Guifang () was an ancient ethnonym for a northern people that fought against the

Shang Dynasty The Shang dynasty (), also known as the Yin dynasty (), was a Dynasties in Chinese history, Chinese royal dynasty founded by Tang of Shang (Cheng Tang) that ruled in the Yellow River valley in the second millennium BC, traditionally suc ...

(1600-1046 BCE). Chinese historical tradition identified the Guifang with the

Rong Rong or RONG may refer to: Places China *Rong County, Guangxi, Yulin, Guangxi, China *Rong County, Sichuan, Zigong, Sichuan, China Nepal * Rong, Ilam, a rural municipality in Ilam District, Nepal Norway * Rong, Norway, a village in Øygarden ...

, Di,Old Text Bamboo Annals
"Wu Yi"
quote: "三十五年，周王季伐西落鬼戎，俘二十翟王。"

Xunyu The Xunyu (; Old Chinese: ( ZS) *''qʰun-lug'', (Schuessler): *''hun-juk'') is the name of an ancient nomadic tribe which invaded China during legendary times. They are traditionally identified with the Guifang, the Xianyun and the Xiongnu. Ident ...

Xianyun The Xianyun (; Old Chinese: (Reconstructions of Old_Chinese#Zhengzhang (1981–1995), ZS) *''g.ramʔ-lunʔ''; (Schuessler) *''hɨamᴮ-juinᴮ'' < *''hŋamʔ-junʔ'') was an ancient nomadic tribe that invaded the Zhou dynasty. This Chinese exonym i ...

, or Xiongnu peoples. This Chinese

exonym An endonym (from Greek: , 'inner' + , 'name'; also known as autonym) is a common, ''native'' name for a geographical place, group of people, individual person, language or dialect, meaning that it is used inside that particular place, group, o ...

combines ''gui'' ( 鬼 "ghost, spirit, devil") and ''fang'' (

方 Radical 70 or radical square () meaning " square" is one of the 34 Kangxi radicals (214 radicals in total) composed of 4 strokes. In the '' Kangxi Dictionary'', there are 92 characters (out of 49,030) to be found under this radical. is also ...

"side, border, country, region"), a suffix referring to "non-Shang or enemy countries that existed in and beyond the borders of the Shang polity."

Overview

Chinese annals contain a number of references to the ''Guifang''. Earliest sources mentioning the Guifang are the

Oracle Bones Oracle bones () are pieces of ox scapula and turtle plastron, which were used for pyromancy – a form of divination – in ancient China, mainly during the late Shang dynasty. '' Scapulimancy'' is the correct term if ox scapulae were used fo ...

.Yu Taishan. (2000). "A Hypothesis about the Source of the Sai Tribes"in ''Sino-Platonic Papers' 106. Ed. Victor Mair. p. 106-109Anderson, Matthew Mccutchen. (2015). "Change and Standardization in Anyang: Writing and Culture in Bronze Age China". ''Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations''. 1589
https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1589
p. 106 Extant oracle bones record no military action between Shang and Guifang, yet Guifang have been interpreted as hostile towards Shang or not hostile. The Bamboo Annals, interred with King Xiang of Wei (died 296 BC) and re-discovered nearly six centuries later in 281 AD (

Western Jin dynasty Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

) in the

Jizhong discovery The Jizhong (汲冢 or Jijun 汲君, northern part of present Henan) discovery in AD 279 is an important event in the paleography of ancient China, recorded in the ''Book of Jin''. A grave robber Biao Zhun 不準 broke into the tomb of King Xiang ...

, state that: *In the thirty-second year of Shang King

Wu Ding Wu Ding (); personal name Zi Zhao, was a king of the Shang dynasty who ruled China around 1200s BC. He is the earliest figure in Chinese history mentioned in contemporary records. The annals of the Shang dynasty compiled by later historians were o ...

(fl. 1200s BCE), he attacked the Guifang, and stationed at Jing (荊); and in the thirty-fourth year, the King's armies subdued the Guifang, and the Di and Qiang came as guests. Wu Ding's conquests against the Guifang are also mentioned in the

Yi Jing The ''I Ching'' or ''Yi Jing'' (, ), usually translated ''Book of Changes'' or ''Classic of Changes'', is an ancient Chinese divination text that is among the oldest of the Chinese classics. Originally a divination manual in the Western Zh ...

