The Building of Water Conservancy Works
2 min readWater has been one of the essential conditions guaranteeing the agricultural production，but flood could wreak havoc on the lives and property of the people.As an agricultural society，Chinese history has been a history of struggle，controlling the flood and eventually making the water serve the agriculture for thousands of years.In bringing the flood under control，our ancestors had built many water conservancy works of various kinds，for comprehensive purposes of irrigation，and navigation as well，which performed the important roles not only in agricultural production but also in the unification of the country.Every dynasty attached much importance to the building and maintenance of water conservancy projects.As early as the Xia Dynasty（2100 B.C.-1600 B.C.），our ancestors had already known the primitive irrigation technology.In the Western Zhou Dynasty（1100 B.C.-771B.C.），a primary system of irrigation and water conservancy had been constructed，with the retaining，drawing，irrigating and discharging functions all in one comprehensively.From the Spring and Autumn and the Warring States Period（770 B.C.-221 B.C.）to the Qin Dynasty（221 B.C.-206 B.C.），monumental water conservancy projects such as the Dujiang Weirs，the Ling Canal and the Zhengbai Canal had been built，greatly enhancing the development of agricultural production in the Central Plains，the south of China，and the west of Sichuan.In the Western Han Dynasty，most of the water conservancy projects were built in the north，but to the south of the Yangtze River，some water projects had also been under construction.Through the Wei and the Jin dynasties，to the Tang Dynasty，waterconservancy projects had been built all over the country and the Song Dynasty made even greater efforts to build water projects.In building large water conservancy works，the last three dynasties could not be compared with the previous dynasties，but they built more smaller water projects，evenly scattered all over the country，like the stars in the sky，promoting the agriculture in all regions throughout the nation.
