Stories, and the people behind them

The legendary ancestor honoured every spring at his birthplace in Xinzheng.

Xinzheng, Zhengzhou

The Shang capital he founded still lies under central Zhengzhou.

Zhengzhou

He raised troops in Nanyang and moved the Han court back to Luoyang.

Nanyang and Luoyang

His move of the capital to Luoyang began the carving at Longmen.

Luoyang

China's only female emperor ruled from Luoyang and sponsored its great Buddha.

Luoyang

He made Kaifeng the capital of a commercial empire that invented the night market.

Kaifeng

A painter on the throne whose taste defined Song aesthetics and whose reign ended in captivity.

Kaifeng

The Dao De Jing author's birthplace, with its temple halls still in use.

Luyi, Zhoukou

The philosopher of free wandering came from the plain east of Kaifeng.

Minquan, Shangqiu

The clearest voice of Legalism, writing from the state of Han.

Xinzheng, Zhengzhou

The elusive teacher said to have trained the era's great persuaders at Yunmeng Mountain.

Hebi

The strategist behind the Zhou conquest, now a figure of popular legend.

Weihui, Xinxiang

The reformer whose laws turned Qin into the state that unified China.

Puyang

One of the three founders of the Han, remembered for planning from the tent.

Yuzhou, Xuchang

He farmed at Nanyang before the three visits that changed the Three Kingdoms.

Nanyang

The patient commander whose family eventually founded the Jin dynasty.

Wenxian, Jiaozuo

The general whose loyalty became a byword, honoured at his temple in Tangyin.

Tangyin, Anyang

Her poems on exile and return are among the earliest known by a woman in China.

Qi County, Kaifeng

The circle that drank and wrote at the foot of Yuntai Mountain.

Xiuwu, Jiaozuo

China's most studied poet was born in Gongyi, on the Yellow River.

Gongyi, Zhengzhou

The essayist who argued prose back toward clarity, honoured at his tomb park.

Mengzhou, Jiaozuo

The poet of plain speech, whose lines still travel easily into other languages.

Xinzheng, Zhengzhou

The most allusive of the late Tang poets, born in Qinyang.

Qinyang, Jiaozuo

Exiled repeatedly, he wrote some of the Tang's most stubbornly cheerful lines.

Xingyang, Zhengzhou

The 'poet ghost' whose images stayed strange for a thousand years.

Yiyang, Luoyang

Astronomer, cartographer and builder of the first seismoscope.

Nanyang

The physician whose formulas are still prescribed in Chinese medicine today.

Nanyang

His dictionary of characters is the root of Chinese lexicography.

Luohe

The prince who calculated equal temperament before Europe codified it.

Qinyang, Jiaozuo

The 'sage of painting', whose line was said to move like wind.

Yuzhou, Xuchang

The calligrapher credited with forming regular script.

Changge, Xuchang

His running script is studied by calligraphers far beyond China.

Mengjin, Luoyang

The first patriarch of Chan Buddhism, tied to Shaolin and its cave.

Dengfeng, Zhengzhou

The monk who walked to India and returned with the texts behind Journey to the West.

Yanshi, Luoyang

The second patriarch of Chan, whose shrine stands above Shaolin.

Dengfeng, Zhengzhou

China's first woman in space was born in Zhengzhou.

Zhengzhou

Structural biologist and founding president of Westlake University.

Zhengzhou

The volleyball captain from Zhoukou who led China to Olympic gold.

Zhoukou

Actor and motorcycle racer, born and raised in Luoyang.

Luoyang

One of the most cast young actors in Chinese cinema, from Pingdingshan.

Pingdingshan

The crosstalk comedian whose Henan accent became part of his act.

Puyang

Founder of Hillhouse, one of Asia's best-known investment firms.

Zhumadian

Founder of Muyuan, one of the world's largest pig-farming companies.

Nanyang

The Shuanghui founder whose sausage plants made Luohe a food city.

Luohe