Chong (state)
Chong (崇) was an ancient Chinese state that existed from the Youyu clan period to around the time of the Western Zhou dynasty.
Chong 崇 | |
|---|---|
| c. 2300 BCE–c. 1046-1051 BC? | |
 Map of the Battle of Muye, showing the State of Chong. | |
| Capital | Mount Song, Huyi District in Henan, and/or Guanzhong, modern-day Weicheng District, Xianyang. Thought to be the Laoniupo site (老牛坡遗址).[1] 34°13′N 108°43′E / 34.21°N 108.72°E |
| Common languages | Old Chinese |
| Government | Monarchy |
| Earl (伯) or Marquess (侯) | |
• c. 2300-2200 BCE | Gun, Earl of Chong |
• c. 1200 BCE | Marquess Hu of Cóng (虎琮侯) Marquess Bao of Cóng (豹琮侯) |
• c. 1000-1050 BCE | Marquess Hu of Chong |
| Historical era | Youyu clan Shang dynasty |
• Established | c. 2300 BCE |
| c. 2300–2200 BCE | |
| c. 1100-1000 BCE | |
| c. 1040 BCE? | |
• Disestablished | c. 1046-1051 BC? |
| Chong | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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 Chong (虫) in Oracle bone script. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Chinese | 崇 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Oracle bone variant | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Chinese | 琮 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Oracle bone variant | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 蟲 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 虫 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Etymology and identification
Chong appears to have been written as (虫) in Oracle bones, which mention an Earl of Chong (虫伯) who was allied with the Shang and was mentioned in oracular inscriptions in Zhouyuan. Linguistic evidence implies that the character Chong (虫) is a near-homophone with the Chong 崇 state in received texts even in Old Chinese, and these are thus thought to be the same state.[3][a][4]
Later Oracle bones mention a Marquess Hu of Cóng (虎琮侯) and a Marquess Bao of Cóng (豹琮侯), whose state was a military ally of Wu Ding, and thought to be the same one through linguistic evidence.[5][6][7][4][b] The corpus details the Marquess attending Wu Ding's court, receiving blessings for their invasions of Predynastic Zhou and other polities, receiving permission for hunting, receiving resources, and more. However, the reading and reconstruction for this figure are disputed.[8] Furthermore, as it is very rare for personal names to be used in oracular inscriptions, it is difficult to tell which marquess is being talked about, making it difficult to reconstruct their biographies.
History
The earliest historical records of the State of Chong comes from various Zhou-Qin dynasty texts, such as the Book of Documents and Bamboo Annals. In these documents, during the period of Emperor Yao and the Youyu clan, a severe flood occurred around the Yellow River and River Yangtze, causing severe suffering to the populace. The Bamboo Annals claim that during the 61st year of his reign, Emperor Yao turned to Gun, then-Earl of Chong, for assistance. However, after 8-9[c] years, Gun still failed to successfully control the floods, and was dismissed from office. The Book of Documents records that Gun was imprisoned at Yushan following him taking a special kind of earth that expands in response to water, without permission from Yao. Due to this crime, Gun was defined as one of the Four Criminals of the Yao-Shun period, and his son, Yu the Great, would redeem himself by controlling the floods and founding the Xia dynasty.[2][9][10][d]
During the Late Shang period, Marquess Hu of Chong was among a trio of feudal leaders defending the southern parts of Shang dynasty territory, along with the Marquess of E and King Wen of Zhou (then Ji Chang). In return for acting as the state's vanguard, these states received the benefits of Shang hegemony. The Shang dynasty king, Di Xin, repeatedly went to war against the Dongyi to subdue tribal states. However, Predynastic Zhou became increasingly dissatisfied with Di Xin's rule, and King Wen resolved to gain support to overthrow him. When Marquess Hu heard of the plot, he told Di Xin, which resulted in King Wen's imprisonment. He was eventually released after San Yisheng flattered Di Xin with gifts and women, but the plot continued. Eventually, Predynastic Zhou went to war with Chong and besieged its walls for thirty days. As King Wen's army was unrelenting in its pressure, Marquess Hu eventually surrendered, and his state dissolved, being replaced with Chengyi (程邑) and later Fengjing as the new capital of Predynastic Zhou, within the historical region of Guanzhong. After that, King Wu of Zhou began the Battle of Muye against Di Xin's kingdom and won, beginning the Western Zhou period.[2][12][13] The region where Chong once stood was sacked by the Quanrong in 771 BCE during the Battle of Mount Li between King You of Zhou and the Marquis of Shen.[14][15]
Zuo Zhuan records a city (or possibly state) from the Spring and Autumn Period also named Chong, but it appears to be unrelated.[16]
Notable people
Fictional people
Notes
- ↑ Zhengzhang reconstructs chóng 虫 as /*l'uŋ/, and chóng 崇 as /*zruŋ/.
