The Huang He (yellow) river goes across china for more than 2900 miles. Carries rich yellow silt all from mongolia to pacific ocean. The cahng Jiang River is longer, and it streatches 3400 miles across central china. They merge together to create a fertile area. like, only 10% of the land is fertile enough to grow, even though there are rivers everywhere. China is also surrounded by mountain ranges and river valleys. Difficults traveling trading. So they mainly rely on themselves.
Social Structure
Shang King ruled from capital city of Anyang. His kindom was divided into different districs that were ruled by military leaders. King had all powers though. Chinese believed in supernatural forces so that they could talk to gods and recieve help when needed.
Gender Roles
Family was extremely important (obv). Father was like, the king of the family. He arranged marriages for his daughters, controled education for sons as well as their future careers. Mother occupied a subordinate position in fam and were unable to won property. Mother had more respect when she birthed a son. However, all women had to obey men. All rituals were preformed by males.
Literature
LOTS of literature. Zhon literature was very important. Different books - "Book of History" was the book of Zhou's history. Book of Change was the manual of diviners. Book of Rites was the tules of Etiquette and rituals of the aristocrats. Book of Songs it tells about hte ondition of early Zhou- mostly notable of classic works. Most of the writings had been destroyed in the first empire, however.
Characters
Three Wise Sage Kings:
King Yao - virtuous ruler bringing harmony to society
King Shun: Regulating four seasons, weights, measures, and units of time.
King Yu: Rescued china from raging floods of yellow river.
Economy
Yellow river valley lacked written language or a while. Consequencially, documented ecoonomics are rare. what is known is that the civilization primarikly focused on a day to day agriculture, rather than spontanous growth.
Silk road was a major part of the agri purpose. People would travel all over it for trading purposes. Brought cultural difussion, and agri was an immediate profit cus of fertile soil.
Weapons
Iron Metallurgy was used for farming tools, utensils, and weapons cus its strong. http://besthistorysites.net/index.php/ancient-biblical-history/china http://acc6.its.brooklyn.cuny.edu/~phalsall/texts/chron.html Shang Dynasty 16 C. BCE ~ 1066 BCE [or 1751-1112 BCE
Establishment: Established by Tang of Shang in 1751 bce. Shang Dynasty (1600 BC - 1046 BC) is the first historic Chinese dynasty and ruled in the northeastern region of China. In 1766 bc tang overthrew the Xia dynasty and put in his own shang dynasty. He made Bo the capital. Bo is today’s shangqiu City, Hennan Province. Supposedly governed his people with beneviolence and compassion. and expanded his territory into the Di and Qiang minorities' territories in the west. Under Tang's rule, the country became more and more prosperous. . Even though there were fatuous kings and struggles within the royal family, the Shang Dynasty maintained its rule with the help of some wise and loyal ministers. and paid attention to developing agricultural production. Emporor system.
They fished a lot. Their economy kind of depended on it. A lot of bronze too with jewelry and tools and weapons and stuff. vessels. Among the crops grown were rice, wheat, millet and corn. People began to raise domestic animals such as cows, sheep, horses, chickens, dogs and pigs.
achievement: They invented Porcelain wares. a lot of jade too. also the invention and use and trading of silk. a lot of achievements in the arts. They created musical instruments when the use of bronze flourished. Some of the instruments include: Xun (Ocarina made of baked clay), drums, and copper cymbals. Written communications were written too... The characters were usually carved on tortoise shells, animal bones,