The last dynasty to rule China. Its emperors were Manchus. In 1644 a Ming general, Wu Sangui, invited Manchu Bannermen massed at Shanhaiguan, the undefended eastern end of the Great Wall of China, to expel the bandit chieftain Li Zicheng from Beijing. The Bannermen occupied the city and proclaimed their child-emperor ‘Son of Heaven’. Resistance continued for up to 30 years in south China. Chinese men were forced to braid their long hair into a queue or ‘pigtail’. But Qing rule differed little from that of Chinese dynasties. It emphasized study of the Confucian classics and the Confucian basis of society (see confucianism). The empire of China reached its widest extent, covering Taiwan, Manchuria, Mongolia, Tibet, and Turkistan. The Qing regarded all other peoples as barbarians and their rulers as subject to the ‘Son of Heaven’, and were blind to the growing pressure of the West. Under Kangxi (1654–1722) and Qianlong (1736–96) China was powerful enough to treat the outside world with condescension.

Thereafter, however, the authority of the dynasty was reduced. Faced with major internal revolts, most notably the Taiping Rebellion (1850–64) and a succession of Muslim uprisings in the far west, the Qing proved unable to contend simultaneously with increasing intrusions from western powers interested in the economic exploitation of China. Humiliating defeat in the Sino-Japanese War (1894–95) and the Boxer Rising (1900) weakened Qing power, and after the Chinese Revolution of 1911, the last Qing emperor Puyi was forced to abdicate in 1912.