Xuzhou - The Most Fought-After City in China

[@yujeffrey]

Really interesting to see these videos focused on more interesting local history and geography of regions that generally get less attention. I like your history + geography videos, but these are really interesting also. I haven’t seen that much KZbin content on Chinese regions other than the genre of “tourist visits Beijing/Shanghai/Shenzhen and tries the street food!”. Really top-notch content and I look forward to your next video!

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks, appreciate the support! I'm working on a lot more right now, and looking forward to uploading them once they are done.

[@laturnich9507]

Thank you for another very interesting video. This was a subject I knew almost nothing about so it's great to be able to learn more about it. One thing that came to mind while watching this is that it might be good to go into more depth about the structure and composition of the armies involved. I think most internet history nerds have at least a general idea of what a Greek Phalanx or a Roman Legion looks like and how it works, but beyond some probably not super accurate portrayals in Chinese movies, I don't really have a very good idea of what a Chinese Imperial army looks like in terms of how troops are equipped, how units are organized, or how the command is structured. I'm sure I'm not the only one so that could potentially be a worthwhile topic to dig into. Could maybe also cover how trustworthy some of the enormous troop counts reported in the sources are and how states were able to field and supply such massive armies.

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks again for your thoughtful feedback as usual. I agree this is definitely a topic I should delve more into, especially with the Medieval Chinese History series I'm currently working on. I'll probably slowly introduce more and more discussions on these topics in the series, and in the future I can work up to doing a few videos on specific topics like polearms, siege engines, city wall construction, etc...

[@yuytbe]

You’d be absolutely right. I don’t even watch the Chinese movies to have that fuzzy idea you describe.

[@grabbers6520]

@@gatesofkilikien I would also love to see this!

[@R_Haas]

These videos are fantastic. With a Dutch academic historical bachelor, non-modern eastern history has always been out of the scope of my studies. These videos provide a fantastic insight in Chinese history. I specifically appreciate your focus on Geographics and its influence on economic, political en social developments. This has greatly improved my understanding of Chinese development and internal relations and development. Keep up the good work!

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks, glad you've found it helpful, and appreciate the feedback! I love geography and feel that being able to visualize it it is such a fundamental part of understanding history, so hopefully this video and future ones, especially with the topographical maps, can provide more context on why certain patterns of development or political events panned out the ways they did.

[@Notnick04726]

I lived in Xuzhou for 3 and a half years and even speak xuzhou dialect. Downtown is still called 彭城一号, miss my Chinese hometown

[@gatesofkilikien]

That's quite cool you have a connection to this area, and I hear the food there is incredible (hearty, spicy, if that's your thing). So many Chinese cities like Xuzhou, as with elsewhere in the world too, still have these cool local names that provide connections with the past.

[@Notnick04726]

@@gatesofkilikien the local specialty of 地锅鸡 is fantastic, I always make sure to eat some when I go there or an area near by. Xuzhou food just has the perfect mix of spicy and numbing spice 辣和麻辣. I live in shanghai now for work and honestly you can’t find any proper shandong or xuzhou food it’s sad.

[@Telopead]

Excellent job. KZbin has became so dumbed down for entertainment that I’m kinda surprised this kind of content creator still exists. 听的津津有味。加油！

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks, glad you've enjoyed it!

[@xXxSkyViperxXx]

Xuzhou or Pengcheng was also the site of the ancient capital of the Huai Yi states before in ancient antiquity times. the Dong Yi, Huai Yi, Nan Yi were likely the ancient ancestors of the Proto-Japonics, which were defeated around over 2k years ago and eventually many migrated away and those that remained eventually got assimilated. they migrated away by sailing to the korean peninsula by supposedly looking for Mt. Hōrai / Penglai, eventually many landed in the area of where the medieval Paekche, Kaya, Tamna were which later centuries, also triggered the Yayoi migrations to Kyushu and all of Japan and Ryukyu

[@despro8088]

astronesian languages people. that's why now japanese people are very chinese in DNA

[@sivelti3914]

I really liked this more locally focused look at the Chinese history. Great video!

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks, glad you enjoyed it!

[@LOLMAN9538]

Xuzhou was actually a strategic point for lords and other infantry traveling from either Xuchang or Jianye to Xiapi.

[@膜法师-b6g]

徐州地方，历代大规模征战五十余次，是非曲折难以论说，但史家无不注意到，正是在这个古战场，决定了多少代王朝的盛衰兴亡、此兴彼落，所以古来就有问鼎中原之说。

[@wheezysqueezebox7651]

This video is so packed with information, I'm definitely going to need to watch it again! Probably more than once...

