Guifang (Chinese: 鬼方; Wade–Giles: Kuei-fang; lit. 'Demon Territory'[2]) was an ancient ethnonym for a northern people that fought against the Shang dynasty (1600–1046 BCE). Chinese historical tradition used various names, at different periods, for northern tribes such as Guifang, Rong, Di,[3] Xunyu, Xianyun, or Xiongnu peoples.[4][5] This Chinese exonym combines gui (鬼 "ghost, spirit, devil") and fang (方 "side, border, country, region"), a suffix referring to "non-Shang or enemy countries that existed in and beyond the borders of the Shang polity."[6]
Chinese annals contain a number of references to the Guifang. Earliest sources mentioning the Guifang are the Oracle Bones.[7][8][9] Extant oracle bones record no military action between Shang and Guifang, yet Guifang have been interpreted as hostile towards Shang[10][7] or not hostile.[9][a]
The Bamboo Annals, interred with King Xiang of Wei (died 296 BC) and re-discovered nearly six centuries later in 281 AD (Western Jin dynasty) in the Jizhong discovery, state that:
The oracle bones indicate that, following Wu Ding's conquest, the Guifang became Shang's subjects and even assisted the Shang against other polities, e.g. the Qiang. Gui officials even managed to achieve high statuses in the Shang court; for examples, a Gui official, Geng, was ordered to perform the gang sacrifice 剛 in the xiang 亯 sacrificial temple.[7]
Up to the time of Shang king Di Xin (lit. 'Thearch Xin'),[c] Gui chiefs had been long-enfeoffed vassals of Shang and even participated in the Shang royal government.[7] In Stratagem of the Warring States, Lu Zhonglian (魯仲連) related that the Marquis of Gui (鬼侯) ranked among Di Xin's Three Ducal Ministers (along with the Marquis of E (鄂侯) and the Western Count [Ji] Chang (西伯昌)[d]) and married his beloved daughter to Di Xin. However, Di Xin considered her detestably ugly (惡), so he killed her and boiled alive the Marquis of Gui; the Marquis of E sharply criticized Di Xin and was butchered.[22] A parallel account in Shiji features Marquis of Jiu (九侯), his daughter (九侯女), and Marquis of E (鄂侯);[23] Marquis of Jiu was identified with Marquis of Gui.[7][e] Another parallel account in Taiping Yulan states Marquis of Gui's daughter disapproved of Di Xin's debaucheries so Di Xin killed her and her father; and Di Xin had Marquis of Xing butchered instead of Marquis of E.[25][f]
Among the succeeding Zhou dynasty's bronze inscriptions, the Xiao Yu Ding (小盂鼎) –cast in the twenty-fifth year (976 BCE) of King Kang of Zhou (r. 1005/03–978 BCE)– mentioned the Guifang, probably located northeast of the initial Zhou domain. After two successful battles against the Guifang, the Zhou victors brought captured enemies to the Zhou temple and offered to the king. The prisoners numbered over 13,000 with four chiefs who were subsequently executed. Zhou also captured a large amount of booty.[27]
No events involving the Guifang are reported after 650 BCE, which is also the last mention of the Northern Rong (北戎). They were replaced by a new group of Northern foreigners, the Di (狄).[27]
The Guifang do not seem to have seriously challenged Chinese rule, they did not invade China, and on the contrary were the victims of Chinese expeditions. They may only have been an early people which was conquered by the Western Zhou, and ultimately disappeared from history.[28]
As a result of phonetical studies and comparisons based on the inscriptions on bronze and the structure of the characters, Wang Guowei came to the conclusion that the tribal names in the annalistic sources Guifang, Xunyu, Xianyu, Xianyun, Rong, Di,[g] and Hu designated one and the same people, who later entered history under the name Xiongnu.[31][32][33]
Likewise, using Sima Qian's Records of the Grand Historian and other sources, Vsevolod Taskin proposes that in the earlier pre-historic period (i.e. the time of the legendary Yellow Emperor) the Xiongnu were called Hunyu; and in the late pre-historic period (i.e. the time of the legendary Emperor Yao and Emperor Shun) they were called Rong; in the literate period starting with the Shang dynasty (1600–1046 BC) they were called Guifang, in the Zhou period (1045–256 BC) they were called Xianyun, and starting from the Qin period (221–206 BC) the Chinese annalists called them Xiongnu.[34][35][36]
Even so, Paul R. Goldin (2011) reconstructs the Old Chinese pronunciations of 葷粥 ~ 獯鬻 ~ 獯鬻 ~ 薰育 as *xur-luk, 獫狁 as hram′-lun′, and 匈奴 as *xoŋ-NA; and comments all three names are "manifestly unrelated". He further states that sound changes made the names more superficially similar than they really had been, and prompted later commentators to conclude that those names must have referred to one same people in different epochs, even though people during the Warring States period would never have been thus misled.[37]
The Shang state had a system of writing attested to by bronze inscriptions and oracle bones, which record Shang troops fighting frequent wars with neighboring nomadic herdsmen from the inner Asian steppes. In his oracular divinations, a Shang king repeatedly showed concern about the fang (方, likely meaning "border-region"; the modern term for them is 方国 fāngguó "fang-countries"),[39] groups of barbarians outside his inner tu (土) regions in the center of Shang territory. A particularly hostile tribe, Tufang (zh:土方) from the Yan Mountains region, is regularly mentioned in divinatory records.[40] Another Chinese ethnonym for the animal husbandry nomads was ma (馬) or "horse" barbarians mentioned at the Shang western military frontier in the Taihang Mountains, where they fought and may have used chariots.[41]
