they were used by government officials or in private use and regardless of any material used to make them. During the Han dynasty (202–220 AD), an origin myth of the supposed first seal in Chinese history was recorded, this myth states that the first seal was given to the Yellow Emperor by a yellow dragon which had a chart on its back. According to another origin myth, the first seal was given to Emperor Yao by a fenghuang (a mythical bird) as he was sitting in a boat. In both of these origin legends, the gifting of the seal is a symbol that the Mandate of Heaven was conferred to its recipient. So when Tang, the first ruler of the Shang dynasty, overthrows the last tyrannical ruler of the (possibly mythical) Xia dynasty (presumed c. 2070–1600 BC), he seizes the royal seal from him to symbolically establish his power. Imperial China During China's Imperial Period, the term xǐ would gradually begin to become a designation exclusively reserved for the seals of the Emperors. During the Han dynasty, the Emperor of China only had 6 imperial seals, later during the Tang dynasty (618–907) this number had grown to 8, during the Ming dynasty (1368–1644) this number would further grow to there now being over a dozen imperial seals, and by the reign of the Qing dynasty (1636–1912, 1917), there were several dozen official imperial seals that were used by its Emperors. The inscriptions on these official imperial seals usually refer to either the Emperor receiving the Mandate of Heaven or to the Emperor being "the successor of Heaven". According to The New Book of Tang (Tangshu), Empress Wu Zetian issued a decree that changed the usage of the word xǐ, which was up until then used for imperial seals, to bǎo (, treasure). Her reasoning behind this change was that she thought that the word xǐ sounded too much like death (si, 死) or rest (xi, 息). But when Emperor Zhongzong was resumed to the throne of the Tang dynasty in the year 705, he changed the name for imperial seals back to xǐ. In subsequent centuries both the terms xǐ and bǎo were alternated, depending on the period. Another type of seal that was used by the Chinese Emperors was a seal to indicate that a certain text or official document was written in the Emperor’s own handwriting as opposed