00:00:01
it was Empire on a scale that has never
00:00:04
been equaled mysterious violent in the
00:00:08
extreme and endlessly inventive only one
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Empire has survived for 4 000 years
00:00:14
China
00:00:16
all powerful Emperors mobilized immense
00:00:19
peasant armies for Feats of engineering
00:00:22
unparalleled in human history
00:00:25
gilded tomb with rivers of flowing
00:00:27
Mercury it's hard to believe that
00:00:29
something like that could be purely the
00:00:32
product of human labor the world's
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longest canal
00:00:37
a naval fleet mightier than any that had
00:00:39
ever put to Sea
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[Music]
00:00:42
but none can compare to the monument
00:00:44
that would change the face of the Earth
00:00:47
the Great Wall of China this is the
00:00:50
biggest project management in history
00:00:52
and yet Dynasty after Dynasty consumed
00:00:55
by Vanity and greed would be toppled
00:00:58
from power when the people rose up and
00:01:01
oppression turned to destruction
00:01:05
thank you
00:01:07
[Music]
00:01:14
foreign
00:01:17
at the dawn of civilization the Chinese
00:01:20
were there and they are still here hello
00:01:23
I'm Peter Weller when the Egyptians were
00:01:26
building their pyramids the Chinese
00:01:27
already had Sumptuous palaces for their
00:01:30
kings when Rome was planning its soaring
00:01:33
Aqueduct that would bathe its citizens
00:01:34
and quench their thirst the Chinese were
00:01:37
redirecting an entire River by blowing
00:01:39
up a mountain before gunpowder and
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building a dam that would irrigate
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thousands and thousands of acres of land
00:01:45
and launch a population explosion the
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world had never seen
00:01:49
[Music]
00:01:54
four thousand years ago Chinese
00:01:56
civilization Rose and spread across a
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vast area one-third larger than the
00:02:02
United States
00:02:04
but for centuries China was in turmoil
00:02:06
separate kingdoms battled for power and
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control conflict and combat ravaged the
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land
00:02:16
China was as we think of it today more
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or less was made up of a number of
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states all of which were fighting with
00:02:22
one another for Supremacy
00:02:24
the period was called the Warring States
00:02:29
by the 3rd Century BC One Kingdom
00:02:32
emerged as the most powerful and the
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most ruthless
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a western Province home to a hostile
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war-like people they were ambitious
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forbidding and determined to conquer and
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unite all Seven Kingdoms they were
00:02:50
called the chin
00:02:52
their unification of this vast land
00:02:54
would create an empire like no other the
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world has ever seen
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[Music]
00:03:01
the gene prospered in a region that was
00:03:03
fertile and flat with access to Prime
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trading routes like the famed Silk Road
00:03:09
connecting them to the farthest reaches
00:03:11
of China and Beyond
00:03:14
over time the Qing developed two
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critical military advantages over the
00:03:19
other kingdoms
00:03:22
from neighboring Nomads and barbarians
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the chain mastered Horsemanship
00:03:28
simultaneously they also changed
00:03:31
strategy for Waging War
00:03:35
until now Wars had been fought by small
00:03:38
platoons of nobles riding in chariots
00:03:41
but the recent discovery of new metal
00:03:43
forging Technologies led to mass
00:03:46
production of weapons and the rise of a
00:03:49
new type of warrior the foot soldier
00:03:54
it was a time when the use of iron
00:03:57
became much more widespread so just at
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the same time as infantry armies which
00:04:02
tended to be much larger came in so it
00:04:05
was possible to make more weapons
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the Breakthrough the chin launched an
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offensive to conquer all of China as one
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Kingdom after another fell the chain
00:04:19
faced a new challenge how to quickly
00:04:21
produce enough food to fuel their now
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massive Army
00:04:28
that responsibility fell to one man
00:04:32
his name was Lee Bing A Team official
00:04:36
who was one of the greatest hydraulic
00:04:37
Engineers of all time
00:04:41
[Music]
00:04:44
under his guidance Chinese Builders
00:04:47
would construct a masterpiece of
00:04:49
engineering
00:04:50
for centuries the Min River had
00:04:53
tormented the Chinese people causing
00:04:55
winter droughts and summer floods
00:04:59
now libing was determined to harness its
00:05:03
Raging Waters
00:05:06
the centerpiece of his plan was a levy
00:05:09
that would create a whole new Waterway a
00:05:12
channel to control flooding as well as
00:05:14
to provide a water supply for
00:05:16
desperately needed food production
00:05:20
but Lee Bing had an enormous problem
00:05:24
Mount Jang
00:05:26
standing directly in the path of his
