The Military Collapse of China's Ming Dynasty, 1618-44

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Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1134462093
Total Pages : 308 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (344 download)

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Book Synopsis The Military Collapse of China's Ming Dynasty, 1618-44 by : Kenneth M. Swope

Download or read book The Military Collapse of China's Ming Dynasty, 1618-44 written by Kenneth M. Swope and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-01-23 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the military collapse of China’s Ming Dynasty to a combination of foreign and domestic foes. The Ming’s defeat was a highly surprising development, not least because as recently as in the 1590s the Ming had managed to defeat a Japanese force considered to be perhaps the most formidable of its day when the latter attempted to subjugate Korea en-route to a planned invasion of China. In contrast to conventional explanations for the Ming’s collapse, which focus upon political and socio-economic factors, this book shows how the military collapse of the Ming state was intimately connected to the deterioration of the personal relationship between the Ming throne and the military establishment that had served as the cornerstone of the Ming military renaissance of the previous decades. Moreover, it examines the broader process of the militarization of late Ming society as a whole to arrive at an understanding of how a state with such tremendous military resources and potential could be defeated by numerically and technologically inferior foes. It concludes with a consideration of the fall of the Ming in light of contemporary conflicts and regime changes around the globe, drawing attention to climatological factors and developments outside state control. Utilizing recently released archival materials, this book adds a much needed piece to the puzzle of the collapse of the Ming Dynasty in China.

East Asia in the World

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1108479871
Total Pages : 333 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (84 download)

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Book Synopsis East Asia in the World by : Stephan Haggard

Download or read book East Asia in the World written by Stephan Haggard and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-10-29 with total page 333 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This accessible collection examines twelve historic events in the international relations of East Asia.

Harmony and War

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Publisher : Columbia University Press
ISBN 13 : 0231522401
Total Pages : 330 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (315 download)

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Book Synopsis Harmony and War by : Yuan-kang Wang

Download or read book Harmony and War written by Yuan-kang Wang and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2010-12-15 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Confucianism has shaped a certain perception of Chinese security strategy, symbolized by the defensive, nonaggressive Great Wall. Many believe China is antimilitary and reluctant to use force against its enemies. It practices pacifism and refrains from expanding its boundaries, even when nationally strong. In a path-breaking study traversing six centuries of Chinese history, Yuan-kang Wang resoundingly discredits this notion, recasting China as a practitioner of realpolitik and a ruthless purveyor of expansive grand strategies. Leaders of the Song Dynasty (960-1279) and Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) prized military force and shrewdly assessed the capabilities of China's adversaries. They adopted defensive strategies when their country was weak and pursued expansive goals, such as territorial acquisition, enemy destruction, and total military victory, when their country was strong. Despite the dominance of an antimilitarist Confucian culture, warfare was not uncommon in the bulk of Chinese history. Grounding his research in primary Chinese sources, Wang outlines a politics of power that are crucial to understanding China's strategies today, especially its policy of "peaceful development," which, he argues, the nation has adopted mainly because of its military, economic, and technological weakness in relation to the United States.

The Diary of 1636

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Publisher : Columbia University Press
ISBN 13 : 0231552238
Total Pages : 210 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (315 download)

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Book Synopsis The Diary of 1636 by : Na Man’gap

