The Book of Songs is the beginning of China's ancient poems and the earliest collection of poems. The author of The Book of Songs is unknown. It was collected by Yin Jifu and edited by Confucius. At first, it was just called "Poetry" or "Poetry 300". By the Western Han Dynasty, it was honored as a Confucian classic before it was called The Book of Songs.
There are three kinds of editors in The Book of Songs: style, elegance and ode. "Wind" is a ballad of Zhou Dynasty. Elegant music is the official music of Zhou people, which is divided into harmony and elegance. Ode is a musical song used for sacrificial rites in Zhou and noble ancestral temples, which is divided into ode to, and ode to Shang.
Wind, a folk song all over the country, is the essence of the Book of Songs. It sang beautiful things such as love and labor, and also sang the regret and anger of homesickness and anti-oppression and anti-bullying. Repeated chanting is often used, and each chapter in a poem is often only a few words different, which shows the characteristics of folk songs.
Elegance and vulgarity are divided into elegance and vulgarity and Xiaoya, and most of them are poems that offer sacrifices to noble people, pray for a good harvest and praise their ancestors. The author of Daya is an aristocratic scholar, but he is dissatisfied with the real politics. In addition to banquet songs, sacrificial songs and epics, he also wrote some satirical poems reflecting people's wishes. Xiaoya also has some folk songs.
Ode is a poem dedicated to the ancestral temple. The poems in Ya and Ode are of great value to the study of early history, religion and society.