"Book of Changes". *in the thirty-fifth year of the Shang King Wu Yi (i.e. 1119 BCE), Zhou leader Jili attacked the ''Gǔi róng'' () in Xiluo (西落) and captured twenty '' Dí'' kings. Historians believe that the ''Guirong'' were identical to the Guifang.Nicola Di Cosmo, ''The Northern Frontier in Pre-Imperial China//The Cambridge History of Ancient China'', p. 919 The oracle bones indicate that, following Wu Ding's conquest, the Guifang became Shang's subjects and even assisted the Shang against other polities, e.g. the Qiang. Gui officials even managed to achieve high statuses in the Shang court; for examples, a Gui official, Geng, was ordered to perform the ''gang'' sacrifice 剛 in the ''xiang'' 亯 sacrificial temple. Up to the time of Shang king Di Xin (), Gui chiefs had been long-enfeoffed vassals of Shang and even participated in the Shang royal government. In Stratagem of the Warring States
Lu Zhonglian
( 魯仲連) related that Marquis of Gui (鬼侯) ranked among Di Xin's

Three Ducal Ministers The Three Ducal Ministers (), also translated as the Three Dukes, Three Excellencies, or the Three Lords, was the collective name for the three highest officials in Ancient China and Imperial China. These posts were abolished by Cao Cao in 208 AD ...

(along with Marquis of E (鄂侯) and Western Count iChang (西伯昌)) and married his beloved daughter to Di Xin. However, Di Xin considered her detestably ugly (惡), so he killed her and boiled alive Marquis of Gui; Marquid of E sharply criticized Di Xin and was butchered. A parallel account in ''Shiji'' features Marquis of Jiu (九侯), his daughter (九侯女), and Marquis of E (鄂侯); Marquis of Jiu was identified with Marquis of Gui. Another parallel account in

Taiping Yulan The ''Taiping Yulan'', translated as the ''Imperial Reader'' or ''Readings of the Taiping Era'', is a massive Chinese '' leishu'' encyclopedia compiled by a team of scholars from 977 to 983. It was commissioned by the imperial court of the Son ...

states Marquis of Gui's daughter disapproved of Di Xin's debaucheries so Di Xin killed her and her father; and Di Xin had Marquis of Xing butchered instead of Marquis of E.. Among the succeeding

Zhou dynasty The Zhou dynasty ( ; Old Chinese ( B&S): *''tiw'') was a royal dynasty of China that followed the Shang dynasty. Having lasted 789 years, the Zhou dynasty was the longest dynastic regime in Chinese history. The military control of China by ...

bronze inscriptions Chinese bronze inscriptions, also commonly referred to as bronze script or bronzeware script, are writing in a variety of Chinese scripts on ritual bronzes such as ''zhōng'' bells and '' dǐng'' tripodal cauldrons from the Shang dynasty (2nd mi ...

, the ''Xiao Yu Ding'' (小盂鼎) –cast in the twenty-fifth year (976 BCE) of

King Kang of Zhou King Kang of Zhou, personal name Ji Zhao, was the third sovereign of the Chinese Zhou Dynasty The Zhou dynasty ( ; Old Chinese ( B&S): *''tiw'') was a royal dynasty of China that followed the Shang dynasty. Having lasted 789 years, the Zhou ...

(r. 1005/03–978 BCE)– mentioned the ''Guifang'', probably located northeast of the initial Zhou domain. After two successful battles against the ''Guifang'', the Zhou victors brought captured enemies to the Zhou temple and offered to the king. The prisoners numbered over 13,000 with four chiefs who were subsequently executed. Zhou also captured a large amount of booty. As a result of phonetical studies and comparisons based on the inscriptions on bronze and the structure of the characters,

Wang Guowei Wang Guowei (; 2 December 18772 June 1927) or Wang Kuo-wei, courtesy name Jing'an () or Boyu (), was a Chinese historian and poet. A versatile and original scholar, he made important contributions to the studies of ancient history, epigraphy, ph ...

came to the conclusion that the tribal names in the annalistic sources ''Guifang,

, Xianyu,

, Di'', and '' Hu'' designated one and the same people, who later entered history under the name ''Xiongnu''. Likewise, using Sima Qian's

Records of the Grand Historian ''Records of the Grand Historian'', also known by its Chinese name ''Shiji'', is a monumental history of China that is the first of China's 24 dynastic histories. The ''Records'' was written in the early 1st century by the ancient Chinese his ...

and other sources, Vsevolod Taskin proposes that in the earlier pre-historic period (i.e. the time of the legendary

Yellow Emperor The Yellow Emperor, also known as the Yellow Thearch or by his Chinese name Huangdi (), is a deity ('' shen'') in Chinese religion, one of the legendary Chinese sovereigns and culture heroes included among the mytho-historical Three Sovereig ...

