CHINA

China is the world’s most populous country and the fourth largest by total area, encompassing a geographic range that extends from the Gobi Desert and Tibetan Plateau in the west to a long Pacific coastline in the east. It has one of the longest continuous recorded histories of any civilization on earth, spanning more than 3,500 years, and was the origin of numerous technologies that transformed the ancient and medieval world, including paper, printing, gunpowder, and the compass.

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