The widespread phenomenon of “one child many fathers” exposed by the incompatibility of Reingold-Tilford algorithm, made us realize the structure of historic family trees is different from other features in nature. They are like bonsai plants, combining man-made and natural forces. The trees appear tortuous, mechanical, but have the directional and hierarchical characteristics of natural plants. We gained a bird’s-eye view of ancient family relationships in China across the passage of time and discovered questionable points that are unknown. How did the last emperor of Han Dynasty, LIU Xie, know about his relative LIU Bei? How did they try to save Han Dynasty, and what kind of relationship was between them? To some degree, this tree helps us understand a complicated period in Chinese history. When we were identifying the famous individuals in the Royal Family Tree of the Han Dynasty, a new picture emerged that raised questions that we were never aware of: did the descendants know they were members of a royal family? After almost a Millennium, maybe LIU Zhiji, a famous scholar in Tang Dynasty, did not know that he had emperors' blood. As the family members were visualized into a tree-like shape, we asked ourselves how can we better understand the families? Why is this family tree so tall? Why was there only one child in some generations? Why was the growth of this branch suddenly stopped and another branch kept growing? These trees help us analyze, compare and reason the fate of individuals within each family tree, motivating historical learning.
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