) the Xiongnu were called ''Hunyu''; and in the late pre-historic period (i.e. the time of the legendary

Emperor Yao Emperor Yao (; traditionally c. 2356 – 2255 BCE) was a legendary Chinese ruler, according to various sources, one of the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors. Ancestry and early life Yao's ancestral name is Yi Qi () or Qi (), clan name ...

and

Emperor Shun Emperor Shun () was a legendary leader of ancient China, regarded by some sources as one of the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors being the last of the Five Emperors. Tradition holds that he lived sometime between 2294 and 2184 BC. Tradition al ...

) they were called ''Rong''; in the literate period starting with the

Shang dynasty The Shang dynasty (), also known as the Yin dynasty (), was a Dynasties in Chinese history, Chinese royal dynasty founded by Tang of Shang (Cheng Tang) that ruled in the Yellow River valley in the second millennium BC, traditionally suc ...

(1600–1046 BC) they were called ''Guifang'', in the Zhou period (1045–256 BC) they were called ''Xianyun'', and starting from the Qin period (221–206 BC) the Chinese annalists called them ''Xiongnu''. Even so, Paul R. Goldin (2011) reconstructs the

Old Chinese Old Chinese, also called Archaic Chinese in older works, is the oldest attested stage of Chinese, and the ancestor of all modern varieties of Chinese. The earliest examples of Chinese are divinatory inscriptions on oracle bones from around 12 ...

pronunciations of 葷粥 ~ 獯鬻 ~ 獯鬻 ~ 薰育 as *''xur-luk'', 獫狁 as ''hram′-lun′'', and 匈奴 as *''xoŋ-NA''; and comments all three names are "manifestly unrelated". He further states that sound changes made the names more superficially similar than they really had been, and prompted later commentators to conclude that those names must have referred to one same people in different epochs, even though people during the

Warring States period The Warring States period () was an era in ancient Chinese history characterized by warfare, as well as bureaucratic and military reforms and consolidation. It followed the Spring and Autumn period and concluded with the Qin wars of conquest ...

would never have been thus misled.

Other fang-countries

The Shang state had a system of writing attested to by bronze inscriptions and

oracle bone Oracle bones () are pieces of ox scapula and turtle plastron, which were used for pyromancy – a form of divination – in ancient China, mainly during the late Shang dynasty. '' Scapulimancy'' is the correct term if ox scapulae were used fo ...

s, which record Shang troops fighting frequent wars with neighboring nomadic herdsmen from the inner Asian steppes. In his oracular divinations, a Shang king repeatedly showed concern about the ''fang'' (方, likely meaning "border-region"; the modern term for them is 方国 ''fāngguó'' "fang-countries"), groups of barbarians outside his inner ''tu'' (土) regions in the center of Shang territory. A particularly hostile tribe, ''Tufang'' ( :zh:土方) from the

Yan Mountains The Yan Mountains, also known by their Chinese name Yanshan, are a major mountain range to the north of the North China Plain, principally in the province of Hebei. The range rises between the Chaobai River on the west and the Shanhai Pass on t ...

region, is regularly mentioned in divinatory records. Another Chinese ethnonym for the animal husbandry nomads was ''ma'' (馬) or "horse" barbarians mentioned at the Shang western military frontier in the

Taihang Mountains The Taihang Mountains () are a Chinese mountain range running down the eastern edge of the Loess Plateau in Shanxi, Henan and Hebei provinces. The range extends over from north to south and has an average elevation of . The principal peak is ...

, where they fought and may have used

chariot A chariot is a type of cart driven by a charioteer, usually using horses to provide rapid motive power. The oldest known chariots have been found in burials of the Sintashta culture in modern-day Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia, dated to c. 2000&nb ...

Overview

Other fang-countries

Notes

References

Citations

Sources

Further reading

See also