B. Ming Dynasty

In the late 1500s, the Ming dynasty appeared to be at the height of its glory. It had achieved remarkable accomplishments in culture and the arts. The West's expansion into new global explorations contrasts to the Ming dynasty's withdrawal from overseas adventures and the knowledge that might have come from it. A self defeating pattern had begun that would bring the dynasty to a violent end. Falling tax revenues led to failures to pay the army promptly. Troop desertions encouraged border penetrations by hostile tribes. A flow of silver from the West brought unexpected stress on the Chinese economy. Poor state granary supervision and harsh weather led to undernourishment and a susceptibility to pestilence among the rural populations. Random gangs of the disaffected coalesced into armies where survival became their ideology. By 1644, all of these elements combined in such a fashion that the last Ming emperor committed suicide.

The Jurchen tribesmen brought order from across China's northern border. They called themselves Manchus. With the help of large numbers of surrendered or captured Chinese troops, the Manchus advanced from north to south and east to west. Soon the Qing dynasty took their place in history, incorporating a vast array of Chinese administrators to rule in the Manchu's name. The Communists would repeat the timing and direction of the Manchu advance when they unified China in 1949 after the country's fragmentation in the twentieth century.