, show distinct traces of having belonged to the same race. But it is
unsafe to say how the Chinese-transcribed name Yii-yiieh was
pronounced; still more unsafe is it to argue that it must have been _U_
or _O-viet_ simply because the Annamese so pronounce the word
now. We have seen that, according to one historical statement, the
Wu and Yiieh people spoke the same language; in which case the
members of the ruling Wu caste who fled to Japan in 473 B.C. were
probably not of the same race as the "savages around them." As an
act of bravado, in 481, the King of Wu made five condemned
centurions cut their own throats before the Tsin envoy, in order
to show what effectively stern discipline he kept, In 484 the King
of Yiieh had already committed a similar act of bravado; but
neither of these barbarian states is distinctly recorded to have
indulged in human sacrifices at the death of a sovereign. Previous
to the crushing of Wu by Yiieh, in 473 B.C., Yiieh was nearly
annihilated by Wu, and on this occasion Kou-tsien's envoy
advanced crawling on his knees to beg for mercy; this is hardly an
orthodox Chinese custom.
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