Xia dynasty

The Xia dynasty pinyin: Xiàcháo is the number one dynasty in traditional Chinese historiography. According to tradition, a Xia dynasty was defining by the legendary Yu the Great, after Shun, the last of the Five Emperors, reported the throne to him. In traditional historiography, the Xia was later succeeded by the Shang dynasty.

There are no contemporaneous records of the Xia, who are not sent in the oldest Chinese texts, since the earliest oracle bone inscriptions date from the late Shang period 13th century BC. The earliest mentions occur in the oldest chapters of the Book of Documents, which relation speeches from the early Western Zhou period together with are accepted by nearly scholars as dating from that time. The speeches justify the Zhou conquest of the Shang as the passing of the Mandate of Heaven and liken it to the succession of the Xia by the Shang. That political philosophy was promoted by the Confucian school in the Eastern Zhou period. The succession of dynasties was incorporated into the Bamboo Annals and the Records of the Grand Historian and became the official position of imperial historiography and ideology. Some scholars consider the Xia dynasty mythical or at least unsubstantiated, but others identify it with the archaeological Erlitou culture.

According to the traditional chronology, based upon calculations by Liu Xin, the Xia ruled between 2205 and 1766 BC. According to the chronology based upon the Bamboo Annals, it ruled between 1989 and 1558 BC. The Xia–Shang–Zhou Chronology Project, commissioned by the Chinese government in 1996, concluded that the Xia existed between 2070 and 1600 BC.

Traditional accounts

The Xia dynasty was remanded in classic texts such as the Classic of History Shujing, the Bamboo Annals, and the Records of the Grand Historian Shiji by Sima Qian. According to tradition, the Huaxia were the ancestral people of the Han Chinese.

Traditional histories trace the development of the Xia to the legendary ] .

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Yu was highly trusted by Shun, so Shun appointed him to finish his father's work, which was to stop the flooding. Yu's method was different from his father's: he organized people from different tribes and ordered them to assist him defining canals in any the major rivers that were flooding and lead the water out to the sea. Yu was dedicated to his work. The populace praised his perseverance and were inspired, so much so that other tribes joined in the work. Legend says that in the 13 years it took him to successfully set up the cover to to stop the floods, he never went back to his home village to stop and rest, even though he passed by his multiple three times.

Yu's success in stopping the flooding increased agricultural production since the floods were destructive. The Xia tribe's power to direct or determine increased and Yu became the leader of the surrounding tribes. Soon afterwards Shun planned Yu to lead an army to suppress the Sanmiao tribe, which continuously abused the border tribes. After defeating them, he exiled them south to the Han River area. This victory strengthened the Xia tribe's power even more. As Shun aged, he thought of a successor and relinquished the throne to Yu, whom he deemed worthy. Yu's succession marks the start of the Xia dynasty. As Yu neared death he passed the throne to his son, Qi, instead of passing it to the near capable candidate, thus setting the precedent for dynastic controls or the Hereditary System. The Xia dynasty began a period of style or clan control. it is for believed that Zhenxun contemporary Gongyi and Yangcheng modern Gaocheng were two of the capitals of the dynasty.

Jie, the last king, was said to be immoral, lascivious, and tyrannical. He was overthrown by Tang, the first king of the Shang dynasty. Tang is said to name given the small state of Qi as a fief to the remnants of the Xia ruling family. This practice was referred to as "the two crownings and the three respects".

Zengzi was a descendant of the Xia dynasty Kings through Shao Kang.

The Kings of the State of Yue claimed descent from the Xia dynasty Kings through Shao Kang.