AD 600-900 Imperial China

At the end of the Period of Disunity (AD 221-589), north and south China were reunited under a Northern Zhou general, Yang Jian (541-604). As the emperor Wendi, he founded the Sui dynasty. The Sui built the Grand Canal system, linking the Yellow, Huai and Yangzi rivers, promoted Buddhism, and carried out reforms to government administration, law, and the tax system.

Over-ambitious foreign ventures weakened the Sui and another general, Li Yuan, seized power, establishing the Tang dynasty (618-906) and beginning one of the most brilliant periods in Chinese history. Under the Tang, the Chinese empire expanded east as far as Korea, and west into Central Asia, recovering territory once administered by the Han. China controlled oasis towns along the Silk Route, sending silk west and receiving western furs, cloth and animals. Porcelain was invented in the Tang period and exported by sea as far as India and Western Asia.

By the reign of the scholar emperor Xuanzong (712-56), China was the richest and most powerful political unit in the world, and enjoyed a golden age of poetry and the arts. But it became more costly to maintain such a far-flung empire. Turks and Arabs inflicted defeats on China in Central Asia. As the empire fragmented in the later 9th century, peasant rebellions led to the deposition of the last Tang emperor in 906.