India and China Establish Empires

Chapter7 Group7Elena Katsanos, Kari Andresen,

Victoria Albano, Nancy Tao

China’s Geography

• China was is very mountainous because it is in the Himalayas which is the tallest mountain range in the world. To the east is the Pacific ocean and to the north is the Gobi desert. China’s two rivers were the Huang He river (yellow river) and the Chang Jiang river (Yangtde).

Han Dynasty

The Han Dynasty was divided into two periods, the former Han Dynasty lasted from 220 B.C. to 9 A.D. In between there was the Wang Mang period. The later Han Dynasty started again in 25 A.D. to 220 A.D. The Han Dynasties government was a centralized government and also a bureaucracy. The bureaucracy included civil service jobs, and the emperor had authority over all of the officials. During the Han Dynasty they invented new things such as the plow, iron tools, and the collar harness to improve the ways of farming and agriculture to feed Chinas population more efficiently. They also built the Great Wall for defense and roads to connect the empire and help with transportation. Wang Mangs rule didn’t last long because of his policies that lead to his downfall and demise.

Silk Roads

• Europe, Egypt, and West Asia surrounded the Indians who were considered the middle men. The silk roads connected them and promoted trade between the countries. China Provided all the other countries with silk that’s why they called it the silk road. On the other hand, they also traded other goods on the silk road such as cloth, grains, ivory, metal, precious stone, slaves, spices, timber, and tortoise shells.

India’s Geography

• In the northern part of India they depended on the Ganges and Indus rivers. To the north of India are the Himalayas and the Hindu Kush mountains. In the northwest part of India is the Thar desert. In the north they had patriarchal family rule which means the eldest male ruled, and in the south they had matriarchal rule which means the mother rules. In The south there are two mountain ranges that are called the Western Gahts and the Eastern Gahts. To the west is the Arabian sea and to the east is the Bay of Bengal.

Mauryan Empire

• Chandra Gupta Mauryan established the Mauryan empire in about 321B.C. He had an adviser named Kautilya and his government was bureaucratic. His empire was divided into 4 provinces. He had high taxes and you had to serve in the military, unless you were a farmer. His son Asoka became king in 269 B.C. after a bloody war in Kalinga, he felt bad and decided to rule by Buddhism. He preached new policies about religious toleration, non violence, and treating subjects fairly and humanely, also caring for the well being of his subjects. The Maryuan empire fell because new groups of people were entering to escape turmoil of other countries like Greeks, Persians, and central Asians.

Gupta Empire

Chandra Gupta the 1st established his empire in A.D. 320, and in A.D. 335 Samudra Gupta the son became king. During the Gupta empire Hinduism was widespread and was the main religion. Chandra Gupta the 2nd became king in A.D. 375 and he died in A.D. 415, he ruled for 40 years. Chandra Gupta the 2nd was a good diplomat between other kingdoms and formed alliances and defeated his enemies, for example Shakas. The downfall of India was caused by the invasions of the Hunas.

Buddhism and Hinduism• Buddhism was divided into 2 sects one of them was the Mahayana

and the other was the Theravada (Hinayana). The Mahayana wasn’t as strict and it allowed people to become Buddha's and they could give up nirvana and become philanthropists to save humanity.

• In Hinduism people could change which god they wanted to worship. The three main gods that they would choose to worship were Brahma, who was the creator of the world, Bishnu who was the preserver of the world and Shiva who was the destroyer of the world. Since people were able to choose what they were able to worship it became more popular.

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