Books in the History of Imperial China series

Just over a thousand years ago, the Song dynasty emerged as the most advanced civilization on earth. Within two centuries, China was home to nearly half of all humankind. This book is an essential introduction to this transformative era.

Traces the history of imperial China from the beginnings of unification under the Qin emperor in the third century BCE to the end of the Qing dynasty in the early twentieth century. This title also captures a dynamic era in which Tang dynasty reached its greatest geographical extent under Chinese rule.

In a brisk revisionist history, William Rowe challenges the standard narrative of Qing China as a decadent, inward-looking state that failed to keep pace with the modern West. This original, thought-provoking history of China's last empire is a must-read for understanding the challenges facing China today.

The Mongol takeover in the 1270s changed the course of Chinese history. What China had been before its reunification as the Yuan dynasty in 1279 was no longer what it would be in the future. Four centuries later, another wave of steppe invaders replaced the Ming dynasty. This title explores what happened to China between these two invasions.

After the collapse of the Han dynasty, China divided along a north-south line. Lewis traces the changes that underlay and resulted from this split in a period that saw China's geographic redefinition, more engagement with the outside world, significant changes to family life, literary and social developments, and the introduction of new religions.

In 221 BC the First Emperor of Qin unified what would become the heart of a Chinese empire whose major features would endure for two millennia. In the first of a six-volume series on the history of imperial China, Lewis highlights the key challenges facing court officials and scholars who set about governing an empire of such scale and diversity.