After 300 years of rule by outsiders, the Ming Dynasty, lasting from the fourteenth to the seventeenth centuries CE, restored Chinese rule to the region.
[1]
The dynasty was founded by a peasant rebel general, Zhu Yuanzhang, later known as Emperor Taizu or the Hongwu Emperor.
[2]
Taizu destroyed the Yuan capital in Beijing, forced the Mongols to retreat to Mongolia, and founded the Ming capital in Nanjing in 1368 CE.
[3]
The period saw a resurgence of Chinese intellectualism and economic activity,
[4]
but Ming emperors often struggled to control their massive empire and they do not tend to number among the Chinese emperors considered ’great’ by historians.
[5]
The Ming expanded their territory to the southwest during their rule.
[6]
However, they never expanded into Mongolia - conflict with the Mongols in the north led the Ming emperors instead to carry out restorations works on the Great Wall.
[7]
The Dynasty came to an end in 1644 CE, when the region was re-captured by descendants of Jin Dynasty’s Jurchen rulers from Manchuria known as Qing.
Population and political organization
Ming emperors were not consistent in their style of rule. While Emperor Taizu ruled as an autocrat, some Ming emperors left the governance of the nation in the hands of officials and eunuchs.
[5]
The emperor presided over the central government in concert with various levels of chief ministers and imperial officials, and the central government structure was replicated on a smaller scale at the provincial level.
[1]
Officials were recruited through an examination system.
[1]
The period was marked by increasing openness to non-Confucian ideas and an increase in literacy among the lower levels of society.
[7]
Intellectual culture flourished among the elites
[4]
and the publishing industry expanded greatly in the Lower Yangtze region.
[6]
Novels, including The Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Water Margin, and the play Peony Pavilion were written in the Ming period.
[1]
The rapid growth of the international trading system along with foreign desire for Chinese porcelain and silk led to large increases in foreign trade and an influx of silver into the Ming economy.
[7]
In the later Ming period, trade conflicts impacted China’s foreign silver supply, leading to massive deflation. The Ming government, near bankruptcy, could not fund military campaigns against the rebellion spreading through the nation.
[8]
The Ming population was between 60 million and 66.5 million in 1400 CE and 90 million and 110 million in 1600 CE.
[9]
[10]
[1]: (Theobald 2000) Theobald Ulrich. 2000. ’Ming Dynasty Government and Administration’. Chinaknowledge.de. http://www.chinaknowledge.de/History/Ming/ming-admin.html. Accessed 16 March 2017.
[2]: (Brook 1998, 8) Timothy Brook. 1998. The Confusions of Pleasure: Commerce and Culture in Ming China. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
[3]: (Ebrey 1996, 191) Patricia Buckley Ebrey. 1996. The Cambridge Illustrated History of China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[4]: (Mote, Twitchett and Fairbank 1988, 1) Frederick W. Mote, Denis Twitchett and John K. Fairbank. 1988 ’Introduction’, in The Cambridge History of China, Volume 7: The Ming Dynasty, 1368-1644, edited by Frederick W. Mote and Denis Twitchett, 1-10. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[5]: (Ebrey 1996, 216) Patricia Buckley Ebrey. 1996. The Cambridge Illustrated History of China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[6]: (Ebrey 1996, 190) Patricia Buckley Ebrey. 1996. The Cambridge Illustrated History of China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[7]: (Ebrey 1996, 212) Patricia Buckley Ebrey. 1996. The Cambridge Illustrated History of China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[8]: (Ebrey 1996, 215) Patricia Buckley Ebrey. 1996. The Cambridge Illustrated History of China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[9]: 《明太祖實錄 卷140》
[10]: (Weatherhead East Asian Institute 2008) Weatherhead East Asian Institute. 2008. ’Issues and Trends in China’s Demographic History’. Asia for Educators. Columbia University. http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/special/china_1950_population.htm. Accessed 16 March 2017.
