Important+People+of+Sui,+Tang+and+Song+China

__ Wendi: __
 * First Emperor of the Sui Dynasty
 * A member of a prominent north Chinese family. He secured a marriage alliance between his daughter and the ruler of the northern Zhou empire.
 * Took power as emperor through military support of commanders of neighboring nomadic tribes by confirming their titles and showing little favor for the Confucian scholar-gentry class.
 * Extended the empire to northern China, and unified China for the first time in 350 years (Han Dynasty) while conquering the Chen kingdom.
 * Lowered taxes and built granaries, ensuring that there will be food in time of famine; gained support through this.
 * The granaries also supplied the markets during food shortages to prevent prices from rising.



__ Yangdi: __
 * Second emperor of the Sui Dynasty
 * He murdered his father (Emperor Wendi) to get the throne and also plotted against his elder brother (Yang Yong)
 * Defeated nomadic tribes that invaded
 * Established a milder legal code
 * Promoted Confucianism and brought back the civil service exam for those who wanted to gain a position in the bureaucracy
 * The legal and educational reforms he promoted led to the deterioration of aristocratic families and nomadic military commanders
 * He was fond of luxurious and extravagant construction projects and forced peasants to:
 * Build a lavish new palace for himself and a new capital at __ Loyang __
 * Build the Grand Canal. He made laborers construct a system of canals 1,200 miles long, from Beijing (north) to Hangzhou (south).
 * Risked his power and the throne to have these things built.
 * Linked the original centers of Chinese civilization on the north China plain with the Yangtze river basin.
 * Intended to facilitate control over the southern regions by courts, bureaucracies, and armies.
 * The canal made it possible to transport to the capital revenue (grain) and transfer food from the south to districts threatened by drought and famine.




 * Rebuilt the __ Great Wall __


 * Constructed large __ grain-storage buildings __
 * Constructed new __ roads __ all over China
 * By 600, Korea's state of Koguryo was militarily strong, and in fear of Koguryo allying itself with the northern Turks to take over China, he decided to lead 3 major attacks on Koguyro. These ended unsuccessfully as well as other military campaigns. This lead to revolts and in the end the downfall of China.
 * Was assassinated by his own ministers (618) and left the empire in a decentralized state.
 * Although many of his military operations failed, he successfully expanded China into northern Vietnam.



__ Li Yuan (Emperor Gaozu): __
 * Founder of the Tang Dynasty
 * Had mixed Chinese-nomadic origins
 * One of Yangdi's officials; loyal supporter (he saved Yangdi's forces when they were greatly outnumbered and trapped by the Turkish cavalry). To rescue his family and the empire, he felt rebellion was the only choice (Yangdi became increasingly unreasonable; unrest in people of the empire).
 * Lowered taxes, abandoned the harsh laws made by the Sui, and reformed the judicial system.
 * Tang Taizong (second son) had killed all other contenders for the throne, and set the foundation for the Tang dynasty's golden age.



__Li Shimin (Emperor Taizong)__
 * The second emperor of Tang Dynasty
 * Captured the eastern Turks but failed to gain control of the western Turks
 * Expanded Tang Empire to Central Asia, Korean Peninsula and __#|Oasis__ States of the Tarim Basin
 * Tried take control of Korea but failed
 * Named the "true founder" of the Tang Dynasty by some scholars since he was the force and "voice of reason" behind his father's actions
 * Killed his brothers and nephews so he could be the only living family member to be the heir to the throne
 * Forced his father to step down as emperor so he could claim the title.
 * Generally remembered as a wise and conscientious ruler (open-minded)

__ Li Zhi (Emperor Gaozong): __
 * The third emperor of Tang Dynasty
 * Had an alliance with Silla and conquered Paekche and Koguryo
 * Extended the Chinese Empire to the Tarim Basin
 * He is the husband of Empress Wu

