Historical Chronicles of Chinese Dynasties: From Zhou to Jin and Song

When the Duke of Tai Shi was reading the Spring and Autumn Annals, whenever he came to the time of King Li of Zhou, he would always put down the book and let out a sigh. Said: Alas! Lu’s Taishi Zhi is really insightful! King Zhou of the Shang Dynasty made ivory chopsticks, and Min Zi lamented because of his extravagance. The politics of the Zhou Dynasty is still flawed, and the poet makes Guan Ju, based on the love lives of men and women. As benevolence and righteousness declined, the poet composed the poem “Deer Song” to satirize it. When King Li of the Zhou Dynasty was sick of hearing people pointing out faults to him, all the ministers of the time were afraid of being killed and did not dare to admonish him directly. From then on, the different vassal states began to conquer each other by force, and the stronger ones oppressed the weaker ones, and no longer consulted the Zhou Emperor in their conquests. However, these vassals were all trying to conquer other states in the name of the imperial court, and competed for the position of the alliance, and the government was manipulated by the five hegemonic powers, so that the vassals were arbitrary, extravagant, obscene, and did not abide by the law, and the rebellious and usurping ministers gradually rose up. Qi, Jin, Qin, Chu and other countries in the Western Zhou Dynasty are very weak, some of them have a fiefdom of 100 miles, some only 50 miles. Jin was hindered by three rivers, Qi had the East China Sea at its back, Chu was bounded by the Yangtze River and the Huai River, and Qin relied on the stronghold of Yongzhou. These four states emerged in succession and became hegemons one after another, and the great states that King Wen and King Wu had once honored were submissive to them because of their prestige. Therefore, Confucius had worked for more than seventy kings in order to realize the way of emperors and kings, but he failed to get reappointed. So Confucius went westward to look at the charts and books of the Zhou, discussed the history of old stories, and compiled the Spring and Autumn Annals on the basis of Lu’s calendar, starting from the year of Lu’s Yin Duke, and going down to the year of the then-existing Wulin. He abbreviated the language used in the historical books and deleted the cumbersome and redundant parts, so as to formulate the righteousness and law, and thus make the way of the king more complete, and make the personnel understandable. The seventy or so disciples of Confucius all received the will of his personal teaching, which could not be expressed in writing because it contained such words as criticizing, exhorting, praising, concealing, depreciating, and damaging. The ruler of the state of Lu was concerned that Confucius’ disciples were all holding heresies and opinions and losing the original face of the Spring and Autumn Annals, so he wrote the Zuo’s Spring and Autumn Annals based on the history compiled by Confucius and elaborated his views. Duo Jiao was the master of King Wei of Chu. Since the king of Chu could not read the entire Spring and Autumn Annals, he selected the part of it that tells the lessons of success and failure, and wrote forty chapters named Duo’s Micro. At the time of King Hsiao-cheng of Zhao, his chancellor Yu Ching took the records of the Spring and Autumn Annals upwards and looked at the situation of the present age downwards, and also wrote eight works, also known as Yu’s Spring and Autumn Annals. Lu Buwei, the prime minister of King Zhuangxiang of Qin, also consulted ancient historical records, deleted or chose the contents of the Spring and Autumn Annals, and compiled the current affairs of the six states, writing eight overviews, six treatises, and twelve chronicles, which were called the Spring and Autumn Annals of the Lu Clan. Xunqing, Gongsun Gu, and Han Fei also wrote books on the meaning of the Spring and Autumn Annals, and it was difficult to write down all of them. Zhang Cang, the prime minister of the Han Dynasty, wrote the “Biography of the Five Virtues of the End and the Beginning” in the format of a calendar, and Dong Zhongshu, the senior doctor, also wrote some articles on the subtle meanings contained in the Spring and Autumn Annals.

The Duke of Tai Shi said: For the Spring and Autumn Annals, the Confucianists only used it out of context, and the lobbyists only played up its rhetoric and did not emphasize the synthesis of the whole; those who studied the calendar only valued the years and months in the Spring and Autumn Annals, those who studied fate only saw the divine fortune in the Spring and Autumn Annals, and those who organized the genealogical spies only borrowed the lineage in the Spring and Autumn Annals, and the words used were very abbreviated, and it was very difficult for us to get a glimpse of the main purpose of the Spring and Autumn Annals. Therefore, I will be the Spring and Autumn period of the twelve vassal states compiled into a genealogy, from the Republic of China down to Confucius, in the form of a chronology of the study of the Spring and Autumn period of the “State Language” scholars get the purpose of the prosperity and decline of the details of the present, for those who aspire to become a study of the ancient texts of the people to mention the outline, cut out the miscellaneous.

