BULS

The Three Sage Kings of ancient China were Suiren, Fuxi and Shennong. They made personal sacrifices to improve the lives of the people. Today they are remembered for the many unique contributions to the Chinese people and mankind in general.

The first sage King was Suiren (approx. 16,000 BC) who reputedly discovered how to make fire by drilling wood. With fire mankind could eat cooked food, keep warm and protect themselves from wild animals.

Many people remember Fuxi for creating the Bagua or Eight Trigram which became the basis of the Yi Qing or the Book of Changes. However not many remember that he taught people to domesticate animals and lay traps to catch fish, birds and other wild animals. Even lesser people know that he invented marriage and the laws that governs it as well a 35 strings musical instrument.

Shennong greatest contribution was teaching people to farm and for inventing many farming aids. He taught the people to grow rice, wheat, beans etc and invented barter trading. He also invested a 5 strings musical instrument.

However he was best remembered for tasting hundreds of wild herbs to find remedies to treat illnesses. In the process he suffered continually from poisoning and eventually die from eating one too many.

The emperors after Shennong were Huangdi, Zhuanxu, Diku, Yao and Shun and they are collectively known as the Five Legendary Rulers.

Huangdi was a good leader. He knows how to maximize the ability of those around him to rule the country and come out with innovations that benefit his people.

Huangdi was instrumental to the development of a written language for the Chinese people. He was also very interested in the art of healing and commissioned the compilation of The Yellow Emperor’s Medicine Classic? He also developed the 60 year cycle Farmer’s Calendar.

Huangdi was a man of peace and did not like war. During his rule, there was peace, stablility and prosperity in his kingdom.

Zhuanxu who succeeded Huangdi was not his son. He was chosen over Huangdi’s many sons because of his outstanding ability. Zhuanxu greatest contribution was to bring law and order to the people plus consolidating the power of the central authority.

Huangdi’s great grandson, Diku succeeded Zhuanxu. While his great grandfather developed the calendar, Diku further improved on it. He also created new positions and ministries to cope with the growing population. As a benevolent king who cared for his people, he made frequent person visits to his ministry to ensure that the country was well run.  

Yao was Diku’s son. He was industrious and benevolent like his father. He further developed the calendar and modified the timing of planting that resulting in bumper harvests.

Shun was Yao’s son in law. Although his mother died when he was very young, and his step mother and father ill-treated him, he remained filial to them. His great virtue helped him to gain fame and he was summoned to King Yao’s service at 30. He eventually married King Yao’s daughter.

During Shun reign, he divided the country into 12 independent states each with their own administrator. He made further changes to the department of land, water, works, music, farming and rites. He was credited with drafting many rules and regulations including the five rules of etiquette.   

After Shun comes Yu. Yu founded the Xia Dynasty and he was credited for his ability to control the floods. More on Yu in future articles.

Technorati Tags: bagua, chinese calendar, chinese history, jia zi, xia calendar

The Chinese have long been undermined by the western world as not being well known for their technological accomplishments. However this is completely untrue, and thanks to the efforts of a British philanthropist Joseph Needham the Chinese have been accredited with the discovery of an independent invention of the decimal system, seismological detectors, the blast furnace, gunpowder, paper money, the wheel barrow, paper, printing, the compass, natural gas as a fuel, the rotary fan, the suspension bridge, spaghetti and many more, as well as having made a huge contribution to the fields of medicine, astronomy and logic.

The most important Chinese inventions, the ones that have impacted the rest of the world that is to say, have been gunpowder, just think about war and armaments! Paper, printing (they invented moveable type, not John Gutenberg) and the compass. Although they are also credited with the creation of brandy and whiskey and these are pretty important innovations for some people.

Chinese alchemists played a major role in the development of gunpowder, and this invention has probably had the biggest impact of any other discovery. It formed the basis for all armaments, and waging war. It was accidentally discovered in the Tang Dynasty, while and alchemist was trying to create the elixir of life. However this was only one of many military innovations, there was the grid sight, tear gas, mustard gas, rockets, bombs and even a small version of the cannon.

In 105 AD Cai Lun was responsible for the invention of paper, he was a Chinese Eunuch (please don’t make me explain what this means). And this was one of the greatest Chinese inventions. During the Battle of Talas River in 751, some Chinese paper makers were captured by the Arabs and this is how paper making came to be known to the world, by a process of enculturation.

The compass was originally used as a religious accruement; the Chinese people believed that when you built a new house, it had to be perfectly aligned with nature, so the compass was used to ensure this alignment. Obviously perfect alignment with nature must have been true north. This was a simply wooden circle, with notches carved on it, on which the monk balanced a magnetic spoon. Navigation throughout the world has been developed and dictated to by the compass.

Anesthetics have been used as far back as the 3rd century, this was a type of wine which had an anesthetic affect. The Chinese are world renowned for their knowledge of herbal medicines and acupuncture and this dates back millennia. 4000 year old skulls have been found in Heilongjiang, Qinghai and Henan provinces which indicate some kind of surgery may have taken place on them, the age of these skulls have been confirmed by Carbon Dating.

The Chinese invented a lot of stuff that has an impact on our everyday life. We can go on and on but the above is probably good enough for now.

Technorati Tags: chinese history, chinese inventions, compass