00:05:28
irrigation Channel he couldn't move the
00:05:31
mountain so he decided to carve a path
00:05:33
for his new Waterway straight through it
00:05:38
long before the invention of gunpowder
00:05:41
it would have taken decades to cut a
00:05:43
path through the mountain by manual
00:05:45
labor using only Hammers and drills
00:05:50
teen military demanded more immediate
00:05:52
results forcing Lee Bing to devise a
00:05:55
bold new technology
00:05:59
he'd let the forces of nature do the
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heavy lifting for him
00:06:03
first heating the rocks through
00:06:05
controlled fires then dousing them with
00:06:08
cold water
00:06:09
this caused the boulders to crack into
00:06:11
small pieces that could be carted away
00:06:16
[Music]
00:06:18
eight years after he started Lee Bing
00:06:21
had blasted an irrigation Channel
00:06:23
straight through the mountain
00:06:27
now he had to construct the enormous
00:06:29
Levy that would divert the Waters of the
00:06:31
mean into the new irrigation Channel
00:06:35
thousands of workers were brought to the
00:06:37
site working with nothing but muscle and
00:06:40
chisels carving out the Earth
00:06:43
remarkably Lee Bing designed a levy that
00:06:46
could regulate the Raging Waters of the
00:06:48
mean according to the season
00:06:51
in summer more water could be driven to
00:06:53
the irrigation channel to prevent
00:06:55
flooding along the river
00:06:57
in Winter the proportions were reversed
00:07:00
directing more water into the river to
00:07:03
avoid drought
00:07:05
by irrigating a vast stretch of chain
00:07:08
territory Lee Bing's Levy triggered a
00:07:11
massive population boom and the military
00:07:13
had a new base to launch attacks into
00:07:16
enemy territory
00:07:22
the state of chin was evolving into a
00:07:25
Powerhouse
00:07:29
and he used the wealth created by
00:07:31
Agriculture and the power created by the
00:07:34
military to unite all of China
00:07:37
in 247 BC that job was left to the
00:07:40
Chain's New Emperor a 13 year old named
00:07:43
Yin Jang the Young Ruler assumed the
00:07:46
throne with his mother acting as Queen
00:07:48
dowager
00:07:50
but Ying Zhang came to power in a palace
00:07:52
teeming with enemies already plotting
00:07:55
his demise knives were being sharpened
00:08:02
top of the list of those who wanted him
00:08:04
dead was his own mother
00:08:07
she now had a lover and two new Sons she
00:08:10
wanted on the throne
00:08:12
at the age of 22 Yin Jang discovered her
00:08:16
plot to have him killed he had his
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mother banished and his step-brothers
00:08:21
and her lover killed
00:08:25
his authority was now absolute
00:08:29
with his throne secured Ying Zhang sent
00:08:32
his armies out to finish the job of
00:08:35
unifying all of China
00:08:37
only one Kingdom stood in the way
00:08:41
they were called The Chew
00:08:44
in 238 BC the chain launched an epic
00:08:49
all-out war on the tube in a conflict
00:08:52
that raged doggedly on for 15 years
00:08:56
finally in 223 BC they too raised the
00:09:00
banner of surrender the last great
00:09:03
obstacle to the Qing conquest of China
00:09:05
had been crushed the Qin Supremacy over
00:09:09
the two is they were able to organize
00:09:12
their armies in a much more efficient
00:09:14
way than had been done before
00:09:15
the chain dream of empire was complete
00:09:18
China was unified and at peace now a
00:09:23
true Emperor Yin Zhang needed a royal
00:09:26
name
00:09:27
he would come to be known throughout
00:09:29
China and around the world simply as
00:09:32
kirwangdi the first emperor
00:09:37
shirwangdi proclaimed his dynasty would
00:09:40
last ten thousand Generations
00:09:43
it was during his Reign that China
00:09:45
embarked on perhaps the most spectacular
00:09:48
construction project of all time a wall
00:09:52
unlike any the world had ever seen
00:09:55
But the Qing would pay a heavy price for
00:09:58
their Emperor's Grand Ambitions in the
00:10:01
wrath of Ruthless leaders
00:10:03
and the blood of its own people
00:10:09
the Chinese invented deep Drilling in
00:10:11
the first century BC and were able to
00:10:14
drill boreholes up to 4 800 feet deep
00:10:19
220 BC China's first emperor the
00:10:24
triumphant shirwangdi sets off to survey
00:10:27
his new Empire for the first time ever
00:10:30
China was unified and secure and he
00:10:34
intended to keep it that way with the
00:10:36
most ambitious engineering project ever
00:10:39
conceived
00:10:41
Great Wall of China
00:10:44
well the Great Wall was a linking up of
00:10:47
walls that had existed previously a
00:10:50
number of states in the north of China
00:10:51
had built walls partly to defend against
00:10:55
one another but more importantly to
00:10:57
defend their Northern Frontier
00:11:00
it remains to this day unsurpassed by
00:11:03
modern engineering a single impregnable
00:11:06
barrier to seal the vast Chinese Empire
00:11:09
from the outside world along a border
00:11:13
that stretches for thousands of miles
00:11:16
this is Chong Chung in mandarinet means
00:11:19
long wall and believe me covering more
00:11:21
Turf than the continental United States
00:11:23
is wide and including all of its Spurs
00:11:25
that go off into no place it's six
00:11:28
thousand miles and man that's long
00:11:32
D China's first emperor started building
00:11:35
it two thousand years ago it was worked
00:11:37
on right up until the 17th century but
00:11:39
the original wall didn't look like this
00:11:40
it was kind of a mud brick Affair but it
00:11:42
presented an interesting engineering
00:11:44
challenge nonetheless because it had to
00:11:46
go all the way from the sea and the East
00:11:48
to the Gobi desert in the west just to
00:11:50
keep the northern Nomads like the
00:11:52
Mongols out and the Chinese people in
00:11:56
