Portal:China

The China Portal


China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the second-most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, representing 17% of the world's population. China borders fourteen countries by land across an area of 9.6 million square kilometers (3,700,000 sq mi), making it the third-largest country by area. The country is divided into 33 province-level divisions: 22 provinces, 5 autonomous regions, 4 municipalities, and 2 semi-autonomous special administrative regions. Beijing is the capital, while Shanghai is the most populous city by urban area and largest financial center.

The first humans in China arrived during the Paleolithic era. By the 2nd millennium BCE dynastic states had emerged in the Yellow River basin. The 8th–3rd centuries BCE saw a breakdown in the authority of the Zhou dynasty, accompanied by the emergence of administrative and military techniques, literature and philosophy. In 221 BCE, China was unified under an emperor, ushering in two millennia of imperial rule. Chinese achievements include the invention of gunpowder, paper, printing and the compass, the establishment of the Silk Road, and the building of the Great Wall. Chinese culture has flourished and has had a great influence on the region and beyond. China began to cede parts of the country in the 19th century, to European powers through a series of unequal treaties. The 1911 Revolution overthrew the Qing dynasty and the Republic of China was established the following year. The country was unstable and fragmented during the Warlord Era, this came to an end with the Northern Expedition conducted by the Kuomintang to reunify the country.

Since 1949, China has been a unitary communist state with the CCP as its sole ruling party. It is one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and a member of numerous multilateral and regional organizations. Making up around one-fifth of the world's economy, China is the second-wealthiest country in the world, with the Chinese economy being the largest when adjusted for PPP. However, China ranks poorly in measures of democracy and human rights. China has been one of the fastest-growing modern economies and is the world's largest manufacturer and exporter, as well as the second-largest importer. China has the world's largest standing army, second-largest defense budget, and third-largest nuclear weapons stockpile. It is described as either a potential or established superpower due to its influence in the fields of geopolitics, science and technology, manufacturing, economics and culture. China is known for its cuisine and culture. It is a megadiverse country, and has 60 UNESCO World Heritage Sites. (Full article...)

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  • One of Hu Zhengyan's personal seals

    Hu Zhengyan (Chinese: 胡正言; c. 1584 – 1674) was a Chinese artist, printmaker and publisher. He worked in calligraphy, traditional Chinese painting, and seal-carving, but was primarily a publisher, producing academic texts as well as records of his own work.

    Hu lived in Nanjing during the transition from the Ming dynasty to the Qing dynasty. A Ming loyalist, he was offered a position at the rump court of the Hongguang Emperor, but declined the post, and never held anything more than minor political office. He did, however, design the Hongguang Emperor's personal seal, and his loyalty to the dynasty was such that he largely retired from society after the emperor's capture and death in 1645. He owned and operated an academic publishing house called the Ten Bamboo Studio, in which he practised various multi-colour printing and embossing techniques, and he employed several members of his family in this enterprise. Hu's work at the Ten Bamboo Studio pioneered new techniques in colour printmaking, leading to delicate gradations of colour which were not previously achievable in this art form. (Full article...)

  • 1830 depiction of Zhao

    Zhao Chongguo (Chinese: 趙充國; pinyin: Zhào Chōngguó, 137 BCE – 52 BCE) was a Chinese military commander and official during the Western Han dynasty. Born to a family of officials in what is now eastern Gansu, Zhao studied military science in his youth. Around 100 BCE, he joined the Feathered Forest, a recently-created elite cavalry unit recruited from the northwestern districts. He joined General Li Guangli's campaign against the Xiongnu confederation the following year, and was severely wounded in combat. Emperor Wu, impressed by Zhao's service, promoted him. He served as chief of staff for the supreme head of cavalry units. In 80 BCE, Zhao was appointed to manage the imperial parks, and also controlled the minting of cash coinage.

    In 74 BCE, Zhao collaborated with the political leader Huo Guang to depose the newly enthroned emperor Liu He in favor of Emperor Xuan. For this, he was appointed Marquis of Yingping and was promoted to General of the Rear. After participating in conflicts against the Xiongnu, he volunteered to lead a campaign against the Qiang people (in what is now Qinghai) in 62 BCE. Joined by his son, he succeeded in pushing deep into Qiang territory, and exploited tribal divisions by granting amnesty to the Qiang who defected to the Han forces. Zhao rejected proposals by his fellow generals and the emperor to continue offensive operations, believing that a protracted occupation would subdue the Qiang through attrition. He was able to implement his policy of tuntian (lit. 'farming garrisons'), although the emperor simultaneously approved offensive operations by other generals. Zhao's garrison technique proved successful, gaining him acclaim and influence on later strategists. He retired in 60 BCE after his son created a scandal and committed suicide. Zhao's life and career is known mainly through a biography in the Book of Han. (Full article...)

