
Earthy Glories of Ancient China - wormold
http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2017/05/06/the-earthy-glories-of-ancient-china/
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restalis
_" the Chinese at least have a better claim than most people of being heirs to
a unified culture"_

That is, if you can count Chinese as one people in the first place. How can
one consider that loosely mass of over one billion people, with variegated
groups of cultures and (not long ago) mutually-unintelligible languages, to
have a common single heritage, without a politically forced inclusive
approach?

~~~
gumby
That's Baruma's point: though such claims are propagandistic and false (and he
says that nobody three millennia ago would have called themselves "Chinese" to
make it clear), there is at least a long-running thread, which is visible in
the exhibition.

Also, per your "common single heritage, without a politically forced inclusive
approach" \-- this is true of a country like, say, France, which is a
deliberate, forced creation of Louis XIII and Napolean. China is hardly alone
in this regard!

~~~
restalis
_" France, is a deliberate, forced creation of Louis XIII and Napolean"_

I disagree. On political, administrative, cultural and on many other levels,
all that territory had pretty much a monolithic evolution. Starting from the
first bits of recorded history, the territory of modern France was mostly
inhabited by Gallic tribes, which shared a common language and common customs.
Then Caesar came and conquered all the territory of modern France, i.e. it
shifted as a whole from the rule of free Gauls to that of Rome. OK, maybe
Attila with his Huns might have attacked only parts of modern France in his
struggle with Roman Empire, but he didn't left behind a lasting state to cause
divergent evolution for different parts of territory/population. Then Franks
came and occupied, again, _all_ of that territory, and from then on Kingdom of
France followed and lasted, except for relatively short periods, as a coherent
political entity that evolved over time into modern France. France happened
(and I strongly believe that it would have lasted even) without figures like
Louis XIII or Napoleon. Now compare this historical evolution of France with
what China has.

~~~
gumby
O oais, nos ancêtres les gaulles. The consolidation of the surrounding
kingdoms (Burgundy, Savoie, Aquitaine etc) was hardly preordained, and why
should, say, Savoy be French and Piedmont not (much less Corsica!)? The
consolidation of two of the three Frankish kingdoms was official state policy
pursued by a combination of sword and institutions (e.g. l'Academie Française
and the promulgation of a single French language with its concomitant
suppression of regional languages and their relegation to dialectical status).

Disclaimer: I have a degree in French history. Apologies for typos but the
spell corrector on this computer aggressively defaults to English.

