history of china, i guess | History Teacher Reacts

hey there I'm Mr Terry my high school history teacher welcome back to another history teacher acts video all right I saw another bill wz Style video pop up and I knew I had to check it out because this one's called history of China I guess so this is from a new YouTuber named Gilgamesh and this video will be linked down below make sure you support it we want more and more history creators here on the platform all right let's get started I love Chinese history it's one of those regions that's you know you can study and never ever finish you know what I mean it is so deep and it is so complex spend your whole life doing it and never get it so I implore all of you to do that all right and maybe this will be a good platform for us all right let's see how good we got this China is a country in Asia and it's huge the Yellow River Valley is a great place to live except floods keep destroying everything you the engineer stops the flooding so they make him King and he starts the Shia Dynasty after a few Kings things go downhill so a new tribe takes over it's the Shang Dynasty they use bones to talk to their ancestors and record their conversations using a fancy new language after a few K things go downhill so all righty off to a great start so the Yellow River up there wangi River um the first we see real building of complex civilization in uh in China there um Chinese rivers that you know the big ones run from west to east out of the Himalayas so you got the Yellow River and then down south you're going to have the Yi River and those are very very fertile places but like they said they're also very destructive which also bring in cultural aspects of divine intervention and natural disasters not unlike what you saw in ancient times in uh in the uh in Mesopotamia where you had deities you know that were constantly cursing people and and stuff like that and with that became floods and flood stories and all that so um off to a good start and the earliest writing we have in China were on those Oracle bones he talked about the earliest writing we have is on Bones and they were Oracle bones so the shamans would write something on them and stick these bones in a heat source of fire and it would cause the bones to crack and they would use that as fortune telling in one way or the other biggest reason why those are the oldest you know writing oldest writing we have in China is because those bones preserve so much better than you know writing on wood or something like that so anyway I'm only 25 seconds in and but I love talking about some of that early Chinese history cuz I find that so many people don't know about it so we got these early dynasties coming out Shang and Jo Dynasty is two of the big ones the Sha Dynasty may or may not have even existed if I remember right as well but Chang and Joe for sure new tribe takes over wait why should we consider you the legitimate rulers Mandate of Heaven because we have the Mandate of Heaven if you're a good ruler Heaven supports you and life is great for everyone if you're a bad ruler Heaven gets angry with you and life is for everyone and they're allowed to have rebellions if someone overthrows you then Heaven Must Be on their side seems legit everything's going great then okay um an indicator of that were natural disasters so how do you know if the rulers are being bad there's a lot of things I mean there's peasant revolts and all that but one of the indicators was literally they thought was from natural disasters so earthquakes happen flooding of rivers that's a sign from the gods that whoever is ruling is doing a bad job and they have the right to be overthrown so you overthrow them claim this Mandate of Heaven you know you have to the manmade the Mandate of Heaven if things are going well it's kind of self-fulfilling but it is an integral part of the D atic cycle that's exist that existed in China for thousands of years then the king Exiles his wife to pick up a new girl and his wife's dad is angry and revolts destroys the capital and kills the king sounds like you lost the Mandate of Heaven and now CH own now that there's no charge everyone starts coming up with new ideas including dosm Confucianism and legalism so all right let's see it let's hold on it's coming up with new ideas got to see Confucianism and legalism good yeah DS and go with the flow um natural it it actually means that adasha advocates for small or less intensive government um the more intervention of of humans into society and nature of governing is unnatural and taism is all about that by the way also see da is it with a D um it's more natural confusion ISM um yeah so it's it's about morals and relationships of knowing your place in society both men women uh subject parent child all of those things legalism says that people are naturally not very good and need harsh rulers um and you know strong strong rulers strict laws so some of these are are dialogically opposed to each other sunzu just figured out how to fight Wars properly and wrote a whole book about it so everyone goes to war the king of chin conquers more and more of Unites it all this isn't a kingdom it's an Empire which unified it by the way uh confucious was a leader during or not a leader he