Great article – the observation that entire North China Plain can be regarded as the Yellow River delta is spot on. That makes (north and central) China kind of Egypt on steroids.
Two points I'd like to add:
(1) The traditional dividing line between north and south is Qinling Mountains and River Huai. The former is obvious enough as a dividing range; the climates of two sides of the mountain range are different. The latter may seem odd because today the Huai is a minor waterway and only a "half river" (it has no consistent route into the sea and flows into the Grand Canal at Hongze Lake). But actually the Huai has been for a long time the downstream of Yellow River, including during the time of north-south rivalry. That makes it a more natural line that's hard to cross and relatively easy to defend.
(2) You could have said more about the geographical locations of various imperial capitals. The oldest capital Changan was on the western periphery of the plain. It was chosen not only because it was the ancestral land of Qin, the predecessor dynasty, but also showed Han dynasty's strategic pivot to the west (today's Gansu and Xinjiang). The Han also had a secondary capital, Luoyang, that's more accessible from the eastern regions. In Eastern Han, Luoyang became the primary capital.
After late Tang and the destruction of both capitals, northern Chinese dynasties are ruled from Kaifeng, more to the population centre of the plain. If Changan is like the head that controls the body through a narrow neck, Luoyang is like the heart, and Kaifeng the belly button.
Placing the capital in Nanjing was an aberration in classical times, driven by the necessity of defence. Beijing only became important, as you noted, when the steppe powers invade the central plains. So it's only a "recent phenomenon" (by Chinese standards = in the last 800 years).
Thanks - both for the praise, and your detailed response.
I was conscious about the length while writing this, but if your comment is anything to go by, perhaps unnecessarily. I do note the Qinling-Huai line in the body of the text, but could have spent more time on the matter. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that for hundreds of kilometres west of roughly Fuyang the breadth of the Huai narrows considerably into a web of smaller tributaries more easily crossed, and with river management needing to be split in not-straightforward ways, particularly in the drier seasons. So although the border is not wide-open, over the longer term it seems that conflict is virtually inevitable (particularly given the Yellow's dramatic course changes liability to upend any detailed treaty that might be hammered out).
As far as more central capitals go, I touched on their earlier status, but admit I got a little caught up in the literary device of Nan/Beijing as a way to convey to the reader the enormous geographic scale of the natural concerns of the Empire, and the consequent impossibility of sustaining good governance across the generations.
Great article – the observation that entire North China Plain can be regarded as the Yellow River delta is spot on. That makes (north and central) China kind of Egypt on steroids.
Two points I'd like to add:
(1) The traditional dividing line between north and south is Qinling Mountains and River Huai. The former is obvious enough as a dividing range; the climates of two sides of the mountain range are different. The latter may seem odd because today the Huai is a minor waterway and only a "half river" (it has no consistent route into the sea and flows into the Grand Canal at Hongze Lake). But actually the Huai has been for a long time the downstream of Yellow River, including during the time of north-south rivalry. That makes it a more natural line that's hard to cross and relatively easy to defend.
(2) You could have said more about the geographical locations of various imperial capitals. The oldest capital Changan was on the western periphery of the plain. It was chosen not only because it was the ancestral land of Qin, the predecessor dynasty, but also showed Han dynasty's strategic pivot to the west (today's Gansu and Xinjiang). The Han also had a secondary capital, Luoyang, that's more accessible from the eastern regions. In Eastern Han, Luoyang became the primary capital.
After late Tang and the destruction of both capitals, northern Chinese dynasties are ruled from Kaifeng, more to the population centre of the plain. If Changan is like the head that controls the body through a narrow neck, Luoyang is like the heart, and Kaifeng the belly button.
Placing the capital in Nanjing was an aberration in classical times, driven by the necessity of defence. Beijing only became important, as you noted, when the steppe powers invade the central plains. So it's only a "recent phenomenon" (by Chinese standards = in the last 800 years).
Thanks - both for the praise, and your detailed response.
I was conscious about the length while writing this, but if your comment is anything to go by, perhaps unnecessarily. I do note the Qinling-Huai line in the body of the text, but could have spent more time on the matter. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that for hundreds of kilometres west of roughly Fuyang the breadth of the Huai narrows considerably into a web of smaller tributaries more easily crossed, and with river management needing to be split in not-straightforward ways, particularly in the drier seasons. So although the border is not wide-open, over the longer term it seems that conflict is virtually inevitable (particularly given the Yellow's dramatic course changes liability to upend any detailed treaty that might be hammered out).
As far as more central capitals go, I touched on their earlier status, but admit I got a little caught up in the literary device of Nan/Beijing as a way to convey to the reader the enormous geographic scale of the natural concerns of the Empire, and the consequent impossibility of sustaining good governance across the generations.
Wonderfully informative piece.
Cheers!