Chapter 19 - Southern Material Culture

Summary

During the Six Dynasties, much as in the North, the South was also subject to enormous changes in the composition of its population. Even before the fall of the Western Jin, large parts of the northern elite lineages fled south in several waves of migration that would last until the mid-fifth century. In the South, the refugees found themselves a minority in an unfamiliar environment, but they still maintained control of what remained of their state; in 317, Jiankang (modern-day Nanjing) was established as the capital of what we term the Eastern Jin. But Jiankang was not the only destination of the northern refugees. Some chose the middle reaches of the Yangzi, or settled in the southeastern coastal regions, while some headed even further south toward modern Guangzhou. These population movements clearly manifest themselves in the archaeological evidence.