In 368, Zhu Yuanzhang, the Ming emperor, proclaimed himself emperor in Yingtianfu, with the title Daming. Because Ming Taizu's surname is Zhu, he is also called Zhu. In the early Ming Dynasty, the capital should be Tianfu. 142 1 year, moved the capital to Shuntianfu and established Nanzhili. At the beginning of Ming Dynasty, the national strength was strong, which created the prosperous times of Hongwu, Yongle, Ren Xuan and Hongzhi. National strength reached its peak and its territory was vast. In the middle and late period, political corruption and natural disasters led to the decline of national strength and the outbreak of large-scale civil strife. 1644, Li Zicheng went to Beijing, and Emperor Chongzhen Zhu Youjian hanged himself in Jingshan Park. The Ming imperial clan established the Nanming regime in the south of the Yangtze River, and then the Qing Dynasty took advantage of the chaos to enter the customs and defeated the peasant army and Nanming regime in Li Zicheng. 1662, Emperor Zhu Youlang of Li Yong was killed and Nanming fell. 1683, Taiwan Province province was captured by the Qing army, and the Ming and Zheng dynasties ended.
The territory of the Ming dynasty included the mainland 18 provinces. In the early years, the northeast tribes arrived in the Sea of Japan, and the outer Xing 'an Mountains and the Heilongjiang River Basin had suzerainty, and then contracted to the Liaohe River Basin. I arrived in the Gobi desert in the north at the beginning of the year and retreated to the Great Wall today. To Hami in northwest Xinjiang, and then to Jiayuguan; He once set fetters in Manchuria, Dongjiang and Tibet. During the reign of Emperor Chengzu of Ming Dynasty, Annan had a short recovery. 1424, the territory of the Ming dynasty reached about100000 square kilometers.
In the Ming Dynasty, handicrafts and commodity economy were developed, the economy was prosperous, and commercial market towns and capitalism sprouted. Art shows a trend of secularization. In terms of population, the recorded population of the Ming Dynasty was more than 70 million, but many scholars believe that it actually exceeded 654.38+0 billion, and some people pointed out that the population at the end of the Ming Dynasty was close to 200 million.
Ming Dynasty is another powerful Central Plains dynasty after Han, Tang and Song Dynasties. In the Ming Dynasty, there were no consorts of Han, no buffer regions of Tang, no coins of Song, the emperor protected the country and the king died. In the history books of the Qing Dynasty, the Ming Dynasty ruled the Tang and Song Dynasties, with the Han and Tang Dynasties as the distance.