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I am looking for the area of the territories controlled by the different Chinese dynasties since Zhou all the way to the Qing. There are maps available of the different territories but I haven't found the area specified anywhere. In principle the information could be extracted from the images, but I don't want to resort to counting pixels!

Any resource (preferably in English) that contains this information would be appreciated. It doesn't need to track changes every year, only the significant ones.

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    Note that the accuracy / precision of most of those maps are... not good. Most of the pre-modern maps are effectively guesswork, so attaching numbers to them is fairly meaningless. Secondly, the area controlled by each dynasty can fluctuate pretty wildly, so asking for areas over 2400 years of history is an incredibly daunting task. I suggest you pick a dynasty or period, or perhaps a specific map, to ask about, and ask as many questions as needed.
    – Semaphore
    Nov 8, 2019 at 12:22
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    I get your point. Still, even with these uncertainties, people have put significant effort into drawing explicit boundaries for the territories of the dynasties, spanning thousands of years. A rough estimate of the areas is a small amount of information by comparison.
    – Sebby
    Nov 8, 2019 at 13:29
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    No, those are not "explicit boundaries" in any real sense - most frontiers were no more than a rough guesstimate line placed according what the author guess feels right. But my main point was that this is too broad for a single question by History.SE norms, so again I suggest you pick a specific dynasty, or period, or set of maps to ask about, and create as many questions as you need to cover all the periods you want.
    – Semaphore
    Nov 8, 2019 at 13:34
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    This is one of the source I usually use but it's all Chinese. Nice thing about it is that it has modern city/province in background as well so it's easier to reference.
    – tweray
    Nov 8, 2019 at 13:57
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    Wikipedia has a list of largest empires. Each empire is listed at its largest extent and the date of that largest extent is given. Various major Dynasties are list as separate empires. The Qing dynasty is listed as the 5th largest, the Yuan dynasty as the 9th largest, the Eastern Han Dynasty as 14th largest, and so on down to the Xia Dynasty. In many cases due to uncertainty in the size of a realm, an area range is given instead of a single area, and the area in some periods may be more uncertain than is indicated. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_empires
    – MAGolding
    Nov 8, 2019 at 16:27

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According to this Wikipedia list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_empires1

The Xia dynasty was at its largest about 1800 BC with an estimated area of about 450,000 square kilometers or 170,000 square miles.

The Shang dynasty was at its largest about 1122 BC with an estimated area of about 1,250,000 square kilometers or 480,000 square miles.

The Zhou dynasty was at its largest about 1100 BC with an estimated area of about 550,000 square kilometers or 210,000 square miles.

The Qin dynasty was at its largest about 220 BC with an estimated area of about 2,300,000 square kilometers or 890,000 square miles.

The Western Han dynasty was at its largest about 50 BC with an estimated area of about 6,000,000 square kilometers or 2,320,000 square miles.

The Eastern Han dynasty was at its largest about AD 100 with an estimated area of about 6,500,000 square kilometers or 2,510,000 square miles.

The Eastern Wu dynasty was at its largest about AD 221 with an estimated area of about 1,500,000 square kilometers or 580,000 square miles.

The Shu Han dynasty was at its largest about AD 221 with an estimated area of about 1,000,000 square kilometers or 390,000 square miles.

The Chao Wei dynasty was at its largest about AD 263 with an estimated area of about 2,000,000 square kilometers or 770,000 square miles.

The Western Jin dynasty was at its largest about AD 280 with an estimated area of about 3,100,000 square kilometers or 1,200,000 square miles.

The Former Zhao dynasty was at its largest about AD 316 with an estimated area of about 2,000,000 square kilometers or 770,000 square miles.

The Later Zhao dynasty was at its largest about AD 329 with an estimated area of about 2,500,000 square kilometers or 970,000 square miles.

The Eastern Jin dynasty was at its largest about AD 347 with an estimated area of about 2,800,000 square kilometers or 1,080,000 square miles.

The Former Qin dynasty was at its largest about AD 376 with an estimated area of about 2,000,000 square kilometers or 770,000 square miles.

The Northern Wei dynasty was at its largest about AD 450 with an estimated area of about 2,000,000 square kilometers or 770,000 square miles.

The Liu Song dynasty was at its largest about AD 450 with an estimated area of about 2,000,000 square kilometers or 770,000 square miles.

The Liang or Southern Liang dynasty was at its largest about AD 502, 549, or 579 with an estimated area of about 1,300,000 square kilometers or 500,000 square miles.

The Northern Qi dynasty was at its largest about AD 557 with an estimated area of about 1,500,000 square kilometers or 580,000 square miles.

The Northern Zhou dynasty was at its largest about AD 557 with an estimated area of about 1,500,000 square kilometers or 580,000 square miles.

The Sui dynasty was at its largest about AD 589 with an estimated area of about 3,000,000 square kilometers or 1,160,000 square miles.

The Tang dynasty was at its largest about AD 669 or 715 with an estimated area of about 5,400,000 to 10,760,000 square kilometers or 2,080,000 to 4,150,000 square miles.

The Song dynasty was at its largest about AD 980 with an estimated area of about 3,100,000 square kilometers or 1,200,000 square miles.

The Liao dynasty was at its largest about AD 947 or 1111 with an estimated area of about 2,600,000 to 4,500,000 square kilometers or 1,0000,000 to 1,740,000 square miles

The Western Xia dynasty was at its largest about AD 1100 with an estimated area of about 1,000,000 square kilometers or 390,000 square miles.

The Yuan dynasty was at its largest about AD 1310 or 1330 with an estimated area of about 11,000,000 to 13,720,000 square kilometers or 4,250,000 to 5,300,000 square miles.

The Ming dynasty was at its largest about AD 1450 with an estimated area of about 6,500,000 square kilometers or 2,510,000 square miles.

The Qing dynasty was at its largest about AD 1790 or 1820 with an estimated area of about 12,160,000 to 14,700,000 square kilometers or 4,700,000 to 5,6870,000 square miles.

The estimated areas of some of those dynasties at their largest are very uncertain according to this list, and I suspect that the areas of some dynasties are less certain than the list indicates.

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    Fantastic. Thank you. I missed that.
    – Sebby
    Nov 8, 2019 at 21:46

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