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==The Fall of the Ming==

==The Fall of the Ming==

In the early decades, a weakened Ming Dynasty saw the rise of numerous rebel and bandit groups, in part in response to famines and onerous tax burdens. One rebel leader, [[Li Zicheng]], known by some as a "dashing prince," captured Beijing in [[1644]], finding only a few companies of soldiers and a few thousand eunuchs defending the city's twenty-one miles of city walls. The [[Chongzhen Emperor]] hanged himself two days later.<ref name=tignor500>Tignor, Elman, et al., 501.</ref>

By the beginning of the 17th century, the Ming was beginning to severely weaken, due to a number of factors. Declining tax revenues made it difficult to pay officials and the military, leading to many disgruntled army officers and soldiers; meanwhile, inflows of [[silver]] from Western powers, from Japan, and elsewhere, threatened to destabilize the economy, and famines and pestilence struck various parts of the empire, exacerbated by poor granary emergency preparation policies.<ref>Jonathan Spence, ''The Search for Modern China'', Second Edition, W.W. Norton & Co. (1999), 3.</ref>

 

A weakened Ming Dynasty saw the rise of numerous rebel and bandit groups, in part in response to these famines and onerous tax burdens. One rebel leader, [[Li Zicheng]], known by some as a "dashing prince," captured Beijing in [[1644]], finding only a few companies of soldiers and a few thousand eunuchs defending the city's twenty-one miles of city walls. The [[Chongzhen Emperor]] hanged himself two days later.<ref name=tignor500>Tignor, Elman, et al., 501.</ref>

Meanwhile, the Ming had been fighting the Manchus in the north, suffering a notable early defeat in [[1619]], but otherwise managing to hold back the steppe nomads. Hearing of the fall of Beijing, however, the commander of the Ming armies in the northeast enlisted the aid of the Manchus to help oust Li Zicheng. The Manchu armies, led by Ming forces to Beijing, did just that, defeating Li Zicheng, but afterwards, they kept Beijing for themselves, going on to conquer the remainder of China in the ensuing decades.<ref name=tignor500/>

Meanwhile, the Ming had been fighting the Manchus in the north, suffering a notable early defeat in [[1619]], but otherwise managing to hold back the steppe nomads. Hearing of the fall of Beijing, however, the commander of the Ming armies in the northeast enlisted the aid of the Manchus to help oust Li Zicheng. The Manchu armies, led by Ming forces to Beijing, did just that, defeating Li Zicheng, but afterwards, they kept Beijing for themselves, going on to conquer the remainder of China in the ensuing decades.<ref name=tignor500/>