The myth of the Xia Dynasty

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Abstract
Was there a Xia Dynasty? By the mid-nineteen thirties, the works of Henri Maspero and other scholars in the West and of Gu Jiegangand his compatriots in China had clearly established the originally mythological character ofthe founder of the Xia Dynasty (traditionally ca. 2200–1760 B.C.) and of the rulers who preceded him in traditional Chinese historiography. The excavations near Anyang of late Shang palaces, tombs and inscribed oracle bones had also established the authenticity of the Shang Dynasty which followed the Xia, or at least of the latter part of it. In 1936, Chen Mengjiapublished an article in which he related the Xia king list to the Shang and argued that the two periods were the same. For the next forty years, the question of the authenticity of the Xia was left largely in abeyance although most scholars did continue to assume that the Xia Dynasty, which was hereditary like the Shang, would some day be authenticated by archaeological excavation.

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