Huang Di, The Yellow
Emperor
The Chinese people
often refer to themselves as the descendants of Huang Di, the Yellow
Emperor, a part-real, part-legendary personage who is credited with
founding the Chinese nation around 4,000 BC. He is known as the Yellow
Emperor for his imperial colour, chosen for the tones of the yellow
earth. Many extravagant tales have grown up around him. A collection of
legends written down in the Warring States period (475-221 BC) gives
the following account.
Huang
Di lived in a magnificent palace in the Kunlun Mountains in the west,
with a heavenly door keeper who had the face of a man, the body of a
tiger and nine tails. The Kunlun Mountains were full of rare birds and
animals and exotic flowers and plants, and Huang Di had a pet bird that
helped take care of his clothes and personal effects.
To
Huang Di was attributed the invention of the cart, the boat and the
south-pointing chariot- a chariot with a gear mechanism that enabled a
pointer to always indicate south no matter which way the cart turned.
Huang Di is said to have taken one with him in battle. He is credited
with the laws of astronomy and drawing up the first calendar used by
the Chinese people. His supposed conversations on diagnosis and
treatment with the physician Qi Bo are contained in China's first
medical book, Nei Jing (The Yellow Emperor's Canon of
Medicine).
Lei Zu, Huang Di's
wife, is said to have taught the people to raise silkworms and weave
beautiful silk fabrics. Apparently, encouragement of the initiative of
talented persons was a thing as much desired then as it is now, for the
Warring States account mentions that this was one of Huang Di's strong
points. As a result, a whole list of men are credited with inventions.
Cang Jie of pictographs; Ling Lun, the twelve tone musical scale; Li
Shou, various measuring instruments; and the craftsman Fang Bo who
actually built the south-pointing chariot. These things all did come
into existence four or five thousand years ago, so in this way the
Yellow Emperor has become the symbol of the culture of the Chinese
nation and representative of its talents. A pavilion on cypress-covered
Mount Qiaoshan in Huangling county on the road north from Xi'an is
Shananxi province marks the place said to be his grave. There
ceremonies have been performed honouring him as the founder of the
Chinese nation. A theory has been advanced that Huang Di may represent
a real leader of a tribal confederation of the Yangshao Neolithic
culture.
A story
which may originate in a memory of tribal wars between Huang Di and Chi
You is related in the Taiping Yulan compiled by Li Feng and
others between 977 and 981. (Chi You is described therein as a god, and
in other sources as leader of tribe). He had 72 brothers (81 by some
accounts), all of them with ferocious visages such as a head of bronze
and forehead of iron, a human face and the body of an animal. He was
skilled at making weapons and casting bronze, and his arrows, axes and
spears were unparalleled. He took his men to Shangdong and attacked the
tribe of Yan Di, driving him into Huang Di's territory around Zhuolu in
northwestern Hebei province. The latter was angered and went battle
with Chi You.
He was no rival for
Chi You and at first suffered several defeats. Chi You conjured up a
thick fog which blurred the vision of the Yellow Emperor's men. Luckily
the south-pointing chariot helped them know their way. Huang Di also
had his men make bugles. There were in Chi You's army many spirits, but
they were afraid of the sound of a certain kind of dragon. So the
Yellow Emperor had his men make instruments out of animal horns which
duplicated this sound and the demons were paralysed with fear.
Chi You
called on a god of wind and rain and blew up a tempest, but Huang Di
brought out his daughter who emanated an enormous amount of heat and
dried up the storm. Before Chi You's brothers could recover from their
surprise Huang Di's forces defeated them.
The
last and decisive battle was fought at Zhuolu. Chi You had gone for
help to the Kuafu, a clan of giants in the north (its ancestor was
Kuafu who raced with the sun and died of thirst ) and they drove Huang
Di back 50 li. But, using strategy learned from the Goddess of the
Ninth Heaven, Huang Di finally defeated them. Chi You retreated until
he reached what is today's Shanxi, where he was captured by Huang Di's
men and beheaded. To make sure the head would not reunite with the
body, Huang Di sent it to be buried a thousand li away. The place where
Chi You was beheaded came to be called Xiexian (xie, to sever,
and xian, county) and is still known as that today. Nearby
there is a salt lake with water of a reddish colour, tinted, people
say, by Chi You's blood.
After
the defeat of Chi You, Huang Di became leader of all the tribes on the
central plains. He ruled an area stretching east to the sea, west to
today’s Gansu province, south to the Changjiang (Yangtze) River and
north into today’s Shanxi and Hebei provinces. Legend has it that he
lived to be 110 years old and then a dragon came and took him back to
Heaven where he belonged.