Download or read book The Diary of 1636 written by Na Man’gap and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2020-08-04 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Early in the seventeenth century, Northeast Asian politics hung in a delicate balance among the Chosŏn dynasty in Korea, the Ming in China, and the Manchu. When a Chosŏn faction realigned Korea with the Ming, the Manchu attacked in 1627 and again a decade later, shattering the Chosŏn-Ming alliance and forcing Korea to support the newly founded Qing dynasty. The Korean scholar-official Na Man’gap (1592–1642) recorded the second Manchu invasion in his Diary of 1636, the only first-person account chronicling the dramatic Korean resistance to the attack. Partly composed as a narrative of quotidian events during the siege of Namhan Mountain Fortress, where Na sought refuge with the king and other officials, the diary recounts Korean opposition to Manchu and Mongol forces and the eventual surrender. Na describes military campaigns along the northern and western regions of the country, the capture of the royal family, and the Manchu treatment of prisoners, offering insights into debates about Confucian loyalty and the conduct of women that took place in the war’s aftermath. His work sheds light on such issues as Confucian statecraft, military decision making, and ethnic interpretations of identity in the seventeenth century. Translated from literary Chinese into English for the first time, the diary illuminates a traumatic moment for early modern Korean politics and society. George Kallander’s critical introduction and extensive annotations place The Diary of 1636 in its historical, political, and military context, highlighting the importance of this text for students and scholars of Chinese and East Asian as well as Korean history.

A Dragon's Head and a Serpent's Tail

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Publisher : University of Oklahoma Press
ISBN 13 : 0806185023
Total Pages : 424 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (61 download)

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Book Synopsis A Dragon's Head and a Serpent's Tail by : Kenneth M. Swope

Download or read book A Dragon's Head and a Serpent's Tail written by Kenneth M. Swope and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2013-04-29 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The invasion of Korea by Japanese troops in May of 1592 was no ordinary military expedition: it was one of the decisive events in Asian history and the most tragic for the Korean peninsula until the mid-twentieth century. Japanese overlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi envisioned conquering Korea, Ming China, and eventually all of Asia; but Korea’s appeal to China’s Emperor Wanli for assistance triggered a six-year war involving hundreds of thousands of soldiers and encompassing the whole region. For Japan, the war was “a dragon’s head followed by a serpent’s tail”: an impressive beginning with no real ending. Kenneth M. Swope has undertaken the first full-length scholarly study in English of this important conflict. Drawing on Korean, Japanese, and especially Chinese sources, he corrects the Japan-centered perspective of previous accounts and depicts Wanli not as the self-indulgent ruler of received interpretations but rather one actively engaged in military affairs—and concerned especially with rescuing China’s client state of Korea. He puts the Ming in a more vigorous light, detailing Chinese siege warfare, the development and deployment of innovative military technologies, and the naval battles that marked the climax of the war. He also explains the war’s repercussions outside the military sphere—particularly the dynamics of intraregional diplomacy within the shadow of the Chinese tributary system. What Swope calls the First Great East Asian War marked both the emergence of Japan’s desire to extend its sphere of influence to the Chinese mainland and a military revival of China’s commitment to defending its interests in Northeast Asia. Swope’s account offers new insight not only into the history of warfare in Asia but also into a conflict that reverberates in international relations to this day.

The Making of the Modern Chinese Navy

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Publisher : Anthem Press
ISBN 13 : 1785271016
Total Pages : 100 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (852 download)

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Book Synopsis The Making of the Modern Chinese Navy by : Bruce A. Elleman

Download or read book The Making of the Modern Chinese Navy written by Bruce A. Elleman and published by Anthem Press. This book was released on 2019-08-31 with total page 100 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ‘The Making of the Modern Chinese Navy’ includes 14 historical case studies that help to illuminate a number of special characteristics of the modern-day Chinese navy most Chinese naval officers perhaps take for granted, including a belief in the Mandate of Heaven, tributary system and the fear of ‘losing face’ either in a diplomatic setting or by risking valuable equipment in battle. Ethnic and language differences, regional loyalties and political mistrust potentially exacerbate these problems. Special peculiarities include the Mongol dual-officer diarchy that led to the political commissar system utilized by the People’s Liberation Army. Outside influences, such as blockade, sanctions or embargoes, can exert a profound impact on China, just as foreign intervention or, equally important, a decision not to intervene, can often determine the outcome of major maritime events. [NP] The 14 case studies discuss many of these characteristics, while the Conclusion examines all case studies together and places them in a historical perspective. ‘The Making of the Modern Chinese Navy’assesses which of these historical characteristics and peculiarities are still present in full force in China and which ones may no longer have as great an impact on the contemporary Chinese navy.

