FIRES ALONG THE BORDER

While the Tang Dynasty (唐朝, 618 CE to 907 CE) is rightly considered one of China’s golden ages, because of the huge amount of art and literature that was created during the long prosperous years of peace under able emperors, there were always pockets of flame flickering here and there in the empire. Not all the barbarians brought under the imperial sway were equally pleased to be part of the most cosmopolitan society that existed on earth, nor were some of them even remotely capable of appreciating the warm embrace of civilization.


THE PESTILENTIAL SCOURGE

This is not surprising, when you consider that many malcontents were Turks. Their ancestors had assaulted the borders for over a millennium, bent on slaughter, rapine, and pillage. It wasn’t till very many generations after the fall of Tang that some Turkish tribes would actually acquire a written language and more acceptable manners.
During the eighth and ninth centuries they were still vicious savages happily despoiling all settled societies within reach.

The Chinese frontier, even during the height of Tang power, always tempted confederacies of horse-borne brigands, who would search out weak spots, and strike at opportune moments. Sometimes they succeeded in breaking through the wall, and laid waste to entire provinces.

Yes, I know. It isn’t politically correct to talk about an ethnic group in such disparaging terms. Even the Turks.
But were it not for their greed, bloodlust, depraved savagery, and brutal opportunism, the thousand mile wall to keep them out would never have been necessary, let alone built.  The Great Wall more than anything else preserved China, and persuaded the heathen desert demons to expand westward, where their descendants eventually raped Russia, destroyed the Caliphates, and conquered Byzantium.

Until the extermination of the Zhungar Khanate by the Ching under Chienlung (乾隆帝) in 1755, which served as a splendid object-lesson to the other wasteland terror-ethnicities, the eastern Turks and Turco-Mongols were kept at bay at best, feared as inhuman monsters at worst.
The three thousand year struggle to keep the heartland from being ravaged by the barbarians beyond the wall occupied the government of every dynasty, created an undying cultural memory of threat and immense sacrifice, and also inspired great literature.
That last far outweighs any contribution from the other side.
Whose impact worldwide has been mostly desolation.

Now, having riled up your liberal sentiments, possibly offended you (ESPECIALLY if you are a cultural relativist, a socialist, or simply ignorant), and having also perhaps insulted your ancestors, if you have the ghastly bad karma to actually be descended from the bestial hordes, here are a few lines of poetry from the height of the Tang period that express beautifully what the long frontier meant to the Chinese.


隴西行 LUNG-SAI HANG
陳陶

誓掃匈奴不顧身, 五千貂錦喪胡塵。
可憐無定河邊骨, 猶是深閨夢裡人。

Sai sou hung-nou bat gu san, ng-chien diu-gam song wu-chan;
Ho-lin mo-ding ho pin gwat, yau si sam-gwai mung-leui yan.

THE TURKESTAN CAMPAIGN
By Chan Tou (Chen Tao)
"Sworn to crush the Hsiungnu without considering themselves, five thousand clad in fur and silk lie buried in the Tatar dust;
How pitiable, those bones by the river of shifting sands, that still populate their widows' dreams."

[Notes: 匈奴 hung nou: an ancient term for the barbarians; 'Hun'. 貂錦 diu-gam: sable and silk, metaphorically the splendid accoutrements of imperial service. 可憐 ho-lin: how sad, how pitiable! 深閨夢 sam-gwai mung: dreams in the women's quarters. ]


夜上受降城聞笛 YE SEUNG SAU HONG SENG MAN DAK
李益

回樂峰前沙似雪, 受降城外月如霜。
不知何處吹蘆管, 一夜征人盡望鄉。

Wui lok fung chin saa chi suet, sau-hong seng-ngoi yuet yu seung;
Pat-chi ho chyu cheui lou gun, yat ye jing-yan cheun mong heung.

AT NIGHT HEARING A FLUTE ON THE CITY WALL AT SHOU-HSIANG
By Lei Yik (Li Yi)
"The sands before Hui-Le Peak seem like snow, beyond Accept-Surrender city the moon shows frost;
Not knowing from where the flute sound comes, all night long recruits think of home."


征人怨 JING -YAN YUEN
柳中庸

歲歲金河復玉關, 朝朝馬策與刀環。
三春白雪歸青塚, 萬里黃河繞黑山。

Seui-seui gam ho fu yuk gwaan, chiu-chiu maa-chaak yu dou-waan;
Saam cheun pak suet gwai ching chung, maan lei wong ho yiu haak saan.

A SOLDIER'S RESENTMENT
By Lau Jung-yung (Liu Zhongyong)
"Year upon year returning to the Jade Pass, age after age of horsewhips and sword hilts;
Three springtimes now snow has blanketed green graves, for a thousand miles the Yellow River girds Black Mountain."

[Notes: Dense visual imagery posed in contrast - snow versus the grasses growing on tombs, as ceaselessly the troops come to guard the frontier; though just the latest recruits in this eternal war, the writer states that for three years they has seen the seasons shift here, but the heartland (Huang Ho: 'Yellow River') will remain constant and timeless.]


AFTERWORD

The phonetic transcription I have given is based on the Cantonese language. This is fitting not only because many of the Chinese in San Francisco speak Cantonese, but also because the Cantonese are the only group to refer to themselves as 'Men of Tang' (Tong yan: 唐人), and their language as 'Tang-speech' (Tong-wa: 唐話).
It is also suitable, because the poetry of that era still mostly rhymes when voiced in their language, the last and greatest descendant of the koine of Tang

The barbarians are yet at the gates, by the way. But they are vastly outnumbered now, and have become rather less relevant since the conquest of Chinese Turkestan (Xinjiang: 新疆) by the Ching Dynasty.
Other than occasional outbursts of irredentist violence, they have no significance.


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