The development of the Chinese Empire in the South : a discussion of the origins of the state of Wu of the Three Kingdoms

Abstract

For more than fifty years of the third century A.D., from 229 to 280, the emperors of the state of Wu 吴 ruled over South China. Their territory comprised the area of the modern Chinese provinces of Chekiang, Fukien, Kiangsi, Hunan, Kwangtung, Kwangsi, the southern parts of Kiangsu, Anhwei and Hupeh, together with the coastal regions of presentday Vietnam. In this period, known as the 'Three Kingdoms', a Chinese imperial government was set up south of the Yangtse, enforcing a great expansion of Chinese culture and control among the barbarian peoples and marking the first of the southern dynasties which maintained their independence from the north during four centuries after the end of Han.