Huang pillages Qi and Huang (in modern Wuhan, Hubei) Prefectures in winter 877, but flees after the Tang general Zeng Yuanyu defeats him.

Kublai, having by 1254 marched north to encounter his first Song forces using elephants, combats them with flaming arrows, but heavy losses have reduced his original one hundred thousand-man army to only twenty thousand soldiers.

Ariq Böke, commander of the Mongol homelands, had decided to attempt to make himself Khan, as his older brother Kublai was campaigning against Song China at the time of Möngke's death.

Kublai continues his attack on Wu-han, but soon receives news that his younger brother has held a kurultai at the Mongolian imperial capital of Karakorum and has been pronounced Great Khan.

Most of Genghis Khan's descendants favor Ariq Böke as Great Khan; however, his two brothers Kublai and Hulagu are in opposition.

Kublai quickly reaches a peace agreement with Song troops and returns north to …

Hong Xiuquan proclaims his new dynasty, the T'ai-p'ing T'ien-kuo ("Heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace") on his birthday, January 1, 1851, and assumes the title of T'ien-wang, or Heavenly King.

Hong Xiuquan officially begins the Taiping Rebellion on January 11, 1851.

Hong's rebels expand from the district of Kuei-p'ing in Kwangsi into neighboring districts.

Absorbing some secret-society members and outlaws, they dash to Wu-han, the capital of Hupeh.