Diqin Designer

Chapter 454 Ode to Yanhuang and the Origin of the Qin Dynasty
After giving a vivid and eloquent recounting of the history of China, the young man from Qin on the stage announced loudly, "Next, please enjoy the Ode to the Yellow Emperor!"

After the young man finished speaking, he quickly left the stage and replaced him with two groups of Qin people with a somewhat strange style. The strange style was because neither of these groups was dressed properly. Instead, they were wrapped in animal skins or wore skirts made of grass and leaves, carrying animal skin drums, animal skin flags (banners), and animal bone knives and clubs. A barbaric atmosphere was palpable.

The two groups were wrapped in different animal hides and grasses, clearly belonging to opposing camps. They beat drums, waved flags, and began a "fierce" battle led by their respective leaders.

The sounds of chime bells, earthenware jars, and stone chimes on the stage changed as the two sides took to the stage to fight, becoming more stirring and magnificent. The background music that accompanied the Qin youth's gentle narration became the background music for the battle, conveying to the people watching this performance in the stadium that thousands of years ago, on this land, such a battle really took place!
This performance depicts the Battle of Banquan, a battle between the Yellow Emperor and the Yan Emperor. The Yellow Emperor defeated and captured the Yan Emperor, but instead of killing him, he made peace with him, which is why this land is known as "Yanhuang".

Li Nian was not entirely satisfied with the performance, feeling that it contained too much artistic embellishment and did not accurately reflect the true history of the Battle of Banquan.

For example, during the Battle of Banquan, the Yellow Emperor led six armies: "bears, brown bears, wolves, leopards, lynxes, and tigers." The Yan Emperor also had various armies under his command. According to true history, there should have been people representing these armies, but now the Yellow Emperor's side and the Yan Emperor's side are simply represented by two teams.

Furthermore, the armies under the Yellow Emperor and the Yan Emperor each had their own banners marked by their own objects of worship. They should have made more banners, but now they only use two banners.

But that's impossible. It's impossible to recreate the Battle of Banquan exactly as it happened in history. Not to mention how much manpower and resources it would take, there's simply no platform to accommodate it.

On the platform, after a fierce battle, the Yellow Emperor's forces emerged victorious, and the Yan Emperor was captured alive. The Qin actor playing the Yellow Emperor walked up to the Qin actor playing the Yan Emperor, personally untied the ropes binding him, helped him up, and, witnessed by both sides, took his hand and lifted him high together...

Upon seeing this, many Qin people in the audience erupted in cheers, and many understood the meaning behind the scene.

This is thanks to Li Nian's scholar lecture program. Although the illiteracy rate in Qin was still high, it had improved somewhat, especially regarding the history of Yanhuang, Huaxia, and Qin. Li Nian instructed scholars in Xianyang and other places to tell people more about these things, so that many Qin people, who may not be literate, knew a little about this history.

These are interesting stories from history, and stories and anecdotes always spread faster than dry and monotonous knowledge. They can be heard or spread when chatting with people over tea or after meals.

Phrases like "Brothers, do you know how our Great Qin came about?", "No, do you know how it came about?", and "I just happened to find out the other day, so I'll tell you about it today!" spread and then these listeners would spread it even further when they chatted with other people.

Today, many Qin people have discovered that the performance on this stage is exactly the interesting story they heard in their casual conversations, which has made them understand the meaning of this scene: the Yellow Emperor and the Yan Emperor formed an alliance after the war, and the Yan-Huang alliance began from then on.

Some dignitaries from various countries looked puzzled as to why the Qin people were cheering. A Qin person nearby translated and explained to them: "This performance depicts the Battle of Banquan. The Battle of Banquan was a war between our ancestors, the Yellow Emperor and the Yan Emperor. In this battle, the Yan Emperor was captured by the Yellow Emperor, but the Yellow Emperor did not kill him. Instead, he formed an alliance with the Yan Emperor. Without this alliance, there would be no Great Qin today, and no us today!"

This scene shows the alliance made by two crucial ancestors of the Qin people. No wonder the Qin people were so excited; this is their root, their origin!

Just then, the performance on the platform changed again. After the Yellow Emperor and the Yan Emperor formed an alliance, another group of people with a barbaric style arrived and engaged in a fierce battle with the Yellow Emperor. This group was quite powerful and did not lose to the Yellow Emperor. However, the Yellow Emperor and the Yan Emperor had already formed an alliance, and the people playing the Yan Emperor's side left to provide support.

The Qin translator further explained: "This scene is the 'Battle of Zhuolu,' a great battle fought between the Yellow Emperor, the Yan Emperor, and Chiyou."

After hearing this, a political figure from a small kingdom in the Western Regions nodded and concluded, "I see. This Chi You must be a foreigner!"

