From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibet_under_Yuan_rule Tibet under Yuan rule refers to the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty's rule over Tibet from approximately 1270 to 1354. During the Yuan dynasty rule of Tibet, the region was structurally, militarily and administratively controlled by the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. In the history of Tibet, Mongol rule was established after Sakya Pandita got power in Tibet from the Mongols in 1244, following the 1240 Mongol conquest of Tibet led by the Mongol general with the title doord darkhan. It is also called the Sakya dynasty (Tibetan: ས་སྐྱ་, Wylie: sa skya, Chinese: 薩迦王朝; pinyin: Sàjiā Wángcháo) after the favored Sakya school of Tibetan Buddhism.
The region retained a degree of political autonomy under the Sakya lama, who was the de jure
head of Tibet and a spiritual leader of the Mongol Empire. However,
administrative and military rule of Tibet remained under the auspices of
the Yuan government agency known as the Bureau of Buddhist and Tibetan Affairs or Xuanzheng Yuan, a top-level administrative department separate from other Yuan provinces,
but still under the administration of the Yuan dynasty. Tibet retained
nominal power over religious and political affairs, while the Yuan
dynasty managed a structural and administrative rule over the region, reinforced by the rare military intervention. This existed as a "diarchic structure" under the Yuan emperor, with power primarily in favor of the Mongols. One of the department's purposes was to select a dpon-chen, usually appointed by the lama and confirmed by the Yuan emperor in Dadu (modern-day Beijing).
Tibet formed a special and close relationship with the Mongols. The traditional Tibetan priest and patron relationship coexisted with Tibet's political subordination to the Yuan dynasty.
The arrangement from the priest and patron relationship was mutually
advantageous: the Tibetans retained autonomy and received protection
from invasions, while the Mongols of the Yuan dynasty gained further
legitimacy for their rulers and embraced profound Buddhist philosophical teachings and moral principles. The lamas also made effective regents through whom the Mongols ruled Tibet.
Tibet was invaded by the Mongol Empire in 1240 and 1244. The first invasion was by Prince Köden or Godan, grandson of Genghis Khan and son of Ögedei Khan. The second invasion by Möngke Khan resulted in the entire region falling under Mongol rule. Kublai Khan incorporated the region into his later Yuan dynasty, but left the legal system intact. Drogön Chögyal Phagpa, the Sakya lama, became a religious teacher to Kublai, who made him the nominal head of the region.
Mongol rule (1244–1260)
Although
the Yuan maintained administrative rule of Tibet, scholarly opinion on
the exact nature of this rule is disputed: according to different
sources, it is considered a direct subject, an indirect part of the Yuan
dynasty or an "autonomous" region outside direct Yuan rule, but subject
to the greater Mongol Empire. While no modern equivalents remain, the relationship is analogous to that of the British Empire and the British Raj in India.
The rule was described in the Mongolian chronicle "Ten Laudable
Laws", which describes "two orders", one order based on the religious
and one order based on the secular. Religious is based on the Sutras and
Dharani, secular on peace and tranquillity. The Sakya Lama is
responsible for the religious order, the Yuan emperor for the secular.
The religion and the state became dependent on each other, each with its
own functions, but the will of the Emperor, through the dpon chen, held the de facto upper hand.
Through their influence with the Yuan rulers, Tibetan lamas
gained considerable influence in various Mongol clans. Besides Kublai,
there were, for example, clear lines of influence between scattered
areas of Tibet and the Mongol Ilkhanate based in Persia. Kublai's success in succeeding Möngke
as Great Khan meant that after 1260, Phagpa and the House of Sakya
would only wield greater influence. Phagpa became head of all Buddhist
monks in the Yuan
empire. Tibet would also enjoy a rather high degree of autonomy
compared to other parts of the Yuan empire, although further expeditions
took place in 1267, 1277, 1281 and 1290/91.
Drogön Chögyal Phagpa was the spiritual advisor and guru to Kublai Khan. In 1260, Kublai appointed Chögyal Phagpa as "Guoshi", or State Preceptor, in 1260, the year when he became Khagan. Phagpa was the first "to initiate the political theology of the relationship between state and religion in the Tibeto-Mongolian Buddhist world". With the support of Kublai Khan, Chögyal Phagpa established himself and his sect as the preeminent spiritual leader in Tibet, and in the wider Mongol Empire.
In 1265 Drogön Chögyal Phagpa returned to Tibet and for the first time
made an attempt to impose Sakya hegemony with the appointment of Shakya
Bzang-po, a long time servant and ally of the Sakyas, as the Mongol
approved dpon-chen, or great administrator, over Tibet in 1267. A census
was conducted in 1268 and Tibet was divided into thirteen myriarchies.
While maintaining administrative control through the dpon-chen,
Kublai's relationship with the Sakya Lama became known in the Tibetan
tradition as the patron and priest relationship. Subsequently, each Yuan emperor had a Lama as a spiritual guide.
According to Rossabi, Khublai established a system in which a Sakya lama would be "Imperial Preceptor" or Dishi (originally "State Preceptor" or Guoshi), who would reside in China and supervise all the Buddhists of the empire, and a Tibetan called dpon-chen (Ponchen) or "Civil Administrator" would live in Tibet to administer it. Nevertheless, this system also led to conflicts between the Sakya leaders and the dpon-chens.
Kublai Khan commissioned Chögyal Phagpa to design a new writing system to unify the writing of the multilingualMongol Empire. Chögyal Phagpa in turn modified the traditional Tibetan script and gave birth to a new set of characters called Phagspa script
which was completed in 1268. Kublai Khan decided to use the Phagspa
script as the official writing system of the empire, including when he
became Emperor of China in 1271, instead of the Chinese ideogrammes and the Uyghur script.
However, he encountered major resistances and difficulties when trying
to promote this script and never achieved his original goal. As a
result, only a small number of texts were written in this script, and
the majority were still written in Chinese ideogrammes or the Uyghur
alphabet. The script fell into disuse after the collapse of the Yuan dynasty in 1368. The script was, though never widely, used for about a century and is thought to have influenced the development of modern Korean script.