  • Traditional



    The modern Chinese varieties make frequent use of what are called classifiers or measure words. One use of classifiers is when a noun is qualified by a numeral or demonstrative. In the Chinese equivalent of a phrase such as "three books" or "that person", it is normally necessary to insert an appropriate classifier between the numeral/demonstrative and the noun. For example, in Standard Chinese, the first of these phrases would be: (Full article...)

  • Wong in 1935

    Wong Liu Tsong (January 3, 1905 – February 3, 1961), known professionally as Anna May Wong, was an American actress, considered the first Chinese American film star in Hollywood, as well as the first Chinese American actress to gain international recognition. Her varied career spanned vaudeville, silent film, sound film, television, stage, and radio.

    Born in Los Angeles to second-generation Taishanese Chinese American parents, Wong became engrossed in films and decided at the age of 11 that she would become an actress. Her first role was as an extra in the movie The Red Lantern (1919). During the silent film era, she acted in The Toll of the Sea (1922), one of the first films made in color, and in Douglas Fairbanks' The Thief of Bagdad (1924). Wong became a fashion icon and had achieved international stardom in 1924. Wong had been one of the first to embrace the flapper look. In 1934, the Mayfair Mannequin Society of New York voted her the "world's best dressed woman." In the 1920s and 1930s, Wong was acclaimed as one of the top fashion icons. (Full article...)

  • With the pale yellow rump visible. Buryatia, Russia.

    Pallas's leaf warbler (Phylloscopus proregulus) or Pallas's warbler is a bird that breeds in mountain forests from southern Siberia east to northern Mongolia and northeast China. It is named after the German zoologist Peter Simon Pallas, who first formally described it. This leaf warbler is strongly migratory, wintering mainly in south China and adjacent areas of southeast Asia, although in recent decades increasing numbers have been found in Europe in autumn.

    Pallas's leaf warbler is one of the smallest Palearctic warblers, with a relatively large head and short tail. It has greenish upperparts and white underparts, a lemon-yellow rump, and yellow double wingbars, supercilia and central crown stripe. It is similar in appearance to several other Asian warblers, including some that were formerly considered to be subspecies of it, although its distinctive vocalisations aid identification. (Full article...)

  • A Yuan-era stele in the ruins of the Cross Temple. Another stele (left) and some scattered groundwork (right) are visible in the background.

    The Cross Temple (Chinese: 十字寺; pinyin: Shízì sì) is a former place of worship in Fangshan, Beijing. The temple was used during different periods by Buddhists and early Chinese Christians. Though it was originally built as a Buddhist temple, some scholars hypothesise that it saw Christian use during the Tang dynasty (618–907). The temple was used by Buddhists during the Liao dynasty (916–1125) and by Christians during the Yuan dynasty (1271–1368). It returned to Buddhist use during the Ming dynasty (1368–1644), before being sold in 1911. It was first recorded in modern scholarship in 1919, damaged during the Cultural Revolution, and re-established as a national-level protected site in 2006. Some scholars consider it to be the only place of worship of the Church of the East (also known as Nestorian Christianity) discovered in China.

    Today, the site features two ancient steles, as well as groundwork and the bases of several pillars. The steles date to the Liao and Yuan dynasties, but their inscriptions were tampered with during the Ming. During the early 20th century, two stone blocks carved with crosses and other patterns were also discovered at the site, with one of them also bearing an inscription in Syriac. The blocks are presently on display at the Nanjing Museum. (Full article...)

  • The gills of L. indigo

    Lactarius indigo, commonly known as the indigo milk cap, indigo milky, indigo lactarius, blue lactarius, or blue milk mushroom, is a species of agaric fungus in the family Russulaceae.

    The fruit body color ranges from dark blue in fresh specimens to pale blue-gray in older ones. The "milk", or latex, that oozes when the mushroom tissue is cut or broken (a feature common to all members of the genus Lactarius) is also indigo blue, but slowly turns green upon exposure to air. The cap has a diameter of 4–15 cm (2–6 in), and the stem is 2–8 cm (3⁄4–3+1⁄8 in) tall and 1–2.5 cm (3⁄8–1 in) thick. (Full article...)

  • Peking opera in Shanghai, 2014

    Peking opera, or Beijing opera (Chinese: 京劇; pinyin: Jīngjù), is the dominant form of Chinese opera, which combines instrumental music, vocal performance, mime, martial arts, dance and acrobatics. It arose in Beijing in the mid-Qing dynasty (1644–1912) and became fully developed and recognized by the mid-19th century. The form was extremely popular in the Qing court and has come to be regarded as one of the cultural treasures of China. Major performance troupes are based in Beijing, Tianjin and Shanghai. The art form is also preserved in Taiwan, where it is also known as Guójù (Chinese: 國劇; lit. 'National opera'). It has also spread to other regions such as the United States and Japan.

