Wei Boyang is considered a semi-legendary figure who represented a "collective unity." The Cantong Qi was probably written in stages from the Han dynasty onward until it approached its current form before 450 AD.
Wei Boyang () was a notable Chinese writer and Taoist alchemist of the Eastern Han Dynasty. He is the author of The Kinship of the Three, and is noted as the first person to have documented the chemical composition of gunpowder in 142 AD.