| 50 S |
| Great Ming |
| Nanjing | |
| Beijing |
| Empire of the Great Ming | |
| Great Ming |
| alliance with [---] |
| China |
| [4,000,000 to 5,000,000] km2 |
| cultural assimilation |
| Succeeding: Early Qing (cn_qing_dyn_1) [continuity] | |
| Preceding: Great Yuan (cn_yuan_dyn) [cultural assimilation] |
| unitary state |
| 150,000 people | 1400 CE |
| 672,000 people | 1500 CE |
| 706,000 people | 1600 CE |
| 3,900,000 km2 | 1400 CE |
| [3,900,000 to 5,200,000] km2 | 1500 CE |
| 3,655,000 km2 | 1600 CE |
| [60,545,800 to 66,598,300] people | 1400 CE |
| 50,908,700 people | 1500 CE |
| [90,000,000 to 110,000,000] people | 1600 CE |
| absent | 1368 CE 1570 CE |
| present | 1570 CE 1644 CE |
| present |
| absent |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| inferred present |
| present |
| present |
| absent |
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| present |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| present |
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| absent |
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| present |
| present |
| absent |
| inferred present |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| unknown |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| present |
| [6,259 to 6,700] km |
| present |
| inferred present |
| absent |
| present |
| present |
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| unknown |
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| present |
| Year Range | Great Ming (cn_ming_dyn) was in: |
|---|---|
| (1368 CE 1643 CE) | Middle Yellow River Valley |
1479 CE greatest population
c1420s CE greatest territorial extent"The Ming dynasty’s retreat from Vietnam brought Ming territorial expansion to a close. Ming power generally declined until 1565, before briefly reviving from 1570 until 1610."
[1]
1449 CE 500,000 fielded army
1450 CE political stabilityMongols return captured Emperor Zhengtong "having gained almost nothing" because the minister’s in Beijing had elected a new emperor.
[2]
1471 CE Great Wallplans submitted by Yu Zijun "to build a wall between Yansui and Qingyang to aid in defense." First two walls finished 1474 CE, 129 miles and 566 miles long.
[3]
"Kenneth Swope has asserted that from 1580 to 1600 the Ming was as powerful as it had been since Yongle’s reign, and the course of the Three Great Campaigns bears him out.
[4]
however: two of the campaigns were against a troop mutiny and tribal rebellion. the other campaign was a defensive war vs Japan (rather than expansionist). while all the campaigns may have been successful, and may demonstrate effective government, the reasons for these campaigns do not necessarily suggest a polity at its peak state.
"Certainly by the 1570s, the government could afford the massive military expenditures necessary to prosecute the wars that would come to be called the Three Great Campaigns."
[4]
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 119)
[2]: (Lorge 2005, 123)
[3]: (Lorge 2005, 124)
[4]: (Lorge 2005, 128)
km^2
people
Beijing: 400,000: 1350 CE; 150,000: 1400 CE; 600,000: 1450 CE; 672,000: 1500 CE; 690,000: 1550 CE; 706,000: 1575 CE; 706,000: 1650 CE.
[1]
[1]: (Chase-Dunn Spreadsheet)
squared kilometers. Contains interpolated data. 3,100,000: 1369 CE; 3,367,000: 1380 CE; 3,633,000: 1390 CE; 3,900,000: 1400 CE; 4,420,000: 1410 CE; 4,940,000: 1420 CE; 5,460,000: 1430 CE; 5,980,000: 1440 CE; 6,500,000: 1450 CE; [6,067,000-5,200,000]: 1470 CE; [5,200,000-4,333,000]: 1490 CE; 3,900,000: 1513 CE; 3,845,000: 1530 CE; 3,791,000: 1550 CE; 3,736,000: 1570 CE; 3,682,000: 1590 CE; 3,655,000: 1600 CE; 3,600,000: 1616 CE; 2,950,000: 1630 CE; 2,300,000: 1644 CE [1]
