united several villages shanghai literally translates to quote on top of the sea meanwhile the yuan dynasty had built a bunch of cool lakes in da du or future beijing under their leadership it became impressively modern and cosmopolitan jump ahead to NUMBER_TOKEN after the collapse of the yuan dynasty the ming dynasty took over and renamed dadu bei ping which translates to quote northern peace in NUMBER_TOKEN the yongle emperor renamed it once more to beijing which translates to quote northern capital finally no more name changes okay for the next NUMBER_TOKEN years yongle transformed beijing into a beautiful place with a big reconstruction program in fact some of beijing's most iconic surviving buildings like the forbidden city and the temple of heaven were built under yongle's rule for the rest of the ming dynasty beijing became one of the most dominant cities in the world actually it literally became the biggest city in the world that chaos returned during the NUMBER_TOKENs after the ming dynasty fell ultimately the manchu people took over under the qing dynasty but under their leadership beijing and china as a whole was multi-ethnic at the height of the qing dynasty beijing had around NUMBER_TOKEN million people and it was only during this time that shanghai finally began to become an economic hub itself exporting cotton silk and fertilizer all over the world and becoming a seaport as more and more ships from around the world came to china during the NUMBER_TOKENs it especially became strategically important during the first opium war british forces temporarily controlled shanghai during the second opium war british and french forces took over beijing both cities had to deal with lots of foreign powers getting all up in their business for the rest of the century sometimes this was for their benefit in the NUMBER_TOKENs japan built the first factories in shanghai further fueling its economic growth by NUMBER_TOKEN it had nearly a million people meanwhile beijing was the center of the boxer rebellion an anti-foreign anti-colonial anti-christian uprising in china after the NUMBER_TOKEN revolution into the qing dynasty and created the republic of china beijing remained the capital and quickly modernized while shanghai soon entered a golden age beginning to attract migrants from around the world and becoming known as quote the paris of the east and quote the new york of the west this resentment toward foreigners in both cities however never fully went away and led to massive protests throughout the NUMBER_TOKENs and NUMBER_TOKENs especially after japan took over parts of china in fact it controlled beijing from NUMBER_TOKEN all the way up until the end of world war ii the japanese consistently terrorized the local population throughout the war only parts of shanghai fell to japan and the rest of it became a refugee hub not only providing a safe place for chinese refugees but folks from all over the world notably it was the only place other than spain that unconditionally accepted jewish refugees during a time when they faced genocide in europe just a few years after world war ii ended beijing found itself at the center of the chinese civil war
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