Chinese Great Flood Yu Engineer

In Chinese mythology, a Great Flood covered the land, and unlike the Biblical story, humans fought back under the leadership of Prince Gun and his son, Yu the Engineer, who battled demons and called on gods and dragons to build drainage basins and dams. According to legend, Emperor Yao first tasked Gun with controlling the waters, but Gun failed after nine years because he tried to block the flood with a special self-expanding soil. The emperor then ordered Gun’s execution and chose Yu, who instead worked with the natural flow of the rivers, organizing massive dredging and channeling projects across the realm. Yu’s success in taming the flood made him a culture hero and paved the way for him to found the Xia dynasty in later tradition.

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