[1]: (Chase-Dunn Spreadsheet)
squared kilometers. Contains interpolated data. 3,100,000: 1369 CE; 3,367,000: 1380 CE; 3,633,000: 1390 CE; 3,900,000: 1400 CE; 4,420,000: 1410 CE; 4,940,000: 1420 CE; 5,460,000: 1430 CE; 5,980,000: 1440 CE; 6,500,000: 1450 CE; [6,067,000-5,200,000]: 1470 CE; [5,200,000-4,333,000]: 1490 CE; 3,900,000: 1513 CE; 3,845,000: 1530 CE; 3,791,000: 1550 CE; 3,736,000: 1570 CE; 3,682,000: 1590 CE; 3,655,000: 1600 CE; 3,600,000: 1616 CE; 2,950,000: 1630 CE; 2,300,000: 1644 CE [1]
[1]: (Chase-Dunn Spreadsheet)
squared kilometers. Contains interpolated data. 3,100,000: 1369 CE; 3,367,000: 1380 CE; 3,633,000: 1390 CE; 3,900,000: 1400 CE; 4,420,000: 1410 CE; 4,940,000: 1420 CE; 5,460,000: 1430 CE; 5,980,000: 1440 CE; 6,500,000: 1450 CE; [6,067,000-5,200,000]: 1470 CE; [5,200,000-4,333,000]: 1490 CE; 3,900,000: 1513 CE; 3,845,000: 1530 CE; 3,791,000: 1550 CE; 3,736,000: 1570 CE; 3,682,000: 1590 CE; 3,655,000: 1600 CE; 3,600,000: 1616 CE; 2,950,000: 1630 CE; 2,300,000: 1644 CE [1]
[1]: (Chase-Dunn Spreadsheet)
people
[1]: 《明太祖實錄 卷140》
[2]: 《明孝宗實錄 卷194》
[3]: 第五章 〈封建社會唐（後期）宋遼金元的經濟〉//《中國古代經濟簡史》. 復旦大學. 1982年: 第154頁－第165頁
[4]: (http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/special/china_1950_population.htm)
people
[1]: 《明太祖實錄 卷140》
[2]: 《明孝宗實錄 卷194》
[3]: 第五章 〈封建社會唐（後期）宋遼金元的經濟〉//《中國古代經濟簡史》. 復旦大學. 1982年: 第154頁－第165頁
[4]: (http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/special/china_1950_population.htm)
people
[1]: 《明太祖實錄 卷140》
[2]: 《明孝宗實錄 卷194》
[3]: 第五章 〈封建社會唐（後期）宋遼金元的經濟〉//《中國古代經濟簡史》. 復旦大學. 1982年: 第154頁－第165頁
[4]: (http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/special/china_1950_population.htm)
levels.
1. Capital City2. Province (Sheng)Ming had 16 provinces including Liaodong, North Zhili, Shandong, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Henan, South Zhili, Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangxi, Huguang, Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, and Guangdong.
[1]
3. Prefecture/Subprefecture4. CountyMing had about 1,173 counties. The totals fluctuated as boundaries were revised
[2]
5. CantonsMing counties were subdivided into half a dozen or more cantons
[3]
6. TownshipCantons were divided into about a dozen townships
[3]
7. WardsTownships were divided into dozen of wards. A ward was small enough- mandated as fifty families in the Yuan, a hundred or so families in the Ming- to conform the contours of existing villages, or that was ideal.
[4]
[1]: (Brook, 2010, p.41)
[2]: (Brook, 2010, p.39-42)
[3]: (Brook, 2010, p.47)
[4]: (Brook, 2010, p.47-48)
levels. Inferred from previous polities.
1. Emperor
2. Ministry of Rites
3. Ritual specialists
levels.
"When Zhu Yuanzhang regularized his army, he formed it into units derived from Yuan practice. The weisuo system established Guards (wei) of 5,600 hereditary soldiers, named after its garrison location. The five battalions (qianhusuo) of 1,120 men were further divided into ten companies (bohusuo) of 112 men. These smaller units were often detached from their Guard unit for service outside of the large formation’s theater of operation."
[1]
1. Emperor2. "Zhu’s personal bodyguard, the Embroidered Uniform Guard, functioned as a secret police force acting outside of the established legal system."
[2]
2. Bureaucratic controlZhu’s reorganization of army in 1364 CE placed general’s "under bureaucratic control for the first time, with units of regular size commanded by officer of specific, appropriate rank."
[3]
Following the Great Purge of 1380 CE "the Chief Military Commission was split into five regional military commissions and the positions of censor-in-chief and vice censor-in-chief were similarly done away with."
