As the lyrics of the song read:

In the ancient East there is a dragon;
China is its name.
In the ancient East there lives a people,
The dragon’s heirs every one.
Under the mighty claws of this might dragon I grew up
And its heir I have become.
Like it or not —
Once and forever, an heir of the dragon.

The Yellow Emperor 黃帝 is of equally venerable ancestry and influence in the Chinese world. A mythological figure, in modern times the Yellow Emperor was evoked for political, and nationalist, needs in the years leading up to and at the time of the founding of China’s first modern state, the Republic of China.

In the late-nineteenth century race and nation, and the concept of nation-states, had a profound influence on how different peoples imagined their own heritage as well as their political practices. In China, the influence of modern racial theory and ideas filtered through Japan as well as from Western sources; patriots found in the Yellow Emperor a worthy ancestor the reconceptualisation of the Chinese nation. As the Qing dynasty, a ruling house founded by invaders from the north-east, foundered, patriots tethered their belief in a unique and ancient civilisation to the figure of Yellow Emperor.

In China Heritage Annual 2017 we discuss the founding of the new Republic in early 1912 when the nationalist leader Sun Yat-sen led a thanksgiving at the tomb of the founding emperor of the Ming dynasty, the last ‘native’ Chinese ruling house established in Nanking in 1368 (see Light Returns 光復). Sun Yat-sen not only propitiated the spirit of the Ming Founder, he also sent a delegation far west, to Qiaoshan 橋山 in rural Shaanxi province. There an encomium he had composed was read out with much solemnity at the Tomb of the Yellow Emperor, who is also known by the personal name Xuanyuan 軒轅.

On Qingming eighty years ago, the leader of the Chinese Communist Party, Mao Zedong, who was vying with this Nationalist rival, Chiang Kai-shek, for stewardship over China, sent a delegation to the Tomb of the Yellow Emperor. It was not far from the wartime Communist base of Yan’an, and at the time propitiating national icons, and claiming them for the Communist cause, was part of the Party’s evolving policy on creating a United Front, aimed at forging the broadest possible coalition of patriotic forces.

For his part, Chiang also paid homage to the national ancestor and both delegations read out liturgical texts written for then occasion. Neither was as succinct as that of Sun Yat-sen, and while that of the Nationalists was more formulaic, making much of the Yellow Emperor’s contribution to civilisation and the ‘Chinese Race’, Mao’s text extolled unity in the face of the Japanese invaders.

Following 1949, the Yellow Emperor, as well as the Qingming Festival, were all but ignored by the revolutionary priorities of the Chinese party-state. It is only since the 1980s that the Yellow Emperor has again been a feature of the Communist Party’s United Front work with overseas Chinese and  Taiwan. On the day of Qingming ponderous celebrations of racial unity and nationalism are held in China and are encouraged internationally.

Although Qingming was decreed to be a modern holiday, Tomb-Sweeping Day, by the Nanking-based National government as early as 1935, in the People’s Republic (1949-) it was not until late 2007 that it was legislated as a national holiday. In recent years it has been extended into a three-day celebration of the spring and is one of the official ‘short extended holidays’ 小長假 introduced to affirm state-approved traditions.

In 2014, Beijing promulgated a new ‘Martyr’s Commemoration Day’ 烈士纪念日. Although Qingming is still, as it was even during the Maoist heyday, an occasion for towns, cities and provincial governments to organise official party-state ceremonies for the revolutionary dead at martyrs’ tombs and monuments, the official commemoration is gazetted for 30 September, on the eve of the 1st of October National Day. This day formally commemorates those who died in the conflicts that led to the founding of the People’s Republic, as well as those who have died for the party-state since. An unofficial count estimates that over twenty million men, women and children ‘heroically died for national independence, the liberation of the people, the strengthening and prosperity of the nation, as well as for the sake of the people during the various historical stages of Revolutionary War, Socialist Construction and the Open Door and Reform’ 中国革命战争、社会主义建设、改革开放各个历史时期，烈士们为民族独立、人民解放、国家富强、人民幸福而英勇牺牲. According to the same 2014 source, the official Martyrs’ List records 1.93 million people by name.

In March 2017, Li Hong 李紅, a young Anhui provincial delegate to the National People’s Congress, called for a law that would ban the defamation of heroes and martyrs and punish those who derided or mocked the dead. Those who abused the names, image or reputation of individuals who had contributed to the social good must take legal responsibility and pay the price. Li called for the legislative authorities to draft a ‘Heroes Protection Law’ 英雄保护法 forthwith.

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Unquiet Graves

Qingming also marks the day in the People’s Republic when mourners gathered en mass to protest against Party autocracy.

The Yellow Emperor and Leizu 

黃帝、嫘祖

Xi Xi

西西

Translated by Christina Sanderson

The Yellow Emperor is one of the most famous of China’s legendary rulers. He is said to have reigned from 2698 to 2598 BCE, and to have been miraculously conceived by his mother Fu Bao 附寶, who gave birth to him on the banks of the river Ji 姬, from which he took his surname. His personal name was Youxiong 有熊, taken from that of his hereditary Principality; and also Xuanyuan 軒轅, said by some to be the name of a village near which he dwelt, by others to refer to wheeled vehicles of which he was the inventor, as well as of armour, ships pottery and other useful appliances. The close of his long reign was made glorious by the appearance of the phoenix and the mysterious animal known as the qilin 麒麟, in token of his wise and humane administration. He died at the age of 111 years.

Xiling Shi is the Lady of Xiling, a title given to Leizu 嫘祖, consort of the Yellow Emperor, from her birthplace. She is said to have taught the art of rearing silkworms and is now worshipped as the Goddess of Sericulture 先蠶.

