Qin campaign against the Baiyue

Background

After Qin Shi Huang defeated the state of Chu in 223 BC, the Qin dynasty in 221 BC undertook a military campaign against the Baiyue in Lingnan to conquer the territories of what is now southern China and possibly as far south as northern Vietnam. On another account, one hundred thousand people in armies were the maximum including those transporting provisions and maintaining road pavement as parts of combat service support. As the population of Lingnan were in an earlier Bronze Age civilization, the population would have been reasonably sparse. At the time of the Qin campaign, the population in Lingnan numbered one hundred thousand at the maximum.

The region's vast geographical topography coupled with its rich natural endowment of valuable exotic products motivated Emperor Qin Shi Huang's desire to secure his geopolitical boundaries to the north with a fraction of the Qin army, while devoting a large majority of it towards the south to seize the land and profit from it and concurrently attempting to subdue the Yue tribes of the southern provinces.

Campaigns

After conquering the Yue state in northern Zhejiang, Qin Shi Huang began to conquer the regions in southern Zhejiang, Jiangxi and Fujian. The East Ou and the Minyue in the Fujian province soon became vassals of the Qin empire.

Qin Shi Huang sent an army of 500,000 to conquer the West Ou (西瓯) in today's Guangxi. After three years, Qin forces killed West Ou chief Yiyusong (譯籲宋). Even so, West Ou waged guerilla warfare against Qin and slew Qin commander Tu Sui (屠睢) in retaliation. The Qin army was unfamiliar with the jungle terrain, and was defeated and nearly annihilated by the southern Yue tribes' guerrilla tactics, suffering casualties of over 10,000 men. Despite these initial military setbacks, the central imperial government would begin to promote a series of policies for assimilating the Yue tribes through sinicization.

The Qin empire started the construction of the Lingqu Canal, connecting the Xiang River in the Hunan Basin with the Li River which flows south into the Gui River in Guangxi, which they used heavily to supply, garrison, rally, and reinforce troops during its second attempt to besiege to the south. Nanhai was a site of strategic attraction for the Qin as it provided an outstanding opening for maritime trade with Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent, the Near East, and the European Roman Mediterranean.

With the Qin's superior armament and disciplined military organization of the Qin army, the Qin forces would ultimately prevail over the Yue tribes. By 214 BC, Guangdong, Guangxi, and possibly northern Vietnam were subjugated and annexed into the Qin empire. Building on these territorial gains, the Qin armies conquered the coastal lands surrounding Guangzhou and took areas of Fuzhou and Guilin. The annexed territories were partitioned and administered into new three prefectures of the Qin empire, Nanhai, Guilin, and Xiang (象郡). Partitioned into four territories, each with its own governor and military garrison, these coastal territories became the business epicenter of Chinese maritime activity and international foreign trade.

During this time, Guangdong was a vastly underdeveloped and primitive semitropical frontier region of forests, jungles, and swamps inhabited by elephants and crocodiles.

In addition to promoting immigration, Qin Shi Huang imposed the use of the Han Chinese written script as new language and writing system. Liang Tingwang theorises that there was a proto-Zhuang script which was curbed but later developed into Old Zhuang script or Sawndip. However, most scholars believe that this script originated much later.{{citation | trans-title = Research on Zhuang square characters | trans-chapter = The cultural legacy of the Zhuang nationality: the Zhuang square characters | trans-title = Research on the ancient scripts of China's nationalities

To exercise even greater control to sinicize and displace the indigenous Yue tribes, Qin Shi Huang forced the settlement of thousands of Han Chinese immigrants, many of which were convicted felons and exiles to move from northern China to settle in the newly annexed Qin domains. Though the Qin emperor emerged victorious against the Yue kingdoms, Chinese domination was brief and the collapse of the Qin dynasty led the Yue tribes to regain their independence.

Post Qin

Main article: Vietnam under Chinese rule

Following the collapse of the Qin dynasty, the Qin Chinese renegade general Zhao Tuo took control of Guangzhou and extended his territory south of the Red River as one of the primary targets of the Qin dynasty was to secure important coastal seaports for trade.

In 208 BC, Zhao Tuo reached Cổ Loa Citadel, capital of the state of Âu Lạc. There, he defeated An Dương Vương and established the Nanyue kingdom during the same year. Following Zhao's capture of Au Lac, Zhao partitioned it into two prefectures Jiaozhi and Jiuzhen. Zhao established his capital at Panyu (modern-day Guangzhou) and divided his empire into seven provinces, which were administered by a mix of Han Chinese and Yue feudal lords.

By the end of the Qin dynasty, Zhao Tuo claimed independence from Qin and declared himself the emperor of Nanyue in 207 BC. At its height, Nanyue was the strongest of the Yue states, with Zhao declaring himself emperor and receiving allegiance from the neighboring kings. Zhao opened up Guangxi and southern China to the immigration of hundreds of thousands of Han Chinese and the kingdom of Nanyue was established after the collapse of the Qin dynasty in 204 BC.

With dynastic changes, geopolitical upheavals, famines, wars, and foreign invasions, Han Chinese living within the confines of Northern and Central China were forced to venture out and expand into the unknown regions of the south. Prior to the Qin conquest, what is now modern Southern China encompassed territories beyond the Han Chinese heartland, which were inhabited by diverse non-Han tribal groups that included the vast conglomerations Baiyue whom were regarded by the inbound Northern and Central Han Chinese immigrants as foreign and barbarian. For a long time, what are now designated as the southern parts of contemporary China and Northern Vietnam were considered barbarian, as it was populated by numerous non-Han minorities unaccustomed to Chinese peculiarities that were regarded by the Han migrants as alien and unfamiliar.

During Han Wudi's reign in 111 BC, a militarily powerful Han dynasty launched an expedition to conquer and annex Nanyue. Five armies led by the Han general Lu Bode were met by two Nanyue legates at the Giao Chi border; with the two men offering Nanyue's acceptance of the Han dynasty annexation and provided the invading army with 100 cattle, 1000 measures of wine, and other tokens of submission to be absorbed into the Han empire.

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