A famous ancient Chinese myth from this book is that of Yu the Great, who spent years trying to control the deluge. It contains many short myths, and most rarely exceed a paragraph. Each chapter follows roughly the same formula, and the whole book is repetitious in this way. Many descriptions are very mundane, and an equal number are fanciful or strange. The descriptions are usually of medicines, animals, and geological features. The book is not a narrative, as the 'plot' involves detailed descriptions of locations in the cardinal directions of the Mountains, Regions Beyond Seas, Regions Within Seas, and Wilderness. In addition, some scholars also believe that the author of the book is written by a disciple of Mozi, named Sui Chaozi, during the Warring States period. This theory originated from Liu Shipei, who in his research on 'A Study of Zou Yan's Theory on the Plurality of Literature in the Western Han Dynasty' inferred that, according to records in Mozi, the book Biographic of the Great Yu was a combined version of Records of the Grand Historian: Biography of Dawan and the Classic of Mountains and Seas, which supports the idea that the book was written by Zou Yan. Moving to the 20th century, some scholars put forward that the author of the book was Zou Yan in the Warring States period. He claimed that the 'Mountains Classic' was written by Yu the Great and Boyi, the 'Overseas Classic' and 'Inside Seas Classic' were written by people from the Qin dynasty, and the 'Great Farmland Classic' was produced when Liu Xiu revised it. On the basis of summarizing the research achievements of the previous dynasties scholars, Bi Yuan of the Qing dynasty further proposed that different sections of the book were written separately by different authors.

Hu Yinglin recorded in his Shaoshi Mountain Room Pen Cluster that the book was by 'a curious man in the Warring States period', based on the books Tale of King Mu, Son of Heaven and Tian Wen. Zhu Xi from the Southern Song dynasty and the scholar from Ming dynasty Hu Yinglin believed that the book was written by a curious person during the Warring States period. A curious man during the Warring States period Many people also believe that the book was written by the descendants according to a map, which is the text description of the map named 'Mountains and Seas'. Chen Zhensun's Zhizhai Bibliography, Zhu Xi's Annotations on Chu Ci: Dialectical Differentiation of Chu Ci, Hu Yinglin's Shaoshi Mountain Room Pen Cluster and others have acknowledged that it is a book written during the classical era, but it is not written by Yu the Great and Boyi. However, scholars after the Tang dynasty raised doubts about the authenticity of assigning the book's authors as Yu the Great and Boyi. In Zhao Ye's Spring and Autumn Annals of Wu and Yue, Guo Pu's Preface of Classic Mountains and Seas, and Yan Zhitui's The Yan Family's instructions,' all of them supported the idea that the book's authors are Yu the Great and Boyi. Wang Chong and Zhao Ye in the Eastern Han dynasty also identified the author as Boyi in their works, and was modified by later generations in the process of spreading. Liu Xiu believed that the Classic of Mountains and Seas was written by Yu the Great and Boyi, during the classical era around Xia dynasty. The author of the book was first clearly identified in 'The table of the Classic Mountains and Seas' written by Liu Xiu in the Western Han dynasty. The earliest records of the Classic of Mountains and Seas can be found in Sima Qian's 'Records of the Grand Historian - Biography of Dawan'. Since Sima Qian, the debate about the author(s) of the book has been going on for more than two thousand years.ĭefinite references Yu the Great and Boyi The book is divided into eighteen sections it describes over 550 mountains and 300 channels. It is largely a fabulous geographical and cultural account of pre- Qin China as well as a collection of Chinese mythology. Early versions of the text may have existed since the 4th century BCE, but the present form was not reached until the early Han dynasty. The Classic of Mountains and Seas, also known as Shanhai jing, formerly romanized as the Shan-hai Ching, is a Chinese classic text and a compilation of mythic geography and beasts. Scrollable pages from volume five of the Classic of Mountains and Seas, a Ming dynasty (1368–1644) woodblock printed editionĬlassic of Mountains and Seas illustration of a nine-headed phoenix (colored Qing dynasty edition) Classic of Mountains and Seas illustration of Nüwa Classic of Mountains and Seas illustration of Nine-tailed Fox, companion of the Queen Mother of the West

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