East Asia · The Sixteen Kingdoms and the Northern and Southern dynasties
Northern Wei
386–535
The Northern Wei (386–535), founded by the Tuoba Xianbei (Tuoba Gui, Emperor Daowu), reunified all of northern China by 439 (under Emperor Taiwu), ending the Sixteen Kingdoms and inaugurating the Northern Dynasties. Emperor Xiaowen (r. 471–499) moved the capital to Luoyang (494) and enacted sweeping sinicization (Chinese surnames, dress, language).
- Existed
- 386–535
- Shown on the map
- AD 387–533
- Peak area
- 1.2M km²
- Region
- East Asia
Overview
The Northern Wei (386–535), founded by the Tuoba Xianbei (Tuoba Gui, Emperor Daowu), reunified all of northern China by 439 (under Emperor Taiwu), ending the Sixteen Kingdoms and inaugurating the Northern Dynasties. Emperor Xiaowen (r. 471–499) moved the capital to Luoyang (494) and enacted sweeping sinicization (Chinese surnames, dress, language). It sponsored monumental Buddhist art (Yungang and Longmen grottoes). The Six Frontier Garrisons revolt led to its split (534–535) into Eastern and Western Wei.
Common questions
- What was Northern Wei?
- The Northern Wei (386–535), founded by the Tuoba Xianbei (Tuoba Gui, Emperor Daowu), reunified all of northern China by 439 (under Emperor Taiwu), ending the Sixteen Kingdoms and inaugurating the Northern Dynasties. Emperor Xiaowen (r. 471–499) moved the capital to Luoyang (494) and enacted sweeping sinicization (Chinese surnames, dress, language).
- When did Northern Wei exist?
- Northern Wei existed 386–535. On this map it is drawn AD 387–533.
- How large was Northern Wei?
- At its greatest extent drawn on this map, Northern Wei covered about 1.2 million km². That is the largest area the border data gives it across the years it is drawn, not necessarily its greatest extent in history.
Sources
This compendium cites its sources once for the whole document rather than per territory. Its bibliography names the English Wikipedia article for each polity as the basis of these profiles, supplemented by Encyclopaedia Britannica, chinaknowledge.de, the World History Encyclopedia, museum and university sources, and the academic works it lists. The article this entry is anchored on:
- Wikipedia — Northern Wei en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Wei
This entry was last updated .
This entry was researched and drafted with AI from the sources above, and has not been reviewed by a historian. How entries are made
Text available under CC BY-SA 4.0: reuse it with a credit to The World Through Time and a link to this page. Passages drawing on the Wikipedia articles listed above are also licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 by their contributors.
Border geometry for the map itself comes from Cliopatria v0.12 (Seshat Global History Databank, CC-BY-4.0).
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