and canals, they suffered from climatic and natural conditions to which they were unaccustomed.  Their main strength was still in cavalry; and they came to grief.  The supplies and reinforcements for the vast army failed to arrive in time; units did not reach the appointed places at the appointed dates.  The southern troops under the supreme command of Hsieh Hsuean, far inferior in numbers and militarily of no great efficiency, made surprise attacks on isolated units before these were in regular formation.  Some they defeated, others they bribed; they spread false reports.  Fu Chien’s army was seized with widespread panic, so that he was compelled to retreat in haste.  As he did so it became evident that his empire had no inner stability:  in a very short time it fell into fragments.  The south Chinese had played no direct part in this, for in spite of their victory they were not strong enough to advance far to the north.

3 The fragmentation of north China

The first to fall away from the Tibetan ruler was a noble of the Mu-jung, a member of the ruling family of the “Earlier Yen dynasty”, who withdrew during the actual fighting to pursue a policy of his own.  With the vestiges of the Hsien-pi who followed him, mostly cavalry, he fought his way northwards into the old homeland of the Hsien-pi and there, in central Hopei, founded the “Later Yen dynasty” (384-409), himself reigning for twelve years.  In the remaining thirteen years of the existence of that dynasty there were no fewer than five rulers, the last of them a member of another family.  The history of this Hsien-pi dynasty, as of its predecessor, is an unedifying succession of intrigues; no serious effort was made to build up a true state.

In the same year 384 there was founded, under several other Mu-jung princes of the ruling family of the “Earlier Yen dynasty”, the “Western Yen dynasty” (384-394).  Its nucleus was nothing more than a detachment of troops of the Hsien-pi which had been thrown by Fu Chien into the west of his empire, in Shensi, in the neighbourhood of the old capital Ch’ang-an.  There its commanders, on learning the news of Fu Chien’s collapse, declared their independence.  In western China, however, far removed from all liaison with the main body of the Hsien-pi, they were unable to establish themselves, and when they tried to fight their way to the north-east they were dispersed, so that they failed entirely to form an actual state.

There was a third attempt in 384 to form a state in north China.  A Tibetan who had joined Fu Chien with his followers declared himself independent when Fu Chien came back, a beaten man, to Shensi.  He caused Fu Chien and almost the whole of his family to be assassinated, occupied the capital, Ch’ang-an, and actually entered into the heritage of Fu Chien.  This Tibetan dynasty is known as the “Later Ch’in dynasty” (384-417).  It was certainly the strongest of those founded in 384, but it still failed to dominate any considerable part of China and remained of local importance, mainly confined to the present province of Shensi.  Fu Chien’s empire nominally had three further rulers, but they did not exert the slightest influence on events.