MING: 50 YEARS THAT CHANGED CHINA

The Ming Dynasty ruled China from 1368 to 1644, and its many achievements are the subject of a dazzling show, curated by Professor Craig Clunas of Oxford University and Jessica Harrison- Hall of The British Museum.

With its population of around 85 million, 15th-century Ming China was by far the largest state on the globe. As Professor Clunas writes in the catalogue, everything about it was on a grand scale: ‘It had a greater land area, bigger cities (and more big cities), bigger armies, bigger ships, bigger palaces, bigger bells, more literate people, more religious professionals.’

The exhibition opens with two magnificent scrolls: the earliest known painting of Nanjing, where the first Ming emperor, Zhu Yuanzhang, made his capital from 1368 to 1398, and a later 15th-century image of the Forbidden City in Beijing, which became the capital under the third Ming ruler, the Yongle emperor (1403-1424) – with the result that Mandarin, the local dialect, gained the predominant position it has to this day.

Having overthrown the previous Mongol rulers of China, Zhu Yuanzhang took the personal title Hongwu (Vast Military Power). Prolifically procreative, he fathered 16 daughters and 36 sons. These male heirs were dispatched to the provinces, where they played a hitherto underestimated part in projecting the dynasty’s image throughout China.

A fuller appreciation of the grandeur of these provincial courts has been made possible by excavations conducted in recent years. A selection of finds from tombs in Sichuan, Shandong and Hubei vividly illustrate the lavish lifestyle the princes enjoyed.

Blue-and-white porcelain was not a Ming invention, but during the Yongle emperor’s reign it reached new heights of refi nement, and the size of some orders given to the imperial kilns was staggering: one placed in 1433 was for 443,500 pieces.

The role of Middle Eastinspired designs and of cobalt from Iran in the perfection of blue-and-white porcelain are both telling indicators of another central initiative of the Ming emperors: the opening up of China to the wider world, well over half a century before Portuguese and Spanish ships appeared on the horizon. The desire to establish, internationally, the legitimacy of the dynasty’s rule in China and to exact recognition of its primacy in the entire hemisphere led to numerous trading and armed diplomatic expeditions, distributing luxury Chinese goods westwards and stimulating adventurous European navigators to set sail for the mythical regions of Cathay.

Until 5 January 2015 at the British Museum, Great Russell Street, London WC1: 020-7323 8299, www.britishmuseum.org