Table of Contents

Foreword: Old Wine in New Bottles, by Victor H. Mair
Introduction
Chapter 1. The Legacy of the Tuoba Xianbei: The Tang Dynasty
Chapter 2. From Mulan to Unicorn
Chapter 3. Brotherly Matters and the Canine Image: The Invasion of "Barbarian" Tongues
Chapter 4. The Huns and the Bulgars: The Chinese Chapter
Chapter 5. The Mystery of the "White-Drake" Oracle: The Iranian Shadows
Chapter 6. Son of Heaven and Son of God
Chapter 7. Bai Juyi and Central Asia
Appendix. Turkic or Proto-Mongolian? A Note on the Tuoba Language
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Acknowledgments

Promotional Information

Multicultural China in the Early Middle Ages exposes a number of long-hidden "foreign" elements in Chinese culture that represent the legacy of the Tuoba, a former nomadic group originally from central Asia.

About the Author

Sanping Chen is an independent scholar.

Reviews

"Sanping Chen's fine new work on the diversity of the first millennium of the Common Era in China is exactly what teachers and scholars of Chinese history need to be reading at the beginning of an even newer millennium. Chen begins with a startling title that immediately shakes the Confucian historiographical cobwebs with its modern sound. . . . Chen's arguments are both penetrating and backed by linguistic evidence and a thorough understanding of the key historical documents of his period."
*History: Reviews of New Books*

"Chen's work is a useful corrective and provides a nuanced perspective on China's history and culture in the first millennium C.E."
*Peter B. Golden, Rutgers University*