[4]
2. CommandersZhu Yuanzhang enfeoffed "his sons in important defence commands along the northern border."
[5]
3. wei (Guards)5,600 hereditary soldiers
4. qianhusuo (battalions)1,120 men
5. bohusuo (companies)112 men
6. Lower level unit?
7. Individual soldier
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 111)
[2]: (Lorge 2005, 110)
[3]: (Lorge 2005, 104)
[4]: (Lorge 2005, 109)
[5]: (Lorge 2005, 112)
levels. Number equal to the levels comprising the provincial government, plus the Emperor.
1. Emperor
_Central government_
2. Grand Secretariatfollowing the Great Purge of 1380 CE "All of the top positions of the Secretariat were abolished".
[1]
The Hongwu Emperor "established the roots of the Grand Secretariat when he employed members of the Hanlin Academy to help him with the workload he was saddled with after he abolished the executive posts in the Secretariat. Under Xuande the system became more regular with a complement of three or four grand secretaries drawn from the Hanlin Academy as assistants to the emperor. Still, the grand secretaries were not formally connected to the bureaucracy in a chain of command..."
[2]
2. Secretariat six boards (Personnel, Revenue, Rites, War, Justice, and Works).
[3]
following the Great Purge of 1380 CE "Without its top ranks, the heads of the Secretariat’s six boards reported to the emperor personally."
[1]
2. Censorate
[4]
_Provincial government_
2. ProvinceProvince: Ming had in total of 16 counties and a triad of provincial agencies known as the Three Offices: the Provincial Administration Commission, the Provincial Surveillance Commission, and the Regional Military Commission.
[5]
3. Prefecture
4. County (Magistrate)County: The County was the lowest unit to which the central government appointed an official. Each county had one magistrate, who was always native of another province according to what was called the rule of avoidance, designed to prevent retrenchment of local power at the expense of center. The magistrate was responsible for overseeing the security and finances of anywhere from 50,000 to 500,000 people. When the burdens of a magistrate became too heavy, a county could be subdivided and new counties formed
[6]
5. TownTown could be elevated to county status under some conditions. For instance, The Town of Tong-xiang south of Lake Tai, was elevated in 1430 CE in a major reorganization designed to improve fiscal operations in this densely populated region.
[7]
_Local government_
5. Community (Community chief)
"The entire population was divided into communities of 110 adjacent households as the basic unit of self-government and state control. Each year one of the heads of the ten wealthiest households held the position of community chief, who served as representative to the local magistrate and the local tax collector.
[8]
"Each family was classified according to hereditary status - the chief categories being civilian, military, and artisan - and neighbouring families of the same category were organised into groups for purposes of self-government and mutual help and surveillance. Civilians were grouped into ’tithings’ of 10 families, and these in turn were grouped into communities totaling 100 families, plus 10 additional prosperous households, which in annual rotation provided community chiefs, who were intermediaries between the citizenry at large and the formal agencies of government. This system of social organization, called lijia (later replaced by or coexistent with a local defense system called baojia), served to stablize, regulate, and indoctrinate the populace under relatively loose formal state supervision."
[3]
6. Ten households (Family head)"The other 100 households were grouped into ten groups of ten, with each family head acting as representative for his group to the community chief on an annual rotation. Everyone in each group was responsible for the actions of the other members, creating a vast mutual surveillance system."
[8]
very similar to the Three Chiefs System of 486 CE
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 109)
[2]: (Lorge 2005, 120)
[3]: (Pletcher 2010, 197)
[4]: (Pletcher 2010, 198)
[5]: (Brook, 2010, p.39)
[6]: (Brook, 2010, p.40-41)
[7]: (Brook, 2010, p.41)
[8]: (Lorge 2005, 110)
"The hereditary military system was virtually dead by the 1570s, replaced by a paid army."
[1]
"While the army itself had changed from a mostly hereditary, financially independent force into a paid, professional force, now heavily dependent upon firearms, the officer corps remained dependent on hereditary leaders. These hereditary leaders were not the families of the early Ming..."
[2]
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 128)
[2]: (Lorge 2005, 139)
"The hereditary military system was virtually dead by the 1570s, replaced by a paid army."
