Why did the ancients use yarrow and tortoise shell for divination?

The mysterious yarrow and tortoise shell

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Yarrow and tortoise shell are both instruments used for ancient divination. Many people may not be familiar with yarrow, but tortoise shells are easy to understand. Let's talk about tortoise shells first. As the name implies, tortoise shells are the thick shells of turtles. Turtles rely on this armor to avoid natural enemies. When it makes a slight movement, it immediately retracts its head, tail and limbs into the shell. People often like to make fun of timid people and call them "cowards". More people call names "tortoise". In short, in our life, the tortoise is the object of ridicule and contempt.

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But you may think that this is just the fate of the tortoise now. In ancient China, the turtle was once a symbol of good fortune, and was regarded as a sacred object to communicate with heaven and earth, and its status was quite respected. "Li Yun" records: "What are the four spirits? Forest, phoenix, turtle and dragon are collectively called the four spirits. " Turtles can be compared with legendary animals such as Kirin, Phoenix and Dragon, which shows their high status. In archaeological discoveries, jade turtles and other decorations have been found many times, which shows that people loved turtles in ancient times.

In people's eyes, the tortoise is sacred. Why do you say that? Let's look at two materials. 1987, a group of jade tortoises and plates were found in Tomb No.4 of Lingjiatan, Anhui Province, engraved with mysterious patterns pointing in all directions and the inner circle of the foreign side, symbolizing all directions and containing ancient time and space thoughts. Li Shizhen's Compendium of Materia Medica in the Ming Dynasty also recorded: "The turtle is 360, while the turtle is long, and the text is based on the law, and the law is the next." "Upper" refers to the turtle's back, and "lower" refers to the turtle's belly, indicating that there are 360 species of beetles, of which the tortoise is the longest, and the tortoise's back armor is embossed with texture, symbolizing the astronomical phenomena; Turtle belly is flat and textured to symbolize landform. Maybe today we look ridiculous and feel incredible, but there was a time in history when the tortoise was regarded as a symbol of heaven and earth and received special respect. Moreover, the mysterious color shrouded in turtles has been greatly enhanced by the ancients for divination.

There are many kinds of turtles, but according to experts' research, most of the divination turtles found in Yin Ruins are water turtles, which are small in size and mostly live in swampy rivers. This can also prove that when turtle divination prevailed, people were still in the fishing and hunting society, and turtles were animals that people used to look at. It's a little strange. Although a large number of tortoise shells have been found in Yin Ruins, with more than100000 pieces, according to research, even at that time, there were no turtles living in the location of Yin Ruins. These tortoises were collected from other places, even as far away as the South China Sea today. After such a long journey, how to get them together is a very confusing problem. In the past, people always thought that the Yellow River civilization was the origin of Chinese civilization. Later, the Yangtze River civilization was gradually discovered. According to the recent archaeological discovery, the civilization of the Pearl River Basin is far beyond people's imagination. Maybe tortoiseshell was the product of the exchange of different civilizations at that time.

At that time, divination was very popular, and turtles were regarded as the most important divination materials. If there is demand, there will be industry to meet the demand. At that time, there was a one-stop process from catching and killing turtles to cutting and polishing turtle shells, in which the process of killing turtles was the most cruel. It is said that the common method is to press the caught turtle tightly with a heavy object so that it can't move, and then burn the tail of the turtle with fire. When the turtle in the turtle shell is in unbearable pain, it will suddenly jump out of the shell and leave an empty shell. It seems that it is not easy to be sacred. It is not only enshrined in the temple for people to pay tribute to, but also tortured by blood and flesh. After a series of treatments, the tortoise shell is made into a deck of cards with proper size and smooth surface, which can be used for divination. Usually, the process of divination is as follows: first, drill a few small holes in the tortoise shell, the number of which is uncertain, and then throw the tortoise shell into the fire and burn it. Tortoise shell will burst at high temperature, and irregular cracks will appear on the nail surface. At this time, the turtle shell will be taken out, and the cracks on it will be analyzed after cooling, and good or bad luck will be predicted according to the direction of the grain. We know that the lines on the tortoise shell are caused by burning. Nature has no rules to follow, and the results are varied. Therefore, distinguishing lines was also a very profound knowledge at that time, and there were special officials to identify, study and judge whether it was good or bad. Judging from the large number of tortoise shells excavated in Yin Ruins, there were many kinds of divination at that time, including important national activities such as fighting and offering sacrifices, and trivial things such as losing cattle and sheep, which reflected from one side how important the tortoise shells played in social life at that time. No matter how big or small, they should be carried out in the direction indicated by the mysterious lines on the tortoise shells after pious divination.

