Peth's Asian Studies

Song Dynasty (960-1279 CE)

Rise and Fall

Song Dynasty is divided into two individual periods; the Northern Song (960-1127 CE ) and the Southern Song (1127-1279 CE ). The Northern Song is united by Emperor Taizu, he was able to piece most of China together after disintegration and rebellion of the Tang Dynasty 907 CE and succeeded the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms. He built an effective system of government composed of Civilian Scholars-officials. Regional military officers were being appointed from the capital itself. He was able to concentrate power into one area, the capital at Bianjing (now Kaifeng).

The Song Dynasty was engaged with different diplomacy and warfare in order to stabilize the borders with the Tungats of the Western Xia Dynasty and the Khitans of the Liao Dynasty. The Liao Dynasty to the North (916-1125 CE), however in 1125 it was reform by the Jurchen, a tribe that inhibit within the Liao Dynasty, and establish a new dynasty, the Jin Dynasty (1115-1234 CE). The Song Dynasty made an alliance with the Jurchen during the reign of Emperor Huizong of Song (1100-1125 CE); their armies together were able to take complete control of the Liao Dynasty by 1125 CE. The Song Dynasty’s army weakness was spotted due to their poor performance by the Jing Dynasty; therefore they broke the alliances with the Song Dynasty and launched their attack in 1125 and 1127 CE. They were able to take over the capital at Kaifeng and retire the Emperor Huizong and the succeeding Emperor Qinzong of Song and most of his courts. Thus end of the Northern Song Empire.

The Southern Song with its sturdy Economy and being led by self appointed Emperor Goazong of Song, they established a new capital at Lin’an. Although being forced down south along the Huai River, the Southern Song Dynasty was able to make a stand against the in Dynasty. The government sponsor massive projects improving shipbuilding and harbors. Beacons, seaports and warehouses were built to support and improve sea navigation and trade. Because of increasing number ships in the waters of the East China Sea and Yellow Sea (to Korea and Japan), South East Asia, the Indian Ocean, and the Red Sea, it was essential to have a official standing navy to protect and support ships with maritime interest in these areas and therefore China’s and world first official standing navy in 1132. The Song prepared their navy and was prepared to face the Jin on the Yangtze in 1161 where the Battle of Tangdao and the Battle of Caishi took place. The Song forces was victorious in the both of the battles even though they were faced with 70,000 men and 600 war ships, but they won with only 3,000 men and 120 warships. The navy was equipped with better technology like the trebuchet catapults, launching gunpowder bombs at a fair range and paddle wheel ships. The Song navy was very much emphasized after that and after a century it grew to 52,000 fighting marines, but the financial and its economy is going down, but it did not stop the defensive preparation. The government also took possession of lands owned by the gentry and the upper class to fund the defensive projects, but it let to reduction of loyalty among the land owning families, some even use connections and their position to cheat on taxes.

Although the Song was able to stand up against the Jin, a new enemy emerged from the north. The Mongols led Genghis Khan (r. 1206-1227 CE), they invaded the Jin Dynasty in 1205, 1209 and 1211 and they were forced to give in to the Mongols and pay tributes. The Mongols were also able to conquer the Xia Dynasty, Korea and even as far as Middle East. The Mongols were allied with the Song until it was broke off when the song recapture its former capital Kaifeng in 1259. There war long war campaign, in 1265 the Mongols led by Kublai Khan won a significance battle at Sichuan and in 1279 the Mongols were able to beat the Song resistance and complete defeat when the child Emperor Bing Committed suicide with his officials.

Religion of Song Dynasty

During the Song Dynasty there were three religions or rather set of principles and philosophy that developed Chinese Buddhism was the main religion of the Song at the time. Buddhism was starting to decline due economic and political persecutions. So new religions were starting to emerge like Neo-Confucianism or set of principles, which influenced from Buddhism.

Taoism or Daoism is Buddhism plus Neo-Confucianism, Buddhism is the mind educator and Neo-Confucianism is the self educator. Other Foreign religions were Jew and Islam.

Legacy and Accomplishments from the Song Dynasty.

The Northern Song is the most advance and longest period of the Song Dynasty. The advancements in education and literature all were taken to a new standard. Kaifeng was one the largest city during this era. The reason for all of this to happen is because of the increase in population between 10^th and 11^th century. The expansion of rice cultivation in central and the south, with its abundance of labor and food. It fuel the change of China’s Economy to a pre-modern china. They were the first to issue bank notre. This is also why the Southern Song Dynasty was able to revive after losing land to the Jin Dynasty.

