James Baquet

The Battle of the Northern Desert (“Mobei”) was a confrontation between China’s Han Dynasty (202B.C.-220) and the somewhat mysterious marauding northern people known as the Xiongnu.

The contrast between the civilized Han and the nomadic Xiong-nu is a prototype of the so-called “Hua-Yi Distinction,” also called the “Sino-Barbarian Dichotomy,” which distinguishes the Chinese (“Hua”) from the “Yi”: Though charitably translated “foreigner,” it carries the connotation of “barbarian.”

After the failure of a 200 B.C. assault on the Xiongnu, these “barbarians” were kept at bay over the next 70 years through marriage alliances and the giving of gifts (and early versions of the Great Wall).

However, in 129 B.C., Emperor Wu of Han decided that the nation was ready to deal with the Xiongnu head-on. After 10 years of continuous victories, large tracts of land were recovered for the Han.

The Xiongnu then withdrew to the north of the Gobi Desert, using the wasteland as a sort of natural “wall.” But in 119 B.C., Emperor Wu sent a massive expedition with over 100,000 cavalry and double that in infantry. The forces were deployed in two columns of equal size. Those in the east (Dai Prefecture, in northern Hebei) were led by Huo Qubing, whose superior troops made quick work of the Xiongnu under the “Tuqi King.”

Wei Qing’s forces in the west (Dingxiang, south of modern Hohhot in Inner Mongolia) had a harder time of it, as the main Xiongnu force was here, rather than in the east as anticipated. Nevertheless, after taking up defensive countermeasures under a Xiongnu cavalry charge of some 10,000 horses, Wei Qing effected a stalemate which lasted until dusk. When a massive sandstorm struck, the Han were able to encircle the Xiongnu in the low visibility, and over 19,000 of the Xiongnu’s 80,000 men were killed that night. The remainders fled, were pursued, and were besieged in a fortress which the Han subsequently burned to the ground.

The Xiongnu were forced to move farther north, and in time split into southern and northern branches. The southern branch became subordinate to the Han; the northern Xiongnu ultimately became the Huns.

Vocabulary:

Which words above mean:

1. division into two parts

2. area of barren land

3. opposing actions

4. darkening time around sunset

5. held back

6. original model

7. kindly

8. expected, looked for

9. situation in which neither side can advance

10. raiding, plundering