The Ming Dynasty

The peasant uprisings broke out successively owing to the corrupt and degenerate rule in the late Yuan dynasty (1206-1368), and Zhu Yuanzhang established Xiwu Regime in 1364 after fighting battles across the country, directly confronting with the Ming regime, and he claimed himself emperor of a new dynasty- the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) in Yingtianfu (present Nanjing) in 1368. Zhu Di (later Emperor Chengzu) moved capital from Nanjing to Beijing in 1421 and took reforms in economy, political and culture, making the Ming empire more prosperous and stable.

To publicize national prestige and strengthen the bonds with foreign countries, Zheng He was sent to travel to the west under Emperor Chengzu's order for seven times, and he sailed with a fleet of 62 ships to the Southeast Asian Countries, Africa and the Indian Ocean. The national power of the Ming empire declined in the Zhengde Period and was restored in the early period of Emperor Jiajing's reign, which declined again later owing to troubles at home and aggression from abroad, including the contradictions between the emperor and the officers and the invasion from Japanese pirates. Zhang Juzheng took reforms under Emperor's Wanli's order in middle Ming dynasty, followed by "Wanli Resurgence" through putting down rebellions in Gansu and Guizhou and assisting Korea to fight against Japan. The capitalism rudiment appeared in the late Ming dynasty, when the Ming Empire covered an area of 150,000,000 square kilometers with Korea to the west and Tubo (present Tibet) to the east, and An'nan (present Vietnam) was a part of the Ming Empire as well.

Owing to the enlightened political and social environment, the science and technology surpassed the European couturieres in the Ming dynasty (especially in topography and gun powers), when great ideologists such as Wang Shouren and Li Zhi emerged. What was more, great progress was made in novels, of which the representative ones were the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, All Men Are Brothers, Journey to the West and the Golden Lotus. "The Four Masters of the Wu Painting School" (Shen Zhou, Wen Zhengming, Tang Ying and Qiu Ying) rose in the middle period of the 15th century, who absorbed the essence of the painting techniques in the Tang dynasty (618-907), Song dynasty (960-1279) and the Yuan dynasty and formed their own unique painting styles. The outstanding painter Xu Wei drew numerous excellent splash-ink paintings, and Zhang Hong found a new path to drawing landscape paintings that were very true to life.

With the large-scaled peasant uprisings breaking out in 1627 and the Black Death widely spread in Beijing in 1643, Li Zicheng took this opportunity to capture Beijing in 1644, and the last Ming-era emperor, Emperor Chongzhen, committed suicide in the Meishan Mountain (present Jingshan Mountain), resulting in the demise of the Ming dynasty and the rise of the Qing dynasty (1644-1911).

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