Chinese people often call themselves descendants of Yan and Huang Di, the root of which lies in identifying Emperor Yan and Huang Di as their ancestors. Although countless books mention the Emperor Yan and the Yellow Emperor, and the epic battle, when you open the history books to find the truth, you will find that the truth is more complicated than you think!
First of all, the earliest record about Yandi and Huangdi comes from "Guoyu·Jinyu": "Xi Shaodian married Yu Youjiao and gave birth to Huangdi and Yandi. Huangdi was made from Jishui, and Yandi was made from ginger. So Huangdi is Ji, Emperor Yan is ginger. The two emperors used their teachers to help each other, because of their different virtues. ”
This is the earliest record of the birthplace of Yan Emperor and Huang Emperor in Chinese history.
In the mythological system, Emperor Yan and Huangdi belong to different tribes. In order to fight for territory, the two sides fought a battle in Banquan. Huangdi defeated Yandi and annexed others. Small tribe. After that, there was the Huaxia clan. Therefore, the descendants of Yan and Huang also have a generational name, descendants of China.
The interesting thing is that, although Emperor Yan played an important role in ancient myths and legends, the "Five Emperors" of the Confucian "Great Dairy Book of Rites" is not seen at all. Obviously, Emperor Yan does not belong to the Han Dynasty. The mainstream theology compiled by Confucianism, but as the defeated, it is not a book.
At the same time, in many areas, Emperor Yan is considered to be the god of fire, or Shennong, who taught human lighting, heating and farming, and was handed down as the "Lishan Shennong" s legend.
In the oracle bone inscriptions, the word "yan" is more like a standing god, surrounded by four magical flints. It is not difficult to see that in ancient times, because of the technology of using sky fire, Yan freed human beings from darkness. Fetter, thus became the great god admired by all.
However, back to the topic, is Emperor Yan a mythical figure or a historical figure?
Looking at the most authoritative "Historical Records" of the prehistoric civilization, there is no mention of the "Three Emperors" in the whole article, which confuses future generations, so I went to the Tang Dynasty In the dynasty, Sima Zhen wrote the "Three Emperors" to complement the "Historical Records", supplementing the history of ancient mythological figures and tribal leaders such as Fuxi, Nuwa, and Shennong.
Unfortunately, due to lack of corroboration, most of the "Historical Records" published now do not use "Three Emperors", so many people do not know it.
In the "Three Emperors", it is believed that Emperor Yan referred to his appearance as "human body bull head". This image is obviously related to agricultural production. Starting from slash and burn, the guardian of fire evolved into the guardian of farmers.
According to the "Three Emperors", the leader of the first generation of Lieshan tribe is called Shennong, the first ancestor of the tribe, and his identity is like Moses of Israel.
After continuously annexing other small tribes, Shennong became the leader of the tribal alliance. Later people continued to use this name and passed on for hundreds of years. Collectively referred to as Shennong's.
A multi-purpose approach has caused modern people to seriously misunderstand the life span of Emperor Yan, thinking that he is a god who has lived for hundreds of years. actually not.
Shennong gave birth to Kui, Kui gave birth to inheritance, inherited Ming, Ming Sheng straight, straight birth, next life mourning, mourning Sheng Ke, Ke gave birth to Yu Zheng. The eight generations of leaders have passed on for 530 years, and each leader lived an average of 66.25 years. Although this was a sign of longevity in ancient times, it did not deviate from the basic rules of physical anthropology. Shennong is still a man, not a god.
However, some experts have put forward different opinions, saying that God of Yan and Shennong are two different deities. However, over time, they have gradually become confused.
But this distinction does not seem to make much sense. After all, even the existence of the Xia Dynasty has serious differences, which have not been recognized so far, let alone the five thousand years of Emperor Yan?
According to the myth and legend system, we can probably sort out the following historical context.
After the Lieshan clan annexed many small tribes in the south, it became a powerful tribal alliance. However, after a long time, a tribe named You Xiong challenged the Lieshan clan, and the two sides fought fiercely in the "Banquan" area.
In the end, the Lieshan clan was defeated, and some of the tribes surrendered to the Youxiong clan, while the other subordinates were reorganized under the Lieshan clan's banner to preserve the blood of the Lieshan clan.
In the era when Yu Zheng was in power, the entire Lieshan chiefdom became stronger again after hard work, so the "Second Yanhuang War" took place, and both sides suffered losses. Xiong moved to Jishui and changed his surname to Ji.
The above are just inferences made through the analysis of history and legends.
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