if it took the audacity of Emperors to
00:11:58
dream great it took the Relentless Drive
00:12:01
of the Chinese labor force to build
00:12:03
great but not without a price their
00:12:05
capacity to endure hardship was
00:12:07
unimaginable men women and children
00:12:09
worked with their hands on this wall and
00:12:11
if you complained or tried to run away
00:12:12
you were killed disease was constant
00:12:16
injury was commonplace dressed only in
00:12:18
rags these people suffered bitter cold
00:12:21
bitter hunger bitter exhaustion records
00:12:24
say that at the height of production on
00:12:26
this wall close to one-fifth of China's
00:12:28
entire labor force one million people
00:12:31
were working here and a quarter of those
00:12:33
people died and if you died here usually
00:12:35
you were buried here in the wall giving
00:12:38
rise to its other nickname among some a
00:12:41
long graveyard
00:12:43
foreign
00:12:46
millions of arms and legs and backs were
00:12:49
broken to build the wall
00:12:54
there is very Moving Poetry mostly
00:12:56
written by wives and mothers about young
00:12:59
boys going off and working on the Great
00:13:01
Wall project not having food dying in
00:13:04
the cold Winters and never returning
00:13:06
home
00:13:09
but brute force would not be enough
00:13:12
different regions had vastly different
00:13:14
terrain and varying construction
00:13:17
materials on hand
00:13:19
wherever possible Engineers added to
00:13:22
existing walls but most of it was built
00:13:25
from scratch they devised a brilliant
00:13:27
system utilizing one material they had
00:13:30
in abundance the tapped Earth method is
00:13:33
what Chinese is called Hong tool what
00:13:36
this means is you build a wooden frame
00:13:38
to enclose the wall and you start low
00:13:42
with say two boards parallel and then
00:13:46
you pour some gravel and some sticks and
00:13:49
some clay and then you use the end of a
00:13:51
log to beat it and pound it until it's
00:13:54
very very compact
00:13:55
and then you put another layer in and
00:13:57
you keep doing that and then you put
00:13:58
other boards on the outside to hold it
00:14:01
in place and you keep going up and keep
00:14:03
going up until you reach the height that
00:14:05
you want
00:14:07
when it was dry the frame was removed
00:14:09
leaving just a solid slab of tamped
00:14:12
Earth strengthened by the willow Reeds
00:14:14
like the steel rebar that reinforces
00:14:17
modern concrete
00:14:21
the southern side facing China was
00:14:24
defended by a simple parapet while the
00:14:27
northern side Facing The Barbarians was
00:14:30
crenellated
00:14:33
there was a guard Tower every seven
00:14:35
hundred to one thousand yards
00:14:38
a paved Road ran along the top of the
00:14:40
wall for troops and even wagons making
00:14:43
it an efficient Communications route
00:14:45
especially for the soldiers stationed at
00:14:48
each Tower
00:14:51
but as a work of military engineering
00:14:53
the wall was only partially successful
00:14:57
a wall exists to be defended but in the
00:15:01
long run the wall was not very
00:15:02
defensible Nomads could break through it
00:15:04
or go around it
00:15:06
bribe their way through it
00:15:09
but the Great Wall was not only designed
00:15:11
to keep barbarians out it was also a
00:15:14
symbolic dividing line locking the
00:15:17
Chinese in the Great Wall in a sense is
00:15:20
a cultural marker as much as it is a
00:15:23
military fortification it's the way of
00:15:26
the Chinese saying to the nomads you
00:15:28
stay out there and raise horses and
00:15:31
sheep and will stay in here and grow
00:15:33
grain
00:15:35
by 210 BC the Great Wall had stretched
00:15:39
over 3 000 miles leaving an indelible
00:15:42
mark on China's harsh Terrain
00:15:45
but resentment was swelling into a rage
00:15:48
against shirwangdi many in his kingdom
00:15:51
felt the Colossal barrier was not worth
00:15:53
the toll it inflicted on the Chinese
00:15:55
people
00:15:56
once again his enemies were plotting
00:15:59
against him
00:16:01
final years were marked by what I think
00:16:05
is reasonable to call paranoia
00:16:07
but as the old joke says just because
00:16:09
you paranoid doesn't mean people are now
00:16:11
to get you
00:16:13
at least three assassination plots came
00:16:15
very close to succeeding
00:16:18
struck back by turning China into a
00:16:22
virtual prison for its people he ordered
00:16:24
all historical records of his ruthless
00:16:27
regime destroyed punishment for anyone
00:16:30
who didn't comply was forced labor or
00:16:33
even death some 400 people were buried
00:16:37
alive as a lesson to those who spoke out
00:16:40
against the regime when the emperor's
00:16:42
eldest son objected even he was banished
00:16:47
sherwangdi's brilliant Vision had
00:16:49
transformed China into a great Empire
00:16:52
but he paid the price with a descent
00:16:55
into madness
00:16:57
he would now turn his obsessions and his
00:17:00
army of forced labor to another stunning
00:17:03
feat of construction begun years earlier
00:17:05
[Music]
00:17:07
a monument to his own fear and death
00:17:11
in the 1040s movable type printing was
00:17:16
invented in China a huge development in
00:17:19
the history of printing
00:17:23
by 220 BC teen Emperor shirwangi has
00:17:28
United China for the first time
00:17:30
[Music]
00:17:34
on the northern border millions are
00:17:37
toiling and dying laying the foundation
00:17:39
for China's signature engineering
00:17:41
Triumph
00:17:45
the 3 000 mile long Great Wall
00:17:49
but the first emperor wasn't done even
00:17:53
as he fought against other Chinese
00:17:54
kingdoms and his own demons
00:17:58
shirwangdi began to Garrison nearly 700
00:18:01
000 men near his capital in central
00:18:03
China to build the most personal of all
00:18:07
his engineering projects an epic tomb he
00:18:11
had begun planning at the age of 13.
