Brief History of Chinese Kites

    Kites in China have a long history. It is said that, in Han Dynasty, General Han Xin used a kite as a tool to survey. During the time of LiangwuDi Emperor, it was used for sending messages to each other. Unfortunately, it didn¡¯t work well. In South and North Dynasty, someone jumped off a high place with carrying a kite on his back. He survived. Mr Zhang of Tang Dynasty took advantage of kite to send signals successfully for help as he was surrounded by the enemy.

    From Tang Dynasty, gradually, kites were regarded as toys. There were whistles made of wire or bamboo flutes on the kites, which came into being at late Tang Dynasty. It whistled when there was wind. Therefore, it was named, in Chinese, ¡°Feng Zheng" (¡°Feng" means wind in Chinese.) It is also said that, during the time of Five Dynasties, it was named as ¡°Feng Zheng"when Li Ye used paper to make kites and put bamboo flutes on it.
By the time of Song Dynasty, kites were developed greatly in terms of variety and capability, involving greatly in people¡¯s life.

    By the time of Qing Dynasty, flying kites were getting more popular. It is said that Cixi sent an eunuch to Tianjin for ¡°Kite Wei" to make a kite named ¡°The God of Longevity on the back of the crane for her. Three big kites were collected in the Imperial Palace, which were flown by Fu Yi. That is to say, kites have reached a pretty high level at that time.
From Song Dynasty and Tang Dynasty, Chinese kites were spread towards the whole world. They were first spread to Japan, Korea, Malaysia, etc, and the countries of the Southeast Asia. Then, it was popularized in Europe and America, etc.

    There is a Chinese kite on which the words, ¡°The earliest spacecrafts made by human is China¡¯s kite and rocket. is printed, which was hung in the hall of Washington Space Navigation Museum in the United States.