On the Trail of the Yellow Tiger

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Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 149620624X
Total Pages : 557 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (962 download)

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Book Synopsis On the Trail of the Yellow Tiger by : Kenneth Swope

Download or read book On the Trail of the Yellow Tiger written by Kenneth Swope and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2018-01-01 with total page 557 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Manchu Qing victory over the Chinese Ming Dynasty in the mid-seventeenth century was one of the most surprising and traumatic developments in China's long history. In the last year of the Ming, the southwest region of China became the base of operations for the notorious leader Zhang Xianzhong (1605-47), a peasant rebel known as the Yellow Tiger. Zhang's systematic reign of terror allegedly resulted in the deaths of at least one-sixth of the population of the entire Sichuan province in just two years. The rich surviving source record, however, indicates that much of the destruction took place well after Zhang's death in 1647 and can be attributed to independent warlords, marauding bandits, the various Ming and Qing armies vying for control of the empire, and natural disasters. On the Trail of the Yellow Tiger is the first Western study to examine in detail the aftermath of the Qing conquest by focusing on the social and demographic effects of the Ming-Qing transition. By integrating the modern techniques of trauma and memory studies into the military and social history of the transition, Kenneth M. Swope adds a crucial piece to the broader puzzle of dynastic collapse and reconstruction. He also considers the Ming-Qing transition in light of contemporary conflicts around the globe, offering a comparative military history that engages with the universal connections between war and society.

The Troubled Empire

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Publisher : Harvard University Press
ISBN 13 : 0674072537
Total Pages : 337 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (74 download)

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Book Synopsis The Troubled Empire by : Timothy Brook

Download or read book The Troubled Empire written by Timothy Brook and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2013-03-11 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Mongol takeover in the 1270s changed the course of Chinese history. The Confucian empireÑa millennium and a half in the makingÑwas suddenly thrust under foreign occupation. 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 would replace the Ming dynasty with yet another foreign occupation. The Troubled Empire explores what happened to China between these two dramatic invasions. If anything defined the complex dynamics of this period, it was changes in the weather. Asia, like Europe, experienced a Little Ice Age, and as temperatures fell in the thirteenth century, Kublai Khan moved south into China. His Yuan dynasty collapsed in less than a century, but Mongol values lived on in Ming institutions. A second blast of cold in the 1630s, combined with drought, was more than the dynasty could stand, and the Ming fell to Manchu invaders. Against this backgroundÑthe first coherent ecological history of China in this periodÑTimothy Brook explores the growth of autocracy, social complexity, and commercialization, paying special attention to ChinaÕs incorporation into the larger South China Sea economy. These changes not only shaped what China would become but contributed to the formation of the early modern world.

Ming China and its Allies

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1108489222
Total Pages : 263 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (84 download)

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Book Synopsis Ming China and its Allies by : David M. Robinson

Download or read book Ming China and its Allies written by David M. Robinson and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-01-02 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Explores the Ming Dynasty's foreign relations with neighboring sovereigns, placing China in a wider global context.

The Gunpowder Age

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Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691178143
Total Pages : 444 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (911 download)

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Book Synopsis The Gunpowder Age by : Tonio Andrade

Download or read book The Gunpowder Age written by Tonio Andrade and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2017-08-29 with total page 444 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A first look at gunpowder's revolutionary impact on China's role in global history The Chinese invented gunpowder and began exploring its military uses as early as the 900s, four centuries before the technology passed to the West. But by the early 1800s, China had fallen so far behind the West in gunpowder warfare that it was easily defeated by Britain in the Opium War of 1839–42. What happened? In The Gunpowder Age, Tonio Andrade offers a compelling new answer, opening a fresh perspective on a key question of world history: why did the countries of western Europe surge to global importance starting in the 1500s while China slipped behind? Historians have long argued that gunpowder weapons helped Europeans establish global hegemony. Yet the inhabitants of what is today China not only invented guns and bombs but also, as Andrade shows, continued to innovate in gunpowder technology through the early 1700s—much longer than previously thought. Why, then, did China become so vulnerable? Andrade argues that one significant reason is that it was out of practice fighting wars, having enjoyed nearly a century of relative peace, since 1760. Indeed, he demonstrates that China—like Europe—was a powerful military innovator, particularly during times of great warfare, such as the violent century starting after the Opium War, when the Chinese once again quickly modernized their forces. Today, China is simply returning to its old position as one of the world's great military powers. By showing that China’s military dynamism was deeper, longer lasting, and more quickly recovered than previously understood, The Gunpowder Age challenges long-standing explanations of the so-called Great Divergence between the West and Asia.

