The Context

Four decades ago, a retired national martial arts champion debuted in a movie about how Shaolin monks saved a Tang emperor from a warlord. The movie, called Shaolin Temple, was an overnight success. This big-screen blockbuster not only propelled its leading actor Jet Li from a mere martial arts master to a full-fledged movie star, but it also made “Shaolin” a household word around the world.

The Shaolin Temple is arguably the most famous Buddhist temple in China, renowned for its Kungfu warrior monks. With amazing feats of strength, flexibility, and endurance of pain, the Shaolin monks have created a worldwide reputation as the ultimate Buddhist warriors.

Today, we’re going to talk about how monks at the Shaolin Temple in central China’s Henan Province were trained to become Kungfu masters and fought to turn the wheels of fortune for an empire.

In 1971, Zhang Fengxiang, a farmer in the Ongniud Banner in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region happened to dig out an “iron hook” while planting trees near his home. He immediately gave it to his four-year-old brother to play with. The child tied a rope to the artifact and dragged it along the ground for fun. Eventually, the “rust” on its surface chipped off to reveal the shiny and translucent jade underneath.

It is China’s First Jade Dragon, one of the most representative artifacts of Hongshan culture and the earliest prototype of the Chinese dragon. 

For more than 13-hundred years, this treacherous and winding path that meanders through the mountains and valleys of southwest China has been trod by human feet and horse hoofs helping to bridge the Chinese hinterland with the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Along this unpaved and rugged commercial passage, livestock and commodities flowed back and forth: tea, salt and sugar flowed into Tibet, while horses, furs and other local products flowed out. This ancient trade route, which first appeared during the Tang Dynasty, came to be known as the Tea Horse Road. And it lasted until the 1960s – yes, the 1960s – when highways were finally constructed in Tibet.

Today we continue to discuss how an ancient horse trail in China’s mountainous southwest helped to play a key role in defending the nation amid the fires of war. 

For more than 13-hundred years, this treacherous and winding path that meanders through the mountains and valleys of southwest China has been trod by human feet and horse hoofs helping to bridge the Chinese hinterland with the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Along this unpaved and rugged commercial passage, livestock and commodities flowed back and forth: tea, salt and sugar flowed into Tibet, while horses, furs and other local products flowed out. This ancient trade route, which first appeared during the Tang Dynasty, came to be known as the Tea Horse Road. And it lasted until the 1960s – yes, the 1960s – when highways were finally constructed in Tibet.

In the first installment of what will be a two-part feature, we’re going to talk about how an ancient horse trail in China’s mountainous southwest helped to develop the local economy by promoting border trade and promoted the cultural development of various ethnic groups in southwest China.

Today, we’re going to talk about how a small seal from the Western Jin Dynasty has born witness to the ups and downs of the Qiang people and the gradual integration of northwestern minorities that helped to build the great Chinese nation of today. 

The 40-episode costume drama series A Dream of Splendor, starring A-list actress Liu Yifei, has gathered hundreds of millions of views since it began streaming in June.

Today, we’re going to talk about how a popular TV drama highlights the tea contests that emerged during the Tang Dynasty, flourished in the Song and helped inspire tea culture in Japan.

China is home to a long-established and flourishing tea culture. In many ways, Japanese culture is fundamentally influenced by China. In its earliest form, Japanese tea practice was no more than a duplicate of Chinese tea culture, but over time, it gradually took on its own features, leading to the formation of the uniquely Japanese “way of tea”.

Today we will introduce how the Japanese tea ceremony – or chadō （茶道）, the way of tea – first originated from China before evolving into something quite different from Chinese tea culture.

Few would have imagined that visitors would throng to a museum to partake of the beauty of a mural, despite it being a replica, at an exhibition on Chinese civilization earlier this year at the Palace Museum, or popularly known the Forbidden City, in Beijing.

The mural or its replica is not beautiful in the visual sense. A mural from the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang, northwest China’s Gansu Province, it has lost its original luster due to 1,500 years of wear and tear in the dim and dark cave, and the changing climate. So the replica of the mural depicting Jataka of the Deer King must have drawn people’s attention because of a completely different reason.

Today, we talk about how a Jataka tale rendered in the Chinese context in a mural in the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang has blossomed in popular memory across the country, thanks to a popular animation.

After the Qing Dynasty established its rule over the heartland of China, the region known as Zhongyuan in the lower and middle reaches of the Yellow River centered on the region between Luoyang and Kaifeng in Henan Province, the Manchus fully controlled the country. Although setting up a unified dynasty, there were fewer people and Manchu culture was less developed than in Zhongyuan, which was perceived as the birthplace of Chinese civilization.

Today we continue to discuss how Qing Dynasty emperor Qianlong holds Confucius in high esteem in order to stabilize his reign where Han nationality dwell.

In the recent cultural relics exhibition titled “The Making of Zhongguo – Origins, Developments and Achievements of Chinese Civilization” at China’s Palace Museum, otherwise known as the Forbidden City, in Beijing, there were two sets of bronzes. One is the Bronze Chime Bells of Zheng State (806-375 BCE), usually housed at Henan Museum in Zhengzhou, one of the largest sets of chime bells ever unearthed in China. The other is known as Shangzhou Shigong, or the 10 ceremonial utensils of the Shang and Zhou dynasties (c.16th century-256 BCE) to commemorate Confucius, the celebrated thinker, educator and philosopher of the Spring and Autumn Period (770-476 BCE).

Today, we discuss how Qing Dynasty emperor Qianlong holds Confucius in high esteem in order to win over men of letters where Han nationality dwell.