Anthropomorphic axe, bronze, excavated in the tomb of Heibo (潶伯), a military noble in charge of protecting the northern frontier, at Baicaopo, Lingtai County, Western Zhou period (1045–771 BCE). Gansu Museum. This is considered as a possible depiction of a Xianyun or Guifang.[1]
The Xunyu (Chinese: 獯鬻; Wade–Giles: Hsünyü; Old Chinese: (ZS) *qʰun-lug, (Schuessler): *hun-juk[2]) is the name of an ancient nomadic tribe which invaded China during legendary times. They are traditionally identified with the Guifang, the Xianyun and the Xiongnu.[3]
Identification
Chinese annals contain a number of references to the Xunyu. The earliest authors were Sima Qian (c. 145 or 135 BC – 86 BC), Ying Shao (AD 140–206), Wei Zhao (204-273), and Jin Zhuo (c. late 3rd or 4th century).[4] They claimed that Xunyu or Xianyun were names that designated nomadic people who during the Han dynasty were called Xiongnu (匈奴).[5]
Sima Zhen quoted Zhang Yan (張晏) as saying that “Chunwei, during the Yin era, fled to the northern borders.”;[6] immediately after, Sima Zhen stated that Yue Chan (樂產) wrote in the now-lost Guadipu (括地譜) "Register of the Encompassing Lands" that: “Jie, (ruler of) the House of Xia lived an immoral life. Tang exiled him to Mingtiao, he died there three years later. His son Xunyu 獯粥 married his concubines and they wandered far away to the northern wilderness in search of pasture lands, and then in the Middle Kingdom they were mentioned as Xiongnu 匈奴.”[7] Wei Zhao identified the names Chunwei and Hunyu with the name of the Xiongnu: “During the Han (206 BC-220 AD) they were called Xiongnu 匈奴, and the Hunyu 葷粥 is just another name for the same people, and similarly, the Xunyu 獯粥 is just another transcription of Chunwei 淳維, their ancestor’s name”.[8] Jin Zhuo stated that: "In Yao's time they were called Hunyu; in Zhou's time they were called Xianyun; in Qin's time they were called Xiongnu."[9] Sima Zhen quoted from Fengsu Tongyi (風俗通義) "Comprehensive Meaning of Customs and Mores", by Ying Shao 應劭, that “In the time of Yin, they were called Xunyu [獯粥], which was changed to Xiongnu [匈奴]”;[10] however, this quote no longer exists in Fengsu Tongyi's received text.[11]
Based on phonetical studies and comparisons of inscriptions on bronze and the structure of the characters, Wang Guowei (1877–1927) came to the conclusion that the tribal names Guifang (鬼方), Xunyu, Xianyu (鮮虞), Xianyun (獫狁), Rong, Di, and Hu in the old annals designated one and the same people, who later entered Chinese history under the name Xiongnu,[12][13][14]
The exact time period when the nomads' ethnonym had the Old Chinese phonetizations ancestral to standard ChineseXunyu remains determined only vaguely. They were mentioned in legends involving legendary Zhou ruler Old Duke Father Dan (古公亶父; Gǔgōng Dǎnfù): in the book Mencius (published c. 300 BCE) as 獯鬻 Xunyu,[15] and in Records of the Grand Historian (published c. 91 BC) as Hunyu 葷粥[16] or Xunyu 薰育.[17]
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.[18][19][20]
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.[21]
^"灵台白草坡 西周墓葬里的青铜王国". www.kaogu.net.cn. The Institute of Archaeology (CASS Chinese Academy of Social Sciences). 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"。
^Schuessler, A. (2014) "Phonological Notes on Hàn Period Transcriptions of Foreign Names and Words" (PDF). Studies in Chinese and Sino-Tibetan Linguistics: Dialect, Phonology, Transcription and Text. Language and Linguistics Monograph Series (53). Taipei, Taiwan: Institute of Linguistics, Academia Sinica. p. 264
^Sima Qian, "Shiji", Bo-na, 1958, Ch. 110, p. 1a. quoted: "匈奴，其先祖夏后氏之苗裔也，曰淳維。唐虞以上有山戎、獫狁、葷粥，居于北蠻，隨畜牧而轉移。" translation: "Xiongnu, their ancestor descended the lineage of Lord Xia, named Chunwei. Since before the time of Tang and Yu there had been the Mountain Rong, Xianyun, and Hunyu living among the northern barbarians and pasturing while wandering."
^Taskin V.S., "Materials on history of nomadic tribes in China 3rd-5th cc", Issue 3 "Mujuns", "Science", Moscow, 1992, p. 276, ISBN5-02-016746-0
^Goldin, Paul R. "Steppe Nomads as a Philosophical Problem in Classical China" in Mapping Mongolia: Situating Mongolia in the World from Geologic Time to the Present. Penn Museum International Research Conferences, vol. 2. Ed. Paula L.W. Sabloff. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania. 2011. p. 237
^Wang Guowei, "Guantang Jilin" (觀堂集林, Wang Guowei collection of works), Ch.2, Ch. 13
^Taskin V.S., "Materials on history of nomadic tribes in China 3rd-5th cc", Issue 3 "Mujuns", p. 276
^Taskin V.S., 1968, "Materials on history of Sünnu", "Science", Moscow, p.10
^Shiji, "Annals of Zhou" quote: "薰育戎狄攻之，欲得財物，予之。" translation: "The Xunyu, Rong, Di attacked him, demanding wealth and livestock; he gave those away to them".
^in Taskin V.S., "Materials on history of Sünnu", p.10
^Classic of Poetry "Major Hymns - Decade of Dang - Dang" quote: "文王曰咨、咨女殷商。……內奰于中國、覃及鬼方。" Legge's translation: "King Wen said, 'Alas! Alas! you [sovereign of] Yin-shang, [...] Indignation is rife against you here in the Middle kingdom, and extends to the demon regions."
^Goldin, Paul R. "Steppe Nomads as a Philosophical Problem in Classical China" in Mapping Mongolia: Situating Mongolia in the World from Geologic Time to the Present. Penn Museum International Research Conferences, vol. 2. Ed. Paula L.W. Sabloff. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania. 2011. p. 225-226; p. 237, n.22
Zhonghan Wang, "Outlines of Ethnic Groups in China", Taiyuan, Shanxi Education Press, 2004, p. 133, ISBN7-5440-2660-4
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