Social Media Ideas for Chinese History

Along the river, before the fall: China pre-Renaissance city life

Ancient China laws punished men for crying; people with messy handwriting forced to drink ink

Ancient China’s legal system was never only about crime and punishment. It was also a mechanism of imperial control, used to protect the throne, discipline officials and regulate s...

2 notable women in ancient China broke barriers, made major contributions to medicine, science

In ancient China, women were largely denied formal education and confined to the roles of dutiful wives and mothers. Against this restrictive social order, two women pushed beyond...

How Chinese philosophy influenced US founding fathers

“Founding Father, Benjamin Franklin, published the sayings of Confucius in his colonial newspaper and today’s sculpture recognising that ancient Chinese age is carved into the face...

Did volcanic eruptions ruin China’s Ming dynasty and undermine the Qing?

By many historical accounts, the Ming dynasty’s doom was sealed when Li Zicheng, the leader of a peasant rebel army, invaded Beijing in 1644. Less than 24 hours after the rebel for...

Ancient Chinese Wedding Rituals the Modern World Left Behind

Walk into almost any Chinese wedding today and you will see white gowns, Western style vows, and a bouquet toss, customs that now feel ordinary even though they were once entirely...

Ancient Chinese lord buried with bells meant to silence ancestral war rituals

Imagine, for a moment, that you lived in ancient China, with a rival state threatening your people’s very existence. In the quest for any advantage, one strategy might involve perf...

Ancient China elites used water fans, ice to cool down in summer; folks had bamboo pillows

In ancient China, summer heat could be deadly long before the advent of air conditioning. To survive it, people resorted to remedies ranging from imperial ice sculptures and water-...

Can China team’s Greek dig unveil an untold truth in ancient world history?

Chinese archaeologists have started work on a joint excavation project at a site in Greece that may help answer some increasingly popular questions in China about the roots of anci...

The Forbidden City: Inside China's largest imperial palace complex, a hidden empire within a city for 500 years

How China imperial exam leaves historical footprint and impact on gaokao, modern education

In the first of a two-part series focusing on China’s hugely important national college entrance examination, or gaokao, the SCMP examines and explains the origins of the test and...

Asal-Usul Bagaimana Bangsa Cina Mencipta Kertas: Penemuan Yang Mengubah Dunia

Hari ini kita menulis nota, membaca buku, mencetak dokumen dan membungkus pelbagai barang menggunakan kertas. Ia kelihatan begitu biasa sehingga ramai yang tidak pernah terfikir da...

Column: Finding the answer to China's success

by Bahtier HamdamovAs the Communist Party of China (CPC) marks its 105th anniversary, I often find myself reflecting on a question: How did a political party founded at a time of n...

How a Tribe of Frontier Warriors Built the Kushan Empire–And Sent the First Buddhist Missionaries to China 

Nearly 2,200 years ago, a tribe called the Yuezhi (月氏) from north of the Qilian Mountains on China’s frontiers was pushed out of its homeland by the Xiongnu, a multi-tribal nomad...

What’s Driving Anti-Qing Sentiment in Contemporary China?

A patriotic film backfired because a growing number of Han Chinese don’t see the Manchu-origin Qing dynasty as a part of their history.

Ancient DNA Reveals the Hidden Origins of China’s Mysterious Shimao Civilization

Ancient DNA from Shimao reveals local origins, broad prehistoric connections, a patrilineal social structure, and gender-specific patterns of human sacrifice. At Shimao, a vast sto...

Ancient Chinese texts depict ‘immortal mirror’ akin to CT scan – an early notion of robots

Ancient China dreamed of future technology long before the modern age, conjuring visions of magic mirrors, ingenious machines and even lifelike wooden puppets. In the Tang dynasty...

The “Ten Great Buildings” of China 1959 – and how to visit?

While it feels like the Peoples Republic of China has been around forever, it is pretty young as countries go, being founded in 1949 by Chairman Mao. In the early days of the Commu...

The I Ching, Leibniz and AI: how old China-West links shaped modern science

The advent of artificial intelligence (AI) appears sudden and revolutionary, yet its origins stretch deep into history, revealing a profound and forgotten intellectual exchange bet...

China’s Climate Policies: A Timeline

China has long been the world's top emitter of greenhouse gases, making its climate and energy policies crucial for the rest of the world.  It initially took the position that West...

How adversity has guided the path of Chinese civilisation through the ages

Places well-endowed with natural resources don’t usually become great powers or world-conquering empires. If anything, many suffer from the “resource curse”, which corrupts the dom...