Southern Dynasties
The Southern Dynasties ( Chinese 南朝 , Pinyin Náncháo ) are a section in the time of the Southern and Northern Dynasties . They include: the Liu Song Dynasty , the Southern Qi Dynasty , the Liang Dynasty, and the Chen Dynasty , most of whose capitals were all located in Jiankang (although the capital of the Southern Qi was briefly in Jiangling (江陵, modern Jingzhou , Hubei ), during the reigns of Emperor He of the Southern Qi and Emperor Yuan of the Liang Dynasty, as well as the later Emperors of the Western Liang ( Emperor Xuan , Emperor Xiaoming and Emperor Xiaojing ), Jiangling was also chosen as the capital, and Xiao Zhuang who is considered by some historians to be an emperor of the Liang Dynasty, had his capital in Yingcheng (郢 城, modern Wuhan , Hubei)).
Political situation under the Southern Dynasties
After the capitals Luoyang and Chang'an were conquered by (only partially Sinised) nomadic princes 311 and 316 , the political and cultural focus of China shifted to the south. The Sixteen Kingdoms began in the north , while Jiankang (i.e., Nanking) became the capital of the Eastern Jin and their successor dynasties in the south .
Court history is full of clique battles and intrigues, and the emperors were weak, even if their court was always an important economic factor. Political power was in the hands of the aristocrats . They defended their large estates from the tax demands and the attempts to limit the imperial officials, so that the emperors could not build up domestic power and sometimes became a plaything of the large families. Large estates meant for the state a decrease in the number of taxpayers and labor service providers, because only the owner of the land could be obliged, not the tenants or slaves. The aristocrats did not pay taxes, they had many dependents and semi-private gardens and were recorded in genealogical registers (jiapu). Access to offices and privileges was dependent on the age and celebrity of the families and it is clear that officials who were large landowners themselves did not act against them. In the late 5th century aristocratic rule was so advanced that even marriages between nobles (mingjia) and non-nobles (hanmen) were forbidden.
Conversely, the emperors of the south made only a few, isolated efforts to break the power of the aristocracy. The Qi dynasty (479–502) is particularly noteworthy, because it proceeded against the aristocracy with the filling of leading positions by non-nobles, with the punishment of tax register falsification and with executions. Accordingly, this dynasty was overthrown by Xiao Wen, alias Emperor Liang Wu Di (r. 502-549). At that time, the aristocracy faced a completely different kind of competition: the rise in long-distance trade ended the self-sufficient position of the large landowners in the provinces and undermined their economic supremacy. The time of Liang Wu Dis is still considered to be the golden age of aristocratic culture, but immediately afterwards there were civil wars lasting almost ten years, which bleeding the nobility to death. The last southern dynasty, the Chen Dynasty (557-589), was too weak in terms of foreign policy to establish a stable state again.
Social situation under the Southern Dynasties
The colonization of the south
At the time of the ( Eastern Jin and) Southern Dynasties, the south of China was still largely colonial. The Chinese initially only settled the plains of the Yangtze River Basin, the southern part of Hangzhou Bay and the area around Canton, the rest was inhabited by the "pre-Chinese" population. Even the Chinese population was not particularly dense. But it was enough to decimate and push back the other groups (Yue, Thai, Yao, Tibeto-Burmanen), to press them into employment relationships and finally to gradually assimilate them.
After the seizure of power (only partially Sinicized) nomad prince in northern China (about 311 / 316 ) fled countless Chinese people from the upper class to the south. The reason for this was that they had little chance of gaining respect and influence with the new rulers in the north, as they only valued Chinese culture to a limited extent and wanted to adapt the entire economic and monetary system to their own ideas (e.g. Horse breeding).
In southern China, however, there were already Chinese who had immigrated in earlier times, especially at the time of the Three Kingdoms at the beginning of the 3rd century. In addition, the long-established, “pre-Chinese” population of the Yao (mountain settlers with fire management and hunting), Thai (valley settlers, mainly rice industry) and Yue (on the Yangtze and on the coast, fishing and shipping) existed everywhere , and they also mixed with each other. The “pre-Chinese” population increasingly adapted their habits, at least in the core areas. In addition, their stratum was reinforced by impoverished Chinese farmers, so that the differences to the Chinese gradually disappeared. The state population census recorded a steady increase in the Chinese element.
The newcomers came into sharp contrast with the established Chinese settlers in the 4th century. The latter sat (in view of the not yet particularly densely populated Yangtze Valley) on large estates that were processed by their tenants (mostly Yue, Thai and Yao, but also impoverished Chinese farmers) or ran trading companies, while the newcomers often had no land or capital Were in the military and were seeking administrative posts. Each of the two groups tried to exclude the other from political power and to usurp as much property as possible. In addition, some of the newcomers maintained family contact in the north, defected or had plans for reconquest, which the down-to-earth upper class in the south did not support.
The contrast between the two groups of Chinese had to be balanced out in the 4th and early 5th centuries. For this purpose, different tax lists were drawn up and they were forced to create their own command offices for the immigrants. At the time of the Earlier Song (420–479), however, the problem seems to have essentially been solved, because the taxation of the ordinary population could be standardized.
Cultural
A strong rise of Buddhism can be observed (e.g. under Liang Wu Di ), which although not superseded Confucianism , took much of its effect. This was due to the loosening of social ties in unstable China. Values such as state and family lost their importance and a replacement was sought across all classes. The spread of Buddhism took place from the centers of power and large cities, in which it was already strongly represented by 300. The monasteries along the trade routes also gave shelter to traveling merchants and their goods and engaged in business, and this symbiosis increased their wealth and importance.
Furthermore highlight cultural differences, because the ways of life between North and South Chinese differed significantly: Typical of the south were in this period country houses with gardens and various amenities (ponds, etc.), of course, only for the upper class, and built on tax-free Common Ground . With the establishment of these "country houses" (pieh-yeh), the common land disappeared. In the south people thought a lot of art poetry and cohabitation , or rather brothels in merchants. There were also differences in the taste of music, as their music was introduced via the "native" concubines. Furthermore, differences in eating habits developed: in southern China rice replaced wheat as the main food between approx. 300 and approx. 600 and people ate more vegetables and less meat than before.
Among the poets, Tao Qian (365-427) should be mentioned, who, however, was far removed from the art poetry customary at the time with its allusions and learned phrases and was therefore considered to be second class. Among the calligraphers it is Wang Xizhi (307–365), he is still considered a role model today. In painting , landscape painting emerged as a reproduction of the universe in miniature. An important painter was Gu Kaizhi (344–405).