Qin+Shi+Huang+Di


 * also known as Zhao Zheng
 * life of Shi huangDi and what happened before/ after he came to the throne/ Qin
 * (warring states period ended in 221
 * Qin kingdom wins)
 * they had started to dominate in the 300's
 * **Shang Yang**
 * put in a number of reforms
 * broke up the kingdom into groups of ten households
 * if anybody in your household was misbehaving, you were expected to denounce them
 * "whoever does not denounce a bad person cut in half"
 * takes away aristocratic power
 * big on Legalism
 * blames the teachers of the culprit instead of the culprit himsefl
 * 7 parasites of a society
 * music
 * waste of time
 * History
 * you don't want people to worship the good governing of the past vs. that of the present
 * Virtue
 * Filial piety
 * devotion should go to the government
 * you were expected to denounce family members if they misbehaved
 * Faith
 * Benevolence
 * Cowardice
 * (He was basically against confucianism)
 * Shang Yang also didn't like merchants
 * unless you are building, making, growing for the society you are not doing anything useful
 * merchants and traders who did nothing but trade and sell were punished
 * hard workers got land
 * people were not allowed to move without permission
 * forced people to be more sustainable with their farming (they couldn't just suck nutrients out of area of soil and move on )
 * in 256, the last Zhou emperor (who symbolized the weak union of china) died. Since the emperor was essentially powerless, he wasn't replaced...
 * leaders of various states wanted to rule all of china
 * civil wars ramped up
 * meanwhile in Qin
 * Chao was the duke of Qin at this time
 * he had a number of sons with concubines
 * the son of one of his least favored concubines was Tzu Chu
 * Lu Pu Wei gives Tzu Chu money to bribe his way through and gain control of Qin once Chao is dead (in exchange for control of a part of Qin)
 * Tzu Chu becomes ruler of Qin
 * however, Lu Pe Wei and Tzu had shared a concubine, and that concubine had a son of whom the father was not known (either Tzu or Lu Pu)
 * this kid, Zhao Zheng, is heir to the throne
 * Zhao Zheng takes over at age 21
 * he fires Lu Pu Wei and has him kill himself
 * Zhao goes nuts in the civil war and conquers all of china by 221
 * gives himself a new name : **Shi Huangdi**
 * During his reign
 * he abolished primogeniture
 * he made the center of Qin control the administrative system
 * officials were appointed and watched over by his agents
 * Dynasty
 * committed to standardization
 * Li Si, the legalist prime minister:
 * persuaded Shi Huangdi that the scholars (usually confucians) were opposing the legalist ways of the Qin and wanted it to be like it was in the past
 * the scholars were executed and books (with the exception of practical books such as medicine and divination) were burned
 * clash with nomads
 * Nomads would raid settled places and take what they needed
 * Shi Huangdi sent forces to drive the nomads north...successful
 * built an ancestor wall to the great wall of China
 * **Xiongnu:** the confederacy that posed a threat to china
 * because Qin was building roads, walls, and using a military
 * an oppressive program of compulsory military labor services was instituted
 * large groups of people were relocated
 * Shi Huangdi is later written about as cruel, but he might not have been.
 * Fall of Qin and the death of Shi Huangdi/ Zhao Zheng
 * Shi dies in 210
 * people scheme with his son for power over throne
 * how/when he died:
 * Shi Huangdi died of mercury poison because he thought that taking mercury pills was good
 * he had gone out to seek for the eternal life island when he died
 * before he died, he wrote a note to his son telling him to rule Qin after he died
 * his advisers changed the note and told the son that his father wanted him to kill himself
 * When he died, his advisers carried him around dead (sometimes using dead fish to cover up smell) and they controlled the empire as him
 * they are eventually forced to reveal his death
 * his 18th oldest son is made emperor : Qin Er Shi
 * weak and advisers were able to push him around
 * nobody respected him
 * this made him more cruel
 * he came up with vicious ways to kill people
 * by 207 most of his advisers were faking sick and not going to work, afraid of death
 * it all fell apart when, while he was drafting an army to fight a civil war, a group of soldiers (knowing that they would get killed by him anyways because they were late, decided to rebel)
 * Qin Er Shi kills himself and the Qin dynasty ends and is followed by a 5 year civil war mainly between Xiang (a cruel monster) and Liu Bang (not the greatest most interesting man but a generally nice guy). Liu Bang ends up taking control of most of china in 202 and changes his name to Han Gaozu, who starts the Han dynasty. (see Han page)