How Useful was the Great Wall of China Really?
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- čas přidán 25. 05. 2024
- The Great Wall provided critical benefits to many Chinese dynasties.
Chapters:
0:00 Introduction
1:10 Military Benefits
3:50 Political Benefits
8:20 Economic Benefits
10:06 Conclusion
Maps were created using maps-for-free.com/ by ©OpenStreetMap www.openstreetmap.org/copyright
#greatwall #asia #chinesehistory #history #historyofchina #china #xiongnu #mongols #handynasty #tangdynasty #mingdynasty #nomads
Very interesting, the maps in particular helped a lot. I did not realize how close to the 'frontier' Beijing was. The fact that they deliberately built the wall along the rainfall border is something I never realized and makes a lot of sense.
Thanks, glad you've found it helpful. And yes Beijing was traditionally a frontier city, arguably the most important one, and I'll have to do a video on its geography sometime.
Yes, Beijing was initially the capital of a frontier fief/prefecture. When the northern 'barbarians' invaded China and captured the city, it became the capital of those 'barbarian' empires, and the capital of China after being reclaimed. Also I believe part of the reason China always fell to foreign invasions so quickly after Ming dynasty is because Beijing was too close to China's northern frontier and coastline
People love to talk about its failure, but the Wall had already been allowed to fall into disrepair by then, leaving gaps Genghis could walk through. Genghis only got his Chinese siege engineers to siege the inner rest, after he had already rode through existing gaps in the old one. For many centuries the original Great Wall had been a resounding success.
That’s why modern day China is barbaric its capital is bejing
interrestingly, the defense style of having spread out guards able to hold out a limited time and call for reinforcements isnt too dissimilar from the fluid defence style usually used in modern combat, tho without large fortified walls of course.
if you changed the walls into trenches and fortifications such as bunkers it still is very similiar.
maybe can think of the wall as a highway
@@zhu_zi4533 thats clever
Very informative, thank you! (But as for the Roman Empire, they did also build walls, though not as long as in China. In Great Britain they built Hadrian's Wall, and in German lands they built the Limes. I believe they also used the Danube River as a fortified defensive line. On another point: the Romans used mercenaries from the Germanic tribes. As you noted about why China did not do that, the barbarians learned Roman skills and eventually conquered the western parts of the empire.) Thank you again!
Romans are cool😎 plus europe is better so its easier
@@JaKingScomez Agree, except it would be hard/impossible to compare which culture was "better." I haven't studied Chinese history but it seems pretty amazing, which is why I found the video so helpful. So very different from European history, and yet even so there are interesting parallels. It was also interesting to see how both had to deal with the Mongols.
Rome was great and still affects those of us in the so-called West deeply. But it also had deep flaws.
And so it couldn't last. 😔
Chinese dynasties also employed huns or northern barbarians in its armies. One of the kingdom in the Warring State period even adopted hunic or barbarian style dress and ways of life to build up a fighting cavalry. Throughout history the Chinese did employ friendly hunic tribes and settle them in the border region. They were OK when China was united and strong, but after the East Han dynasty and after the Three Kingdoms Period, these various barbarian tribes rose up and established their own kingdoms and took over northern China for couple of hundred years. And the same thing happened towards the end of the Tang Dynasty. Generals who were not ethnic Hans rebelled when the central government weakened and caused great disasters for China, eventually caused the downfall of Tang.
China didn't do it because they integrated all other cultures they conquered, effectively stopping any revolt caused by previously defeated nations/empires by 90%
@@JaKingScomezWhat's easier?
This channel hands down is one of the best at giving me a profound understanding the Chinese history, because it does such a good job at teaching the role of geography; and in turn teaches us the importance of geography in world history.
Thanks, glad you've found it helpful! Yeah geography and history are such closely intertwined subjects and IMO to understand both well we have to learn them together.
Your geographical commentary is very useful for providing a more comprehensive historical perspective of whatever you discuss.
Thanks, glad you've found it helpful. One of the key goals I have for this channel is to bring geography and history together - they're quite intertwined subjects but too often just discussed on their own.
Tang dynasties didn't emphasize building great wall b/c earlier if they started building it, Turks would've been alert and launched campaigns, then once Tang conquered Mongolia and drove away Turks, they no longer needed the great wall as it served as a divider to their empire which they understood to be inclusive of the steppe.
I love how metropolitan the tang was.
And great wall will hinder their expansion to Eastern Gokturk and Goguryeo.
I learned a lot from this video, thank you for putting it together in such a succinct yet information-dense way. One of the small tidbits I didn't know about which you touched on briefly was that most Chinese dynasties had difficulty raising large cavalry forces. This intrigued me quite a bit. Was there an issue with the availability of the type of land useful for mass domestication of horses, over alternate uses, leading to horse domestication not becoming a widespread part of early culture and thus never becoming a necessarily large facet of the army as a matter of course? Or was it simply that the cost/benefit analysis for having a wall was so much better than for having cavalry, as you explain? I suppose I am wondering whether there was some ecological or terrain based reason for the difficulty with the scaled domestication of horses that contributed to the necessity of the wall, or whether the wall itself dissuaded the need for large scale horse domestication? You touch on the ecological differences between the areas divided by the wall, which got me thinking to what extent those differences affected their early cultures around horses domestication. As you mention, the raiders would have been riding on horseback their whole lives as nomads. Was this difference just nomadic vs civilizational, or did the ecological differences play a large role in forging that dichotomy (and subsequent, unavoidable clash) early on? Were horses common farm animals in Chinese agriculture, trade, or otherwise widely used for non-cavalry purposes during or prior to these dynasties? Lots of branching off points in this video for me to look into further. Thanks again, I enjoyed it!
