Having finished the book, readers can enjoy the many other writings about Romance of Three Kingdoms in the Commentary section. You can also enjoy the wisdom of war strategy through a read of The Art of War by Suntzu (or Sunzi), a 13-chapter treatise of military methods, famous for its brevity and wide applications.

With all these writings, we believe you will come to understand and appreciate the first masterpiece.

The online Romance of Three Kingdoms is the collaboration of many people. We want to thank them all for their contributions in writings, ideas, energy, and resources. Special thanks to:

 Christopher G. Parent, Ellen Xue, Kathryn Goodell, Jonathan P. Voth, Ma Teng, Oliver Pierce, Corey Quilliam, Brian Swift, Richard Yip, and Nuttasit Boonplang for your shaping the directions and other contributions;

 George Koo, Rafe de Crespigny, Li Ung Bing, Yan Zhang, Peter Konieczny, Bu Ching, Timothy Chiang, and Ryan Youngsaye for your writing contributions.

 Joseph Whiteside, Yin Yang, Khue Nguyen, Budihardjo Budi, Gloria Wu, Kyle Ishida, CJ Sephiro, Shou Tsurugi, Steven Prabowo, and Roy Padgett for your research, editing, design, and information supports;

 Sangdo Ha and the "World of Computer" radio program for sending free the book on floppy disks to readers around the world, who do not have Internet access.

This online Romance of Three Kingdoms is in its second edition. It has quite a few changes compared to the previous edition. First, some of the Latin names have changed. For example, Laurent-Xavier is the new name, instead of Xerces-Blue; Yale-Gifford becomes Yale-Perez; Raleigh-Segal becomes Raleigh-Estrada; Krom-Gunnell becomes Krom-McQueen, etc.

Second, we have the zip files available for you to download the whole book to your hard drive. There are readers in the countries where Internet connection is expensive. Reading offline is therefore a good option. A zip file will simplify your download to one instead of 140+ files. We want to thank the copyright holders who have given permission for us to publish the zip format online.

Third, in design, we further reduce the amount of graphics for shorter download time. Those who wish to see the pictures of Three Kingdoms can go to the "Links" section, where there are many links to other web sites with beautiful graphics from video games and movies.

Fourth, in respond to some of your complaints about reading such a huge book on screen, we have designed the web page so that you can change the font color and background color to your preference. You can also quickly change the font to gray and the background to black by hitting the "Night" button. Our poll shows this setting is very pleasant when you read the book in the dim light or no light at all. The color setting feature can only be used with web browsers that support Java: Netscape Navigator 4.0 or higher, Microsoft Explorer 4.0 or higher.

And fifth, we add a sound version of the book. You now can have a computer voice read the book for you. Some of the friends told us when they were children, they listened to Romance of Three Kingdoms on radio, and they enjoy this format. So, we implement the audio feature. The visually impaired can greatly benefit in this feature, too. And those who want to learn English will find this feature very helpful. In order to use the audio version, users will need the Internet browsers that support Visual Basic Script. The audio software will download automatically for you from Microsoft.com web site. The technology enabling the audio feature is Microsoft Agent 2.0. Microsoft makes this technology free to Internet users, and we want to thank them for that.

Magna Media ABC LLC makes the online Romance of Three Kingdoms available to all readers, to whom we dedicate.

Snow N. Snow

The inhabitants of China are known to the world as Chinese. They speak of themselves as the "people of Han." As Han is name of a dynasty, it hardly denote the origin of the culture. Many theories, based more or less upon religious myths, have been advanced to show whence the first inhabitants of China came; but their correctness must necessarily await further scientific discoveries. All accounts, however, agree that the basin of the Yellow River was the cradle of the Chinese culture, and that their ancestors were a nomadic people who, some five or six thousand years ago, migrated from the north-western part of Asia and finally settled in the northern-central part of what is now China.

They soon learned how to till the ground and produce grain. As time went on, the settlers formed themselves into tribes ruled by chieftains. Wars with the aborigines and among the different tribes were frequent. The result was that the original inhabitants were driven off in all directions, and the most powerful chieftain became the acknowledged head. As to how long this state of affairs had continued to exist, history is silent. What we do know of this period is founded largely upon the law of evolution, which is common to all cultures.

Given the first rank among the chieftains is Fuxi, or "Conqueror of Animals." He taught his subjects how to catch animals and fish with nets and to rear domestic animals for food. He is also the originator of the writing system which, with their improvements and modifications of ages, has been handed down to us in the form of the modern Chinese characters.

Before Fuxi, there lived in the pre-historic times a ruler, called Sui Jen, "Producer of Fire." As the name implies, he is believed to have been the man who brought down fire from heaven for the first time and employed it in the preparation of food. Before his time the people lived like wild beasts and ate their food raw.

Some 1300 years after Fuxi, the throne fell to Shennong, or "God of Agriculture," who taught the people the art agriculture and the use of herbs as medicine.

The three foregoing rulers are commonly spoken of by historians as the "Three Divine Rulers."

The successors of Shennong were all rulers of inferior ability, and unable to check the encroachments of the savage tribes whose subjugation was left to Huang Di, or the Yellow Emperor. He was a warrior as well as a statesman. He has been immortalized by the famous battle of Zhuo Lu, where he used a compass to locate his chief enemy and defeat him. His chief enemy was among those killed in the battle, and this victory is believed to have prepared the way for a permanent Chinese settlement in the Middle Kingdom.

After this conquest of the aborigines, Huang Di was placed on the throne. He took his title from the color of the earth, believing that he had come into power by its virtue. His kingdom spread north and west to the desert, east to the ocean, and south to the Great River ((Yangtze River)). This was the largest empire hitherto known in China.

His rule lasted 100 years, a century of progress and enlightenment. He is commonly believed to have been the inventor of boats, carts, bow, arrows, bamboo musical instruments, copper coins, calendar, and fixed standard weight and measures, and more. His ministers invented six kinds of writing, constructed a Celestial Globe, and recorded the movement of stars. His wife taught the people how to rear silkworms and weave silk, and has been regarded as the goddess of the silk industry.

Huang Di, his grandson, his great-grand son, Yao, and Shun are commonly spoken of as the Five Sovereigns.