High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Sima Qian (ca. 145 or 135 BC 86 BC) was a Prefect of the Grand Scribe of the Han Dynasty. He is regarded as the father of Chinese historiography because of his highly praised work, Records of the Grand Historian , a "Jizhuanti" style general history of China covering more than two thousand years from the Yellow Emperor to Emperor Han Wudi . His definitive work laid the foundation for later Chinese historiography.Sima Qian was born and grew up in Longmen, near present-day Hancheng, Shaanxi. He was raised in a family of astrologers.