Among the dynasties in the history of the mainland, the Xia Dynasty must be the most mysterious, because this is not only the first dynasty in the history of the mainland, but also one of the most controversial.
According to some historical records, the Xia Dynasty existed for 400 years, but in today's archaeological excavations, it seems that no ruins of the Xia Dynasty have been found.
In terms of our archaeological culture type, the Xia Dynasty corresponds to the Xia culture between the Longshan culture and the Shang culture, also known as the Erlitou culture.
However, some archaeologists have concluded that the Xia Dynasty may not have actually found Yin Ruins, convincing experts who had previously questioned the existence of the Shang Dynasty.
And it is also consistent with the historical records, so the existence of the Shang Dynasty is a real thing, but why do everyone question the existence of the Xia Dynasty?
01
In the records of the historical books, there was a flood outbreak in the Yao Shun period, so Emperor Shun appointed Yu to control the flood, and Yu also after 13 years, finally completed this great cause, because of his contribution to the water control, so by the way the Zen position was given to Yu, Yu thus established the Xia Dynasty.
After his death, his son ascended the throne, through the records of the literature, we can see that the general logic at that time was because Dayu complied with the mandate of heaven, meritorious, meritorious, so he was supported and loved, and became the founder of the Xia Dynasty.
But is Dayu really because he has controlled the flood and has high prestige, so he naturally got the world?
First of all, let's take a look at why Dayu controls the water, put aside the unrealistic ideas of saving the people, as far as the most basic reason is concerned, the flood control must be because the disaster occurred in a densely populated place, which posed a threat to life safety.
The second question is, why not relocate? I think it should be that if you relocate, it will pay a huge amount of manpower and cost, and it is better to control the flood in comparison, so there is Dayu to control the flood.
02
Modern scholars have made statistics on the floods in the Yangtze River and Yellow River basins before, from 602 BC to the founding of New China, the Yellow River alone has had nearly 1,600 resolutions.
Even because of the occurrence of various floods, there have been six large-scale diversions, and the situation of the Yangtze River is not much better.
Judging from the modern Three Gorges Dam and Sanmenxia Dam, such a project requires extremely high manpower and financial resources, so for the unified dynasties of the Han Dynasty and the Yuan Dynasty at that time, it may take the strength of the whole country to complete it when the production civilization is not so developed.
And for the Dayu era, which was not yet a civilized society at that time, it was impossible to govern the seldom-populated areas, as well as the areas that did not cure the symptoms, that is, those that spent effort to repair and govern, but may only be able to hold on to a stable place for a few years.
Therefore, they may choose to migrate directly, so it seems that Dayu's control of the water must be because of the two conditions mentioned above.
Therefore, we can infer that the area of Dayu should be the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, or the middle reaches of the Yellow River, according to the research of modern experts, in 1920 BC or so, there was a huge and tragic dam failure.
This led to flooding at that time, people's lives were greatly affected and soil erosion, so it took Dayu 13 years to govern Of course, his father also spent a full 9 years before, so the father and son worked hard for 22 years to successfully control the flood.
So we can speculate that the Xia Dynasty was established at least after 1900 BC after the success of Dayu's flood control, but now most people think that the Xia Dynasty was established in 2070, which is not correct with our flood speculation just now.
03
So what was the time of the Great Flood before the establishment of the Xia Dynasty? Based on modern archaeological findings, we know that the Great Flood should have erupted between 1920 and 1900 BC.
Therefore, Dayu's water control must be later than this time, so it seems that from the new culture to the Erlitou culture is the culture of the entire Xia Dynasty.
The Xia Dynasty was established 170 years later than we expected, in fact, in the book and historical records, only a few words were mentioned for the location of Dayu's water control, and the specific governance location was not marked.
Some scholars believe that the location of Dayu's water control is in the territory of Jishishan County, Linxia Prefecture, Gansu Province today, and archaeologists have indeed found a place called Lajia Ruins here.
This was indeed destroyed in the earthquake and flood around 2000 BC, but it cannot prove that Dayu controlled the water here.
In 1900, the largest Wadian site in the entire Yuzhong region was only 1.1 square kilometers, and the level of civilization was generally low, but after the disaster, it suddenly flourished, and the area increased nearly 20 times.
In the tombs that followed, the existence of ritual vessels such as jade and bronze tools was also found, which fully indicates that after that disaster, the population of other tribes migrated to the prison, and traces of the existence of the Yu Dynasty were also found in the archaeology of Jinnan and Luxi.
This has also led some archaeologists to wonder if this is the center of a new civilization, which is what we now call the establishment of a new dynasty.
04
In the last century, the Chinese civilization discovered a central point, which is what we now often call the Erlitou area, which is generally believed to belong to the Xia Dynasty.
However, in the mainstream archaeological circles, the upper limit of the age of the Erlitou site can only be up to 1750 BC, which is more than 200 years different from the age of Dayu's water control.
Nowadays, some experts try to put the era of Dayu's water control before and after the Erlitou culture, so there seems to be no problem, but if the Xia Dynasty really belongs to the Erlitou culture, then this Erlitou should contain the entire Xia Dynasty, not the late period.
And in some historical records and bamboo book years, the time and place mentioned can not be linked to Erlitou, although now some evidence of the Xia Dynasty has been found in Erlitou, which can represent that it belongs to the late period, but the traces of the establishment of the Xia Dynasty still have no exact archaeology to prove, which still needs us to continue to find.
Reference Sources:
Henan Daily Walking in Henan and Understanding China丨Erlitou: Exploring the Source of "The Earliest China"