page_title: Society of the Song dynasty
section_title: Catastrophe and reforms
hierarchical_section_title: Society of the Song dynasty / Military and warfare / Catastrophe and reforms
caption_attribution_description: Español: Dinastía Song del norte Čeština: Čína za vlády dynastie Severní Sung (rudě), severovýchodně od ní říše Liao (hnědě), severozápadně říše Si-sia (khaki) English: Northern Song, copy from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:China_11a.jpg
context_page_description: Chinese society during the Song dynasty was marked by political and legal reforms, a philosophical revival of Confucianism, and the development of cities beyond administrative purposes into centers of trade, industry, and maritime commerce. The inhabitants of rural areas were mostly farmers, although some were also hunters, fishers, or government employees working in mines or the salt marshes. Conversely, shopkeepers, artisans, city guards, entertainers, laborers, and wealthy merchants lived in the county and provincial centers along with the Chinese gentry—a small, elite community of educated scholars and scholar-officials.
  As landholders and drafted government officials, the gentry considered themselves the leading members of society; gaining their cooperation and employment was essential for the county or provincial bureaucrat overburdened with official duties. In many ways, scholar-officials of the Song period differed from the more aristocratic scholar-officials of the Tang dynasty. Civil service examinations became the primary means of appointment to an official post as competitors vying for official degrees dramatically increased.
context_section_description: Despite the size of the army and these beneficial reforms, the high ranks of Song military command were heavily corrupt. At the beginning of the 12th century, Song generals collected funds based on the number of troops they recorded; instead of using the funds to benefit troops, they used this money to bolster their own salaries.  Troops of the standing army, meanwhile, were given very small salaries while assigned tasks of menial labor.  The scholar-officials running the government often paid little attention to the plight of soldiers and even to the demands of officers, since they were seen as being on a lower tier in society. Fairbank writes that the "civilian domination of the military was part of the ruling elite's control of the state, but it left the state military weak."
  The corruption of the high command and ineffectiveness of military strength was soon revealed once the Song made a joint effort with the Jurchen people to conquer the Khitan Liao dynasty (916–1125). After the successful rebellion of the Jurchens against their Khitan masters, the Jurchen observed the weakness of the Song army and broke their pact, then attacked the Song as well. By 1127, the capital at Kaifeng was captured and northern China overrun, while the remnants of the Song court fled south to Hangzhou and established the Southern Song. This was a crucial blow to the Song military elites, as they had been closely tied to the political structure until 1127; afterwards they became alienated from the emperor and the Song court. Although they had lost northern China to the new Jurchen Jin dynasty (1115–1234), this loss prompted the Song to make drastic and lasting military reforms. Emperor Gaozong, desperate to refill the decimated ranks of the central army, drafted men from all over the country. This had been done before, but not on the same scale. In the tenth and eleventh centuries only the most skilled soldiers became imperial guardsmen, while under Gaozong entire central army units were composed of soldiers from every region and background. The Southern Song eventually recovered their strength and commanded the loyalty of vaunted commanders such as Yue Fei (1103–1142), who successfully defended the border at the Huai River. The Jurchens and Song eventually signed a peace treaty in 1141.
  In 1131, the Chinese writer Zhang Yi noted the importance of employing a navy to fight the Jin, writing that China had to regard the sea and the river as her Great Wall, and use warships as its greatest watchtowers. Although navies had been used in China since the ancient Spring and Autumn period (722–481 BC), China's first permanent standing navy was established by the Southern Song in 1132.  The Jurchen launched an invasion against the Southern Song along the length of the Yangtze River, which resulted in two crucial Song victories at the Battle of Caishi and Battle of Tangdao in 1161. The Jin navy was defeated by the Song's standing navy, which employed trebuchets on their ships' top deckhouses to launch gunpowder bombs.
caption: Territory controlled by the Northern Song
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