Back to category: Arts

Limited version - please login or register to view the entire paper.

¡§Guanyin¡¨

The Sung Dynasty has been referred to the ¡§golden age¡¨ of Chinese culture. It immediately precedes the Yuan or Mongol Dynasty, which the West associates with time of Marco Polo¡¦s expeditions. Sung Dynasty rulers were content to be masters of China itself, unlike the preceding Tang Dynasty, whose rulers had great expansionist tendencies and brought Central Asia into their political and cultural orbit. China, during the Sung Dynasty, looked inward to herself. Traditional ideas in art forms and religious thought were now modified and made more truly Chinese. Buddhist philosophy was fused with the meditative mysticism of native Chinese Taoism.
Over 300 years of Sung history is divided into the two periods of Northern and Southern Sung. Because of the barbarian occupation of northern China the second half of the Sung rule was confined to the area south of the Huai River. Artistic and intellectual output increased enormously. Sung thinkers turned back to the Confucian classics, a...

Posted by: Helene Hannah

Limited version - please login or register to view the entire paper.