- ↑ The working corpus of texts with the glyph as mentioned by Chen Jian 陳劍 include 《合集》8092, 8093, 8098, 152正, 7076, 32981, 10474, 10976正, 5668, 6949正, 32806, 32804, 3310, 32087, 32805, 5505, 8095, 3314, as well as《怀特》362 and 393.
- ↑ Records of the Grand Historian says 9, the Bamboo Annals say 8
- ↑ It should be stressed that the legitimacy and/or extent of the traditional Great Flood narrative is disputed.[11]
References
- ↑ "存档副本". Archived from the original on 2014-08-08. Retrieved 2014-08-05.
- 1 2 3 4 Sima, Qian. "五帝本記，殷本記，周本記". 史記. Chinese Text Project.
- ↑ 王晖 虫伯”及其种族地望考——兼论有关鬼方的几个问题《中国历史地理论丛》1990年第2期85-98,126,共15页 http://dianda.cqvip.com/Qikan/Article/Detail?id=1002995503
- 1 2 Chen 陳, Jian 劍 (January 2007). "陳劍：釋"琮"及相關諸字（二）改定-复旦大学出土文献与古文字研究中心". www.fdgwz.org.cn. 復旦大學出土文獻與古文字研究中心. Retrieved 25 May 2026.
- ↑ 胡厚宣．卜辞中所见之殷代农业．台湾大通书局，1972年：52
- ↑ 韩江苏 江林昌 等．《中国商代史第二卷》．中国社会科学出版社，2006：478-482
- ↑ Heji 合集 6554
- ↑ Zhang 张, Liejun 利军 (24 September 2023). 张利军：殷卜辞所见外服“侯”考（上）_腾讯新闻 (in Chinese (China)) (QQ ed, originally published in 《中国历史研究院集刊》2022年第2期 ed.). 中国历史研究院. Retrieved 25 May 2026.
- ↑ Fu, Sheng. "虞書". 尚書. Chinese Text Project.
- ↑ "帝堯陶唐氏，帝辛". 竹書紀年. Chinese Text Project.
- ↑ Wu, Qinglong; Zhao, Zhijun; Liu, Li; Granger, Darryl E.; Wang, Hui; Cohen, David J.; Wu, Xiaohong; Ye, Maolin; Bar-Yosef, Ofer; Lu, Bin; Zhang, Jin; Zhang, Peizhen; Yuan, Daoyang; Qi, Wuyun; Cai, Linhai; Bai, Shibiao (31 March 2017), "Response to Comments on "Outburst flood at 1920 BCE supports historicity of China's Great Flood and the Xia dynasty"", Science, 355 (6332): 579–582, Bibcode:2017Sci...355R1382W, doi:10.1126/science.aal1325, PMID 28360294, S2CID 206654344
- ↑ "道應訓". 淮南子. Chinese Text Project.
- ↑ "指武". 說苑. Chinese Text Project.
- ↑ "Fenghao Site". en.chinaculture.org. Retrieved 2024-11-03.
- ↑ Liu, Jiaqi; Zhang, Lei; Zhao, Jieyu; Liang, Yuan; Han, Qingxi; Chirwa, Sambirani (2023-05-18). "Exploration of the spatial relationship between Xi'an City and its mausoleums from the perspective of time evolution". Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. 11. doi:10.3389/fevo.2023.1158563. ISSN 2296-701X.
- ↑ 《左传·宣公元年》：晋赵穿帅师侵崇。 《左传·宣公二年》：秦师伐晋，以报崇也，遂围焦。夏，晋赵盾救焦。