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Why Did a Peasant Rebel Topple the Ming Before the Qing Arrived? - The Fall of the Ming and the Qing Entry into Beijing | Sleepy Facts About History
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Most people carry a simple picture of 1644: the Manchus swept down from the north, broke through the Great Wall, and overthrew the Ming dynasty in a single decisive stroke. It is a clean and dramatic image, but it obscures a much messier and more revealing reality. By the time the first Qing soldier entered Beijing, the Ming state had already collapsed. The emperor was dead by his own hand, and the capital was in the hands of a peasant rebel who had marched out of the famine-ravaged…
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