[1]
"While the army itself had changed from a mostly hereditary, financially independent force into a paid, professional force, now heavily dependent upon firearms, the officer corps remained dependent on hereditary leaders. These hereditary leaders were not the families of the early Ming..."
[2]
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 128)
[2]: (Lorge 2005, 139)
"... begun during the Tang dynasty... The rise of religious professionals and soldiers as clearly separate groups was contrary to the previous normative view of society divided into knights (shi, the term that would later be applied to the literati or gentry), farmers, artisans and merchants." [1]
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 7)
"While the army itself had changed from a mostly hereditary, financially independent force into a paid, professional force, now heavily dependent upon firearms, the officer corps remained dependent on hereditary leaders. These hereditary leaders were not the families of the early Ming..."
[1]
"By the tenth century, soldiers, to the intense consternation of statesmen, were wholly divorced from any productive activities and earned their livings by skill at arms. Despite many attempts to replace this "mercenary" system, it remained in place until the end of imperial times."
[2]
"The problem Chinese statesmen had with the standing army was how to keep it out of politics and isolate its functions to a static, reliable instrument of dynastic stability ...The answer for the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties was to fuedalize much of the army into a hereditary class with attached lands that would support them in peacetime."
[3]
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 139)
[2]: (Lorge 2005, 7)
[3]: (Lorge 2005, 8)
e.g. the Magistrate’ yamen
"...the exams were revived again in 1384 and remained in place from then on. Serious problems remained, however, as the metropolitan exam of 1397 did not pass a single northern scholar. ... A new evaluation added 61 names; the original examiners were punished, and the precedent of quotas of regional graduates was established. The purely meritocratic aspect of the exam system was thus overridden by the need to create a fully empire-wide bureaucracy, or at least one in which the particular advantages of a few regions in the south did not dominate the government." [1]
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 109)
Zhu experimented with the exam system. "The first civil service exams were held at the lowest level (of three) in 1371. They were suspended two years later by a disgusted emperor, who found the graduates literary but impractical. Further recruitment by recommendations stressed virtue over book learning, but the exams were revived again in 1384 and remained in place from then on." [1]
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 109)
Lawyer not yet a recognized profession. According to Pils, the view of the government and social elite of legal advocacy in imperial China was largely that they were socially harmful -- a view espoused since c.6th century BCE. Some ’clever’ intellectuals were engaged in helping people involved in litigation before the magistrate. "Litigation masters" were tolerated even though they continued to be denounced: "Their role might be hushed up as something of an embarrassment to the system, and scholars of legal history have straightforwardly characterised their profession as an ’underground’ one." [1] [2] Professional Lawyers emerge in the later Qing period.
[1]: (Pils, 2014, p.21, 28)
[2]: (Du Jin, 2013)
Punishments proposed by a judge or judges had to be sent to the Ministry of Justice for deliberation and memorialized to the throne for final approval. Any judge who deliberately or negligently reduced or increased a punishment violated the law (Art. 46). [1] "Judges were required to cite the relevant article of the code when setting a provisional sentence for a criminal...Thus, as far as Chinese judges were concerned, the doctrine of nulla poena sine lege or ’no punishment without a law’ may be said to have been in force. The work of a judge often included investigation and fact finding, research into legal precedents and in some cases, forensic work. [2]
[1]: (Jiang, 2011, p.45)
[2]: (Fairbank, 1978, p.178, 185)
The legal code drawn up in the time of the Hongwu Emperor was considered one of the great achievements of the era. The code was known as Ta-Ming lu (大明律). The Ta-Ming lu, which comprised criminal and administrative as well as civil law, was divided under seven main heads [1]
[1]: (Chan, c1982, p.33-35)
[2]: (Pletcher 2010, 197)
"tile and clay pipes were used in Nanjing City in the early Ming Dynasty to transport water from Xuanwu Lake into the inner city canal. Metal pipes made of copper or bronze were used only from the 15th century onwards (Needham & Wang 1999)." [1]
[1]: (Du and Koenig 2012, 205) Du, P and Koenig, A. in Angelakis, Andreas Niklaos. Mays, Larry W. Koutsoyiannis, Demetris. 2012. Evolution of Water Supply Through the Millennia. IWA Publishing.
