10,000-8,000 BCE
Beginnings of settled agriculture in the north China plain |
5000-1500 BCE
Neolithic settlements grow in sophistication of agriculture, of pottery, and of jade tools |
CA. 1500-1045 BCE
Shang kings dominate north China plain, develop stratified feudal-type society with writing and sophisticated bronze culture |
1045 BCE
Zhou people conquer Shang settlements, develop idea of Mandate of Heaven |
1045-771 BCE
Western Zhou dynasty continues Shang bronze and artistic culture, king rules through feudal-type division of outlying territories |
770-256 BCE
Spring and Autumn period (after the Spring and Autumn Annals); gradual decline of Zhou court as vassals in outlying territories become increasingly independent |
481-221 BCE
Warring States period (after Intrigues of the Warring States); independent kingdoms compete in attempt to conquer and absorb competing states |
221-206 BCE
Qin dynasty; Qin Empire, under Qin Shi Huangdi, defeats and unifies all the Warring States into a central bureaucratic empire |
206 BCE-220 CE
Han dynasty; Han Empire maintains Qin imperial institutions while moderating harsh Qin laws and promoting Confucianism as a state ideology |
220-589
North-South Division; nomadic peoples (with Chinese collaborators) dominate north China; series of weak Chinese regimes in south China; Buddhism grows dramatically in both south and north |
581-618
Sui dynasty; Sui Empire unifies north and south militarily and politically in 589 and builds Grand Canal from central to north China |
618-907
Tang dynasty; great age of Buddhism and of poetry; Tang Empire maintains strong central state and becomes cosmopolitan center of world trade |
755-763
An Lushan Rebellion weakens Tang politically and militarily |
907-960
Five Dynasties period of division and civil war |
960-1279
Song dynasty; growing prosperity and trade; revival of Confucian thought (Neo- Confucianism); increasingly threatened by neighboring nomadic peoples |
960-1127
Northern Song dynasty; capital at Kaifeng falls to Jurchen invaders in 1127 |
1127-1279
Southern Song dynasty; capital moved to Hangzhou |
1279-1368
Yuan dynasty; Mongols conquer all of China in 1279 and rule the south harshly |
1368-1644
Ming ynasty; Zhu Yuanzhang defeats Mongols and establishes more authoritarian monarchical rule; growing prosperity in sixteenth century; China again becomes center of world trade (tea, silk, porcelain for New World silver) |
1644-1911
Qing ynasty; Manchus from northeast of Beijing conquer all of China with collaboration of many elite Chinese |
CA. 1700-1799
Height of Qing influence over Tibet, Central Asia, and Inner Mongolia |
1839-1842
Opium War demonstrates weakness of Qing dynasty in face of industrializing western European states |
1840s-1911
Qing weakness invites Western and Japanese encroachment on Chinese sovereignty |
1912-1949
Republic of China; Yuan Shikai, first president, asserts dictatorship but dies in 1916 |
1916-1927
Warlord period; no strong central government; warlords compete for power mainly through training and equipping of armed troops |
1925-1927
Nationalist Party and Communist Party cooperate to seize military control of southeast and central coastal areas by 1927 |
1927-1937
Nanjing Decade; Chiang Kai-shek purges Communist Party allies in 1927 and wins allegiance of northern warlords to “unify” north and south under Nationalist Party control |
1931
Japan seizes control of Manchuria |
1937-1945
Sino-Japanese War; Japan occupies eastern third of China; Chinese Communist Party occupies northwest, and Nationalist Party occupies southwest |
1945-1949
Communist-Nationalist Party negotiations break down; civil war begins in 1947; Communist forces quickly defeat Nationalists, who flee to Taiwan |
1949-present
People’s Republic of China on mainland; Republic of China on Taiwan |
1957
Hundred Flowers campaign leads to persecution of intellectuals |
1958-1961
Great Leap Forward leads to massive famine and thirty million deaths |
1959
Suppression of revolt in Tibet |
1966-1969
Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution produces chaos and isolates China diplomatically |
1971-1972
China readmitted to the United Nations; U.S. president Richard Nixon visits China |
1976
Zhou Enlai dies in January; Mao Zedong dies in August; Hua Guofeng succeeds Mao and arrests his closest associates, the “Gang of Four” |
1978
Deng Xiaoping returns to power, promotes “the four modernizations,” and ends the decades of Maoist-style class struggle |
1979
Special Economic Zones created to stimulate foreign trade and investment |
1987
In Taiwan, President Chiang Ching-kuo (Chiang Kai-shek’s son) lifts martial law and permits opposition political parties |
1989
Prodemocracy demonstrations suppressed in early June after six weeks of occupying the streets of Beijing and other cities |
1992
Deng Xiaoping on “southern tour” to Shenzhen reaffirms commitment to economic reform and rapid development (with Communist Party monopoly on political power) |
1994
Jiang Zemin succeeds Deng Xiaoping and continues his policies |
1997
Hong Kong reverts to Chinese control |
1998
Pragmatist Zhu Rongji succeeds conservative Li Peng as premier |
2000
Chen Shui-bian of the Democratic Progressive Party wins Taiwan presidency, putting the Nationalist Party out of power on Taiwan for the first time |
2001
China becomes a member of the World Trade Organization |
2003
Hu Jintao succeeds Jiang Zemin as president and general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party; continues policies of Deng Xiaoping and Jiang Zemin |
2008
Ma Ying-jeou regains Taiwan presidency for Nationalist Party, calling for improved relations and negotiations with the People’s Republic of China; China hosts Summer Olympics; in response to global economic crisis, government announces $586 billion government investment in economic infrastructure building |
