Talk:Dynasties of China/Archive 1

Archive 1

Yuan

Why is the Yuan dynasty text linked and none of the others? I am removing the text link as it clearly states that the "H" will take you to the history of the dynasty. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sasquatch (talk • contribs) 04:46, 15 December 2004 (UTC)

Han

whats the difrence between eastern and western han? and which han are we refering to when chinese call themselves han chinese? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.82.165.73 (talk • contribs) 15:01, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

It was split in the middle, and it's the same people. -- Jjjsixsix ^(talk)/_(contribs) @ 20:27, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

No. Eastern Han refers to the period from 206 BCE – 9 CE when the capital was a Changan while Eastern Han refers to the period from 25–220 CE when the capital was in Louyang. Louyang was a little bit east of Changan, so that's why. The Han Dynasty is the general term for both dyansty and the Han Chinese call themselves after this dynasty.--Queen Elizabeth II's Little Spy (talk) 23:13, 11 December 2010 (UTC)

Romanisation

Why are romanisations in Chinese languages other that Putonghua being swiftly deleted? Whilst Mandarin might be the official and dominant language of the PRC, this was not the case in imperial China, and thus we should not base our use of the Chinese language solely on modern practice in mainland China, as there are many other Chinese communities around the world where Mandarin is not the lingua franca or the official standard - more often than not this is either Cantonese or Hokkien (Minnan). Indeed, Cantonese is used officially in both SARs of the PRC and is undoubtedly the most commonly spoken Chinese language within Chinese communities in the west. Hokkien is the mosty common first language in the ROC and enjoys a semi-official sort of status being used in politics, in the media, and in government advertisements amongst other things, and it is the most common lingua franca in Asian overseas Chinese communities. The people and communities who speak these languages are usually proudly Chinese and their languages are no less legitimate than PRC Putonghua. It should be noted that linguists generally consider the southern Chinese language to be closer to older forms of Chinese and thus they would probably even be more suitable than putonhua for representing the names of the older dynasties. Why at the moment is it alright to have more than one Mandarin romanisation on many pages, but not any for other Chinese languages? If there is considered to be a problem of cluttering the page, maybe we should use Template:Chinese. Vox latina (talk) 08:20, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

The language preferred by the vegetable farmer is irrelevant. The only romanizations that are relevant are the ones used in the English-language literature on Chinese history, that is, Wade-Giles and Hanyu Pinyin. The romanizations serve as an aid for readers to identify terms and topics, not to placate large amounts of people for political reasons. If it's not widely used in the field in Chinese history, then it's not helpful and does not belong.--Jiang (talk) 04:29, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Xia Dynasty

The table shows the Xia Dynasty lasting 470 years from 2100 BCE to 1600 BCE. If it ended in 1600 BCE, then either the duration was 500 years, or it began in 2070 BCE. I think it would be better with the latter, since the Xia Dynasty page says "The Xia Shang Zhou Chronology Project results in 2070 BCE and 1600 BCE," and the Xia Shang Zhou Chronology Project page shows 2070 BCE as well. Why is it 2100 BCE here in Dynasties in Chinese history? wei1lian2 (talk) 05:13, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Yuan Shikai

Should Yuan Shikai's Empire of China be considered a dynasty? Xinophiliac (talk) 18:44, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Are there descendants of these dynasties nowadays?

Something that I always found troublesome is the lack of information regarding the families of each Chinese dynasty. You see, if you look for House of Habsburg or House of Bourbon you'll go straight to an article about these families, their members, etc... in the case of Chinese history here on Wikipedia, if we look after Chinese dynasties, we'll see articles about historical eras, not about the families.

