Confucius’ life overlapped with those of Pythagoras and Socrates. Even in comparison to Europe, China isn’t that old. The world’s first city, Uruk, in modern-day Iraq, dates back seven thousand years. Writing systems in Egypt and Mesopotamia predate Chinese writing by a thousand years. In terms of age, civilizations in other parts of the world precede China. But even if you accept the preceding mythical Xia dynasty as the start, it takes you back only to around 2000 BC. Earlier than that, history disintegrates into mythology. The Shang dynasty (founded around 1600 BC) of the Yellow River valley in northern China is as far back as we have solid archaeological evidence and positive proof of the first written records. A slightly strange concept anyway, and, regardless of whether you want to define “history” as starting with written records or by the emergence of “civilization” as seen in the first large settlements, the five thousand figure is wrong. Somehow we are supposed to believe that China has more history than other places. “Five thousand years of history.” It’s a phrase repeated by both Chinese and non-Chinese. Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt speaking in 2007 China is a nation with a five-thousand-year history.
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