Gong Liu - The Modest Settler 公刘兴周道 | Chinese History - The Western Zhou Dynasty E02

Now, the protagonist of today's story, Gong Liu, was also known as Gong the Elder or Lao Gong. Yeah, I can already hear the jokes that all you guys who understand Chinese are making now. So yeah, Lao Gong. We are talking about Lao Gong today. Lao Gong. Anyways, jokes aside, Gong Liu is the third leader of the early Zhou clan and he followed in the footsteps of his father Ji Tao and his grandfather Pu Zhou in following the teachings of their early founding ancestor Hou Ji in leading the people in the steady development of agriculture and the construction of irrigation infrastructure. Now, his leadership of the early Zhou people brought about the massive development of vast areas of wilderness in ancient China into cultivated farmland, which rapidly lifted the standard of living for a clan that was still in its infancy at that time. And he settled new and better lands for the future development of his people. Now, his achievements attracted followers from all over the land and his reputation for being a modest and diligent man won him the respect and the love of everyone who came into contact with him and the respect and love of his people and his followers. And his policies laid down a very strong foundation that will one day turn this minor clan into a ruling dynasty of ancient China. Hello and welcome to the show. My name is Api Ngo. I'm that Chinese history guy. Here we share the myths, the legends and the histories of the Chinese people from the first creator to the last imperial dynasty. More than 6,000 years of stories. One video at a time. And before we begin, don't forget to bury me and bury this channel in your likes, in your subs, in your comments. And don't forget to share this channel and share this video with everyone you know. Now, according to records, Gong Liu lived during the late Xia dynasty and he took over leadership of the Zhou clan after his father, Ju Tao, passed away. Now, he collated the experiences and the knowledge of all his ancestors and developed his own ideas on leadership and governance. Now, this will contribute greatly to the development of the Zhou as a people for generations to come. Now, around the 22nd year of King Jie's reign during the end of the Xia dynasty. Yeah, that King Jie, that tyrant. Yeah, this link here. So, during around the 22nd year of King Jie's reign, the northlands bordering the steppes where the Zhou people resided at that time was constantly raided by the steppe tribes of the Quanrong. So, Gong Liu made the decision to lead his people in a southern migration to the lands of Bin where they would live peacefully amongst the indigenous people. Now, Gong Liu followed his father's and grandfather's example in leading with virtue and continued the traditions passed down by Hou Ji in reclaiming the wilderness and cultivating them into arable farmland for the people. Now, under his leadership, the lands of the Zhou people steadily expanded until it encompassed the entire area, which in today's terms would cover the northern areas of today's Shanxi province and the western regions of Pingliang in Gansu. Now, after the migration, when they settled these new lands, great thought from the beginning, great thought was put into proper city planning and the construction of the various zones and buildings in the settlement. The cultivation of new farmlands was also carried out in a systematic manner and due to this meticulous way that Gong Liu governed the land, the lives of the people improved tremendously in a relatively short time and the settlement grew very rapidly due to proper planning and proper building. And soon, they established the state of Bin with Gong Liu as their lord. Now, this was technically the first time a leader of the Zhou clan or the Zhou people was a lord of the land rather than just a clan leader or clan chief. So, this was quite an important event when they established a state of Bin. Now, note this is not the state of Zhou. This is still the state of Bin which was named after the area they settled and Gong Liu was officially acknowledged as a lord of the land. Now, when things were more or less settled in the land of Bin, Gong Liu led his people out of the lands of Qi and Ju and he crossed the Wei river and entered into the Qin mountain ranges or Qinlin. And why did he do that? Why did he lead his people on such an arduous journey across the land? Well, he did that so that they could acquire the metals and the stones that was in abundant supply in the Qin mountain ranges. He led his people to these new lands to acquire these materials that were actually needed for tool making. And they transported all this raw material back to their own lands in Bin to be used in improving the people's standard of living by making new tools, by making better buildings and stuff like that. And when they secured this supply of raw materials, the now prospering state went through another phase of rapid growth and they finally built their first standing army establishing by this time themselves as a real power in the land. No longer are they just a collection of disparate people held together by a core of the Zhou clan, but now they have a state, they have a prospering settlement and they most importantly have a standing army which means they have the capability to protect themselves from external threats and invasions. Now Gong Liu is very very famous, very well known. In fact, this would be his most well-known trait. Gong Liu was very well known for being a very modest man and he ruled with ethics and virtue which like I mentioned before, won him the love and the respect of his people and his followers. His modesty was so well known that in fact that the poem named Gong Liu which was compiled in the Daya chapter of the Classic of Poetry, Si Daya Gong Liu. This poem was specifically composed to honor his virtue and his achievements and every stanza of this ancient poem started with Oh the modest Gong Liu. So yeah, that's how modest he was. People composed an entire poem with every stanza that started with Oh the modest Gong Liu. Yeah, that's how well known his modesty was. Now, why is this important? Because modesty is one of the core virtues of traditional Chinese culture and a poem that starts off every stanza praising his modesty is no doubt an affirmation of his good character and high moral standing amongst his peers in society and it also showed how much the people of his time loved and respected him. Now, of course the poem was not just all about praising his modesty that would be pretty overkill. I mean with all six stanzas of it but rather it's a rather good documentation of the achievements and the major events that took place under the leadership of Gong Liu you know like the time where he led his people on the migration southwards like the time he was confirmed and recognized by his people as the leader of a state by the as a lord of the land you know rather than just a clan chieftain and the times he built a standing army and it also recorded some of his policies and his style of governance and so his policy of steady expansion allowed for the building of wealth amongst his people and his diligence in constantly improving the standard of living for his people made them basically the envy of all the surrounding clans and tribes and many members of those clans and tribes actually moved into Zhou lands and joined up with them to live under his leadership because he's giving his people a better life than everyone else at that time and although all these improvements were achieved under Gong Liu's leadership during his time he never forgot to remind the people that all these achievements were only possible due to the initial foundation laid down by his father and his grandfather who actually founded the Zhou clan as we know it and it was their teachings that guided his style of leadership he was merely working from the shoulders of giants and all the accolades he gained were built upon the hard work of his predecessors now Gong Liu was succeeded by his son Qingjie either in his later years or after he passed away and very fortunately for the next nine generations every leader that came out to lead the Zhou people continued with Gong Liu's policy of development and expansion of the state of Bin, the Bin state and it was only during the reign of Tan Fu that the Zhou people finally migrated once again to avoid the growing harassment of the Rong and the Di tribes that were starting to gain more and more power in their lands and so Tan Fu would then lead the Zhou people to this place called Zhou Yuan or the Zhou plains around the Qi Mountain region Qi Shan region where they would rebuild their homeland and officially rename themselves as the state of Zhou so yeah I know this is a relatively short video and short story not much is really known about Gong Liu or Lao Gong basically apart from the fact that he was a very modest man and he you know laid a very strong foundation for the future development of the Zhou people, the Zhou plains and yeah short but very important nonetheless so hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed making it and if you did don't forget you know I need and the channel needs all your likes all your subs all your comments and it would really help if you share this video and share this channel with everyone you know that will really help us out more than you would think and if that's still not enough for you and if you still want to do more than that you can consider becoming a patron of the channel and the links are available in the description box and that will really help keep the lights on around here like what these patrons these current patrons of the channel are doing they are helping to keep the lights on they are feeding me and yeah they are feeding the furball who is just off screen so you guys you're legends thank you so much you're helping out more than you know and I guess that's it for today and yeah next next next video things are going to you know get a little bit more interesting the pace is going to pick up a little bit so yeah keep your eyes peeled and I will see you ridiculously beautiful people out there I will see you in the next episode