According to ancient historical legends such as the Classic of History, the Xia Dynasty was the first dynastic clan to rule China. However, there are no known archeological remains that would substantiate those written records. The ancient accounts tell about the rise and fall of a small kingdom along the Yellow River in the northern part of the country over a 500-year period from about 2,100 BC to 1,600 BC. The main ancient accounts are in the Records of the Grand Historian (史記) that were written between about 109 BC and 91 BC by Sima Qian and the Bamboo Annals (竹書紀年). The Bamboo Annals was a text that was said to have been buried with the King of Wei who died in 296 BC and was rediscovered in 281 AD during the Jin Dynasty. The text was written on flat pieces of bamboo, and this is why it is called the Bamboo Annals. Are these accounts accurate? It is said that the Xia Dynasty people didn't keep written records, but that their histories were passed orally. Archeologists debate whether the Bronze Age towns that have been uncovered in recent years are the remains of the Xia Kingdom. Unless new evidence is unearthed, it is impossible to know how much of the accounts in those texts is accurate and how much is myth about the Xia Dynasty. What the Different and Conflicting Legends Say In the written stories, there was once a great flood that lasted many years about 2215 BC. A man named Yu the Great was given the task to control flooding on the Yellow River by a sagely king named Yao (2358–2258 BC). As you can see, the dates of these supposed events don't even match. It is said that Yao told Gun who was Yu's father to control the flood. But the dikes that he built against the flooding didn't work. They collapsed, and the area was flooded. So Yao executed Gun and recruited Yu. Instead of relying on dikes, Yu had canals dug to divert the water. Digging the canals meant removing a mountain. Though his hard work his body became miraculously different. The place where the mountain was removed was called Yu's Doorway (禹門口). The people seeing his hard work and success at controlling the canal respected him highly, and he became the ruler of the Xia tribe. Even if this story is a myth, it points to a basic idea in Chinese culture that monumental hard work in obedience to authority pays off. It gives people a doorway to respect and position. The rest of the account about the Xia Dynasty is likewise full of morals. Perhaps these are fables or even parables that were circulated in ancient times such as during the Warring States Period before the Bamboo Annals were written. A Different Account Another account describes that Yu was called Yu the Great after this feat. Because of greater harvests, the Xia tribe grew stronger. They were able to defeat a rival tribe. Yao gave his authority over to Shun. Shun executed Gun who was Yu's father. Obviously, there is a contradiction here. The Bamboo Annals says that Shun rebelled against Yao and imprisoned him there. So the sage King died there. It is fairly obvious that there are differing accounts and legends even about the how the Xia Dynasty began. Shun passed the kingdom to Yu the Great and not to his own son. The Course and End of the Dynasty This Xia Dynasty is said to have continued for hundreds of years. The kingdom had ups and downs, and it expanded over the course of the lives of 15 later emperors. The last emperor, named Jie, was very extravagant and fell into dissipation. Jie constructed a palace for his favorite concubine and drank all night long. He killed his loyal ministers who criticized him. Tang watched. Tang was the leader of the Shang tribe, and he led an army, and many of the common people joined him and defeated Jie. Jie then died, and Tang became the first leader of the Shang Empire. The Mandate of Heaven Even if this story isn't true either, it is reminiscent of the lives of many emperors and accords with the ancient concept of a dynasty losing the Mandate of Heaven. For example, the Sui Empire fell to the Li clan who founded the Tang Dynasty because the ruler was said to have lived overly luxuriously, and his rule was harsh. He killed too many of the people so that the people rebelled. Again, Cixi who was considered the last empress of the Qing Dynasty squandered a lot of the imperial wealth on luxuries and building palaces and buildings instead of helping the people of the empire. Her empire fell in 1912. The concept of Mandate of Heaven is an ancient and important political idea. The Archeological Evidence In the 20th century the remains of Bronze Age architecture were discovered in the region of the central part of the Yellow River basin where the Xia Dynasty is said to have ruled. People found bronze tools and artifacts, but no written records have been found except for some markings on pottery and shells. Archeologists call the ancient people the "Erlitou Culture." The Erlitou archaeological site is outside of Yanshi, between Luoyang and Zhengzhou, in western Henan Province. Radiocarbon dating places these discoveries between 2,000 and 1,500 BC. But whether the Erlitou people are the people who were called the Xia, people don't know. See Evidence of China's Earliest Civilization for Yourself The bronze implements and weapons and fine jade jewelry and figurines show high craftsmanship. Some artifacts can be seen in the National Museum in Beijing. Customize a tour of Beijingg to visit the museum. The Erlitou exhibit in Yanshi is off the beaten path. It would be best visited in conjunction with a Luoyang tour or a Zhengzhou tour.

