The origin of oriental dragon

In the Yellow River Basin, the birthplace of the Chinese nation, affected by the temperate monsoon climate, floods are a great threat to people. Therefore, it is the greatest wish of ancient ancestors to yearn for a god who can dominate the rain, protect the weather and ensure a bumper harvest. Ancient humans living in different regions and environments benefited from different natural objects around them. Therefore, people use different objects to represent the nature and gas field of natural objects. Some animals living around them are the most commonly used materials to make gods, so our ancestors created a symbolic image of the main water god-dragon, which is based on the alligator, a reptile unique to China.

Although the image of the dragon was fused with other animals in the form of oral transmission by the ancients and distorted artificially, it still has all the basic morphological characteristics of the Chinese alligator: 1, covered with scales; 2. Long chin and upturned nose on the top of the head; 3. Conical fangs with sharp edges; 4 big round protruding eyes; 5 long thick tail; 6. Strong limbs and claws with five fingers; 7. There are horizontal stripes on the abdomen. [Transferred from Iron Blood Community/]

In order to make up for the defect that the bald tail of the Chinese alligator is detrimental to the image of the gods, the ancients used their full imagination to add horns, whiskers and caudal fins to it, and transformed the protruding horny spines arranged longitudinally on the back into serrated dorsal fins to lengthen the body to render the imposing manner and enrich the decorative effect, so the Chinese alligator was shaped into the legendary dragon image, with its teeth flying about. Although there are many differences between the mythical dragon and the real Chinese alligator after artistic exaggeration, in contrast, we can still see the main features of the Chinese alligator, such as long jaws, fangs, scales and claws.

Later, due to man-made destruction of ecology, slash and burn, deforestation in the Yellow River basin, soil erosion, environmental deterioration and cold climate, the Chinese alligator, which is suitable for warm and humid environment, is difficult to survive and gradually disappears (now only exists in the south of Anhui Province, China). Because the Chinese alligator no longer exists in real life, the impression in people's memory will fade away, leaving only the image of the dragon created by ancestors. As a result, dragon and Chinese alligator have become two different concepts, and the origin of dragon has become confusing.

Early dragons had no horns. 1987, a picture of a Chinese alligator (dragon) in a clam shell was once found in an ancient tomb unearthed in Puyang, Henan Province, 6000 years ago. The dragons depicted on painted pottery of Yangshao culture are also reptiles with big heads and long tails. The Yunlong stone carving in Nanshan, Dazu, Sichuan is a vivid image of a Chinese alligator without horns and eyebrows. Ceratosaurus was first seen in Oracle Bone Inscriptions and bronzes in Shang Dynasty. A bronze ware with dragon pattern unearthed in Shanxi, with double horns, is exactly the same as the Chinese alligator.

Chinese characters are hieroglyphics, and the dragon in Oracle Bone Inscriptions is an animal with a big mouth and a bent body. The pronunciation of the word "dragon" is an imitation of the crocodile's cry, and the crocodile's roar is a low "rumbling" sound. Therefore, the sound of "dragon" became the name of crocodile in ancient times. Today, the common names of Chinese alligator in southern China are still "Dragon Map" and "Pig Polong".

The appearance of God is not a blind and deliberate fabrication, but a true record of human knowledge and experience. Throughout the ages, many records, legends and folk customs about dragons are related to the living habits of Chinese alligators.

Chinese alligators live in swamps of rivers and lakes. "Zuo Zhuan" "osawa in the deep mountain, born with dragons and snakes." Dragon (Chinese alligator) and snake are two animals with similar living environment and habits. [Transferred from Iron Blood Community/]

The Chinese alligator built a labyrinth underground cave near the water. The cave is 2-3 meters deep from the ground and usually lives in water. As a result, people imagined the magical scene of "the Dragon King lives in the Dragon Palace under water". However, when I saw the Chinese alligator escape because its cave was destroyed every time there was a flood, I thought it was "the Dragon King making waves". I didn't know that Chinese alligators were also victims of floods.

Chinese alligators feed on fish, frogs and mussels. There are many pearls in the clam shell. Crocodiles are ferocious by nature, and they will kill each other if they are hungry for a long time. Some people saw the Chinese alligator fighting for mussels and spit out pearls in their mouths, so there was a saying that "two dragons play with pearls".