Tortoise shell was widely used in Yin and Shang Dynasties, but after Zhou Dynasty, although tortoise shell divination was still going on, yarrow was used in more and more occasions and eventually completely replaced tortoise shell divination. Compared with tortoiseshell, the mysterious color of yarrow is only stronger, because even now, what yarrow looks like is still controversial, and even herbs or woody plants are uncertain, and some people even doubt its existence. Why is this happening? Because the historical records about yarrow are really amazing. According to legend, Yi Gan Wei Kun Chisel written by the Han people records: "The sage designed it to make a living, the sage measured it, and the grass and the sky rested together." Wanjing said:' You were born at the age of one thousand, and only at the age of one hundred have forty-nine stems, which is enough to inherit the number of heaven and earth. At the age of 500, the shape is gradually dry and solid, at the age of 700, there are no branches and leaves, at the age of 900, the color is purple as iron, and at the age of 1000, there is still purple gas, and there is turtle shrinkage. "Xuanyuan Mu Jing" said: "Under the purple scorpion, there are five dragons and ten friends. The spirit of nature is adopted by saints, but nine out of forty is used to transport the number of heaven and earth and the source of thousands. ""The yarrow described in these articles has a life span of 1,000 years, and there are only 49 leaves in a hundred years. Why not about 49 leaves? Because 49 is the number of heaven and earth, and there is purple air over yarrow, guarded by turtles, symbolizing good luck. Where is this grass? It's like a fairy descending to earth for nine days. The record in Shuowen is also very mysterious: "Zanthoxylum bungeanum, Artemisia, born at the age of one thousand with 300 stems." "

It is considered that yarrow is a kind of Artemisia and other plants, but its life span is very long, with 300 stems 1000. It seems difficult to popularize such a divine plant. Sima Qian in Han Dynasty had a wide range of knowledge. At the age of twenty, he began to travel all over Kyushu, even in remote areas such as Bashu and Kunming at that time. But when he wrote about yarrow in Historical Records, he could only hear the old man say that yarrow was born there. There are no tigers and wolves in animals, and grass is nontoxic. " This statement seems to be close to real life, but it is estimated that there are no tigers, wolves and nontoxic yarrow to highlight the auspiciousness of yarrow.

Scholars of all ages, for various reasons, have constantly added mystery to yarrow and made it sacred. In fact, this statement is obviously untenable, because the use of yarrow was very common at that time, and people had to turn to it for help in big and small things. If it's as amazing as described in these books, where can they find so much? From this point of view, yarrow should undoubtedly be a common plant in people's lives, and the explanation in Ci Hai may be the closest to the truth: "Plant names, also known as yarrow, sawtooth grass, tiger grass and compositae. The leaves are alternate and the long lines are lanceolate ... widely distributed in northern China and Siberia in the Soviet Union. " As we all know, Zhou people are in the middle reaches of the Yellow River and belong to the northern region. Judging from the description of Ci Hai, the distribution areas are undoubtedly the same. Imagine that people living in this area often grab the stems of yarrow at random to predict a divination after work, or in the fields or in rural alleys, but it is also a pleasure.

Things have changed. Tortoise shell and yarrow are common members of nature. Because of the need of religious divination, they were carried to the altar and accepted the worship of the world. Now, because people no longer enjoy divination, they have stepped down from the altar. I'm afraid they didn't think of it themselves. As a tool, they have been divining people's good and bad for many years, but they can't even predict their own fate, which is ridiculous.