Yu the Great(大禹)

Yu the Great or Yu the Engineer was a legendary king in ancient China renowned for pioneering "the first successful state efforts at flood control," establishing the Xia dynasty (which began dynastic rule in China), and exemplifying exceptional moral character. He features prominently in the Chinese legend "Great Yu Controls the Waters" (大禹治水; Dà Yǔ zhì shuǐ). Confucius and other Chinese teachers praised Yu alongside other ancient sage-kings for their virtues and moral excellence. He remains one of the few Chinese monarchs honored posthumously with the epithet "the Great."

No contemporary evidence confirms Yu's existence as traditionally described in the Shiji. According to legend, Yu ruled as sage-king during the late 3rd millennium BC, almost a millennium before the oracle bone script—China's oldest known writing system used during the late Shang dynasty. Yu's name appears neither on artifacts from his purported lifetime nor on later oracle bones. The earliest inscriptions of his name appear on vessels dating to the Western Zhou period (c. 1045–771 BC).