This is an exciting year for archaeology in Asia! As I have discussed earlier, new discoveries have transformed our understanding of the Indus Valley Civilization (IVC). Now, new research presented in Science has shed new light on the origins of Chinese civilization. Chinese historiography generally presents Chinese history through the lens of various dynasties. The earliest historically attested dynasty is the Shang Dynasty, which arose around 1600 B.C.E. However, traditional Chinese histories speak of a Xia Dynasty that existed before the Shang. Many modern scholars, both Western and Chinese, have questioned the existence of the Xia, noting that many of the characteristics associated with Xia Dynasty are merely the opposite of the Shang, thus leading to the belief that the Xia were created as a sort of foil for the Shang. Nonetheless, whether or not there were dynasties and states, there is evidence of agriculture and advanced social organization in China going back several thousands of years before the Shang. According to traditional Chinese histories, “sometime between 2200 B.C.E. and 2000 B.C.E., … a legendary hero named Yu tamed Yellow River flooding and earned a mandate to become the founding emperor of the Xia dynasty, the country’s first.” Now, new research indicates there is truth to this ancient story. The paper in Science is the culmination of over ten years of research from “the fields of archaeology, anthropology, seismology, and geology.” The research indicates that the Yellow River did indeed flood, though somewhat later than the traditional starting date of the Xia Dynasty, 2070 B.C.E. According to researchers, the flood occurred around 1920 B.C.E. Whoever managed to bring the flood under control–the man traditionally known as Yu–probably oversaw irrigation and digging work that allowed water to be guided back into its proper channels. According to the study, restoring order after the chaos earned “him the divine mandate to establish the Xia dynasty, the first in Chinese history.” According to the findings of the research, the flood occurred when a vast landslide, the result of an earthquake, blocked the Yellow River in Qinghai province (near Tibet). This lead to the formation of a lake behind the blocked river; eventually the natural dam was breached, leading to a flood downstream, where the ancestors of today’s Chinese people inhabited farming settlements. The flood was one of the largest known floods of the past 10,000 years according to Darryl Granger, professor in the department of Earth atmospheric planetary sciences at Purdue University. The floodwaters surged to 38 meters above the modern river level. It is no surprise then, that such a major natural disaster was the trigger to the actual formation of organized state societies, and people tried to manage natural phenomenon in order to survive and farm.

The Xia Dynasty (c. 2070-1600 BCE) was the first government to emerge in ancient China and became the first to adhere to the policy of dynastic succession; thus making it the first dynasty of China. It was regarded as a mythical construct of later Chinese historians until excavations in the late 20th century CE uncovered sites which corresponded to descriptions in these earlier historians' accounts. The Xia were overthrown by the Shang Dynasty, a more historically certain governmental entity, who were in turn overthrown by the Zhou Dynasty. The argument claiming the Xia Dynasty is a mythological construct claims that the Zhou (and later dynasties) wanted to make clear that the previous ones lost their right to rule through immoral conduct and so created a proto-dynasty - the Xia - as a prehistoric model for this. Many scholars today still maintain that the Xia Dynasty is a myth but seem to be at a loss to explain why the physical evidence uncovered argues against their claim. Those who believe the Xia Dynasty was a reality are at an equal disadvantage in that none of the sites uncovered so far positively identify themselves as belonging to the Xia Dynasty and could as easily be interpreted as early Shang Dynasty buildings. THE RISE OF THE XIA According to historians like Sima Qian (145-86 BCE), there was once a great ruler named Huang-ti (also Huangdi, `emperor') better known as the Yellow Emperor who emerged from the tribal system of prehistoric China to rule the region of Shandong between 2697-2597 BCE. The Yellow Emperor created Chinese culture and established a form of government which would last for centuries. He is credited with inventing musical instruments, developing the production of silk, instituting law and customs, and the development of medicine and agriculture. Upon his death, he was buried in Huangling County, Shaanxi Province in the mausoleum which is today a popular tourist attraction. Huang-ti was succeeded by his grandson Zhuanxu, one of the famous Five Emperors, who founded the Xia tribe. After defeating their rivals, the Xia established the first dynasty in China under the leadership of the Emperor Yao. Yao ordered great palaces to be built and small villages of huts grew into urban centers. He is considered a great philosopher-king who ruled his people wisely and worked in their best interests following the precepts of Huang-ti. The Flood Yao had a serious problem during his reign in controlling the flooding of the Yellow River which disrupted agriculture as well as drowning or displacing his people. He appointed a man named Gun (revered as a demi-god in many accounts) to take care of this situation. Gun tried for nine years to stop the flooding but every year the waters grew stronger and more lands were covered and people killed. Finally, Gun constructed a series of dykes which he