Qin Shi Huang

Reign: 220 BCE – 209 BCE
Life: 258 BCE–209 BCE

By 221 BC, he had conquered all the other warring states and unified all of China, and he ascended the throne as China's first emperor. During his reign, his generals greatly expanded the size of the Chinese state: campaigns south of Chu permanently added the Yue lands of Hunan and Guangdong to the Sinosphere, and campaigns in Inner Asia conquered the Ordos Plateau from the nomadic Xiongnu, although the Xiongnu later rallied under Modu Chanyu. Qin Shi Huang also worked with his minister Li Si to enact major economic and political reforms aimed at the standardization of the diverse practices among earlier Chinese states. He is traditionally said to have banned and burned many books and executed scholars. His public works projects included the incorporation of diverse state walls into a single Great Wall of China and a massive new national road system, as well as his city-sized mausoleum guarded by a life-sized Terracotta Army.

During Qin Shi Huang's reign, Emperor Kōrei ruled Japan.

Want to learn more? Further reading

The First Emperor of China by John Man

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The World During Their Reign

The most notable rulers who held power elsewhere at the same time, from European courts to Ottoman, Mughal, and Chinese thrones.

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Go deeper on Qin Shi Huang

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The First Emperor of China

John Man

Man's popular biography of the unifier who gave China its name and its terracotta army.

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The Cambridge History of China, Vol. 1
Denis Twitchett & Michael Loewe
The scholarly foundation for Qin unification and the empire that outlasted its founder.
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