History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)

Book Description

Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.

Customer Reviews:

Calculations are only as good as your numbers.......2007-08-03

Yes, we can all agree that mainstream history is nearly 100% BS due to politics, economics, ego, problems with dating techniques, and various conspiracies. Agreed. But, I've been researching the distinct possibility that human history (in terms of civilizations) are much more ancient than we've been told, so coming across this book was very interesting to me. I wondered how Fomenko could be wrong (if at all) because he is very persuasive in his presentations. Then it dawned on me. If at previous times in prehistory, due to the various catastrophies that are well documented (comets, asteroids, planetary disruptions, plasma discharge, pole reversals, etc) the Earth was in a different position in relation to the sun, different tilt on its axis, different orbit, different rotation (in terms of velocity and DIRECTION), and the continents were in different positions, then would this not cause the ancients to see the sky (constellations) differently? In other words, is Fomenko making erronious assumptions about the physics of the Earth in pre-history, which then corrupt his data with regards to dating the relevant astrology? The last event to seriously disrupt our planet occured roughly 3500 years ago, according to other good researchers, so is it possible Fomenko has been confused by this? The vastly different physics of our planet in the not so distant past may explain this confusion, which is not to say the "mainstream" version of history is correct; on the contrary. I am not an expert in these fields, but wanted to see if this idea could spark discussion.

Pants on fire?.......2007-07-19

Will people ever read before spamming? Yes, Jesuits could not rewrite world history alone, they had help. Anyway, Dr Prof Acad A.Fomenko does not point to jesuits as the driving force of world wide history manipulation in published volumes 1,2,3;, actually he barely mentions the poor devils. Check it with 'Search inside' feature, please. China is rarely mentioned either, in fact, Dr Fomenko is completely eurocentric. Right, his theory contradicts all mainstream schools of history, because in their actual state they are all built on blatantly erroneus chronology. You don't need a mysterious cabal (conspiracy) to falsify history, the falsification is its modus operandi. It is inherent to history(ians) to falsify (distort) events, as it is inherent to humans to boast as it is inherent to power (authority) to legimize itself by referrring to glorious past made to its own order. Dr Prof Fomenko and team have identified scores of instances of such manipulation in Russian, European, etc.. history, and delivered valid statistical proof thereof. His own 'reconstruction' is completely another story. Forget c14 as a valid method of dating. W.Libby has initially discovered a brilliant method of INDEPENDENT dating. Too bad, c14 method has become a joke after a forced marrige with dendrochronology with consensual chronological scale inbuilt. Radiocarbon method can't stand blind tests, but is so very productive as a rubberstamp.

Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09

There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.

For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.

Very Interesting.......2007-03-07

It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.

History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10

Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.

I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.

Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.

Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.

I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.

This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.

Chinese Women in the Imperial Past: New Perspectives (Sinica Leidensia, V. 44)

Average customer rating:

Chinese Women in the Imperial Past: New Perspectives (Sinica Leidensia, V. 44)

Manufacturer: Brill Academic Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Asia | History | Subjects | Books

General | World | History | Subjects | Books

Social History | Historical Study | History | Subjects | Books

General | Interior Design | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books

General | Social Sciences | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

General | Women's Studies | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 9004110658

Our Great Qing: The Mongols, Buddhism, And the State in Late Imperial China

Average customer rating:

Our Great Qing: The Mongols, Buddhism, And the State in Late Imperial China
Johan Elverskog
Manufacturer: University of Hawaii Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Asia | History | Subjects | Books

Central Asia | Asia | History | Subjects | Books

General | World | History | Subjects | Books

History | Buddhism | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
Similar Items:

ASIN: 0824830210

Book Description

Although it is generally believed that the Manchus controlled the Mongols through their patronage of Tibetan Buddhism, scant attention has been paid to the Mongol view of the Qing imperial project. In contrast to other accounts of Manchu rule, Our Great Qing focuses not only on what images the metropole wished to project into Mongolia, but also on what images the Mongols acknowledged themselves. Rather than accepting the Manchu's use of Buddhism, Johan Elverskog begins by questioning the static, unhistorical, and hegemonic view of political life implicit in the Buddhist explanation. By stressing instead the fluidity of identity and Buddhist practice as processes continually developing in relation to state formations, this work explores how Qing policies were understood by Mongols and how they came to see themselves as Qing subjects.