    Peking opera features four main role types, sheng (gentlemen), dan (women), jing (rough men), and chou (clowns). Performing troupes often have several of each variety, as well as numerous secondary and tertiary performers. With their elaborate and colorful costumes, performers are the only focal points on Peking opera characteristically sparse stage. They use the skills of speech, song, dance and combat in movements that are symbolic and suggestive, rather than realistic. Above all else, the skill of performers is evaluated according to the beauty of their movements. Performers also adhere to a variety of stylistic conventions that help audiences navigate the plot of the production. The layers of meaning within each movement must be expressed in time with music. The music of Peking opera can be divided into the xīpí (西皮) and èrhuáng (二黄) styles. Melodies include arias, fixed-tune melodies and percussion patterns. The repertoire of Peking opera includes over 1,400 works, which are based on Chinese history, folklore and, increasingly, contemporary life. (Full article...)
  • The Ming dynasty considered Tibet to be part of the Western Regions. While the Ming dynasty at its height had some degree of influence in Tibet, the exact nature of their relations is under dispute by modern scholars. Analysis of the relationship is further complicated by modern political conflicts and the application of Westphalian sovereignty to a time when the concept did not exist. The Historical Status of China's Tibet, a book published by the People's Republic of China, asserts that the Ming dynasty had unquestioned sovereignty over Tibet by pointing to the Ming court's issuing of various titles to Tibetan leaders, Tibetans' full acceptance of the titles, and a renewal process for successors of these titles that involved traveling to the Ming capital. Scholars in China also argue that Tibet has been an integral part of China since the 13th century and so it was a part of the Ming Empire. However, most scholars outside China, such as Turrell V. Wylie, Melvyn C. Goldstein, and Helmut Hoffman, say that the relationship was one of suzerainty, Ming titles were only nominal, Tibet remained an independent region outside Ming control, and it simply paid tribute until the Jiajing Emperor, who ceased relations with Tibet.

    Some scholars note that Tibetan leaders during the Ming frequently engaged in civil war and conducted their own foreign diplomacy with neighboring states such as Nepal. Some scholars underscore the commercial aspect of the Ming–Tibetan relationship, noting the Ming dynasty's shortage of horses for warfare and thus the importance of the horse trade with Tibet. Others argue that the significant religious nature of the relationship of the Ming court with Tibetan lamas is underrepresented in modern scholarship. (Full article...)

  • A Western Han (202 BC – 9 AD) covered jade cup with gilt bronze fittings, Sackler Museum

    The economy of the Han dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD) of ancient China experienced upward and downward movements in its economic cycle, periods of economic prosperity and decline. It is normally divided into three periods: Western Han (206 BC – 9 AD), the Xin dynasty (9–23 AD), and Eastern Han (25–220 AD). The Xin regime, established by the former regent Wang Mang, formed a brief interregnum between lengthy periods of Han rule. Following the fall of Wang Mang, the Han capital was moved eastward from Chang'an to Luoyang. In consequence, historians have named the succeeding eras Western Han and Eastern Han respectively.

    The Han economy was defined by significant population growth, increasing urbanization, unprecedented growth of industry and trade, and government experimentation with nationalization. Another large component of the government is that it was run by influential families who had the most money. In this era, the levels of minting and circulation of coin currency grew significantly, forming the foundation of a stable monetary system. The Silk Road facilitated the establishment of trade and tributary exchanges with foreign countries across Eurasia, many of which were previously unknown to the people of ancient China. The imperial capitals of both Western Han (Chang'an) and Eastern Han (Luoyang) were among the largest cities in the world at the time, in both population and area. Here, government workshops manufactured furnishings for the palaces of the emperor and produced goods for the common people. The government oversaw the construction of roads and bridges, which facilitated official government business and encouraged commercial growth. Under Han rule, industrialists, wholesalers, and merchants—from minor shopkeepers to wealthy businessmen—could engage in a wide range of enterprises and trade in the domestic, public, and even military spheres. (Full article...)

  • Qing-era print depicting Cai as the patron of papermaking, 18th century

    Cai Lun (Chinese: 蔡伦; courtesy name: Jingzhong (敬仲); c. 50–62 – 121 CE), formerly romanized as Ts'ai Lun, was a Chinese eunuch court official of the Eastern Han dynasty. He occupies a pivotal place in the history of paper due to his addition of pulp via tree bark and hemp ends which resulted in the large-scale manufacture and worldwide spread of paper. Although traditionally regarded as the inventor of paper, earlier forms of paper have existed since the 3rd century BCE, so Cai's contributions are limited to innovation, rather than invention.

    Born in Guiyang Commandery (in what is now Leiyang), Cai arrived at the imperial court in Luoyang by 75 CE, where he served as a chamberlain for Emperor Ming, and then as Xiao Huangmen, an imperial messenger for Emperor Zhang. To assist Lady Dou in securing her adopted son as designated heir, he interrogated Consort Song and her sister, who then killed themselves. When Emperor He ascended the throne in 88 CE, Dou awarded Cai with two positions: Zhongchang shi , a political counselor to the emperor that was the highest position for eunuchs of the time, and also as Shangfang Ling, where Cai oversaw the production of instruments and weapons at the Palace Workshop. (Full article...)

