People offer sacrifice to the Yellow Emperor in April last year.(Photo: China Daily) Photo Gallery>>>

    BEIJING, March 20 -- The 2007 Sacrifice Offering Ceremony for the Yellow Emperor will be held in Xinzheng on April 19 (the third day of the third month of the lunar calendar), the emperor's birth anniversary.

    Xinzheng, a county-level city in Zhengzhou, is the hometown of the Yellow Emperor, or Huangdi, the common ancestor of the Chinese people.

    Twenty thousand people, including leaders of the central and local governments, delegations from China's Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions and Taiwan Province, and Chinese delegations from overseas will attend the ceremony.

    The three highlights of the celebration will be the construction of the Surname Culture Square, the building of the Sacred Fire Altar before the Yellow Emperor's sculpture and a torch relay to be flagged off from his hometown.

    There will also be a series of activities to mark the occasion, including the Yellow Emperor Culture Forum, to be held in Xinzheng from April 17-19, and a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the completion of the sculptures of the Yellow Emperor and the Red Emperor in the Yellow River Scenic Area in Zhengzhou. A High-Rank Forum on the Yellow Emperor Culture on April 18 and a large-scale art performance, both in Zhengzhou, as well as other trade, investment and tourism promotion events will also be held.

    Common ancestor

    The Yellow Emperor was a great tribal leader born some 5,000 years ago in Xinzheng.

    The famous historian Sima Qian of the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC - AD 25) states in his "Historical Records" that there were three strong tribes in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River at the time: the Youxiong Tribe led by the Yellow Emperor, and two others led by Chiyou and the Red Emperor respectively.

    The Yellow Emperor made his tribe the strongest by teaching them farming and helping them improve moral integrity.

    The Youxiong and the other two tribes finally formed a union. Many other tribes also joined the union, marking the first unification of the Chinese nation. The Yellow and Red emperors are thus regarded by the Chinese people as their common ancestors.

    The united nation designated Xinzheng (then called Youxiong) as the capital. In ancient times, locals also called it "City of the Yellow Emperor."