Revolt
The Sakya
hegemony over Tibet continued into the middle of the fourteenth
century, although it was challenged by a revolt of the Drikung Kagyu sect with the assistance of Duwa of the Chagatai Khanate in 1285. The revolt was suppressed in 1290 when the Sakyas and the Yuan army under Temür Buqa [zh; ja], Kublai's grandson, burned Drigung Monastery and killed 10,000 people.
Decline of the Yuan
Between 1346 and 1354, the Yuan dynasty was weakening from uprisings in the main Chinese provinces. As Yuan declined, in Tibet, Tai Situ Changchub Gyaltsen toppled the Sakya and founded the Phagmodrupa dynasty, the rulers of which belonged to the Kagyu
sect. The succession of Sakya lamas in Tibet came to an end in 1358,
when central Tibet in its entirety came under control of the Kagyu sect, and Tibet's independence was restored, to last nearly 400 years. "By the 1370s the lines between the schools of Buddhism were clear." Nevertheless, the Phagmodrupa founder avoided directly resisting the Yuan court until its fall in 1368, when his successor Jamyang Shakya Gyaltsen decided to open relations with the Ming dynasty, founded by ethnic Han.
Battle between the Mongol and Jin Jurchen armies in north China in 1211 depicted in the Jami' al-tawarikh (Compendium of Chronicles) by Rashid-al-Din Hamadani.
The Mongol conquest of China was a series of major military efforts by the Mongol Empire
to conquer various empires ruling over China for 74 years (1205–1279).
It spanned seven decades in the 13th century and involved the defeat of
the Jin dynasty, Western Liao, Western Xia, Tibet, the Dali Kingdom, the Southern Song, and the Eastern Xia. The Mongol Empire under Genghis Khan started the conquest with small-scale raids into Western Xia in 1205 and 1207.
In 1279, the Mongol ruler Kublai Khan formally established the Yuan dynasty in the Chinese tradition, having crushed the last Song resistance, marking the reunification of China under Mongol rule, the first time that non-Han people had ruled the entire country. It was the first time that Tibet was unified with the rest of China.
In the early 1200s, Temujin, soon to be Genghis Khan, began consolidating his power in Mongolia. Following the death of the Kerait leader Ong Khan to Temujin's emerging Mongol Empire in 1203, Kerait leader Nilqa Senggum led a small band of followers into Western Xia. However, after his adherents took to plundering the locals, Nilqa Senggum was expelled from Western Xia territory.
Using his rival Nilga Senggum's temporary refuge in Western Xia
as a pretext, Temujin launched a raid against the state in 1205 in the Edsin region. The Mongols plundered border settlements and one local Western Xia noble accepted Mongol supremacy.
The next year, 1206, Temujin was formally proclaimed Genghis Khan,
ruler of all the Mongols. In 1207, Genghis led another raid into Western
Xia, invading the Ordo region and sacking Wuhai, the main garrison along the Yellow River, before withdrawing in 1208.
In 1209, Genghis Khan undertook a larger campaign to secure the
submission of Western Xia. After defeating a force led by Kao Liang-Hui
outside Wuhai, Genghis captured the city and pushed up along the Yellow
River, taking several cities and besieging the capital Yinchuan, which possessed a well-fortified garrison of 150,000.
The Mongols were not yet experienced with siege warfare, and attempted
to build a dike to divert the Yellow River and flood the city. However,
the dike instead broke and flooded the Mongol camp. Emperor Li Anquan, still under threat by the Mongols and receiving no relief from the Jin dynasty,
surrendered to the Mongol and demonstrated his loyalty by giving his
daughter Chaka to Genghis in marriage, along with a tribute of camels,
falcons, and textiles.
After their defeat in 1210, the Western Xia served as faithful
Mongol vassals for the following decade, aiding the Mongols against the
Jin. In 1219, Genghis Khan launched his campaign against the Khwarazmian dynasty in Central Asia,
and requested military aid from Western Xia. However, the emperor and
his military commander Asha refused to take part in the campaign,
stating that if Genghis had too few troops to attack Khwarazm, then he had no claim to supreme power. Infuriated, Genghis swore vengeance and left to invade Khwarazm, while Western Xia attempted alliances with the Jin and Song dynasties against the Mongols.
After defeating Khwarazm in 1221, Genghis prepared his armies to
punish Western Xia for their betrayal, and in 1225 he attacked with a
force of approximately 180,000. After taking Khara-Khoto,
the Mongols began a steady advance southward. Asha, commander of the
Western Xia troops, could not afford to meet the Mongols as it would
involve an exhausting westward march from the capital Yinchuan through
500 kilometers of desert, and so the Mongols steadily advanced from city
to city. Enraged by Western Xia's fierce resistance, Genghis engaged the countryside in annihilative warfare and ordered his generals to systematically destroy cities and garrisons as they went. Genghis divided his army and sent general Subutai
to take care of the westernmost cities, while the main force under
Genghis moved east into the heart of the Western Xia Empire and took Ganzhou, which was spared destruction upon its capture due to it being the hometown of Genghis's commander Chagaan.
In August 1226, Mongol troops approached Wuwei, the second-largest city of the Western Xia empire, which surrendered without resistance in order to escape destruction. In Autumn 1226, Genghis took Liangchow, crossed the Helan Shan desert, and in November lay siege to Lingwu, a mere 30 kilometers from Yinchuan.
Here, in the Battle of Yellow River, the Mongols destroyed a force of
300,000 Western Xia that launched a counter-attack against them.
Genghis reached Yinchuan in 1227, laid siege to the city, and
launched several offensives into Jin to prevent them from sending
reinforcements to Western Xia, with one force reaching as a far as Kaifeng, the Jin capital.
Yinchuan lay besieged for about six months, after which Genghis opened
up peace negotiations while secretly planning to kill the emperor. During the peace negotiations, Genghis continued his military operations around the Liupan mountains near Guyuan, rejected an offer of peace from the Jin, and prepared to invade them near their border with the Song.
