Pre Animal Explore Geographic Issues

The theme of this paper is the animal distribution and changes of the pre-Qin period in Chinese history. It also discusses the related problems such as the natural history of animals and Zoology in ancient China.There are already a number of research books and articles studied some scientific problems of Chinese Historical Zoo-geography. They mainly focused on the geographical distribution of animals in historical period according to the records of ancient literature. And further, they discussed the climate and environment characteristics of some ancient animals’ distribution area based on the climatic and environmental conditions of the similar living species. These researches extensively considered and analysed of various information about animals in Chinese ancient literature. Their research ideas and methods, fully embodies the combination of art-science interdisciplinary perspective. So, these researches are completely different from the ancient scholars’ simply interpretation of historical books, but presented very important scientific value. However, there are also some limitations we can find from the previous research perspective. These limitations are mainly embodied in2aspects as follows:1, All the animal species lived during the pre-Qin period of China are considered as living species. None has ever consider the possibility of the so-called "fossil species" which might had once survived from the Old Stone Age (Pleistocene);2, The reason of the ancient animal distribution change (sharply southward) has often been attributed basically to the ancient climate change. The other factors have been neglected or despised obviously.This paper emphasizes2aspects as follows:1, Animals (such as elephants) lived in historical times of China are not necessarily belonged to the living species. There might be some extinct species lived to the so-called "historical times".2, Climate changes may not be the only main reason which caused the distribution of animals changed. Such factors as regional economic development, human profit-seeking behaviour and surface water environmental change also played important roles. These two research perspectives are the most important innovations of this paper.There are2most important reaearch cases of this paper:elephants and rhinoceros, especially the so-called "wild elephants" and "wild rhinoes" lived in pre-Qin period of Chinese history. At the same time, this paper also deals with some other animal species, who’s distribution range has obviously changed during historical times, such as the bamboo rats.The E. maximus (Asian elephant) is only distributed in tropical and subtropical regions today. But in the pre-Qin period, there were still many "wild elephants" lived in North China. Because the academic circles have never considered the possibility of extinct species, so all of these elephants were put into the species E. maximus. But as the recent studies of historical climate change show, in the pre-Qin period, North China was not controlled by the tropical or subtropical climate. Based on the related fossils (including bones and remains) and cultural relics, as well as the review and analysis of historical documents, this paper draws3new understandings:1, The so-called " wild elephants" once lived in North China during the pre-Qin period should not belonged to the species Elephas maximus, but Palaeoloxodon sp..2, The "retreat to the south" of the "wild elephants" is not synchronized to the climate change.3, The disappearance of these elephants from the northern region, seems mainly caused by the pressure of human activities.Similar to the elephants, this paper also discusses about the rhinoceros, especially the so-called "wild rhinoes" once livd in North China during the pre-Qin period. Based on the related fossils (including bones and remains) and cultural relics, as well as the review and analysis of historical documents, this paper draws3new understandings:1, The "retreat to the south" of the "wild rhinoceros" is not synchronized to the climate change, and also not synchronized to the retreat of the mentioned elephants.2, The "retreat to the south" of the "wild rhinoceros" is not synchronized to the climate change. The disappearance of these rhinoceros from the northern region, seems mainly caused by the hunting acts of human.3, The prototype of the famous deity animal "kylin" in ancient Chinese arts and myths, perhaps come from a kind of giant ancient fossil rhinoceros—Elasmotherians.This paper also discusses about a few kinds of other animals, such as bamboo rats, whales and mussels.As a summary, this paper put forward2new view points as follow:1, There are some animals can not live in North China today, but they once could, in the historical times. The better explanation of this phenomenon may be that the ancient ones belonged to the fossil species, not the living species, as the old view suggested.2, The disappearance of these animals from North China, seems mainly caused by variety of factors including the interference of human activities, not only by climate change (temperature fluctuations).