A universal guide for China studies

Chinese History - Western Xia Dynasty 西夏 (1038-1227)

Encoding: Unicode (UTF-8) [Location: HOME > History > Western Xia][bottom]


Western Xia Dynasty
introduction

period before (Wudai)
-- Song Dynasty
-- Liao Dynasty (Khitan)
-- Jin Dynasty (Jurchen)
next period (Yuan)
An further tribe founding a dynasty after Chinese pattern were the Tanguts (Chinese: Dangxiang 黨項), relatives to the Tibetians, who founded a Western Xia Dynasty (Xixia 西夏) in 1038. This people was controlling the routes to Inner Asia and demanding high tributes the Song emperors, after the Song had to sign a peacy treaty with them in 1044. The Tangut people of the Western Xia kingdom did not adopt Chinese customs and habits as quick as the Liao-Khitan ruling class had done; the main part of their ruling class remained to be nomads. But they adopted an own script, modeled after the Chinese script, because the Indian or Tibetian alphabet proved not to be suitable for their languge. The Xixia empire was conquered by the Mongols in 1227.
The name of the Xia Empire still lives in the modern self-governing Muslim region of Ningxia 寧夏回族自治區).
Map and Geography

Event History


Emperors and Rulers


Government and Adminstration


Literature and Script


Religion and Customs

(> Song)
Technology and Inventions


Economy


Arts and Culture

[HOME and sitemap: ][top]