In his investigation of Mongol society on the eve of the Manchu conquest, Elverskog reveals the distinctive political theory of decentralization that fostered the civil war among the Mongols. He explains how it was that the Manchu Great Enterprise was not to win over "Mongolia" but was instead to create a unified Mongol community of which the disparate preexisting communities would merely be component parts.To foster this change, Manchu rulers sought religious sanction "from above" through the cult of Chinggis Khan and with this mandate set about to restructure the cult itself and the Mongol aristocrats as members of a unified empire. As a result, the Mongol nobility came to see themselves as representing a single community that had been rescued by the gracious Manchu rulers during the civil wars of the early seventeenth century. A key element fostering this change was the Qing court's promotion of Gelukpa orthodoxy, which not only transformed Mongol historical narratives and rituals but also displaced the earlier vernacular Mongolian Buddhism. Finally, Elverskog demonstrates how this eighteenth-century conception of a Mongol community, ruled by an aristocracy and nourished by a Buddhist emperor, gave way to a pan-Qing solidarity of all Buddhist peoples against Muslims and Christians and to local identities that united for the first time aristocrats with commoners in a new Mongol Buddhist identity on the eve of the twentieth century.

By providing an intellectual history of Mongol self-representations in late imperial China, Our Great Qing offers an insightful analysis of the principal changes that Mongolian concepts of community, rule, and religion underwent from 1500 to 1900 while offering new insights into Qing and Buddhist history. It will be essential reading for a range of different audiences, from those working specifically in Sino-Inner Asian history to those interested more broadly in the history of empires, their peripheries, and the role of religion in communal and state formations.

Average customer rating:

Solid

The Early Chinese Empires: Qin and Han (History of Imperial China)
Mark Edward Lewis
Manufacturer: Belknap Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

China | Ancient | History | Subjects | Books
Early Civilization | Ancient | History | Subjects | Books
General | Ancient | History | Subjects | Books
General | Asia | History | Subjects | Books
General | China | Asia | History | Subjects | Books
General | World | History | Subjects | Books
Look Inside History Books | Trip | Specialty Stores | Books
Similar Items:

The Government of the Qin And Han Empires: 221 Bce-220 Ce

Readings in Han Chinese Thought

The Open Empire: A History of China to 1600

Chinese Society in the Age of Confucius (Monumenta Archaeologica) (Cotsen Institute of Archaeology: Ideas, Debates and Perspectives)

The Confusions of Pleasure: Commerce and Culture in Ming China

ASIN: 067402477X

Book Description

In 221 bc the First Emperor of Qin unified the lands that would become the heart of a Chinese empire. Though forged by conquest, this vast domain depended for its political survival on a fundamental reshaping of Chinese culture. With this informative book, we are present at the creation of an ancient imperial order whose major features would endure for two millennia.

The Qin and Han constitute the "classical period" of Chinese history--a role played by the Greeks and Romans in the West. Mark Edward Lewis highlights the key challenges faced by the court officials and scholars who set about governing an empire of such scale and diversity of peoples. He traces the drastic measures taken to transcend, without eliminating, these regional differences: the invention of the emperor as the divine embodiment of the state; the establishment of a common script for communication and a state-sponsored canon for the propagation of Confucian ideals; the flourishing of the great families, whose domination of local society rested on wealth, landholding, and elaborate kinship structures; the demilitarization of the interior; and the impact of non-Chinese warrior-nomads in setting the boundaries of an emerging Chinese identity.

The first of a six-volume series on the history of imperial China, The Early Chinese Empires illuminates many formative events in China's long history of imperialism--events whose residual influence can still be discerned today.