00:18:15
this was a Monumental project that
00:18:18
required the labor of thousands and
00:18:20
thousands of people over a very long
00:18:21
time it was by Design the biggest and
00:18:25
best tomb that China had ever known
00:18:27
[Music]
00:18:30
in 1974 Farmers digging a well came face
00:18:34
to face with an ancient Chinese warrior
00:18:38
the mysterious terracotta skull would
00:18:41
prove the gateway to one of the greatest
00:18:43
archaeological discoveries of all time
00:18:50
the mound is huge the mound was always
00:18:53
known to be the tomb mound of the first
00:18:55
emperor what was a total surprise was
00:18:58
the army of terracotta warriors about a
00:19:02
kilometer to the east of the Tomb who
00:19:05
presumably were guarding
00:19:07
the approach to the tomb itself
00:19:11
season after season of excavation since
00:19:14
the 1970s has yielded more than five
00:19:18
large pits
00:19:21
the individualized faces and drapery and
00:19:25
armor suggest that each one of these
00:19:26
Warriors was molded from the life from
00:19:29
an individual separate human being the
00:19:31
Precision and Detail in the sculpting
00:19:33
the firing of the Claire unmatched today
00:19:35
these Warriors are a colossal
00:19:37
achievement and some believe the
00:19:39
greatest archaeological find of the 20th
00:19:41
century but they are only the tip of the
00:19:43
iceberg because this ghost Army only
00:19:47
served as a guard detail for an
00:19:49
engineering feat as fantastic as the
00:19:51
world has ever known the opulent tomb of
00:19:54
schwer hongdi each statue stands between
00:19:58
five feet eight inches and six feet two
00:20:01
inches tall Giants for the time some
00:20:04
weighed up to 600 pounds
00:20:07
but it was the Terracotta itself that
00:20:10
sent shock waves through the teams
00:20:12
Excavating the site the clay had a
00:20:15
hardness beyond anything they'd ever
00:20:17
seen before indicating that sheer
00:20:20
wangdi's Artisans had developed a
00:20:22
revolutionary new technology Blast
00:20:25
Furnace Kilns that fired the statues at
00:20:28
temperatures up to 2 000 degrees
00:20:30
Fahrenheit
00:20:32
archaeologists eventually uncovered
00:20:34
three massive pits filled with a
00:20:37
Terracotta Army guarding the first
00:20:39
Emperor's tomb
00:20:41
one pit alone contains over six thousand
00:20:45
life-size Warriors and horses in battle
00:20:48
formation
00:20:50
in a second pit thirteen hundred of
00:20:53
sheer wangdi's Elite military forces
00:20:56
including archers chariots and Cavalry
00:21:00
were discovered
00:21:01
while the third pit with 68 figures and
00:21:04
one Chariot was the command center of
00:21:07
the entire Army headquarters for the
00:21:10
defense of shirwangdi's Empire even in
00:21:13
death
00:21:15
the military armor is fairly specific we
00:21:19
can tell that the armor used was
00:21:21
lacquered leather we can see that people
00:21:23
had cleats on the bottom of their boots
00:21:25
to help them run in the mud we can see
00:21:28
the kinds of caps people wore and
00:21:30
Associate them with rank
00:21:35
30-foot walls divided the massive
00:21:38
complex which stretches out for seven
00:21:41
thousand yards into three parts the
00:21:44
outer city and inner city and then the
00:21:47
mausoleum itself
00:21:49
during construction of the Tomb an army
00:21:52
of workers excavated a gigantic
00:21:54
terrorist pit measuring about sixteen
00:21:57
hundred feet by Seventeen hundred feet
00:22:00
equal to 580 basketball courts
00:22:04
when the sprawling tomb complex was
00:22:07
complete it was topped with a terraced
00:22:10
mountain of Earth nearly 400 feet tall
00:22:15
at the time it may have been nearly as
00:22:17
large as the Great Pyramid of Giza in
00:22:20
Egypt
00:22:21
but over two thousand years weather has
00:22:24
worn down the original man-made Mountain
00:22:26
to about 250 feet
00:22:29
it's hard to believe that something like
00:22:31
that could be
00:22:32
purely the product of human labor but it
00:22:35
is that mound was put there basket full
00:22:38
of Earth after basket full of Earth to
00:22:40
cover
00:22:41
what we assume is an entire underground
00:22:44
city
00:22:45
dedicated to the afterlife of the first
00:22:49
emperor
00:22:50
[Music]
00:22:54
expression of a guy who wanted his
00:22:55
Empire to blow away everything the world
00:22:57
had ever known the ceiling is said to be
00:23:00
a night sky studded with constellations
00:23:02
made out of pearl the floor an entire
00:23:04
Recreation of his Empire and miniature
00:23:07
with Pavilions and pagodas by a flowing
00:23:09
river of mercury the king himself laid
00:23:11
out in gold and Jade in a bronze coffin
00:23:14
floating on a pool of mercury now all
00:23:17
this is pretty fantastic and
00:23:18
mind-blowing but is it true
00:23:20
