Tang Dynasty Founded
In 618 AD, Li Yuan, a former Sui official and military governor, proclaimed himself emperor and founded the Tang dynasty, taking the throne name Gaozu. The Tang would rule China for almost three centuries and became one of the most influential states in world history. Its reach, prosperity and cultural achievements made it a model for later Chinese dynasties and for neighboring societies in Korea, Japan and Vietnam.
The Tang rose from the collapse of the Sui dynasty, which had reunified China in 589 after nearly four centuries of division. The Sui accomplished a great deal, including completing the Grand Canal, but its emperors drained the population with huge construction projects and costly, failed campaigns against the Korean kingdom of Goguryeo. Rebellions spread across the empire in the 610s. Li Yuan, who held a command in the northern region of Taiyuan and was related to the Sui imperial family, joined the turmoil in 617 and seized the capital, Chang'an. After the Sui emperor Yang was killed in 618, Li Yuan declared the new dynasty.
Founding the dynasty did not immediately end the fighting. Rival warlords still controlled large parts of the country, and the Tang spent several years defeating them. Much of the military success is credited to Li Yuan's second son, Li Shimin. In 626 he killed his brother, the crown prince, in a violent coup and forced his father to cede power. As Emperor Taizong, he is traditionally remembered as an exemplary ruler, though the sources were written under a court that had reasons to polish his image and his path to the throne.
Under Taizong and later rulers, the Tang built a centralized government staffed increasingly through examinations, refined the legal code, and distributed land in ways meant to support peasant farmers and tax revenue. Armies pushed Chinese influence deep into Central Asia, and the Silk Road trade brought merchants, envoys and religions from Persia, India and beyond. Chang'an, the eastern end of those routes, was among the largest cities in the world; figures of around a million inhabitants in the city and its surroundings are commonly cited, though they are estimates. Buddhism flourished, and the poets Li Bai and Du Fu helped make the era a high point of Chinese literature.
The dynasty was not without crisis. Empress Wu Zetian ruled in her own right from 690 to 705, interrupting Tang rule with her own short-lived Zhou dynasty. The devastating An Lushan Rebellion, beginning in 755, weakened central authority and left regional military governors with lasting power. The Tang limped on until 907, when it dissolved into the fragmented Five Dynasties period. Even so, its legacy endured, and people of Chinese descent abroad are still sometimes called "people of Tang" in some Chinese-speaking communities.