Customer Reviews:

Solid.......2007-08-26

A solid introduction to Chinese Imperial history. This is the first volume of a projected survey of Imperial history being brought out by Harvard University Press. Lewis presents the first Chinese Empires, the Chin and the Han, as developing several of the basic institutions that would characterize the Chinese state for centuries. These include the overarching goal of a unified state transcending regions, a political system based on the Emperor as source of all authority and focal point of loyalty, the development of a unified intellectual culture serving the state, the demilitarization of the interior and development of professional and client armies defending the frontiers against nomadic peoples, and the emergence of the gentry that would be the mediator between the Imperial center and the countryside.

Lewis describes the Chin/Han as akin to the Classical period of Western history. This is true in both the sense of these societies establishing basic features of their descendant cultures but also in the sense of the problems of reconstructing their histories. As with Classical history, Lewis draws on literary accounts, contemporary histories, a modest amount of surviving primary documents, epigraphy, and archaeological evidence. One thing that appears to be different is the greater degree of continuity between the Chin/Han and later states.

Lewis covers the emergence of the initial Chin empire from the preceding Warring States. This seems to be the story of the development of a relatively centralized and militarized state emerging from a welter of feudatories, and then able to conquer rival states to produce a unified Empire. The history of the succeeding Han is presented as a partial dismantling of Chin institutions to produce the basic features of the Chinese state. Lewis does not present a typical narrative but rather more of a structural analysis. Much of the book consists of thematic chapters on family life, religion, intellectual culture, and law. This may be due in part to the limitations of the narrative record. Perhaps for the same reason, some very intriguing aspects, such as the apparent considerable monetarization of the Chinese economy are not explored. There is a particularly interesting discussion of the military strategies adopted by the Han to deal with Central Asian nomads and how their failure apparently precipitated the fall of the Han.

Lewis is a competent, as opposed to very good, writer. Perhaps because of the survey format, there are some limitations for the general reader. A brief discussion of the nature of the Zhou feudal state would have been useful. Similarly, Lewis has a good discussion of the emergence of an official intellectual canon but little discussion of the actual content of its different components. Having raised the comparison with Classical history, Lewis provides no comparative discussion. For example, the use of Central Asian nomads as client armies invites comparison with the later Roman Empire.

There are a number of maps but they are not of very good quality. Overall, this is a good start for this series.

China and Iran: Ancient Partners in a Post-Imperial World

Average customer rating:

Fascinating Insight into Anti-Hegemonist Unity

China and Iran: Ancient Partners in a Post-Imperial World
John W. Garver
Manufacturer: University of Washington Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

China | Ancient | History | Subjects | Books

General | Middle East | History | Subjects | Books

General | Politics | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Look Inside History Books | Trip | Specialty Stores | Books

Look Inside Nonfiction Books | Trip | Specialty Stores | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Nonfiction | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
Similar Items:

ASIN: 029598631X

Book Description

“The powerful army of the Islamic Republic of Iran is in the service of peace and security and is no threat to anyone. But in the face of enemies, it is like a meteorite. It will cut off the hand of any aggressor and leave the enemy covered in shame.” -Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, president of Iran, April 18, 2006 “Garver has again proven himself to be the nation's leading scholar of China's foreign relations. This pathbreaking scholarship provides a much-needed corrective to media caricatures and fills a void of reliable information.” -David Shambaugh, George Washington University “Garver's painstaking research shows how China and Iran try consistently to resist perceived American hegemony and invoke their ancient relations to legitimize the convergence of their national interests. Garver empathetically probes these relations from the perspectives of their leaders, rather than his own American lenses.” -R. K. Ramazani, University of Virginia “Garver's incisive and lucid work draws attention to the range and depth of China-Iran cultural interactions and how these shape their perceptions and projection of power…. These rigorous, refreshing, innovative insights on the intricacies of regional politics are likely to recast our thinking on power relationships in Asia and the Middle East.” -Saaed Shafqat, Columbia University “A tour de force of the highest importance to U.S. policymakers and scholars alike.” -Ambassador Thomas Graham Jr. “The first of its kind, Garver's timely book combines exciting insights on politics, ideology, Islam, and energy, as well as military and nuclear policy. This will be the standard work for some time to come.” -Yitzhak Shichor, University of Haifa In recent years, Iran's nuclear aspirations have dominated its relations with the United States and Europe. China stands as Iran's staunchest ally on the UN Security Council, as well as its primary source of advanced technology and military assistance, built on centuries of close economic relations. Successive governments of these two ancient and proud nations have reaffirmed their common interests in seeking an Asia free of Soviet expansionism and U.S. unilateral domination. John W. Garver charts the evolution of Sino-Iranian relations through several phases, including Iran under the shah, the 1979 revolution, and the Iran-Iraq war. China and Iran also explores the contentious debates over Iran's nuclear programs and China's role in assisting these programs and supporting Iran's efforts to modernize its military and oil industry infrastructure.

