#348 - Arrow War 2: Ashes of Perfect Brightness

Podcast: The History of China Podcast · Chris Stewart

Opublikowano: 2026-09-25

For two days in mid-October, ash fell like snow atop Beijing. All that remained of one of the greatest cultural storehouses in all of human history, put to the torch as an extremely personalized punishment... after everything not nailed down inside it had already been looted off, of course. But the man it was meant to punish... wasn't even there. He'd already slipped out the back door of the Forbidden City weeks before - leaving an opera troupe to play on and cover his escape, as he left his own capital behind to its conquerors for the last time. What...