The Guifang may also correspond to the Seima-Turbino culture of the Altai Mountains.[38] Several of the Shang dynasty artifacts of the Yin Ruins and from the tomb of Fu Hao (died c. 1200 BCE), excavated in Shang capital of Anyang, are similar to Seima-Turbino culture artifacts, such as socketed spearheads with a single side hook, jade figurines and knives with deer-headed pommel.[38] These Late Shang artifacts, visibly derived from the Seima-Turbino culture to the north, were made precisely at the same time the Shang reported intense protracted conflicts with the northern tribes of the "Guifang". This would suggest that the Guifang were the Altaic Seima-Turbino culture itself, and that their century-long conflict with the Shang led to the transfer of various object and manufacturing techniques.[38][42]
Particularly, the introduction of the socketed spearheads with a single side hook seems to date back to the period of the Taosi culture, when the earliest and most faithful Seima-Turbino types start to appear in China, circa 2100-2000 BCE.[38] These early artifacts suggest that Chinese bronze metallurgy initially derived from the cultures of the Eurasian steppes.[43] Soon however, China was able to appropriate this technology and refine it, particularly through its mastery of bronze casting, to create a highly sophisticated and massive bronze industry.[43]
The nomadic leaders depicted in Deer stones in Mongolia, dated to 1400-700 BCE, leading large-scale organized nomadic groups, may have affected the late Shang and early Zhou dynasties of China to their south.[44]
They were equipped with weapons and instruments of war, such as daggers, shafted axes, or curved rein holders for their horses. They may not have ridden on horseback, but they are documented to have possessed horse-drawn charriots, with two or four horses, as shown in the drawings on Deer Stones and multiple finds of horse skeletons with heavy wear.[45] These powerful nomadic leaders, leading large-scale organized nomadic groups capable of building monumental decorated stone tombs, may have being part of the nomadic challenge to the early Chinese dynasties.[44] They may also be connected to the rise of the horse chariot during the Shang dynasty.[45]
The Siwa culture culture is sometimes proposed as being connected to the northern tribes which challenged the Shang and Zhou dynasties, but questions are raised against this theory because the Siwa sites are small with low subsistence levels, whereas the northern tribes, particularly the Xianyun, seem to have been more advanced, using bronze weapons and chariots.[46] According to Feng Li, the archaeological remains of the Siwa culture suggest that they could not have sustained an advanced society capable of rivalizing with contemporary Chinese armies.[46] The debate remains open.[47]
Comments about the conflicts against the Guifang appear in bronze inscriptions of the Western Zhou.
Name | Artifact | Inscription | Translation |
---|---|---|---|
Xiaoyu ding 小盂鼎 979 BCE (King Kang)[48] |
Lost in the Taiping Rebellion (19th century) The Xiaoyu ding was probably similar to the Da Yu ding made two years before, in 981 BCE:
|
"It was the eighth month, after the full moon, the day was on jiashen [day 21]; in the morning dusk, the three officials of the left and the three officials of the right and the many rulers entered to serve the wine. When it became light the king approached the Zhou temple and performed the guo-libation rite. The king's state guests attended. The state guests offered their travel garments and faced east."
[49][50]
"Yu with many flags with suspended Guifang...entered the Southern Gate, and reported saying: 'The king commanded Yu to take... to attack the Guifang and shackle chiefs and take trophies. [I] shackled two chiefs, took 482 trophies, captured 13,081 men, captured...horses, captured 30 chariots, captured 355 oxen and 38 sheep.'" "The king called out to...to command Yu with his trophies to enter the gate and present them in the Western Passageway... [He] entered and performed a burnt offering in the Zhou temple,... [He] entered the Third Gate, assumed a position in the central court, facing north. Yu reported..." "The guests assumed position. [He] served the guests. The king called out: 'Serve!' Yu in their...presented guests... At mid-morning, three Zhou...entered to serve wine. The king entered the temple. The invocator...the state guests grandly toasted...used a victim in ancestral sacrifice to the king of Zhou [i.e. King Wen], to King [Wu] and to King Cheng...divination cracks have pattern. The king toasted. Toast followed toast: the king and the state guests. The king called out to...to command Yu with the booty to enter. All of the booty was registered." |
There is research on the ethnic image of the northern nomadic people of the Altaic language family. It may be that this is the image of the Xianyun tribe that once posed a serious military threat to the northern border of the Zhou Dynasty. They were called "Ghost people" (Guifang) because they looked different from the Chinese. 有考证系阿尔泰语系的北方游牧民族人种形象。可能是曾经对周朝北方边境构成严重军事威胁的猃狁部族,因相貌异于华夏,被称作"鬼方"。
In subsequent centuries such knives were more popular with peoples of the northern zone than with the Shang and Zhou inhabitants of Shaanxi and Henan. It is, therefore, possible that even in the Erlitou period such knives illustrate contact with northern peoples. Alternatively, the spread of Erligang culture may have taken such knives from central Henan to the periphery.