Thanks for the kind words, and yes this is a huge topic, and I could touch on some of them more in future videos when the subjects overlap. Regarding horses there's a ton of reasons for it that I've seen, including but not limited to:
- much of northern China is devoted to intensive agriculture, so in general it was just difficult to have land to raise horses, especially since horses eat so much
- the climate in northern China (intensely hot humid summers combined with harsh cold winters) creates a lot of extreme contrast that aren't healthy for horses
- Chinese farmers in general use ox to pull stuff rather than horses, so over time there's just less know-how to raise horses
- even when horses were produced, they were often not military-grade
- the best grazing lands to raise horses tend to be in certain areas near the frontier, like on the edge of the Tibetan Plateau or right up against the northern steppes, and sometimes these areas were heavily contested with outside powers.
With this said some Chinese dynasties did manage to raise very large cavalry forces, like the Western Han Dynasty did in order to ride deep into Xiongnu territory and defeat them. This was just prohibitively expensive though, and unless it was absolutely necessary to do so it was just much cheaper to rely on infantry instead.
Various Chinese dynasties tried all kinds of ways to get horses. One common route was through trade with the nomads on the steppes, often through the Great Wall, and another route was trading tea with the peoples on the Tibetan Plateau via "tea horse" routes. Some dynasties also had big government programs to artificially encourage peasants to raise more horses, but sometimes with very poor results for the amount of money spent.
@@gatesofkilikien Thanks for the answer! Those are exactly the details I was wondering about and where my mind was going. Much appreciated! Going to continue to check out the other vids.
@@dinosaursnack Thanks, glad it helped! And please feel free to let me know if you have other thoughts, comments, or questions too
It's not just the Chinese. A Roman Legion would have 5-10% Equestes, with the rest being Infantry. Ancient Greece, Persia and Egypt also relied on Infantry, with Cavalry and Chariots being expensive and elite. Throughout the history of Europe, armies consistently had more Infantry then Cavalry (but also used a lot of draft horses and donkeys for logistics). Having an almost pure Cavalry army is a steppe nomad thing.
I have also read that the soils in China were particularly low in a mineral called Selenium, making their horses grow smaller with weaker bones. As a result when they imported stronger horses from the Greek Kingdom of Bactria they called them the "Heavenly Horses". There was a war fought with the Saka (Scythians) simply for control of these horses.
Just found your channel. Excellent work! I love the comparative analysis, evident research, and straight forward presention!
Thanks, glad you've found it helpful!
Very informative video and well produced. Many thanks.
Thanks, glad you enjoyed it!
Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Will definitely check your other videos out.
Thanks, appreciate the support!
Excellent work! I have heard most of these in Chinese, but this is the best explanation of GW in English that is rooted in the Chinese history/geography and philosophy.
Thanks, appreciate it!
Great video! Keep up the good work!
glad to like it, thanks for your support!
Great video, very informative!
Glad it was helpful, thanks for your support!
Absolutely love your content! Greetings from the other side of the Great Wall
Awesome! Thank you!
Fantastic and informative video
Another great video!
thanks, appreciate the kind words!
Great video! Such an interesting topic. We briefly learned about the Great Wall in school. Such an amazing structure with rich history surrounding it! Thanks for enlightening me and enriching my knowledge about it.
Thanks, appreciate the feedback, and glad to hear it's been helpful!
analysis i,nsight and the presentation of the facts is so good, it makes it meaningful to listen to you over and over
Thanks, glad you've found it helpful!
amazing work❤
Thanks!
Fantastic video. The wall's ability to protect rebellions from within was something I couldn't have imagined. Good stuff.
Great channel.
Thank you!
I’ve just recently started watching your channel and HOLY COW I love your content! I feel as though eastern history is often neglected here in the United States and I love that you have made a point to create videos covering the region and specifically ancient China. It’s endlessly fascinating and you’re an amazing speaker, I really enjoyed your videos on the Roman empires presence on the Liberian peninsula and Ancient Greece as well! Easily one of my favorite content creators!
Thanks, appreciate the kind words. Yeah for Chinese history it's one of those areas where unfortunately there just isn't a lot of info available in English relative to what's available in Chinese, so hopefully I can help demystify some of that. And glad to hear you've liked the Roman/Greek videos too. I have some partial drafts on more Mediterranean stuff but have just been backed up so haven't been able to finish them yet, hopefully soonish though.
There are too many errors in this person's video, especially regarding the Great Wall. Many dynasties in ancient China built the Great Wall, but their functions were different. The Han Dynasty's Great Wall was built within the territory of the Xiongnu, which was simply to help the Han army effectively occupy territory; At the same time, the Great Wall is not a city wall, but a sentry post. China's border is too long to deploy too many troops. The role of the Great Wall is to discover enemy troops, light beacon fires, and transmit signals to surrounding military camps, allowing the main forces to gather and prepare for battle
@@linshitaolst4936 I wonder if you have really watched the video. All of your points have been mentioned in the video as well.
