When Yu was a child, his father Gun moved the people east toward the Central Plain. Emperor Yao enfeoffed Gun as lord of Chong, usually identified as the middle peak of Mount Song. Yu is thus believed to have grown up on the slopes of Mount Song, just south of the Yellow River. He later married a woman from Mount Tu () who is generally referred to as Tushanshi (). They had a son named Qi, a name literally meaning revelation.