Agriculture In Chinese Mythology
Agriculture is an important theme in Chinese mythology. There are many myths about the invention of agriculture that have been told or written about in China. Chinese mythology refers to those myths found in the historical geographic area of China. This includes myths in Chinese and other languages, as transmitted by Han Chinese as well as other ethnic groups (of which fifty-six are officially recognized by the current administration of China). Many of the myths about agriculture involve its invention by such deities or cultural heroes such as Shennong, Houji, Houtu, and Shujun: of these Shennong is the most famous, according to Lihui Yang. There are also many other myths. Myths related to agriculture include how humans learned the use of fire, cooking, animal husbandry and the use of draft animals, inventions of various agricultural tools and implements, the domestication of various species of plants such as ginger and radishes, the evaluation and uses of various types of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Shennong2
Shennong ( zh, c=神農, p=Shénnóng), variously translated as "Divine Farmer" or "Divine Husbandman", born , was a mythological Chinese ruler known as the first Yan Emperor who has become a deity in Chinese and Vietnamese folk religion. He is venerated as a culture hero in China and Vietnam. In Vietnamese, he is referred to as . Shennong has at times been counted amongst the Three Sovereigns (also known as "Three Kings" or "Three Patrons"), a group of ancient deities or deified kings of prehistoric China. Shennong has been thought to have taught the ancient Chinese not only their practices of agriculture, but also the use of herbal medicine. Shennong was credited with various inventions: these include the hoe, plow (both style and the plowshare), axe, digging wells, agricultural irrigation, preserving stored seeds by using boiled horse urine (to ward off the borers), trade, commerce, money, the weekly farmers market, the Chinese calendar (especially the division into th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bigu (avoiding Grains)
''Bigu'' () is a Daoist fasting technique associated with achieving ''xian'' "transcendence; immortality". Grain avoidance is related to multifaceted Chinese cultural beliefs. For instance, ''bigu'' fasting was the common medical cure for expelling the ''sanshi'' " Three Corpses", the malevolent, grain-eating spirits that live in the human body (along with the hun and po souls), report their host's sins to heaven every 60 days, and carry out punishments of sickness and early death. Avoiding "grains" has been diversely interpreted to mean not eating particular foodstuffs (food grain, cereal, the Five Grains, ''wugu'', or staple food), or not eating any food (inedia). In the historical context of traditional Chinese culture within which the concept of ''bigu'' developed, there was great symbolic importance connected with the five grains and their importance in sustaining human life, exemplified in various myths and legends from ancient China and throughout subsequent history. The con ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Zhurong
Zhurong (), also known as Chongli (), is an important personage in Chinese mythology and Chinese folk religion. According to the ''Huainanzi'' and the philosophical texts of Mozi and his followers, Zhurong is a god of fire and of the south. The '' Classic of Mountains and Seas'' gives alternative genealogies for Zhurong, including descent from both the Yan Emperor and Yellow Emperor. However, it is recorded in the suspicious part of and that were written last. Some sources associate Zhurong with some of the principal early and ancient myths of China, such as those of Nüwa ( Nüwa Mends the Heavens), Gonggong, and the Great Flood. Chinese mythology has in the past been believed to be, at least in part, a factual recording of history. Thus, in the study of historical Chinese culture, many of the stories that have been told regarding characters and events which have been written or told of the distant past have a double tradition: one tradition which presents a more historicised ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Yellow Emperor
The Yellow Emperor, also known as the Yellow Thearch, or Huangdi ( zh, t=黃帝, s=黄帝, first=t) in Chinese, is a mythical Chinese sovereign and culture hero included among the legendary Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors. He is revered as a deity individually or as part of the Wufang Shangdi, Five Regions Highest Deities () in Chinese folk religion. Regarded as the initiator of Chinese culture, he is traditionally credited with numerous innovations – including the traditional Chinese calendar, Taoism, wooden houses, boats, carts, the compass needle, "the earliest forms of writing", and cuju, ''cuju'', a ball game. Calculated by Jesuits in China, Jesuit missionaries, as based on various Chinese chronicles, Huangdi's traditional reign dates begin in either 2698 or 2697 BC, spanning one hundred years exactly, later accepted by the twentieth-century promoters of a universal calendar starting with the Yellow Emperor. Huangdi's cult is first attested in the Warring States peri ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Traditional Chinese Medicine
Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is an alternative medicine, alternative medical practice drawn from traditional medicine in China. A large share of its claims are pseudoscientific, with the majority of treatments having no robust evidence of effectiveness or logical mechanism of action. Some TCM ingredients Traditional Chinese medicine#Safety, are known to be toxic and cause disease, including cancer. Medicine in traditional China encompassed a range of sometimes competing health and healing practices, folk beliefs, Scholar-official, literati theory and Confucianism, Confucian philosophy, Chinese herbology, herbal remedies, Chinese food therapy, food, diet, exercise, medical specializations, and schools of thought. TCM as it exists today has been described as a largely 20th century invention. In the early twentieth century, Chinese cultural and political modernizers worked to eliminate traditional practices as backward and unscientific. Traditional practitioners then selec ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Soil And Grain
