Yuan: The Mongols
Chinggis Khan and the Mongol conquest of north China, Kublai Khan and the Yuan dynasty (1271-1368), the conquest of the Southern Song, the ethnic hierarchy, Dadu (Beijing), Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta, the failed invasions of Japan, Yuan drama and culture, and the rebellions that ended Mongol rule (see Ancient Kingdoms P11 for the wider empire).
Part of a world empire
For a century China was part of the largest contiguous land empire in history. Debate continues over Marco Polo: his book describes Kublai's court in detail but omits things like tea and the Great Wall; some historians think parts are second-hand, while Hans Ulrich Vogel (2013) argued his details on currency and salt show first-hand knowledge.
Morris Rossabi, Khubilai Khan: His Life and Times (1988); Timothy Brook, The Troubled Empire: China in the Yuan and Ming Dynasties (2010); Hans Ulrich Vogel, Marco Polo Was in China (2013); Ibn Battuta, Rihla.