they built in rammed earth. Most of the stone and brick wall visitors see today dates from the Ming dynasty, from the 14th to 17th centuries. The wall is long but narrow, and astronauts have said it is hard to pick out from orbit with the naked eye. The space claim was in print before spaceflight, in the 1930s.

    Sources

    1. BookWaldron, Arthur. The Great Wall of China: From History to Myth. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
    2. PrimarySima Qian. Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), ch. 88, Biography of Meng Tian. Chinese history, c. 100 BCE.

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