The ''Yu Gong'' or ''

Tribute A tribute (; from Latin ''tributum'', "contribution") is wealth, often in kind, that a party gives to another as a sign of submission, allegiance or respect. Various ancient states exacted tribute from the rulers of lands which the state con ...

of Yu'' is a chapter of the ''Book of Xia'' ( Chinese: ''Xià Shū'') section of the ''

Book of Documents The ''Book of Documents'' ( zh, p=Shūjīng, c=書經, w=Shu King) or the ''Classic of History'', is one of the Five Classics of ancient Chinese literature. It is a collection of rhetorical prose attributed to figures of ancient China, a ...

'', one of the

Five Classics The Four Books and Five Classics are authoritative and important books associated with Confucianism, written before 300 BC. They are traditionally believed to have been either written, edited or commented by Confucius or one of his disciples. S ...

of ancient

Chinese literature The history of Chinese literature extends thousands of years, and begins with the earliest recorded inscriptions, court archives, building to the major works of philosophy and history written during the Axial Age. The Han dynasty, Han (202 ...

. The chapter describes the legendary

Yu the Great Yu the Great or Yu the Engineer was a legendary king in ancient China who was credited with "the first successful state efforts at flood control", his establishment of the Xia dynasty, which inaugurated Dynasties in Chinese history, dynastic ru ...

and the provinces of his time. Most modern scholars believe it was written in the fifth century BCE or later.

Contents and significance

The chapter can be divided into two parts. The first describes the

nine provinces The term Nine Provinces or Nine Regions (), is used in ancient Chinese histories to refer to territorial divisions or islands during the Xia dynasty, Xia and Shang dynasty, Shang dynasties and has now come to symbolically represent China. "Pro ...

of Ji (), Yan (),

Qing The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

(), Xu (), Yang (), Jing (), Yu (), Liang (), and Yong (), with the improvement works conducted by Yu in each province. The second enumerates Yu's surveys of the rivers of the empire, followed by an idealized description of five concentric domains of five hundred li each, from the royal domain ( ''Diānfú'') around the capital to the remote wild domain ( ''Huāngfú''). Later, this would become important in the justification for the concept of ''

Tianxia ''Tianxia'', 'all under Heaven', is a Chinese term for a historical Chinese cultural concept that denoted either the entire geographical world or the metaphysical realm of mortals, and later became associated with political sovereignty. In anc ...

'' or "All Under Heaven" as a means to back up the territorial and other claims of successive Chinese dynasties.

Origin and versions

Although the ''Yu Gong'' is traditionally dated to the

Xia dynasty The Xia dynasty (; ) is the first dynasty in traditional Chinese historiography. According to tradition, it was established by the legendary figure Yu the Great, after Emperor Shun, Shun, the last of the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors, Fiv ...

(), most modern scholars agree that the work is considerably more recent. Tradition dictates that

Confucius Confucius (; pinyin: ; ; ), born Kong Qiu (), was a Chinese philosopher of the Spring and Autumn period who is traditionally considered the paragon of Chinese sages. Much of the shared cultural heritage of the Sinosphere originates in the phil ...

(551–479 BCE) compiled the ''Book of Documents'' and included the ''Yu Gong'', although it is more likely that this was done later.

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 scholar, he made important contributions to the studies of ancient history, epigraphy, philology, vern ...

suggested in his that the ''Yu Gong'' was written at the start of the

Zhou dynasty The Zhou dynasty ( ) was a royal dynasty of China that existed for 789 years from until 256 BC, the longest span of any dynasty in Chinese history. During the Western Zhou period (771 BC), the royal house, surnamed Ji, had military ...

, but most scholars now agree with the view of Gu Jiegang that it is a product of the

Warring States The Warring States period in Chinese history (221 BC) comprises the final two and a half centuries of the Zhou dynasty (256 BC), which were characterized by frequent warfare, bureaucratic and military reforms, and struggles for gre ...

, Qin or Early Han periods. References to maritime history in the ''

Analects of Confucius The ''Analects'', also known as the ''Sayings of Confucius'', is an ancient Chinese philosophical text composed of sayings and ideas attributed to Confucius and his contemporaries, traditionally believed to have been compiled by his followers. ...

'' and the ''Yu Gong'' suggest their origin in a single culture while the appearance of the West River () and South River () in the latter indicate that the author came from the

State of Wei Wei (; ) was one of the seven major State (Ancient China), states during the Warring States period of ancient China. It was created from the three-way Partition of Jin, together with Han (Warring States), Han and Zhao (state), Zhao. Its territo ...

. In the preface to his ''Commentary on the Yu Gong Map'' (),

Ming dynasty The Ming dynasty, officially the Great Ming, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol Empire, Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming was the last imperial dynasty of ...

Scholar (1583–1646) considered the the "progenitor of all geographic texts both ancient and modern."

References

External links

禹貢 - Tribute of Yu
at the Chinese Text Project: Chinese text with

James Legge James Legge (; 20 December 181529 November 1897) was a Scottish linguist, missionary, sinologist, and translator who was best known as an early translator of Classical Chinese texts into English. Legge served as a representative of the Lond ...

's English translation (amended to employ pinyin) {{Authority control Chinese history texts Chinese classic texts Confucian texts Historical geography of China Book of Documents