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| 256 B.C.E |
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| Qin deposed the last Zhou ruler and seized its lands. | 1 |
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| 231–221 B.C.E |
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| Qin emerged victor over the other states and unified the realm (221 B.C.E.). | 2 |
| Qin rulers had frequently employed advisors from different states to help reform and strengthen the region. The most famous was Gongson Yang (d. 338 B.C.E.) from Wei, also known as Lord Shang, who served as high counselor to the Qin, 356–338 B.C.E. His Legalist policies (See Legalism) helped strengthen Qin: he made the peasants freeholders who remitted taxes, built a bureaucratic administration, organized the populace into mutual surveillance groups, and instituted stringent laws. Lü Buwei (d. 238 B.C.E.) from Henan served as the Qin's chief counselor, 250–238 B.C.E.; and LI SI (d. 208 B.C.E.) from Chu became an important advisor from 237 B.C.E. He later became chief counselor and a major figure in building the Qin's Legalist state system. The Qin unifier, later to become known as QIN SHI HUANGDI (259–210, r. 247–210 B.C.E.) or “First Emperor of the Qin,”coined the term huangdi for “emperor.” | 3 |
| Society in the eastern Zhou was organized around nuclear families and stressed worship of ancestors, but warfare in the Spring and Autumn period and Warring States period brought about a decline of the older feudal order. By the Spring and Autumn period, the stress on lineage overcame the elite's earlier aristocratic roots. In the later Zhou centuries, great clans took up political roles, but these clans were largely destroyed in the Warring States period with the Qin later delivering the coup de grâce. The Qin sought complete central control over the entire realm and divided the country up into nuclear families who spied on one another, thus ensuring loyalty to the regime. With the decline of the great clans, commoners and non-natives found their way into high posts, such as the merchant Lü Buwei and the commoner Shen Buhai, indicating a trend that stressed individual merit over birth. China's population reached 50–60 million in this era; one record gives a population of 70,000 households for the state of Qi. Rulers needed satisfied troops for this era of warfare and were thus less rigid about class rankings than earlier and less harsh in land tenure arrangements. They also needed experts in administrative management and the like. This spawned generations of itinerant intellectuals, the Hundred Schools with their numerous responses to China's troubles. | 4 |
| As for the economy, the Zhou feudal manorial system had disintegrated by the later centuries of eastern Zhou. The Qin sought uniform standards for the whole populace. The size of “China” grew throughout the Zhou with new lands reclaimed and territorial expansion. The major irrigation projects date from mid-Zhou, as did such innovations in agriculture as the horse-drawn plow. Iron implements were introduced into agriculture and weaponry in the 5th century B.C.E. In the Warring States period, large foundries for casting iron produced a wealthy merchant class. Cities in the Spring and Autumn period and Warring States period became not only administrative centers, but industrial and commercial centers as well. Money grew in importance, although a barter economy remained largely intact; money was used for interregional trade. Cast-iron coins—in use from no later than the 5th century B.C.E.—were of many sorts and regionally minted. It was apparently so confusing that the Qin abolished them all for a standard currency. | 5 |
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