China was once called Khitan, the first dynasty in the northern frontier where Han and nomadic cultures coexisted!

As early as 3500 BC, the Eurasian steppe served as a corridor for the spread of bronze technology. From the pre-Qin period to the Han dynasties, animal motifs representing steppe bronze culture had already spread to northern China. During the Wei, Jin, and Northern and Southern Dynasties, nomadic tribes like the Rouran and Turks rose as intermediaries on the Silk Road. After the Tang dynasty unified the northern steppes, the eastern section of the Grassland Silk Road expanded. The Liao dynasty further developed this route, breaking the traditional separation of farming and herding cultures along the Great Wall. Across ten thousand miles of grasslands, the Khitan horses galloped swiftly. From the 10th to 12th centuries, the Khitan people established the Liao dynasty on the northern frontier. From their capital, Shangjing, they traversed the steppes, opening the northern Grassland Silk Road deep into Central and Western Asia. Khitan means "hardened iron." They lived in mobile homes, following water and grass, migrating with the seasons. In 916, Yelü Abaoji founded the Liao dynasty, implementing a dual administrative system of northern (nomadic) and southern (Han-style) governance. Locally, they adopted tribal systems for nomadic peoples like the Khitan and prefecture-county systems for Han and Bohai people. The Liao ruled according to local customs, establishing unique systems like the Five Capitals, the Four Seasonal Encampments (Nabo), and the Ordo (royal tent) system. The "Spring Water" motif also foreshadowed the Yuan dynasty's "Full Pond of Beauty" design. Dongjing (Eastern Capital) was built atop the ruins of Liaoyang. After Emperor Taizu Abaoji conquered the Bohai Kingdom, he renamed it the "Eastern Dan Kingdom," with his son Yelü Bei as the "King of Human Sovereigns." He renamed Shangjing of Bohai (Huhan City, today's Yi'an, Heilongjiang) to "Tianfu City." Emperor Taizong Yelü Deguang, following Yelü Yuzhi's advice, relocated people to Dongping, later renamed Dongjing. Han Kuangsi, son of founding minister Han Zhigu, had five sons. His fifth son, Han Derang, was granted the imperial surname (Yelü Longyun) and rose to the highest ranks, assisting the Liao in establishing a "Golden Age of Revival." He was later granted the surname Yelü, given a private Ordo, and his family was enrolled in the "Hengzhang" imperial lineage. The Han family epitomized the Liao's dual administrative system. The Khitan hair-shaving custom, inherited from the Wuhuan and Xianbei tribes, involved shaving all or part of the hair on the crown, leaving only small decorative strands at the temples or forehead. Khitan women shaved their heads before marriage but grew their hair afterward, styling it into high buns. After Abaoji declared himself emperor in Longhua Prefecture, he "ordered the construction of Confucian temples, Buddhist monasteries, and Taoist temples." Among them, the Kaijiao Temple became the first Buddhist temple in Khitan history. The "Han City" in Shangjing Linhuang Prefecture became the Buddhist center of the Khitan. Yelü Deguang worshipped the White-Robed Guanyin as the family deity. Excavations at the Buddhist temple ruins on the western hillside of the Liao Shangjing imperial city in Bairin Left Banner unearthed clay arhat statues from the Liao and Jin periods. Existing Liao pagodas are mostly brick structures, with stone pagodas like the East Zen Temple Stone Pagoda in Zhuozhou, the Yunju Temple Stone Pagoda in Fangshan, Beijing, and the Huaishudong Stone Pagoda in Chaoyang, Liaoning. The only surviving wooden pagoda is the Sakyamuni Pagoda of Fogong Temple. The White Pagoda of Qingzhou is an octagonal, seven-story brick-and-wood arched pavilion-style pagoda, adorned with 56 reliefs of heavenly kings. It was built by Emperor Xingzong Yelü Zongzhen for his birth mother, Empress Dowager Zhangsheng Xiao Najin. Liao burials included both cremation and inhumation, with strict hierarchical order. Khitan funeral customs retained nomadic traditions like breaking burial objects and "burning offerings." The nobility practiced lavish burials, with metal death masks and wire mesh shrouds. The Tomb of Princess Chen, daughter of Yelü Longqing (brother of Emperor Shengzong), and her husband Xiao Shaoju, was a joint burial. The Khitan saw camels as "ships of the desert," and camel-drawn carts symbolized escorting the deceased through the underworld to eternal life. Through the Grassland Silk Road, the Liao established frequent political and economic exchanges with Central and Western Asia via political marriages, tributary gifts, and border trade markets.