Multicultural China in the early Middle Ages / Sanping Chen.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Chen, Sanping.

Series:

Encounters with Asia.

Encounters with Asia

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Ethnicity--China--History.

Ethnicity.

China--History--221 B.C.-960 A.D.

China.

China--Ethnic relations--History.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (292 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, c2012.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

In contrast to the economic and cultural dominance by the south and the east coast over the past several centuries, influence in China in the early Middle Ages was centered in the north and featured a significantly multicultural society. Many events that were profoundly formative for the future of East Asian civilization occurred during this period, although much of this multiculturalism has long been obscured due to the Confucian monopoly of written records. Multicultural China in the Early Middle Ages endeavors to expose a number of long-hidden non-Sinitic characteristics and manifestations of heritage, some lasting to this very day. Sanping Chen investigates several foundational aspects of Chinese culture during this period, including the legendary unicorn and the fabled heroine Mulan, to determine the origin and development of the lore. His meticulous research yields surprising results. For instance, he finds that the character Mulan is not of Chinese origin and that Central Asian influences are to be found in language, religion, governance, and other fundamental characteristics of Chinese culture. As Victor Mair writes in the Foreword, "While not everyone will acquiesce in the entirety of Dr. Chen's findings, no reputable scholar can afford to ignore them with impunity. "These "foreign"-origin elements were largely the legacy of the Tuoba, whose descendants in fact dominated China's political and cultural stage for nearly a millennium. Long before the Mongols, the Tuoba set a precedent for "using the civilized to rule the civilized" by attracting a large number of sedentary Central Asians to East Asia. This not only added a strong pre-Islamic Iranian layer to the contemporary Sinitic culture but also commenced China's golden age under the cosmopolitan Tang dynasty, whose nominally "Chinese" ruling house is revealed by Chen to be the biological and cultural heir of the Tuoba.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Foreword: Old Wine in New Bottles / Mair, Victor H.

Introduction

Chapter 1. The Legacy of the Tuoba Xianbei: The Tang Dynasty

Chapter 2. From Mulan to Unicorn

Chapter 3. Brotherly Matters and the Canine Image: The Invasion of "Barbarian" Tongues

Chapter 4. The Huns and the Bulgars: The Chinese Chapter

Chapter 5. The Mystery of the "White-Drake" Oracle: The Iranian Shadows

Chapter 6. Son of Heaven and Son of God

Chapter 7. Bai Juyi and Central Asia

Appendix. Turkic or Proto-Mongolian? A Note on the Tuoba Language

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Acknowledgments

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references (p. [237]-265) and index.

ISBN:

9781283898089

128389808X

9780812206289

0812206282

OCLC:

822017897