The Tang dynasty: the cosmopolitan golden age
The capital, Chang'an, was the largest city in the world, open to merchants, monks and ideas from all over Asia.
Under the Tang, China was a world power. Merchants from Persia, Sogdiana and India came along the Silk Road, and the capital Chang'an perhaps had a million inhabitants.
Art was colourful and cosmopolitan. Tomb figures in sancai ware – three colours, green, yellow and brown – show camels, horses and foreign merchants. Court painters painted emperors, horses and beautiful court ladies.
Poets such as Li Bai and Du Fu wrote under the Tang, and the poet and painter Wang Wei has been regarded as the father of landscape painting. Buddhism reached its height but was persecuted in 845.