__ Empress Wu: (690-705) __
 * First female ruler of China
 * Supported Buddhism establishment and tried to elevate it to a state religion
 * Commissioned many Buddhist paintings and sculptures (sculptures were noteworthy due to their big size)
 * Pagodas built (pagodas- a place of worship for Buddhists of the Far East, usually made up of a series of stories, each with its own roof.)
 * Empress Wu's pagoda building caused an amazing flourish of Buddhism in the early centuries of Tang rule. "By the mid-9th century, there were nearly 50,000 monasteries and hundreds of thousands of Buddhist monks and nuns in China" (Pearson/Longman 269)

__ Emperor Wuzong: __ __ Xuanzong: __
 * Under his rule persecution of Buddhism became open
 * Thousands of monasteries and Buddhist shrines were destroyed
 * Thousands of monks and nuns were forced to abandon their monastic orders and return to civilian lives
 * Monastery lands were distributed to taxpaying land lords and peasant smallholders.
 * Led a palace revolt that destroyed Empress Wei and her supporters
 * His rule became known as the peak of the Tang dynasty
 * Strong interest in political and economic reforms
 * Started patronizing the arts more and enjoying luxuries within the imperial city
 * Emperor who had fallen in love with his son's concubine, Yang Guifei.
 * After his "love" was killed, his grief made him incapable of running an empire.

__ Yang Guifei: __
 * Second wife (concubine) of Emperor Xuanzong's son.
 * Xuanzong fell in love with her, and showered her and her family with many gifts. Her family came to have many seats in the government, taking control over a large portion of it.
 * Yang betrayed Emperor Xuanzong by elevating her favorite general, Turkish leader An Lushan, who had amassed 160,000 soldiers along the northern and northeastern frontiers. He led his army and attacked Chang'an and Luoyang. The emperor escaped to Sichuan in the south and his troops strangled her for her role in the rebellion.

__ Zhao Kuangyin ( Emperor Taizu, Founder of the Song) 960 - 976:__
 * Military commander who came up to reunite China under the Song Dynasty, after the fall of the Tang
 * Reputation as one of the most honest and able generals of the last of the Five Dynasties that had struggled to control north China after fall of the Tang
 * More successful in education and learning than military success while out compaigning
 * Troops tried to convince him to claim the name emperor, and he renamed Emperor Taizu
 * Overcame all rivals, except the northern Liao dynasty, founded by the nomadic Khitan people
 * Through his success, he founded the Song dynasty that ruled most of China for the next 300 years

__ Zhu Xi: __
 * Believed in applying philosophical ideas to everyday life.
 * Wanted to bring back Confucian teachings (also known as Neo-Confucianism)
 * Believed in personal morality (personal virtue or ethics)
 * Virtue could be gained through:
 * Reading books
 * Experiences and Observations
 * Contact with people who have more knowledge than you (kind of like when people tell you to listen to your elders because they have more knowledge than you).
 * Believed that you could shape a person's personality to give them a good nature by making those superior teach the less superior.

__ Li Bai __
 * The most famous poet of the Tang era.
 * His poems blend images of the every day world with philosophical musings.

__ Wang Anshi: __ Was the chief minister of the Song Shenzong emperor. Wang Anshi had an alternative to attempting to ward off the collapse (soon to occur) of the dynasty. He had introduced sweeping reforms. As a result, it was successful, leaving Wang running the government due to his potential of allowing the state to be energetic and interventionist, which could foreshadow the dynasty's increase in resources and strength. These are some things that Wang did while in position of maintaining the government basis:
 * Ran the government under the Legalist assumption that an energetic and interventionist state would greatly increase the resources and strength of the dynasty.
 * His reforms stressed analytical thinking rather than the memorization of the classics
 * Tried to correct grave defects in imperial order
 * Introduced cheap loans and irrigation projects (assisted by the government; irrigation projects encouraged agricultural expansion)
 * Taxed landlord and scholarly classes
 * Used money gained (as profit from revenues) to establish mercenary forces that replaced armies due to the fact that these mercenary forces are more well trained in comparison to the armies' unwilling peasantry and lack of training skill
 * Tried to reorganize the education system, that included universities as well as changing the orientation of the examination system