### q3 similarities between the collapse of the Han Dynasty and western Rome > If we want to get solidly outside of the Mediterranean, the collapse of the Han Dynasty (206BC-220 AD) into the Three Kingdoms era (220-280) has fairly strong parallels with how Roman power declined in the western parts of the empire, particularly in how the loss of power in the imperial center caused the steady fragmentation of the empire into much smaller competing states. The warfare and fragmentation of the period seem to have been *very* destructive, though as with all pre-modern collapses, most of the population decline must have been in the form of disease and famine (potentially taking place gradually in the form of increased infant mortality [playing out through subsistence farming survival strategies](https://acoup.blog/2020/07/24/collections-bread-how-did-they-make-it-part-i-farmers/)). If the census figures of the period are to be believed (there is, as I understand it, grounds for significant skepticism), by the time the Jin dynasty reestablished unified control of the country and could do a new census, the population of China had declined by almost 60% from its Han Dynasty peak over a period of just over a century. - [View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01fn502x2mv0pj7xpjxhpzfjtb) - [[Hidden String-Pullers, Falling Empires and Tactics Against Horse Archers by Bret Devereaux#q3 similarities between the collapse of the Han Dynasty and western Rome|View in Vault]]