The Book of Songs is a collection of poems which was produced more than 2,500 years ago at the end of the slave society in China. It is the beginning of China's ancient poetry, and it is a very important material for studying the history of ancient Chinese literature and ancient history, especially the history of ancient poetry. Judging from the history of China's poetry development, The Book of Songs is the earliest collection of poems in China.
It collected poems from the 1 1 century to the 6th century BC, reflecting the social features of China during the 500 years from the early Western Zhou Dynasty to the mid-Spring and Autumn Period. The Book of Songs was finally compiled into a book in the twenty-ninth year of Duke Xiang of Lu (544 BC). The original name of The Book of Songs is Shi or Jing, and it was added in the Warring States Period.
According to Records of the Historian, there were more than 3,000 original ancient poems before compilation, and 305 poems were left with "applicable etiquette" after being edited by Confucius. The Book of Songs is the lyrics of chorus. According to the different nature of music, it is divided into three categories: "wind, elegance and ode", and there are 305 existing pieces.
2. Background knowledge of The Book of Songs
The works in The Book of Songs were produced after the downfall of Shang Dynasty in Zhou Wuwang (BC 1066). "Song of Zhou" is the earliest work in the early years of the Western Zhou Dynasty, and it is the work of noble literati. It is mainly composed of ancestral temple music songs and ode to the gods, and some of them describe agricultural production. Daya is the product of the prosperous period of the Zhou Dynasty and the only remaining epic in ancient China.
Xiaoya was born in the late Western Zhou Dynasty and moved eastward. Truffles and Ode to Shang Dynasty were both produced after Zhou Shi moved eastward (770 BC).
Extended data:
After the book of songs was published, it was widely circulated. Although it was later caught in the Qin fire, it was preserved because it was passed down orally and easy to remember. There are four schools of * * * who taught the Book of Songs in the early Han Dynasty, namely, Qi Zhiyuan's drums, Lu Pei, Yan Zhiyi's Han Ying, Zhao Zhimao Heng, and, for short, Qi's, Lu's, Han Shi's and Shi Mao's (the former two are named after the country, while the latter two are named after the family).
The poems of Qi, Lu and Han were established as doctors and became official schools in the Western Han Dynasty. Although Shi Mao came out late, it was not established as an official school in the Western Han Dynasty, but it was widely read among the people, and eventually prevailed over the three poems. Later, the three schools of poetry died out one after another, and the Book of Songs we see now is the handed down version of the "Mao Poetry" school.
Baidu Encyclopedia-The Book of Songs