Customer Reviews:

Fascinating Insight into Anti-Hegemonist Unity.......2007-07-20

That China and Iran are determined to resist American imperialism is a given. The How Question is adeptly described in this unique work, that shows how China has deftly walked the high wire dividing its interests in maintaining trade relations with the US and assisting Iran in developing its economic and military potential. The mutual antipathy of Iran and the US provides the backdrop for China's diplomacy, which has been characterized in its post-Mao phase by an under-the-radar handling of foreign relations. This approach is in sharp contrast to the US approach, which is to bomb first and then ask no questions later. It is little wonder that China is making friends as fast as we are making enemies. Naturally, Iran's ideological perspective makes it a prime candidate for being America's latest Devil Number One, and vice versa, a status that allows China to play both ends against the middle.
The author describes in not-too-cumbersome detail the economic, cultural, military and political relationship between these two self-proclaimed civilization progenitors (the depth of the conviction that both are ancient forerunners of everything good and noble today is a theme whose sincerity should not be questioned, though its practical significance remains an open question.)
I found the author's discussion of how China may be using Iran as a future bargaining chip over Taiwan interesting, though not wholly convincing that the Chinese are as capable as the US is in such cold-calculating cynical backstabbing. That China would come to Iran's assistance in case of yet another Bush-League War is doubtful, given China's pragmatic approach to international relations and its continued need for American development of its economic base. But, having said that, there is no doubt that China would do everything short of direct war with American to assist Iran, if for no other reason than to seriously weaken an already overstretched Uncle Sam. Such a scenario would make Taiwan look like the proverbial ripe fruit begging to be picked by the PRC.
This book is a valuable addition to any library stocked with Asian history titles or international political tomes.

Average customer rating:

Steinhardt's work shows the importance of Chinese cities

Chinese Imperial City Planning
Nancy Shatzman Steinhardt
Manufacturer: University of Hawaii Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Architecture | Professional & Technical | Subjects | Books

Urban & Land Use Planning | Architecture | Professional & Technical | Subjects | Books

General | Asia | History | Subjects | Books

Regional Planning | Politics | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

General | Urban Planning & Development | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

ASIN: 0824821963

Customer Reviews:

Steinhardt's work shows the importance of Chinese cities.......2000-04-11

Chinese Imperial City Planning is an excellent historical account of the spatial development of China's ancient cities. Extremely well researched, Steinhardt does a nice job of chronicling the impacts each empire had on urban form in China.

As a scholar interested in Japanese and other East Asian cities, the author's chapter discussing China's historical legacy to urban form in Ancient Japan, was especially interesting. This chapter clearly illustrates how necessary the study of Chinese cities is to the understanding of other Asian cities. It also demonstrates the care Steinhardt took in her research.

I recommend this book to anyone interested in the historical origins of urban planning and spatial form in China and Japan.