However, in August 1227, Genghis died of a historically uncertain
cause, and, in order not to jeopardize the ongoing campaign, his death
was kept a secret. In September 1227, Emperor Mozhu surrendered to the Mongols and was promptly executed.
The Mongols then mercilessly pillaged Yinchuan, slaughtered the city's
population, plundered the imperial tombs west of the city, and completed
the effective annihilation of the Western Xia state.
Conquest of Jin dynasty
The siege of Zhongdu (modern Beijing) in 1213–14.Mongol Empire's Ayimaq in North China
One of the major goals of Genghis Khan was the conquest of the Jin dynasty, allowing the Mongols
to avenge the earlier death of a Mongol Khan, gain the riches of
northern China and to establish the Mongols as a major power in the
East-Asian world.
Genghis Khan declared war in 1211, and while Mongols were
victorious in the field, they were frustrated in their efforts to take
major cities. In his typically logical and determined fashion, Genghis
and his highly developed staff studied the problems of the assault
of fortifications. With the help of Chinese engineers, they gradually
developed the techniques to take down fortifications. This eventually
would make troops under the Mongols some of the most accomplished and
most successful besiegers in the history of warfare.
As a result of a number of overwhelming victories in the field
and a few successes in the capture of fortifications deep within China,
Genghis had conquered and consolidated Jin territory as far south as the
Great Wall
by 1213. Cherik soldiers were non-nomad soldiers in the Mongol
military. Jin defectors and Han Chinese conscripts were recruited into
new armies formed by the Mongols as they destroyed the Jin dynasty. A
critical role in the defeat of the Jin was carried out by the Han
Chinese cherik forces. Han Chinese defectors led by General Liu Bolin
defending Tiancheng from the Jin in 1214 while Genghis Khan was busy
going back north. In 1215 Xijing fell to Liu Bolin's army. The original
Han cherik forces were created in 1216 and Liu Bolin appointed as their
leading officer. As Han troops kept defecting from the Jin to the
Mongols the size of Han cherik forces swelled and they had to be
partitioned between different units. Han soldiers made up the majority
of the Khitan Yelu Tuhua's army, while Juyin soldiers from Zhongdu made
up Chalaer's army and Khitan made up Uyar's army. Chalaer, Yelu Tuhua
and Uyar led three cherik armies in northern China under the Mongol
commander Muqali in addition to his tamma armies in 1217–1218.
Many Han Chinese and Khitan defected to the Mongols to fight against the Jin. Two Han Chinese leaders, Shi Tianze, Liu Heima [zh] (劉黑馬, Liu Ni), and the Khitan Xiao Zhala [zh] (蕭札剌) defected and commanded the 3 Tumens in the Mongol army. Liu Heima and Shi Tianze served Ogödei Khan. Liu Heima and Shi Tianxiang led armies against Western Xia for the Mongols.
There were 4 Han Tumens and 3 Khitan Tumens, with each Tumen consisting
of 10,000 troops. The three Khitan Generals Shimobeidier (石抹孛迭兒), Tabuyir (塔不已兒) and Xiao Zhongxi (蕭重喜)
commanded the three Khitan Tumens and the four Han Generals Zhang Rou,
Yan Shi, Shi Tianze, and Liu Heima commanded the four Han tumens under
Ogödei Khan. Shi Tianze (Shih T'ien-tse), Zhang Rou [zh] (Chang Jou, 張柔), and Yan Shi [zh] (Yen Shih, 嚴實)
and other high ranking Chinese who served in the Jin dynasty and
defected to the Mongols helped build the structure for the
administration of the new state. The Mongols received defections from Han Chinese and Khitans while the Jin were abandoned by their own Jurchen officers.
Interethnic marriage between Han and Jurchen became common at this
time. The Han Chinese General Shi Tianze's father Shi Bingzhi (史秉直, Shih
Ping-chih) were married to a Jurchen woman
Shi Tianze was married to two Jurchen women (Mo-nien and Na-ho), a Han
Chinese woman (Shi), and a Korean woman (Li), and his son Shi Gang was
born to one of his Jurchen wives and the family served the Yuan
prominently. and Shi Gang married a Kerait woman, the Kerait were Mongolified Turkic people and part of the "Mongol nation".
Genghis advanced with three armies into the heart of Jin territory, between the Great Wall and the Yellow River.
With the help of Chenyu Liu, one of the top officers who betrayed Jin,
as well as the Southern Song, who wanted revenge on Jin, Genghis
defeated the Jin forces, devastated northern China, captured numerous
cities, and in 1215 besieged, captured and sacked the Jin capital of Yanjing (modern-day Beijing).
However, the Jin emperor, Xuan Zong, did not surrender, but moved his capital to Kaifeng. The city fell in the siege of Kaifeng in 1232. Emperor Aizong fled to the town of Caizhou. After this, the Han Chinese general Shi Tianze
led troops to pursue Emperor Aizong as he retreated, and destroyed an
80,000-strong Jin army led by Wanyan Chengyi (完顏承裔) at Pucheng (蒲城). The
Jin dynasty collapsed after the siege of Caizhou in 1234. Eastern Xia, an short-lived kingdom which declared independence from Jin in 1215, was conquered in 1233.
The first Han armies in the Mongol army were those led by
defecting individual officers. There were 1,000 Han (Chinese) troops
each in 26 units which made up three tumeds arranged by Ogedei Khan on a
decimal system. The Han officer Shi Tianze, Han officer Liu Ni and the
Khitan officer Xiao Chala, all three of whom defected to the Mongols
from the Jin led these three tumeds. Chang Jung, Yen Shi and Chung Jou
led three additional tumeds which were created before 1234. The Han
defectors were called the "Black Army" (Hei Jun) by the Mongols before
1235. A new infantry based "New Army" (Xin Jun) was created after the
Mongols received 95,000 additional Han soldiers through conscription
once the 1236 and 1241 censuses were taken after the Jin was crushed.
