[4] The unofficial history compendium Lost Book of Zhou mentioned the "Dai Di" (代翟) among the northern neighbors of Shang Chinese.

[5] The White Di (Baidi) were recognized as "Northern Barbarians" by the Zhou,[6][7][8] although they possessed towns and organized states of the Chinese model like Dai and Zhongshan.

[10] They migrated east of the Ordos Loop into the valleys and mountains of northern Shanxi by the 6th century BC,[11][10] creating states there which were defeated and annexed by the Zhou vassal of Jin and its successor Zhao.

[12] The area inhabitants acted as middlemen between nomads of the Eurasian Steppe and the Chinese states, supplying the latter with furs,[13] jade, and horses.

[6] He sent them to Mount Chang[a] to look for a chop he had placed there; only Prince Wuxu (t 趙毋卹, s 赵毋恤, Zhào Wúxù), his son by a Di slave girl, was able to find it.

Later sources record that Zhao even "shared" governance of Dai with "the barbarians" in order to keep it relatively peaceful and to allow invasions against the nomadic Hu, who constantly harassed the area with raids.