China is seen variously as an ancient civilization Civilization is a term used to describe a certain kind of development of a human society. A civilized society is often characterized by advanced agriculture, long-distance trade, occupational specialization, and urbanism. Aside from these core elements, civilization is often marked by any combination of a number of secondary elements, including a extending over a large area in East Asia East Asia or Eastern Asia is a subregion of Asia that can be defined in either geographical or cultural terms. Geographically and geo-politically, it covers about 12,000,000 km2 (4,600,000 sq mi), or about 28 percent of the Asian continent, about 15 percent bigger than the area of Europe, a nation A nation is a group of people who share culture, ethnic origin and language, often possessing or seeking its own independent government. The development and conceptualization of a nation is closely related to the development of modern industrial states and nationalist movements in Europe in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, although and/or a multinational A multinational state is a state in which the population consists of two or more ethnically distinct[citation needed] nations that are of significant size.[citation needed] This contrasts with a nation-state where a single nation comprises the bulk of the population entity.
China is one of the world's oldest civilizations and is regarded as the oldest continuous civilization.[1][2] Prior to the 19th century, it possessed one of the most advanced societies and economies in the world; but through successive dynasties Historians traditionally consider a state's history within a framework of successive dynasties, particularly with such nations as China, Ancient Egypt and the Persian Empire. Much of European political history was dominated, successively and together, by dynasties such as the Carolingians, the Capetians, the Habsburgs, the Stuarts, the it then missed the industrial revolution The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to the 19th century where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transport and technology had a profound effect on the socioeconomic and cultural conditions starting in the United Kingdom, then subsequently spreading throughout Europe, North America, and eventually the world. The and began to decline.[3][4] In the 19th and 20th century, imperialism Imperialism, as defined by The Dictionary of Human Geography, is "the creation and maintenance of an unequal economic, cultural and territorial relationship, usually between states and often in the form of an empire, based on domination and subordination." Imperialism has been described as a primarily western concept that employs ", internal weakness and civil wars A civil war is a war between organized groups within a single nation state, or, less commonly, between two countries created from a formerly-united nation-state. The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies. It is high-intensity conflict, often damaged the country and its economy, and led to the overthrow of imperial Imperial is a term that is used to describe something that relates to an empire, emperor, or the concept of imperialism rule.
In 1949, after major combat ended in the Chinese Civil War The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party of China (CPC). The war began in April 1927, amidst the Northern Expedition. The war represented an ideological split between the Western-supported Nationalist KMT and the Soviet-supported Communist CPC. In the People's Republic of China the war is more commonly known, two states In 1912, Xuantong Emperor abdicated as a result of the Xinhai Revolution and the Republic of China was established by revolutionists led by Dr Sun Yat-sen. It was ruled by the Kuomintang as a single-party state. In 1921, the Communist Party of China was founded in Shanghai calling themselves "China" emerged:
- The People's Republic of China b. ^ Simple characterizations of the political structure since the 1980s are no longer possible (PRC), established in 1949, commonly known as China, has control over mainland China Mainland China, Continental China, the Chinese mainland or simply the mainland, is a geopolitical term that refers to the area under the jurisdiction of the People's Republic of China on the Asian mainland. This term excludes the PRC Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macau and the largely self-governing territories of Hong Kong Hong Kong[note 3] is one of two special administrative regions (SAR) of the People's Republic of China; the other is Macau. Situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour. With a land mass of 1,104 km2 (426 sq mi) and a population of seven (since 1997) and Macau Macau , also known as Macao (pronounced /məˈkaʊ/) is one of the two special administrative regions of the People's Republic of China, the other being Hong Kong. Macau lies on the western side of the Pearl River Delta, bordering Guangdong province to the north and facing the South China Sea in the east and south (since 1999).
