The Chinese people are proud of their long history.

About 5,000 years ago, Huang Di, the Yellow Emperor, according to legend, ruled part of the Yellow River valley. He and another leader, Yan Di, or the Fiery Emperor, made great contributions to the progress of civilization. Huang Di is said to have invented the cart, the boat, clothes, script and medicine, and Yan Di to have taught people how to turn the soil with a plow. Today, Chinese all over the world regard them as their earliest ancestors, calling themselves "Yan-Huang's descendants".

Many , many years after them, Yao, Shun and Yu led the people one after another. Yu was popular and prestigious, for legend has it that he had tamed the flooding rivers by channelling their waters into the sea. Upon his death, Yu was succeeded gy his son, Qi. Thus the first dynasty n Chinese history was founded. It was callled the Xia. This event marked the change from primitive society, where there was no family, private property, or class distinction, to a class society based on family and private ownership.

The Xia, which lasted about 400 years was overthrown by Shang, a state in the east. The Shang dynasty was to rule the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River for about 500 years before it was replaced by the Zhou.

It should be noted that Chinese history before the Shang dynasty, though recorded in several ancient classics, is mainly legendary. So far no material evidence has been discovered to prove that Huang Di, Yao, Sun, Yu and the Xia dynasty really existed. However, the existence of the Shang has been proved by the oracle bones and other things unearthed in Anyang County, Henan Province, about a century ago.

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The Shang rulers were superstitious. Before they made an important decision, they would ask their court diviner to discover if the occasion was favourable. He would take an ox bone or a tortoise shell, drill a hole in it, and put it over a fire until cracks developed. Then he would study the cracks, from which he could foretell whether the action considered would have good or bad results. Both the conclusion he drew from the cracks and the real result of the action, if it was performed, would be recorded in a few words on the bone or shell. In this way the Shang diviners wrote faithful accounts of many important events of their time.

Over the years about 100,000 pieces of oracle bones have been discovered and collected in Anyang. The place was certainly one of the capitals, probably the last one, of the Shang, which moved its capital several times. Over 3,000 different words have been found on those bones, indication that written Chinese was slready highly developed more than 3,000 years ago.

The Shang ruled over a slave society. Slaves, most of whom had been captured in battles with other states or tribes, were forced to till the land and do household work for their masters. What was more tragic was that slaves might be killed as sacrifices to the gods and their masters' ancestors, and might even be buried alive to accompany their master when he died.

During the 11th century B.C., probably in 1066, the Shang dynasty was conquered by Zhou, a state in the Wei River valley in present-day Shaanxi Province. King Wen of Zhou had made his state strong and planned the the conquest. A few years after his death, his son, king Wu, led an army in an attack on the Shang capital and quickly defeated the Shang troops. King Wu became the first king of the new Zhou dynasty.

When king Wu died two years later, his son was still too young to rule the country, so for several years state affairs were directed by king Wu's younger brother, the Duke of Zhou. The political and social systems of the niw dynasty were mainly designed by these three founders: King Wen, King Wu and the Duke of Zhou.

They established a feudal fief system. The whole country was divided into a number of areas, each of which was assigned to a member of the royal family or a noble related by marriage to the rulers, or to the chief of a small state that had been loyal to the Zhou. Not only land, but the people o itm were given to such a man and became his and his descendants' property. This man subdivided his fief into several areas and gave them to members of his family and their descendants. These in turn gave land and people to those under them. It is said that altogether there were ten classes in this system, each class having to pay tribute and offer military and other services to the one above.

At the top of this social ladder was the king, the master of all, people and land alike. At the bottom was the serf, bound to the land. He had to work his lord's land before attending to his own small field, and was not allowed to move out of his lord's fief. When there was a war, he had to go and fight. When his lord needed a women, his wife or daughter might be taken away. In short, his lot was like that of a slave, but was a little better, for he had a small piece of land, a home and a family, and some tools.

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The Zhou rulers used two means to maintain law and order: severe punishments to keep the serfs and common people obedient, and rites to adjust relations among the nobles. The rites were rules of behaviour and conduct, regulations of ceremonies and social institutions. The basic principle was that the rites should never apply to the nobles.

These systems and institutions suited the social conditions very well and the Zhou enjoyed peace and stability for about 300 years. Then in 771 BC, natural calamities, internal struggle in the court and attacks by border tribes brought Zhou rule to the brink of collapse. In the following year the capital had to be moved from Haojing in the west to Luoyi, now Luoyang, to its east. From then on the dynasty was called the Eastern Zhou, and the period from 1066 to 771 BC the Western Zhou.

The history of the Eastern Zhou was divided into two periods. The first 300 years, 770-476 BC, was called the Spring and Autumn Period, because all the important events of this period were recorded in a historical work called The Spring and Autumn Annals. The period from 475 to 221 BC was called the Warring States Period, because there were continual wars among the states. The dynasty was finally brought to an end in 256 BC, and 35 years later, in 221 BC, China was unified by the Qin dynasty.

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During the Spring and Autumn and warring States Periods, the king was the ruler and master of the country in name only. He was weak in every way and unable to control the nobles who had large fiefs. The area under his direct rule was becoming smaller and smaller as a result of invasions by nobles who were no longer loyal to him. Powerful states often tried to occupy the land of weaker ones, and they fought each other to increase their influence. As wars went on, the number of states was reduced from over 1,000 during the Western Zhow to about 100 during the Spring and Autumn Period, and to about 20 at the beginning of the Warring States Period.

There were great social changes too. The increasing use of iron tools helped to develop agriculture. Landowners came to realize that they could get more from thjeir land than the old serf system if it was turned into plots and rented to their serfs. Gradually their "common field"--fields formerly tilled by their serfs without pay--became private fields leased out to their serfs for rent. Thus serf-owners became in effect landowners and serfs became tenants, who showed greater interest in production and enjoyed greater independence and freedom than they had as serfs.

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Along with this development of agriculture, handicrafts and commerce also grew, and there appeared a new merchant class. Many merchants were rich enough to visit and bribe princes and dukes.

Another group of people, scholars, also developed. These came from different classes. Before the Spring and Autumn Period, what learning there was had been monppolized by the nobles; they alone could use the books and cocuments stored by the government, and other people could not share this right. The great political and social changes during the Speing and Autumn and Warring States Periods broke the monopoly of learning by the nobles. At all levels of society--declining nobles, new landlords, free citizens, even poor people--there were people who made an effort to study and turn themselves into scholars. When rulers of states wanted wise advice that would help them to make their states rich and strong, they turned to scholars for such help and often put them into important positions.

The Spring and Autumn and Warring States Periods were thus a time of change. States expanded or were conquered. The old systems and institutions established in the Western Zhou were no longer observed. The rites and original social order were broken.Old beliefs collapsed and new ideas spread. This turbulent stituation urged scholars of the day to think of ways to bring about peace and stability, or to make a state rich and strong. Some of them went a step further to study fundamental principles of the universe and human life. Therefore these two periods, especially the Warring States Period, saw the rise of many different schools of philosophy. It was a period when, as people often say, a hundred schools of thought contended.

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