or Huang Ch'ao died 884, China Chinese rebel leader whose revolt against the Tang dynasty, though ultimately defeated, so weakened the dynasty that it collapsed shortly thereafter. A salt smuggler turned rebel, Huang captured Guangzhou (Canton) in 879 and the Tang capital of Chang'an in 881. There he proclaimed himself emperor but was driven out by an alliance of government troops and Turkish nomads. One of his generals overthrew the Tang (907) and founded the first of the short-lived Five Dynasties
or Huang Ho English Yellow River River, northern central and eastern China. The second-longest river in China, it flows 3,395 mi (5,464 km) from the Plateau of Tibet east to the Yellow Sea (Huang Hai). In its lower reaches it has often overflowed its banks, flooding millions of acres of rich farmland, China's rice granary. Its outlet has shifted over the years to enter the Yellow Sea at points as far apart as 500 mi (800 km). Irrigation and flood-control works have been maintained for centuries, and dams, begun in 1955, exploit the river's hydroelectric potential
Political ideology based on the tenets attributed to the Yellow Emperor Huangdi and on the Daoist teachings of Laozi. This method of governance, which stressed the principles of reconciliation and noninterference, became the dominant ideology of the imperial court in the early Western Han (206 BC-AD 25). The Huang-Lao masters believed that Laozi's Daodejing perfectly described the art of rulership, and they venerated the legendary Yellow Emperor as the founder of a golden age. Their teachings constitute the earliest Daoist movement for which there is clear historical evidence. See also Daoism