According to a note in one late Ming commonplace book, the network of official roads extended 10,900 li (6,278 km or 3,900 miles) east to west, and 11,750 li (6,768 km or 4,200 miles) north to south. A modern scholar estimates that the total length of official land and water routes in the Ming amounted to 143,700 li (84,200 km or 52,300 miles). [1]
[1]: (Brook, 2010, p.30)
e.g.: 1450 CE:《九章算法比类大全》; 1606 CE: Euclid’s Elements (幾何原本): translated by Xu Guangqi(徐光啟) and Matteo Ricci(利瑪窦). Xu Guangqi was a Chinese scholar-bureaucrat, agricultural scientist, astronomer, and mathematician in the Ming Dynasty. Matteo Ricci was an Italian Jesuit priest and one of the founding figures of the Jesuit China missions; 1637 CE: Tiangong Kaiwu/The Exploitation of the Works of Nature (天工開物): was a Chinese encyclopedia compiled by Song Yingxing (宋應星). It covered a wide range of technical issues and materials including agriculture, irrigation, hydraulic engineering, milling processes, sericulture, textile technology, salt technology, sugar technology, ceramics technology, transportation, bronze metallurgy, iron metallurgy, coal metallurgy, vitriol metallurgy, sulfur metallurgy, and arsenic, oil technology, papermaking, silver metallurgy, lead metallurgy, copper metallurgy, tin metallurgy, zinc metallurgy, military technology, and etc.
e.g. The Great Ming Code [1] Yonglin Jiang notes the role of the Great Ming Code as ’moral textbook’ for all of society to follow in order to exist harmoniously. [2] Ming emperors supported Daoism throughout the dynasty, with Daoist priests being placed in charge of official rituals, and the composition of various hymns and messages to the gods. Daoist and Buddhist scriptures start to emerge by the end of the fifteenth century, and indicate the two main streams of mythology and belief branching out of the dominant Confucian thought. [3]
[1]: (Jiang, 2011, p.4)
[2]: (Jiang, 2011, p.4, 55)
[3]: (Adler, 2005)
* 1394 CE: Network of Routes Connecting the Realm (Hyanyu tongue): The Ministry of War produced a guide, Network of Routes Connecting the Realm (Hyanyu tongue). This cheaply printed handbook, first published in 1394 CE, lists all courier routes in the country along with the 1,706 station serving them. [1]
[1]: (Brook, 2010, p.31)
e.g. Confucian philosophy. Under the Ming, sectarian scriptures appeared during the same movement used to reinforce popular religion under the Mandate of Heaven. These scriptures produced new vernacular literature of all types, morality books of Neo-Confucian values and philosophical thought. [1]
[1]: (Adler, 2005)
e.g. Yellow Register Archives in Nanjing.
Fengshen Yanyi/ The Investiture of the Gods, The Apotheosis of Heroes (封神演義); 1592CE: Journey to the West (西遊記): written by Wu Cheng’en(吳承恩). It is one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature; [1522 - 1566 CE]: Water Margin(水滸傳): Written in vernacular Chinese by Shi Nai’an (施耐庵) It is one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature; Jin Ping Mei/ The Plum in the Golden Vase/ The Golden Lotus(金瓶梅): a Chinese naturalistic novel composed in vernacular Chinese during the late Ming Dynasty. It is written by Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng(蘭陵笑笑生), whose identity was unknown.
