The revolts at the end of the Western Jin Dynasty by non-Chinese peoples living in North China soon ended in the division of North China - from sourthern Manchuria to the eastern oases of central Asia, and from Szechwan to Shantung - into several small kingdoms whoses ruling classes were most often natives of the northern and north-western borders. Thus the early fourth centry saw the opening of a period the political history of which is exremely confused. This period did not end until 439, when North China was reunited by the descendants of a Hsien-pei tribe. The various annexations, the successive emergence of new powers, and the frequent changes of capital - for example, between 407 and 431 the Hsai moved their political centre from northern Shensi to Hsi'an, then to T'ien-shui in eastern Kansu, and finally to the upper valley of the Ching, north-east of T'ien-shui - make any clear, connected narrative impossible. The multiplicity of racial groups, their degree of intermarriage with the Han Chinese, their varying stages of evolution - they were more or less sinicized and sedentary - add to the complexity of the political history. However, it is worth noting that these racial groups, which Chinese historians call the Five Barbarians (Hsiung-nu, Chieh, Hsien-pei, Ch'iang, and Ti) belong to two different peoples. The Ch'iang and the Ti were related to the Tibetans and Tangut of later ages, came from the north-western border, and spoke Sino-Tibetan languages. The other three tribes were descendants of the nomadic cattle-raisers of the steppes and their languages belonged to the group which includes Turkish, Mongolian and Tungus. It looks as if their forms of social and political organization were fairly different: the Ch'iang and the Ti were strangers to the aristocratic, tribal system of the nomads and seem to have had only a military organization.

These people - or, to be precise, their elites - thus combined thier own political and social traditions with large borrowings from Chinese concepts and institutions. Their ruling classes were so thoroughly sinicized that they regarded themselves as the heirs to the old political units of North China. The Hsiung-nu of Shansi adopted the name of the great Han dynasty, and ancient names from the period of the Warring States also reappeared in the fourth century: the Sixteen Kingdoms of the Five Barbarians bore the name of Ch'in in Shensi, of Chao in Shansi, and of T'en in Hopei and Shantung. The only exceptions were the kingdoms established in Kansu, which took the name of Liang (the modern Wu-wei) in the centre of this province. In the reigning families, intermarriage with the Han Chinese who formed the majority of the population was so frequent that it is impossible to distinguish between Chinese and non-Chinese. Thus no conclusions can be drawn from the fact that, of the sixteen kingdoms which succeeded each other in North China between the early years of the fourth century and 439, three are supposed to have been founded by families of Han origin: the Earlier Liang of 314-76, the Western Liang of 400-21 and the Northern Yen of 409-39.

The only outstanding event in the extremely confused political history of North China in the fourth century was the foundation of a big kingdom by a family of proto-Tibetan origin, that of the Earlier Ch'in (351-94). The greatest sovereign of this kingdom centred on Ch'ang-an, in the valley of the Wei, was Fu Chien (357-85), who succeeded in unifying North China during the years 370-76 into a powerful military state and even threatened the Western Chin empire in the valley of the Yangtze. According to tradition, in 382 Fu Chien mounted a formidable expedition against the South - the figures given by the historical texts, 600,000 infantry and 270,000 cavalry, are exaggerated - but suffered a decisive defeat on a river in central Anhwei. This was the famous battle of the Fei (383).

- Jacques Gernet (Re.1987). A History of Chinese Civilization