The national destiny of a unified dynasty in Chinese history often lasted around 200-300 years, and basically went through five stages: establishment, development, prosperity, decline, and destruction.
For example, the Western Han Dynasty (202 BC - 8 BC) 210 AD, the Eastern Han Dynasty (25 AD - 220 AD) 195 AD, the Tang Dynasty (618 AD - 907 AD) 289 AD, the Song Dynasty (960 AD - 1279 AD) 319 AD, the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) 276 years, Qing Dynasty (1636-1912) 276 years.
Of course, the Song Dynasty is somewhat special. On the one hand, it is not a unified dynasty in the complete sense (the Northern Song Dynasty did not have the Yanyun Sixteenth Prefecture, and the Southern Song Dynasty did not have North China and Guanzhong). On the other hand, it was broken into the Northern Song Dynasty due to the shame of Jingkang ( 960-1127) and the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279).
However, the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368), as a unified dynasty with the vastest territory (13.72 million square kilometers) in Chinese history, only had a national destiny of 97 years. direct cause.
The predecessor of the Yuan Dynasty was the Mongol Khanate, from which the Yuan Dynasty was the part of China. The Mongol Khanate was a slave state established by Temujin, a generation of prodigy, through plunder and military exploits. It completed the unification of the Mongolian grasslands in 1206.
After that, under the leadership of Temujin, Tolei, Ogedei, Guyuk, Mengge, Kublai Khan and other great Khans, the Mongolian cavalry conquered east and west and south in just about 70 years. During the Northern War, we captured a vast territory stretching from Korea in the east, Austria and the Mediterranean in the west, Siberia in the north, and Indochina and the Indian Ocean in the south. It can be called a miracle in the world's military history.
In the process of conquest, the Mongol Khanate used longbows and scimitars to seize territory and population, while dividing the spoils among the near and far. However, in the process of dividing the spoils, there is always "not concern about scarcity but inequality", and there will always be unfair distribution results. Therefore, Temujin's several sons, dozens of grandsons, and many relatives split into interest groups one by one, seizing land and population through assassinations, poisonings, coercion, inducements, and even wars. They were pulling against each other. The entire Mongol Khanate quickly declined and split.
After Meng Ge, the last true Great Khan of the Mongol Khanate, violently broke out in Diaoyu City, Chongqing, the so-called Golden Family began to split into two major factions, one was the Western Expedition Faction, and the other was the Southward Faction. The Western Expedition faction is represented by Alibuge. Their expansion direction and ruling power are mainly concentrated in the Western Regions, Central Asia, West Asia, Eastern Europe and other regions. They have preserved the characteristics of the Mongolian grassland regime and adopted a feudal regime and a nomadic economic structure; the Southward faction Represented by Kublai Khan, his sphere of influence was mainly concentrated in the former Jin Kingdom, Xixia, and Southern Song Dynasty. He advocated the implementation of sinicization policies, governed the world with Confucianism, and adopted a feudal political form and an agricultural economic structure.
Obviously, Kublai Khan's sinicization policy aroused dissatisfaction among many Mongolian princes and nobles of the Western Expedition faction. They believed that this was an act of forgetting the ancestral line and deviating from Genghis Khan's original intention of establishing the Mongolian steppe empire.
Therefore, the Western Expedition faction supported Alibaba's succession to the throne and opposed Kublai Khan's succession to the throne. After that, Kublai Khan and Alibaba fought for the throne for many years, which intensified the conflicts and contradictions between different interest groups and pushed the huge Mongol Khanate to split.
In the end, Kublai Khan defeated Ali Buge, but he also lost the support of the Western Expeditionists. Several khanates in the northwest became independent one after another and no longer recognized Kublai Khan as the co-owner of Mongolia. Later, after Kublai Khan put down the Haidu Rebellion, the Northwest Khanate only regarded the Yuan Dynasty as its nominal suzerainty.
From then on, the huge Mongol Khanate split into the Yuan Dynasty and four khanates (Golden Horde, Chagatai Khanate, Ogedai Khanate, and Il Khanate) under Kublai Khan.
