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Chapter 4 • Political Transformations, 1450–1750 229

the region. People of noble rank, Buddhist monks, and 0 250 500 miles
those associated with monasteries were excused from 0 250 500 kilometers RUSSIAN EMPIRE
the taxes and labor service required of ordinary peo-
ple. Nor was the area flooded with Chinese settlers. MONGOLIA MANCHURIA
A
In parts of Mongolia, for example, Qing authorities X X X X XINJIANG (added 1697)
sharply restricted the entry of Chinese merchants and (added 1750s) Beijing TOKUGA
A AWA
other immigrants in an effort to preserve the area as a TIBET KOREA JAPAN
source of recruitment for the Chinese military. They (added 1720) Nanjing
East
QING
feared that the “soft” and civilized Chinese ways might NEPAL EMPIRE China
U
U
U
HU
Sea
erode the fighting spirit of the Mongols. MUGHAL BHUTAN Guangzhou TAIWAN
A A
The long-term significance of this new Qing EMPIRE BURMA (Canton) (added 1683)
A A A A A A A A A A A A A A
AOS
imperial state was tremendous. It greatly expanded LA South PACIFIC
China
D
ND
HA
the territory of China and added a small but import- THAILAND O O Sea OCEAN
AM
CAMBODIA
ant minority of non-Chinese people to the empire’s V VIETNAM
vast population (see Map 4.3). The borders of con-
temporary China are essentially those created during Map 4.3 China’s Qing Dynasty Empire
strayerap5e_04_m03_40930
the Qing dynasty. Some of those peoples, particularly After many centuries of intermittent expansion into Central
China’s Qing Dynasty
those in Tibet and Xinjiang, have retained their older Asia, the Qing dynasty brought this vast region firmly under its
First proof
control.
identities and in recent decades have actively sought
greater autonomy or even independence from China. 18p0 x 15p5 AP ®
Even more important, Qing conquests, together with the expansion of the COMPARISON
Russian Empire, utterly transformed Central Asia. For centuries, that region had Compare the pattern of
been the cosmopolitan crossroads of Eurasia, hosting the Silk Road trading network, Qing expansion with that
of Russia. What were
welcoming all the major world religions, and generating an enduring encounter similarities and
between the nomads of the steppes and the farmers of settled agricultural regions. differences in how the
Now under Russian or Qing rule, it became the backward and impoverished region two empires interacted
with conquered people?
known to nineteenth- and twentieth-century observers. Land-based commerce
across Eurasia increasingly took a backseat to oceanic trade. Indebted Mongolian AP ® EXAM TIP
nobles lost their land to Chinese merchants, while nomads, no longer able to herd Understand these
their animals freely, fled to urban areas, where many were reduced to begging. important effects of
The incorporation of inner Eurasia into the Russian and Qing empires “eliminated Chinese expansion
in the era ca. 1450–ca.
permanently as a major actor on the historical stage the nomadic pastoralists, who 1750.
had been the strongest alternative to settled agricultural society since the second ®
21
millennium [b.c.e.].” It was the end of a long era. AP
CAUSATION
How did the expansion
of Russia and China
Empires of the Islamic World transform Central Asia?
Finding the Main Point: How did Islamic empires in this period manage their
expansion and their interactions with diverse cultures?
Stretching across much of Afro-Eurasia, the enormous domain of Islam experienced
remarkable changes during the early modern era. The most notable change lay in
the political realm, for an Islamic civilization that had been severely fragmented
Uncorrected proofs have been used in this sample.
Copyright © Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers.
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