Changes

==Myth or history?==

==Myth or history?==

{{History of China}}

{{History of China}}

The character use to write Xia is not used on the Shang oracle bones, the earliest phase of Chinese writing. It does appears on several bronze inscriptions from the Zhou dynasty (c. 1046–256 BC). These are not thought to be references to the dynasty, but rather mean "large" or "summer." The earliest mention of a Xia dynasty is in ''Analects'' by Confucius, over a thousand years after the end of the dynasty. The main sources for the story of the Xia are the ''Bamboo Annals'' (~300 BC) and ''Records of the Grand Historian'' by Sima Qian around 100 BC.<ref>Mair, Victor, “[https://www.sino-platonic.org/complete/spp238_xia_dynasty_china.pdf Was there a Xia dynasty?]” Sino-Platonic Papers, May 2013.</ref>

The character used to write Xia was not used on the Shang oracle bones, the earliest phase of Chinese writing. It does appears on several bronze inscriptions from the Zhou dynasty (c. 1046–256 BC). These are not thought to be references to the dynasty, but rather mean "large" or "summer."

 

The earliest mention of a Xia dynasty can be found in ''Analects'' by Confucius (c. 551 – c. 479 BC). This is over a thousand years after the end of the dynasty. ''Analects'' does not provide much information about the Xia. The main sources for the story of the Xia are the ''Bamboo Annals'' (~300 BC) and ''Records of the Grand Historian'' by Sima Qian around 100 BC.<ref>Mair, Victor, “[https://www.sino-platonic.org/complete/spp238_xia_dynasty_china.pdf Was there a Xia dynasty?]” Sino-Platonic Papers, May 2013.</ref>

==The Mandate of Heaven==

==The Mandate of Heaven==