hoped would hold back the water but the dykes collapsed, causing further destruction and death. Yao had relinquished rule by this time to his successor Yu Shun who was not pleased at Gun's failure to control the waters. According to some versions of the tale, Gun then killed himself while according to others he was imprisoned by Yu Shun and still others report he exiled himself to the mountains. After he was gone, Emperor Shun appointed Gun's son Yu to complete the work and stop the flooding. YU THE GREAT Yu learned from his father's mistakes: Gun had tried to do too much by himself, had underestimated his need for help, and had overestimated his own abilities. He had also acted without respect for the forces of nature and had worked against the water instead of working with it. Yu enlisted the aid of the surrounding tribes and had them construct canals which would work with the water to lead it out toward its own kind in the sea. Yu's project lasted thirteen years and he was so dedicated to his task that he never visited his home once, even though he passed by it three times in his work. Yu's wife and young son would call out to him as he passed and his colleagues would encourage him to go home for a rest but Yu would not abandon his task until it was completed. He claimed there were many who were homeless, who had lost their own wives and children to the flooding, and he did not feel he should rest until the problem was solved. His single-mindedness and dedication to his work inspired those around him who looked up to him as a role model and worked harder until the waters of the river were contained and there were no more floods. Once the water problem had been solved, Shun was very proud of Yu and placed him in command of his army. Yu led his men against the Sanmiao, a tribe hostile to the Xia who continuously raided their borders. He defeated the Sanmiao and drove them from the land and, as a reward for his victories, Shun declared him heir to the throne. Yu's rule is considered the beginning of the Xia Dynasty and he is known as Yu the Great not only for his victories over the flood and the Sanmiao but for the establishment of a stable central government and the organization of the country into nine provinces to make governing such an enormous area more manageable. DEATH OF YU & DECLINE OF XIA Yu ruled for 45 years and, on his deathbed, named his son Qi as his successor. Qi had been a young boy during the time of the great flood and many people loved him for the story of how his father refused to return home until the flooding had been stopped and how young Qi bore his father's absence so well. Yu had intended to name his minister as successor, not wishing his son to have the burden of rule, but so many people favored Qi that Yu had no choice. In naming Qi his successor, Yu initiated the policy of dynastic succession. Qi's son, Tai Kang, was a poor ruler but many of his successors were highly skilled and numerous inventions and innovations are attributed to the later Xia, such as the development of armor in warfare and rules of chivalry in battle. The fourth ruler after Qi was the great hero Shao Kang who revitalized the country and is well known through the many legends which tell his tales. The Xia Dynasty began to decline under the rule of Kong Jia (c. 1789 -1758 BCE) who cared more for strong drink than the responsibilities of rule. He was succeeded by Gao who was succeeded by Fa, neither of whom did a great deal to improve the lives of anyone but themselves. The last emperor was Jie (1728-1675 BCE) who was known as a tyrant and who lost the mandate of heaven to rule. He was overthrown by Tang who established the Shang Dynasty. MYTHOLOGY VS. HISTORY Much of the above was considered mythology from the 1920's CE until the mid 1960's CE when archaeological evidence began to emerge to corroborate the tales of the historians. Even now, the scholarly consensus is that the history of the Xia Dynasty is largely mythological even if such a dynasty did actually exist. The skepticism grew because there were no early accounts of the Xia Dynasty and because no physical evidence argued for its existence. It was thought that historians, especially the famous Sima Qian, created the Xia Dynasty as a model precedent to explain and justify dynastic change in China. The scholar Justin Wintle explains this: Sima had a specific political purpose [in giving credence to mythological figures and events]. In his view, as in the view of others, rulers were entitled to govern by the "Mandate of Heaven"...If they misgoverned, then that license was forfeit. The Yellow Emperor and his successors, including Yu, not only invented all the essentials of civilizations, but provided a model government. As a result of human corruption, however, this divinely instituted order soon collapsed, and thus began the familiar "dynastic cycle". A new regime comes to power, but sooner or later loses the divine right to govern, at which point it is replaced by another that does enjoy the Mandate. And this transferability of the Mandate, Sima Suggests, is the underlying principle of history (3). The mythological interpretation of the Xia Dynasty was challenged in the 1960's/1970's CE with the discovery of palaces and four-walled homes (as distinct from earlier round homes) matching the descriptions of the historians who wrote on the Xia Dynasty centuries after its decline. Further evidence of the Xia's existence has been discovered since but no written record on any of these structures positively identifies them as Xia constructs and so the debate continues on whether the first dynasty of China was a reality or simply a politically motivated fabrication of later writers.