Average customer rating:

new information

The Dao of Muhammad: A Cultural History of Muslims in Late Imperial China (Harvard East Asian Monographs)
Zvi Ben-Dor Benite
Manufacturer: Harvard University Asia Center
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Asia | History | Subjects | Books
General | China | Asia | History | Subjects | Books
General | World | History | Subjects | Books
History | Islam | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books
All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
Similar Items:

The Chinese Sultanate: Islam, Ethnicity, and the Panthay Rebellion in Southwest China, 1856-1873

Eurasian Crossroads: A History of Xinjiang

Dangerous Knowledge: Orientalism and Its Discontents

Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light

Muslim Chinese: Ethnic Nationalism in the People's Republic, Second Edition (Harvard East Asian Monographs)

ASIN: 0674017749

Book Description

This book documents an Islamic-Confucian school of scholarship that flourished, mostly in the Yangzi Delta, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Drawing on previously unstudied materials, it reconstructs the network of Muslim scholars responsible for the creation and circulation of a large corpus of Chinese Islamic written material--the so-called Han Kitab. Against the backdrop of the rise of the Manchu Qing dynasty, The Dao of Muhammad shows how the creation of this corpus, and of the scholarly network that supported it, arose in a context of intense dialogue between Muslim scholars, their Confucian social context, and China's imperial rulers.

Overturning the idea that participation in Confucian culture necessitated the obliteration of all other identities, this book offers insight into the world of a group of scholars who felt that their study of the Islamic classics constituted a rightful "school" within the Confucian intellectual landscape. These men were not the first Muslims to master the Chinese Classics. But they were the first to express themselves specifically as Chinese Muslims and to generate foundation myths that made sense of their place both within Islam and within Chinese culture.

Customer Reviews:

new information.......2006-10-09

This book was very interesting in that it uncovers a new key document in Chinese Muslim literary tradition- a scholarly geneaology documenting the existence of an extensive teaching network across China (beginning from the northwest) and it was through this network that the Han Kitab authors were born. Some new figures are introduced through this document such as She Yunshan, a well-known Muslim teacher, one of the few Chinese converts to Islam of historical note. The Han kitab authors are also examined- though only insofar as they pertain to the network. He also seeks to analyze how these authors viewed themselves vis- a vis the Chinese educated elite- of which they were a part, how they negotiated being both Confucian scholars and Muslims. His conclusions are quite fascinating. For the more detail of the contents of the Han kitab, check out Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light.

Homoerotic Sensibilities in Late Imperial China (Routledgecurzon/Asian Studies Association of Australia East)

Average customer rating:

Homoerotic Sensibilities in Late Imperial China (Routledgecurzon/Asian Studies Association of Australia East)
Wu Cuncun
Manufacturer: RoutledgeCurzon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Australia | Australia & Oceania | History | Subjects | Books

General | World | History | Subjects | Books

History | Gay & Lesbian | Subjects | Books

General | Nonfiction | Gay & Lesbian | Subjects | Books

General | Social Sciences | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Gay & Lesbian | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Nonfiction | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
ASIN: 0415334748

Book Description

Homoerotic Sensibilities in Late Imperial China is the richest exploration to date of late imperial Chinese literati interest in male-love. Employing primary sources such as miscellanies (including diaries and letters), poetry, fiction and "flower guides", the author argues that male homoeroticism played a central role in cultural life of late imperial Chinese literati elites. Countering recent arguments that homosexuality was marginalized and disparaged during this period, this book also seeks to trace the relationship of homoeroticism to status and power, arguing that existing paradigms for the study of sexuality, centered on identity and behavior, must be extended and placed within the larger context of a sexual culture. Only with this shift in methodological focus is it possible to accurately account for the distinctive character of homoerotic sensibilities in late imperial China.

In addition to historical analysis the book also develops the concept of "sensibilities" as a method for interpreting the complex range of homoerotic texts produced in late imperial China, recognizing a need to think about sexuality not only in terms of behavior and identity but also in terms of culture: not necessarily national culture, but particular cultures in which practices and identities are given meaning and evaluated. Such an approach, employing a combination of historical and textual strategies, allows us to account for the rise in homoeroticism in late Qing China as a significant and far reaching sensibility (feng) that in turn acted upon the wider cultural landscape.

