The Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) was the first unified dynasty in Chinese history to be established by ethnic minorities, ruled by the Mongol Boer Only Jin clan, the capital of Dadu (present-day Beijing), and the 11th Emperor of the Fifth Dynasty. The Qing Dynasty (1616-1912) was the last unified feudal dynasty in China, with a total of twelve emperors and 296 years of the country. So why did the Yuan Dynasty, a dynasty also founded by ethnic minorities, last less than a hundred years, while the Qing Dynasty was able to enjoy more than two hundred and sixty years?
In 1271 AD, the Yuan Dynasty, a huge dynasty established by the Mongols, officially entered the stage of history. With their powerful force, the Mongols not only conquered the Central Plains and the area south of the Yangtze River, but also expanded their control to the entire West Asia region, becoming the largest dynasty in China's history.
The Mongols are an ancient people who have lived a predominantly nomadic life until then. Around the twelfth century AD, under the leadership of Temujin, the Mongols gradually became stronger and became a force to be reckoned with in northern China. The attack on Western Xia and the destruction of the Jin Dynasty quickly laid a good foundation for the unification of all of China. After Genghis Khan Temujin, Wokoutai, Möngke, and Kublai Khan succeeded him as Great Khan. Part of the reason why Beijing has become the capital today is because Genghis Khan's grandson Kublai Khan established the Yuan Dynasty in Dadu (present-day Beijing), which gradually became the political, economic and cultural center of China for nearly seven hundred years.
The merits of the Yuan Dynasty cannot be denied. First of all, the provincial system that the Qin, Han, Tang, and Song dynasties did not expect was established, and the optimal model of the central and local power structure was successfully designed. The effect of the provincial system is excellent, and it has been used in the Ming and Qing dynasties since then, and has provided a solid historical foundation and institutional guarantee for national unification. Second, a new type of frontier management agency, the Xuanzheng Yuan, was established. Because before the Yuan Dynasty, no dynasty attached so much importance to the governance and development of border ethnic areas, and no dynasty placed Tibet and other areas under the direct rule of the central government like the Yuan Empire. The Yuan Dynasty specially set up institutions such as the Xuanzheng Yuan and the Xuanwei Department, thereby strengthening the effective control of the central government over the border areas. Moreover, the establishment of the two capital patrol system shows the pluralistic common prosperity of the great unification of China, and the harmonious unity of the nomadic civilization and the agricultural civilization.
However, in order to rule over the Han people, the Rulers of the Yuan Dynasty divided the people into four classes, namely the Mongols and the Semu [the Eight-Year Rule of Dade, except for han, Goryeo and Barbarians, all of them were Semu people (YuanDian Zhang)], northern Han chinese, and southern Han people. Obviously, under this system, the status of the Han people is extremely low, and they are the objects of human motivation. It is also because in the early years of the Yuan Dynasty's rule, there were many uprisings between the Han and the ethnic minorities in the south against the tyranny of the Mongols.
At that time, the material abundance made the life of the rulers of the Yuan Dynasty gradually luxurious, and at the same time, the struggle for power within the Mongol rulers intensified. In the twenty-five years from 1308 to 1333 AD, the Yuan Dynasty experienced eight emperors successively, which shows that the internal struggle at that time was very fierce. In the late Yuan Dynasty, emperors lived a luxurious life, constantly collecting various taxes from the people, especially the Han Chinese. The people's resentment boiled over, and only then did Zhu Yuanzhang end the rule of the Yuan Dynasty and establish the Ming Dynasty.
Back to the Qing Dynasty. In 1635, Emperor Taiji abolished the old clan name "Zhushen" (Jurchen) and named the clan "Manchuria". In 1636, after surrendering to southern Mongolia, Emperor Taiji called the emperor and changed the name of the country "Jin" to "Great Qing", officially establishing the Qing Dynasty and changing the era name to Chongde. In the second year of Chongde (1637), Emperor Taiji divided the Han military flag into two banners. Subsequently, "eight banners of the Han Army were set up, and Zu Zerun and eight other people were unified" (Draft History of the Qing Dynasty). At this point, the Eight Banners of the Han Army officially appeared and became one of the three armies of the Qing Dynasty. The descendants of the original Han chinese in the Eight Banners of the Han Dynasty enjoyed the same hereditary treatment as the Manchus, and there were also many hereditary positions. The Han military flag people are judicially the same as the Manchurian flag people, and they are not punished for the same crime as the people.
After that, the Qing Dynasty developed rapidly, and when Kangxi succeeded to the throne, a series of measures were adopted to facilitate socio-economic recovery and development. The abolition of the land enclosure order stipulated that the land enclosed should be returned to the peasants, and then the number of years for reclamation was successively relaxed, and it was stipulated that the reclamation had achievements, and according to the amount of reclamation, different official positions were given, which promoted the enthusiasm for reclamation, and at that time the wasteland in the whole country was basically opened up. After the middle period, the handicraft industry, which had been severely damaged by the war, was gradually restored and developed. By the Qianlong period, the silk weaving industry in Jiangning, Suzhou, Hangzhou, Foshan, Guangzhou and other places were very developed, including the cotton weaving industry in Jiangnan and the porcelain in Jingdezhen, which reached a historical peak, and the population of the Qing Dynasty also increased greatly.
From the attitude of the Yuan and Qing dynasties towards the Han people, it can be seen why the Yuan Dynasty did not last as long as the Qing Dynasty. The Yuan Dynasty can be said to have ruled the country by force, and in addition to not paying attention to learning the advanced culture of the Central Plains, they discriminated against the Han people, and the cruel exploitation of the people in the later period of rule made the society very dark. But at the same time, it is precisely because of the historical lesson of the rapid demise of the Yuan Dynasty that the rulers of the Qing Dynasty sounded a wake-up call, so the Qing Dynasty had a lesson for the future.
Most of the rulers of the Qing Dynasty (especially in the early period) actively studied the advanced Central Plains culture and appointed Han Chinese as important officials. This has won people's hearts and minds, and it has also improved itself. In general, during the Yuan Dynasty, the Mongols were very stubborn and refused to be assimilated by the Han Chinese, so they eventually returned to the steppe.
bibliography:
Draft History of the Qing Dynasty
《元典章》