Han cherik forces were used to fight against Li Tan's revolt in 1262.
The New Army and Black Army had hereditary officer posts like the Mongol
army itself.
The Mongols valued physicians, craftsmen and religious clerics
and ordered them to be spared from death and brought to them when cities
were taken in northern China.
Conquest of Dali Kingdom
Möngke Khan dispatched Kublai to the Dali Kingdom in 1253 to outflank the Song. The Gao family dominated the court, resisted and murdered Mongol envoys. The Mongols divided their forces into three. One wing rode eastward into the Sichuan basin. The second column under Uryankhadai took a difficult way into the mountains of western Sichuan.
Kublai himself headed south over the grasslands, meeting up with the
first column. While Uryankhadai galloping in along the lakeside from the
north, Kublai took the capital city of Dali and spared the residents
despite the slaying of his ambassadors. The Dali King Duan Xingzhi [zh] (段興智)
himself defected to the Mongols, who used his troops to conquer the
rest of Yunnan. The Mongols appointed King Duan Xingzhi as Maharajah and
stationed a pacification commissioner there.
After Kublai's departure, unrest broke out among the Black Jang (one of
the main ethnic groups of the Dali kingdom). By 1256, Uryankhadai, the
son of Subutai had completely pacified Yunnan. The Duan family were originally Han Chinese from Wuwei in Gansu.
The Duan family still ruled Dali relatively independently during the Yuan dynasty. The Ming abolished them.
The Tusi
chieftains and local tribe leaders and kingdoms in Yunnan, Guizhou and
Sichuan submitted to Yuan rule and were allowed to keep their titles.
The Han Chinese Yang family ruling the Chiefdom of Bozhou which was recognized by the Song dynasty and Tang dynasty also received recognition by the Mongols in the Yuan dynasty and later by the Ming dynasty.
The Luo clan in Shuixi led by Ahua were recognized by the Yuan
emperors, as they were by the Song emperors when led by Pugui and Tang
emperors when led by Apei. They descended from the Shu Han era king Huoji who helped Zhuge Liang against Meng Huo. They were also recognized by the Ming dynasty.
At second, the Mongols allied with Southern Song as both had a common
enemy in the form of Jin. However, this alliance broke down with the
destruction of Jur'chen Jin in 1234. After Song forces captured the
former Northern Song capitals of Luoyang, Chang'an and Kaifeng from the
Mongols and the Song had killed a Mongol ambassador,
the Mongols declared war on the Song. Very quickly the Mongol armies
forced the Song back to the Yangtze, although the two sides would be
engaged in a four-decade war until the fall of the Song in 1276. Islamic engineers joined later and especially contributed counterweight trebuchets,
"Muslim phao", which had a maximum range of 300 meters compared to 150
meters of the ancient Chinese predecessor. It played a significant role
in taking the Chinese strongholds and was as well used against infantry
units on the battlefield.
The Mongol force which invaded south China was far greater than the force they sent to invade the Middle East in 1256.
The Mongols made heavy use of indigenous ethnic minority soldiers in southern China rather than Mongols. The Kingdom of Dali's
indigenous Cuan-Bo army led by the Duan royal family were the majority
of the forces in the Mongol Yuan army sent to attack Song China during
battles along the Yangtze river. During a Mongol attack against the Song
China, there were only 3,000 Mongol cavalry at one point under the
Mongol commander Uriyangkhadai, the majority of his army were native
Cuan-Bo with Duan officers.
While the Mongol forces had success against the non-Han Chinese
ruled states of the Jin and Xia, conquering the Song took much more
time. The Song forces were equipped with the best technology available
at the time, such as an ample supply of gunpowder weapons like fire lances, rockets and flamethrowers.
The fierce resistance of the Song forces resulted in the Mongols having
to fight the most difficult war in all of their conquests,
and the Mongols required every advantage they could gain and "every
military artifice known at that time" in order to win. They looked to
peoples they already conquered to acquire various military advantages. However, intrigues at the Song court would favor the Mongols.
The Yuan dynasty created a "Han Army" (漢軍) out of defected Jin troops and army of defected Song troops called the "Newly Submitted Army" (新附軍).
Southern Song Chinese troops who defected and surrendered to the
Mongols were granted Korean women as wives by the Mongols, whom the
Mongols earlier took during their invasion of Korea as war booty. The many Song Chinese troops who defected to the Mongols were given oxen, clothes and land by Kublai Khan.
As prize for battlefield victories, lands sectioned off as appanages
were handed by the Yuan dynasty to Chinese military officers who
defected to the Mongol side. The Yuan gave Song Chinese soldiers who
defected to the Mongols juntun, a type of military farmland. Chagaan (Tsagaan) and Han tumen General Zhang Rou jointly launched an attack on the Song dynasty ordered by Töregene Khatun.
After several indecisive wars, the Mongols unsuccessfully attacked the Song garrison at Diaoyu FortressHechuan when their Great Khan, Möngke, died of cholera or dysentery. However, the general responsible for this defence was not rewarded but instead was punished by the Song court.
Discouraged, he defected to the Mongols and suggested to Möngke's
successor, Kublai, that the key to the conquest of Song was the capture
of Xiangyang, a vital Song stronghold.
The Yuan dynasty under Kublai Khan after the conquest of Southern Song dynasty.
The Mongols quickly enclosed Xiangyang and defeated any attempt to reinforce it by the Song.
After a siege that lasted several years, and with the help of Muslim artillery created by Iraqi
engineers, the Mongols finally forced the city of Xiangyang to
surrender. The dying Song dynasty sent its armies against the Mongols at
Yehue under the incompetent chancellor Jia Sidao. Predictably, the
battle was a disaster. Running out of troops and supplies, the Song
court surrendered to the Mongols in 1276.
Many Han Chinese were enslaved in the process of the Mongols invasion of China proper.
According to Japanese historian Sugiyama Masaaki (杉山正明) and Funada
Yoshiyuki (舩田善之), there were also a certain number of Mongolian slaves
owned by Han Chinese during the Yuan dynasty.
