The Extent of Warlord Control of China in 1926

The checkerboard of warlord satrapies was constantly changing, except for the domains of one or two long-term experts at survival such as Yan Xishan, who ruled Shanxi from 1912 to 1949 with only one brief interruption. This map which shows the division of territories around 1926, is intended mainly as a antidote to any excessive faith in functional arenas in which Chinese history was enacted below the national level. Under the warlords, a region might be amalgamated into domains composed of one or more regions, as happened at this time to the piece of the North China region controlled by the Manchurian warlord Zhang Zuolin.