Red Turban Rebellion

The Red Turban Rebellion began in 1351 amid famine, flooding, epidemic disease, heavy taxation and compulsory labour under the Yuan dynasty. Rebel movements drawing on millenarian religious ideas and local grievances established competing regimes across central and southern China, while Yuan commanders and regional armies struggled to restore control.

Zhu Yuanzhang joined the forces of Guo Zixing, gained control of Nanjing and gradually defeated rival rebel leaders as well as Yuan armies. In 1368 he proclaimed the Ming dynasty and sent forces north to capture the Yuan capital, bringing Mongol rule over China proper to an end while further campaigns of consolidation continued.

This context supports historical fiction about the fall of the Yuan, the rise of Zhu Yuanzhang, the struggle among late-Yuan rebel states and the founding of the Ming dynasty. It is more specific than the broader Yuan Dynasty context and should be used without redundantly assigning that parent.