— by Tao Yuanming (Jin Dynasty) I build my hut among the haunts of men,Yet hear no noise of carts and horses there.You ask me how this can be so?When the heart is distant, the place itself grows remote.I pluck chrysanthemums beneath the eastern hedge,And idly gaze at the southern hills.The mountain air is…
— by Tao Yuanming (Jin Dynasty) From youth I had no taste for worldly ways,My nature loved the hills and mountains.By mistake I fell into the dusty net,And for thirty years I strayed.A caged bird longs for its former woods,A pond fish yearns for its native deeps.So now I clear wild land along the…
Tao Yuanming is remembered as the serene poet who “picked chrysanthemums beneath the eastern fence.” But his famous resignation was far more than a gesture of moral integrity. In an age when Ji Kang was executed at forty, Ruan Ji was broken by forced collaboration, and Lu Ji’s entire clan was wiped out, official…
Zu Ti’s Northern Expedition (313–321 CE) refers to the military campaign led by the Eastern Jin general Zu Ti across the Yangtze River to recover the Central Plains from non-Han regimes following the collapse of the Western Jin.
A series of three military campaigns launched by Huan Wen, a powerful general and de facto ruler of the Eastern Jin dynasty, between 354 and 369 CE, aimed at recovering the Central Plains from non-Han regimes that had occupied northern China after the collapse of Western Jin.
Xie An (320–385 CE) was a prominent statesman of the Eastern Jin dynasty. His courtesy name was Anshi, and he was a native of Yangxia, Chen Commandery (modern-day Taikang, Henan).
During the Eastern Jin Dynasty, there lived a distinguished minister named Xi Jian, who held the esteemed position of Grand Commandant. He had a beloved daughter, Xi Xuan, who had just reached a marriageable age. She was not only beautiful but also exceptionally talented. Xi Jian, doting on his daughter, was determined to find…