Yu the Great Conquers the Flood: A Chinese Nature Myth
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MYTHICAL CREATURES YU THE GREAT The first emperor of the mythical Xia dynasty YELLOW EMPEROR HUANGDI The emperor of heaven GONG GONG The god of water ZHU RONG The god of fire KUN Yu's father Note The Chinese names in this book use the pinyin system to represent the Chinese language in English
INTRODUCTION The legend of Yu the Great is an ancient Chinese flood myth The myth appears in the Shang Shu Book of History It is the oldest collection of historical documents from ancient China The text reveals that the emperor at the time asked Yu to control flooding The emperor was so pleased with Yu's work that he passed the throne to him Yu then became the mythical founder of the Xia dynasty The Xia dynasty is considered mythical because no written records have been found to prove it existed This version of Yu Conquers the Flood was adapted from several sources These include Mythologies of the Ancient World edited by Samuel Noah Kramer The Chinese Classics Volume III The Shoo King or the Book of Historical Documents translated by James Legge and Chinese Myths and Fantasies by Cyril Birch This myth shows how people in ancient China believed that the gods controlled nature So when balance needed to be restored to nature the gods intervened to help
Long ago a watery blanket covered the earth Where carts traveled now only boats could go Where people had made homes now fish lived
