Tang Dynasty

State · 623–910 CE · at its largest around 661 CE

From its cosmopolitan capital Chang'an, one of the largest cities in the world, the Tang welcomed Silk Road traders, Buddhist monks and foreign envoys. It is remembered as the high point of Chinese poetry, with Li Bai and Du Fu, and saw the first printed books.

On its lands while it lasted

Sogdians (c. 500 BCE – c. 900 CE): Iranian people of the Zeravshan valley around Samarkand and Bukhara whose merchants dominated trade along the Silk Roads, especially between the 4th and 8th centuries.
Silk Road (c. 130 BCE – c. 1450 CE): A network of overland caravan routes linking China with Central Asia, Persia and the Mediterranean, along which silk, spices, horses, religions, technologies and diseases travelled for more than 1,500 years.
Goguryeo (c. 37 BCE – c. 668 CE): Kingdom traditionally founded by Jumong in 37 BCE that grew to rule northern Korea and Manchuria.
Baekje (c. 18 BCE – c. 660 CE): Kingdom in southwestern Korea, traditionally founded in 18 BCE, a conduit of culture and Buddhism to Japan.
Bagan (200–1293 CE): Capital of Pagan Kingdom (850–1293).
Brahmagupta (c. 598 CE – 668 CE): Mathematician and astronomer from Bhillamala in Rajasthan who gave the first rules for arithmetic with zero and negative numbers.
Emperor Taizong of Tang (598 CE – 649 CE): Second Tang emperor, whose reign (626–649) is remembered as a model of good government and military expansion.
Tang dynasty (618–907 CE): The Tang dynasty, ruling from Chang'an, presided over a cosmopolitan golden age of poetry, Buddhism and trade.
Wu Zetian (624 CE – 705 CE): The only woman to rule China as emperor in her own right, proclaiming the Zhou dynasty (690–705) with Luoyang as her capital.
Zero as a number (628 CE): In his Brahmasphutasiddhanta of 628, Brahmagupta treated zero as a number in its own right and set out rules for calculating with it.
Xuanzang’s journey to India (629–645 CE): The Buddhist monk Xuanzang left Chang’an without imperial permission, crossed Central Asia to study at Nalanda in India, and returned with hundreds of texts; his Great Tang Records on the Western Regions describe the lands he visited.
Battle of Talas (751 CE): Abbasid forces defeated a Tang Chinese army near the Talas River, ending Tang expansion westward into Central Asia.
An Lushan rebellion (755–763 CE): Rebellion by the frontier general An Lushan that devastated northern China and permanently weakened the Tang dynasty.
Gunpowder (c. 850 CE): Chinese alchemists discovered the explosive mixture of saltpetre, sulphur and charcoal by the 9th century; the first written formulas appear in 1044.
Diamond Sutra (868 CE): A woodblock-printed copy of the Diamond Sutra found at Dunhuang is dated 868, making it the oldest known dated printed book.