Han, also known as the Chinese family is the main part of the Chinese nation, for the ancient tribes and culture, descendants of the tribe or Chinese people. The han nationality or a in history has never been interrupted, long, also is the world's most populous nation.
According to the pre-qin literature records and xia, shang and Zhou Li scope, the ancient ancestors of the han nationality can be generally up long mountain, mount tai in the east and west of Huang Hezhong, downstream for activity area; Are mainly distributed in the area of yangshao culture and longshan culture of these two types of neolithic culture, as the pioneers of the han Chinese ancient cultural relics. The two civilization as the representative of the circle of Chinese civilization.
For the ancestors of the han emperor and yan emperor in the central plains tribe alliance leader and an outbreak of e. springs, yan emperor tribes, incorporated into the huangdi tribe, yanhuang alliance into shape. Later, they defeated here in integration involved problems.the zhuolu war nine li group leader human-god, expand the coalition forces to today's shandong province. And then to yan tribes and huangdi tribe as the main body, and formed a larger part of shandong province here tribe of huaxia tribal alliance, huaxia basic fixed source. Before the 2100-2100 BC in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River descendants of the yellow emperor group has established the xia dynasty, shang dynasty and zhou dynasty.
In 221, before the qin dynasty unified China, huaxia clan from division to unity again. Han the pre-qin period claimed to China, from the beginning of the han dynasty and gradually appear "han" claim. Therefore, huaxia clan has another name: han. But the original title "huaxia" did not disappear, but with the name "han" used together ever since.
According to genetic research compare migration history record of fudan university, the expansion of the han nationality is mainly from north to south in the history of the mobile population. Before the jin han are mainly distributed in the north, and later due to factors such as always fine the disorderly moves southward migration, migrating south han and gene with the han nationality and language different aboriginal mixed in southern China. From north to south in the history of this mass movement has also changed the civil population distribution density.
汉族又名华夏族，是中国的主体民族，为上古时期黄帝部落和炎帝部落的后裔，即炎黄子孙。汉族还是一个在历史上从未中断过的、悠久的民族，也是世界上人口最多的民族。
据先秦文献的记载与夏、商、周立都范围，汉族的远古先民大体以西起陇山、东至泰山的黄河中、下游为活动地区;主要分布在这一地区的仰韶文化和龙山文化这两个类型的新石器文化，为汉族远古先民的文化遗存。这两个文明为华夏文明圈的代表。
汉族的祖先黄帝和炎帝在中原为争夺部落联盟首领而爆发了阪泉之战，炎帝部落战败，并入黄帝部落，炎黄联盟初具雏形。后来他们在涿鹿之战中打败了东夷集团的九黎族首领蚩尤，把联盟势力扩大至今日的山东境内。后又以炎帝部落和黄帝部落为主体，与山东境内的部分东夷部落组成了更庞大的华夏部落联盟，华夏族源基本固定。公元前2100～前770年黄河中下游黄帝集团的后裔先后建立了夏朝、商朝、周朝。
前221年，秦统一中国，华夏族又从分裂走向统一。汉族先秦时期自称华夏，从汉朝开始又逐渐出现“汉”的自称。因此，华夏族有了另一个名字：汉。但原先的称谓“华夏”并没有消失，而是与“汉”这个称谓一起使用至今。
根据复旦大学的基因研究对照历史迁移记录，汉民族的扩张主因是历史上的由北往南的人口移动。在晋朝以前汉族主要分布于中国北方，随后因永嘉之乱等因素大举向南迁徙，南迁汉族则和与汉族基因及语言相异的中国南方原住民混居。这历史上由北往南的大规模移动也改变了南北人口分布密度。
