 Biographical treatments of Confucius, beginning with the “Hereditary House of Confucius” (Kongzi shijia 孔子世家), a chapter of Sima Qian’s 司馬遷 (c.145–c.86 BCE) Records of the Grand Historian (Shiji 史記), were initially based on information from compilations of independently circulating dialogues and prose accounts. Tying particular elements of his philosophy to the life experiences of Confucius is a risky and potentially circular exercise, since many of the details of his biography were first recorded in instructive anecdotes linked to the expression of didactic messages. Nevertheless, since Sima Qian’s time, the biography of Confucius has been intimately linked with the interpretation of his philosophy, and so this section begins with a brief treatment of traditional tropes about his family background, official career, and teaching of 72 disciples, before turning to the dialogue and prose accounts upon which early biographers like Sima Qian drew.