__NOTOC__ Soil and grain was a common Chinese political term in the Sinosphere for the state. Shejitan, the altars of soil and grain, were constructed alongside ancestral altars. Chinese monarchs of the Ming and Qing dynasties performed ceremonies of soil and grain to affirm their sovereignty at the Beijing Shejitan. During the Chinese Warring States period, ministers defied their rulers by claiming a greater loyalty to the "soil and grain". A similar concept to ''sheji'' is that of the earth deities Tudi and Houtu. It is also linked to Sheshen or deities which are sometimes directly called soil () Houtu is the overlord of all the Tudigongs ("Lord of Local Land"), Sheji ("the State"), Shan Shen ("God of Mountains"), City Gods ("God of Local City"), and landlord gods worldwide. In other cultures Korean monarchs of the Joseon dynasty did so at the Seoul Sajikdan. It has also been rendered "gods of soil and grain" in English, owing to its associations of prayer and supernat ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ox In Chinese Mythology
Oxen, cows, beef cattle, buffalo and so on are an important motif in Chinese mythology. There are many myths about the oxen or ox-like beings, including both celestial and earthly varieties. The myths range from ones which include oxen or composite beings with ox characteristics as major actors to ones which focus on human or divine actors, in which the role of the oxen are more subsidiary. In some cases, Chinese myths focus on oxen-related subjects, such as plowing and agriculture or ox-powered carriage. Another important role for beef cattle is in the religious capacity of sacrificial offerings. Terminology The Chinese character 牛 () used for "ox" is rather non-specific. It can refer to a male, castrate or not, or to a female, young or old, of various species of the bovine family which have been domesticated for use as draft animals, with their strength being harnessed for various purposes, especially carting loads and various types of farm work, such as plowing. ''Niú'' ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Great Flood (China)
The Great Flood of Gun-Yu, also known as the Gun-Yu myth,. was a major flood in ancient China that allegedly continued for at least two generations, which resulted in great population displacements among other disasters, such as storms and famine. People left their homes to live on the high hills and mountains, or nest on the trees. According to mythological and historical sources, it is traditionally dated to the third millennium BCE, or about 2300–2200 BCE, during the reign of Emperor Yao. However, archaeological evidence of an outburst flood at Jishi Gorge on the Yellow River, comparable to similar severe events in the world in the past 10,000 years, has been dated to about 1920 BCE (a few centuries later than the traditional beginning of the Xia dynasty which came after Emperors Shun and Yao), and is suggested to have been the basis for the myth.. Treated either historically or mythologically, the story of the Great Flood and the heroic attempts of the various human ch ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Five Grains
The Five Grains or Cereals () are a set of five farmed crops that were important in ancient China. In modern Chinese ''wǔgǔ'' refers to rice, wheat, foxtail millet, proso millet and soybeans. It is also used as term for all grain crops in general. History The earliest usage of the term "five grains" is found in '' the Analects'' and does not list which grains it refers to. The first lists of the five grains appear in the Han dynasty. The Classic of Rites lists soybeans (), wheat (), proso millet (), foxtail millet () and hemp (). Zheng Xuan in his commentary on '' The Rites of Zhou'' has rice () instead of hemp. Millet, beans, and wheat were widely recognized as part of the five grains and the debate was mainly about the inclusion of hemp or rice. Rice was not commonly cultivated in northern China while hemp was more commonly used as fiber for clothing, although its seeds could be used for oil. In modern Chinese, Wugu includes rice instead of hemp. Mencius writes that Houj ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Di Ku
Kù (, variant graph ), usually referred to as Dì Kù (), also known as Gaoxin or Gāoxīn Shì () or Qūn (), was a descendant of the Yellow Emperor. He went by the name Gaoxin until receiving imperial authority, when he took the name Ku and the title Di, thus being known as Di Ku. He is considered the ancestor of the ruling families of certain subsequent dynasties. Some sources treat Ku as a semi-historical figure, while others make fantastic mythological or religious claims about him. Besides varying in their degree of historicizing Ku, the various sources also differ in what specific stories about him they focus on, so that putting together the various elements of what is known regarding Ku results in a multifaceted story. Di Ku was (according to many versions of the list) one of the Five Emperors of the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors of Chinese mythology. Birth Ku's lineage is derived from descent from the legendary Yellow Emperor, then through the line of Shaohao (as ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dog In Chinese Mythology
Dogs are an important Motif (folkloristics), motif in Chinese mythology. These motifs include a particular dog which accompanies a hero, the dog as one of the twelve totem creatures for which years are named, a dog giving first provision of grain which allowed current agriculture, and claims of having a magical dog as an original ancestor in the case of certain ethnic groups. Myth versus history Chinese mythology includes myths in Chinese language, Chinese and other languages, as transmitted by Han Chinese as well as other ethnic groups (of which fifty-six are officially recognized by the current administration of China). In the study of historical Chinese culture, many of the stories that have been told regarding characters and events which have been written or told of the distant past have a double tradition: one which tradition which presents a more historicized and one which presents a more mythological version. This is also true of some accounts related to mythological dogs i ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Chinese Literature
The history of Chinese literature extends thousands of years, and begins with the earliest recorded inscriptions, court archives, building to the major works of philosophy and history written during the Axial Age. The Han dynasty, Han (202 BC220 AD) and Tang dynasty, Tang (618–907 AD) dynasties were considered golden ages of poetry, while the Song dynasty, Song (960–1279) and Yuan dynasty, Yuan (1271–1368) were notable for their lyrics (''ci''), essays, dramas, and plays. During the Ming dynasty, Ming and Qing, mature novels were written in written vernacular Chinese, an evolution from the preeminence of Literary Chinese patterned off the language of the Chinese classics. The introduction of widespread woodblock printing during the Tang and the invention of movable type printing by Bi Sheng (990–1051) during the Song rapidly spread written knowledge throughout China. Around the turn of the 20th century, the author Lu Xun (1881–1936) is considered an influential voi ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |