The suspension of construction on the Great Wall during Tang, Song and Yuan Dynasties

The feudal governments of the Tang, Song and Yuan Dynasties suspended the construction on the Great Wall. Their reasons were various.

Tang Dynasty was developed to the height of great prosperity and splendor of the feudal society in China. All nomadic tribes to the north and west of the Great Wall submitted to the authority of Tang Empire. The Empire then came a westward expansion into the wilderness of Central Asia, which was far beyond the border along the Great Wall, so that no neccessary to restore the Wall. Only 3 cities were erected to the south of Yinshan Mountain, which served the purpose to accept surrenders of those nomadic tribes. Those cities were connected with walls and spaced 400 li apart. Tang government also built Guazhou City in the west of Gansu Province. Although functionally similar, those constructtions could never match the Great Wall. Korea, the neighboring countr on the east border of Tang Empire, on the contrary, constructed a long wall, aiming to prevent the invasion of the Tang army. The Korean wall extended from the Fuyu, Kaiuan, Xinbin to the mouth of Datong River and measured 2000 li in length.

During Song Dynasty, the 16 Yanyun cities in north were under the ruling of Liao regime and Western Xia Dynasty captured the land to the west of the Yellow River. The governing area of Song was to the south of the Great Wall. Thus no construction work was carried into execution on the Wall. Only Yanmen Pass was erected to guard its northern frontier. The northern Liao and Jin Dynasty sprang up in succession afterwards. They invaded Song' s territory and occupied the vast land across the huai River, Han River, and even the land on the north bank of the Yangtze River. Song Dynasty narrowly survived on the southern part of the Yangtze River only and thus contributed nothing to the construction of the Great Wall. Frustrated by the afflictions and struggles with Mongolian and other nomadic tribes, the Liao and Jin Regime, constructed the Mingchang Wall, also nicknamed as Genghis Khan Wall. The wall totaled over 10,000 li. After the conquering of Liao and Song Dynasties, the Jin regime built 2 walls along the northwestern border with Mongolian. The ruins of Jin Walls indicates those constructions were large in scale at that time.

Yuan Dynasty boasted the widest boundary ever in Chinese history. Its territory bestrode Asian and European continents and expanded to the further north of the Great Wall. The ruling Mongolians were all nomadic people, so they never thought about the construction of the Great Wall. Thus came the hundreds of years' suspension on the Wall.

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