Читать книгу Asia Past and Present - Peter P. Wan - Страница 56

Over time, wealth and power corrupted the rulers of the Tang Dynasty. They became complacent, extravagant, and indulgent. Scholar‐officials in high office and eunuchs close to the royal family formed cliques, and focused their energies on grabbing power and fortunes. The Tang royal court, like the Roman court, began relying on nomadic generals and their troops to defend their borders. One royal court favorite was An Lushan (703–757), a frontier general of non‐Han origin. He turned against the court and marched his troops on the capital Chang’an. His troops looted and burned the world’s richest city to the ground. Although he was eventually defeated, the eight‐year An Lushan Rebellion (755–763) marked the end of Tang’s Golden Age.

The government’s power and the nation’s economy plummeted. Peasant rebellions broke out and swept across the land. Huang Chao (820–884) led the most devastating of them. His rebellion adopted guerrilla warfare, marauding across the country, and wreaking havoc wherever they showed up. They ransacked Guangzhou and killed some 200,000 Arab and Persian merchants who had come to the port to trade. Then they captured the capital city of Chang’an without even laying siege to it, and went on a spree of looting and slaughter, leaving it in ruins again. Now Huang Chao proclaimed himself emperor of a new dynasty, but as is always the case, the rebel army became fractured by internal strife and was crushed by government troops. Huang Chao committed suicide. It is noteworthy that Huang Chao’s rebellion championed the idea of “leveling the rich and the poor,” which was a big draw to the peasants.

Granted, both rebellions had failed, but just as the Roman Empire was shaken but not toppled by Spartacus’ slave rebellion, the Tang Empire was left standing, though on very shaky legs. A string of weak and dissolute emperors soon brought about its total collapse.

Following Tang’s fall, China again entered a period of disunion. Large areas of the North came under the rule of non‐Han nomadic tribes. This period is known as the period of the “Five Dynasties [in the North] and Ten States [in the South].” Notably, this period of disunity lasted only half a century. In the future, China would continue to go through cycles of unity and disunity, but periods of disunity would become increasingly shorter, indicating a more thorough merging of the various ethnic, racial, and geographical groups throughout the land.