Northern Wei (386-534) a new form of empire in East Asia Northern Wei (Three hundred eighty-six to five hundred thirty-four) Pearce, Scott creator author. text bibliography Electronic books. History nyu 2023 2023 monographic eng remote 1 online resource (xxv, 355 pages) : illustrations, map. "This is a study of an Inner Asian people called the *Taghbach (Ch. Tuoba), who half a century after collapse of the Han state (206 BCE-220 CE) began the process of building a new kind of empire in East Asia. Though addressing larger historiographical issues, the book's main purpose is, within the limits of our sources, to see this people in and of themselves, in a detailed narrative that follows them from the emergence of the khan Liwei in the mid-third century, in the highland frontier between Inner Asia and the Chinese world, and ends almost three hundred years later, with the drowning of the dynasty's last matriarch in the Yellow River. Across the centuries, they repeatedly changed their name, nature and location. What remained relatively consistent, however, was their reliance on cavalry armies, filled with loyal men of Inner Asian origin. When that ended, the dynasty ended as well. Underlying the narrative are two main issues. One is that Northern Wei was the first major example of a kind of empire seen often in East Asian histories, the "conquest dynasties," regimes of Inner Asian origin which would over the centuries repeatedly seize control of territories inhabited for the most part by Chinese to create cultural and ethnically complex state systems. The second is historiographical: that this dynasty was renamed and reimagined to fit into the textual tradition of its Chinese subjects. Being our only primary written sources for the dynasty, these texts are here used with care"-- Prologue: Defining Our Arenas -- Section I: On Sources. -- Chapter 1: The Emperor Taiwu and the Creation of History -- Chapter 2: History Writing and Its Discontents -- Section II: Origins. -- Chapter 3: Growth from out Decay -- Chapter 4: Myths of Origin -- Section III: A Dynasty Takes Shape. -- Chapter 5: The Interloper -- Chapter 6: Establishing a State -- Section IV: Creating an Empire. -- Chapter 7: The Way of War -- Chapter 8: The World Shegui Entered -- Chapter 9: The World Shegui Created -- Chapter 10: Troubling Innovation -- Section V: Pingcheng as Center of a World. -- Chapter 11: The Wei Army -- Chapter 12: The Wolf Lord -- Chapter 13: Hunting and Gathering in the Land of Dai -- Section VI: End Games. -- Chapter 14: A Transitional Age -- Chapter 15: The Two Buddhas -- Chapter 16: To Luoyang -- Chapter 17: Downfall of the Theater State -- Summing Up; Looking Ahead Scott Pearce. Includes bibliographical references and index. a-cc--- Xianbei (Asian people) China History Northern Wei dynasty, 386-534 Chine Histoire 386-534 (Dynastie Wei du Nord) Asia HISTORY China Social History Northern Wei Dynasty (China) Xianbei (Asian people) China Asian history History 386-534 fast DS748.7 .P43 2023 951/.015 Northern Wei (386-534) Pearce, Scott. New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2023] (DLC) 2022059419 (OCoLC) 1357549844 Oxford studies in early empires 9780197600429 0197600425 0197600409 9780197600412 0197600417 9780197600405 9780197600399 2022059420 http://proxy.library.tamu.edu/login?url=https://academic.oup.com/book/46157 DLC 221209 20260318165119.8 in00005697868 eng