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I've always found it funny that mainland Chinese always refer to Shanghai "southern", when from a geographic perspective it's near the geographic latitude median and if accounting for population density, probably north of that. At least in my experience, the people from places like Jiangsu, Nanjing, Shanghai, Hangzhou seem a lot more similar to people from Beijing than than to people from Guangdong.
That’s because when the Chinese empire divides (usually along the Yangtze River) the seats of major southern successor states are usually in the Yangtze Delta, almost never in the Pearl River Delta (except for Sun Yat-sen’s brief governance from Guangzhou, which reflect the shift of gravity within China in the late imperial era until now). The “southern dynasties” almost invariably choose to rule from Nanjing or Hangzhou. It’s customary to call that part of China “the south”, meaning mostly the region south of Yangtze.
Cantonese and Hokkien are more clannish and, yes, pretty easy to distinguish. But I do think northerners and the “southerners” in the Yangtze Delta are also easily distinguishable, from the way they look or accent or mannerism. One of those in-group sensitivity things I guess.
Isn't it usually along the Huai? That was the point of division for the Jin (晉) and the Sixteen Kingdoms, as well as the Southern Song and the Jin (金). This puts the entire Yangtze delta area unambiguously within the "South", rather than it being bisected by the Yangtze into North and South, at least if you follow the old course of the river before it became a Yangtze tributary.
(I realise I'm nitpicking and this comment is more being a pedant for the other commenters, as you clearly suggest that the Yangtze delta is "Southern" in another comment)
Yes, the Qinling-huaihe line is the traditional north-south boundary. It roughly matches the 800mm isohyet and divides China into the more arid, wheat-based north and the more humid, rice-based south. You probably know this already.
On the boundary question: you’re right that the Huai has historically served as the natural border between eastern Jin and the northern states (and roughly the boundary through most of 南北朝), and later between Jurchen Jin and Song. But the boundary kept shifting throughout the three kingdoms and the northern and southern dynasties. Sun Wu mostly held the Yangtze as their line against Wei, and by the end of Liang the southern dynasty had retreated to the Yangtze, where it stayed until Sui. Throughout 魏晋南北朝 the frontier generally is somewhere between the yellow river and the Yangtze, with the Huai as the midpoint and a major river for fortification. 所谓守江必守淮. I’m not sure why the Yangtze as a border is more fragile than the Huai though, so if you know that I’d love to hear.
For some reason in my own mental map I still place the boundary at the Yangtze. I know cities like Hefei and Yangzhou are solidly southern, but for some reason I still feel like the line should be drawn there. Apparently not just modern Chinese like me, Book of Southern Qi:
They seem to think they’re “江北” and the southern Qi “江南”. Not exactly matching the map.
Maybe the Yangtze is just a stronger mental image than the Huai, and that was already true before the Huai ceased to be a meaningful independent river after it merged with the yellow river 夺淮入海.
With a huge caveat that I'm not a historian, let alone a military historian of classical China, my understanding is that:
Riverine warfare becomes much more important starting with the Huai, at least in comparison to cavalry warfare, and northern states tended to have significantly weaker maritime capabilities due to the lack of necessity for this in conquering the North China Plain;
An inability to exert power along the Huai river and Huainan for a southern state means that a northern state is able to exert much more initiative in trying to attack the Yangtze proper;
Conversely, being able to hold the Huai river/Huainan gives a lot more slack for a southern defender before an invader can reach the Yangtze.
So it is perhaps less that the Huai is exceptionally defendable as much as that the Huai river and gatekeeps the Jiangnan area; a northern state able to dominate the Huai river and its surrounds is more likely to be a credible threat to the south both in terms of maritime capability as well as logistically. On the other hand, a southern Chinese state that was capable of exerting power over the Huai would not necessarily find itself being able to dominate the plains north of it.
This is of course only part of it. As you know, another way of conquering a southern state based on the Yangtze is from upstream, as with the eventual conquest of Wu, or the fall of southern Song after the fall of Xiangyang.
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Ah, I figured there must be a historic reason so I appreciate the added context. China is certainly not unique in this regard, considering the "Middle East" is in the western half of Eurasia and the "Midwest" is in the eastern half of the US.
So when Chinese say "southerners", are they referring to everyone from Shanghai to Hainan to Sichuan? If that's the case, are there real unifying cultural reasons or is this more of a definition by exclusion on the part of northerners to group "everyone that isn't us"?
Yes and no I guess? In my mind (I'm from the north but my ancestors lived in Zhejiang for millennium) southerners means people who live within 300km of Nanjing, basically those in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shanghai, Anhui. But I asked my wife and for her it means anyone who lives south of the Yangtze.
I think there are cultural reasons. Northern China was under nomadic rule for longer, and cultural customs are similar enough there although not entirely homogeneous. Southern China was mostly under Han Chinese rule, and is more culturally diverse (Southerners from Shanghai, Guangzhou or Chengdu are meaningfully different than northerners from Beijing and Shenyang, at least in my mind).
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