[@Veldtian1]

If you're going to watch it again, or again after the second time, that'll be definitely more then once.🤔

[@MPTW1]

Great video. Keep it up!

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks, will do!

[@Jinke888]

Excellent work

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thank you!

[@Miguelitojones1]

your topographic map is such a delight to look at

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks, I try my best to make good accurate maps, glad to hear you like them!

[@Miguelitojones1]

@@gatesofkilikien I'm no cartographer but I'm autistic and have loved maps since age 3 lol it's honestly the best I've seen for understanding the general implications of topography on human society. I also really like M. Laser's maps, they're quite similar to yours in that regard

[@ryanmbira3968]

很有意思，非常感谢！

[@Wakobear.]

Fascinating. If the yellow river's changing course caused so much damage, couldn't it have been possible to dredge up the old channel and force it back to its northern course?

[@gatesofkilikien]

Yes I suppose it would have been possible, and that's essentially what happened in the 1800s when the Yellow River flooded again and this time took the course of another preexisting river. The central issue though was that the Ming and Qing Dynasties were focused on keeping the Grand Canal open, and any northward disruption of the Yellow River would jeopardize the Grand Canal. So they basically forced the Yellow River to keep its southerly course at all costs. The other factor to consider is that they could have just shipped grains from the Yangtze Delta to Beijing by sea, foregoing the need for the Grand Canal completely. But due to a lot of political reasons the priority was to keep the Grand Canal open at all costs, even if ocean navigation was orders of magnitude cheaper. But to keep the Grand Canal open all kinds of suboptimal decisions had to be made regarding the Yellow River and the Huai River, leading to an ecological disaster across the entire region that's still being felt today.

[@SuperFeeltheburn]

It's really amazing how china sustained its population throughout its history because of the central plain's location and agricultural importance. Very cool, a very flat and almost featureless area yet full of rich history. Its sad that China isn't really much talked about in terms of its rich history in the west. Thank you for this video, Its refreshing to learn something aside from "social-credit system" and "china bad" 😂😂 Keep it up man! Great and informative content.

[@Veldtian1]

The CCP is not the China this vid is referencing, the CCP is a foreign socio/political cancer that has systematically obliterated almost every trace of actual Chinese history and culture, unlike Taiwan..

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks! Yes the historiography of China goes back far enough that just about any random spot in this region could trace its history back thousands of years, and the amount of information available (almost all solely in Chinese) is overwhelming. Xuzhou in particular is extremely famous, and with this video I've only just scratched the surface of everything that took place around it. Appreciate the support, and I'm currently working on various other videos on Chinese history too.

[@Feibie]

Man keep these videos coming

[@gatesofkilikien]

Definitely, will do!

[@cooldude-on9gm]

good stuff, i'm really enjoying your videos, very interesting and useful for someone interested in chinese history. it'd be awesome though if you did a video about the tang dynasty at some point, without a doubt it is one of the most important periods of chinese history, yet there is not so much about it on the english speaking side of youtube.

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks, I'm really glad to hear you've found this info helpful. I plan to do a whole series on medieval Chinese history. I'm in the middle of the period of disunity from 100s-500s right now, but after that the next sections in the series would be the Sui and Tang Dynasties. I'm also in the planning stages for a concurrent series on ancient Chinese history that takes place from the early beginnings to the fall of the Han Dynasty, so between these two series and some additional projects I want to work on in the meantime it might be some time before the series reach the Tang Dynasty, especially the latter half of the Tang Dynasty. In the meantime I can include more snippets about the Tang Dynasty in videos like the geography videos. The first half of the Tang Dynasty can be a bit boring unless the narrative delves deeper into court politics, and the second half is by far one of the most chaotic, convoluted periods in Chinese history, but even then there should be plenty of topics I can fit into the geography videos. Are there also any specific topics about the Tang Dynasty that you'd be interested in my discussing down the line?

[@planescaped]

I'd like a video on the history of Liangshan Marsh. I know the area these days is all farmland since the marsh was drained hundreds of years ago. But the marsh was a big part of the central plains as far as I know and important in times other than just the Song dynasty. It just seems wild to me that the entire wetlands area was wiped out so long ago.

[@gatesofkilikien]

It's something I can talk about eventually as I get to the Song/Yuan dynasties. There's been a ton of changes to the geography in the region with the way the Yellow River changed its courses, so would be a pretty complicated/technical subject, but still good to discuss given how famous it is.

[@dinosaursnack]

Another great video. Did they rename the city because the old name had an association with the previous dynasty/rulers, like New Amstersam getting renamed New York when the English took over the colony from the Dutch?