- The Republic of China The Republic of China , commonly known as Taiwan, is a state in East Asia comprising the islands of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu and other minor islands located off the east coast of mainland China. Neighbouring states include the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the west, Japan to the northeast, and the Philippines to the south (ROC) established in 1912 in mainland China, now commonly known as Taiwan, has control over the islands of Taiwan Taiwan, also known as Formosa , is an island situated in East Asia in the Western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. It has comprised most (99%) of the territory of the Republic of China (ROC) since the 1950s. The term "Taiwan" has also become a commonly used alternative name both domestically and, Penghu 'Peng-hu' was first recorded in unofficial historical records and regional logs in 1171 during the Southern Song Dynasty. From the middle of the 17th century to 1895, Taiwan and the archipelago were ruled by pirates, the colonial Dutch Empire , the Koxinga kingdom, and the Qing Dynasty, successively, Kinmen Kinmen , also known as Quemoy, is a small archipelago of several islands administered by the Republic of China (ROC): Greater Kinmen (大金門), Lesser Kinmen, and some islets. Administratively, it is Kinmen County of Fukien Province, Republic of China. The county is claimed as part of Fujian's Quanzhou Prefecture by the People's Republic of, and Matsu The Matsu Islands are a minor archipelago of 19 islands and islets in the Taiwan Strait administered as Lienchiang County(連江縣; Lièng-gŏng-gâing), Fujian Province of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Not all of what is historically part of Lienchiang county is under the control of the ROC. The People's Republic of China controls the part of.
In the 1950s, change to economic policies in Taiwan transformed the island into a technology-oriented industrialized developed economy after a period of high growth rates and rapid industrialization. In mainland China, in the 1970s, reforms known as the Four Modernizations The Four Modernizations were the goals of Deng Xiaoping’s reforms. They were first introduced by Zhou Enlai in 1975 at the Fourth National People's Congress in one of his last public acts. After his death and Mao’s soon thereafter, Deng Xiaoping assumed control of the party in late 1978. In December 1978 at the Third Plenum of the 11th Central modernized the agriculture, industry, technology and defense, vastly raising living standards Standard of living is generally measured by standards such as real income per person and poverty rate. Other measures such as access and quality of health care, income growth inequality and educational standards are also used. Examples are access to certain goods (such as number of refrigerators per 1000 people), or measures of health such as life, and making the PRC one of the great powers A great power is a nation or state that has the ability to exert its influence on a global scale. Great powers characteristically possess economic, military, diplomatic, and cultural strength, which may cause other smaller nations to consider the opinions of great powers before taking actions of their own. International relations theorists have.[5][6][7]
Historically, China's cultural sphere The Culture of China is one of the world's oldest and most complex cultures. The area in which the culture is dominant covers a large geographical region in eastern Asia with customs and traditions varying greatly between towns, cities and provinces has extended across East Asia as a whole, with Chinese religion, customs Customs is an authority or agency in a country responsible for collecting and safeguarding customs duties and for controlling the flow of goods including animals, personal effects and hazardous items in and out of a country. Depending on local legislation and regulations, the import or export of some goods may be restricted or forbidden, and the, and writing systems Writing systems are distinguished from other possible symbolic communication systems in that the reader must usually understand something of the associated spoken language to comprehend the text. In contrast, other possible symbolic systems such as information signs, painting, maps and mathematics often do not require prior knowledge of a spoken being adopted to varying degrees by neighbors such as Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south. The characters that make up Japan's name mean "sun-origin", which is why Japan is, Korea Korea (Korean: 한국 Hanguk [hanɡuːk] or 조선 Joseon [tɕosʌn] – South and North Korea, respectively ) is a territory of East Asia that was formerly unified under one state, but now divided into two separate states and a region in northeastern Asia. Located on the Korean Peninsula, it is bordered by China to the northwest, Russia to the and Vietnam Vietnam (pronounced /ˌviː.