Heroes of the Five Dynasties

The Tang dynasty is widely considered one of the most powerful dynasties in Chinese history. The great civil and military achievements of the Tang Empire are forever etched into the monument of history.

By the time of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, dozens of military regimes had arisen in succession. In the final years of the Tang, the land was home to dozens of regimes: the Five Dynasties, Later Liang, Later Tang, Later Jin, Later Han, and Later Zhou; and the Ten Kingdoms, states that vied for the Central Plains and proclaimed themselves kings or emperors, sometimes allying with the Five Dynasties and sometimes breaking away from them: Wu, Southern Tang, Wuyue, Min, Chu, Jingnan, Former Shu, Later Shu, Southern Han, and Northern Han. They fought, slaughtered, annexed, split apart, rose, and fell without end... In a mere fifty-three years, the land of China was a complete mess. One powerful regime after another took the stage, until the people and the birds had all fled, leaving nothing but a vast, empty wasteland.

Later, Zhao Kuangyin, a soldier by birth, seized his chance amid a child ruler and a kingdom in doubt. He engineered the Chenqiao Mutiny and took the imperial robe, then staged the farce of relinquishing military power over a cup of wine, consolidating the Zhao regime and gradually unifying the country. Yet the Liao, Jin, and Xia rose in the north, and the Song court was too weak to recover. Both emperors of the Northern Song became prisoners. The Southern Song court sought refuge in complacency, only to suffer the same fate: its three child emperors were captured, died, or were lost at sea...