Shangqiu is one of the famous "famous hills in the world" in Chinese history. It not only has a recorded history of more than 3,000 years, but also has become a famous place in the Central Plains with its long-standing and rich material and cultural connotations. A shining pearl on the earth. How did the name "Shangqiu" come about? Many domestic historians have done long-term research on this, and even overseas sinologists have written long works on this issue. However, there are still different opinions on this issue, and there is no consensus. Some even They are contradictory to each other, like a mysterious thread that is difficult to solve.

The oracle bone inscriptions written more than 3,000 years ago already contain the words "Shang", "Zhongshang", "Dayi Shang" and "Qiu Shang". The word "Shang" all appears as place names. "Zhongshang" refers to the middle of the four directions, east, west, north and south, and the middle refers to the direction; "Dayi Shang" refers to the central city of the Shang Dynasty and the capital area; although "Qiu Shang" refers to the place name, it is not the same as today's "Shangqiu" Connected. The first time that "Shangqiu" was connected with a place name was "Zuo Zhuan" written in the Spring and Autumn Period. The book records "Shangqiu" in two places: first, in the ninth year of Xianggong: "The Tao Tang family's Huo Zhenglan Bo lived in Shangqiu. "Xiangtu Yinzhi" Second, in the reign of Emperor Zhao: "In the past, the Gao Xin family had two sons. The uncle was called Yan Bo and Ji was Shi Shen. They lived in the wild forest and were incompatible with each other. The emperor later moved Yan Bo to Shangqiu. "Zhu Chen." Both of these stories tell the story of Yan Bo who moved to Shangqiu at the end of primitive society and worshiped Da Chen Xing. Later Da Chen Xing was also called Shang Xing. According to this record, the name "Shangqiu" has existed at least in the Spring and Autumn Period. However, whether this place name is today's "Shangqiu" is highly controversial in history. There are two main theories: one of them says that "Song, Shang, and Shangqiu" , three people and one place", this is the textual analysis of Du Yu (Jin Dynasty) in "Spring and Autumn Annals". Wang Guowei, a famous scholar in the Qing Dynasty, praised this theory and further extended it: "The ancient Song Dynasty was really named Shangqiu, and Qiu was also called Xu. In Song Dynasty, it was called Shangqiu, just like Huanshuinan was called Yinxu, because Shang was in the Song Dynasty." ("Guantang Jilin") The second is that Shangqiu is Emperor Qiu, today's Puyang, from "Emperor Century" and "Shiben": "Qi lived in Fan, and Xiangtu moved to Shangqiu. The original Zhuanxu's ruins... today's Puyang is also "Whether the ancient "Shangqiu" was in today's Shangqiu or Puyang is not the topic of this article and can be left aside for the time being. However, it can be seen from these records that "Shangqiu" as a place name existed from the Western Zhou Dynasty to the Spring and Autumn Period at the latest.

Let’s talk about “business” first. More than 2,000 years ago, Sima Qian, the great historian of the Western Han Dynasty, quoted from the Book of Songs in his famous work "Benji of Yin": "The black bird of destiny descended and gave birth to Shang." This means that the Shang people claim that their ancestors were appointed by God. Blackbirds are born from fallen eggs. This is an ancient myth and legend: According to legend, at the end of primitive society, there was a family named Wei who had two daughters: the eldest was named Jian Di and the younger was named Jianchan. The two of them were bathing in the river and saw the black bird dropping an egg from the sky. Jian Di snatched it and ate it, and later they became pregnant and had a baby. Qi is the ancestor of the Yin people. In primitive societies, due to low productivity, people often cannot explain everything in nature, such as lightning and thunder, and even the source of their own life, so they believe that a superhuman power controls them. This is human totem worship. The totem of the Yin Shang clan may be the black bird.

What kind of bird is the black bird? Traditionally, it is believed to be a swallow. "Chu Ci? Li Sao" Wang Yi notes: "Xuanniao, Yanye." Xuan means "black". Li Shan's annotation of Zhang Heng's "Si Xuan Fu" believes that "Xuanniao is also called a crane bird." Because the crane "stands out from the flock" among all birds, it is the first of the hundred birds. Guo Moruo and others verified that it was the phoenix. "Shuowen Jiezi" written by Xu Shen of the Han Dynasty said: "The phoenix is ??a divine bird." "Zuo Zhuan? The Seventeenth Year of Zhaogong" has "My great ancestor Shao Hao established the phoenix bird at the right time." , so the discipline is based on birds, and they are bird masters and bird officials." Mr. Guo Moruo also believes that the word "Shang" in oracle bone inscriptions is a hieroglyphic character. It has "a head with a sharp mouth, two horns, one leg, a short tail, and sometimes something like a cane." It is vivid and vivid. A strange animal like a monkey.

