Archaeologists confirm location of Yao capital 4200 yrs ago

Beijing: Chinese archaeologists have confirmed the location of the capital of the Yao period about 4,200 years ago.

"The archaeological circle has reached a consensus that Taosi is the capital of the period of Yao," said Wang Wei, head of the institute of archaeology under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Yao was one of the sage emperors living in the middle reaches of the Yellow River in Chinese mythology. Excavation of the Taosi site in Linfen City, Shanxi Province, began in l978.

Latest excavations showed the ancient city of Taosi covered an area of 2.8 million square meters with various functional divisions, He Nu, a researcher with the institute at a seminar on Yao culture said.

"Taosi is what some historical materials identify as Pingyang, the capital of the Yao regime. The era of Yao and the succeeding emperors Shun and Yu are not legend. They are true history," Xinhua news agency quoted He as saying.

Pingyang is the ancient name of Linfen City, where the temple and mausoleum of Yao are located.

Yao originally lived in Tang County, Hebei Province which neighbors Shanxi. Later he migrated southward and finally chose Pingyang as his capital, according to Chinese historians.

Many Confucian histories praised rulers Yao and Shun as models of morality and benevolence, but skeptics of the early 20th century challenged their existence.