Also, are there present-day descendants of Chinese dynasties (except for the last one, which I'm aware that there are even a pretender)? If yes or no, shouldn't this article tell the reader about it? --Lecen (talk) 15:47, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

I've added a column showing the ruling house's surname/clan name, that should be helpful. --Shibo77 (talk) 18:38, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply, but it's still unclear. What I want to know is if there is a present-day individual who can trace his lineage in male line up to a Chinese Dynasty. Sharing the same surname does not mean that a person is descendant of an Emperor, or does it? --Lecen (talk) 18:58, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

It does for the most part. Most Chinese people have family shrines honoring such descents and notable ancestors. My mother's family, the Liu, descend from an obscure son of the Emperor Jing of the Western Han. I would say families such as the Zheng family of the Qin Dynasty were wiped out by the order of Xiang Yu when he toppled the dynasty. Most Chinese are descended from the more prosperous emperors who had many sons during the beginning or middle of the dynasty rather than the end where most were killed off by the next family to come in. There are so many descendants of the Chinese emperor that it is basically not really anything special to be trace a person's descent from one. Family descent didn't make a person the emperor of China; it was whoever could seize power and declare that he had the Mandate of Heaven. --KAVEBEAR (talk) 00:42, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

There are those who said like a portion of the population took up their surnames after the fact but after so many milleniums I don't think it really matters.--KAVEBEAR (talk) 00:44, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply. So there are descendants from the Han Dynasty? How could it be possible to someone to keep knowledge after centuries when Euroepeans can't go that farther? --Lecen (talk) 12:39, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

It does not sound realistic at all to say that "Most Chinese are descended from the more prosperous emperors who had many sons", obviously the rest of the population taken together could have millions more sons and daughters than the emperors... --Damián A. Fernández Beanato (talk) 21:55, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

But that is one out of a thousand ancestors that a person could have today. It’s not mutually exclusive that a person can’t be descended from an emperor in antiquity and a peasant as well. If you go back 20 generations, a person can theoretically have 1048576 ancestors. Nearly every Western European is a descendant of Charlemagne. [1]. KAVEBEAR (talk) 17:05, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Good record keeping and a continuous civilization that valued history and writing is the answer. Descendants of Confucius today know how many generations removed they are from their 6th century BC ancestor. See Descent from antiquity. KAVEBEAR (talk) 17:05, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Mnemonics

Quietly he stroked the soft milky minge.(Needed Improvement) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.41.10.48 (talk) 11:47, 8 September 2012 (UTC)

it is good information for research

Bold 157.119.170.7 (talk) 12:00, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Since the mnemonics are all in Chinese, I don't think they contribute much to the English-language version of this page. Perhaps if they had a translation as well as a transliteration. I can see that some of the transliterated words seem to refer to the names of the dynasties, but not all of them seem to, and since I speak no Chinese I'm also not sure whether they just are homonyms of the empire names. --64.165.112.146 23:17, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree that they don't seem to serve much of a purpose here on the English wikipedia. They're not homonyms, though, just rhymes/cadences using the actual names of the dynsties. For example, the last line of the first mnemonic is: 宋元明清后,皇朝至此完 which transliterates in pinyin as sòng yuán míng qīng hòu, huáng cháo zhì cǐ wán, and roughly translated as Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing are last, empires until the end (of the list). It's more like the mnemonic for remembering the names of all the English kings and queens that schoolchildren in the UK learn (or used to learn?). siafu 01:12, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm going to cut the mnemonics section out, regardless, as anyone who knows Chinese well enough to use them probably knows it well enough to read the Chinese wikipedia and find out. siafu 01:14, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually, as an English-speaking student of Chinese, I cannot (yet) read the Chinese Wikipedia, but may find the mnemonics helpful. I found them for my own use in the page history. What if we added a translation next to the characters and pinyin? wei1lian2 (talk) 05:35, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

For an English version, try this: (Thirteen Chinese Dynasties): She Shamefully Chose Chinese Hand Jingles and Sinfully Sweet Tango Songs: "You 'n Me, Chickadee!" (Xia (Hsia), Shang, Zhou (Chou), Qin (Ch'in), Han, Jin, Southern & Northern, Sui, Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming, Qing (Ching)) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.172.77.223 (talk) 03:34, 22 May 2013 (UTC)