The ancestors Jun, Ku, and Shun worshiped by merchants are all the same person, and they are all beast-shaped ancestors of merchants. Some people think it is an orangutan. Mythologist Yuan Ke thinks it is a peacock. He said: "The god Emperor Jun worshiped by the Yin people in the East is a person with the head of a bird, two horns on the head, the body of a macaque, and only one foot. He often holds a crutch in his hand and arches his back. This strange animal that walks on a limping foot is their ancestor god." He also believed from the pictographic meaning of "black bird" that this "phoenix looks like a swan goose in the first half and a unicorn or snake in the second half. The neck of the fish, the wencai of the dragon, the back of the turtle, the chin of the swallow, the beak of the chicken..." became a complex of various animals such as birds, beasts, reptiles, and swimming fish. Zhang Guangzhi of Harvard University in the United States believes that the upper half of the word "Shang" is the pictogram of "Xin", which represents the frontal portrait of the ancestors. The ruling class of the Yin and Shang Dynasties were all wearing hats, which was in sharp contrast to the lowest class who showed their braids. . The lower part of the character "Shang" is the character "C", which means that the upper part is a flat surface on which items can be placed, and the lower part has four legs, which can be used to place the image of ancestors on the sacrificial table. Some people think it is the image of Kui, the totem of merchants. "The Classic of Mountains and Seas? The Great Eastern Classic" records: "There is a beast on it, shaped like an ox, with a pale body and no horns. It has one leg. If it goes in and out of water, it will be windy and rainy." Here again became —a beast. Some people think that it is a legendary mythical beast, which was later widely used in the decoration of Shang bronzes - Kui pattern. The Taotie decoration of the Xia Dynasty was also composed of two Kui patterns.

Some people think that the black bird is a rooster, and merchants first used the rooster as a totem. It seems that even at the very least, it is difficult to achieve the ultimate consciousness of whether it is a bird, an animal, or a human being, not to mention that there are many ways to say what kind of bird it is!

Then, further speaking, businessmen, How can the Shang tribe and the Shang state be called Shang? There are several competing opinions at home and abroad. As early as the 1920s, historian Xu Zhongshu pointed out in "Chinese Studies": "The origin of Shang is because before the Western Zhou Dynasty, merchants did not call Shang, but called 'Yin'. After King Wu of Zhou destroyed Shang, he left the Yin survivors Among the vassal states, those who were assigned to Shangqiu were those who were good at doing business among the Yin people. At that time, merchants were called "Jia". Because the Yin people were good at doing business and the Zhou people valued agriculture, they later despised them. The Yin people despised the Jia people and actually called the businessmen merchants. This is why China calls businessmen "merchants". Guo Moruo agreed with this. According to the passage "Zhao leads a chariot to a distant Jia" in "Shang Shu Jiu Gao", He believes that "the founder is the beginning. It can be seen that people in the early Zhou Dynasty believed that business behavior began in the Yin Dynasty. Probably because of this, later generations called people who engaged in this kind of behavior as merchants." Mr. Wang Zhichang believes that Shangqiu people. The origin is that in the Xia Dynasty, Xiangtu, a descendant of Qi, was granted the title of Shangqiu, so he was called Shangguo, and the people of Shangguo were called merchants. Xiangtu, who was enfeoffed in Shangqiu, saw that Shangqiu was located in a moderate location, broad and flat, with good transportation. It was convenient, so they invented the method of getting off the carriage and using horses to transport goods and trade... At that time, people in the Shang State followed suit one after another, traveling east and west, south and north, to do business and engage in commercial activities in some small countries and tribes around them. .

Later, people from other small countries around them gradually formed a habit. When they saw people doing business, they thought they were Shang people and called them merchants, so "merchants" became people doing business. pronoun, this is the origin of the name "Merchant". Therefore, Shang State originated from "Shangqiu", and "Merchant" was born in Shang State. However, Mr. Wu Hui also believed in the book "Ancient Chinese Business History" that "King Wu of Zhou destroyed Shang Dynasty." , the Shang people became racial slaves of the Zhou Dynasty, were moved to other places, and were closely monitored and ruled by the Zhou Dynasty. The Shang nobles could not engage in agricultural and handicraft activities like other slaves, so they regarded trading as their main occupation. . In the minds of Zhou people, those who do business are merchants. After the demise of the Shang Dynasty, people who were good at doing business were collectively called merchants.