1. Invasion and Exploration
And why didn’t China colonize the world?
Shade in lightly the Tang dynasty on your map (very lightly)

2. Now we need to revisit some people we have encountered before.

3. The Steppe In central Asia there is a large area called the steppes.
These stretched from The Black Sea to Northern China.

4. Following the herds
This is where Mongolian peoples followed their herds as they grazed.
This is the homeland of the Mongols.
What does it look like?

5. Mongolian herds
Originally they were a people who were loosely connected to each other and spent their time raising cattle, goats, sheep, and most importantly horses.

6. Recap They were a horse culture. They lived their lives on horseback.
They also were a fierce people and were incredibly skilled at waging war.
As you know they were experts at archery, but they also used spears and swords.

7. Temujin In the 1160s a Mongolian child named Temujin was born.
His name meant ‘blacksmith’

8. A hard childhood
After Temujin’s father, Yesugei died, his clan disbanded.
Temujin, his brothers and mother were shamed and had to eke out a living on shrubs and small animals.

9. Fratricide Food was scarce, so Temujin divided it up how he needed to.
When he caught his half brother stealing fish from the tribe, he shot him in the heart with in arrow.
His mother was mad, but it was vital to their survival.

10. Meeting in the Gobi
In 1206 there was a meeting in the Gobi desert, which covers parts of Mongolia and China.
This is the Mongolian cabinet and they still meet in the Gobi desert.

11. The Khan
At this meeting the Mongolian tribes united to elect Temujin, Genghis Khan.
The title meant ‘strong ruler’.

12. The Mongolian Army
It was at this time that he brought together Mongol laws into a new law code.
And he made a council of tribal chiefs to help plan military campaigns.
As mentioned in our Islam Unit Khan wanted to conquer the known world and for this he assembled his armies. 
They were, at this time, the most skilled fighters in the world.

13. Khan invades China In 1211 Khan sent his armies to invade China.
It took them only 3 years to take all of Northern China
They focused on cities that controlled the Silk Road.

14. Sons of Khan
Khan died in 1227 leaving his large empire to be divided up by his four sons, who continued to expand the empire.
In the years that followed the Mongols amassed the greatest land empire in history.

15. Mongols build roads!
Eventually the Mongol empire was a peaceful one, they encouraged trade and established taxes on goods traded throughout Asia.

16. Conversion
After the initial violence of the take over the Mongols showed they had great respect for the cultures that they encountered in the major cities.
They adopted many of the beliefs and customs of their subjects.
In the west they learned about and converted to Islam.

17. Gunpowder turned lethal
When the Mongols fought the Chinese they learned about gunpowder and the fire lance.
These weapons made the Mongols even more powerful.

18. Kublai Khan
In 1260 Genghis Khan’s grandson, Kublai Khan became the new ruler.
He continued the conquest of China.

19. Khanbaliq
He moved his capital from Karakorum in Mongolia to Khanbaliq in China, which today we call Beijing.
The Mongols put an end to the Song dynasty when they conquered Southern China.
The new dynasty they began was the Yuan (YOO-AHN)dynasty.

20. The Yuan Dynasty
Kublai ruled for about 30 years and the dynasty lasted about 100 years.

21. Yuan government
The Mongols had a very different culture than the Chinese and they had different laws.
This meant that there was some separation between the two populations.
Khan gave the top government posts to Mongols and the rest of the government continued to be run by the Chinese officials who still had to pass the exams.

22. Buddhist Mongols
Mongols in China were predominantly Buddhist, but were tolerant of other religions.

23. The Ural Mountains
Though there were still geographic and cultural barriers between the East and the West one traveler from Europe managed to go to China and come back to write about it.

24. Marco…Polo He was an Italian from Venice and his name was Marco Polo.
Polo was in China for about 16 years.
In that time he enjoyed a special status in Kublai Khan’s court.
Khan sent Polo on fact- finding missions and business trips.
Italy

25. Spice for a bland diet
The Mongolian Empire that stretched from China to Eastern Europe increased the trade of goods from east to west.
This made Europe fall in love with the goods and spices of the East.

26. Only Nature could stop them…
The Mongols also added Vietnam and Korea. They also forced their people to build warships to attack Japan but something we will learn about later kept him from ever getting there.
In similar fashion the Mongols didn’t conquer India because of the Himalayas.

