This is a history of the epic story of the Great Wall of China that guides the reader through the conquests and cataclysms of the Chinese empire, from the second millennium B. C. to present day. Over 2,200 years old and 4,300 miles long, the Great Wall of China has made an overwhelmingly confident physical statement about the country it spans: China's age-old sense of being an advanced civilization anxious to draw a clear line between itself and the barbarians at its borders. But behind the Wall's intimidating exterior, and the myths that have clustered around it, is a complex history that has both defined and undermined China. It is this history that the author explores here, an epic tale that stretches over two millennia as it follows the rise and fall of the great Chinese ruling dynasties. Full of astonishing details and extraordinary characters from emperors to engineers, statesmen to soldiers, this book helps those who want to understand China's past, present, and future.