China has undergone epic changes over the past five hundred years. At the midpoint of the last millennium, Ming dynasty China was one of the engines of the world economy and a dynamic center of cultural, literary, and artistic production. Over the ensuing period, China witnessed a brutal and transformative conquest by a non-Chinese dynasty; a doubling of the empire’s size; a period of unprecedented economic and demographic growth during the eighteenth century; the most destructive rebellions in human history; colonial incursions by multiple Western nations; the demise of an imperial system over two millennia old; a period of widespread political and social experimentation and uncertainty; a tragic and debilitating war against Asia’s new preeminent power, Imperial Japan; a Communist revolution that dwarfed in size its Russian counterpart; a tumultuous period of Communist rule that has fluctuated between periods of unprecedented economic growth and chaos,