Institutions and Environment in Ancient Southern East Asia 3000 Bce - to 300 Ce

Over the past decades, archaeological exploration of southern China has shattered the image of primitive indigenous people and their pristine environments. It is known, for example, that East Asia's largest settlements and hydraulic infrastructures in the third millennium BCE were located in the Yangzi valley, as were some of the most sophisticated metallurgical centers of the following millennium. If southern East Asia was not a backward periphery of the Central Plains, then what created the power asymmetry that made possible 'China's march toward the Tropics'? What did becoming 'Chinese' practically mean for the local populations south of the Yangzi? Why did some of them decide to do so, and what were the alternatives? This Element focuses on the specific ways people in southern East Asia mastered their environment through two forms of cooperation: centralized and intensive, ultimately represented by the states, and decentralized and extensive, exemplified by interaction networks.

List of contents

1. Introduction; 2. Southern East Asia: geographical and environmental orientations; 3. Agricultural expansion, social complexity, and polity formation, 3000-1800 BCE; 4. Joining the Eurasian Bronze Age, 1800-1000 BCE; 5. States and networks: Southern East Asia meets China, 1000-250 BCE; 6. Southern East Asia in the Sinitic Empire, 250 BCE -300 CE; 7. Conclusion.

Product details

• Authors: Maxim Korolkov, Maxim (Universitat Heidelberg) Korolkov
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press ELT
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 31.01.2025
• EAN: 9781009507264
• ISBN: 978-1-0-0950726-4
• No. of pages: 94
• Series: Elements in Ancient East Asia
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > History > Regional and national histories; Non-fiction book > History > Miscellaneous; HISTORY / Asia / General, Social groups, South East Asia, Social issues & processes, Asian History, Archaeology by period / region, Institutions and learned societies: general, Social Integration and assimilation, Archaeological sites, Social groups, communities and identities, Institutions & learned societies: general