2 The Five Emperors

The Five Emperors were legendary, morally perfect sage-kings. According to the Records of the Grand Historian they were:

• The Yellow Emperor
• Zhuanxu (顓頊)
• Ku (喾)
• Yao (堯)
• ShunThe Emperor Shun (2258-2211 BC) was a lengendary leader of prehistoric China, among the Three August Ones and the Five Emperors. Born Yao Chonghua . He was also known as Youyu-shi . He was given the leadership at 53 and died at 100, after giving his seat (舜)

Yao and Shun are also known as the Two Emperors, and, along with YuYu (often called Da Yu "Yu the Great") was a legendary Emperor of the Xia Dynasty, occasionally identified as one of The Three August Ones and the Five Emperors. He is remembered for teaching the people flood control techniques to tame the rivers and lake (禹), founder of the Xia dynasty, were considered to be model rulers and moral examplars by Neo-Confucians in later Chinese history. The Shangshu xu (尚書序) and Diwang shiji include Shaohao (少昊) instead of the Yellow Emperor.

The Song of Chu (楚辭) identifies the Five Emperors as directional gods:

• Shaohao (east)
• Zhuanxu (north)
• Yellow Emperor (centre)
• Shennong (west)
• Fuxi (south)

The Book of Rites (禮記) equates the Five Emperors with the Five Lineages (五氏), which comprise:

• Youchao -shi (有巢氏)
• Suiren-shi (燧人氏)
• Fuxi (伏羲氏)
• Nüwa (女娲氏)
• Shennong (神農氏)

The first historical emperor of China was Qin Shi Huang, who coined a new term for "emperor" (huangdi) by combining the titles of "august one" (huang) and "sage-king" (di).

History of ChinaChina is the world's oldest continuous major civilization, with written records dating back about 3,500 years and with 5,000 years being commonly used by Chinese as the age of their civilization. Successive dynasties developed systems of bureaucratic cont Chinese mythology

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