was a a philosopher educator during the ward story in States period that traveled and had you know people that that followed him as well that um were trying to give advice to rulers during the Waring States period so that's the context of him yep first emperor of China shiong D which makes him the first emperor of China standardize all the things language standardized currency standardized weights and measurements standardized he runs the country based strict laws with harsh punishments if you break the law then no worries the government will just kill you your parents grandparents children grandchildren siblings uncles aunts and cousins these legalists did not like dosm don't like legalism get purged he builds a wall to keep out barbarians one day it's going to be a great wall he really doesn't want to die so he looks rudimentary wall at that time but just in case he dies he builds a gigantic tomb with a whole Army to defend then he drinks an immortality potion and dies Rebellion some random peasant is we thought that mercury and people thought that mercury um was some kind of mystical substance that could prolong life and in fact it killed him um it it broke his brain he end up dying like his 50s um died literally trying to become immortal and I I think few people were uh going to really mourn his death so his dynasty Falls with him he's the last basically the last one there so um his tomb is also amazing it's we know the sight of it we never excavated it it's got all kinds of mercury content in it tal trap doors um it's not too far from the Terracotta Warriors hopefully one day we can excavate it safely and respectfully transporting prisoners and some of them escape the penalty for letting a prisoner escape is death so he can either go back to get his death sentence or join the rebellion and overthrow the emperor so he frees all the prisoners joins the rebellion and overthrows the emperor and then he reunites all of China and starts a new Dynasty now that China is stable again people start paper a compass an earthquake detector and a wheelbarrow then they conquer Vietnam and they're tired of having sad lame weak pathetic useless horses so they fight a war to get better horses then they beat the barbarians and establish a new protectorate anyone that was a big reason why the you know they the wall you know building the walls was from uh those nomadic people from the front uh from the north the Chinese uh and you know the nomatic peoples of of um northern China always had this kind of LoveHate relationship sometimes they would get along great and work with each other because you know they're herders they're Nomads up north and trade for you know uh uh farming you know products and and and food like that and then trade that for horses but then sometimes especially when ecologically things aren't going well in the north and grazing lands aren't good you got raids down in the South and then you'd have violence that's why the walls were end end up being built there um the Han by the way the Chinese people today um often refer their Heritage to the Han they they consider themselves like Han Chinese that's a very popular thing against uh for many people in China so um a lot of people look at them really as like the historic Golden Age really of China want silk yes entire planet so they build a road to the outside world legalism sucks let's make Confucianism the foundation of government instead the haveen over the government and the peasants think the government is too corrupt so they put on yellow hats and start a rebellion and now China's broken again don't worry happens all the time just kidding in the middle of this chaos everyone turns to a hot new religion that traveled up the Silk Road from Bud came from India people make temples good timing for Buddhism to show up time were very tough um at this time the the violence of uh actually it was uh Buddhism came into China even before this too but um was good at giving people a really a more positive view because it kind of promis an eternal happiness through Buddhism and at a the Waring States periods which you know there's the major one but then a bunch of other broken periods perfect time for the perfect or perfect message for the perfect time for the people of China um yep statues paintings and books theu Dynasty reunites China they build a grand canal to connect the Empire and they extend the Great Wall then they invade Vietnam goes well then they invade Korea and fail and invade Korea and fail and invade Korea and fail and invade Korea and fail the people get tired of so they overthrow the emperor it's time for the and they invade Korea succeed hold up the new emperor is a woman is that even allowed it's not not allowed now that things are a golden age of literature people write stories poetry history encyclopedias feeling everyone's drinking it want to read a book we can print things now printing yep first wood Brock uh was first printing I guess that we could really say there uh the Tang were the most militaristic of all the Chinese dynasty they expanded further than anybody else did they created tributary States on their Frontiers you know with like Vietnam or or Korea um and also move into Western Asia uh and get very different ethnic groups coming into