“Yang Di or Yang Ti orig. Yang Guang (569-618) Second ruler of the Chinese Sui dynasty. Under Yang Di canals were built and great palaces erected. In 608 he built a great canal linking the rice-producing areas in the south with the densely populated north, and he extended this system in 610, contributing to what was to become the Grand Canal network. He embarked on military campaigns in Vietnam and Inner Asia. Three expeditions to Korea were so disastrous that the Chinese people turned against him; he was assassinated in S China. One of his former officials reunited the empire and established the Tang dynasty.”
Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.
Mark's Text Terminal 