Chinese III

1368-1644 CE

From 1368 to 1644 CE, the Chinese expelled the Mongols and built a dynasty of walls — the Ming restoring Han rule with a ferocity that erased even Mongol names from the records, their emperors rebuilding the Great Wall, their fleets under Zheng He reaching Africa before withdrawing into splendid isolation. The Forbidden City rose as the world's greatest palace; examinations selected the world's largest bureaucracy. Yet eunuch factions and peasant rebellions gnawed at the foundations until Manchu horsemen rode through the gates.