  • The Song dynasty at its greatest extent in 1111

    The Song dynasty (/sʊŋ/ SUUNG) was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 960 to 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song, who usurped the throne of the Later Zhou dynasty and went on to conquer the rest of the Ten Kingdoms, ending the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period. The Song often came into conflict with the contemporaneous Liao, Western Xia and Jin dynasties in northern China. After retreating to southern China following attacks by the Jin dynasty, the Song was eventually conquered by the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty.

    The dynasty's history is divided into two periods: during the Northern Song (北宋; 960–1127), the capital was in the northern city of Bianjing (now Kaifeng) and the dynasty controlled most of what is now East China. The Southern Song (南宋; 1127–1279) comprised the period following the loss of control over the northern half of Song territory to the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty in the Jin–Song wars. At that time, the Song court retreated south of the Yangtze and established its capital at Lin'an (now Hangzhou). Although the Song dynasty had lost control of the traditional Chinese heartlands around the Yellow River, the Southern Song Empire contained a large population and productive agricultural land, sustaining a robust economy. In 1234, the Jin dynasty was conquered by the Mongols, who took control of northern China, maintaining uneasy relations with the Southern Song. Möngke Khan, the fourth Great Khan of the Mongol Empire, died in 1259 while besieging the mountain castle Diaoyucheng in Chongqing. His younger brother Kublai Khan was proclaimed the new Great Khan and in 1271 founded the Yuan dynasty. After two decades of sporadic warfare, Kublai Khan's armies conquered the Song dynasty in 1279 after defeating the Southern Song in the Battle of Yamen, and reunited China under the Yuan dynasty. (Full article...)

  • Song dynasty river ship armed with a trebuchet catapult on its top deck, from the Wujing Zongyao

    The Battle of Caishi (Chinese: 采石之戰) was a major naval engagement of the Jin–Song Wars of China that took place on November 26–27, 1161. It ended with a decisive Song victory, aided by their use of gunpowder weapons.

    Soldiers under the command of Wanyan Liang, the emperor of the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty, tried to cross the Yangzi River to attack the Southern Song dynasty. (Full article...)

  • Bust of Shen at the Beijing Ancient Observatory

    Shen Kuo (Chinese: 沈括; 1031–1095) or Shen Gua, courtesy name Cunzhong (存中) and pseudonym Mengqi (now usually given as Mengxi) Weng (夢溪翁), was a Chinese polymath, scientist, and statesman of the Northern Song dynasty. Shen was a master in many fields of study including mathematics, optics, and horology. In his career as a civil servant, he became a finance minister, governmental state inspector, head official for the Bureau of Astronomy in the Song court, Assistant Minister of Imperial Hospitality, and also served as an academic chancellor. At court his political allegiance was to the Reformist faction known as the New Policies Group, headed by Chancellor Wang Anshi (1021–1085).

    In his Dream Pool Essays or Dream Torrent Essays (夢溪筆談; Mengxi Bitan) of 1088, Shen was the first to describe the magnetic needle compass, which would be used for navigation (first described in Europe by Alexander Neckam in 1187). Shen discovered the concept of true north in terms of magnetic declination towards the north pole, with experimentation of suspended magnetic needles and "the improved meridian determined by Shen's [astronomical] measurement of the distance between the pole star and true north". This was the decisive step in human history to make compasses more useful for navigation, and may have been a concept unknown in Europe for another four hundred years (evidence of German sundials made circa 1450 show markings similar to Chinese geomancers' compasses in regard to declination). (Full article...)
  • Luo Yixiu (Chinese: 羅一秀; 20 October 1889 – 11 February 1910) was the first wife of Chinese communist revolutionary and future leader of China, Mao Zedong, to whom she was married from 1908 until her death. Coming from the area around Shaoshan, Hunan, in south central China – the same region as Mao – her family were impoverished local landowners.

    Most of what is known about their marriage comes from an account Mao gave to the American reporter Edgar Snow in 1936, which Snow included in his book Red Star Over China. According to Mao, he and Luo Yixiu were the subject of an arranged marriage organised by their respective fathers, Mao Yichang and Luo Helou. Luo was eighteen and Mao just fourteen years old at the time of their betrothal. Although Mao took part in the wedding ceremony, he later said that he was unhappy with the marriage, never consummating it and refusing to live with his wife. Socially disgraced, she lived with Mao's parents for two years until she died of dysentery, while he moved out of the village to continue his studies elsewhere, eventually becoming a founding member of the Chinese Communist Party. Various biographers have suggested that Mao's experience of this marriage affected his later views, leading him to become a critic of arranged marriage and a vocal feminist. He married three more times, to Yang Kaihui, He Zizhen and Jiang Qing, the last of whom was better known as Madame Mao. (Full article...)