However, after hearing his judgment, the Qin translator shook his head and said decisively, "No, Chi You is one of the ancestors of our Chinese nation. Although Chi You fought against the two ancestors Yan and Huang at Zhuolu, he was not a foreigner. He was one of the ancestors of our Chinese nation along with the two emperors Yan and Huang. Chi You's tribe, Jiuli, was one of the ancestral tribes of our Chinese nation!"

After the Battle of Zhuolu, the Jiuli people were defeated by Chiyou and split apart. One part joined the Yanhuang alliance, while the other part was integrated into the Dongyi group by Shaohao. Later historical records suggest that the ancestors of the Qin people were Dongyi people...

If Chi You and Jiuli were considered foreign races, not belonging to the Chinese, then this boomerang might very well end up hitting the Qin people themselves.

Moreover, this view is not conducive to the unity of China. The current territory of the Qin Dynasty has not even fully encompassed the territory of later generations. Many tribes in those areas have evolved from those that split off from the Jiuli. If Chi You and the Jiuli are designated as foreign tribes, wouldn't these tribes also be designated as other peoples?

This would hinder the Qin Dynasty from conquering these territories and governing these tribes in the future, especially since they are all one family!

The official from the small kingdom in the Western Regions quickly apologized: "I misspoke, please forgive me!"

The Qin translator said, "It is normal for Prime Minister Mo to have such thoughts since he is unaware of this matter, but we hope that Prime Minister Mo will not say such things again in the future."

The officials of the small kingdom in the Western Regions hurriedly promised that they would not say such things again. After hearing this conversation, the officials of other surrounding countries all had the same thought: they must learn more about the history of the Qin state so that they would not make the same mistake.

After the Battle of Zhuolu, the platform began to perform some events that happened when the Yellow Emperor was revered as the common lord by many tribes and ruled the world. Many props on the platform were changed, and the music was no longer intense and full of fighting spirit, but pleasant and light.

A man sat on the ground with many stone slabs and wooden plaques in front of him. He seemed to have thought of something and began to carve various symbols on the wooden plaques and stone slabs with a stone blade. However, due to the distance, the audience could not see what he was carving.

Then, a woman came on stage, dressed in animal skins and a grass skirt. She walked with several other women through a forest represented by trees made of props. Suddenly, she noticed something on a certain tree and stopped to observe it carefully.

The Qin translator then explained to the dignitaries of the various states, "This was during the reign of the Yellow Emperor, when the ancient sage Cangjie created characters. It was thanks to Cangjie's creation that we, the people of Qin, have the written characters we use today! However, the characters created by Cangjie were still very rudimentary and primitive. The simplified characters of Qin today (later simplified characters) were developed by Prince Li Nian. His achievement is no less than that of the ancient sages!" After hearing the Qin translator's words, the dignitaries of the various states once again recognized Prince Li Nian's high standing in the eyes of the Qin people. He was a peerless talent comparable to the ancient sages, and would become a sage whose name would be etched in history. Unfortunately, such talent belonged to Qin, not to them!

If Li Nian knew that the Qin translator was boasting about his achievements in front of the dignitaries of various states, he would be speechless: how could his achievements compare to Cangjie's? Humans create something from nothing, from zero to one, while he merely benefited from the advantages of later generations. Unfortunately, he could not explain it and could only accept these achievements that did not actually belong to him.

The Qin translator continued, "That woman was Leizu, the first wife of the Yellow Emperor. She saw silkworms spinning silk and forming cocoons, and invented sericulture. Without Leizu, we might still be wearing animal skins and grass skirts."

While it would certainly have an impact, it wouldn't be as severe as the Qin translator described. Even if Leizu hadn't invented sericulture, people wouldn't have continued wearing animal skins and grass skirts. They would have gradually discovered that hemp, cotton, and other materials could be made into clothing, and would have used animal fur to make clothes.

The dignitaries from various countries then saw the man playing Emperor Yan carrying a basket on his back, walking here and there, stopping here and there, occasionally bending down to pick a leaf or a blade of grass (props) from the ground and putting them in his mouth to taste.

What was the purpose of Emperor Yan tasting tree leaves and grass slices?
The Qin translator explained: "This is 'Shennong tasting hundreds of herbs.' Emperor Yan is also known as 'Shennong.' One of the achievements of Emperor Yan's ancestors was tasting hundreds of herbs, which made the Chinese people know which plants were poisonous and which plants could be used as medicine, ending the days when the Chinese people could only suffer from illnesses and had no medicine available."

This achievement is truly remarkable. No wonder the Qin people held it in such high esteem. Thousands of years ago, the ancestors of the Qin people had already begun searching for medicines to cure diseases. In contrast, what were their ancestors doing at that time?
Because the performance time had to be controlled, and some historical events were difficult to depict with the current technology of the Qin Dynasty, they had to be cut. After the people representing Yan and Huang left the platform, the performance jumped directly to the scene of Yu the Great abdicating the throne.

The reason for jumping to this scene is that the ancestor recognized by the Qin royal family is "Yi", also known as "Boyi". His grandfather was Yefu, his grandmother was Nüxiu, his father was Daye, and his mother was Nühua.

