"Four Barbarians" () was a term used by subjects of the Zhou and Han dynasties to refer to the four major people groups living outside the borders of Huaxia. Each was named for a cardinal direction: the Dongyi ("Eastern Barbarians"), Nanman ("Southern Barbarians"), Xirong ("Western Barbarians"), and Beidi ("Northern Barbarians"). Ultimately, the four barbarian groups either emigrated away from the Chinese heartland or were partly assimilated through sinicization into Chinese culture during later dynasties. After this early period, "barbarians" to the north and the west would often be designated as "Hu" ().
Etymology
Ancient China was composed of a group of states that arose in the Yellow River valley. According to historian Li Feng, during the Zhou dynasty (), the contrast between the 'Chinese' Zhou and the 'non-Chinese' Xirong or Dongyi was "more political than cultural or ethnic".. Li explains that "Rong" meant something like "warlike foreigners" and "Yi" was close to "foreign conquerables". Lothar von Falkenhausen argues that the perceived contrast between "Chinese" and "Barbarians" was accentuated during the Eastern Zhou period (770–256 BCE), when adherence to Zhou rituals became increasingly recognised as a "barometer of civilisation"; a meter for sophistication and cultural refinement. The Chinese began making a distinction between China (Hua) and the barbarians (Yi) during that period. Huaxia, the earliest concept of "China", was at the center of tianxia ("[everywhere] under heaven; the world"). It was surrounded by "Four Directions/Corners" (), "Four Lands/Regions" (), "Four Seas", and "Four Barbarians/Foreigners". The text Erya from the late Zhou dynasty defines the Four Seas as " the place where the barbarians lived, hence by extension, the Four Barbarians... are called the four seas".
The Four Barbarians were the Yi to the east of China, Man in the south, Rong in the west, and Di in the north. Scholars such as Herrlee Glessner Creel argue that Yi, Man, Rong, and Di were originally Chinese names of particular ethnic groups or tribes. During the Spring and Autumn period (771–476 BC), these four exonyms were expanded into "general designations referring to the barbarian tribes" in a given cardinal direction. For example, "Yi" became "Dongyi", literally meaning "East(ern) Yi". The Russian anthropologist Mikhail Kryukov concludes: This would, in the final analysis, mean that once again territory had become the primary criterion of the we-group, whereas the consciousness of common origin remained secondary. What continued to be important were the factors of language, the acceptance of certain forms of material culture, the adherence to certain rituals, and, above all, the economy and the way of life. Agriculture was the only appropriate way of life for the [Huaxia].
In Chinese, the term "Four Barbarians" uses the character for Yi (). The sinologist Edwin G. Pulleyblank states that the name Yi "furnished the primary Chinese term for 'barbarian'," despite paradoxically being "considered the most civilized of the non-Chinese peoples." Yi is the Modern Chinese pronunciation. The Old Chinese pronunciation is reconstructed as (Bernhard Karlgren), *ɤier (Zhou Fagao), *ləj (William H. Baxter), and *l(ə)i (Axel Schuessler). Schuessler defines Yi as "The name of non-Chinese tribes, prob[ably] Austroasiatic, to the east and southeast of the central plain (Shandong, Huái River basin), since the Spring and Autumn period also a general word for 'barbarian'", and proposes a "sea" etymology, "Since the ancient Yuè (=Viet) word for 'sea' is said to have been yí, the people's name might have originated as referring to people living by the sea".
The modern character for yi (), like the Qin dynasty seal script, is composed of "big" and "bow" – but the earliest Shang dynasty oracle bone script was used interchangeably for yi and shi "corpse", depicting a person with bent back and dangling legs. The archeologist and scholar Guo Moruo believed the oracle graph for yi denotes "a dead body, i.e., the killed enemy", while the bronze graph denotes "a man bound by a rope, i.e., a prisoner or slave". Ignoring this historical paleography, the Chinese historian K. C. Wu claimed that Yi should not be translated as "barbarian" because the modern graph implies a big person carrying a bow, someone to perhaps be feared or respected, but not to be despised. The scholar Léon Wieger provided multiple definitions to the term yi: “The men armed with bows , the primitive inhabitants, barbarians, borderers of the Eastern Sea, inhabitants of the South-West countries." Hanyu Da Cidian,1993 ed., vol. 3, p. 577 a major Chinese language dictionary, notes Siyi as derogatory:
"Four barbarians" is the common English translation of Siyi. Compare these Chinese-English dictionary equivalents for Siyi: "the four barbarian tribes on the borders of ancient China", "the barbarians on borders of China", and "four barbarian tribes on the borders". Some scholars interpret the si "four" in Siyi as sifang (四方 "four directions"). Liu Xiaoyuan says the meaning of Siyi "is not 'four barbarians' but numerous 'barbarous tribes' in the four directions". However, Liu also states that the term yi might have been used by the early Chinese to simply mean "ordinary others". Yuri Pines translates Siyi as "barbarians of the four corners".
In Chinese Buddhism, siyi () or siyijie () abbreviates the si boluoyi () "Four Parajikas" (grave offenses that entail expulsion of a monk or nun from the sangha).