that a rebellion but it was also very very expensive Dynasty survives by alive need money steal from the Buddhists The Peasants are dying from drought buddh have a lot of Poss of Heaven it's interesting because like Buddhist it's like you don't have possessions but they also have monasteries and Relics and stuff like that but not seen as those type of possessions so Buddhism like riches and wealth are Illusions they're a of of pain right cuz that's what buddhism's kind of foundational message is is life full of suffering so get rid of things that cause suffering but yeah uh looting you know Buddhist monasteries and and Buddhist lands uh very common in Harsh Times China is broken again need money steal from the Buddhists time to reunite all of China dasty guess we'll have to share it this time now we're so rich we have the best in the world the population increases a ton people invent new technology like paper money gun gunpowder and better printing there's new paintings Pottery poetry plays and puppet shows so the the big difference in the tang and the songs yeah Tang were very militaristic the song were very governmental um very much promoting of culture and arts and stuff like that very uh a different shift though I believe the song were founded by a military leader but they kind of give up a lot of that expansionism but they still spent extravagantly instead of it being on Military efforts although the Chinese still had amazing military at this time it was on very bureaucratic government and a lot of this stuff the government builds retirement homes public hospitals and a postal service want a place to relax try going to the Tea House need friends let's join the exotic food Club want to play go let's do it after the firework show there's a new Dynasty in the north and they would like to conquer all of China so they go to war meanwhile in the middle of nowhere gen Khan just decided to take over the world the song dnasty allies with the Mongols to fight the gin and they win then the Mongols the song and genis canan's grandson declares himself emperor of China hey Japan you suck says China no you says Japan so they send troops to invade Japan but get killed by the wind then they send an even stronger Army and have a nice time fighting the Japanese but get killed by the wind some European Guy visits China lives there all right so um man a lot went through there so you had the Mongol Empire um the uh China took like 100 years to conqueror Jenis never was able to finish it Kua Khan did and really moves the capital there uh creates the U Dynasty and the Mongols ruled China for about 100 years and the Chinese hated every minute of it um and you'll get to a little bit here about when they eventually expel the Mongols and then totally try to go lockdown mode um for foreign influence there the Mongols very much cracked China open really just burst open the Silk Road expanded it Imports coming in exports going out yeah but Imports coming in something the Chinese have never really loved cuz they don't really want that influence but they want to sell a lot of stuff Marco Polo is going to travel with with the Mongols um through the conquest there and writes a famous book which brought a lot of Europeans to knowledge about East Asia that they never had before and very much influence people after like the Age of Exploration explorers like Christopher Columbus who was a devout supporter and lover of Marco Polo and was very influenced by him there for a while and writes a book about how great it is then everything gets bad there's drought famine plague sounds like you lost the Mandate of Heaven so some peasants put on red hat and overthrow the emperor the Ming build one of the most powerful navies in the world make some voyages to let everyone know how W China's rich and then they dis the Navy and forget it ever happened they build a fancy new Palace okay so the early Ming were actually when they came into Power okay the Ming Dynasty they threw over the Mongols overthrew the Mongols yeah um their Emperor jongle he sent out those missions Jang ha and the early 1400s probably traveled more by sea than anybody ever um incredible ships if you've seen them they're massive uh massive treasure ships but they weren't colonizing missions um they were basically to go out to as much of the world as possible declare the new Ming Dynasty get tribute from people impress the world and that kind of thing and it brings in a very interesting uh idea you know what if the Ming were really trying to colonize um they try to go into so I mean there's India Africa but what if they continue to gone East there's uh some Fringe historians uh not maybe even is one that said that maybe the Chinese even explored across the Pacific maybe even getting to the Americas what if they colonized the Americas early 1400s a century before Europeans did bunch of great wh ifs but when that Emperor died they recalled all of those ships and said no more of this foreign you know interactions we just got done beating the Mongols screw the foreigners let's lock down no more voyages like this end up shutting all of that stuff down jangha gets recalled dismantle the ships and really go in inner mode and with that reusing a lot of those funds to rebuild the Great Wall of