Han (Warring States state)

Han was an ancient Chinese state of the Warring States period, in central China between Shanxi and Henan, south and east of Luoyang, the Eastern Zhou capital. Scholars often write the name as Hann to distinguish it from the later Han dynasty. It was ruled by lords of the Ji ancestral temple who had risen as a ministerial family of Jin until their power eclipsed the Jin house itself, and the partition of Jin among Han, Wei and Zhao in 453 BC opened the Warring States age, with King Weilie recognising the new states. Han was small, mountainous and unprofitable, and its land barred Qin's road into the North China Plain. It tried to reform itself, notably under Chancellor Shen Buhai, who improved administration and the army, but the reforms could not save it, and in 230 BC it became the first of the seven warring states to fall to Qin. An earlier Qin attack on Han's Shangdang in 260 BC, and the district's surrender to Zhao, had produced the Battle of Changping, reputed the bloodiest battle of the age, in which up to four hundred thousand men are said to have died.