I guess the problem here is that the article really mixes up two different things: "continuosly existing state" and "continuosly existing civilization".

E.g., when people talk about Ancient Egypt nobody doubts its continuity even though there were at least 3 Intermediate Periods similar to periods between Chinese dynasties.

its continuity

It's not necessarily unique, however. While European civilisation is more fragmented by nationalism, by comparison there's clear lineage through religion, law, culture, etc. Much like China's lineage was really kick-started by the Han, Europe still owes much to Rome. If you get right down to detail then sure, there's a difference in the character of the cultural journey, but I think the principle is similar.

I agree. China is more isolated geographically and hence less diverse than Europe and hence it is still quite different. It is definitely not the only culture that passed that long though.

>For the first part, I still think that Chinese culture is quite special with culture that passed on for that long.

Of course you do, this myth of the "5,000 years of history" making China both unique and exempt from trends that affect the rest of the world is a very old part of the CCP's propaganda:

The Myth of "5,000 Years of History" http://camphorpress.com/5000-years-of-history/

I am just sharing thought base on personal experience.

I never mention 5000 years of History, only 1500. I am trying to not related with any politics here.

By your reasoning if there exists some propaganda then my personal experience should not be trusted?

In addiction, the long history is not created by CCP but following the Chinese scholar tradition. It is correct that CCP used it for creating nationalism, but they did not fabricate the whole thing.

To know more about Chinese culture not from [politic fueled](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ross_(academic)) books, I suggest you to read The [Problem of China](http://www.freeclassicebooks.com/Bertrand%20Russell/The%20Pr...) by Bertrand Russell. It is authored by a well-known scholar and written before the CCP exists in case you accuse me of suggesting you propaganda. The opinions by the book may be too old but at least the facts are unbiased IMO.

Its awesome yes, but also - horrific in a way. I felt that way in italy. Everywhere you went, some master painter, artisan or historic figure went before you, all you ever did was but a footnote in history compared to the aeons gone before.

It creates this mindset of golden-ageism, where you expect everything to be already done, everything to be discovered and all of it, just some library lookup away.

Yeah, that kind of thinking still exist in China. Even in popular fictions the ancient masters are always better than younger generations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wuxia

I'm curious to know: Does the Chinese education system generally teach China's history in the way described in the article, as a "long series of sequential dynasties?"

Yes. Even when Mongolia occupies China, in textbooks it is called the dynasty of Yuan. But it is not invented by the communist party, it is told in this way following the tradition by the Chinese scholars. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scholar-official

In many European countries it's standard to learn latin. So we can understand whole texts written 2000 years ago.

Being from Europe, this has not been my experience at all. I'd be hard pressed to find anyone who has actually studies Latin.

> As a normal Chinese with standard Chinese education till 10th grade (then move to a foreign country), I can understand fragments of writings carved in stones 1500 years ago in museums, which I felt quite amazing.

Is this unusual, though? Fairly certain most romance language speakers can understand at least some latin if they put their minds to it.

I am French, interested in middle age history. There is simply no way I can read something which is 600 years old. I could maybe decipher one word out of 50.

I heard old French read aloud. I understood 10% (optimistically) and not even the overall meaning.

I would say that starting from the 1700's the language slowly makes sense.

> Is this unusual, though? Fairly certain most romance language speakers can understand at least some latin if they put their minds to it.

Yes it works for basic texts, you can understand some words here and there.

> Yes it works for basic texts, you can understand some words here and there.

Even as an English speaker, which is not a romance language, I can understand quite a few Latin words here and there, due to the fact that something like 50% of English vocabulary was borrowed from Latin or other romance languages.

And so, for that matter, can we from the cold, benighted, Germanic north.

It pivots on what we mean by "understand fragments".

The average English speaker cannot make sense of Latin prose. Picking out a few words here and there, isn't the same thing.

"Quidquid Latine dictum sit, altum videtur."

All but 'Latine', and perhaps 'dictum', is gibberish to the average English speaker.

English is not a Romance language. It is Germanic.

Even Old English is pretty much unreadable by most speakers of Modern English. They still used runes rather than Latin letters 1500 years ago, but even transliterated you'd have a hell of a time.

First stanza of Beowulf in Old English, transliterated into Latin characters:

> Hwæt. We Gardena in geardagum, þeodcyninga, þrym gefrunon, hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon. Oft Scyld Scefing sceaþena þreatum, monegum mægþum, meodosetla ofteah, egsode eorlas. Syððan ærest wearð feasceaft funden, he þæs frofre gebad,weox under wolcnum, weorðmyndum þah, oðþæt him æghwylc þara ymbsittendra ofer hronrade hyran scolde, gomban gyldan. þæt wæs god cyning. ðæm eafera wæs æfter cenned, geong in geardum, þone god sende folce to frofre; fyrenðearfe ongeat þe hie ær drugon aldorlease lange hwile.

It seems painful. I feel that in Romance languages is easier to identify the roots.

Now that I think about it, I have never read Romance text written before the XIII century: Cantigas, Dante, etc.

It has multiple roots, thanks mainly to the Normans. It also has a habit of plundering vocabulary from other languages, to the point where a single thesaurus entry might list synonyms with etymological origins from a dozen different languages. It can also smash affixes from disparate languages together without shame, particularly prevalent as mixes of Greek and Latin.

There is a decent chance that an English speaker with a broad vocabulary would be able to recognize individual words in any foreign language that can be expressed with the ASCII character set.

Oops, I missed that.

I think it is amazing you can read and understand 1,500-year-old writings on museum pieces. That is awesome!