27. The Ming dynasty
Add this to your map.

28. Yuan decline
After the death of Kublai Khan the Yuan dynasty slowly broke apart and eventually the resentment that the Chinese felt at Mongol control made them want their own dynasty.

29. Founding a new dynasty
In 1368 a rebel leader named Zhu Yuanzhang (JOO YOO-AHN-JAHG)
Became the emperor.
Zhu reunited the country and made his capital Nanjing in Southern China.
Here he founded the Ming dynasty.

30. Hong Wu The Emperor took the name Hong Wu or ‘military Emperor’
He was ruthless and trusted no one
He had anyone he suspected of treason killed.

31. Yong Le His son, Yong Le, moved the capital back to Beijing.
He built the Imperial city, or the Forbidden City as it came to be called.
Emperors after him lived there for more than 500 years.

32. The work of the civil service
Once again they restored the civil service exams and made the tests even harder than before.
The Ming officials also took a census.
They ordered that buildings and farms that had been destroyed by the Mongols to be rebuilt.
The grand canal was expanded and internal trade began to thrive again.

33. Flowering of Chinese culture
Agriculture also grew under the Ming.
‘Chinese artisans who made silk, and porcelain were supported and became wealthier.
The Ming period writers also produced many novels and wrote dramas.

34. Exploration
Most importantly the Ming dynasty put effort into building ships.
They became interested in exploring the outside world in a way China had not before.
They also wanted to increase their influence abroad.

35. Chinese naval power
Emperor Yong Le decided to send out a fleet of ships.
The fleet went on seven voyages.
The emperor wanted them to show other places the dominance of China.

36. The Chinese Admiral
The leader he chose for the fleet was a Chinese Muslim, and court official named Zheng He (JUNG HUH).

37. The Fleet
The Frist fleet had 62 large ships, and 250 small ones and around 28,000 men.
The largest ship he had was 5 times as big as Columbus’ Santa Maria which sailed 90 years later.

38. The Voyages
The fleet went to Southeast Asia, India, Arabia, and East Africa.
He brought back to China: Sliver, spices, wood, and other goods.
From Africa he brought back animals for the Emperor’s Zoo.

39. Chinese trading ports
Chinese merchants settled near these ports and spread some Chinese culture and ideas.
They also grew rich from this trade.

40. Questions raised at court
Though the voyages were making money, Chinese court officials felt that they were a waste of money and that new ideas from outside of China were corrupting society.

41. Going against the natural order
But the biggest case against the voyages was that Confucius taught that people should place loyalty to society ahead of their own desires and the voyages to become wealthy and powerful meant that they were disobeying this principal.

42. After Zheng He’s death in 1433 China did something no Europeans would have done…

43. …They burned the fleet.

44. No more sailing
Within 50 years they had forgotten how to make the giant ships they once had.

45. Europeans arrive In 1514 a fleet from Portugal arrived.
It was the first time that Europeans had ever sailed to China, and the first direct contact between the Chinese and Europeans since Marco Polo.

46. Trade and conversion
The Portuguese had 2 goals, they wanted to trade and they wanted to convert people to Christianity.

47. Europeans seen as backward
The Imperial court didn’t take the Europeans seriously. They looked down on them as inferior, which, at the time their technology was.
Confucian Imperial College, or Guozijian, was used during the Qing and Ming dynasties as a central learning institute for Confucius studies. This is located in Beijing near the Lama Temple.

48. Macao trading post
In 1600 China decided it would be okay to trade with them and they were allowed to set up a trading post in Macao in Southern China.
Christian missionaries came there and brought with them ideas from European technologies.

49. Revolt
After a long period of prosperity, the Ming dynasty began to weaken and corrupt government officials placed heavy taxes on the people who began to revolt.

50. The Ming dynasty falls
Once law and order disappeared a people called the Manchus attacked China.
They lived just north of the Great Wall and in after defeating the Chinese armies they set up a new dynasty.
The Ming Tombs are a collection of mausoleums built by emperors of the Ming dynasty. Different animals were chosen according to their symbolism in Chinese folklore and feng shui. These tombs are located on the outskirts of Beijing.