Chinese Æsop:

In the Han Dynasty lived a man by the name of Dong Yong. His family was poor when he was a small child. When his father died, he was willing to sell himself into slavery for a little money for the funeral. Moved by his filial piety, the youngest daughter of the Emperor of Heaven secretly came to the secular world. With the soil as their matchmaker, they held a wedding under an old locust tree. In order to repay the debt, the couple returned to the master to work as slaves. Since the fairy could weave ten bolts of fine silk overnight, the master cut down Dong Yong’s hire period from three years to one hundred days. On the expiration, the couple were returning home when the God of Heaven made an edict that the fairy should go back to the heavenly palace. Shedding tears, the fairy had to part with Dong Yong under the old locust tree. She flew into the sky and vanished.

The book, the Record of Years and Seasons of Jing Chu, published in the Southern and Northern Dynasty (420—589 AD), recorded a story about the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl: In the east of the Heavenly River, there was a weaver girl, who was the daughter of the Emperor of Heaven. She worked very hard on the loom year after year, weaving colorful clouds and heavenly clothes. The Emperor of Heaven took pity on her loneliness, he married the weaver girl to a cowherd lived in the west side of the Heavenly River. But the weaver girl totally neglected her weavering task after she was married. The Emperor of Heaven became very angry, and ordered her to return to the east of the River, only allowed the couple to be together for a single night, which is the seventh night of the seventh moon. In this variation of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl story, the weaver girl was a daughter of the Emperor of Heaven, instead of the grand daughter, and we don't know if she was the seventh girl, who w...

Lu Ban was born in the state of Lu during the Spring and Autumn Period. His real name was Gongshu Ban, also known as Gongshu Zi. He was an outstanding civil engineer and craftsman in Chinese history and was once an official in the civil engineering department. His craftwork has been circulated for thousands of years, earning him great esteem. Carpenters, stonemasons, bricklayers, an other construction industry and furniture manufacturers all worship Lu Ban as the founder of their profession. Lu Ban was born in the afternoon on May 7, 507 B.C. At the time of his birth, cranes gathered together and an exotic fragrance permeated the house. At the age of fifteen, he was suddenly awakened to his life’s purpose and went to study under Duanmu. Lu Ban invented Flying Bird which is the prelude of today's airplane He was a great inventor and taught many students. The books of Hanfeizi, Huainanzi, Lun Heng, and Mozi all recorded that Lu Ban made a bird from wood. After Lu Ban set it to...

Lady White and Xiaoqing (literally, Xiaoqing means little Cyan or little blue), two spirits of snake in fact, came down to earth to seek the little boy who had saved the life of Lady White when she was small and stayed in her heart ever since. When they visited Westlake, Hanzhou, they meet a very handsome young gentleman, whose name was Xu Xian. He turned out to be the very man they had been looking for. Lady White and Xu Xian (literally means an imortal whose surname is Xu) fell in love with each other and later with the help of Xiaoqing they got married. They lived happily in a villige nearby Westlake. They took a walk on the Su Causeway, or rolled painted boat together on the Westlake, as time went by, Lady White become pregnant. At the time of Dragon Boat Festival (Duanwu, double five festival, on the fifth day of the fifth month of each year), it was the custom for every household to fasten plants such as calamus and Chinese mugwort on the ground to drive away spirits, which we...

In the Qin Dynasty, there lived a family Meng and a family Jiang, who were next-door neighbors. When Family Meng planted a melon, the seedling crawled across the wall between the two houses and bore a melon there. The ripe melon was cut open and revealed the girl within, who was named Meng Jiang Girl. As she grew up, the First Emperor of the Qin Dynasty began to draft people for the construction of the Great Wall. A fellow named Fan Xiliang escaped from his family. He ran into the back yard of Meng Jiang Girl’s family to take refuge from the drafting. The two fell in love and prepared to get married. Unexpectedly, one servant of family Meng informed against them. Fan was caught and sent to build the Great Wall. He died there and his body was buried under the wall. When the winter came, Meng Jiang Girl went to send cotton-padded clothes for her husband. She went through misery and hardships, and finally arrived there, only to be told that her husband was already dead and was buried ...