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The first civilizations of Eastern Asia began to form around the Huang He, or Yellow River. As with all of the other great river valley civilizations, farming was made easier in this region by the yearly flooding of the river that deposited topsoil all around. By around 2000 BC, the first large cities began to form in the region. A family known as the Xia Dynasty began to take charge of much of the land around the Huang He. Eventually other families would begin taking over different regions of eastern Asia.
Because much of the land in east Asia was flat and easy to invade, many cities built large dirt walls around their cities for protection. Wall building became very important to the early people. They built walls around groups of cities, individual cities, and even individual homes.
In this region, culture was very much centered around family life. Honor and respect of elders was seen as the key to a safe society, much more than laws produced by a government. With the belief in filial piety ( respect for parents), society was kept in order. Nobody wanted to do anything to bring shame to their family. This reduced crime, increased productivity and made life much better overall. One of the major proponents of this system of honor was a man known as Confucius.
Confucius believed that all life could be divided into four relationships. Ruler and subject Father and son Husband and wife Older brother and younger brother In these relationships one person should always be in charge and the other would follow. Both would do their best to honor the other. If the relationship was kept, society would be kept peaceful. This would be the primary philosophy keeping order in China until the 1900’s
The Asians created a writing system that for the first time in history was not simple pictures to represent objects or actions. In their language each symbol represent a syllable of sound. The main problem with this system was the huge number of symbols used. To be able to read simple documents, you had to know at least 1500 characters. To read in depth books you would need to know around 10,000 characters. Although the language was difficult to learn, it was used throughout east Asia and helped to unify the people.
Another major philosophy found in east Asia was Daoism. Taoists believed in harmony through balance. The creator of Daoism, Laozi, taught that everyone should follow, “The Way”. Nobody should ever become too happy or too sad. Nobody should ever be too rich or too poor. According to Laozi, too much of anything was a bad thing. Even if something was very good, if their was too much of it, it would end up being bad.
Throughout east Asia, the government was run in a feudal system. This meant that different families controlled certain sections of land. In each section, their was one main leader, who granted smaller sections of land to others so that they could control the land for him. The Overall land owner was known as an Emperor, and his underlings were Shogun. The basic workers were peasants who spent their entire life working the land. The system was held together by the system of honor and respect. Emperors gained power through the belief that they had a “Mandate of Heaven” meaning the gods has chosen them to be king.
Eventually different shoguns began to fight to take control of more land. By 221 BC, all of the lands were unified for the first time under the Qin Dynasty (pronounced “chin”). This is where the name China comes from.
