Talk:Xu Fu

Number of boys and girls, as with purpose
Xu Fu knew that he was unable to return with such an elixir able to grant immortality. However he was smart enough that in order to survive, he would require many ships and around five hundred young boys and girls to create a new nation. Xu Fu knew that Qing wouldn't have spared him if he were to decline in searching for the immortality. Thanksly, Aeryck89 09:31, 25 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Thats speculative I assume - or do you have sources for his motivation? (if it is your own speculation, its a pretty good one:)....Engr105th (talk) 22:50, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

By the way, this does not sound like a case of someone who "disappeared". Sounds like he lived out his life in a colony in Japan. Should he really be on a list of Disappeared Persons ? Engr105th (talk) 22:52, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I think the problem is that we can't really tell what happened to him. Historical records about him haven't been verified with any archaeological studies so they're all really up for interpretation.  How much can you trust a record that was written hundreds of years ago about events that happened hundreds of years prior to the writing of the record?  But at any rate, I am not opposed to it if we removed the "Disappeared people" category from the article.  Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 23:01, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

With the number of crewmen, I think there is a mistake on one of the articles about that number. On this article, it states he took a few thousand of each gender where on the Elixir of Life article it states he only took 500 of each gender and a man by the name of Shi Huang Di took the few thousand. I think someone might need to look into these two articles and determine which one has the correct number. (Sivos909 (talk) 19:03, 4 April 2012 (UTC))

Character for Fu
I'm not sure about the character for "Fu" given - the character I have here in Celestial Lancets (Needham et al, 1980), looks more like 幅, actually the left hand side looks like the left hand side of 祔, but with the right hand phonetic for "food" (as the original character). Reading Chinese Characters (1927, Catholic Mission Press) p. 193 (lesson 75D) it also notes the character means a "transcendent influence that brings luck". Perhaps this character has changed shape in the 20th century? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 203.97.235.49 (talk) 09:30, 7 May 2007 (UTC).
 * Yes, that's the case (though I can't say if it occurred in the 20th century). They are the same character. _dk 12:55, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Mythology?
Interesting story, but (at least part of) it seems more mythology than fact, with Perseus type qualities. The 3000 virgins on a boat bit sounds like the two ships with 50 virgins of King Danaus and 50 sons of his brother, King Aegyptus that sailed to Argos. Their descendent Perseus also fought monsters (Gorgons) in search for an elixir of life. Tchoutoye (talk) 03:12, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
 * That is your belief. Don't impose it on the article. _dk (talk) 04:53, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

The word myth is defined as something that has yet to be proven true or false. We know Xu Fu was a real person and he really did leave China with a large crew to search for the Elixir of Life (this is fact), what happened to him afterwards is more of an Amelia Earhart type of story. We do not know if Perseus was a real person or just a made up story, so we classify his story as a myth. Simply put, just because one story has some form of similarities to another story doesn't mean they are the same type of story. (Sivos909 (talk) 19:09, 4 April 2012 (UTC))

i removed an innacurate link
that website was written by an ammature who has no brains. He doesnt realized the reason why japanese has more loanwords and influence from the southern chinese dialects is because they are more closely related to ancient chinese because their speakers MIGRATED FROM THE NORTH. plus japanese is NOT related to the chinese language, it cotains chinese LOANWORDS, nothing to do with relation, and dont put that link back please.ㄏㄨㄤㄉㄧ (talk) 22:48, 27 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Ancient Chinese language, both written and spoken, is largely preserved in southern China due to population migration. Chinese language in northern China nowadays (Mandarin) is heavily influenced by Manchu language, Mongolian and other languages from northern nations. If you can read Chinese, compare 飲 (drink) and 食 (eat) still used in Cantonese as they did in Chinese classics hundred years ago BC. In mandarin, they have been changed to 吃 and 喝, which have different meanings originally.--水水 (talk) 05:07, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

External links modified
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mythology section violates WP:OR
See No original research to understand why the mythology section is problematic. None of the sources cited in the deleted mythology section mention Xu Fu and his hstoricity. I hardly find it relevant to include in this article. It seems to be mostly original research / cherrysynth. Please stop restoring it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:249:C01:3990:3847:14D5:B217:928B (talk) 20:26, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
 * This section is now named the "Skeptics" section but the problem remains, as pointed out by 2601:249:C01:3990:3847:14D5:B217:928B. It appears to be an argument which synthesizes various facts sourced to references that do not make the argument made here. In fact none of the current sources actually state the main point of the section, which is that the story is mythological. I can probably find sources for this part, but I am not sure some of the supporting sentences can be sourced. In the meantime I have tagged some statements that need attention. Fiwec81618 (talk) 03:09, 12 January 2022 (UTC)

Original synthesized analysis
"If Xu Fu had settled in Japan then Japanese would presumably speak a Chinese dialect. However, the Japanese language has no genetic relationship with Chinese and it belongs to a different language family called Japonic languages."

The sources do state that the Japanese language is not related to Chinese languages. However, they do not connect Xu Fu to this fact, so this is a synthesized analysis that has no source to back it up. 2600:6C44:117F:95BE:5D04:764B:AF07:F0F8 (talk) 21:37, 17 January 2023 (UTC)