Chinese alligators mate in June and lay eggs in July. Male crocodiles look for female crocodiles by barking (crocodiles are the only reptiles that can bark). Every June is the beginning of rainy summer in the Yellow River basin, so people associate the loud cry of Chinese alligators with the coming of wind and rain. Whenever the wind and rain are approaching, lightning and thunder also inspire the ancients, who think that the wind, rain, thunder and lightning are closely related to dragons, so the ancients regard dragons as the god of thunderstorms, and the Shan Hai Jing records that "dragons can give orders."

In Shuo Wen Jie Zi, it is described that "dragons ... ascend to heaven at the vernal equinox and dive at the autumnal equinox." There are only two kinds of crocodiles in the world, the Chinese alligator and the Mississippi alligator, which live in temperate zones and need to hibernate. Because of the climate, they go into hibernation every early winter. In spring (February of the lunar calendar), the earth thaws, and they begin to go out after being dormant for a winter. At the same time, when it began to rain in the Yellow River basin, the ancestors linked them together, so there was a custom of offering sacrifices to "On February 2nd, the dragon looked up".

There are many such things, so I won't list them one by one. It is natural that dragons appear with other animals in the zodiac, because before Xia and Shang Dynasties, the dragons referred to by the ancients were real Chinese alligators, and crocodiles are one of the animals that people all over the world pay close attention to and worship. There are crocodiles in the zodiac in Egypt and Greece.

Dragon is a specific product of sacrificial culture. The ancient book says, "Water is a dragon." It can be seen that the dragon was created as the main water god (the legendary dragon king), and there is no sufficient basis for the statement that the dragon is related to totem worship in ancient clan society. Since written records, all clans in ancient China have taken China's surname as a symbol, and there is no record of using animal figures as symbols. Ancient people's abstract thinking ability is very low and they can't think logically. They can only understand things through analogy and reproduction. It is difficult for ancient ancestors to create a virtual animal image that combines various animal characteristics. People's imagination is always limited. No matter how strange the gods are, they can only be created on the background of authenticity, and no matter how bizarre the myths are, they can finally find their original materials in reality. Therefore, dragons are not virtual animals. In Er Ya Yi, the dragon has "nine elephants" (horns like deer, neck like snake, claws like eagle ...), which means that the local shape of the dragon is similar to some animals, but it does not mean that the dragon is composed of the characteristics of nine animals. Even the worship symbols of ancient foreign nations are images of real animals (eagles, tigers, etc.). ) or the combination of man and beast (Sphinx). [Transferred from Iron Blood Community/]

After the Han Dynasty, feudal rulers of past dynasties used people's admiration and worship psychology to flaunt themselves as the sacred incarnation of dragons, and dragons gradually became the symbol of feudal emperors. The dragon design became the patent of the emperor and could only be decorated on the buildings and articles used by the emperor. In the 2 1 century, the dragon is no longer a symbol of the gods and feudal emperors in traditional customs, but has been given a new meaning, and has become a symbol of expressing the lofty aspirations of the people to revitalize China and soar in the world and representing the spirit of self-improvement of the Chinese nation.

The origin of ancient "dragon" is related to totem worship in addition to the above primitive religion and witchcraft. Totem is a symbol of a clan in primitive society, also known as clan emblem. In the clan society, people often think that their ancestors are certain animals, plants or other inanimate things, and this species becomes the symbol and protector of clan ancestors. According to ancient documents, many clans in China regard dragons as totems, such as the ancient Yellow Emperor and clans, Gong Shi, Zhu Rong, Yao, Shun, Yu clans and wuyue clans. However, these documents were written late, which is a review of future generations. When the literature was produced, the concept of dragon had been formed, so it is inevitable that there will be the possibility of addition and rendering in the description. Totem legends of ancient clans often turned into fairy tales, but left some clues. According to expert research, these so-called dragon totems are actually snakes, crocodiles, lizards and other animals similar to later dragon images. These animals are not only endowed with sacred significance in clan sacrifices, but also deified in form. In the long ancient times, the animal totem image was combined with the animal worship image in other primitive religions to form the original dragon image.