China and today's Great Wall of China is much more representation of the Ming era than any of the previous versions of the wall so you're not allowed to visit and the Navy happened they build a fancy new Palace in a city you're not allowed to visit and they make the wall great again art and literature are booming look at those Ming vases the Portuguese would like to build a trading post so China lends them some land the emperor doesn't feel like being Emperor anymore so he goes on strike very restrictive uh the Chinese didn't they wanted to sell stuff to Europeans but they did not want them to stick around they didn't want to import anything China doesn't make anything that or sorry Europe doesn't make anything the Chinese want so it was very restrictive they said okay you can have this one port maau which is actually like an island off of the mainland China you're going to be constantly uh watched by government minders you have to leave at certain times of the year um you can buy stuff but we're not going to be selling stuff and you can only pay basically with gold and silver Europeans hated that but there's nothing they can do about it China's powerful you can't force entry and expansion at this time waigh about 200 years there are famines floods an epidemic and a giant earthquake sounds like you lost the some barbarians from the north take over it's the Ching has to get this new haircut or China expands the population booms and everything's going great hi it's the Europeans trade relationships fine you can trade but you'll have to do it right here the British are selling opium and now everyone's addicted so China so why opium remember they would not allow trade of any Goods Britain wants to sell Goods to them um this is this is starting with the Industrial Revolution Europe is uh like Britain especially is producing a crap ton of stuff China's a huge Market um it's not allowed to be traded so they start sneaking opium um into sales into port cities become a massive epidemic as you see here the Chinese are like no more of this seizes all the Opium and destroys it problem solved knock knock it's the British with huge boats guns gun boats legalize drugs stop having drugs be illegal no says China okay you don't know something crazy opium trade was upwards to a fifth of the entire British economy the biggest economy basically in the world at this time about nearly a fifth of it was off drugs you see why the the British took this ser seriously when they said uh the Chinese said they were going to enforce the ban on it legalize drugs stop having drugs be illegal no says China I mean yes says China and they sign an unequal treaty now they have to open up five ports to foreign countries give away Ecom British and pay the British back for all the drugs they lost good day I am Hong Kong back to the 1990 and it's time to Ching and create heaven on Earth says some guy causing the war of all time now the Ching is biggest rebellion in a peasant rebellion in history did you see the little stat he put up people don't realize this say some guy causing the deadliest Civil War 10 to 30 million was just over 10 years 10 to 30 million you guys we're talking World War numbers okay took almost 10 years to uh start or to to to go the Ching eventually squashed the things completely weakens China as you can imagine it's a disaster the 1800s were disastrous for China war of all time now the Ching is weak and everyone knows it hi it's France we own Vietnam now hi it's Japan we own Korea and Taiwan now some peasants are tired of all this foreign influence they rise up and attack the foreigners and then the entire world invades China harmonist the Ching Dynasty weighing their options carefully thinks really really hard about what to do next and decides to declare war in the entire world surprisingly they lose and then people revolt and create a that's essentially what it was they were sick I mean the 1800s was a whole Century of China being completely exploited by foreigners um with industrial power that they could they could use to force unequal treaties and stuff like that so the government was a failure in trying to respond to it so people start doing it Society of the righteous harmonious fists awesome name and you get anti-foreign uh uh rebellions in major cities all across and across China and as you saw the industrial Nations like n not cool bringing their industrial weapons smoke these guys out right here in the late 1800s and China like they said is losing ter they're losing Wars it's a bad time call the Republic of China but the Ching Dynasty is technically still around and the new government doesn't have a military so they ask a guy from the previous governments to overthrow the emperor in exchange for becoming president and he does it and becomes president then he assassinates the democratically elected leader dissolves the government and declares himself the new emperor of China and everyone gets so angry that China breaks again there's but territories are ruled by Warlords the Nationalist party is reformed and they want to unify China the Communist party is formed and they also want to unify China why don't we do it together so they team up to reunite China and then the nationalists betray the Communists and now there's