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Selected cuisine or food -

Sichuan cuisine or Sichuanese cuisine, alternatively romanized as Szechwan cuisine or Szechuan cuisine (Chinese: 四川, Standard Mandarin pronunciation: [sɨ̂.ʈʂʰwán] ⓘ) is a style of Chinese cuisine originating from Sichuan province and the neighboring Chongqing municipality. Chongqing was formerly a part of Sichuan until 1997; thus, there is a great deal of cultural overlap between the two administrative divisions. There are many regional, local variations of Sichuanese cuisine within Sichuan and Chongqing.

The four major substyles of Sichuanese cuisine include Shanghebang, Xiaohebang, Xiahebang, and Buddhist vegetarian style. Shanghebang is represented by Chengdu and Leshan; Xiaohebang by Zigong (which is also known for a genre of dishes called yanbangcai), Yibin, Luzhou, and Neijiang; and Xiahebang by Chongqing and Dazhou. (Full article...)

East Asia

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  • Map showing the expansion of Han dynasty in the 2nd century BC

    The Han campaigns against Minyue were a series of three Han military campaigns dispatched against the Minyue state. The first campaign was in response to Minyue's invasion of Eastern Ou in 138 BC. In 135 BC, a second campaign was sent to intervene in a war between Minyue and Nanyue. After the campaign, the Han dynasty divided Minyue among the Minyue king Zou Chou (騶丑) and the Dongyue king Zou Yushan (騶餘善). In 111 BC, the rebellion instigated by Zou Yushan in the hope of self-governance was suppressed, prompting the Han dynasty's complete annexation of Dongyue into its dominion and the conquest of the residual territories that constituted the former Minyue, effectively consolidating the permanent integration of both domains into the Han empire indefinitely. (Full article...)
  • The 2019 China Championship (officially the 2019 Evergrande China Championship) was a professional snooker tournament that took place from 23 to 29 September 2019. The event was held at the Guangzhou Tianhe Sports Centre in Guangzhou, China. Qualifying for the event took place from 15 to 18 August 2019 at the Barnsley Metrodome in Barnsley, England. The tournament was the fourth edition of the China Championship and the third ranking event of the 2019/2020 season.

    Mark Selby was the defending champion, having defeated John Higgins in the previous year's final 10–9. Selby reached the semi-finals, before losing 6–3 to Shaun Murphy. Murphy reached his third consecutive final, having done so at the two prior events Shanghai Masters and the International Championship. Murphy played Mark Williams in the final, winning his 8th ranking title with a 10–9 in the final. The highest break of the event was a 145 made by Mark Allen in the first round win over Anthony Hamilton. (Full article...)


  • The total death toll of the Nanjing Massacre is a highly contentious subject in Chinese and Japanese historiography. Following the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War, the Japanese Imperial Army marched from Shanghai to the Chinese capital city of Nanjing, and though a large number of Chinese POWs and civilians were slaughtered by the Japanese following their entrance into Nanjing on December 13, 1937, the precise number remains unknown. Since the late-1960s when the first academic works on the Nanjing Massacre were produced, estimating the approximate death toll of the massacre has been a major topic of scholarly debate.

    Currently, the most reliable and widely agreed upon figures place the massacre victims within Nanjing City Walls to be around 50,000, mostly massacred in the first five days from December 13, 1937; while the total victims massacred as of the end of March 1938 in both Nanjing and its surrounding six rural counties far exceed 100,000 but fall short of 200,000. Hence, depending on the timeframe and the geographic scope, an empirically verifiable, scholarly valid victimization range is from over 40,000 to under 200,000. (Full article...)

  • Mao in 1920

    The early life of Chinese revolutionary and politician Mao Zedong covered the first 27 years of his life, from 1893 to 1919. Born in Shaoshanchong, Shaoshan in Hunan province, Mao grew up as the son of Mao Yichang, a wealthy farmer and landowner. Sent to the local Shaoshan Primary School, Mao was brought up in an environment of Confucianism, but reacted against this from an early age, developing political ideas from modern literature. Aged 13 his father organised a marriage for him with Luo Yigu, the daughter of another land-owning family, but Mao denounced the marriage and moved away from home.

    In 1911 Mao began further education in the Hunanese capital of Changsha, where he came under the influence of republicanism, and became an admirer of republican revolutionary Sun Yat-Sen. When the Xinhai Revolution broke out between republicans and monarchists, Mao signed up as a soldier, although conflict subsided and he left the army after six months. Seeing himself as an intellectual, he became heavily influenced by classical liberalism, and began studying at the First Normal School of Changsha, as well as penning his first publications. With Xiao Zisheng he co-founded the Renovation of the People Study Society in April 1918 to discuss and perpetuate revolutionary ideas among students, before graduating in 1919. (Full article...)
  • Crazy Rich Asians is a 2018 American romantic comedy drama film directed by Jon M. Chu from a screenplay by Peter Chiarelli and Adele Lim, based on the 2013 novel by Kevin Kwan. The film stars Constance Wu, Henry Golding, Gemma Chan, Lisa Lu, Awkwafina, Ken Jeong, and Michelle Yeoh. It follows a Chinese American professor, Rachel, who travels to Singapore with her boyfriend Nick and is shocked to discover that Nick's family is one of the richest families in Singapore.

