Records of the Grand Historian in the context of "Yellow Emperor"

Sima Tan (traditional Chinese: 司馬談; simplified Chinese: 司马谈; pinyin: Sīmǎ Tán; Wade–Giles: Ssu-ma T'an; c. 165–110 BCE) was a Chinese astrologist, astronomer, and historian during the Western Han dynasty. His work Records of the Grand Historian was completed by his son Sima Qian, who is considered the founder of Chinese historiography.

The Bamboo Annals (Chinese: 竹書紀年; pinyin: Zhúshū Jìnián), also known as the Ji Tomb Annals (Chinese: 汲冢紀年; pinyin: Jí Zhǒng Jìnián), is a chronicle of ancient China.It begins in the earliest legendary time (the age of the Yellow Emperor) and extends to 299 BC, with the later centuries focusing on the history of the State of Wei in the Warring States period. It thus covers a similar period to Sima Qian's Records of the Grand Historian (91 BC). The original may have been lost during the Song dynasty, and the text is known today in two versions, a "current text" (or "modern text") of disputed authenticity and an incomplete "ancient text".

The Wei River (Chinese: 渭河; pinyin: Wèi Hé; Wade–Giles: Wei Ho) is a major river in west-central China's Gansu and Shaanxi provinces. It is the largest tributary of the Yellow River and very important in the early development of Chinese civilization. In ancient times, such as in the Records of the Grand Historian, the river was called Wei Shui (渭水; Wèishuǐ; 'Wei water').

The total length of the Wei River is 818 km (508 mi), covering a drainage area of 135,000 km (52,000 sq mi). Some of the major tributaries include the Luo River, Jing River, Niutou River, Feng River and the Chishui River. In a direct line, it travels due east for 700 km (430 mi) before draining into the Yellow River at Tongguan County near the tri-provincial boundary between Shaanxi, Shanxi and Henan provinces, with a series of major cities along its course including Tianshui, Baoji, Xianyang, Xi'an and Weinan.

The Kunlun Mountains constitute one of the longest mountain chains in Asia, extending for more than 3,000 kilometres (1,900 mi). In the broadest sense, the chain forms the northern edge of the Tibetan Plateau south of the Tarim Basin. Located in Western China, the Kunlun Mountains have been known as the "Forefather of Mountains" in China.

The exact definition of the Kunlun Mountains varies over time. Older sources used Kunlun to mean the mountain belt that runs across the center of China, that is, Altyn Tagh along with the Qilian and Qin Mountains. Recent sources have the Kunlun range forming most of the south side of the Tarim Basin and then continuing east, south of the Altyn Tagh. Sima Qian (Records of the Grand Historian, scroll 123) says that Emperor Wu of Han sent men to find the source of the Yellow River and gave the name Kunlun to the mountains at its source. The name seems to have originated as a semi-mythical location in the classical Chinese text Classic of Mountains and Seas.

The burning of books and burying of scholars was the purported burning of texts in 213 BCE and live burial of 460 Confucian scholars in 212 BCE ordered by Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huang. The events were alleged to have destroyed philosophical treatises of the Hundred Schools of Thought, with the goal of strengthening the official Qin governing philosophy of Legalism.

Modern historians doubt the details of the story, which first appeared more than a century later in the Han dynasty official Sima Qian's Records of the Grand Historian. As a court scholar, Sima had every reason to denigrate the earlier emperor to flatter his own, but later Confucians did not question the story. According to the historian Ulrich Neininger, their message was, "If you take our life, Heaven will take the life of your dynasty."

The Book of Han (Chinese: 漢書), finished in 111 CE, is one of the Twenty-Four Histories and covers the Western, or Former Han dynasty from the first emperor in 206 BCE to the fall of Wang Mang in 23 CE. The work was composed by Ban Gu (32–92 CE), an Eastern Han court official, with the help of his sister Ban Zhao, continuing the work of their father, Ban Biao. They modelled their work on the Records of the Grand Historian (c. 91 BCE), a cross-dynastic general history, but theirs was the first in this annals-biography form to cover a single dynasty. It is the best source, sometimes the only one, for many topics such as literature in this period. The Book of Han is also called the Book of the Former Han (前漢書; Qián Hàn shū) to distinguish it from the Book of the Later Han (後漢書; Hòu Hàn shū) which covers the Eastern Han period (25–220 CE), and was composed in the fifth century by Fan Ye (398–445 CE).

Tai Wu (Chinese: 太戊) or Da Wu, personal name Zi Mi (子密), was a Shang dynasty King of China. Records of the Grand Historian he was listed by Sima Qian as the ninth Shang king, succeeding his brother Yong Ji (太庚). He was enthroned with Bo (亳) as his capital. He appointed Yishe (伊陟) and Chenhu (臣扈) as his higher officers.

On the 7th year of his reign a mulberry tree (桑) and millet (穀) were found growing together in his palace. According to the Records of the Grand Historian, surprisingly, they grew to very tall trees within 7 days. This young king was quite scared and turned to Yishe for explanation, which was in regard to the king's former incapable governance. Tai Wu listen to his intelligent ministers and worked diligently; then, those two unusual trees withered very soon after he became a good king.

Hou Ji (or Houji; Chinese: 后稷; pinyin: Hòu Jì; Wade–Giles: Hou Chi) was a legendary Chinese culture hero credited with introducing millet to humanity during the time of the Xia dynasty. Millet was the original staple grain of northern China, prior to the introduction of wheat. His name translates as Lord of Millet and was a title granted to him by Emperor Shun, according to Records of the Grand Historian. Houji was credited with developing the philosophy of Agriculturalism and with service during the Great Flood in the reign of Yao; he was also claimed as an ancestor of the Ji clan that became the ruling family of the Zhou dynasty or a founder of the Zhou.

After the Zhou dynasty, ancient Chinese historians, folklorists, and religious practitioners had a variety of opinions on Hou Ji, including the opinion that he became deified as the god Shennong after his death.

The Nine Tripod Cauldrons (Chinese: 九鼎; pinyin: Jiǔ Dǐng) were a collection of ding in ancient China that were viewed as symbols of the authority given to the ruler by the Mandate of Heaven. According to its origin narrative, they were cast by Yu the Great of the Xia dynasty.

At the time of the Shang dynasty during the 2nd millennium BCE, the tripod cauldrons came to symbolize the power and authority of the ruling dynasty with strict regulations imposed as to their use. Members of the scholarly gentry class were permitted to use one or three cauldrons; the ministers of state (大夫, dàfū) five; the vassal lords seven; and only the sovereign Son of Heaven was entitled to use nine. The use of the nine tripod cauldrons to offer ritual sacrifices to the ancestors from heaven and earth was a major ceremonial occasion so that by natural progression the ding came to symbolize national political power and later to be regarded as a National Treasure. Sources state that two years after the fall of the Zhou dynasty at the hands of what would become the Qin dynasty the nine tripod cauldrons were taken from the Zhou royal palace and moved westward to the Qin capital at Xianyang. However, by the time Qin Shi Huang had eliminated the other six Warring States to become the first emperor of China in 221 BCE, the whereabouts of the nine tripod cauldrons were unknown. Sima Qian records in his Records of the Grand Historian that they were lost in the Si River to where Qin Shi Huang later dispatched a thousand men to search for the cauldrons to no avail.