well scientific tests have proven
00:23:23
mercury levels 100 times the norm around
00:23:25
the mountain and ground penetrating
00:23:28
Radars detected a room inside the
00:23:30
mountain 33 feet high so the emperor's
00:23:32
tomb may be all it's cranked up to be
00:23:34
but we're gonna have to wait to find out
00:23:35
because the Chinese government has
00:23:37
decided not to excavate the place until
00:23:40
they have the technology to preserve
00:23:42
what's inside and even then once they go
00:23:45
in it may be a very treacherous dig
00:23:50
there were corridors and trap doors and
00:23:54
booby traps that were designed to
00:23:56
prevent tomb robbing
00:23:59
now we assume that those are no longer
00:24:01
operable after a couple thousand years
00:24:03
but I'm sure whoever goes into that tune
00:24:06
first is going to step carefully
00:24:10
huangdi had boasted the Qing Dynasty
00:24:13
would last 10 000 Generations but just
00:24:16
three years after his mysterious death
00:24:18
the vast Empire collapsed
00:24:22
the first emperor paid a steep price for
00:24:25
his epic engineering projects the great
00:24:27
wall and magnificent tomb bankrupted the
00:24:30
country and ultimately broke the backs
00:24:33
of China's peasants
00:24:35
pushed to their limits the people
00:24:37
revolted and China was plunged into
00:24:40
chaos
00:24:45
shirwangdi is said to have died from
00:24:48
ingesting Mercury which he believed to
00:24:51
be an elixir of immortality
00:24:55
shirwangdi the first emperor of a United
00:24:58
China is dead
00:25:00
few mourn
00:25:03
many have eagerly anticipated an end to
00:25:07
the hated and ruthless Qing Dynasty
00:25:10
a vicious power struggle ensued for
00:25:13
control of the empire
00:25:15
in a word it was chaotic very quickly
00:25:18
after the death of potential Juan D
00:25:20
things fell into civil war with various
00:25:23
people vying for power
00:25:28
206 BC a new ruler comes to power
00:25:32
determined to bring stability to China
00:25:34
his name was lubong
00:25:37
a former Soldier and cunning politician
00:25:40
who knew how to win the hearts and minds
00:25:43
of the people over the next four years
00:25:46
new bong Consolidated his Rule and
00:25:49
rallied the people behind him peace and
00:25:52
stability returned to the Empire
00:25:55
by the time he died in 195 BC he had
00:25:59
launched a dynasty that would Thrive for
00:26:01
nearly four centuries the Han
00:26:07
the Han embarked on a wall building
00:26:09
campaign even more massive than
00:26:11
shirwangdi's
00:26:14
they extended the Great Wall much
00:26:16
further to the West than it had been and
00:26:19
set up a set of garrisons and a series
00:26:23
of watchtowers that guarded the trade
00:26:27
routes out into Central Asia for
00:26:29
hundreds of miles to the northwest of
00:26:32
the capital the Han built their
00:26:34
fortresses at closer intervals than
00:26:36
earlier dynasties every one to three
00:26:39
miles
00:26:40
in areas of heavy enemy activity that
00:26:43
could increase to only 500 yards apart
00:26:47
Han soldiers had three critical missions
00:26:49
along the wall defend against Invasion
00:26:52
gather Military Intelligence on enemy
00:26:55
activity
00:26:56
and keep the vital Beacon Towers
00:26:58
maintained and supplied with Beacon fire
00:27:01
fuels
00:27:05
Han Dynasty signal Towers Incorporated
00:27:08
several sorts of alarms flags and smoke
00:27:11
were only used in the daytime torches
00:27:13
were only used at night bigger bonfires
00:27:15
and drums were used at any time and
00:27:17
complex codes were devised for these
00:27:19
signals and just like today modern codes
00:27:22
they were all classified as top secret
00:27:24
and unknown to the public
00:27:27
from around 200 BC to 200 A.D just about
00:27:31
the time that Rome was dissolving as a
00:27:33
republic only to be reborn as an Empire
00:27:35
that would gobble up and transform the
00:27:37
Western World China was an Empire that
00:27:39
was consuming and transforming the East
00:27:42
during the Han Dynasty the population of
00:27:44
China grew to 50 million people the
00:27:47
Empire went as far south as Vietnam as
00:27:50
far west as Afghanistan it was massive
00:27:53
but after 400 years just like Rome
00:27:55
internal disintegration started to
00:27:57
overshadow military success and in 184
00:28:01
A.D a peasant Rebellion brought the Han
00:28:03
Dynasty to a screeching halt and once
00:28:06
again China was on the verge of Chaos
00:28:14
for three centuries Warfare treachery
00:28:17
and death were the rule in China and
00:28:21
once again it took a ruthless hand to
00:28:23
put an end to the time of turmoil
00:28:26
[Music]
00:28:27
in the 6th Century a northern people the
00:28:31
sway declared war on the chaos
00:28:33
conquering one part of the Empire after
00:28:36