@bonawang4995 Okay, maybe I watched the video too carelessly, because I have seen many foolish comments from European and American history enthusiasts, saying that the Great Wall is useless and that the Mongols can bypass it..... What I want to refute is that the Great Wall is not a city wall, but a sentry post. The condition that determines whether the nomadic people can defeat China is not the strength of the city wall, but the Chinese army. Once the Chinese dynasty is corrupt and declining, the combat effectiveness of the army will decrease, and the nomadic people have hope of winning
This is terrific! The history of China is so fascinating; you present it so beautifully.
I just finished watching "The Story of Ming Lan," which takes place during the Northern Song Dynasty. They regularly refer to the Lost 16 Prefectures. I wondered where these were located. Thanks!
They're a border region centered around modern-day Beijing. Without them it was hard for the Northern Song Dynasty to build effective defenses against invasions from the north.
失落的幽云十六州，是叛军石敬瑭，为了获得北方契丹人的支持和承认，把土地送给了契丹，导致长城也在北方民族势力范围内。
失去长城的情况下，这也是为什么宋朝在防御大范围边境线时，很难守住北方民族偷袭的原因，
也是历史上北宋都城被骑兵包围的最主要的直接原因。
@@gatesofkilikienNorthern Song did pretty well in its early wars against Liao. Without the 16 prefectures, they made up by building dikes and canals ( and planting of trees) in Northern Hebei to not only obstruct Liao raids but the canals also helped funnel supplies to the Song garrisons. Surprisingly even on the field, the Song forces were not all trash but did hold their own against the Liao in a number of battles during this period. It’s only after Chanyuan treaty that things went really downhill for the Song military.
Great video! Surprised this topic hasn't been answered this frankly before/I hadn't even thought about how useful it really was. Definitiely susbcribing, keep it up! :)
Very good analysis.
Great video. You explain things clearly. Have you made one about Chinese inventions (eg. printing & gun-powder?).
Thanks, and not yet, although these are topics I'm sure I'll talk about in the future especially during the respective periods they were developed/invented.
Nice video
Thanks!
Very interesting. The Great Wall is amazing!!!! Keep it up man
thanks!
I love walls. That's why I prefer Age of Empires 2 over Rise of Nations.
nice video bro.
Thanks!
You are an amazing educator and a gifted communicator. This video is great. I have always been interested in imperial China. In the US, eastern history is not typically covered in any great detail. Subscribed!
Thanks, appreciate the kind words, and glad you've enjoyed the video!
Very interesting
Thanks!
Very good video. Roman walls built between England and Scotland. Hadrians wall and the Antonine wall. Thanks
Not to forget the limes in Germany…
Great video! I always wondered how practical it was! Wish the Dynasty Warriors games covered this aspect of ancient China!
I think it wasn't very effective at preventing incursions but it was effective in preventing retreats.
This is mirrored by the Romans too. In the 4th century, the army was reformed from primarily heavy infantry to cavalry and light infantry. The limitanei border forces were stationed in garrison forts to funnel barbarian raids through unprotected routes. The mobile comitatensis armies usually couldn't keep pace with barbarian raids, so instead ambushed the barbarians on their retreat while they were weighed down by plunder. The limitanei slowed and funnelled the enemy until the comitatensis could arrive to clean up.
a good deterrent if history shows that ppl dont come out alive
One of the best video on the great wall of china.
Thanks! Appreciate the kind words and support
03:33 Mulan movie is one thing.
However, according to the Ballad of Mulan, Mulan was a citizen of Toba Wei. In the ballad, the leader of Toba Wei was called great khaan.
Toba Wei was a nomadic state originated from Hunnu (so called Xionnu) and became semi-nomadic and city state later.
Mulan called the king as the great khaan in the ballad, which suggests she was referred to Toba Wei that was a semi- or full nomadic state. From that angle, the great wall wouldn't serve much for nomads who controlls the great wall like how Manchu's (Qing Dynasty) abandoned the wall.
Therefore, it wasn't a suprise a female to be a warrior. Women warriors were common in nomadic society without any discrimination.
It is a fine point often missed by the Western audiences, since Disney decided to import Mulan. We learned the poem and had to memorize it in middle school. And so it was clear that it was from the Northern Dynasties, which were Sinonized Hu tribes. Toba Wei were of the Xianbei tribe. And so, the poem reflects much of the more open nomadic tribes culture from the Northern Dynasties. So, yes, they were still considered Chinese, since they gradually adopted many aspects of Han Culture.
Also, Northern Wei or Toba Wei faced its own nomadic enemy in the north, called Ro-ran. It's not beyond reason to see they employee the various walls and frontier fortification against this nomadic tribe.
I mean, many of northern tribes who settled in China adopted Chinese customs, culture and agricultural lifestyle, so it's not a huge stretch to imagine that they could imitate the Chinese wall building strategy as well. It's known that the Liao empire, established by the nomadic khitans, built parts of the great wall to defend against other nomads.
Very interesting video. What sources did you use to get this information? 12:31
It's kind of insane how little we talk about this absolutely massive monument... it's sooo fing long and was built ages ago and everyone's just like: "yeah no biggie"
They're kinda THE tourist attraction for China, so I don't know about little but, I guess maybe there's just not much to say? The system is interesting, but there's not much big story about big battles about the defense there that I know of.