However, there is no evidence that Han Chinese, who were considered
people of the bottom of Yuan society according to some researchers,
suffered particularly cruel abuse.
With the desire to rule all of China, Kublai established the Yuan dynasty and became Emperor of China.
However, despite the surrender of the Song court, resistance of Song
remnants remained. Chinese resistance lasted for a few more years as
Song loyalists organized themselves around a powerless boy emperor,
brother to the last formal Song emperor. In an attempt to restore the
Song dynasty, several Song officials set up a government in Guangdong,
aboard ships of the vast Song navy, which still maintained over a
thousand ships (which then carried the Song army, which had been forced
by the Mongol army off of the land onto these Song warships). Realizing
this, in 1279 Kublai sent his fleet to engage the Song fleet at the battle of Yamen in the waters off of modern Hong Kong, winning a decisive victory in which the last Song Emperor Bing of Song
and his loyal officials committed suicide. This was the final major
military confrontation of the Mongol conquest of the Song in southern
China.
However, members of the Song Imperial Family continued to live in the Yuan dynasty like Emperor Gong of Song, Zhao Mengfu, and Zhao Yong. Zhao Mengfu painted at the Yuan court and was personally interviewed by Kublai Khan. This practice was referred to as 二王三恪, "Two Kings and Three Ke's."
Historian Patricia Buckley Ebrey noted that the Mongol Yuan dynasty
treated the ethnically Jurchen Wanyan royal family of the Jin Dynasty
harshly, totally butchering them by the hundreds along with the Tangut emperor of Western Xia
when they defeated him earlier. However, Ebrey notes that the Mongols
were totally lenient with the Han Chinese Zhao royal family of the
Southern Song, unlike the Jurchens treatment of the Northern Song in the
Jingkang incident. The Mongol armies spared the Southern Song royalty in the capital of Hangzhou, like Emperor Gong of Song
and his mother. Without sacking the city, they spared the civilians
inside, allowing them to go about their normal business, and rehired
Southern Song officials. The Mongols did not take the southern Song
palace women for themselves but instead had Han Chinese artisans in
Shangdu marry the palace women.
The Mongol emperor Kublai Khan even granted a Mongol princess from his
own Borjigin family as a wife to the surrendered Han Chinese Southern
Song Emperor Gong of Song and they fathered a son together named Zhao
Wanpu.
Chinese resistance in Vietnam against the Mongols
The ancestors of the Trần clan originated from the province of Fujian
and later migrated to Đại Việt under Trần Kinh (陳京 Chén Jīng), the
ancestor of the Trần clan. Their descendants, the later rulers of Đại Việt who were of mixed-blooded descent later established the Trần dynasty, which ruled Vietnam (Đại Việt). Despite many intermarriages between the Trần and several members of the Lý dynasty alongside members of their imperial court as in the case of Trần Lý and Trần Thừa,
some of the mixed-blooded descendants of the Trần dynasty and certain
members of the clan were still capable of speaking Chinese such as when a
Yuan dynasty envoy had a meeting with the Chinese-speaking Trần prince Trần Quốc Tuấn in 1282.
Professor Liam Kelley
noted that people from Song dynasty China like Zhao Zhong and Xu
Zongdao fled to Tran dynasty ruled Vietnam after the Mongol invasion of
the Song and they helped the Tran fight against the Mongol invasion. The
ancestors of the Tran clan originated from the modern day province of
Fujian as did the Daoist cleric Xu Zongdao who recorded the Mongol
invasion and referred to them as "Northern bandits". He quoted the Đại Việt Sử Ký Toàn Thư
which said "When the Song [Dynasty] was lost, its people came to us.
Nhật Duật took them in. There was Zhao Zhong who served as his personal
guard. Therefore, among the accomplishments in defeating the Yuan [i.e.,
Mongols], Nhật Duật had the most." The Tran defeated the Mongol invasions of Vietnam.
Southern Song Chinese military officers and civilian officials
left to overseas countries, went to Vietnam and intermarried with the
Vietnamese ruling elite and went to Champa to serve the government there
as recorded by Zheng Sixiao. Southern Song soldiers were part of the Vietnamese army prepared by emperor Trần Thánh Tông against the second Mongol invasion.
During their campaigns, the Mongol Empire recruited many nationalities in their warfare, such as those of Central and East Asia. The Mongols employed Chinese troops, especially those who worked catapults and gunpowder to assist them in other conquests. In addition to Chinese troops, many scholars and doctors from China accompanied Mongol commanders to the west. The Mongols valued people with specialized skills.
The ability to make cast iron which was tough enough for shooting
objects with gunpowder was available to the Chinese in the Song dynasty
and it was adopted by the Liao, Jin, and Yuan dynasties.
During the invasion of Transoxiana
in 1219, along with the main Mongol force, Genghis Khan used a Chinese
specialist catapult unit in battle. They were used in Transoxania again
in 1220. The Chinese may have used the catapults to hurl gunpowder
bombs, since they already had them by this time (although there were other siege engineers and technologies used in the campaigns, too.)
While Genghis Khan was conquering Transoxania and Central Asia, several
Chinese who were familiar with gunpowder were serving with Genghis's
army.
"Whole regiments" entirely made out of Chinese were used by the Mongols
to command bomb hurling trebuchets during the invasion of Iran.
Historians have suggested that the Mongol invasion had brought Chinese
gunpowder weapons to Central Asia. One of these was the huochong, a
Chinese mortar. Books written around the area afterward depicted the use of gunpowder weapons which resembled that of China.
One thousand northern Chinese engineer squads accompanied the Mongol Hulagu Khan during his conquest of the Middle East. 1,000 Chinese participated in the Siege of Baghdad (1258). The Chinese General Guo Kan was one of the commanders during the siege and appointed Governor of Baghdad after the city was taken.
While serving in the Mongol armies, Chinese generals were able to observe the invasion of West Asia.
According to Ata-Malik Juvayni during the assault on the AlamutAssassinsfort, "Khitayan" built siege weapons resembling crossbows were used. "Khitayan" meant Chinese and it was a type of arcuballista, deployed in 1256 under Hulagu's command.