    The film was announced in August 2012 after the rights to the book were purchased. Many of the cast members signed on in the spring of 2017, and filming took place from April to June of that year in parts of Singapore, Malaysia, and New York City. It is the first film by a major Hollywood studio to feature a majority cast of Chinese descent in a modern setting since The Joy Luck Club in 1993. Despite praise in the United States for its Asian representation, the film also received criticism for its casting decisions. Few of the actors were from Singapore, from Southeast Asia, or of fully ethnically Chinese heritage. The film also failed to portray the reality of Singapore's multiracial population, neglecting people of Malay and Indian descent, while also being seen by some to perpetuate stereotypes of East Asians. (Full article...)

  • The Dongda Hall of the Foguang Temple

    Foguang Temple (Chinese: 佛光寺; lit. "Temple of Buddha's Light") is a Buddhist temple located five kilometres from Doucun Town, Wutai County, Shanxi Province of China. The temple complex covers approximately 8.4 acres and contains over 120 structures dating from the Northern Wei dynasty to the Qing dynasty. The temple is inscribed as part of the Mount Wutai UNESCO World Heritage Site.

    The major hall of the temple is the Dongda Hall, built in 857 AD, during the Tang dynasty (618–907). It is the third earliest preserved timber structure in China. The Dongda Hall is the only building to contain Tang-dynasty architecture, sculpture, mural painting, and calligraphic inscriptions in a single structure, known as the "Four Supremacies", and the temple is regarded as China's foremost national treasure of ancient architecture. (Full article...)

  • Li He, as depicted in the 1743 book Wanxiaotang Zhuzhuang Huazhuan (晩笑堂竹荘畫傳).

    Li He (李賀; c. 790–791 – c. 816–817) was a Chinese poet of the mid-Tang dynasty. His courtesy name was Changji, and he is also known as Guicai and Shigui.

    He was prevented from taking the imperial examination due to a naming taboo. He died very young, and was noted for his sickly appearance. (Full article...)

  • Fossils of A. longicervia described in Wong et al. (2015)

    Archaeamphora longicervia is a fossil plant species, the only member of the hypothetical genus Archaeamphora. Fossil material assigned to this taxon originates from the Yixian Formation of northeastern China, dated to the Early Cretaceous (around 143 to 101 million years ago).

    The species was originally described as a pitcher plant with close affinities to extant members of the family Sarraceniaceae. This would make it the earliest known carnivorous plant and the only known fossil record of Sarraceniaceae, or the New World pitcher plant family. Archaeamphora is also one of the three oldest known genera of angiosperms (flowering plants). Li (2005) wrote that "the existence of a so highly derived Angiosperm in the Early Cretaceous suggests that Angiosperms should have originated much earlier, maybe back to 280 mya as the molecular clock studies suggested". (Full article...)

  • The Han dynasty (201 BCE – 220 CE) was the second imperial dynasty of China. It followed the Qin dynasty, which had unified the Warring States of China by conquest. It was founded by Liu Bang (Emperor Gaozu). The dynasty is divided into two periods: the Western Han (202 BCE – 9 CE) and the Eastern Han (25–220 CE), interrupted briefly by the Xin dynasty (9–23 CE) of Wang Mang. These appellations are derived from the locations of the capital cities Chang'an and Luoyang, respectively. The third and final capital of the dynasty was Xuchang, where the court moved in 196 CE during a period of political turmoil and civil war.

    The Han dynasty ruled in an era of Chinese cultural consolidation, political experimentation, relative economic prosperity and maturity, and great technological advances. There was unprecedented territorial expansion and exploration initiated by struggles with non-Chinese peoples, especially the nomadic Xiongnu of the Eurasian Steppe. The Han emperors were initially forced to acknowledge the rival Xiongnu Chanyus as their equals, yet in reality the Han was an inferior partner in a tributary and royal marriage alliance known as heqin. (Full article...)

  • Typhoon June on August 29 at 07:27 UTC

    Typhoon June, also known in the Philippines as Typhoon Maring, was the first of two tropical cyclones to affect the Philippines in a one-week time span in August 1984. June originated from an area of convection that was first witnessed on August 15 in the Philippine Sea. Despite initial wind shear, the area intensified into a tropical storm three days later as it tracked westward. After tracking over Luzon, June entered the South China Sea on August 30. Despite remaining poorly organized, June re-intensified over land, and it was estimated to have briefly attained typhoon intensity before striking China, just to the east of Hong Kong, at maximum intensity, although its remnants were last noticed on September 3.

