The Full Story

The first dynasty of Chinese tradition; still debated by archaeologists, but Erlitou's palace-city suggests a real early state.

The first dynasty with writing — oracle bones record divination on turtle shells. Master bronze casters.

Established the 'Mandate of Heaven' idea and the feudal order that Confucius later idealised.

Eastern Zhou's early era — a fragmented world of rival states; Confucius and Laozi live in this period.

Seven great powers fight for supremacy; iron weapons, legalism, and the groundwork for unification.

China's first empire. Standardises writing and weights, begins the Great Wall — and leaves the Terracotta Army.

Consolidates the empire, opens the Silk Road, elevates Confucianism. The dynasty of Lady Dai's tomb.

A brief usurper dynasty sandwiched between the Hans — included so the timeline has no gap.

Restores Han rule after Wang Mang; paper is invented and Buddhism arrives along the Silk Road.

Wei, Shu and Wu split the empire — the era immortalised in the novel 'Romance of the Three Kingdoms'.

A short reunification followed by collapse into northern invasions.

Court culture flees south; Nanjing becomes a capital for the first of many times.

A divided age of warring states north and south — and of spectacular Buddhist cave art at Longmen and Yungang.

Reunites China after 300 years and builds the Grand Canal — at great human cost.

China's golden age — poetry, cosmopolitan cities, and a capital larger than any city on earth at the time.

Another brief interregnum of short-lived northern regimes and southern kingdoms.

An age of astonishing invention — printing, gunpowder, the compass — and refined painting and tea culture.

Court retreats south of the Yangtze; Hangzhou becomes a city of canals, silk and scholars.

A steppe empire of the Khitan people ruling the north parallel to the Song.

A Tangut kingdom on the Silk Road, famed for its distinct script — destroyed by the Mongols.

Jurchen conquerors who take northern China from the Song; Beijing becomes a capital.

Kublai Khan completes the Mongol conquest; Marco Polo's 'Khanbaliq'. China reunited under Mongol rule.

A native Chinese dynasty that builds the Forbidden City and the Great Wall as we know it today.

China's last imperial dynasty, founded by the Manchus; its collapse ends 2,000 years of imperial rule.