ɛtˈnɑːm/ VEE-et-NAHM; Vietnamese: Việt Nam, listen ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (Vietnamese: Cộng hòa xã hội chủ nghĩa Việt Nam, listen (help·info)), is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by People's Republic of China (PRC) to the. Through its history, China was the source of many major inventions China has been the source of many significant inventions, including the Four Great Inventions of ancient China: papermaking, the compass, gunpowder, and printing . The list below contains these and other inventions.[8] It has also one of the world's oldest written language systems Written Chinese comprises the written symbols used to represent spoken Chinese and the rules about how they are arranged and punctuated. These symbols are commonly known as Chinese characters (traditional/simplified Chinese: 漢字/汉字; pinyin: hànzì). Chinese characters do not constitute an alphabet or a compact syllabary. Rather, the. The first evidence of human presence in the region was found at the Zhoukoudian Zhoukoudian or Choukoutien is a cave system in Beijing, China. It has yielded many archaeological discoveries, including one of the first specimens of Homo erectus, dubbed Peking Man, and a fine assemblage of bones of the gigantic hyena Pachycrocuta brevirostris. The Peking Man lived in this cave approximately 200,000 to 750,000 years ago cave. It is one of the earliest known specimens of Homo erectus Homo erectus is an extinct species of hominid that originated in Africa—and spread as far as China and Java—from the end of the Pliocene epoch to the later Pleistocene, about 1.8 to 1.3 million years ago. There is still disagreement on the subject of the classification, ancestry, and progeny of H. erectus, with two major alternative hypotheses:, now commonly known as the Peking Man Peking Man , also called Sinanthropus pekinensis (currently Homo erectus pekinensis), is an example of Homo erectus. A group of fossil specimens was discovered in 1923-27 during excavations at Zhoukoudian (Chou K'ou-tien) near Beijing (written 'Peking' before the adoption of the Pinyin romanization system), China. More recently, the finds have, estimated to have lived from 300,000 to 780,000 years ago.[9][10][11]
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Etymology
Main article: Names of China In China, common names for China include "Zhonghua" and "Zhongguo" (中国/中國) , while "Han" (汉/漢) and "Tang" (唐) are common names given for the Chinese ethnicity. Other names include Huaxia, Shenzhou and Jiuzhou. The People's Republic of China and Republic of China are official names given for the The traditional Traditional Chinese characters refers to one of the two standard sets of printed Chinese characters, the other being simplified Chinese characters. The modern shapes of traditional Chinese characters first appeared with the emergence of the clerical script during the Han Dynasty, and have been more or less stable since the 5th century The retronym (top) and simplified Simplified Chinese Characters are one of two standard sets of Chinese characters of the contemporary Chinese written language. The government of the People's Republic of China (Mainland China) has promoted them for use in printing in an attempt to increase literacy. They are officially used in the People's Republic of China and Singapore (bottom) characters for "China" in Chinese Chinese or the Sinitic language (汉语／漢語 Hànyǔ; 华语／華語 Huáyǔ; 中文 Zhōngwén) is a language family consisting of languages which are mostly mutually unintelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the two branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages. The first character means "middle" or "center", and the second character means "country".English names
The word "China"[nb 1] is derived from Cin (چین), a Persian name for China popularized in Europe by Marco Polo Marco Polo (English pronunciation: /ˈmɑrkoʊ ˈpoʊloʊ/ ; Italian pronunciation: [ˈmarko ˈpɔːlo]) (c. 1254 – January 8, 1324) was a merchant from the Venetian Republic who wrote Il Milione, which introduced Europeans to Central Asia and China. He learned about trading whilst his father and uncle, Niccolò and Maffeo, travelled through.[12][13] In early usage, "china Chinese ceramic ware is an artform that has been developing since the dynastic periods. China is richly endowed with the raw materials needed for making ceramics. The first types of ceramics were made about 11,000 years ago, during the Palaeolithic era. Chinese Ceramics range from construction materials such as bricks and tiles, to hand-built" as a term for porcelain was spelled differently from the name of the country, the two words being derived from separate Persian words.[14] Both these words are derived from the Sanskrit Sanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism and Buddhism[note 1]. Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand word Cīna The Chinas or Ciñas are a people mentioned in ancient Indian literature from the first millennium BC, such as the Mahabharata, Laws of Manu, as well the Puranic literature. They are believed to have been Chinese (चीन),[14] used as a name for China as early as AD 150.