@@Hell_O7 I guess it is a tourist attraction. But I find that in the general "history space" there is little talk about the logistic necessary to build and maintain a massive wall like that in the middle ages or even before
Even though Song dynasty didn't build a wall, the jurchen Jin dynasty did. But their arrogance and incompetence forced the garrisons to rebel and defect to the Mongols. Giving the Mongols access to the empire. With that, the mongol managed to loot Jin armouries allowing them to field heavy cavalry. But still, Jin was a tough nut to crack and didn't end right away.
北方边军挺喜欢叛变的，日本侵华时，毛泽东都写诗骂北方汉奸多😂
The similarity between the Jin Dynasty and the Song Dynasty lies in that they were not qualified horse trainers. In the early days of the Song Dynasty, they inherited more than 1.9 million horses left over after the Tang Dynasty split. However, in the middle and later stages, the Song Dynasty had to spend a high price to purchase horses from nomadic tribes. The founder of the Jin Dynasty, Jurchen, was an excellent knight in the early days, but their horse breeding skills were also poor because Jurchen was a fishing and hunting people, not a nomadic people. In the late stage, The Jurchen, who once had the strongest heavy cavalry in East Asia, also wanted to buy horses from the Dangxiang and Khitan people in the west
Tbf the Romans do have an a large network of walls and fortifications that protected the frontier from germanic forces that to acted as a deterrence to small scale raids and an early warning system to a much larger force, of which can seek help upon to big fortifications/camps to which serve as the a staging point to intercept said barbaric forces.
most of it did not survived tho to the modern day due of it being made primary out of wood, a most common material in the area, the exceptions would be the Hadrian's Wall and Antonian Wall of which many parts of it is made out of stone.
"What waslike watchtower duty like on the Roman Frontier" by Invita has a good documentary about it.
@@aldrinmilespartosa1578but is not like 10 meter high 2 meter wide and 4000 km long in China
@@carkawalakhatulistiwa it mostly boils down to the geography, the materials present, and the the differing ways they handle the borders.
Not saying the Romans have as an impressive set of walls (aside from the Theodosian walls) but its system certainly have its counterpart.
@spiritualpathseeker - Ancient China absolutely did employ mercenaries and auxillary allies from foreign peoples and "barbarian" tribes. The Han Dynasty and Jin Dynasty (which existed around the same time as the Roman Republic and the classical Western Roman Empire) employed non-Chinese people such as the Qiang, Di, Jie, Xiongnu, Wuhuan, XIanbei, Nanman, Yue/Baiyue, etc people into their armies. During the Han Dynasty, the southern Xiongnu confederation became a vassal of the Han Dynasty while the northern Xiongnu confederation was partially destroyed and forced to migrate westward (potentially becoming the different groups of Huns). During the Invasion of the Five Barbarians, the foreign groups/tribes such as the southern Xiongnu, Jie, Xianbei, Qiang, and Di peoples became sinicized enough that they set up their own hybrid Chinese kingdoms in northern Chinese after the collapse of the northern part of the Jin Empire.
Awesome
😀
This has to be one of the most interesting interpretations of the historical role of the Great Wall.
Great
Thanks!
In 2023 there were a story where some idiotic Chinese contractors demolishing a part of the wall for better access but got in deep trouble because it was a historical monument
You stated that a large number of ancient chinese dynasties have invested heavily in the great wall, but then I wonder, from what point in time onwards do you consider these prior walls to be the Great Wall? I can't remember you stating this.
personally I think the Ming period is the peak period for it as they have the most usage of the wall and the build most of the ones we can see in the modern era. (the impressive stone ones)
@@ssrbgangimaribotan6thofthe12 So you consider the Great Wall to reach back to further than the Ming empire, correct?
Perhaps it can be traced back to the vassal states during the Zhou Dynasty, that is, before China was unified in the modern sense.
The ancient world's greatest chill spot
Isny the An Lushan rebellion, shown at the end, the rebelling that infamously resulted in 30000 people being cannabalised?
Yup in the siege/defense of Suiyang
大唐问题。各个朝代灭亡原因都非常奇葩，总之最后导致中国越来越保守，到清朝时达到巅峰。
但保守意味着落后，所以清朝末年可以说是最丧权辱国的朝代。
👍👍👍
Wait, what about limes romanus?
I was wondering what if Great Wall was rebuilt to modern standards to deal with modern theater what would it be like? Walls being wider, taller, longer, materials used more sturdy, with warship guns for defense etc?
One important part of a modern equivalent would be electronic counter-measures to block GPS signals and drone commands. Maybe even some EMP systems to completely fry every crossing planes or drones systems.
@@aixtom979 don't forget tall wall woulf be good cause of EMP, height of structure can add purpose to so Fi have go low tech it has role for infiltration from the ground, as when migrants when they went across USA boarder if they make tall enough that it requires stuff like latter trucks or noisy underground stuff which would be noticable, add ground penetrating radar, and more.
I do believe walls still have role but its matter of how such things like castles and great walls evolve to modern threats and concerns, not to ment stop per day say but slow down or act deterrent, even if only stops like 60% of illegal immigrants and smuggling, that is 60% of resources you fan put into other areas where you are still having problems, to lower it to like 70 or 80 percent if possible.
