The concept of nationality is a concept only existed in modern times, and was put forward by Liang Qichao in his article "On the General Trend of Changes in Chinese Academic Thought" in 1902. However, in the pre-Qin period, there were also distinctions between people with different cultural characteristics in different regions, which were called "ethnic groups" in ancient texts. The most typical example is the Spring and Autumn "Zuo Biao" mentioned that "if it is not my race, its heart will be different." Nowadays, there are 56 ethnic groups in China, which is also the country with the largest number of ethnic groups in the world, and in the past dynastic changes, there have also been ruling regimes of different nationalities, the Liao state established by the Khitan people, the Jin state established by the Jurchen people, and the Yuan Dynasty established by the Mongols.
Nowadays, among the 56 ethnic groups, the largest number of ethnic groups is the Han nationality, the "Han" character in the Han nationality comes from the Han Dynasty, And China was first known to the whole world, that is, it depended on the Han Wu Emperor to open up the Silk Road, so that the countries of the Western Regions, that is, now Central Asia and Europe know that there is a strong and civilized country in the far East, and since then Chinese people have been called Han. That makes people wonder, what was the name of the Han people before the Han Dynasty?
The Central Plains civilization had a very domineering name before the Han People, which was called huaxia at that time. In fact, the name can be traced back even earlier. As early as the Three Emperors and Five Emperors period, there was no dynasty established at that time, so it still existed in the form of tribes.
The word "Huaxia" was first found in the Shangshu Zhoushu Wucheng: "Huaxia is barbaric, reckless and unruly", in the Zhou Dynasty, Hua and Xia are synonymous with different words, and even in the Spring and Autumn Period Confucius once said that "the descendants do not seek Xia, and yi do not mess with Hua." Kong Shengren also believes that "Hua" is also "Xia". In the Tang Dynasty, there was a new annotation to the word Huaxia: China has a great ceremony, so it is called Xia; there is the beauty of the clothing chapter, which is called Hua. The statement here is to illustrate that China is a state of etiquette, and there is a deeper cultural deposition of the word Huaxia.
The more famous ancestors of China that can be traced back are: the Chao clan, the Furen clan, the Fuxi clan, the Shennong clan (YanDi), and the Xuanyuan clan (Yellow Emperor), of which the Youchao clan is the head, known as the first humanistic ancestor of "Huaxia". After some battles, it was finally unified by the Yellow Emperor, who left many remnants of civilization in the Yellow River Basin of the Yangtze River, which was also the beginning of the ancient civilization of the Central Plains.
After the Three Emperors and Five Emperors, Xia Qi dai Yu established the Xia Dynasty, the earliest dynasty in China, from this time on, from the Zen concession system to the hereditary system, thus opening the era of the family world. Later, the Shang Dynasty Xia, the Zhou Dynasty, and the title of the Chinese nation have been inherited hereditary.
After the fall of Western Zhou, the Zhou Tianzi of the Eastern Zhou Dynasty was no longer able to rule in the maintenance system, the princes of the Western Zhou Dynasty began to compete for hegemony, the concept of the dignity and inferiority of the Huaxia people and the barbarians in the Spring and Autumn Period was very strong, and the Chinese orthodoxy represented by the Jin, Qi, and Qin in the Central Plains was very repulsive to the barbarians, and the Duke of Qi Huan took advantage of the great righteousness of "Honoring the King" to become the first overlord of the Spring and Autumn Period.
It is worth mentioning that the barbarians rejected in the Central Plains, and at that time, the evaluation criteria were not only based on origin, but also on the behavior of people. The ancestors of the Chu state, Zhu Rongshi, once helped the Yellow Emperor defeat Xuan you, so they considered themselves to be members of the Chinese nation. However, the State of Chu was excluded because of its long-term coexistence with the Southern Barbarians and its behavior was incompatible with the Central Plains. In the "Zuo Zhuan", it is recorded that "if you are not of my race, your heart will be different" The clan here refers to the Chinese nation, and the "non-my race" refers to the Chu state. The State of Chu was only recognized by the Central Plains during the reign of King Chu Zhuang, and there was only the King of Chu Zhuang among the Five Powers.
Time came to the Warring States after the "three families and Jin", the era after the collapse of Li Le, the Warring States Seven Xiong also became less concerned about the so-called orthodox identity, after all, the most orthodox Zhou Tianzi at that time was beaten by Korea and the Qin State, in order to have more cohesion, so they had unique titles, all called themselves in their respective countries, the Qi people called qi people, the Chu people called Chu people, which was also the beginning of the division of the Chinese nation, which was the starting point of multi-ethnicity.
The Warring States finally ended with the Qin state sweeping the six kingdoms to unify the world, and the unification of the Qin Dynasty was to show that it was legitimate, so the Qin State also continued to use the Huaxia ethnic group used in the previous dynasty.
After the death of Qin Li II, Liu Bang defeated Xiang Yu and established the Han Dynasty. Seventy years after enduring humiliation and burden, Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty repeatedly took the initiative to attack the Xiongnu, defended territorial integrity, resisted foreign invasions, and opened up the Silk Road, spreading the national prestige of the Han to Fan state, and the title of Han nationality was born.
Since the beginning of the Han Dynasty, although the Chinese nation has a title of Han nationality, the title of Huaxia has not been extinguished, but has been passed down to this day. Whether Chinese is called Huaxia or Han, it is the imprint that history has given to every Chinese. Chinese belong to both the Huaxia and Han ethnic groups.