non-coined silver, gold, platinum. Silver ingots most widely used, and since the weights of each individual piece varied, they were treated as bullion and measured in tael. Ingots were privately made, first coming into use in Guangdong before spreading into the lower Yangtze c.1420 CE. Silver ingots were used for trade and for the payment of provincial taxes until the value of silver became too dear due to contractions caused by reduced access to silver from Japan and Spain in the mid 17th century. [1]
[1]: (Chen, 2018, p.354)
1375 CE: Hongwu Emperor issued banknotes (大明通行寶鈔) due to lack to copper; 1389 CE: The government issued more banknotes with smaller denomination. Inflation begun in the circulation market as the Ming did kept issuing banknotes but did not recycle the old ones. "The Ming halted the practice [of using paper money] in the mid-fifteenth century...The private sector moved to fill the void" [1]
[1]: (Eastman 1988, 111 ) Eastman, Lloyd. 1988. Family, Fields and Ancestors: Constancy and Change in China’s Social and Economic History 1550-1949. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
The Ministry of War operated the courier system with military labor. The Ministry of War produced a guide, Network of Routes Connecting the Realm (Hyanyu tongue). This cheaply printed handbook, first published in 1394 CE, lists all courier routes in the country along with the 1,706 station serving them. Use of the system required a pass that specified the route and the mode of transport. [1]
[1]: (Brook, 2010, p.31)
The Ministry of War operated the courier system with military labor. The Ministry of War produced a guide, Network of Routes Connecting the Realm (Hyanyu tongue). This cheaply printed handbook, first published in 1394 CE, lists all courier routes in the country along with the 1,706 station serving them. Use of the system required a pass that specified the route and the mode of transport. [1]
[1]: (Brook, 2010, p.31)
reconstruction and new additions of the Great Wall during the Ming period included the redesigning of many towers and fortifications that stood along the length of the wall, as well as the addition of cannons to some strategic locations. In some areas near the west of Beijing, the Great Wall splits into the Inner Wall and Outer Wall offering additional defence through this section of concentric walls. The wall was heavily garrisoned with soldiers manning battlements, gates, and signal towers. [1]
[1]: (Faust 2016, p.41)
"‘the old type of trebuchet was really more convenient’, said the founder of the Ming dynasty in 1388. ‘If you have a hundred of these machines, then when you are ready to march, each wooden pole can be carried by only four men. Then when you reach your destination, you encircle the city, set them up, and start shooting.’" [1]
[1]: (Turnball 2002) Turnball, S. 2002. Siege Weapons of the Far East (1): AD 612-1300. Osprey Publishing.
In the late fourteenth century, soldiers in southwestern Yunnan were still primarily armed with spears and crossbows, while firearms were being used primarily by the Ming troops which contributed to their military success. The Ming troops frequently employed fire arrows and ’rocket-arrows’ in addition to the stone projectiles launched from their firearms against Maw Chan soldiers and elephant cavalry. [1]
[1]: (Laichen, 2008, p.499-500)
1453 CE: Bronze firearms (銅火銃) was invented. It is the world’s first metal tubular firearm is handguns, small-caliber handguns is the predecessor of the gun, large caliber artillery gun fire predecessor. "The earliest known specimen of a gun was excavated in July of 1970 in Acheng county, Heilongjiang province. Made of bronze, it is 34 centimeters long, weighs 3.5 kilograms and has three distinct parts to its length: a barrel, powder chamber, and socket for a handle at the rear end. It has been dated no later than 1290. ... A 1962 find with an inscribed date of 1332 was 35.3 centimeters long and weighed 6.94 kilograms. Both weapons had touchholes to allow ignition of the gunpowder from the back. The similar sizes, forms, and materials are striking, suggesting that this simple design was being manufactured to regular specifications." [1] "Early fifteenth-century guns were virtually identical to late thirteenth-century weapons." [1] c1338 CE cast iron gun developed. [2] Portuguese arquebuses introduced 1529 CE. [3]
[1]: (Lorge 2011, 69)
[2]: (Lorge 2011, 70)
[3]: (Lorge 2005, 125)