The Song Dynasty was a period of rich culture of art, philosophy and social life. We can all see this from surviving paintings and documented texts. Clothing also state rank in society of the Song people. Knowledge spread much quicker due to printing there was also the invention of movable block printing. Art and philosophy was developed to another level, landscape and portrait painting have reached more maturity and level of complexity after the Tang period. The song Dynasty is also father to many types of kung-fu, for example the “Long Fist” today or the Tàizǔ Chángquán was created by Emperor Taizu himself.

They were the first to have an official standing navy, some new technologies during that time helping to aid the navy were, paddle wheeled ships, trebuchet catapults and gun power. Developing from the gun power, the Songs were able to develop canons, rockets and bombs. From rockets, the Chinese was the first to create a multi-stage rockets, this idea has helped us sent satellites into space and helped man reached the moon

Cuisine, the first restaurant was established during the Song Dynasty, it was called “Ma Yu Ching's Bucket Chicken House” it probably developed from tea house and taverns. Also noodles that we eat today was invented during the Song Dynasty, spaghetti is believed to originate in China when Marco Polo came to visit China during these time and when he went back to Italy it later develop into spaghetti or pasta. Also the creation of tea came up during the Song Dynasty, and it spread across the world through traf

People outside China at the time.

Alexios I Komnenos or Alexius I Comnenus (1048 – August 15, 1118), Emperor of the Byzantine Empire. The military, financial and territorial recovery of the Byzantine Empire known as Komnenian restoration

Marco Polo (September 15, 1254 – January 9, 1324 at earliest but no later than June 1325), gained his famed through his world wide travels and recordings. He was the first westerner to travel the Sil

k Road, Ku

blai Khan o

f the Great Mongol Empire.

Bibliography:

www.wikipedia.org

www.google.com

www.hpmuseum.org

www.chinaknowledge.de

http://www.hyperhistory.net

Erosion

What is Erosion

Erosion is the process when things breaks down or displacement of solids by agents such as wind, water or even animals. Therefore erosion is all around us, but let us discuss about how the surface of the earth is affected by erosion along the coast line or Coastal Erosion



Coastal Erosion
The coast is a narrow contact between the land sea, and it is constantly changing due to the effects of land, air and marine processes. Most of the erosion on coast are cause by the waves from the sea as you can see from the picture to your left

There are two types of waves constructive and destructive. Waves have a circular pattern, but when it reaches the shallow water the bottom come in contact with the surface, this creates friction at the bottom causing the top part to build up, it becomes steeper and higher until it breaks and the water rushes up the the beach called the swash and the backward wash called the backwash. Constructive waves have limited energy. Most of this is used by the swash to transport the material up the beach. Destructive waves have much more energy. Most of this is used by the backwash to transport material down the beach










Now you can see how different types of waves affect the coast, but the coast itself also determines the shape. The coast is made out of rocks, there are soft rocks and hard rocks. When erosion occurs, areas with harder rocks erode slower then the softer rocks creating headlands, and the softer rocks which erode faster forms a bay. Their size depends how much each type of rock is in that area. Hard rocks can be rocks like sand stones, chalk or limestones, and soft rocks can be ricks such as clay.

Cliffs, cliffs tends to form in area of hard, resistant rocks, however there are also weakness within these rocks causing it to erode away forming caves and eventually arches. over time when it can't support anymore it collapses leaving a stack behind and eventually after the stack falls it leaves a stump. In this picture , we can see the arch and some stumps left behind. This process continue until it can not erode further or what we call a death cliff.








At the bays where there are soft rocks, we usually finds a beach. Beaches are faced with the process called longshore drift. Longshore drift is the process of the material along the coast by breaking waves. The direction of the prevailing wind is at an angle, therefore the wave is also at an angle pushing the sand particle and sediments move diagonally upwards and they are push backwards by the backwash. causing a zigzag movement, and eventually it might cause the whole beach to disappear if there are no deposition of particles from other source. This process can be slowed down by placing a wall called a groyne like in the picture





The sediment carried away longshore drift most of the time end out forming a spit on a delta or a river mouth. The spit slows down the velocity of the river creating a salt water marsh, if it closest the mouth completely it may result a lagoon. In this diagram the salt water marsh has already formed behind the spit.






After all this how can coastal erosion be hazards, coastal erosion can cost houses or building built on a cliff to completely collapse and another thing is the lost of land, or a country like Britain with coast all around, it is going to lose quite an amount of land. Coastal Erosion can be a few centimeters a year but over time it adds up. There're many schemes that slows down coastal erosion or permanently stop it. Like the groyne above or we can built a sea wall which may be curved at the top to divert the force of the wave back of to sea. We can also dump in rocks to reduce the power of the waves. This picture to you right is an example of seawall and also the wall of rocks before the sea wall to prevent coastal erosion.