Now in China, the 92% of Chinese population belongs to the Han nationality. But do you know why are majority of Chinese called Han people?
By all accounts, the Han dynasty between 206bce and 220ce is considered the greatest period of chinese history, the Great Wall of China was built and the arts and culture flourished. It's just the reason why Chinese call themselves as ethnic Han.
Especially during the reign of an emperor named Han Wudi, there was a big improvement in all kinds of social fields including policy system, economy, culture, music, etc, even the national territory. If my english
is good enough, I assure you must fall in love with my description about this period of chinese history very much.At that time, for the Chinese emperors in the Han dynasty, they faced a huge threaten from the Huns lived in the northern part of the present China and Mongolia country. The Huns used to go down south to the Han borders, plundering the wealth and killed the Han people. Pitifully, the Han emperors had no ability to deal with the strong and savage northern Hun's army, in order to exchange the temperory peace in the han borders, they had to be submitted to dedicate the princesses (the Han emperor's daughter) to the Hun's chief called "Chanyu" every few years. However, those Han princesses were all reluctant to marry to such a remote and cold northern place where Huns lived. It's said that the natural condition in the north was very harsh and unbearable, the Huns just wore the thick clothers, eating the big blocks of raw meat, living in the humble tents made of the blankets and poles. Since most of Han national territory just lied in the center of the present China where the weather was rather comfortable for people, not too cold, not too hot.
The young emperor Han Wudi had seen by himself the fact that his beautiful and delicate older sisters had to marry to the north, far away from their parents and hometown for ever, which gave him a great impression. He felt this was a big humiliation. So when he grew up and ascended the throne later, he refused to dedicate any han women to the Hun leader--Chanyu. He proposed to fight against the Hun army, giving them a heavy lesson. Then the war between Han and Hun broke out and lasted for decades.
Due to the war, it's natural that Han Wudi should recruit a lot of talented and loyal people to realize his great aspiration, thus a powerful and brand-new social reform was becoming imperative all over the country. In political field, he accepted the assertion--"Oust others doctrines, the overwhelming Confucianism" from a famous Confusion scholar named DongZhongshu. From then on, the Chinese began to believe in the Confucianism as a national religion? which had become a main area of practise under the Chinese feudal ruling and its superiority was never changed later. Confucius also got to be entitled "Saint" till now. People can say that if without the advocation of the emperor Han Wudi, the Confucianism can't be popularized in China. and the Chinese history would be a different look.
In military, oh, It's really a brilliant era of heros coming forth in large numbers. The famous Han senior Generals fighting against Huns such as Weiqing?Huo Qubing?li Guang, etc are just the familiar names for the common Chinese till now. You can also say, in the Chinese mind, they're just the vivid figures, instead of the dead ancient people.
In literary, there's a famous writer named Sima Xiangru, who created a special poem writing style named "Fu". According to the history records, most of his poems "Fu" were worth a lot of gold which won the favour of Han wudi greatly. and just like a famous poem written by another ancient Chinese poet in the Song dynasty saying "It's still difficult to ask to buy a poem "Fu" from Sima Xiangru even with a thousand Liang (Liang is a unit of weight in China. a Liang is equal to 50 grams now.) of gold." Every sentence in peom "Fu" was orderly and full of the soaring rhetorics,
which was suitable for reciting aloud.At the same time, the Chinese most traditional and classical food---beancurd was just invented in Han dynasty. Now there're a variety of cuisines about beancurd in China, served as the fried beancurd, fermented beancurd, beancurd jelly, etc.
Among those stories taken place in the Han dynasty, the famous " The adventure to the west by Zhan Qian " is the one which i'm most interested in. Since Han Wudi always went to war with the Huns in the north, he desired to make friends to the other countries in the west (which lie in the present western part of China--Sinkiang) as the alliance to oppose the northern huns together. Then he dispatched a young envoy named Zhang Qian to adventure westward. Why do we say it's a big adventure? The answer is at that time, there's not any connection between the Han and the Western regions, where the spreading mighty desert was a huge natural barrier which prevented people from knowing each other well. So Zhang Qian must be brave enough to travel to those unknown small countries or tribes scattered in the desert. For the first time, Zhang Qian guided a small group of nearly 100 Han people to go west, following the Han Wudi's will. They all didn't know how their fate would be. Were those people lived in the west desert friendly enough? As a result, Zhang Qian was betrayed by the Huns, he was retained in a small western country in detention on half way where he returned to the Han dynasty. Nevertheless, Zhang Qian had visited a lot of western places and countries, he even arrived in the present Afghanistan.
At last, Zhang Qian got a chance to flee away from this west country to his native country--Han dynasty. Miserably, the former group of 100 people were remained only 2 persons---Zhang Qian himself and an attendent. and the whole 13 years had passed from when he left the Han dynasty's territory at the start, He just turned from a youngster into a middle aged person. Decades later, Han Wudi sent him on mission to the west again. This time, he acheived a great victory. He brought back a lot of western plants and fruits, and music, etc in the han dynasty, opening the famous "Silk Road". The capital Chang'an of Hhan dynasty also changed into an open, prosperous international city, gathering a lot of western businessmen and the beautiful western female dancers (oh, Han people just called them as Hu people at that time.) At that time, the fruits such as the grapes, walnuts, pomegranates,etc for the central people(oh, Han people also called themselves as central people. they just thought they lived in the middle of earth.) were just very fresh and unheard of. I still remember that when i was a child, once a time we ate the pomegranate planted in our yard, my mother told our children that the pomegranate was one of the fruits just from the west, which was introduced by Zhang Qian in Han dynasty.
So I think that even today, Chang'an--the capital of Han dynasty is absolutely a charming city which any foreigners to China should have a visit. Now its name is Xi'an in the Shan'xi province with a large number of cultural relics and scenic spots. (Meanwhile, it has ever been the capital of Tang dynasty--another thriving period of the Chinese history. For the part of the overseas Chinese, the Chinatown just means the Tang people's town. the Chinese traditional clothes are called Tang suits,too.)