1524 CE: Breech-loading swivel gun was imported from Portugal. "cache of hundreds of cast iron cannons found in Nanjing manufactured between 1356 and 1357 ... These guns had been buried at Nanjing after the defeat of Zhang Shicheng by the army of the rising regional power that would become the Ming dynasty about a decade later." Cannon were not used or melted down so why were they buried? "They were junk as far as the Ming army were concerned." "The scale of Chinese gun production in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries must have been so great, and the material resources so plentiful, that storing, hauling away, or melting down the captured iron cannon was no worth the effort." [1] ""Red Barbarian Cannon" came in during the Wanli reign (1573-1620)." "The Ming army developed a much greater facility with cannon than with arquebuses, in contrary distinction to the Japanese army, which became extremely skilled with arquebuses but was entirely lacking in cannon, at least in Korea. This may have been due to the way firearms were deployed in China - in fixed defensive positions rather than in offensive arrays." [2]
[1]: (Lorge 2011, 70)
[2]: (Lorge 2005, 125)
In the late fourteenth century, soldiers in southwestern Yunnan were still primarily armed with spears and crossbows, while firearms were being used primarily by the Ming troops which contributed to their military success. The Ming troops frequently employed fire arrows and ’rocket-arrows’ in addition to the stone projectiles launched from their firearms against Maw Chan soldiers and elephant cavalry. [1]
[1]: (Laichen, 2008, p.499-500)
In the late fourteenth century, soldiers in southwestern Yunnan were still primarily armed with spears and crossbows, while firearms were being used primarily by the Ming troops which contributed to their military success. The Ming troops frequently employed fire arrows and ’rocket-arrows’ in addition to the stone projectiles launched from their firearms against Maw Chan soldiers and elephant cavalry. [1]
[1]: (Laichen, 2008, p.499-500)
"While we don’t have any surviving Ming Dynasty shield, we do have this Joseon Dynasty sample to draw reference from." [1] A unit created to deal with wokou (pirates) used "long weapons, spears and bamboo branches (sometime replaced with metal-branched pole-arms), and shields and close-range weapons." [2]
[1]: http://greatmingmilitary.blogspot.com/2015/11/101st-post-p2.html
[2]: (Lorge 2005, 127)
"this armour cannot be considered a plate armour in its truest sense. The Chinese lack necessary metallurgical expertise to develop full plate armour (with the possible exception of late Ming period Guangdong), and they did not seem to import plate armour directly from the Europeans like their Japanese and Indian neighbours either. ... The Quan Tie Jia (全鐵甲, ’Full iron armour’) is made of several large lacquered iron or steel plates sewn to a backing made from thick cotton (or calico) fabric. The edges of these metal plates are wrapped with thrice-folded coarse fabric, likely to prevent chafing. In this regard, the Quan Tie Jia more closely resemble Russian Zertsalo (Зерцало) armour in construction than European full plate." [1]
[1]: http://greatmingmilitary.blogspot.com/2015/02/plate-armour-of-ming-dynasty.html
"While Quan Tie Jia is no match for European plate harness, its multiple large rigid plates paired with thick fabric backing still offers good protection, a significant improvement over traditional Chinese lamellar and brigandine armour." [1]
[1]: http://greatmingmilitary.blogspot.com/2015/02/plate-armour-of-ming-dynasty.html
[1] According to Laichen, the Chiang Mai chronicle states that Chinese soldiers wore "iron, copper and leather armor that could withstand the spears, swords, guns and arrows of the Lan Na armies." [2]
[1]: http://greatmingmilitary.blogspot.com/2015/02/plate-armour-of-ming-dynasty.html
[2]: (Laichen, 2008, p.507)
Military commander Qi Jiguang (1528-1587 CE): "In Qi’s system a war junk had 55 troops divided into five units. Two units used arquebuses, two used cannon, flame-throwers and rockets, and one used other types of gunpowder weapons. Naval combat required firearms by this point, a marked change in warfare."
[1]
[1]: (Lorge 2005, 127)
Water Route: Modern scholar estimates that the total length of official land and water routes in the Ming amounted to 143,700 li (84,200 km or 52,300 miles). [1] Government barge: The size of the canal demanded labor and equipment on a scale equal to its requirements. By the mid-fifteenth century, 11,775 government grain barges were being hauled up and down the canal by 121,500 solders to keep the imperial storehouses in Beijing full. [2] Imperial barge: The imperial household also operated its own barge to supply the palace. These were said to number 161, of which fifteen were iceboats to transport fresh fish and fruit from the south. 600 skiffs call “fast-as-horse boats” that the Ministry of War were operated to protect imperial haul. [2]
[1]: (Brook, 2010, p.30-31)
[2]: (Brook, 2010, p.110)
The bulk good travel more cheaply by water than by land, hence the importance of rivers and canals for transporting grain and other bulk commodities. The nature flow of China was from its western mountains to its eastern plains, so the Grand Canal, the origins of which go back to seventh century, would become the core of the Ming state’s north-south transportation strategy. [1]
[1]: (Brook, 2010, p.110)