Master of Memory: Accelerated learning, education, memorization - MMem 0506: Memorize a Chinese history timeline in 10 minutes

Episode Date: February 15, 2016

This episode provides a timeline of major events in Chinese history, showing how these can quickly and easily be memorized using a memory palace. What do you want to learn? Leave your question at http://MasterOfMemory.com/. Music credit: Maurice Ravel’s String Quartet, 2nd movement, performed by the US Army Band.

Master of Memory 506. Welcome to Master of Memory. I'm Timothy, and I'm here to answer your accelerated learning questions every day, and to inspire and empower you to learn anything you want to learn faster than ever. In this episode, I'll be presenting a timeline of Chinese history, kind of like the timelines for Swiss and English history that I've presented recently. So basically, I'll be presenting some significant years when major changes happened in China, and you can kind of fill in the details if you want.

You'll basically be creating a memory palace that will be flexible enough that you can put other dates in between these existing dates. Now unlike in previous Monday shows, this time I'm going to leave the memory palace to your imagination, although I will suggest number mnemonics and some general ideas for how to create your mnemonics. You want to choose a place, maybe just look around you right now at some place that you

can use for a memory palace, and include 10 stations because I'm going to choose 10 major years throughout Chinese history. Now, Chinese history is typically divided into ancient China, imperial China, and modern China. And basically, most of the dates that I've chosen are from imperial China, which covers two millennia. And I just have one date before that and one date after that. So the one date from ancient China that I've included is 1046 BC, which is when the Shang fall to the Cao. And the Cao is the longest lasting dynasty in all of China's history, which is why I've included them. So this is the year that their history started, the Cao dynasty. And after about 800 years of the Zhao dynasty being in charge,

the dynasty kind of dissolved and China was no longer united. But when they came into power was 1046. And so for Zhao, you want to think of something that'll work for you for that. I myself would think of a female pig. And then you're going to associate that in this location in the memory palace with dice for 1-0 and 4-6, which I would have be a rash. So you might have the dice have a rash. But I'm actually considering changing that object for roach as I did in episode 500 on learning the periodic table. So maybe a toy cockroach or something like that. But you have 1046 and you have the rise of the Cao dynasty. The next date is the year 221 BC and this is the very beginning of imperial China. So I'd suggest that you have this at the beginning of some major area where we're

going to store most of our dates so that you can remember that this is the opening of an era in China's history that will encompass two millennia. So we have 221 BC, and what happens is the emperor Qin, he has a longer name, but we're just going to call him Qin. He unites China and establishes himself as the emperor. So my mnemonic for Qin is a terracotta king. And that also helps me remember that his is the enormous tomb that still has yet to be excavated with all the terracotta soldiers and supposedly rivers of mercury and things like that guarding his tomb. Now the year is 221, so the objects are a snowball and a nut, and for me I just imagine that this terracotta king is throwing those two things at his enemies, a snowball and a nut. Next we have 589 AD,

and what happens is after Qin united China, it did kind of dissolve into separate kingdoms. In fact, quite a few separate kingdoms. But in 589, the Sui dynasty, or however you pronounce that, really united China again. And that was in 589. And so the objects are a whistle and a fob. And really, this Sui dynasty did not last very long, but it was very significant in the way that it united China again. And it really kind of paved the way for the Tang dynasty, which is the next major date, 618. This one lasts about 300 years, and it's considered China's golden age. So keep in mind that these are AD. So the 589 and the 618 are both AD, whereas the previous two years were BC. So obviously everything after this is going to be AD. So we have the Tang dynasty, and 618 would be a sage leaf, and then toffee or

taffy, whichever you prefer. So 618 is the Tang Dynasty, and this is the Golden Age of China. Next we have the year 907. So the Tang Dynasty falls and China is fragmented again, and that year is 907. So the objects are going to be a soap bar, so nine is soap, and then also a sock. So you can imagine maybe the sock kicking the soap into pieces. That's when China's golden age ends, or the Tang dynasty at any rate, and China's fragmented again. Between that date and our next date, many significant things happen, including the Mongol invasions. But the next date that we're going to set in stone in our memory palace is 1271, when one of the Khans, in fact, a grandson of Genghis Khan, proclaims the Yuan dynasty.

So China is unified again in the Yuan dynasty. And it's one of Genghis Khan's descendants who does that, so it's his grandson, and the year is 1271, so you want to think of a tuna can and a kite, and that represents this Mongol emperor basically establishing the Yuan dynasty in China. Next, in 1368, so a hundred years later, the Ming dynasty overthrows the Mongols because the Chinese weren't that happy about being ruled by the Mongols. So 1368 is going to be a dime and chaff. You're going to associate those with the Ming dynasty overthrowing the Mongol rule. Next, we have 1644, and the Qing dynasty is the last dynasty of imperial China. So if you think about it, we started with the Qin dynasty at the beginning, and our mnemonic was a king, so that may be confusing, but just think

about it this way. We had Qin at the beginning of Imperial China and Qin at the end. So you just add the G to show that it's matured more. So it kind of bookends the Imperial China. We have the Qin Dynasty at the end and the Qin Dynasty at the beginning. Now the year that the Qing dynasty comes to power is 1644, so we have a tissue and a rare stake. So you just imagine wrapping a stake up in a tissue and associating that with the last dynasty that China has. Now this dynasty actually lasts quite a long time, including through the Taiping Rebellion, which is our next major date. The beginning of the Taiping Rebellion was in 1851, and this was the most deadly war of the 19th century. So think about this. This is the Chinese Civil War in 1851. Well, it started in 1851. It lasted quite a while, it resulted in 20 million deaths. And by contrast, the American Civil War right afterwards had fewer than 1 million deaths. So this is a pretty big civil war.

That's the Taiping Rebellion. And the year is 1851. So think of taffy or toffee. And 51 is a wallet. Place those two things in your memory palace to represent the Taiping rebellion. Then our final date of course is 1912 when the People's Republic of China was formed ending two millennia of dynastic rule. So the objects are a tuba and a tuna can. So if you imagine the tuba is playing along being big old China for two millennia this This tuba has been playing,

and then the People's Republic of China just stuffs a tuna can into the tuba, stopping it entirely from playing. So there you go, a general layout of dates in Chinese history from the last 3,000 years. Now, I would suggest that once you have this memory palace created and all of these dates pretty solid, I would suggest that you practice by giving yourself just a variety of dates, maybe generated at random from random.org, and see how quickly you can remember in what period China was during that date. Like if I said 1850, you would remember that that's during the Qing Dynasty, the last dynasty, right before the Taiping Rebellion. Or if I say the year 1000, you're going to remember that it's during the fragmentation of China after the Tang Dynasty fell. Obviously, there are a lot more details to Chinese history than this. There are several centuries that I've left pretty much blank, but you can fill them in once you have these general landmark years and events solidified in your memory palace.

Tomorrow's episode is going to present a complete system for memorizing Greek letters, including capital and lowercase forms, and how you pronounce the letters. Meanwhile, what do you want to learn? The world's knowledge can be yours. Leave your learning request at masterofmemory.com slash question and I'll talk to you again soon.