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks, and great thought - it's certainly something that's happened many times in Chinese history. In this case though the reason was much more boring and technical, basically during the Sui and Tang Dynasties the commanderies (with names like "Pengcheng") got converted into prefectures (with names ending in "Zhou", like Suzhou, Hangzhou, etc...). There's a lot of reasons behind the change and I'm planning to explain it in a different video on how Chinese administrative divisions work. My early draft for this video on Xuzhou had a partial explanation but it was just too complicated to include with everything else for this video.

[@eugeneng2721]

Chinese city names could also be a good video too. Heck, you can make it into a long series. That's because Chinese cities can get renamed a lot throughout history.

[@noahpeng1689]

Pengcheng is the name of this city, and Xuzhou is the name of the province where it is located. In thousands of years of language habits, people gradually became accustomed to calling the city Xuzhou, and it became the official name.

[@ammm8558]

I’ve been trying to find books on this period in Chinese history do you have any recommendations by chance I know you link sources in some videos but not sure if it’s the same source for each one

[@gatesofkilikien]

It's not about Xuzhou in particular, although I'm reading the book "Medieval Chinese Warfare 300-900" and so far it seems quite good. Most of my research has been in Chinese though, so in general it's hard for me to recommend English books, although I'm beginning to make a list of good English books that perhaps I can eventually compile into a recommended books list.

[@alexmarshall942]

I would really love to see a series like this on Europe or America 🙏

[@gatesofkilikien]

Yes I've also been working on videos for ancient Greece and Rome and have 2 uploaded so far, although lately Chinese history has taken most of my time so I haven't been able to work on them as much.

[@eugeneng7064]

I didn't realise the importance of the victory at Tai'erzhuang until I watched this video

[@hongdong3718]

great video

[@gatesofkilikien]

Thanks!

[@mmhoss]

basically new york in marvel comics

[@TTminh-wh8me]

I thought Xiangyang was the most fought-after city in China before watching this video.

[@gatesofkilikien]

Yeah Xuzhou and Xiangyang are basically 1a and 1b in terms of most fought after cities in China, although Xuzhou probably edges out Xiangyang since a lot of battles fought near Xuzhou get lumped in together with it, and Xuzhou was a lot more significant in the 20th Century than Xiangyang was. I've started to write a draft for a video on Xiangyang, but am still some ways off from finishing it.

[@zainmudassir2964]

Wow lot of fighting

[@bosbanon3452]

Can you make how Liu Bei and Lu Bu lose there??

[@jansenjunaedi4926]

This a definition of one city to rule them all.

[@onthihocky5666]

I have a friend from XuZhou and his name is Liu PengCheng 😆

[@ahumpierrogue137]

Obviously this is highly speculative, but if Liu Yu capitalized on his campaign to take Chang'an could he have reunified china in the name of the Jin? Or was it just a short lightning raid doomed to give up the territory.

[@gatesofkilikien]

Most sources I've read suggest he did mean to hold on to the conquered territories, especially since he left his son plus an all-star lineup of generals in charge. It took some self-destruction of epic proportions for the Jin army to lose Guanzhong. Fighting Northern Wei on the open plains Hebei would have been Liu Yu's biggest challenge, but then the local elites on the North China Plain may have preferred to collaborate with him rather than the Tuoba Xianbei, not to mention that had he kept Guanzhong and reinforced his presence there, plus kept his experienced generals and soldiers alive, it would have put him in a much better position to attack Northern Wei. Ultimately though he would just have to have had lived 10 more years.

[@mihaelbitola3812]

Cao cao was furious when Liu bey have taken Xuzhou from him 😂😂.

[@T1000579]

Did Cao Cao massacred the people of Xuzhou at the end of the Han Dynasty as well? This event is very famous in Three Kingdoms Period

[@bosbanon3452]

Tao Qian was beaten do badly by Cao Cao the warlord who the only warlord came from the central Plain

[@Jc-yu2ot]

Let me know when you start teaching at a university. I will sign up for class

[@gatesofkilikien]

Haha thanks, glad you've enjoyed the content and found it helpful :)

[@wischfulthinking]

Mahalo

[@denniskay9486]

The former capital of xichubawang Xiang yu.

[@Discotekh_Dynasty]

Ah so it’s Chinese Berwick-Upon-Tweed

[@cnuseryc]

徐州人路过

[@xiongmaoa2793]

The area around Xuzhou was a dangerous area in ancient times (Most dangerous of China proper), because it is full of cannibal bandits, and the Water Margin also depicts its society, which was sinicized very late (2500 years). Before that, they spoke Dongyi language ( some Proto-Austronesian)

[@abc-id1sq]

江东子弟多才俊，卷土重来未可知