Stones were knocked off the castle and the bolts "burnt" a great number
of the Assassins. They could fire a distance around 2,500 paces. The device was described as an ox's bow. Pitch which was lit on fire was applied to the bolts of the weapon before firing.
Another historian thinks that instead gunpowder might have been
strapped onto the bolts which caused the burns during the battle
recorded by Juvayini.
Alans were recruited into the Mongol forces with one unit called
"Right Alan Guard" which was combined with "recently surrendered"
soldiers, Mongols, and Chinese soldiers stationed in the area of the
former Kingdom of Qocho and in Besh Balikh the Mongols established a Chinese military colony led by Chinese general Qi Kongzhi (Ch'i Kung-chih).
Against the Alans and the Cumans (Kipchaks), the Mongols used
divide and conquer tactics: first the Mongols told the Cumans to stop
allying with the Alans and then, after the Cumans followed their
suggestion, the Mongols defeated the Alans and then attacked the Cumans. Alan and Kipchak guards were used by Kublai Khan. In 1368 at the end of the Yuan dynasty in China Toghan Temür was accompanied by his faithful Alan guards.
"Mangu enlisted in his bodyguard half the troops of the Alan prince,
Arslan, whose younger son Nicholas took a part in the expedition of the
Mongols against Karajang (Yunnan). This Alan imperial guard was still in
existence in 1272, 1286 and 1309, and it was divided into two corps
with headquarters in the Ling pei province (Karakorúm)." Alans were converted to Roman Catholic Christianity as were Armenians in China by John of Montecorvino.
Siege strategy
James
Waterson cautioned against attributing the population drop in northern
China to Mongol slaughter since much of the population may have moved to
southern China under the Southern Song or died of disease and famine as
agricultural and urban city infrastructure were destroyed.
The Mongols spared cities from massacre and sacking if they
surrendered, like Kaifeng which was surrendered to Subetai by Xu Li, Yangzhou, which was surrendered to Bayan by Li Tingzhi's second in command after Li Tingzhi was executed by the Southern Song, and Hangzhou, which was spared from sacking when it surrendered to Kublai Khan. Han Chinese and Khitan soldiers defected en masse to Genghis Khan against the Jurchen Jin dynasty. Towns which surrendered were spared from sacking and massacre by Kublai Khan.
The Khitan reluctantly left their homeland in Manchuria as the Jin
moved their primary capital from Beijing south to Kaifeng and defected
to the Mongols.
Neo-Confucianism (Chinese: 宋明理學; pinyin: Sòng-Míng lǐxué, often shortened to lǐxué 理學, literally "School of Principle") is a moral, ethical, and metaphysicalChinese philosophy influenced by Confucianism, which originated with Han Yu (768–824) and Li Ao (772–841) in the Tang dynasty, and became prominent during the Song and Ming dynasties under the formulations of Zhu Xi (1130–1200). After the Mongol conquest of China
in the thirteenth century, Chinese scholars and officials restored and
preserved neo-Confucianism as a way to safeguard the cultural heritage
of China.
Neo-Confucianism could have been an attempt to create a more
rationalist and secular form of Confucianism by rejecting mystical
elements of Taoism and Buddhism that had influenced Confucianism during and after the Han dynasty.
Although the neo-Confucianists were critical of Taoism and Buddhism,
the two did have an influence on the philosophy, and the
neo-Confucianists borrowed terms and concepts. However, unlike the
Buddhists and Taoists, who saw metaphysics
as a catalyst for spiritual development, religious enlightenment, and
immortality, the neo-Confucianists used metaphysics as a guide for
developing a rationalist ethical philosophy. Traditional Confucian beliefs such as gender roles were also included, leading to the devaluing of women in Korea.
Neo-Confucianism has its origins in the Tang dynasty; the Confucianist scholars Han Yu and Li Ao are seen as forebears of the neo-Confucianists of the Song dynasty. The Song dynasty philosopher Zhou Dunyi
(1017–1073) is seen as the first true "pioneer" of neo-Confucianism,
using Taoist metaphysics as a framework for his ethical philosophy.
Neo-Confucianism was both a revival of classical Confucianism, updated
to align with the social values of the Song dynasty, and a reaction to
the challenges of Buddhism and Taoism philosophy and religion which
emerged during the Zhou and Han dynasties.
Although the neo-Confucianists denounced Buddhist metaphysics,
Neo-Confucianism did borrow Taoist and Buddhist terminology and
concepts.
One of the most important exponents of neo-Confucianism was Zhu Xi
(1130–1200), his teachings were so influential that they were
integrated into civil-service examination from approximately 1314 until
1905.
He was a rather prolific writer, maintaining and defending his
Confucian beliefs of social harmony and proper personal conduct. One of
his most remembered was the book Family Rituals, where he
provided detailed advice on how to conduct weddings, funerals, family
ceremonies, and the veneration of ancestors. Buddhist thought soon
attracted him, and he began to argue in Confucian style for the Buddhist
observance of high moral standards. He also believed that it was
important to practical affairs that one should engage in both academic
and philosophical pursuits, although his writings are concentrated more
on issues of theoretical (as opposed to practical) significance. It is
reputed that he wrote many essays attempting to explain how his ideas
were not Buddhist or Taoist and included some heated denunciations of
Buddhism and Taoism. After the Xining era [zh] (1068–1077), Wang Yangming
(1472–1529) is commonly regarded as the most important Neo-Confucian
thinker. Wang's interpretation of Confucianism denied the rationalist
dualism of Zhu's orthodox philosophy.
There were many competing views within the neo-Confucian
community, but overall, a system emerged that resembled both Buddhist
and Taoist (Daoist) thought of the time and some of the ideas expressed in the I Ching (Book of Changes) as well as other yin yang theories associated with the Taiji symbol (Taijitu). A well known neo-Confucian motif is paintings of Confucius, Buddha, and Lao Tzu all drinking out of the same vinegar jar, paintings associated with the slogan "The three teachings are one!"