Western Zhou usages Bronze inscriptions and reliable documents from the Western Zhou period (c. 1046–771 BCE) used the word Yi in two meanings, says Chinese sinologist Chen. First, Yi or Yifang () designated a specific ethnic group that had battled against the Shang since the time of King Wu Ding. Second, Yi meant specifically or collectively (e.g., zhuyi ) peoples in the remote lands east and south of China, such as the well-known Dongyi (), Nanyi (), and Huaiyi (). Western Zhou bronzes also record the names of some little-known Yi groups, such as the Qiyi (), Zhouyi (), Ximenyi (), Qinyi (), and Jingyi (). Chen notes, "These yi are not necessarily identical with the numerous yi in Eastern Zhou literature. On the contrary, except for the Huaiyi, Dongyi and Nanyi, these yi all seem to have vanished from the historical and inscriptional accounts of the Eastern Zhou".
Inscriptions on bronze gui vessels (including the Xun , Shiyou , and Shi Mi ) do not always use the term yi exclusively in reference to alien people of physically different ethnic groups outside China. According to Chen, "yi" was also used for "certain groups of people residing in places within the region of Zhou control".
Expanding upon the research of Li Ling that Western Zhou bronze writings differentiate the Zhou people (Wangren , lit. "king's people") from other peoples (yi ), Chen found three major categories: people of Zhou, people of Shang, and people of Yi (neither Zhou nor Shang). "The Zhou rulers treated the Shang remnant elites with courtesy and tolerance, whereas they treated yi people with less respect." Shang people were employed in positions based upon their cultural legacy and education, such as zhu "priest", zong "ritual official", bu "diviner", shi "scribe", and military commander. Yi people, who had a much lower status, served the rulers in positions such as infantry soldiers, palace guards, servants, and slave laborers. Chen compares the social status of Yi with "xiangren , people captured from other states or ethnicities, or their descendants".
Chen analyzed diachronic semantic changes in the twin concepts of Xia and Yi. During the Western Zhou, they were employed to distinguish "between the Zhou elite and non-Zhou people"; during the Eastern Zhou, they distinguished "between the central states and peripheral barbarian tribes in a geographical sense, as well as between Zhou subjects and non-Zhou subjects in a political sense." Eastern Zhou canonical texts, says Chen, "frequently assert a differentiation between Xia (or Zhongguo), meaning those states in the central plains subject to the Zhou sovereign, and Yi , Di , Rong , and Man , all of which could be used generally to refer to non-Chinese ethnic groups". Among these four terms, Yi was most widely employed for "barbarian" clans, tribes, or ethnic groups. The Chinese classics used it in directional compounds (e.g., "eastern" Dongyi , "western" Xiyi , "southern" Nanyi, and "northern" Beiyi ), numerical (meaning "many") generalizations ("three" Sanyi , "four" Siyi , and "nine" Jiuyi ), and groups in specific areas and states (Huaiyi , Chuyi , Qinyi , and Wuyi ).
Historians Liu Junping and Huang Deyuan describe how early Chinese monarchs used the concept of the Four Barbarians to justify their rule. Just how heaven (yang) was matched with the inferior earth (yin), "the Chinese as an entity was matched with the inferior ethnic groups surrounding it in its four directions so that the kings could be valued and the barbarians could be rejected." Lius and Huang propose that later Chinese ideas about the "nation" and "state" of China evolved from the "casual use of such concepts as "Tianxia"...and "Four Barbarians"."
Eastern Zhou usages The Chinese classics contain many references to the Siyi "Four Barbarians". Around the late Spring and Autumn period (771–476 BCE) or early Warring States period (475–221 BCE), the names Man, Yi, Rong, and Di became firmly associated with the cardinal directions. Yi changed from meaning a specific "barbarians in the east" to "barbarians" generally, and two new words – Siyi and Man-Yi-Rong-Di – referred to "all non-Zhou barbarians in the four directions". The Zuozhuan and Mozi contain the earliest extant occurrences of Siyi.
The (early 4th century BCE) Zuozhuan commentary to the Chunqiu ("Spring and Autumn Annals") uses Siyi four times. The affair [presenting Rong prisoners and spoils of war to Duke Zhuang] was contrary to rule. When a prince has gained success over any of the wild tribes, he presents the spoils to the king, who employs them to terrify other tribes.Zhuang 31, . It is virtue by which the people of the Middle State are cherished; it is by severity that the wild tribes around are awed.Duke Xi 25, . I have heard that, when the officers of the son of Heaven are not properly arranged, we may learn from the wild tribes all about.Duke Zhao 17, . Anciently, the defenses of the sons of Heaven were the rude tribes on every side of the kingdom; and when their authority became low, their defenses were the various States.Duke Zhao 23, . In addition, the Zuozhuan has an early usage of Man-Yi-Rong-Di meaning "all kinds of barbarians". When any of the wild tribes, south, east, west, or north, do not obey the king's commands, and by their dissoluteness and drunkenness are violating all the duties of society, the king gives command to attack them.Cheng 3, .
The (c. 4th century BCE) Mozi has one occurrence of Siyi referring to King Wu of Zhou. After King Wu had conquered the Shang dynasty and received the gifts bestowed by God, he assigned guardians to the various spirits, instituted sacrifices to Zhou's ancestors, the former kings of Shang, and opened up communications with the barbarians of the four quarters, so that there was no one in the world who did not pay him allegiance.
The (c. 4th century BCE) Guanzi recounts how Duke Huan of Qi (d. 643 BCE) conquered all his enemies, including the Dongyi , Xirong , Nanman , and Beidi . Further to the west, he subjugated the Western Yu, of Liusha and for the first time the Rong people of Qin were obedient. Therefore, even, though the soldiers went forth only once, their great accomplishments [victories] numbered twelve, and as a consequence none of the eastern Yi, western Rong, southern Man, northern Di, or the feudal lords of the central states failed to submit.Xioao Kuang, .