    Affecting the country four days before Typhoon Ike would devastate the Philippines, June brought widespread damage to the nation. Throughout the Philippines, 470,962 people sought shelter. A total of 671 homes were destroyed, with 6,341 others damaged. A total of 121 people were killed, while 17 other individuals were reportedly missing, and 26 other people were wounded. Damage totaled $24.2 million (1984 USD, including $15.24 million in agriculture and $8.82 million in infrastructure). Following June and Ike, several major countries provided cash and other goods. In all, $7.5 million worth of aid was donated to the nation in relief. In addition to effects on the Philippines, 1,500 homes were damaged and 66,000 ha (160,000 acres) of farmland were flooded in the Guangdong province. (Full article...)

  • 13th century sculpture of Maudgalyayana at Daihō’onji Temple, Kyoto, Japan

    Maudgalyāyana (Pali: Moggallāna), also known as Mahāmaudgalyāyana or by his birth name Kolita, was one of the Buddha's closest disciples. Described as a contemporary of disciples such as Subhuti, Śāriputra (Pali: Sāriputta), and Mahākāśyapa (Pali: Mahākassapa), he is considered the second of the Buddha's two foremost male disciples, together with Śāriputra. Traditional accounts relate that Maudgalyāyana and Śāriputra become spiritual wanderers in their youth. After having searched for spiritual truth for a while, they come into contact with the Buddhist teaching through verses that have become widely known in the Buddhist world. Eventually they meet the Buddha himself and ordain as monks under him. Maudgalyāyana attains enlightenment shortly after that.

    Maudgalyayana and Śāriputra have a deep spiritual friendship. They are depicted in Buddhist art as the two disciples that accompany the Buddha, and they have complementing roles as teachers. As a teacher, Maudgalyayana is known for his psychic powers, and he is often depicted using these in his teaching methods. In many early Buddhist canons, Maudgalyāyana is instrumental in re-uniting the monastic community after Devadatta causes a schism. Furthermore, Maudgalyāyana is connected with accounts about the making of the first Buddha image. Maudgalyāyana dies at the age of eighty-four, killed through the efforts of a rival sect. This violent death is described in Buddhist scriptures as a result of Maudgalyāyana's karma of having killed his own parents in a previous life. (Full article...)
  • The Dingyuan class (simplified Chinese: 定远; traditional Chinese: 定遠; pinyin: Dìngyǔan; Wade–Giles: Ting Yuen or Ting Yuan) consisted of a pair of ironclad warships—Dingyuan and Zhenyuan—built for the Imperial Chinese Navy in the 1880s. They were the first ships of that size to be built for the Chinese Navy, having been constructed by Stettiner Vulcan AG in Germany. Originally expected to be a class of 12 ships, before being reduced to three and then two, with Jiyuan having been reduced in size to that of a protected cruiser.

    Completed in early 1883 and 1884, respectively, Dingyuan and Zhenyuan were prevented from sailing to China during the Sino-French War, but first saw combat at the Battle of the Yalu River on 17 September 1894, during the First Sino-Japanese War. They were next in combat during the Battle of Weihaiwei in early 1895, where they were blockaded in the harbour. Dingyuen was struck by a torpedo, and was beached where it continued to operate as a defensive fort. When the fleet was surrendered to the Japanese, she was destroyed while Zhenyuan became the first battleship of the Imperial Japanese Navy as Chin Yen. She was eventually removed from the Navy list in 1911, and was sold for scrap the following year. (Full article...)

  • World War II, or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945), was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Axis powers. Nearly all of the world's countries participated. Tanks and aircraft played major roles, the latter enabling the strategic bombing of cities and delivery of the only nuclear weapons used in war. World War II was the deadliest conflict in history, causing the death of 60 to 75 million people. Millions died in genocides, including the Holocaust, and by massacres, starvation, and disease. After the Allied victory, Germany, Austria, Japan, and Korea were occupied, and German and Japanese leaders were tried for war crimes.

    The causes of World War II included unresolved tensions in the aftermath of World War I, and the rise of fascism in Europe and militarism in Japan. Key events preceding the war included Japan's invasion of Manchuria in 1931, the Spanish Civil War, the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937, and Germany's annexations of Austria and the Sudetenland. World War II is generally considered to have begun on 1 September 1939, when Nazi Germany, under Adolf Hitler, invaded Poland, after which the United Kingdom and France declared war on Germany. Poland was also invaded by the Soviet Union in mid-September, and was partitioned between Germany and the Soviet Union under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In 1940, the Soviet Union annexed the Baltic states and parts of Finland and Romania, while Germany conquered Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. After the fall of France in June 1940, the war continued mainly between Germany, now assisted by Fascist Italy, and the British Empire/British Commonwealth, with fighting in the Balkans, Mediterranean, and Middle East, East Africa, the aerial Battle of Britain and the Blitz, and the naval Battle of the Atlantic. By mid-1941, Yugoslavia and Greece had also been defeated by Axis countries. In June 1941, Germany invaded the Soviet Union, opening the Eastern Front. (Full article...)
  • Hanpu (Chinese: 函普; pinyin: Hánpǔ), later Wanyan Hanpu (Chinese: 完顏函普), was a leader of the Jurchen Wanyan clan in the early tenth century. According to the ancestral story of the Wanyan clan, Hanpu came from Goryeo when he was sixty years old, reformed Jurchen customary law, and then married a sixty-year-old local woman who bore him three children. His descendants eventually united Jurchen tribes into a federation and established the Jin dynasty in 1115. Hanpu was retrospectively given the temple name Shizu (始祖) and the posthumous name Emperor Yixian Jingyuan (懿憲景元皇帝) by the Jin dynasty.

