The Tale of the Shang Conquest

There are many historical accounts of King Wu’s campaign against Zhou, and plenty of novels based on the same story, with Investiture of the Gods being the best known. Most of them, however, draw on mythology and folk legends. The novel The Shang Dynasty’s Fall is instead based on historical records and modern archaeological research. In a nutshell, it is a Three Kingdoms-style version of Investiture of the Gods.

According to the conclusions of the Xia-Shang-Zhou Chronology Project, King Shou of Shang, posthumously known as Zhou and ritually named Di Xin, reigned for thirty years. This novel begins in the year Shou ascends the throne and ends with the Battle of Muye, telling the turbulent life story of the protagonist, Zhou Kao, known to history as Bo Yikao. Zhou Kao’s journey is not confined to the Shang royal domain centered on Yin and Zhaoge. It takes him throughout the various feudal states of the Central Plains and even far beyond, to the countries and tribal clans of the Eastern Yi, Western Rong, Southern Man, and Northern Di peoples.