Technology like castles, fortresses, citadel's, walls, great walls, is to me just waiting for its own revolution, like we had in the industrial revolution. And what not it just matters how and who, can pull it off
The Great Wall is not a city defense, it is connected by many watchtowers. Its function is to monitor enemies on the plateau. Once a target is found, the Great Wall will light a beacon and gather troops in the rear military camp
The modern threat of China would coming from the sea.
Your English is perfect.
the Rong (戎) people were probably the QIangic Gyalrong (嘉絨)
the Beidi, were they mongols and khitans?
Beidi is people related with Chinese different from nomad who live in steppe
@@mimorisenpai8540 who is Heidi? you are Heidi? How is Heidi?
@@xXxSkyViperxXx beidi
@@mimorisenpai8540 alright heidi, were 狄 a bunch of Qiangic people?
odd you didn't mention Hadrian's wall..excellent otherwise
I havent seen the video, but in my opinion it was a great wall
Maybe I missed it, but what about going around the wall? there seems to be plenty of space to do so.
It just would be highly impractical to do so, since the wall would have predominantly been built through each to pass areas near wealthy settlements. There were also many different groups of nomadic peoples with different degrees of closeness to the Chinese dynasties, so that nomadic tribe may likely have to pass through hostile territory to attack in a roundabout way.
@@gatesofkilikien ty for responding
Nomads : xiongnu mongols with their horse advantage up north, hit and run for thousands of years. Can't chase thus the great wall is created: a watch/signal tower and dam for diverting invasion forces. Wall itself isn't to be scare of but it has stairs of death pattern, you'll fall crashing to your death as traps were installed throughout.
I know too that they would often ally 1 Barbarian/nomadic peoples and pit them against others on the border.
The Song Dynasty also heavily intermarried with the Jin who eventually conquered them in an effort to use them as a buffer against the Liao... or was it the other way around? lol...
Another thing that is often forgotten about the Song Dynasty is that they had a REALLY POWERFUL economy, even the best globally at the time. All the nomadic nations depended on Song heavily economically, some even adapted Song's currency, so despite losing the 16 prefectures, Song still had a good leverage on the surrounding nations.
I think Rome is a bad comparison as they in fact had the exact pendant to the Great wall of China: the Limes which was a wall and network of garison and fortifications expanding all along the frontier to Germania which stretches across half of Europe and those frontier troops manning the wall were notorious for being the first to rebel and declare am emperor of their own
Roman version was Hadrians Wall. Also the late Byzantines had a wall across Greece to keep out the Turks.
Just came back from Beijing last week and visited the Great Wall. I knew it was for defense purposes but your perspective / opinion on why historically China didn’t attempt to concur the Xiongnu (nomads) makes sense now. It doesn’t benefit them anyway.
Good video as always. When I walked on the Wall 18 years ago, it was easy to see how it would be difficult for horsemen to pass it.
I recommend visiting it if given a chance, especially at the less touristy areas of it.
When you mention that some dynasties built the Great Wall, and some didn’t, what do you mean by that? Did the dynasties that didn’t build it exist before the first stretch of the Great Wall was created, or do you mean they didn’t built it out more?
for Last dynasty Qing they from outside. they intermarried with monglian tribes as allies so they officially abandent the Greatwall function in policy. Thats why Qing get 13,000,000+ SqKm above all Chineese Dynasties in history.
Sui, Tang, Song, Yuan, and Qing didn't built wall.
Sui and Tang because Gokturk and Goguryeo will got alert if they build wall and will hard to expand to North if they built wall.
Song due to not control entire North China because of khitan, Jurchen and Tangut.
Yuan and Qing they founded by barbarian
I remember being like 8 yo, before the time of the internet, the Great Wall was such a legendary concept in Europe that people made all kinds of rumors about it.
I remember there was a guy in school who told me that the wall was a 1km high and 80km thick... Yes you heard me right, 80km thick, and I was like "woooah, so if they climb the wall, they need to walk 80km to get to the other side, that's so epic."
Great video. Just one detail, your map of Qing Dynasty (11:55) shows Manchuria's current border with Russia. But according to a recent video by RealLifeLore, China extended to the coast.
I know video channels are not the best information sources by themselves, but this extended area was highly stressed out by RLL as it supported its point that historically Russia has been a enemy of China due to territory disputes, which is a fact.
The map shown in this is after the treaty of aigun and the treaty of peking in 1861, which gave the russians the territory, I suspect this map is supposed to represent somwhere around 1885- 1910.
historically Russia didn't reach China until very recent in the 1800s. Russia fought China indirectly in Xinjiang, gained some land around the board, but not much comparing to the northeast of China. The treaty which Qing gave up its land to Russia was much more well known outside of China then in China today, because most of the treaties signed by Qing government were unfair and being the result of foreign occupation. That treaty surprisingly was not that unfair, and the land gave up by Qing was historically the homeland of some nomadic people, even more north than the royal family of Qing came from, while never being officially well governed by the Qing government. As a result, it's mostly not being regarded as a part of China anyway, but definately including it into the map of which parts were lost from Qing, just to show QIng is the worst.
