kingdom · China, Tibet and Mongolia

Southern Han

917 CE – 971 CE · capital Xingwang (Guangzhou)

A kingdom ruled from Guangzhou by the Liu family, rich from maritime trade but notorious for its cruelty and its vast corps of eunuchs.

Origins

Liu Yin, of a family that had grown wealthy in the southern trade, became military governor of Lingnan at Guangzhou late in the Tang. His brother Liu Yan inherited the post and in 917 proclaimed himself emperor of Great Yue, renaming the state Han in 918, with the capital renamed Xingwang.

Rule and society

Southern Han controlled modern Guangdong and Guangxi and grew rich on the sea trade with South-east Asia and the Indian Ocean, handled by Arab, Persian and other foreign merchants at Guangzhou. Its rulers were notorious for elaborate tortures and lavish palaces; under Liu Chang eunuchs numbered in the thousands and dominated government. In 938 its fleet was destroyed by Ngô Quyền at the Bạch Đằng river, ending Chinese rule in northern Vietnam.

Decline and legacy

In 971 a Song Dynasty army under Pan Mei invaded; Liu Chang burned his treasures and surrendered. He lived on at Kaifeng as a pensioned noble, and the far south was reunited with the rest of China.

Connections (2)

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Cite this page
APA
The Epoch Institute. (2026). Southern Han. In The Epoch Institute States Register. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/southern-han
MLA
“Southern Han.” The Epoch Institute States Register, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/southern-han. Accessed .
Chicago
The Epoch Institute. “Southern Han.” The Epoch Institute States Register. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/southern-han.
Harvard
The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Southern Han’, The Epoch Institute States Register. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/southern-han (Accessed: ).

Last reviewed October 2026Random state ↻