![]() However, the Mandate of Heaven philosophy carried on throughout ancient China. The Zhou ruled until 256 BCE, when the state of Qin captured Chengzhou. ![]() ![]() The Zhou needed to erase the various small states of prehistoric China from history, and replace them with the monocratic Xia Dynasty in order for their Mandate of Heaven to seem valid (i.e., to support the claim that there always would be, and always had been, only one ruler of China). The need for the Zhou to create a history of a unified China is also why some scholars think the Xia Dynasty may have been an invention of the Zhou. The gods’ blessing was given instead to the new ruler under the Zhou Dynasty, which would rule China for the next 800 years. In other words, the Zhou believed that the Shang kings had become immoral with their excessive drinking, luxuriant living, and cruelty, and so had lost their mandate. The Zhou claimed that their rule was justified by the Mandate of Heaven. Instead, rulers were expected to be good and just in order to keep the Mandate. Paradox’s artists have dipped into their history books for a fresh take on the uniforms and weaponry of China, Japan and their neighbors during the early modern era. The Mandate of Heaven did not require a ruler to be of noble birth, and had no time limitations. The armies of the east get a shiny new look in the new Content Pack for Europa Universalis IV: Mandate of Heaven. The Chinese character for “Tian,” meaning “heaven,” in (from left to right) Bronze script, Seal script, Oracle script, and modern simplified. ![]()
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