    Chinese historians have long debated whether Hanpu was of Silla, Goryeo, or Jurchen ethnicity. Since the 1980s, they have chiefly argued that he was a Jurchen who had lived in Silla, the state that had dominated the Korean peninsula until it was destroyed by Goryeo in 935. Western scholars usually treat Hanpu's story as a legend, but agree that it hints to contacts between some Jurchen clans and the states of Goryeo and Balhae (a state located between Jurchen lands and Silla until it was destroyed in 926) in the early tenth century. In Korea, a recent KBS history special treated Hanpu as a native Silla man who moved north and settled in Jurchen lands during the demise of Silla. (Full article...)

  • The Dening Hall (Chinese: 德宁殿; pinyin: Déníng Diàn) of the Beiyue Temple

    Beiyue Temple (Chinese: 北岳庙) is a Taoist temple located in Quyang, Hebei Province, China. The temple was used to make sacrifices to Mount Heng by the emperors of the Song dynasty while the mountain was occupied by the Liao dynasty. The Dening Hall of the temple is the largest, earliest and one of the most important extant wooden buildings built in the Yuan dynasty. The temple also contains three gates, an octagonal pavilion and many ancient stelae. (Full article...)

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Pagodas lit up at night near the Lijiang River, in Guangxi Province.

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In the news

16 March 2026 – Middle Eastern crisis
A Pakistan-bound oil tanker with its Automatic Identification System activated, the Karachi, gets safe passage and crosses Hormuz following negotiations between the Pakistani and Iranian governments. According to Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed, Pakistan agreed to pay the oil shipment, purchased from Abu Dhabi, in Chinese yuan instead of in US dollars. (AAJ News)
15 March 2026 – 2026 Winter Paralympics
The Winter Paralympics conclude in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, with China as the highest-ranked team in the medal table. The Paralympic flag is handed over to the organizers of the 2030 Winter Paralympics to be held in the French Alps. (AFP via France 24)
15 March 2026 – 2026 Formula One World Championship
2026 Chinese Grand Prix
In auto racing, Mercedes-Benz driver Kimi Antonelli wins his first Formula One Grand Prix after also setting his maiden pole position at the 2026 Chinese Grand Prix. He becomes the second-youngest Grand Prix winner at 19 years old. (AFP via France 24)
11 March 2026 – United Nations Security Council, 2026 Iran war
The UN Security Council approves a resolution (S/RES/2817) condemning Iran's attacks on the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states and Jordan. The text, presented by Bahrain and co-sponsored by 135 countries, is passed with 13 votes in favor and the abstentions of Russia and China. (United Nations Press)
10 March 2026 – China–North Korea relations, Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on public transport
Train services between Beijing, China, and Pyongyang, North Korea, are announced to resume for the first time since it was suspended six years ago due to the COVID-19 pandemic. (Yonhap)

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China's Politics

The General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, officially General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, is head of the Chinese Communist Party and the highest-ranking official within China, a standing member of the Politburo and head of the Secretariat. The officeholder is usually considered the paramount leader of China.

According to the Constitution, the General Secretary serves as an ex officio member of the Politburo Standing Committee, China's de facto top decision-making body. Since the early 1990s, the holder of the post has been, except for transitional periods, the Chairman of the Central Military Commission, making the holder the Commander-in-chief of the People's Liberation Army.

The current General Secretary is Xi Jinping (pictured), who took the office at the 18th National Congress on 15 November 2012.

The President of the Republic of China is the head of state of the Republic of China (ROC).

The Constitution names the president as head of state and commander-in-chief of the Republic of China Armed Forces (formerly known as the National Revolutionary Army). The president is responsible for conducting foreign relations, such as concluding treaties, declaring war, and making peace. The president must promulgate all laws and has no right to veto. Other powers of the president include granting amnesty, pardon or clemency, declaring martial law, and conferring honors and decorations.

The current President is Lai Ching-te (pictured), since May 20, 2024. Lai is a Taiwanese politician and former physician, who is currently serving as the eighth president of the Republic of China under the 1947 Constitution and the third president from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

You are invited to participate in WikiProject China, a WikiProject dedicated to developing and improving articles about China. 

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