Defending heaven
Subtitle: China's Mongol wars, 1209-1370
By: James Waterson ; foreword by John Man
Contributors: Man, John, 1941- contributor
Publisher: Frontline Books
Published: 2013
Place of publication: London
Language: eng
Number of pages: 236
ISBN-13: 9781848326606
Copyright date: 2013
Subjects: Mongols; History
Description: The Defence of Heaven brings together, for the first time in one volume, a complete history of the Jin, Song and Ming dynasties' wars fought against the Mongols. Lasting nearly two centuries, these wars, fought to defend Chinese civilisation against a brutal and unrelenting foe, pitted personal heroics against the inexorable Mongol war machine and involved every part of the Chinese state. The resistance of the Chinese dynasties to the Khans is a complex and rich story of shifting alliances and political scheming, vast armies and navies, bloody battles and an astonishing technological revolution. The great events of China's Mongol war are described and analysed, detailing their immediate and later implications for Chinese history.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 221-227) and index.
Table of contents: title: Heaven inverted: China on the eve of the Mongol invasion; title: Bystanders to destruction: the Mongol reduction of northern China; title: All under heaven: Song's long war begins; title: Feeding the beast: Song resistance on the Yangzi and Huai and the end of the Mongol world empire; title: Rumors of a war: court politics and the War of Attrition; title: A Chinese civil war? The fall of Fancheng and Xiangyang; title: Horses on heaven's wide plain: the loss of Hangzhou and the flight of the Song court; title: Child emperors and suicides: the end of the Song dynasty; title: The phoenix and the dragon: the ghosts of the Song and the fall of the Yuan; title: Epilogue: a poisoned wound? China after the expulsion of the Mongols.