The Jin–Song Wars were a series of conflicts between the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty (1115–1234) and the Han-led Song dynasty (960–1279). In 1115, Jurchen tribes rebelled against their overlords, the Khitan-led Liao dynasty (916–1125), and declared the formation of the Jin. Allying with the Song against their common enemy the Liao dynasty, the Jin promised to cede to the Song the Sixteen Prefectures that had fallen under Liao control since 938. The Song agreed but the Jin's quick defeat of the Liao combined with Song military failures made the Jin reluctant to cede territory. After a series of negotiations that embittered both sides, the Jurchens attacked the Song in 1125, dispatching one army to Taiyuan and the other to Bianjing, the Song capital.
The Song and Jin were allies against the Khitan Liao. Painting of Khitan hunters, from the National Palace Museum
Jurchen chieftain Wanyan Aguda, who in 1115 became first emperor of the Jin dynasty
Modern statue of Jin emperor Taizong at the Museum of the First Capital of Jin. Taizong ordered military campaigns that led to the fall of the northern Song in 1127.
Emperor Huizong left Kaifeng on January 28, 1126, as the Jurchen army approached the city.
Jurchen is a term used to collectively describe a number of East Asian Tungusic-speaking people. They lived in northeastern China, also known as Manchuria, before the 18th century. The Jurchens were renamed Manchus in 1635 by Hong Taiji. Different Jurchen groups lived as hunter-gatherers, pastoralist semi-nomads, or sedentary agriculturists. Generally lacking a central authority, and having little communication with each other, many Jurchen groups fell under the influence of neighbouring dynasties, their chiefs paying tribute and holding nominal posts as effectively hereditary commanders of border guards.
Siberians capturing a reindeer
A Jurchen man hunting from his horse, from a 15th-century ink and color painting on silk.
Qilang people (奇楞). Huang Qing Zhigong Tu, 1769
Bixi from the grave of a 12th-century Jurchen leader in today's Ussuriysk