Chapter 20: Northern Eurasia 1500-1800
•Japan: Similarities to China and Russia
• Military conflicts (internal and external)
• Political growth and strengthening
• Expanded commercial and cultural contacts
•Japan: Differences with China and Russia
• culturally homogenous population
• natural boundaries
• process of political unification much shorter
• responses to European contacts
When Japan’s political unity disintegrated in the
12th century, the country was controlled by:
• Numerous warlords named daimyo (DIE-mee-oh)
• Each had his own castle town, a small bureaucracy, and an army of warriors
called samurai
• daimyo pledged allegiance to the military leader, the shogun, as well as the
emperor, but neither had real political power.
• Warfare among the daimyo was common, leading to civil wars.
• The most successful of these warlords was Hideyoshi.
In 1592 after years of civil war, Hideyoshi
• Launched an invasion of the
Asian mainland
• He intended to conquer
Korea and China
• Korea, influenced in many
ways by China, employed
their military technology,
including “turtle boats”.
• Hideyoshi was able to get
past Korea into the Chinese
mainland, but after his death
was pushed back out.
One of the consequences of Japanese aggression
was
• Korea was severely devastated by the invasion.
• The most dramatic consequences were in
China—battles in Manchuria allowed Manchu
opposition to grow stronger and eventually take
possession of Beijing.
After the period of civil wars ended in Japan
• A more centralized government was formed
• A new shogun named Tokugawa established a
military government known as the Tokugawa
Shogunate.
• They created a new capital at Edo (now Tokyo)
• Trade promoted economic development, which
is what the Tokugawa government is known for.
Japanese manufacturers in the 1600s and
1700s made beautiful
• Pottery (mostly porcelain)
Despite government efforts to curtail merchant
independence, Japanese merchants:
• Amassed large family fortunes
• The samurais well-being was threatened as they became dependent
customers of merchants goods. That is why the gov’t tried to regulate the
merchants—unsuccessfully.
European contact with Japan resulted in
“opportunities and problems” such as
• Opportunities:
– Japan gained Western weapons, launching
the first East Asian “gunpowder revolution”
– New trade with merchants from Portugal,
Spain, the Netherlands and England (gov’t
closely regulated)
• Problems:
• Hostility eventually surrounded the Christian presence
in Japan, including violent persecution against
Christians.
Japanese response to the Society of Jesus
or the Jesuits was
• Mixed response: many ordinary Japanese found
the religion appealing, but many of the elite
thought it disruptive and foreign
• Many converted, and a daimyo gave a port city
to the Jesuits, many required conversion of
Christianity for their subjects.
Eventually, what was Japan’s response to
European trade and Christian influence?
• The fractious politics of Japan plus the larger suspicion
about Europe’s larger goal in Japan caused the shogun
to be hostile toward Christians.
• A decree ordered that Christians were overthrowing
truth, changing the gov’t, and seizing land caused many
Christians to leave, but others to go underground.
• Violent persecutions of Christians began
• Then in the middle 1600s more decrees ended
European trade, forced people to prove their Buddhist
orthodoxy, and their loyalty to Japan.
• Only the Dutch were allowed to trade, though it was
limited.
What factors led to Tokugawa Japan’s
instability?
• 1700s—population growth put a strain on welldeveloped lands
• the shogunate’s inability to stabilize rice prices
and halt the economic decline of the samurai
• Tokugawa gov’t followed Confucian idea that
agriculture should be basis of gov’t not
merchants
• Its decentralized gov’t limited its ability to
regulate the merchants & actually stimulated
their growth
What was the fate of the samurai of the
Forty-Seven Ronin incident?
• 1701-1703, displays the change from a
military gov’t to a civil one
• They were allowed to commit ritual suicide
Later Ming and Early Qing
• Like Japan, China experienced civil wars
and foreign wars after 1500, but on a
larger scale
• By 1800 China had an expanded
economy, and many doubts regarding the
importance of European trade and
Christianity
European visitors to Ming China in the 16th
century were
• Astonished at their imperial power,
exquisite manufactures, and vast
population.
• They bought so much blue on white
porcelain, all fine dishes became known
as “china”
During its decline, what was experienced by
the Ming?