another until China was United again for
00:28:40
the first time since the Han Dynasty
00:28:42
fell three centuries earlier
00:28:45
the emperor yangdi would build the sway
00:28:48
Empire on the foundation of nearly 1 000
00:28:51
years of dynasties that came before
00:28:54
[Music]
00:28:56
unlike previous Emperors who had
00:28:58
concentrated on fortifying China against
00:29:01
the outside world yangdi would Channel
00:29:04
his energies Inward and strengthen his
00:29:07
Empire within its borders
00:29:11
China is vast and its waterways provided
00:29:15
the most efficient means of
00:29:17
transportation over such great distances
00:29:20
two major rivers Traverse the country
00:29:22
east to west the Yang sea in the South
00:29:25
and the Yellow River in the north but
00:29:28
they are a thousand miles apart
00:29:30
China was A house divided
00:29:36
yangdi decided to do something about
00:29:38
that he aimed to link northern and
00:29:41
southern China by a gigantic Central
00:29:43
artery a grand canal
00:29:46
a kind of hydraulic Highway for
00:29:49
merchants soldiers and citizens
00:29:52
very common to China in terms of
00:29:55
constructing any large infrastructure
00:29:58
project
00:29:59
you know they would look at existing
00:30:01
waterways and try to find area where
00:30:04
they could connect and Link the entire
00:30:06
canal
00:30:07
they want to take advantage of the
00:30:09
natural geography
00:30:11
[Music]
00:30:13
this gigantic construction project would
00:30:16
take more than one million Mand days of
00:30:19
work most of it digging
00:30:21
living and working conditions were
00:30:23
horrendous harsh and primitive tens of
00:30:27
thousands died of starvation fatigue and
00:30:30
illness many were simply beaten to death
00:30:33
by overseers
00:30:36
[Music]
00:30:39
more than 24 locks were needed to create
00:30:43
a massive network of channels but every
00:30:46
time you encounter a natural body of
00:30:48
water you need a lock to make a barrier
00:30:50
between the canal and the lake or the
00:30:53
river when you go up any significant
00:30:56
grade you have to have locks to raise
00:30:59
the water and the boats with it to get
00:31:01
over any rise in the terrain
00:31:06
it took five million workers over six
00:31:09
years to build the Grand Canal
00:31:14
when it was built it stretched 1200
00:31:17
miles and it was the longest and most
00:31:19
ambitious Canal project that had ever
00:31:22
been enacted on the earth up to that
00:31:24
time
00:31:25
by connecting the Yellow River with the
00:31:28
Yangtze the Grand Canal could now
00:31:30
transport Goods up to 45 miles a day
00:31:35
major cities along the canal grew into
00:31:37
silk porcelain and cotton centers
00:31:40
merchants and Artisans supplied
00:31:42
manufactured goods to opening markets
00:31:45
throughout the entire country
00:31:49
economically speaking it made
00:31:51
inter-regional trade much easier as well
00:31:54
as providing work for a lot of people
00:31:55
building it maintaining it working on it
00:31:59
transporting goods and people up and
00:32:02
down it like the Nile in Egypt it
00:32:05
integrated the North and the South
00:32:07
strengthening the foundations of a
00:32:09
unified empire
00:32:12
well the canal was a tremendous
00:32:14
generator of wealth it was opportunity
00:32:16
for poets to travel for painters to
00:32:20
wander and begin painting Landscapes so
00:32:23
it really was an engine of cultural
00:32:26
development not just along its own route
00:32:29
but with influence far beyond its own
00:32:33
confines
00:32:35
with his engineering feat completed
00:32:37
Emperor yangdi decided it was time for a
00:32:40
victory tour down the Grand Canal
00:32:43
it was a garish spectacle with an
00:32:46
Entourage of thousands traveling in
00:32:48
opulence that bordered on the obscene
00:32:50
well the emperor had beautifully
00:32:53
appointed luxurious Imperial barges that
00:32:55
could take him down the Grand Canal
00:32:57
so he would spend as much as half of
00:33:00
every year enjoying himself in the sunny
00:33:03
South the emperor redefined luxury
00:33:06
demanding Exquisite foods and exorbitant
00:33:09
tribute from every County and town along
00:33:12
the canal when large amounts of leftover
00:33:14
Delicacies were dumped overboard the
00:33:17
destitute who built the canal watched
00:33:19
from the shore in despair
00:33:23
but once again a Chinese emperor
00:33:27
underestimated the power of the people
00:33:29
his voyages of conspicuous consumption
00:33:31
fueled a mounting sense of rage against
00:33:34
his decadent regime in 618 A.D the
00:33:39
people rebelled in a series of peasant
00:33:41
uprisings throughout the country
00:33:44
once again chaos consumed China and soon
00:33:49
reached the palace itself
00:33:51
Emperor yangdi was killed by his own