Zheng He

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Publisher : Longman Publishing Group
ISBN 13 : 9780321084439
Total Pages : 238 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (844 download)

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Book Synopsis Zheng He by : Edward L. Dreyer

Download or read book Zheng He written by Edward L. Dreyer and published by Longman Publishing Group. This book was released on 2007 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This new biography, part of Longman's World Biography series, of the Chinese explorer Zheng He sheds new light on one of the most important "what if" questions of early modern history: why a technically advanced China did not follow the same path of development as the major European powers. Written by China scholar Edward L. Dreyer, Zheng He outlines what is known of the eunuch Zheng He's life and describes and analyzes the early 15th century voyages on the basis of the Chinese evidence. Locating the voyages firmly within the context of early Ming history,itaddresses the political motives of Zheng He's voyages and how they affected China's exclusive attitude to the outside world in subsequent centuries.

Ming China and Vietnam

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1316531317
Total Pages : 251 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (165 download)

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Book Synopsis Ming China and Vietnam by : Kathlene Baldanza

Download or read book Ming China and Vietnam written by Kathlene Baldanza and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2016-03-29 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Studies of Sino-Viet relations have traditionally focused on Chinese aggression and Vietnamese resistance, or have assumed out-of-date ideas about Sinicization and the tributary system. They have limited themselves to national historical traditions, doing little to reach beyond the border. Ming China and Vietnam, by contrast, relies on sources and viewpoints from both sides of the border, for a truly transnational history of Sino-Viet relations. Kathlene Baldanza offers a detailed examination of geopolitical and cultural relations between Ming China (1368–1644) and Dai Viet, the state that would go on to become Vietnam. She highlights the internal debates and external alliances that characterized their diplomatic and military relations in the pre-modern period, showing especially that Vietnamese patronage of East Asian classical culture posed an ideological threat to Chinese states. Baldanza presents an analysis of seven linked biographies of Chinese and Vietnamese border-crossers whose lives illustrate the entangled histories of those countries.

The East Asian War, 1592-1598

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Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1317662733
Total Pages : 422 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (176 download)

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Book Synopsis The East Asian War, 1592-1598 by : James B. Lewis

Download or read book The East Asian War, 1592-1598 written by James B. Lewis and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-12-05 with total page 422 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As East Asia regains its historical position as a world centre, information on the history of regional relations becomes ever more critical. Astonishingly, Northeast Asia enjoyed five centuries of international peace from 1400 to 1894, broken only by one major international war – the invasion of Korea in the 1590s by Japan’s ruler Hideyoshi. This war involved Koreans, Japanese, Chinese, Southeast Asians, and Europeans; it saw the largest overseas landing in world history up to that time and devastated Korea. It also highlighted the nature of the strategic balance in the region, presenting China’s Ming dynasty with a serious threat that perhaps foreshadowed the dynasty’s subsequent overthrow by the Manchus, played a major part in the establishment of the Tokugawa regime with its policy of peace and controlled access to seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Japan, and demonstrated the importance for regional stability of the subtle relationship of Korea to both China and Japan. This book presents a comprehensive analysis of the war and its aftermath in all its aspects – military, political, social, economic, and cultural. As such it deepens understanding of East Asian international relations and provides important insights into the strategic concerns that continue to operate in the region at present.