While neo-Confucianism incorporated Buddhist and Taoist ideas,
many neo-Confucianists strongly opposed Buddhism and Taoism. Indeed,
they rejected the Buddhist and Taoist religions. One of Han Yu's most famous essays decries the worship of Buddhist relics. Nonetheless, neo-Confucian writings adapted Buddhist thoughts and beliefs to the Confucian interest. In China,
neo-Confucianism was an officially recognized creed from its
development during the Song dynasty until the early twentieth century,
and lands in the sphere of Song China (Vietnam, Korea, and Japan) were all deeply influenced by neo-Confucianism for more than half a millennium.
Philosophy
Neo-Confucianism
is a social and ethical philosophy using metaphysical ideas, some
borrowed from Taoism, as its framework. The philosophy can be
characterized as humanistic and rationalistic, with the belief that the
universe could be understood through human reason, and that it was up to
humanity to create a harmonious relationship between the universe and
the individual.
The rationalism of neo-Confucianism is in contrast to the mysticism of the previously dominant Chan Buddhism.
Unlike the Buddhists, the neo-Confucians believed that reality existed,
and could be understood by humankind, even if the interpretations of
reality were slightly different depending on the school of
neo-Confucianism.
But the spirit of Neo-Confucian
rationalism is diametrically opposed to that of Buddhist mysticism.
Whereas Buddhism insisted on the unreality of things, Neo-Confucianism
stressed their reality. Buddhism and Taoism asserted that existence came
out of, and returned to, non-existence; Neo-Confucianism regarded
reality as a gradual realization of the Great Ultimate... Buddhists, and
to some degree, Taoists as well, relied on meditation and insight to
achieve supreme reason; the Neo-Confucianists chose to follow Reason.
The importance of li in Neo-Confucianism gave the movement its Chinese name, literally "The study of Li".
Schools
Neo-Confucianism was a heterogeneous philosophical tradition, and is generally categorized into two different schools.
Two-school model vs. three-school model
In medieval China, the mainstream of neo-Confucian thought, dubbed the "Tao school", had long categorized a thinker named Lu Jiuyuan among the unorthodox, non-Confucian writers. However, in the 15th century, the esteemed philosopher Wang Yangming took sides with Lu and critiqued some of the foundations of the Tao school, albeit not rejecting the school entirely.
Objections arose to Yangming's philosophy within his lifetime, and
shortly after his death, Chen Jian (1497–1567) grouped Wang together
with Lu as unorthodox writers, dividing neo-Confucianism into two
schools.
As a result, neo-Confucianism today is generally categorized into two
different schools of thought. The school that remained dominant
throughout the medieval and early modern periods is called the Cheng–Zhu school for the esteem it places in Cheng Yi, Cheng Hao, and Zhu Xi. The less dominant, opposing school was the Lu–Wang school, based on its esteem for Lu Jiuyuan and Wang Yangming.
In contrast to this two-branch model, the New ConfucianMou Zongsan argues that there existed a third branch of learning, the Hu-Liu school, based on the teachings of Hu Hong (Hu Wufeng, 1106–1161) and Liu Zongzhou
(Liu Jishan, 1578–1645). The significance of this third branch,
according to Mou, was that they represented the direct lineage of the
pioneers of neo-Confucianism, Zhou Dunyi, Zhang Zai and Cheng Hao.
Moreover, this third Hu-Liu school and the second Lu–Wang school,
combined, form the true mainstream of neo-Confucianism instead of the
Cheng–Zhu school. The mainstream represented a return to the teachings
of Confucius, Mengzi, the Doctrine of the Mean and the Commentaries of the Book of Changes. The Cheng–Zhu school was therefore only a minority branch based on the Great Learning and mistakenly emphasized intellectual studies over the study of sagehood.
Zhu Xi's formulation of the neo-Confucian world view is as follows. He believed that the Tao (Chinese: 道; pinyin: dào; lit. 'way') of Tian (Chinese: 天; pinyin: tiān; lit. 'heaven') is expressed in principle or li (Chinese: 理; pinyin: lǐ), but that it is sheathed in matter or qi (Chinese: 氣; pinyin: qì). In this, his system is based on Buddhist systems of the time that divided things into principle (again, li), and function (Chinese: 事; pinyin: shì). In the neo-Confucian formulation, li in itself is pure and almost-perfect, but with the addition of qi, base emotions and conflicts arise. Human nature is originally good, the neo-Confucians argued (following Mencius), but not pure unless action is taken to purify it. The imperative is then to purify one's li.
However, in contrast to Buddhists and Taoists, neo-Confucians did not
believe in an external world unconnected with the world of matter. In
addition, neo-Confucians in general rejected the idea of reincarnation
and the associated idea of karma.
Different neo-Confucians had differing ideas for how to do so. Zhu Xi believed in gewu (Chinese: 格物; pinyin: géwù), the Investigation of Things, essentially an academic form of observational science, based on the idea that li lies within the world.
Wang Yangming (Wang Shouren), probably the second most influential neo-Confucian, came to another conclusion: namely, that if li is in all things, and li is in one's heart-mind, there is no better place to seek than within oneself. His preferred method of doing so was jingzuo (Chinese: 靜坐; pinyin: jìngzuò; lit. 'quiet sitting'), a practice that strongly resembles Chan (Zen)meditation, or zuochan (Japanese: 座禅; Chinese: 坐禪; pinyin: zuòchán; lit. 'seated meditation'). Wang Yangming developed the idea of innate knowing, arguing that every person knows from birth the difference between good and evil. Such knowledge is intuitive and not rational. These revolutionizing ideas of Wang Yangming would later inspire prominent Japanese thinkers like Motoori Norinaga, who argued that because of the Shinto
deities, Japanese people alone had the intuitive ability to distinguish
good and evil without complex rationalization. Wang Yangming's school
of thought (Ōyōmei-gaku in Japanese) also provided, in part, an
ideological basis for some samurai who sought to pursue action based on
intuition rather than scholasticism. As such, it also provided an
intellectual foundation for the radical political actions of low ranking
samurai in the decades prior to the Meiji Restoration (1868), in which the Tokugawa shogunate (1600–1868) was overthrown.
