Reunified Empires 61
Suzong, mobilized an army bolstered with mercenary soldiers, mostly
Arabs and Uighurs from Central Asia. By the middle of 757, these Tang
forces were able to recapture Chang’an. Even so, remnant rebel forces
were not entirely eliminated until 763, when the last rebel general com-
mitted suicide. The price of peace was to grant a general amnesty for
those who had joined the rebellion and to hand over some districts to
the very generals who had rebelled there.
The An Lushan Rebellion signifi ed the end of the Tang’s domina-
tion of their neighbors. Many peasants fl ed from the areas of fi ghting,
and the tax rolls were reduced by two-thirds, leaving the state treasur-
ies depleted and the equal-fi eld system in tatters. Local military com-
manders became increasingly independent and reluctant to send their
tax revenues to the central government or to follow orders from the
capital. Tibet was a powerful empire of its own in the eighth century,
and Tibetan forces invaded and looted Chang’an in the fall of 763 and
continued to do so periodically for years thereafter. This became a typi-
cal pattern of the late Tang. Nomadic troops along the northern and
western frontiers began to charge the Chinese extortionate prices for
the horses China needed for its own defense. They sometimes took ran-
som payments in exchange for not invading, and when that failed, they
felt increasingly free to raid Chinese cities with little fear of reprisal.
Despite the long, slow decline of Tang political and military power,
Tang society and the economy continued to fl ourish. As the tax sys-
tem was eroded by the wars of the mid-eighth century, the government
turned to a tax on salt to bolster its revenues. Other trade was left
largely untaxed, and consequently, trade grew rapidly, especially inter-
nal trade and the sea trade with South and Southeast Asia. In the late
Tang, Central Asian nomadic groups were increasingly free to raid the
Silk Roads caravans laden with Chinese silks or porcelains headed west
or those headed toward China with jewels, spices, horses, or textiles.
Yet Sino-Indian trade continued to thrive with the growth of sea-based
commerce from China’s southeast coast around the Southeast Asian
archipelago, past Burma and on to India. The southern port of Guang-
zhou was fi lled with Indian, Persian, Javanese, Malay, Cham, Khmer,
and Arab merchants who brought fragrant tropical woods, medicines,
spices, and incense to China in exchange for silk, porcelain, and even
slaves.^3 As a result of this thriving trade, black pepper from India
became a common part of the Chinese diet in Tang times, and many
Chinese came to use the spices of South and Southeast Asia—including
cloves, aloeswood, benzoin, saffron, and sandalwood—either as food
condiments or in medical prescriptions.