If this ode were not intended to do honour to Wu-ting, the Kao Zung of
Shang, we cannot account for the repeated mention of him in it. Ku Hsi,
however, in his note on it, says nothing about Wu-ting, but simply that
the piece belonged to the sacrifices in the ancestral temple, tracing
back the line of the kings of Shang to its origin, and to its attaining
the sovereignty of the kingdom. Not at all unlikely is the view of Kang
Hsuean, that the sacrifice was in the third year after the death of
Wu-ting and offered to him in the temple of Hsieh, the ancestor of the
Shang dynasty.

Heaven commissioned the swallow, To descend and give birth to (the
father of our) Shang[1]. (His descendants) dwelt in the land of Yin, and
became great. (Then) long ago God appointed the martial Thang, To
regulate the boundaries throughout the four quarters (of the kingdom).

(In those) quarters he appointed the princes, And grandly possessed the
nine regions[2]. The

[1. The father of Shang is Hsieh, who has already been mentioned. The
mother of Hsieh was a daughter of the House of the ancient state of
Sung, and a concubine of the ancient ruler Khu (B.C. 2435). According to
Mao, she accompanied Khu, at the time of the vernal equinox, when the
swallow made its appearance, to sacrifice and pray to the first
match-maker, and the result was the birth of Hsieh. Sze-ma Khien and
Kang make Hsieh's birth more marvellous:--The lady was bathing in some
open place, when a swallow made its appearance, and dropt an egg, which
she took and swallowed; and from this came Hsieh. The editors of the
imperial edition of the Shih, of the present dynasty, say we need not
believe the legends;--the important point is to believe that the birth
of Hsieh was specially ordered by Heaven.