In Joseon Korea, neo-Confucianism was established as the state ideology. The Yuan occupation of the Korean Peninsula introduced Zhu Xi's school of neo-Confucianism to Korea. Neo-Confucianism was introduced to Korea by An Hyang during the Goryeo dynasty.[citation needed]
At the time that he introduced neo-Confucianism, the Goryeo dynasty was
in the last century of its existence and influenced by the Mongol Yuan dynasty.
Many Korean scholars visited China during the Yuan era and An was among them. In 1286, he read a book of Zhu Xi in Yanjing
and was so moved by it that he transcribed the book in its entirety and
came back to Korea with it. It greatly inspired Korean intellectuals at
the time and many, predominantly from the middle class and
disillusioned with the excesses of organized religion (namely Buddhism)
and the old nobility, embraced neo-Confucianism. The newly rising
neo-Confucian intellectuals were leading groups aimed at the overthrow
of the old (and increasingly foreign-influenced) Goryeo dynasty.
After the fall of Goryeo and the establishment of the Joseon dynasty by Yi Song-gye
in 1392, neo-Confucianism was installed as the state ideology.
Buddhism, and organized religion in general, was considered poisonous to
the neo-Confucian order. Buddhism was accordingly restricted and
occasionally persecuted by Joseon. As neo-Confucianism encouraged
education, a number of neo-Confucian schools (서원 seowon and 향교 hyanggyo) were founded throughout the country, producing many scholars including Jo Gwang-jo (조광조, 趙光祖; 1482–1520), Yi Hwang (이황, 李滉; pen name Toegye 퇴계, 退溪; 1501–1570) and Yi I (이이, 李珥; 1536–1584).
In the early 16th century, Jo attempted to transform Joseon into
an ideal neo-Confucian society with a series of radical reforms until he
was executed in 1520. Despite this, neo-Confucianism soon assumed an
even greater role in the Joseon dynasty. Soon neo-Confucian scholars, no
longer content to only read and remember the Chinese original precepts,
began to develop new neo-Confucian theories. Yi Hwang and Yi I were the most prominent of these new theorists.
Yi Hwang's most prominent disciples were Kim Seong-il (金誠一, 1538–1593), Yu Seong-ryong (柳成龍 1542–1607) and Jeong Gu (한강 정구, 寒岡 鄭逑, 1543–1620), known as the "three heroes". They were followed by a second generation of scholars who included Jang Hyungwang (張顯光, 1554–1637) and Jang Heung-Hyo (敬堂 張興孝, 1564–1633), and by a third generation (including Heo Mok, Yun Hyu, Yun Seon-do and Song Si-yeol) who brought the school into the 18th century
But neo-Confucianism became so dogmatic in a relatively rapid
time that it prevented much needed socioeconomic development and change,
and led to internal divisions and criticism of many new theories
regardless of their popular appeal. For instance, Wang Yangming's theories, which were popular in the Chinese Ming dynasty,
were considered heresy and severely condemned by Korean
neo-Confucianists. Furthermore, any annotations on Confucian canon
different from Zhu Xi were excluded. Under Joseon, the newly emerging
ruling class called Sarim
(사림, 士林) also split into political factions according to their
diversity of neo-Confucian views on politics. There were two large
factions and many subfactions.
During the Japanese invasions of Korea (1592–1598), many Korean neo-Confucian books and scholars were taken to Japan and influenced Japanese scholars such as Fujiwara Seika and affected the development of Japanese neo-Confucianism.
Portrait of Chu Văn An (1292–1370), prominently Vietnamese Confucianist teacher in 14th century.
In 1070, emperor Lý Thánh Tông opened first Confucius university in Hanoi named Văn Miếu.
The Lý, Trần court expanded the Confucianism influences in Vietnamese
Mandarin through year examinations, continued the model of Tang dynasty
until being annexed by the Ming invaders in 1407. In 1460, emperor Lê Thánh Tông of Lê dynasty adopted Neo-Confucianism as Đại Việt's basic values.
Bureaucratic examinations
Neo-Confucianism became the interpretation of Confucianism whose mastery was necessary to pass the bureaucratic examinations by the Ming,
and continued in this way through the Qing dynasty until the end of the
Imperial examination system in 1905. However, many scholars such as Benjamin Elman have questioned the degree to which their role as the orthodox interpretation in state examinations reflects the degree to which both the bureaucrats and Chinese gentry actually believed those interpretations, and point out that there were very active schools such as Han learning which offered competing interpretations of Confucianism.
The competing school of Confucianism was called the Evidential School or Han Learning
and argued that neo-Confucianism had caused the teachings of
Confucianism to be hopelessly contaminated with Buddhist thinking. This
school also criticized neo-Confucianism for being overly concerned with
empty philosophical speculation that was unconnected with reality.
Confucian canon
The Confucian canon as it exists today was essentially compiled by Zhu Xi. Zhu codified the canon of Four Books (the Great Learning, the Doctrine of the Mean, the Analects of Confucius, and the Mencius)
which in the subsequent Ming and Qing dynasties were made the core of
the official curriculum for the civil service examination.
New Confucianism
In the 1920s, New Confucianism,
also known as modern neo-Confucianism, started developing and absorbed
the Western learning to seek a way to modernize Chinese culture based on
the traditional Confucianism. It centers on four topics: The modern
transformation of Chinese culture; Humanistic spirit of Chinese culture;
Religious connotation in Chinese culture; and Intuitive way of
thinking, to go beyond the logic and to wipe out the concept of
exclusion analysis. Adhering to the traditional Confucianism and the
neo-confucianism, the modern neo-Confucianism contributes the nation's
emerging from the predicament faced by the ancient Chinese traditional
culture in the process of modernization; furthermore, it also promotes
the world culture of industrial civilization rather than the traditional
personal senses.
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