534 BC

When Confucius was seventeen, a baron of Lu called Chi P’ing Tzu was looking for a man who was familiar with rite and ritual, so he had a feast for the scholars in town. Yang Ho, a corrupt official who handled everything for the baron, stopped Confucius and said, "The baron is giving a feast to the scholars but not you!" So Confucius left. This is the first humiliation he got when he earned his own living in his youth.

Confucius married a girl with the last name of Ch’i when he was twenty years old. This marriage was arranged by Confucius’ mother before she died. His son was born in the second year and Confucius named him Li. (It was a name of a kind of fish in Chinese. In English it is called a carp.)