| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 111.3

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| Book Review | The American Historical Review, 111.3 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Asia

David Curtis Wright. From War to Diplomatic Parity in Eleventh-Century China: Sung's Foreign Relations with Kitan Liao. (History of Warfare, volume 33.) Boston: Brill. 2005. Pp. xi, 287. $167.00.

Published on the millennium anniversary of the Treaty of Shan-yuan, David Curtis Wright's book appropriately commemorates the sworn oath and covenant between two strong rulers from two empires that clashed in eleventh-century Inner and East Asia. At that historic moment, the Chinese Sung dynasty (960–1276) and the Turko-Mongol Kitan Liao (916–1125) were equal in military strength and diplomatic infrastructure, if not in economic wealth, ethnicity, and size of population. When the Sung was founded in 960, Liao had already declared a state and created an empire that claimed the sixteen Chinese prefectures (including Beijing) and the Korean state of Parhae. The accumulated military hostility between Sung and Liao led to a critical stalemate in January 1005, when continued warfare would have devastated both empires. The Liao emperor, leading an invasion force and accompanied by the clear-headed empress dowager and an astute negotiation team, had arrived at Shan-yuan, only a hundred kilometers from the Sung capital of Kai-feng. The Sung emperor and his capable advisors were also at Shan-yuan to halt the Liao advance.

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