Why did all previous dynasties in China attach importance to the management of the Yellow River?

Harnessing the Yellow River and building water conservancy have a long history. The earliest irrigation project in China was the pond in the Yellow River Basin (now southwest of Xianyang, Shaanxi Province), and it was recorded in The Book of Songs that "the pond flows northward and wets the paddy fields".

In the early Warring States period, large-scale water diversion and irrigation projects began to appear in the Yellow River basin. In 422 BC, Ximen Bao built twelve canals by imperial edict, leading to Zhanghe River, a tributary of the Yellow River at that time, to irrigate farmland. In 246 BC, Qin built the Zheng Guoqu in Shaanxi and irrigated more than 40,000 hectares of land with Jinghe River. "So the guanzhong fertile soil, no fierce years. Qin Fuqiang died as a vassal. " It played an important role in the process of Qin's unification of China.

The Han Dynasty paid more attention to farmland water conservancy, built six auxiliary canals and white canals, and expanded the irrigation area of Zheng Guoqu. At the same time, Guo Cheng Canal and Lingbi Canal were built on the Weihe River, and Guanzhong area became the earliest economic zone in China.

In order to consolidate the frontier, the policy of reclaiming farmland and guarding the frontier was implemented from Qin and Han Dynasties, and canals were opened to irrigate fields in Huangshui River Basin and Ningmeng Hetao Plain along the Yellow River, which turned a large desert into a green state and won the reputation of "being on the south of the Yangtze River".

In order to ensure the supply of Kyoto such as Chang 'an, Luoyang and Kaifeng, the water transport development in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River has a long history.

Dayu's achievements in harnessing water also include harnessing the Yellow River, and his "magic power" is found almost everywhere. After the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, the documentary records of river regulation gradually increased, and a large number of precious historical materials were preserved.

As early as the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, dikes were generally built in the lower reaches of the Yellow River. In 65 1 year BC, Qi Huangong, one of the five tyrants in the Spring and Autumn Period, put forward an "irresistible" ban to solve the dispute of embankment construction among vassal states. In the long historical period since then, with the frequent flooding and diversion of the Yellow River, defending against the Yellow River floods has become a major event of successive dynasties, and a lot of manpower and financial resources have been invested to continuously block the mouth and repair the defense. In the Western Han Dynasty, there were official positions such as "River Embankment Builder" and "River Embankment Man", and all county governors along the river had the responsibility of guarding the river embankment, with thousands of full-time personnel guarding the river embankment. "Ten counties near the river, heavily treating the river embankment", the river defense project has been quite large. According to the Records of Gou Yan in Han Dynasty, the upper and lower Qishuikou of the Yellow River (now southwest of hua county) has become a "river on the ground", and the dike body is "four or five feet high" (about 9~ 1 1 m), and the dike body is also very high. It is recorded in Historical Records of Hequ that in 109 BC, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty ordered "Ji Renhe sent tens of thousands of people to stop the river" and personally led his ministers to the scene to participate in the river closure, indicating that the Yellow River closure has been a quite huge project. According to historical records, the earliest large-scale river regulation project was "Wang Jing River Regulation" and "Twelve Years of Yongping" in 69 AD, "sending hundreds of thousands of soldiers to build canals and dikes with Wu Wang, traveling thousands of miles from Xingyang to Haikou". "In the summer and April of the 13th year of Yongping, a branch canal was built ... Zhao Yue said:' ... Now, the embankment has been built, the canal has been rectified, the water has been cut off, the gate has been set up, the rivers and tributaries have been diverted, and its old traces have been restored'". Although the scene saves the service fee, it is still tens of billions. The invasion of the Yellow River south was curbed, and the water transport in the side canal was resumed, which achieved good results.

Kaifeng, the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty, was seriously flooded by the Yellow River. The Song Dynasty attached great importance to river management, and set up a water superintendent with greater authority to be responsible for river management. Local officials along the river attach importance to river affairs, and set up river bank judges in each state to be responsible for river affairs. The imperial court was very important and participated in the debate on river regulation strategy. During this period, the problem of river regulation has aroused many people's discussion, deepened their understanding of the situation and water situation of the Yellow River, and made great progress in river engineering technology. In particular, Wang Anshi presided over the mechanical dredging of rivers, diverting water from the Yellow River and developing silt irrigation, and made many innovations in river management technology.

After the Ming Dynasty, with the development of social economy and the aggravation of the flood disaster of the Yellow River, the imperial court paid more attention to river management, and the river management institutions were gradually improved. In the Ming Dynasty, the Ministry of Industry was in charge of river management, and the prime minister was directly responsible for the river. Later, the title of military affairs prefect was added to the Prime Minister's river course, so that he could directly command the army. Local officials below the governors of the provinces along the river also had the responsibility to manage the river course, and gradually strengthened the unified management of the downstream river course affairs. In the Qing dynasty, the governor of the river channel had greater authority and was directly ordered by the court. In the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, great progress was made in river regulation and dike repair and maintenance technology. A group of effective river management experts, represented by Pan Jixun and Jin Fu, have emerged. During the late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China, wars continued, national politics declined, and river management was at a standstill. In modern times, water conservancy experts, represented by Zhang and Zhang, strongly advocated the introduction of western advanced technology and studied the comprehensive management strategy of the Yellow River, but it was always difficult to make achievements due to the constraints of social and economic cooperation.

Throughout the history of harnessing the Yellow River, before the founding of the People's Republic of China, the so-called river harnessing was actually limited to the lower reaches of the Yellow River, and it was mainly passive flood prevention. However, the long history of river management has left many documents and classics, which are rare for other rivers in the world. This is a valuable legacy, which deserves our further study and reference.