• Climate change called the Little Ice Age in 17th
century dropping temps leading to agricultural
decline and famine
• Declines in local populations resulted
• Rapid urban growth in the trading economy,
coupled with the influx of American silver caused
inflation
• Corruption in gov’t, workers’ strikes
• Japanese attacks in late 1500s harmed the Ming
and strengthened their opponents, the Manchus
Which empire replaced the Ming
Empire of China?
• Qing Empire, headed by a Manchu family
• The Qing/Manchus were a minority
population among ethnic Chinese and had
to adopt Chinese traditions eventually
Although European enthusiasm for Chinese
trade was high, how did the Chinese feel
about Europeans?
• The Chinese were much slower to embrace
European trade—suspicion
Merchants from which country were the first
to arrive in East Asia?
• Portugal
• Eventually expelled from the country, later
allowed to trade. Spain and the Dutch were allowed
to trade from Taiwan briefly.
The VOC (Dutch East India Company)
representatives gained the favor of the
Chinese Emperor by
• They performed the ritual of “kowtow”,
which was an acknowledgment of the
emperor’s moral superiority.
• The visitor to the emperor hit his head on
the floor repeatedly while crawling to the
throne.
What European organization was a
transmitter of science and technology to
China?
• Society of Jesus, or Jesuits
• Far more successful than in Japan (at least for
now)
Who was Matteo Ricci?
• A Jesuit missionary who introduced European
technology to China
• He was permitted to stay in China as a Western
scholar
The Qing Emperor’s desire for security of
the northern border led to
• An intense struggle with Russia
• They feared an alliance between Russia
and the Mongol state
What was the Treaty of Nerchinsk?
• Fixed the northern border of China along the
Amur River
• the
border has endured since then
To gain converts, the Jesuits made what
compromises?
• They tolerated Confucian ancestor worship
• Caused controversy between the Jesuits and
their Catholic rivals in China—the Franciscans
and Dominicans and between Jesuits and the
pope.
• Kangxi (emperor from 1662-1722) wrote the
pope declaring his support for the Jesuits
• Eventually Christians were persecuted rather
than supported by the emperor
During the Qing Empire, what new items or
ideas did Europe gain from China?
•
•
•
•
An early form of inoculation
Wallpaper
Silk, porcelain, tea
Room dividers, painted fans, carved jade and
ivory
• Poetry—expressing political ideas that struck a
chord with European intellectuals who were
questioning their own political philosophies
Europeans were permitted to trade only at
• Canton
What were Britain’s motives for becoming
China’s biggest European trading partner?
• China’s large population made it a
potential market for European goods
• Tea became a fashionable drink in Europe
• They needed a new market after the loss
of the American colonies
• The desire to end the English trade deficit
in China—they were pouring silver in to
buy Chinese goods but weren’t selling
anything to China
What problem did the British face with
Chinese markets that they called the
“Canton System?”
• China didn’t buy British goods
The British Macartney Mission was an
attempt to
• Persuade
China to revise its trade system
• 1792, Britain sent Lord George Macartney went to
China with many scientists, artists, and translators to
show the Qing how interested England was
• Macartney refused to perform kowtow, and the Qing
refused to revise the Canton trading system.
Population growth in China in the 1700s led to
• Severe environmental problems
• Increased demands for building materials
depleted the forests, which accelerated wind
and water erosion, which increased flooding…
• Dams were not maintained, and the Grand
Canal was nearly unusable
• The empire became too vast for the Qing and
decline set in.
The princes of Muscovy organized a
movement of conquest and expansion
against the
• Golden Horde—Mongols had ruled Russia from
1200s to 1480
• Under the Golden Horde Moscow had become
the most important city.
Russian rulers were called:
•Tsars (caesars)
• They believed they were the 3rd Rome.
The motivation for Russian expansion in the
east was
• Availability of fur pelts which provided revenue to
access European technology
How did the growth of a centralized
Russian Empire affect the peasants?
•Peasants became serfs, people who were tied to the land
According to the Russian census of 1795,
over half the population were
• Serfs
The greatest Romanov tsar was
• Tsar Peter the Great
One result of the “Great Northern War” was
• Russian access to the Baltic Sea
The new city that was to be Russia’s “window
on the West” is
• St. Petersburg, modeled after French buildings