A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in Late Imperial China (Philip E. Lilienthal Book)

Average customer rating:

A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in Late Imperial China (Philip E. Lilienthal Book)
Benjamin A. Elman
Manufacturer: University of California Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Asia | History | Subjects | Books

General | World | History | Subjects | Books

Public Affairs & Administration | Government | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Public Policy | Government | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Look Inside History Books | Trip | Specialty Stores | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Nonfiction | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
ASIN: 0520215095

Book Description

In this multidimensional analysis, Benjamin A. Elman uses over a thousand newly available examination records from the Yuan, Ming, and Ch'ing dynasties, 1315-1904, to explore the social, political, and cultural dimensions of the civil examination system, one of the most important institutions in Chinese history. For over five hundred years, the most important positions within the dynastic government were usually filled through these difficult examinations, and every other year some one to two million people from all levels of society attempted them.
Covering the late imperial system from its inception to its demise, Elman revises our previous understanding of how the system actually worked, including its political and cultural machinery, the unforeseen consequences when it was unceremoniously scrapped by modernist reformers, and its long-term historical legacy. He argues that the Ming-Ch'ing civil examinations from 1370 to 1904 represented a substantial break with T'ang-Sung dynasty literary examinations from 650 to 1250. Late imperial examinations also made "Tao Learning," Neo-Confucian learning, the dynastic orthodoxy in official life and in literati culture. The intersections between elite social life, popular culture, and religion that are also considered reveal the full scope of the examination process throughout the late empire.

Ms. Frizzle's Adventures: Imperial China (From the Creator of the Magic School Bus) (Magic School Bus, The)

Average customer rating:

Totally Frizzie
full of info
A great introduction to ancient China

Ms. Frizzle's Adventures: Imperial China (From the Creator of the Magic School Bus) (Magic School Bus, The)
JOANNA COLE
Manufacturer: Scholastic Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Action & Adventure | Literature | Children's Books | Subjects | Books

General | Literature | Children's Books | Subjects | Books

General | Ages 9-12 | Children's Books | Subjects | Books

School | Issues | Children's Books | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

ASIN: 0590108220

Book Description

Is it magic? Ms. Frizzle, Wanda, and Arnold simply duck under the dragon at the local Chinese New Year's parade, and they are mysteriously whisked back in time to ancient China! They arrive in a village where the farmers are in trouble. The Friz and friends vow to go to the capital to get the emperor's help. As they journey, they learn how silk is made, travel on the Grand Canal, and see the Great Wall under construction, but will they fulfill their mission to help the farmers?Cole and Degen relay a bounty of facts with charm and humor as they bring the majesty of imperial China to life.

Customer Reviews:

Totally Frizzie.......2006-03-20

Great book in the world of Magic School Bus. We loved it. I loved the facts about China written all over the book. Read over & over in our house!

full of info.......2005-10-02

Miss Frizzle and her class from The Magic School Bus are back. This time instead of science adventure the kids are off to learn about history. Miss Frizzle and her students travel back in time 100 years. They arrive at a farmers village in China. Here they learn lots of things like how to eat with chop sticks and how to grow crops like rice and silk.

Splendidly illustrated with accurate details, this book is a delight to read: funny, informative, colorful, clear and comprehensive.

An excellent, highly recommended book for children ages 8 to 12.

A great introduction to ancient China.......2005-09-14

I bought this book for my first-grade son, who is a huge Magic School Bus fan, but usually not all that interested in social studies. He found this book very interesting, and we have re-read it many times.

The book is in a larger format than the original Magic School Bus series, which leave more room for all of the sidebar explanations that typify these books. Cole and Degen explain processes, like growing rice and making silk, that are easy for kids to follow, and may teach the adults a thing or two. A common thread through the whole book is a list of things that the ancient Chinese invented before the West, another point that may teach adults something new. The plot is a little silly, but it made my son and I giggle.

All in all, it's great fun, and a nice way to introduce kids to Chinese culture. Teachers could read it to a class, then delve more deeply into subjects that they want to pursue.

Books:

Books Index

Books Home

Recommended Books