You may not be familiar with these people, but if you mention that Yi's father and great-grandfather were Emperor Shaohao, and that the female cultivator's grandfather was Emperor Zhuanxu, you will immediately know that Yi has a profound background!
Because of his meritorious service in assisting Yu the Great in controlling the floods, Emperor Shun bestowed upon him the surname "Ying" and betrothed his daughter to him. This is the origin of the Qin royal family and the reason for jumping to this scene, to perform and showcase the origin of the Qin Dynasty.

On stage, the actor playing Yu the Great said that he was old and feared he would not live much longer. He wanted to choose a new successor for the world, but Gao Yao, whom he had originally chosen, had passed away before him. Yu the Great had to choose a new person. He thought of Yi, who had helped him control the floods. Knowing that Yi was a man of outstanding character and talent, he decided to pass on the throne to Yi.

Yu sent someone to consult Yi, but Yi hid in the countryside to refuse Yu's request. However, just as Yi was refusing, Yu's son Qi seized the opportunity to take over the position of the ruler of the world.

What followed was a series of politically correct artistic embellishments in the Qin Dynasty style. After Qi obtained the position of the ruler of the world, he began to do evil. He felt that Yu had once wanted to pass the throne to Yi, and Yi's existence was a huge threat to him. He wanted to get rid of him as soon as possible, and a fierce battle began between him and Yi.

Qi assembled a large army to fight a great battle against the Dongyi tribe led by Yi. The music on the stage also became fierce and intense, as if we could see thousands of years ago, when two armies fought a brutal battle on the land.

The war ended in a crushing defeat for Yi, who was killed, and countless cities of the Eastern Yi were burned down by Qi.

Later archaeological evidence shows that after this great war, the area where the Dongyi tribes originally lived remained desolate for a long time. This shows that Qi's destruction of the Dongyi must have involved killing people and burning cities.

After Yi died in the war, his people naturally did not fare well either. One branch stayed in the local area, while the other migrated to the northwest.

Seeing the group of people, dressed in rags and with disheveled hair, turning around on the wooden platform and performing a long migration, even without Qin translators explaining, the dignitaries of the various states could understand that this group of people were the ancestors of the Qin people.

In the audience, people who originally belonged to the states of Qi and Chu watched the performance and realized that if the content of the performance was true, then they really had a close relationship with the Qin people and shared a common ancestor. In particular, the Qi people were all originally from the Dongyi tribe.

The seven kingdoms were originally one family, all descendants of Yan and Huang, all of China. This was not a lie concocted by the Qin people to deceive them, but rather that they were all one family from their ancestors. They just fought each other fiercely. There was the great battle between the Yellow Emperor and the Yan Emperor, and then the Yellow Emperor and the Yan Emperor joined forces to fight against Chiyou. Later, Xia Qi and Boyi fought each other, which severely damaged the Dongyi. Then there was the war between the seven kingdoms for hundreds of years.

In this land, they are all brothers killing each other. Why do they fight each other for so long and so tragically?

The Qin state's conquest of the six states and unification of the world was actually a good thing, ending centuries of mutual slaughter.

This was also an idea that Li Nian wanted to leave for these people through the opening ceremony performance: to make them recognize the legitimacy of Qin's unification of the world, so as to reduce the resentment of the people of the six states towards Qin.

The performance continued. If it were to be performed according to the development of dynasties, it should have been about the history of the Xia Dynasty. However, since the Qin Dynasty had already been established, it turned into a performance about where the Qin people came from and why they were Qin people. The ancestors of the Qin people, Fei Chang, Fei Lian, and E Lai, also appeared one by one...

They survived the summer, endured the Shang, and finally came to Zhou. During the Shang dynasty, the ancestors of the Qin people lived relatively well. However, when the Shang dynasty collapsed and the Zhou dynasty was established, the Qin people were also purged because Fei Lian and E Lai were trusted ministers of King Zhou. They were exiled to the area between the Qian and Wei rivers to guard the western border of Zhou and raise horses.

In short, the ancestors of the Qin people were the stablemen in the northwest of the Zhou Dynasty at the beginning of the Zhou Dynasty. At that time, the ancestors of the Qin people were not regarded as their own people by the Zhou people, but as barbarians.

During the reign of King Xiao of Zhou, Fei Zi, the ancestor of the Qin people, was enfeoffed in the Qin region by King Xiao for his meritorious service in raising horses. Fei Zi took the name of his fiefdom as his surname and was known as "Qin Ying". From this moment on, the Qin state was born.

Seeing the performance on the platform and listening to the Qin people translating and explaining, the political leaders of the various states realized that the Qin state and the Qin people were not powerful from the beginning. They had suffered heavy losses and had to migrate to distant lands. They had also been very weak. Even the establishment of the Qin state was only a temporary reward from the Zhou emperor.

(End of this chapter)