Qing Dynasty originally controlled and ruled the area to the east of the Stanovoy Range or Wai Xing An Mountains 外興安嶺. The border with Russia and China were confirmed back in 1689 in the Treaty of Nerchinsk. However, as Qing weakens, Russia continued to push east and in 1858 in the Treaty of Aigun, the local Qing governor was pressured by the Russians to signed all those lands away. This was confirmed in the Treaty of Peking in 1860. That's how Russia got those land so that they have access to a port on the pacific, thought not a never freezing port at Hai shen wei 海參威 or Vladivostok.
Well done.
I don't think there are many people who get the fact that the Wall - was a road.
.
Thanks!
And yes the improved communication network was definitely one of the many benefits the wall provided.
Any idea why Chinese dynasties struggled with raising the horses necessary for a military cavalry?
Also, it's probably a really hard question, but were there any times where there were particular immediate political or economic benefits to building / fortifying the wall? Like giving contracts to "friendly" builders, giving people busywork, or funneling resources into areas you might want to build stronger relationships in?
Best guess would be the Mongolians already took a ton of them
It generally just comes down to if said dyansty owns the Hetao region, its terrain would be critical to raise large amounts of horses
Ie Ming, Qing armies could field large amounts of cavalry, while the Song dynasty that did not own it for most of its existance fielded predominantly infantry
I believe it a large part of the issue is because Horses (like Iron, Salt and even Cattle) were heavily regulated in China.
to add to the guy who explains about the HeTao region, basically most of the region in China south of the Wall are very hot and humid in summer and very cold in winter. This meant many changes of climates in different extremes, which is harder for the commonly nomadic horses to survive. The climate makes them more susceptible to diseases and harder for them to grow bigger. Additionally they don't have that many land for the hroses to graze as most of the land China owned are farmlands that doesn't suit grazing. and grazing requires a lot of land, which the nomads doesn't lack off and thus the nomads can get as many horses as they wanted cause they have the grazing lands and the climate. Additionally the culture also contributes as most of the ones south of the great walls are farmers while the north ar nomads which are used to herding and requires horses to survive as they need to herd their livestock (mostly consists of lamb) all day on horseback. Also hunting is a big part of their culture too.
@@glenbe4026 that's a misinformation, while iron salt and cattle are strictly controlled several ancient Chinese emperors tried to promote the breeding of horses through incentives and policies towards the commoners and farmers but the climate, culture and the amount of grazing pastures are very limited that horses hardly multiplies as fast and as strong as the nomadic counterpart, additionally they get sick more often too due to the climate. So they mainly failed to do so.
Additionally the cattle is not even controlled like "not allowed to be bred" at all, it's more like you are not allowed to kill them off for meat while they are in their prime cause its a luxury. At that time period cattles are important for the livelihood of every farmers in the world. they are the farming machine that tilled the land, providing milk as sustenance and when they are dying/old they can provide meat for the farmers. (thus also the reason why they are sacred in India and not allowed to be killed/eaten).
while salt and iron are basically strategic commodity of that time period. iron is basically like uranium of our era, well might not be as deadly but it basically arming the weapons for anybody who ownes them. So they controlled it to prevent peasant rebellion from succeeding to arm up with advanced weaponaries (of that era) or nomads from having too strong of equipmetns to rival to the imperial infantry (which is the only advantage they have other than fortifications, which is important to leverage to keep). while salt is a strategic component of preservation of food, you need to keep everything edible with salt. (the roman also did the same and at some point even used them as money cause how important it is). The state control int he ancient period is mainly to prevent price hike for everyone and at the same time its one of the most lucrative business in that time period as everyone needs salt.
Don’t matter what kinda walls you’ve got, all it takes is one mf to open the gates
Correction almost all of the nomadic nations all had metallurgical technologies so it wasn’t for the iron. Instead nomadic people wanted more common goods and silk etc.
I’ve the “best” way to get past the wall was to simply bride the guards
should perhaps be mentioned that rome had it's european borders along the major rivers (Rhine and Donau) and so didnt have a need for a wall there
if use as a defensive - It's meh
if use as a market trading road: Shit can still work today if you choose to since a thousand year ago.
so basically, the Great Wall functioned like a River. Like Danube and Rhine were used by the Romans to prevent "barbarians" entering from wherever they wanted, alarm posts and points to funnel the enemy into when entering and getting out...?
Extremely effective. Walls are better at keeping people in than out, and that's what it was for.
Also, lol @ Xiongnu - beware the bear women!
I wonder if someone said similar thing to President Trump.
@@chiensyang I tried telling people then... They couldn't think past their political fervor
What's up with the severely mono-tone delivery? Robot voice?
pretty good it still keeps the people from getting out
Did you never hear of the limes or the Hadrians wall? Rome had great walls as well.
Mr Turks my wavelength is completely over top of you !
Now we've got Chinese robot voices oh my
Just to point out Han did invade and almost genocided them Shounglow or Huns with the first 1M man army including a massive highly skilled ace horse archers with posion. Some sources say there was another army also a million strong that came after tge defeat to clean up and prevent grouping.
Qin and other northen states during 7 waring state period and spring and autom wars started the wall idea. However, the wall wasn't a primary defense and did raide the nomads in the north easily defeating them with tactics big brains moves. At the time the western Barbarians where the strong difficult foe whom a big portion of the near by ones ailed themselves with Qin.