BCE (before the Common Era)	surname Nian	weekly	vassal state during the Zhou Dynasty (1066-221 BC) in modern day Shandong Province	all together	the Jin Dynasties (265-420)	surname Qin	punishment cane (old)	the Song dynasty (960-1279)	vassal state during the Zhou Dynasty (1066-221 BC), located in present day Henan and Hebei Provinces	narrate	surname Cai	Zhou Dynasty vassal state	Yan, a vassal state of Zhou in modern Hebei and Liaoning
841	fifty seventh year G9 of the 60 year cycle, e.g. 1980 or 2040	Republican Year (1)	Zhen Gongbi (2)	Wugong Shou (3)	Jinghou Yisu (4)	Qin Zhong (5)	Xiong Yong (6)	Ci Gong (7)	Cihou (8)	Yu Gongning (9)	Wuhou (10)	Eber (11)	Hyehou (12)
		Prince Li resided in the palace of the Duke of Zhaogong and became King Xuan. The king was young and his ministers	Fifteen years. Fourteen years on the first cloud.	decades	eighteen years	four-year	seven years	eighteen years	fourteen years	fourteen years	twenty-three years	twenty-four years	twenty-four years
840		stupid (Beijing dialect)	sixteen	eleven	the first year of the reign of Marquis Szeto in the Jin dynasty (1115-1234)	5	8	nineteen	fifteen	fifteen	24	25	25
839		surname San	seventeen	twelve	stupid (Beijing dialect)	6	9	20	sixteen	sixteen	25	26	26
838		4	18	thirteen	surname San	7	10	21st	seventeen	seventeen	26	twenty-seven	twenty-seven
837	the sixty-year cycle	5	nineteen	fourteen	4	8	First year of Emperor Xiong Yan of Chu (reigned 1809-1865)	twenty-two	18	18	the first year of Cai Yi Hou’s reign	twenty-eight	twenty-eight
836		6	20	fifteen	5	9	stupid (Beijing dialect)	twenty-three	nineteen	nineteen	stupid (Beijing dialect)	twenty-nine	twenty-nine
835		7	21st	sixteen	6	10	surname San	24	20	20	surname San	30	30
834		8	twenty-two	seventeen	7	eleven	4	25	21st	21st	4	The first year of Cao Youbo’s reign	31
833		9	twenty-three	18	8	twelve	5	26	twenty-two	twenty-two	5	stupid (Beijing dialect)	32
832		10	24	nineteen	9	thirteen	6	twenty-seven	twenty-three	twenty-three	6	surname San	thirty-three
831		eleven	25	20	10	fourteen	7	twenty-eight	24	First year of Chen Li Gongxiao’s reign	7	4	34
830		twelve	26	21st	eleven	fifteen	8	First year of Song Hui Gong □ (13)	25	stupid (Beijing dialect)	8	5	35
829		thirteen	twenty-seven	twenty-two	twelve	sixteen	9	stupid (Beijing dialect)	26	surname San	9	6	36
828		King XIV Xuan was crowned, and the republic was dismissed. (14)	twenty-eight	twenty-three	thirteen	seventeen	10	surname San	twenty-seven	4	10	7	thirty-seven
827	eleventh year A11 of the 60 year cycle, e.g. 1994 or 2054	first year of reign of King Xuan (1027-1043)	twenty-nine	24	fourteen	18	First year of Emperor Xiongshang of Chu (reigned 2043-205 BC)	4	twenty-eight	5	eleven	8	thirty-eight
826		stupid (Beijing dialect)	30	25	fifteen	nineteen	stupid (Beijing dialect)	5	twenty-nine	6	twelve	9	The first year of Yanlihouzhuang’s (15) reign
825		surname San	Ao Yuan, first year of Emperor Wu of Lu (reigned 1046-1043)	26	sixteen	20	surname San	6	30	7	thirteen	first year of Emperor Cao Dai Bershen’s reign	stupid (Beijing dialect)
824		4	stupid (Beijing dialect)	The first year of Wuji of Duke Li of Qi	seventeen	21st	4	7	31	8	fourteen	stupid (Beijing dialect)	surname San
823		5	surname San	stupid (Beijing dialect)	18	twenty-two	5	8	32	9	fifteen	surname San	4
822		6	4	surname San	First year of Emperor Xianhou Ji’s reign	twenty-three	6	9	thirty-three	10	sixteen	4	5
821		7	5	4	stupid (Beijing dialect)	The first year of Duke Zhuang of Qin’s reign (16)	First year of Emperor Xiong’s favoritism in Chu	10	34	eleven	seventeen	5	6
820		8	6	5	surname San	stupid (Beijing dialect)	stupid (Beijing dialect)	eleven	35	twelve	18	6	7
819		9	7	6	4	surname San	surname San	twelve	36	thirteen	nineteen	7	8
818		10	8	7	5	4	4	thirteen	thirty-seven	fourteen	20	8	9
817		eleven	9	8	6	5	5	fourteen	thirty-eight	fifteen	21st	9	10
816		twelve	10	9	7	6	6	fifteen	thirty-nine	sixteen	twenty-two	10	eleven
815		thirteen	Year 1 of the Yi Dynasty (1151-1100 BC)	First year of Duke Wen of Qi’s reign	8	7	7	sixteen	40	seventeen	twenty-three	eleven	twelve
814		fourteen	stupid (Beijing dialect)	stupid (Beijing dialect)	9	8	8	seventeen	forty-one	18	24	twelve	thirteen
813		fifteen	surname San	surname San	10	9	9	18	forty-two	nineteen	25	thirteen	fourteen
812		sixteen	4	4	eleven	10	10	nineteen	first year of reign of Wei Wu (1046-1053), reigned 1046-1043	20	26	fourteen	fifteen
811		seventeen	5	5	The first year of Muhou Fusheng’s (17th) reign.	eleven	eleven	20	stupid (Beijing dialect)	21st	twenty-seven	fifteen	sixteen
810		18	6	6	stupid (Beijing dialect)	twelve	twelve	21st	surname San	twenty-two	twenty-eight	sixteen	seventeen
809		nineteen	7	7	surname San	thirteen	thirteen	twenty-two	4	twenty-three	The first year of the reign of Marquis Cai Li (18)	seventeen	18
808		20	8	8	lit. take Qi’s daughter as one’s wife (idiom); fig. to take an official position	fourteen	fourteen	twenty-three	5	24	stupid (Beijing dialect)	18	nineteen
807		21st	9	9	5	fifteen	fifteen	24	6	25	surname San	nineteen	20
806		twenty-two	In the first year of the reign of Duke Xiaogong of Lu, Bo Yu was established as a ruler and was called Zhu Gongyun (诸公子雲). Bo Yu was the grandson of Duke Wu.	10	6	sixteen	sixteen	25	7	26	4	20	21st