Ancient
times (from antiquity to A.D. 1840)
From
archaeological findings we know that about 500,000-1,000,000
years ago, there were primitive human beings such as
Yuanmous Man, Lantian Man and Peking Man in the wide
expanse know today as China. After the long perod of
primitive existence, the Xia Dynasty, the first in Chinese
history, was established in the 21st century B.C., heralding
the beginning of a slave society in China. The following
shang and Western Zhou dynasties saw further development
of the slave society. They came the Spring and Autumn
and Warring States periods (i.e., the Eastern Zhou Dynasty),
periods of transition from slave to feudal society.
In 221 B.C., Qin Shi Huang, the
First Emperor of the Qin Dynasty, ended the rivalry
among the independent principalities in the Warring
States Period and established the first centralized,
unified, multi-national state in Chinese history - the
Qin Dynasty. Subsequently, one dynasty replaced another.
They included the Han, Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern
Dynasties, Sui, Tang, Five Dynasties, Song, Yuan, Ming
and Qing. China remained a feudal society until the
Opium War in 1840.
Ancient China was fairly well developed
in both economy and culture. During the apex of the
Chinese feudal society - the Han and Tang dynasties
- agriculture, handicrafts, weaving and shipbuilding
were advanced. Transportation both by land and water
was convenient; extensive economic and cultural relations
were established with Japan, Korea, India, Persia and
Arabia. Papermaking, printing, gunpowder and the compass,
four major creations of ancient Chinese science and
technology, are embodiments of the wisdom and power
of the Chinese peole which have exerted an enormously
profound influence on the history of mankind.
Meanwhile, famous thinkers in ancient
China such as Lao Zi and Confucius were influencing
the traditional Chinese culture and even the world civilizations.
Sun Zi's Art of War remains an invaluable reference
for people of the military and economic circles; Cao
Xueqin's Dream of Red Mansions is considered the representative
work of Chinese classical literature and continues to
inspire research and study both at home and abroad.
Great achievements were also made in the fields of astronomy,
mathematics, geography and medicines. The Gan Shi Xing
Jing (Gan Shi Catalogues of Stars) of the Warring States
Period is the earliest catalogue of fixed stars in the
world. Zhang Heng of the Han Dynasty invented the armillary
sphere and seismograph. During the Southern and Northern
Dynasties Zu Chongzhi calculated the Northern Dynsties
Zu Chongzhi calculated the value of (?) to be between
3.1415926 and 3.1415927. He was the first person in
the world to have accurately calculated the value of
(?)to seven decimal places. The Ben Cao Guang Mu ( Compendium
of Materia Medica) by Li Shizhen fo the 16the century,
records more than 1,800 kinds of herbal medicines and
over 10,000 prescriptions.
Modern
Period (1840-1919)
The Opium War, which started in
1840, was a turning point in Chinese history. In the
17 th and 18 th centuries the major countries of Europe
were looking around for markets for their merchandise
and colonies. To protect its opium in trade, Britain
launched the war of aggression against China in 1840.
In 1842 the corrupt Qing court signed the humiliating
Treaty of Nanking with Britain, bartering away China's
national sovereignty. This marked the reduction of China
to a semicolonial, semifeudal country.
The Revolution of 1911, a bourgeois
democratic revolution led by Dr. Sun Yat-sen, ended
the rule of the Qing Dynasty. Thus, the monarchy that
had existed in China for 2,000years came to an end,
and the provisional government fo the Republic of China
was founded.
New
Democratic Revolution ( 1919-1949)
In 1919 the May 4th Movement against
imperialism and feudalism took place. In this moment,
the Chinese working class for the first time appeared
on the political scene. In 1921, at its first National
Congress, delepgates representing Communist groups from
all parts of China including Mao Zedong, Dongbiwu, Chen
Tanqiu, He Shuheng, Wang Jinmei, Deng Enming and Li
Da, met in Shanghai and founded the Communist Party
of China. The Chinese people was led by the Communist
Party participated in a bitter struggle for many years,
which included four periods: the Northern Expedition
( 1924-27), Agrarian Revolutionary War(1927-37), War
of Resistance Against Japan (1937-45), and the National
Liberation War (1945-49). In 1949 the Chinese people
finally ended the rule of the Kuomintang headed by Chiang
Kai-shek, achieving the victory of the New Democratic
Revolution.
The
People's Republic of China (1949- )
On
October 1, 1949, 300,00 people gathered at Tiananmen
Square in Beijing for the ceremony formally declaring
the new state. Mao Zedong, chairman of the Central People's
Government, solemnly proclaimed the founding of the
People's Republic of China.
After a period economic recovery
in the first three years (1950-1952) following the founding
of the People's Republic, and then the basic realization
of agriculture, the handicrafts industry, and capitalist
industry and commerce between 1953 and 1956, the leading
role of public ownership of the means of production
had been defined, and the transition from new democracy
to socialism realized. During the then years from 1957
to 1966 China began large-scale socialist construction.
Overall, great achievements were made in the national
economy during this decade in spite of some serious
mistakes in the economic construction. The nation's
total industrial fixed assets quadrupled between 1956
and 1966, and the national income increased by 58 percent
in constant prices. The output of essential industrial
products, such as steel, coal, crude oil, generated
electricity and metal cutting machine tolls increased
by several or, in some cases, even a dozen times, and
some new and developing industries such as electronics
and petrochemicals were established; work in science
and technology, particularly in atomic energy, jet technology,
computers, semiconductors and automatic control, progressed
rapidly. The "cultural revolution, "which lasted for
then year from May 1966 to Oct. 1976, brought great
calamity to the country and the people, causing the
most serious setbacks and most damaging losses to both
since the founding of the People's Republic of China.
Drawing on the support of the broad
masses of the Chinese people, the communist party of
China smashed the Jiang Qiang counter-revolutionary
clique in Oct. 1976 The end of the disastrous "cultural
revolution" marked the beginning of a new era in Chinese
history. Since the Third Plenary Session of the CPC
Eleventh Central Committee at the end of 1978, China
has instituted a policy of reform and opening to the
outside world. The errors of the " Cultural revolution"
and the earlier" Leftist" deviations were rectified.
The focus was shifted to modernization centered around
the economy; a socialist modernization road with Chinese
characteristics was defined.
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