One interesting thing is that, despite the existence of the Great wall, by the collapse of the Han, local rebellions near the frontier still sprang up in defiance of Luoyang, such is the case with Gongsun Zan, Gungsun Du and Dong Zhuo, Ma teng, and Han sui. Although for the Liang forces, the great wall had not yet extended to Chang an yet, Generals and warlords in the Hebei region still rebelled following the collapse of authority in luoyang. I guess nothing is foolproof.
Yes as at that time period the great wall is not as huge/developed as Ming or the other future dynasties (most of the ones we can see in the modern era are from Ming dynasty) but it still worked most of the time. Additionally the crisis of the eastern Han dynasty (aka the Three Kingdoms period) came from the inside. Hold on tight imma explain them throughoutly with a massively long essay cause i have too much time on hands lol.
The main cause is the yellow turban rebellion which happened and failed to be quelled before it became big because of the inner corruption and ineptness of the emperor's army and government that they can't handle groups of peasants with pointy sticks. This happens especially when the army are lead by He Jin (emperor's brother in law, a peasant butcher with no military experience) and Dongzhuo (yes Dongzhuo did lead the imperial army against the yellow turban, and it's before his coup against the eunuchs and the adult emperor is still alive). The imperial army only ever won against the rebels went hey got lead by Huangfu Song (a capable and loyal general who originally were the one leads the army before DongZhuo) and Lu Zhi (the imperial tutor if I remember it right). But in the end Lu Zhi died in the campaign and Huangfu Song got framed by the eunuchs and pulled back from he frontlines TWICE and i think got executed the second time cause the eunuchs are afraid of him and they are close to the emperor so they slandered him to death (due the increase of his influence cause of the victories against the rebels).
That event lead tot he emperor calling warlords from all over china to help him thus decreasing the influence he have and increasing the autonomy of warlords from all over the place. Additionally with the death of the emperor the imperial power basically is free for all at that point, and the eunuchs the one who held the power (aka the child emperor) are corrupt and have the ire of basically everyone in China, from peasant to nobilities and scholars all hates them. So the coup against the eunuch happened where He Jin (yes that butcher) organized a coup attempt to kill of all the eunuchs with the help of CaoCao and YuanShao, and they felt they don't have enough soldiers in the capital to do this.
Thus they dug their own grave by calling Dongzhuo to bring an army into the capital. While that happened the eunuchs all found out that He Jin wants to kill them off and told the empress (aka He jin's own sister) to call him into the palace and then they killed him off just like that, while YuanShao and CaoCao are right outside the gate where He Jin is being killed off at the time (cause they went together and sends him off expecting him to just meet up with the empress) and so they brings their guards inside and kills off all the eunuchs and started their purge. this brings chaos into the capital cause they are killing all the eunuchs they can find (eunuchs made up of most of the male servants in the palace). While the chaos and burning of the capital happened Dongzhuo came and luckily found the child emperors. Thus the opportune moment to seize power as he has the biggest stick, he has tens of thousands of soldiers right outside the capital and he can just do whatever he wanted at that point.
Meanwhile for Gongsun Zhan and Gongsun Du they is not exactly rebelling against the emperor, Gongsun Zhan used to be a good friend of the adult emperor's brother, who is an influential man and general int he north who is popular amongst the people cause he ahs been protecting the frontier together. But due to conflicts between each other Gongsun Zhan killed him (i think that's all that he did against the imperial family). He mostly fighta against the northern nomads (thus the famous white cavalry title he got from he nomads cause he always brought whit horses with him and he is efficient at killing them) an also fighting YuanShao before getting killed. While Gongsun Du is very obscure and far enough that he is basically a Manchu/Korean at that point. He may have proclaimed himself as an emperor but no one cares about him cause he did nothing until CaoCao took over the north, which he got conquered easily anyway while being a passive and indecisive guy.
While Ma Teng and Han Sui actually defected from the Liang rebels and helped the imperial army quelling the Liang rebellion. While the rebellion itself is actually pretty contained and never even reached Chang 'an (the old capital that's closer to the western part where the Liang rebelled) as they are still outside parts of the great wall. Ma Zhao meanwhile a different case he rebelled because he doesn't care about his father (Ma Teng who is held hostage by CaoCao in the capital and they actually have a strained relationship), and he got talked into by HanSui to rebel (Cause Hansui's clan is close with the Ma clan and he is pretty close toe Ma Chao, he even offered a marriage with his daughter to MaChao) while at that time CaoCao is busy elsewhere thus an opportune moment to strike. Additionally they are practically being driven to corner by CaoCao with his policies thus they both rebelled and failed anyway cause, again the walls actually worked and CaoCao rushed back to crush them once and for all.
btw if you want to know more about three kingdoms period you might want to watch SeriousTrivia he played Total War Three Kingdoms and do a lot of lore series of the historical version of it and sometimes the romance version and explains the difference of the historical records and the romance of the Three kingdoms. (also he is a Chinese guy so he can directly translate a lot of poems and historical contexts that may be missed by most western sources)
@@ssrbgangimaribotan6thofthe12 Haha, I guess we're from the same Community, I watch serious trivia too. But I was more so referring to how, even though the wall was able to provide stability for the Central government in the bordering regions, it wasn't ALWAYS the case, as with warlords such as Gongsun Zan, who basically conducted a military coup against government appointed Liu Yu. I mean, my man literally did a miltiary coup, overthrew, battled, and then executed a scion of the royal family and a government appointed PREFECT who outranked him, thats an example of open rebellion along the Great wall. Regardless, most of the collapse came from within, and the wall did have little to do, but I'm just saying its one rare case where it wasn't able to deter rebellion from within.