The Dynasties and Treasures of China

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Author :
Publisher : Avery
ISBN 13 : 9780670286768
Total Pages : 260 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (867 download)

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Book Synopsis The Dynasties and Treasures of China by : Bamber Gascoigne

Download or read book The Dynasties and Treasures of China written by Bamber Gascoigne and published by Avery. This book was released on 1973 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

The Ming World

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Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000134660
Total Pages : 790 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (1 download)

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Book Synopsis The Ming World by : Kenneth M Swope

Download or read book The Ming World written by Kenneth M Swope and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-08-08 with total page 790 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Ming World draws together scholars from all over the world to bring China’s Ming Dynasty (1368-1662) to life, exploring recent scholarly trends and academic debates that highlight the dynamism of the Ming and its key place in the early modern world. The book is designed to replicate the structure of popular Ming-era unofficial histories that gathered information and gossip from a wide variety of fields and disciplines. Engaging with a broad array of primary and secondary sources, the authors build upon earlier scholarship while extending the field to embrace new theories, methodologies, and interpretive frameworks. It is divided into five thematically linked sections: Institutions, Ideas, Identities, Individuals, and Interactions. Unique in its breadth and scope, The Ming World is essential reading for scholars and postgraduates of early modern China, the history of East Asia and anyone interested in gaining a broader picture of the colorful Ming world and its inhabitants.

In the Shadow of the Mongol Empire

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 9781108729338
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (293 download)

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Book Synopsis In the Shadow of the Mongol Empire by : David M. Robinson

Download or read book In the Shadow of the Mongol Empire written by David M. Robinson and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2022-08-04 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the thirteenth century, the Mongols created the greatest empire in human history. Genghis Khan and his successors brought death and destruction to Eurasia. They obliterated infrastructure, devastated cities, and exterminated peoples. They also created courts in China, Persia, and southern Russia, famed throughout the world as centers of wealth, learning, power, religion, and lavish spectacle. The great Mongol houses established standards by which future rulers in Eurasia would measure themselves for centuries. In this ambitious study, David M. Robinson traces how in the late fourteenth century the newly established Ming dynasty (1368-1644) in China crafted a narrative of the fallen Mongol empire. To shape the perceptions and actions of audiences at home and abroad, the Ming court tailored its narrative of the Mongols to prove that it was the rightful successor to the Mongol empire. This is a story of how politicians exploit historical memory for their own gain.

The Dreaming Mind and the End of the Ming World

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Author :
Publisher : University of Hawaii Press
ISBN 13 : 0824878140
Total Pages : 334 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (248 download)

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Book Synopsis The Dreaming Mind and the End of the Ming World by : Lynn A. Struve

Download or read book The Dreaming Mind and the End of the Ming World written by Lynn A. Struve and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2019-03-31 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the mid-sixteenth through the end of the seventeenth century, Chinese intellectuals attended more to dreams and dreaming—and in a wider array of genres—than in any other period of Chinese history. Taking the approach of cultural history, this ambitious yet accessible work aims both to describe the most salient aspects of this “dream arc” and to explain its trajectory in time through the writings, arts, and practices of well-known thinkers, religionists, litterateurs, memoirists, painters, doctors, and political figures of late Ming and early Qing times. The volume’s encompassing thesis asserts that certain associations of dreaming, grounded in the neurophysiology of the human brain at sleep—such as subjectivity, irrationality, the unbidden, lack of control, emotionality, spontaneity, the imaginal, and memory—when especially heightened by historical and cultural developments, are likely to pique interest in dreaming and generate florescences of dream-expression among intellectuals. The work thus makes a contribution to the history of how people have understood human consciousness in various times and cultures. The Dreaming Mind and the End of the Ming World is the most substantial work in any language on the historicity of Chinese dream culture. Within Chinese studies, it will appeal to those with backgrounds in literature, religion, philosophy, political history, and the visual arts. It will also be welcomed by readers interested in comparative dream cultures, the history of consciousness, and neurohistory.