00:33:54
generals and the sway Dynasty came to an
00:33:58
abrupt end
00:34:00
but with the Empire United again the
00:34:03
stage was now set for China's golden age
00:34:06
and for the first time China's Engineers
00:34:09
would extend the Empire's reach around
00:34:12
the globe
00:34:13
[Music]
00:34:14
from a 4th Century BC on the Chinese
00:34:17
used Blast furnaces to cast iron nearly
00:34:21
1800 years before its widespread use in
00:34:23
Europe
00:34:25
six centuries ago
00:34:28
an astonishing Armada of Chinese ships
00:34:31
crossed the China Sea
00:34:33
before venturing West to Salon Arabia
00:34:36
and East Africa
00:34:39
it was a fleet unlike any that had ever
00:34:41
put to Sea giant nine masted junks
00:34:44
escorted by dozens of Supply ships
00:34:47
Patrol boats and transports for Cavalry
00:34:50
horses crew totaled more than 27
00:34:53
thousand sailors and soldiers
00:34:56
this was the famed Armada of the
00:34:59
powerful Ming Dynasty a Herald to the
00:35:02
world that after a century of Mongol
00:35:04
domination China was returned to its
00:35:07
rightful rulers
00:35:09
at its home was an unlikely Admiral a
00:35:13
commoner from the outlying Yunnan
00:35:15
Province Who Rose to become one of the
00:35:17
most powerful figures of the Ming
00:35:19
Dynasty
00:35:21
his name was jung-ha
00:35:25
Zhang Hao was 11 when his hometown was
00:35:28
conquered by the Ming he was plucked
00:35:31
from his family brought to court as a
00:35:33
gift for the emperor's son
00:35:36
and castrated
00:35:40
eunuchs appear often in Chinese history
00:35:43
and the reason that they gained power
00:35:45
was because they had much greater access
00:35:49
to the emperor and to Imperial women
00:35:51
because they didn't pose a threat
00:35:55
soon Rose through the ranks to become
00:35:57
the chief Lieutenant to the emperor
00:36:00
himself
00:36:01
together they sketched out a bold plan
00:36:03
for conquest of the Seas
00:36:06
Zhang Hao was named to lead an
00:36:08
extraordinary Fleet of ships
00:36:10
it was an engineering challenge unlike
00:36:13
anything a Chinese dynasty had ever
00:36:15
attempted he was somebody who definitely
00:36:19
wanted to create a personal stamp on the
00:36:21
world
00:36:23
[Music]
00:36:24
he ordered 337 ocean-going ships an
00:36:29
additional 188 flat bottom transports
00:36:32
were converted for Ocean Travel
00:36:36
just to get the building materials
00:36:37
together get the Craftsmen get the
00:36:40
designers and all the rest and then say
00:36:42
put together a fleet of 300 ships is
00:36:45
remarkable I mean the British Fleet in
00:36:48
the time of Napoleon it had a really an
00:36:50
upper limit of about a hundred ships of
00:36:53
the line man of war an army of thirty
00:36:56
thousand Carpenters sail makers and sail
00:36:59
rights worked and lived at the shipyards
00:37:02
Working Day and Night on zhengha's
00:37:05
magnificent Fleet
00:37:07
at the center of the enormous Shipyard
00:37:09
seven 1500 foot dry docks were separated
00:37:13
from the Yangtze River by 25 foot high
00:37:16
dams once the ships were complete the
00:37:20
dams were opened flooding the dry docks
00:37:23
the flagship of the fleet was a
00:37:25
spectacular nine-masted vessel measuring
00:37:28
440 feet nearly 1.5 times the length of
00:37:32
a football field making it the largest
00:37:35
wooden ship ever built
00:37:39
designed for stability it had a flat
00:37:42
bottom filled with heavy ballasts of
00:37:44
stones and an Innovative exterior Rudder
00:37:47
post that could be raised to reduce the
00:37:49
ship's draft in Shallow Waters
00:37:52
watertight bulwark compartments inspired
00:37:56
by the partition shape of bamboo stalks
00:37:58
stored drinking water and supplies and
00:38:01
kept the ship afloat if the hull was
00:38:03
breached
00:38:05
the second deck had living quarters for
00:38:08
the crew the kitchen mess all and
00:38:11
operations were on the third
00:38:13
while the fourth deck was used as a high
00:38:16
fighting platform fully rigged the
00:38:19
flagships had nine staggered masts and
00:38:22
12 square sails of red silk soaring
00:38:25
Skyward
00:38:27
other ships were armed with as many as
00:38:30
24 bronze cannons capable of firing up
00:38:33
to 900 feet their bows and Sterns had
00:38:37
reinforced High profiles for ramming
00:38:39
smaller boats some ships carried horses
00:38:42
or transported troops others were
00:38:45
freshwater tankers packed with
00:38:47
Provisions for up to 28 000 men we're
00:38:50
talking about a really really big Fleet
00:38:53
it had as many Soldiers and Sailors on
00:38:55
it as the Spanish Armada of 1588 it had
00:38:59
about twice as many ships
00:39:00
in 1405 the unit Commander jungha set
00:39:05
sail for the world jung-ho was not an
00:39:08
Explorer of what jung-ho was doing was
00:39:11