@@Killerbee4712 Nothing is eternal or 100% perfect. The reality of life is things works until they simply don't. It is like a tire on a car. It works 99% of the time until it eventually hits a sharp object and deflates, or used until the traction on tire itself wears out and becomes no longer usable.
It is the same thing with your skin. Your skin at any given time is preventing an infinite amount of problems, it is preventing infinite amount of viruses and bacteria from infecting your body, and it is what is hold your guts and flesh in. It doesn't mean it doesn't have failure points, since we all know people get sick all the time due to vulnerabilities such as your ears, nose, mouth, and open wounds. But at the end of the day the Great Wall was as necessary for China as is skin is for humans and most animals.
The Chinese dynasty did not truly solve the problem of warlord rebellion until the Song Dynasty, provided that the power of generals was limited, they were regularly transferred from their positions to serve in different military camps, to prevent officers from cultivating their confidants among soldiers, and each military camp had a civil servant responsible for supervising the work of the generals
Great road of China
I think one thing the wall also do, identifies
Surprised to know the ancient Chinese were poor at raising cavalry
Aren't these the same people from which Lu Bu and his legendary horse Red Hare came from?
From the Greek city in Central Asia , Batria
I mean…the romans kinda had a Great Wall of their own: the Limes
This is pure speculation but I wonder the psychological effect of the great wall. Every empire in history saw outsiders as inferior yet without walls they were forced to face them. The Great Wall reinforced the division between China and the peoples beyond in turn creating a more inward facing, less expansionist empire than Rome. If you finish building a fence would you want to rebuild it every time your border grows?
This thinking could then be expanded to the Ming treasure voyages, an attempt to expand China's reach not through colonisation and conquest like later Europeans but by establishing further tributaries in shows of wealth and power before returning to China. If the Great Wall was never built would much more of the world be speaking Mandarin? Again, this is shower thought territory but it is interesting.
Imagine you are a rich guy with a big house and your property consists of all the good land that is known to you. Your land not only makes you self-sufficient but also the most rich guy in the known world. Your land is unfortunately surrounded by a ghetto since you toke all the good land. Wouldn't you also want to build a fence? and the only motivation to go outside of the fence is to teach the ghetto people a lesson so that they would stop stealing from you all the time.
"The Romans didn't build a wall."
Emperor Hadrian has entered the chat.
The Roman Empire built many frontier walls
Damn city Mongolians
I like it how neighbors of China are always "nomads" or "barbarians" until they are Mongols. It's as if they had no names to refer to. It's persistent between channels, platforms even media it's mentioned.
It was the same for most empires. Roman Empire being the most obvious example. Anyone not "Roman" or "civilized tribe" were considered barbarians
Watch Chinese language media/platforms/channels, they are always named. It's just an English media problem I think.
But I think most of the nomads also did themselves no favours by not writing things down so everything we know about them (even their names) comes from the lens of the Chinese who recorded everything.
Every dynasty in China has fallen only because of internal strife. All were strong in martial arts. By the time the odd kingdom of Song changed Chinese history.
Thats not true isnt it? For example they knew Xiongnu since Qin era and called them that way.
You Mean the Great Wall of Sountern Mongolia ?
It sure as hell not useful enough to fully stop any invasion, but at least with its existence, smaller incursions will most likely not so successful, and larger incursions are rarer when you do the comparison
It now have a Great Hole!
I am just gonna summarize and say.. "the great wall of China was not bad for awhile but expensive" hahahahhaa
Let's build a wall and make the Khan's pay for it
Romans were also always planning to expand, whereas china had no real interest in occupying non arable land.
It's always hard to compare two very different civilizations directly, but I'd say the desire to expand was pretty similar between the Roman Empire and the Chinese empires, at least the earlier Chinese empires before the Song Dynasty.
In the case of the Chinese empires don't forget southern China, since for most of Chinese history much of it was pretty economically unproductive compared to northern China, and some parts like Yunnan and Guizhou were conquered fairly recently in the late 1300s (the region had been conquered during the Han Dynasty but then became independent around the Sui/Tang dynasties, not unlike Vietnam which became independent but then managed to stay that way). And this doesn't even include territories like Tibet, Xinjiang, etc, although they're also much more recent than the Roman Empire so direct comparisons between states 1000+ years apart is also going to be tricky.
The Romans also did their fair share of turning down expansion opportunities, such as abandoning the part of Germania between the Rhine and the Elbe after the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest (the land was economically unproductive, but I'm sure if the political will existed they could have still found a way to reconquer the area), or immediately abandoning what is now the Czech Republic & Slovakia that Marcus Aurelius conquered during the Macromannic Wars, or leaving Scotland perpetually unconquered.
Ancient Burmese defence is the best.Other south east asian have nest city border that no one destory.But we Burmese have legs.We run forest and ambush them. Noe one cann't win that on Land.Only British win with their ship.
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I heard that Chinese horses sucked because the grass there lacked selenium.