— adapted from Herbert Giles, A Chinese Biographical Dictionary.

As ever we are grateful to Christina Sanderson for sharing her new work on Xi Xi’s The Teddy Bear Chronicles 縫熊誌 with our readers, and to John Minford who introduced us all to Xi Xi’s panoply of bears. The translation of The Teddy Bear Chronicles will appear as a volume in a series under John’s editorship. That series is generously funded by the Hong Kong Arts Development Council. 

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The Yellow Emperor’s surname was Gongsun. His given name was Xuanyuan; according to some because was born on the hillock of Xuanyuan. As he grew up on the banks of the Ji River, he had another surname, which was Ji. The Yellow Emperor was the leader of the nomadic Youxiong clan and various other neighbouring tribes.黃帝姓公孫，名軒轅，因為生於軒轅之丘﹔因為也長於姬水之畔，所以又姓姬。他是游牧部落有熊，以及附近部落的領袖。

His greatest achievement was to take a brilliantly intelligent woman called Leizu for his wife. Leizu was the daughter of the chief of the Xiling tribe, who lived near present-day Xiling Gorge in Sichuan province. She was obviously an extremely creative person. It was she who discovered that natural silk could be derived from the cocoons silkworms produce after eating mulberry leaves, and that silk could then be woven into a fabric for clothes. She was first adopted by the head of the clan as a daughter, and later became the head of the clan herself. The entire clan was occupied in raising silkworms, spinning silk and weaving cloth, which allowed them to prosper and expand out across the Chengdu plain. When we say that the Yellow Emperor ‘took’ Leizu as a wife, it actually means that he married into Leizu’s family, since theirs was a matriarchal society. 他最聰明的事情是娶了嫘祖為妻。嫘祖是西陵國女子，智慧，顯然也充滿想像力，發現了蠶蟲吃桑葉後吐絲，蠶絲可以織布做衣服。她被族長收為女兒，後來還當了族長；全族人養蠶繅絲、織布，成為成都平原的富庶之族。黃帝娶嫘祖，是嫁到成都去的，入贅嫘祖家﹔當時是母系社會。

For her to grasp the process of raising silk worms and reeling silk was a truly amazing feat. It was no less than the beginning of clothing culture, the point from which China was able to break away from barbarism. The entire history of clothing in China began with Leizu. Her technique for rinsing silk floss later contributed to the invention of paper and printing. 懂得養蠶繅絲，真是了不起的事；這是衣飾文明之始，中國從此擺脫野蠻。中國的服裝史，要從嫘祖寫起。而且，後來絲綢的漂絮技術，又促成了做紙和印刷術的誕生。

To a large extent, women in ancient China were occupied picking mulberry leaves. The indispensable tool required for this task was not a regular basket, but a flat, bamboo carrier called a long 籠. These were very attractive objects. The Han-dynasty ballad The Mulberry Leaves by the Path is about a woman called Luo Fu carrying such a container to go picking mulberry leaves: 古代女子大都忙於採桑。必備的用具不是籃，而是籠，都很漂亮。樂府《陌上桑》寫羅敷提籠去採桑，

The straps holding the long together were woven from strands of women’s hair, and the handle was made from cassia twigs or branches. These “cassia twigs” are actually what we now know as cinnamon bark, a kind of fragrant wood. In the ballad, this wood is used to represent Luo Fu’s noble and unsullied character. 繫在籠上的繩子是用青絲做成，籠的把子則用桂枝。桂枝即是如今的肉桂，是一種香木，以示羅敷的高潔。

Leizu lived in remote antiquity and, as such, she wouldn’t have been as particular about her clothes as those who came after her. My Leizu bear is wearing a simple smock with an apron tied around it. She is fairly rich, as you can tell by looking at her necklace, which is made of cowry shells, the currency of her time. 更遠古的嫘祖當然沒有後人那麼講究。她穿一件套頭衫，繫圍裙。她相當富有，看她的項鏈是貝殼就知道，因為貝就是錢。

When the Yellow Emperor took his people to live with him in Sichuan, he merged the Youxiong and Xiling tribes to form a single large clan. This represented the end of their nomadic existence: they had entered the Agricultural Era. The Yellow Emperor stayed in Chengdu for two years, where two sons were born to him. He then returned to the Central Plain and defeated the tyrannical leader of the Nine Li tribe, Chiyou. This victory united the rest of the disparate tribes in the region. Their social system changed from matriarchy to patriarchy. At that time, clothing started to become more fancy and dignified. 黃帝把部族帶往四川，和西陵族合成一大族，並且結朿了游牧生活，進入農耕時代。黃帝在成都住了兩年，生下兩個兒子，然後回到中原，戰勝蚩尤，統一各部落。母系社會也變為父系社會。那時他的服飾也冠冕堂皇起來。

Prior to the Yellow Emperor’s unification of the tribes, there were no set styles when it came to clothes. I designed this outfit for him. The upper garment imitates the one-shoulder tunics popular in the Bronze Age, as found at the famous archaeological site at Sanxingdui in Sichuan. The thing joined to it is a bunch-pleat, or ‘gathered’ skirt. All the emperors of later ages, from the Song, to the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties loved to wear these roomy gathered skirts. 黃帝統一各部落之前，還沒有訂立服飾的樣貌。我給他設計一件衣裙，上衣是模仿四川三星堆大銅人的斜披肩，相連的是密褶裙。後代的君主，不論宋元明清，都愛穿寬闊的密褶裙。