what we would call in modern terminology
00:39:13
power projection during his 28-year
00:39:16
Naval career Admiral Zhang ha visited 37
00:39:21
countries traveled around the tip of
00:39:23
Africa into the Atlantic Ocean and
00:39:26
commanded a single Fleet whose numbers
00:39:28
surpassed The Fleets of all Europe
00:39:31
combined
00:39:33
Zhang Haas voyages established China as
00:39:36
a superpower on the world's oceans but
00:39:39
in 1433 China's Age of Exploration came
00:39:44
to a crashing halt
00:39:46
Zhang ha suddenly died during a stopover
00:39:50
in India and the fleet was recalled to
00:39:52
China
00:39:54
a new emperor was on the throne
00:39:57
in one stunning command he would change
00:40:00
the course of Chinese history
00:40:02
despite China's Total Domination as a
00:40:05
naval power Zhang ha's magnificent fleet
00:40:09
was to be burned to the ground
00:40:13
it would be one of the great turning
00:40:15
points in Chinese history
00:40:17
China was poised to seize control of the
00:40:20
Seas and colonize the world years before
00:40:23
the Portuguese Spanish Dutch and British
00:40:28
under the new emperor all ocean-going
00:40:31
vessels were destroyed
00:40:33
even records of zhengha's expeditions
00:40:36
were torched China's Age of Exploration
00:40:40
was over the open door slammed shut
00:40:45
the ships were gone and the promise of
00:40:48
international power and Conquest was
00:40:51
dead the reason for the emperor's
00:40:54
decision remains a mystery to this day
00:40:59
1449 16 years after the Empire turned
00:41:03
inward again China's age-old enemy
00:41:06
returned
00:41:07
Mongol forces mounted A Massive Attack
00:41:12
like great dynasties before them the
00:41:14
Ming returned to the wall for protection
00:41:19
the result would be the most Monumental
00:41:21
feat of the entire Chinese Empire
00:41:24
a complex re-engineering of the Great
00:41:27
Wall into the Colossal structure we know
00:41:30
today
00:41:34
made of the Ming walls were faced with a
00:41:38
with brick and stone they were much more
00:41:40
solid and those are the ones that we can
00:41:41
still see parts of today
00:41:43
a crude mortar of sticky rice and burnt
00:41:47
lime created a seal between bricks that
00:41:50
rivaled modern cement in strength
00:41:54
construction of military fortifications
00:41:56
on the Great Wall reached its peak under
00:41:59
the Ming
00:42:00
double walls were added in military
00:42:03
zones along with strongholds passes and
00:42:07
other reinforcements
00:42:09
watchtowers of various shapes and sizes
00:42:12
served as shelters or simply as signal
00:42:15
stations along the wall
00:42:17
shelter Towers were built large enough
00:42:19
to store food and arms and serve as the
00:42:22
living quarters for soldiers a staircase
00:42:26
from the interior led up to the top of
00:42:28
the tower with small holes on each side
00:42:31
of the wall for Lookouts
00:42:33
the overall defenses were enhanced with
00:42:36
a variety of features including
00:42:39
artillery
00:42:41
the Chinese have a clear superiority
00:42:43
over the Mongols in gunpowder weapons
00:42:45
and as long as the Ming Dynasty could
00:42:49
maintain a cohesive enough Army along
00:42:51
the Great Wall
00:42:52
they were capable of resisting
00:42:55
individual Mongol attacks
00:42:57
[Music]
00:43:01
by the end of the Ming Dynasty over 6
00:43:04
000 miles of wall including its many
00:43:07
loops and digressions sprawled across
00:43:10
Northern China
00:43:12
for a century and a half the wall stood
00:43:15
firm but by 1600 the dynasty behind it
00:43:19
was crumbling and a foreign tribe known
00:43:22
as the Manchu were gathering strength on
00:43:25
China's northern border
00:43:27
on May 26
00:43:30
1644 Beijing finally fell to Manchu
00:43:34
forces it would take the Chinese more
00:43:37
than 250 years to overthrow the Invaders
00:43:40
from the north but when they did a new
00:43:43
Chinese Kingdom emerged like none before
00:43:46
it
00:43:47
communist China
00:43:52
nothing symbolizes the enduring power
00:43:54
and Imagination of the Chinese more than
00:43:56
this Great Wall of all of the
00:43:58
civilizations that have reached the
00:44:00
Glorious Heights of Empire only one has
00:44:03
avoided the inevitable Oblivion that
00:44:05
follows
00:44:07
Emperors come and go but for thousands
00:44:09
and thousands of years from the
00:44:11
dedication and vision and resilience and
00:44:13
Brilliance of these remarkable people
00:44:14
they've pushed their civilization to
00:44:17
Triumph again and again and again where
00:44:19
others have simply morphed or dissolved
00:44:22
or just faded away
00:44:24
at the dawn of humanity the Chinese were
00:44:26
here and they are still here and they
00:44:29
ain't finished yet
00:44:31
I'm Peter Weller for the History Channel
00:44:33
[Music]
