Panhu (

hanzi Chinese characters are logographs used to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represent the only one ...

: 盤瓠;

pinyin Hanyu Pinyin, or simply pinyin, officially the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet, is the most common romanization system for Standard Chinese. ''Hanyu'' () literally means 'Han Chinese, Han language'—that is, the Chinese language—while ''pinyin' ...

''Pánhù''; IPA: /pʰan³⁵-xu⁵¹/) is an important figure in Han and Yao mythologies. The Panhu mythological complex includes myths in Chinese and also other languages. This myth has a long history of being transmitted by

Han Chinese The Han Chinese, alternatively the Han people, are an East Asian people, East Asian ethnic group native to Greater China. With a global population of over 1.4 billion, the Han Chinese are the list of contemporary ethnic groups, world's la ...

and several of the other ethnic groups of the fifty-six officially recognized by the current administration of China, both orally and in literature. (Yang 2005:4) The Panhu myth is an important origin myth for various ethnic groups.

Basic myth

The basic Panhu myth is about a dragon-dog who transformed into a man and married a princess. In the myth, there was an old woman in an ancient Chinese king's palace who had ear pain for many years. A royal physician plucked out a small, golden worm from her ear, and placed it inside of a gourd covered with a plate. This is the origin of Panhu's name, which literally means "plate gourd". The worm then turned into a dog, Panhu, who in some versions had five colored fur. The king offered to marry his daughter to anybody that would present him with the head of his enemy. This was accomplished by Panhu. Accounts vary, but eventually Panhu and the princess had six sons and six daughters who became the famous 12 clans of Chinese mythology.

Variants

There are also variant versions.盤瓠神話
/ref> In some variants, the dragon-dog became transformed into a human, except for his head. (Christie 1968: 121-122) This is sometimes attributed to the princess worrying that he was starving inside the golden vessel he was placed inside of for seven days and seven nights to transform into a human, which resulted in the process being incomplete.

Myth versus history

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 presents a more historicized version and one which presents a more mythological version. (Yang 2005:12-13) This is also true in many of the accounts related to Panhu.

Religion

Many of the myths regarding agriculture in China are related to popular religion and ritual. In modern times, Panhu has been worshiped by the

She people The She people (; She Chinese: ; Cantonese: , Fuzhou: ) are an ethnic group in China. They form one of the 56 ethnic groups officially recognized by the People's Republic of China. According to th2021 China Statistical Yearbook the total popul ...

and

Yao people The Yao people () or Dao () is a classification for various ethnic minorities in China and Vietnam. Their majority branch is also known as Mien. They originated in the areas around Changsha, which today is the capital of Hunan province. They s ...

as "King Pan". (Yang 2005: 52-53).

Basic myth

Variants

Myth versus history

Religion

See also

Works cited

References

Further reading