Explain how Qin Shi Huang unified China through Legalist standardization and evaluate the Terracotta Army as archaeological evidence of his power.
In 221 BCE, the ruler of the state of Qin, Ying Zheng, defeated his last rivals and unified China for the first time, taking the title Qin Shi Huang, "First Emperor of Qin" -- and the name "China" itself may come from "Qin." He governed strictly according to Legalism, standardizing the empire's writing script, currency, weights and measures, and even the width of cart axles, so that one huge, diverse territory could function as a single connected state. He also linked and extended earlier defensive walls along the northern frontier into an early version of the Great Wall of China, meant to block raids by nomadic groups from the steppe.
Qin Shi Huang's rule was effective but harsh: Legalist law meant severe, consistently enforced punishment, and he ordered many books burned and scholars, particularly Confucian critics, persecuted to silence opposition. He also forced enormous numbers of laborers to build the wall, roads, and his own massive tomb complex near modern Xi'an -- guarded, archaeologists discovered only in 1974, by an underground army of thousands of individually detailed life-size clay soldiers and horses, the Terracotta Army. His dynasty collapsed within just a few years of his death in 210 BCE, but the unified, standardized China he built endured under the dynasties that followed.
Mastery looks like: They can list at least three things Qin Shi Huang standardized and explain what the Terracotta Army reveals as archaeological evidence.
Common stumbles: Assuming the Great Wall as it exists today was built entirely by Qin Shi Huang, rather than understanding he connected and extended earlier, separate walls.