Paintings of the Ming and Qing Dynasties

China History Archive

From Prehistoric China to the Present Day

China Underground’s history archive gathers more than 250 articles and photo galleries covering the full span of Chinese history, from the ancient dynasties through the fall of the empire, the wars of the twentieth century, the Mao era and the decades of reform that followed.

The collection began with rare and restored photographs: Qing dynasty court life, the Boxer Rebellion, the Sino-Japanese wars, the Cultural Revolution and the transformation of China after 1978. Over the years it grew to include long-form interviews with historians, authors and photographers, book features and original research on subjects that rarely surface elsewhere online, from the secret societies and folk religions of imperial China to the everyday material culture of Republican-era Shanghai and the vanishing bathhouses of old Beijing.

The archive is organized here by historical period instead of sitting in a single undifferentiated feed, so a reader interested in a specific era, the late Qing dynasty, the Sino-Japanese War, the Cultural Revolution, can move straight to it. A separate section covers material that spans several periods or does not sit inside a strict timeline: Chinese folklore and mythology, ethnic minorities and border regions, and everyday cultural traditions.

Many of the images in this archive come from private collections, university archives and out-of-print publications, and several galleries document places, practices and communities that have since disappeared or changed beyond recognition: century-old bathhouses, rural circuses, walled cities, entire villages. The interviews add another layer to the same material: firsthand accounts from authors, researchers and people who lived through, or have spent years studying, the periods covered in the photographs.

Some of these pages date back to the earliest years of the site and were written when photo galleries carried most of the weight and text played a supporting role; others are recent and go into far more depth. Both kinds of pages sit side by side below, grouped by the period of Chinese history they cover rather than by publication date.

Browse by period

Ancient China: Prehistory to the Ming Dynasty

Prehistoric cultures, the early dynasties, classical philosophy and mythology, and imperial China before the Qing takeover in 1644.

The Qing Dynasty (1644-1912)

China’s last imperial dynasty: court life, the Opium Wars, the Boxer Rebellion, and the photographers and travelers who documented it.

The Fall of the Empire and the Republican Era (1895-1937)

The 1911 revolution, the Warlord Era, and the transformation of Chinese cities and society in the early twentieth century.

The Sino-Japanese War and World War II (1931-1945)

The Japanese invasion, the war years, and the Chinese and foreign communities that lived through them.

Civil War and the Mao Era (1945-1976)

The Communist takeover, the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and everyday life under Mao.

Reform Era and Contemporary China (1978-Present)

China after Deng Xiaoping’s reforms: the changes of the 1980s and 1990s, and the country as it is today.

Ethnic Minorities and Border Regions

The peoples, festivals and traditions of Yunnan, Tibet, Taiwan’s indigenous communities and other regions of China.

Culture, Mythology and Folklore

Chinese folk religion, mythology, secret societies, traditions and beliefs that do not sit inside a single historical period.

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