With Qin's victories over its rivals, China for the first time had become a unified empire.
Qin had its beginnings as a state for raising horses and defending the borders keeping out barbarians for the royals of the Zhou. With the fleeing of the Western Zhou (being neighbours of the Qin) to luoyang, gave Qin the room and freedom to expand and grow more powerful.
The people of Qin were considered no better than the barbarians they were keeping out and were thought of as a rough and crude people. Circumstances changed when the Qin began to strengthen their state by recruiting advisors, strategists and diplomats from their rival states. Lord Shang arrived in Qin in 361 BC and launched a series of legalist measures ( a system of reward and punishment) to help strengthen the ruler of Qin at the time. With all these changes in place Qin became formidable conquering all in its path.
The first ruler Ying Zeng after finally ruling 'all under heaven' declared himself the first emperor or Shi Huang Di, of a unified China. This meant that he alone made all rules and regulations for the people of the whole of China, and not as before where vassals states could, as long as they remained in alliance with the capital, independently rule as they saw fit.
Many changes happened in China in this very short period and the Emperor's main agenda was to standardise and unify the whole of China, some of these reforms included having one written and spoken language, one form of coin (Ban Lian coin, round with a square hole), one system of weight and measurement (example, the width of cart axles were standardised so they would fit into the groves on the cobble road ways).
China was divided into 36 commanderies, each in turn divided into counties. The goverment dispatched officals to these states and he controlled them by mass of regulations, reports and penalties for inadequate perfomances. Private possesion of arms were banned and all the previous prominent and wealthy families were brought close to the Emperor in the capital (Xianyang) as to not encourage a rebellion.
The Emperor heavly taxed and worked his people taking on grand and huge projects such as the Great wall ( as mentioned before, earlier states had sections built to sperate their own states, parts were knocked others kept) a grand palace was built taking labour forces up to 700,000 people, and a tomb built for his immortaliy housing the famous Terracotta Army was also constructed.
To prevent his people from thinking in any other way than was to be taught by the empire, he burnt many books ( a wealth of knowledge was lost with this as the era before was a golden age of philosophy and ideas) which he feared would affect people's thinking. Worse, in his second year, after he learnt some scholars' discussions about his arrogance, he buried 460 of them alive. In history, these two events are called 'To Burn the Books and Bury the Scholars Alive'.
The Emperor died without warning in 210 BC leaving his son in power to an over worked and unhappy society, this ruling only lasted a short time due to the prompt murder of him by his younger brother, leading to a revolt and ending the Qin dynasty in 206 BC.
This lead to the next dynasty, the Han Dynasty.
Qin had its beginnings as a state for raising horses and defending the borders keeping out barbarians for the royals of the Zhou. With the fleeing of the Western Zhou (being neighbours of the Qin) to luoyang, gave Qin the room and freedom to expand and grow more powerful.
The people of Qin were considered no better than the barbarians they were keeping out and were thought of as a rough and crude people. Circumstances changed when the Qin began to strengthen their state by recruiting advisors, strategists and diplomats from their rival states. Lord Shang arrived in Qin in 361 BC and launched a series of legalist measures ( a system of reward and punishment) to help strengthen the ruler of Qin at the time. With all these changes in place Qin became formidable conquering all in its path.
The first ruler Ying Zeng after finally ruling 'all under heaven' declared himself the first emperor or Shi Huang Di, of a unified China. This meant that he alone made all rules and regulations for the people of the whole of China, and not as before where vassals states could, as long as they remained in alliance with the capital, independently rule as they saw fit.
Many changes happened in China in this very short period and the Emperor's main agenda was to standardise and unify the whole of China, some of these reforms included having one written and spoken language, one form of coin (Ban Lian coin, round with a square hole), one system of weight and measurement (example, the width of cart axles were standardised so they would fit into the groves on the cobble road ways).
China was divided into 36 commanderies, each in turn divided into counties. The goverment dispatched officals to these states and he controlled them by mass of regulations, reports and penalties for inadequate perfomances. Private possesion of arms were banned and all the previous prominent and wealthy families were brought close to the Emperor in the capital (Xianyang) as to not encourage a rebellion.
The Emperor heavly taxed and worked his people taking on grand and huge projects such as the Great wall ( as mentioned before, earlier states had sections built to sperate their own states, parts were knocked others kept) a grand palace was built taking labour forces up to 700,000 people, and a tomb built for his immortaliy housing the famous Terracotta Army was also constructed.
To prevent his people from thinking in any other way than was to be taught by the empire, he burnt many books ( a wealth of knowledge was lost with this as the era before was a golden age of philosophy and ideas) which he feared would affect people's thinking. Worse, in his second year, after he learnt some scholars' discussions about his arrogance, he buried 460 of them alive. In history, these two events are called 'To Burn the Books and Bury the Scholars Alive'.
The Emperor died without warning in 210 BC leaving his son in power to an over worked and unhappy society, this ruling only lasted a short time due to the prompt murder of him by his younger brother, leading to a revolt and ending the Qin dynasty in 206 BC.
This lead to the next dynasty, the Han Dynasty.
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