Enough northern bronze knives, tools, and fittings have been recovered from royal burials at the Shang capital of Anyang to suggest that people of northern heritage mingled with the Chinese in their capital city. These artifacts must have entered Shang domain through trade, war, intermarriage, or other circumstances.
Parallels with bronze-using cultures further to the north and west in eastern and central Eurasia. (...) Frontier-style bronze weapons and tools dominated the findings from caches at Chaodaogou and Xiaohe'nan. They include straight-bladed bronze daggers, curve-bladed knives with animal head terminals or mushroom-shaped jingle pommels and socketed yue axes. (...) The eyes of the animals are often highlighted with turquoise. Hilts on these knives and daggers were bordered with diagonal or parallel striations, a northern decorative tradition. (...) Knives with animal pommels were likely inspired by daggers with such terminals, while jingle-headed knives have been argued to have originated on the Inner Asia Frontier. (...) In general, bronze weapons and tools found in the Yan mountainous region show stylistic analogies to those found in the Jin-Shaan Plateau west of the Taihang Mountains, in the Transbaikal in Buryatia and in Karasuk sites in the Minusinsk Basin (c. 1500–800 BCE). (...) A very recent study proposed that trade between the Shang and Zhou in the Central Plain and bronze cultures in north central Mongolia brought artifacts to the Chinese northern frontier
We can immediately recognise the engagement of the Shang with their neighbours by looking at the nearly two hundred weapons buried with Fu Hao, who, as consort of the powerful Shang king, Wu Ding (c. 1200 BC), is mentioned in oracle bone inscriptions as a leader in battle. In her tomb were large axes (fig. 1a), derived from the shapes of ancient jade examples, standard spearheads and dagger-axes, ge, for an accompanying fighting force, and knives (fig. 1b) similar to those used in the steppe.
In general the Guifang do not seem to have posed any serious threat to the Zhou frontier and must have been either conquered by the Zhou at an early stage or dissolved politically, since their name soon disappears from the patchy sources at our disposal.
The report on the archaeological excavation of the Yin (Shang) ruins published in 2011 shows a Seima-Turbino style bronze socketed spearhead with a single side hook. (...) It is worth noting that a jade figurine (Figure 15:5) that resembles a Seima-Turbino-style bronze figurine (Figure 15:3) and a knife with deer-head pommel (Figure 15:6) were unearthed from the tomb of Fu Hao at the Yin ruins. A similar knife with deer-head pommel is also in the collection of the Baoji Museum of Bronze Collections (Figure 12:4). These discoveries and collected artifacts reveal the cultural transmission between ancient inhabitants of the Yellow River region and nomads of the Eurasian Steppe.(...) The Illustrious Ancestor [King Gaozong of Yin] disciplines the Devil's Country. After three years he conquers it." (...) Seima-Turbino-style artifacts unearthed at the Yin ruins, including the bronze socketed spearhead with a single side hook, the jade figurine and the knife with deer-head pommel, indicate that the "Devil's Country" refers to the far-away Altai Mountains.
The discovery of the Seima-Turbino culture in China is of great importance, as it demonstrates with material evidence that Chinese metallurgy derives from the cultures of the Eurasian Steppe.
We can look first at Mongolia to explain this shift, for a new development, the creation of large stone monuments, khirigsuurs (fig. 19) and deer stones (fig. 20), marks significant on-going changes in steppe societies. These impressive structures are widespread across western and central Mongolia, dating from 1400-700 BC. It would have taken a large labour force to create the mounds of stones that make up khirigsuurs, which seem to have been both burial and ceremonial sites for central figures of the many small groups of Mongolian mobile pastoralist societies. (...) In some tombs are horse fittings, such as bits. Parts of hundreds of horses might be interred over time around a major khirigsuur. (...) Deer stones tell the same story (fig 20). Although the majority are stylised, a few of these tall, originally standing, stones have a human head carved on one side at the rounded top, sometimes with temple rings shown on two of the other three sides, perhaps representing a powerful individual, or the more general concept of powerful leaders. (...) Then comes a horizontal belt and from this hang weapons, especially knives or daggers, and shafted axes, with curved rein holders below. A shield is often shown higher up. Not only do these deer stones represent people, they memorialise the achievements of warriors with their personal weapons. (...) These developments had probably had an impact on the peoples in the arc who had then interacted with the late Shang and early Zhou states.
Li argues that the Xianyun cannot be identified with the archaeological remains of the Siwa culture because all the sites that are associated with this archaeological culture are small and simple, whereas the activities of the Xianyun suggest a much more complex society (p. 187). While this observation makes sense, it may have more to do with the problematic definition of the archaeological "culture" rather than with Xianyun society. Pushing the location of the Xianyun further north and identifying them with a vaguely defined "Northern Zone" tradition (p. 188) certainly does not advance our under standing of the Xianyun society.
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