"Dragon" lost the word "primitive", that is, from the original dragon pattern to the real dragon pattern, about in the Shang Dynasty. About 2 1 century BC, China produced the first state power-Xia Dynasty. After summer, it was the Shang Dynasty. The commercial power is strong and unprecedented prosperity. In Ode to Shang in the Book of Songs, it is said that Shang is "a thousand miles for the country, the people stop it, and it is faked from all over the world." Translated into modern Chinese, it means "the business territory is thousands of miles wide, people live everywhere in the vast territory, and the business territory reaches four depths." People from all over the world came to praise the Shang Dynasty, with a large number of people and bustling. " The prosperity and unification of Shang Dynasty promoted cultural exchanges between different regions, such as the return of hundreds of rivers to the sea and the unprecedented integration of Shang culture. Businessmen's culture is open and willing to accept other types of culture, which is conducive to cultural integration. Shang dynasty attached great importance to religion and witchcraft, and also attached great importance to the casting of bronzes, which were indispensable ritual vessels in religious activities. Bronze ware, as a ritual vessel to communicate with heaven and earth, has its own religious significance, while the ornamentation on bronze ware has a stronger religious color, that is, through various symbolic ornamentation, it shows people the gods they worship and seeks their protection against monsters. In this decoration, the original dragon pattern becomes the main part.

A prominent sign of the formation of the "dragon" in Shang Dynasty is that the dragon began to have horns. Of course, at this time, the shape of the dragon horn is not fixed, and some are like giraffes, and the horns are tapered; Some are like sheep, with horns rolled back; Some are like corollas, some are like antelopes, and there are various shapes such as forward roll, tiger ears and spiral. There were no horns in the dragon statues before Shang Dynasty, but in Shang Dynasty, dragons gave birth to horns. The reason lies in the diagonal worship of Shang Dynasty.

Among animals, horns are generally found in male animals, and large and strong horns are often a symbol of strength. Therefore, the horn was valued and revered by ancient ancestors and became an indispensable item in religious ceremonies such as sacrifice. The worship of diagonal in Shang Dynasty reached an unprecedented level. Not only should there be sacrificial horns, but also the size and shape of the horns are different according to different occasions. Cattle sacrificed to heaven and earth should have horns as big as cocoons and chestnuts; Cattle used as sacrifices when offering sacrifices to ancestors should have horns that can be held in their hands without going out; Cows are guests, and the horns must be one foot long; Sometimes, cows used as sacrificial handles also require the horns to be even, absolutely speaking, shiny. In the Book of Songs, Zhou Song once praised the horn: "When you kill a man, you will lose his horn, so that you can continue to be like an ancient man." The main idea of the poem is: "kill that bull, its horn is curved and beautiful, and use it to sacrifice the world and the country, so that you can inherit the divine power of your ancestors." Merchants added various horns to dragons that had no horns, because they thought horns were divine. With horns, dragons are more divine and can communicate with heaven and earth. With horns, the original dragon pattern got rid of the prototype animal form and became a kind of god beast different from any animal in the world. Merchants also used the same method to add different organs of animals such as elephants, tigers, pigs and crocodiles to dragons, thus making the image of dragons more magical. There is no essential difference between this dragon after artistic transformation and the dragon image we see now, only the difference of individual body parts.

Not only the animal worship and totem worship of primitive religion have become the source of the formation of dragons, but also some strange and rare natural phenomena have been integrated into the streams where dragons have formed. Because the image of the dragon is weird, its ability is magical, and it has the ability to reach the sky, so some strange natural phenomena similar to the meaning or image of the dragon are also attached to Jackie Chan. According to Shan Hai Jing, there is a mountain called Zhang Weishan outside the Northwest Sea and north of Chishui. There is a "Candle dragon" on the hill. This dragon snake face is thousands of miles long, and its eyes are upright, just like two straight seams. It controls the change of day and night and the flow of time by blinking, closing eyes at night and opening eyes during the day. There is a poem in the Jin Dynasty: "The sky is short of western soil, the dragon has fine fire, the gas is cold and hot, the eyes are dim, and the body is thousands of miles long." Candle dragon's place of residence is "Hanze" where the sun can't shine. According to expert research, the so-called Candle dragon is actually the Northern Lights. After the rain, the rainbow is also attached to the dragon. The colorful seven colors of the rainbow, like the shape of an arch bridge connecting heaven and earth, are closely connected with rain, which makes it easy for ancient ancestors to associate the rainbow with dragons, and even think that it is a two-headed dragon that absorbs water from rivers. In addition, huge tornadoes and thunderbolt lightning in thunderstorm weather are easily considered by the ancients as dragons or dragon activities.