a Civil War the nationalists overthrow the government and reunify this is the part that gets it it's man even even for me like this this is all happening within about 15 years so Empress uh sshi dies and pro U Republic people are like okay this is the time to build up the new Republic and as you saw I mean China has had 3,000 years of of Imperial rule they've never had anything like this and it just descends into Political chaos with different factions um trying to trying to take control and really came down to who can raise an army right and you had different groups you had a communist group uh who again are going to be more like Guerilla Fighters then you had the nationalists or the guadango very much a much more organized Army and descended to these early Democratic years for China were very difficult okay but it's 1928 and uh pretty soon here another group is going to come in and China's going to have to put aside some differences to fighting the Communists and they're winning but the Communists make a really long march to safety so they can regroup news Japan is invading China they take over manua where they set up a puppet government the nationalists want to stop Japan from invading China Communists also want to stop Japan from invading China so they team up again because it worked so well the last time then the Japanese get to naning horrible horrible events horrible World War II is over and China gets back all the land Japan still including Taiwan okay it's important to note that uh up until the invasion of China the nationalists were beating the Communists but during the war what actually interestingly you found out the Communists were better at fighting than the nationalists all those tactics Guerilla tactics and stuff that they had learned um fighting the Guam andong uh the Nationalist ends up paying off and also the whole plight of of the Communist Party became more attractive to a lot of Chinese people and um as they saw this and by the time the war was over World War II was over Communist party and its sympathizers grew a lot more and then once the Japanese are kicked out the Civil War resumes and it looks like you're about to see what the result of that is now we can go back to Civil War the Communists are winning and the nationalists are on the Run they Retreat to Taiwan and make Taipei the new capital of the Republic Communists take the mainland and declare it China and then they try to industrialize in one great leap which fails and causes the largest famine in human history and then M decides that China isn't communist enough so they need another Revolution a cultural one they burn historical sites because they're too capitalist and they destroy cultural artifacts because they're too capitalist and they persecute anyone who seems too capitalist then like yep anyone that was trying was economically almost like seceding on a personal level the cultural revolution purged that um the Great Leap Ford was a giant step backwards economically as they try to basically Implement some policies um to try to you know do more things like collectivize land and and the whole platform right to to share the wealth and and and and stuff in in China and that's that's a whole different thing that needs a lot more um a lot more study but yeah this was also a very hard tradition see every time that they were you see in China here or they're trying to put in reforms right and change their system and really uproot it you saw it with that them trying to bring democracy first on and that was a ends up being disastrous in a lot of ways in The Early Republic and then and then now you're bringing in communism and that transition was also very difficult it's like the most stable times in China were the dynastic times over were the Imperial times not these more modernized ideologies isn't that kind of interesting now dies and the next guy makes China capitalist I mean socialist with Chinese characteristics want to protest don't it capitalize a lot of it a lot more private ownership um happens the economy booms uh deng's economic policy is very different than than Mao um so but uh people a lot of people don't understand the difference economy booms and China gets rich and lifts hundreds of millions out of poverty I'm sure the economy Still Single part abs abely fantastic video had all the I mean the major points that was phenomenal I'm super impressed with goesh and the work here um have a lot of hope that we can see some other great uh videos from them and I'm definitely looking forward to it um this is a new channel again not even 2,000 subscribers like we got to get that up so this video came out about a week ago and again I think if you're still following me here hopefully you really liked the style of the bill wart style but fantastic job hope I was able to add some stuff there was so many things I wanted to add and hopefully that clarified a lot of things and get you guys interested in learning more about Chinese history so again awesome job here I'm excited to follow this channel going further in the future and again this L video is linked down below make sure okay if you haven't seen this yet go give it a view like subscribe to the channel give a good comment tell Mr Terry sent you and we'll see yall next time bye