[15] The origin of this word is the subject of several conflicting scholarly theories.[16] The traditional theory, proposed in the 17th century by Martin Martini, is that the word is derived from "Qin" (秦 =Chin)(778 BC – 207 BC), the westernmost of the Chinese kingdoms during the Zhou dynasty The Zhou Dynasty followed the Shang Dynasty and was followed by the Qin Dynasty in China. The Zhou dynasty lasted longer than any other dynasty in Chinese history — though the actual political and military control of China by the dynasty only lasted during the Western Zhou. During the Zhou Dynasty, the use of iron was introduced to China, while, or from the succeeding Qin dynasty The Qin Dynasty was the ruling Chinese dynasty between 221 and 206 BC. The Qin state derived its name from its heartland of Qin, in modern-day Shaanxi. The Qin's strength had been consolidated by Lord Shang Yang during the Warring States Period, in the 4th century BC. In the early third century BC, the Qin accomplished a series of swift conquests; (221 – 206 BC).[17] In the Hindu A Hindu ( pronunciation , Devanagari: हिन्दु) is an adherent of Hinduism, a set of religious, philosophical and cultural systems that originated in the Indian subcontinent. The vast body of Hindu scriptures, divided into Śruti ("revealed") and Smriti ("remembered"), lay the foundation of Hindu beliefs, which scriptures Mahābhārata China in the Mahābhārata refers to an ancient Chinese people who lived across the Himalayas north of India in the first millennium BC or even earlier, and were mentioned in the ancient Indian epic Mahabharata. This was the earliest reference to the word "China", which may have been referring to either the Qin state which later became (5th century BC )[18] and Laws of Manu (2nd century BC), the Sanskrit word Cīna (चीन) is used to refer to a country of "yellow-colored" barbarians located in the Tibeto-Burman borderlands east of India Home to the ancient Indus Valley Civilisation and a region of historic trade routes and vast empires, the Indian subcontinent was identified with its commercial and cultural wealth for much of its long history. Four major religions, Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism originated here, while Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam.[19] The inhabitants of Yelang Yelang , initially known as Zangke (Chinese: 牂柯), was an ancient political entity first described in the 3rd century BC that was centered in what is now western Guizhou province, China. Estimated to have been active for over 200 years, it was an alliance of tribes, rather than a conventional state, an ancient kingdom in what is now Guizhou Guizhou (simplified Chinese: 贵 , referred to themselves as 'Zina', and may be the source of the Sanskrit word Cīna.[16]
Chinese names
The official name of China changed with each dynasty Historians traditionally consider a state's history within a framework of successive dynasties, particularly with such nations as China, Ancient Egypt and the Persian Empire. Much of European political history was dominated, successively and together, by dynasties such as the Carolingians, the Capetians, the Habsburgs, the Stuarts, the, the imperial governments referred to themselves as the Empire of the Great Qing, Empire of the Great Ming, etc. However, the common name remained as Zhōngguó (simplified Chinese: 中国; traditional Chinese: 中國, Mandarin pronunciation: [t͡ʂʊŋ˥˥ku̯ɔ˧˥]) through dynastic changes. This translates traditionally as "Middle Kingdom," or as "central country."
The name Zhōngguó first appeared in the Classic of History (6th century BC), and was used to refer to the late Zhou Dynasty, as they believed that they were the "center of civilization,"[nb 2] while peoples in the four cardinals were called Eastern Yi, Southern Man, Western Rong and Northern Di respectively. Some texts imply that "Zhōngguó" was originally meant to refer to the capital of the sovereign, to differ from the capital of his vassals.[nb 3] The use of "Zhōngguó" implied a claim of political legitimacy, and "Zhōngguó" was often used by states who saw themselves as the sole legitimate successor to previous Chinese dynasties; for example, in the era of the Southern Song Dynasty, both the Jin Dynasty and the Southern Song state claimed to be "Zhōngguó."[nb 4]
Zhōngguó came to official use as an abbreviation for the Republic of China (Zhonghua Minguo) after the government's establishment in 1912. Since the People's Republic of China, established in 1949, now controls the great majority of the area encompassed within the traditional concept of "China", the People's Republic is the political unit most commonly identified with the abbreviated name Zhōngguó, with the Republic of China nowadays known commonly as "Taiwan".[nb 5]
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