Excuse me, what auspicious animals are there in our traditional culture? What do they mean?

Four ancient spirits/beasts in China (four aspects: black dragon, white tiger, suzaku Xuanwu): Dragon and Phoenix Turtle Forest.

The four most terrifying and powerful beasts in ancient China were Qinglong, Baihu, Suzaku and Xuanwu. Tsing lung and white tiger palm in all directions, Suzaku Xuanwu meets Yin and Yang, and the four-spirit beast is the black dragon and white tiger, Suzaku Xuanwu Tiansi spirit. Qinglong is the God of the East; White tiger is the god of the west; Zhu is known as the god of the south; Xuanwu is the god of the north, and the tortoise and snake are one. Therefore, there is a "three auxiliary maps" saying: "Qinglong, White Tiger, Suzaku, Xuanwu, Tiansi Spirit, taking the square as the square, the king makes the palace pavilion and takes the method."

The ancient ancients divided the sky into four palaces, east, west, north and south, named after Qinglong (black dragon), white tiger, Suzaku and Xuanwu (a turtle-shaped god). In fact, the sky is divided into four parts, which are connected by seven main stars in each part and named after their shapes.

The horn, horn, room, heart, tail and dustpan of the East Palace are shaped like dragons, so it is called Qinglong or Black Dragon.

The seven western stars, Kui, Lou, Stomach, Ang, Bi, Horn and Shen, are shaped like tigers, calling the West Palace the White Tiger.

The well, ghost, willow, star, Zhang, wing and net in the south are bird-shaped, called suzaku;

The northern seven-star bucket, cow, female, empty, dangerous, houses and walls are shaped like turtles and called Xuanwu.

As a result, Qinglong, Baihu, Suzaku and Xuanwu have become the four gods who guard the heavenly officials, create evil and regulate Yin and Yang. Among the four gods, Qinglong and Baihu are mainly regarded as spirits to ward off evil spirits, and their images mostly appear in palaces, temples, gates or tombs and their artifacts. On the last occasion, the dragon is not helping the tomb owner ascend to heaven, but deterring evil spirits and defending the soul peace of the tomb owner.

Dragon: There are many legends about dragons, and there are also many stories about the origin of dragons. Some said it was imported from India, while others said it was transformed from China. India itself is said by the dragon god, but the status of dragons in India is not high, and there is a real thing-python.

In the era when the Five Elements Theory prevailed, the story about Qinglong began to spread slowly. According to the Yin-Yang and the Five Elements, the Five Elements assigned five colors to the Southeast, Northwest and China, and each color assigned a beast and a god. East is cyan, with dragons, west is white, with tigers, south is scarlet, north is black, with martial arts, and yellow is the central positive color.

Among the four gods, according to Shan Hai Jing, "Southern Zhurong is a beast with human face and rides two dragons. 」; "In the west of Ru Shou, there is a snake's left ear, riding two dragons. 」; "In the East, there is Ju Mang, a bird and a face, riding two dragons. 」; "North yujiang county, black hands and feet, was two dragons. Interestingly, the dragons in Shan Hai Jing are all riding, while the snakes of the same kind with him are all being led or held or held or wrapped around their necks, which shows the difference between them. However, the five gods are different from the four gods, so I won't elaborate here. Suzaku, Xuanwu (black tortoise snake, martial arts means tortoise snake), Qinglong and Baihu represent the twenty-eight lodges in four directions respectively. The dragon is the seven lodges in the East-horn, clang, car, room, heart, tail and dustpan. These seven lodges are all dragon-shaped. As can be seen from their meanings, horns are the horns of dragons, and clanging is dragons.

White tiger: In Four Holy Beasts, China, another kind of dragon is often compared with the tiger; Tigers are the leaders of many animals. Its strength and legendary ability to subdue ghosts make it a beast belonging to Yang, and it often goes out with dragons. "Cloud follows dragon, wind follows tiger" becomes the best partner to subdue ghosts.

And the white tiger is also the god of war and war. White tiger has many magical powers, such as avoiding evil, avoiding disasters, praying and punishing evil, promoting good, making a fortune and getting married. And it is one of the four spirits, and of course it is also changed from the stars. Among these 28 stars, there are 7 in the west: osmium, building, stomach, ang, bi, Gou and Shen. Therefore, it is the representative of the west, and its whiteness is due to the west. The five elements belong to gold and the color is white. So it is called white tiger not because it is white, but because it comes from five elements.

Phoenix: Phoenix is a divine bird and the king of all birds. The ancients said that men were called phoenixes and women were called phoenixes. Later, Phoenix was collectively referred to as; Later, when the dragon and the phoenix matched, the phoenix became the name of the imperial concubine. According to legend, Phoenix evolved from the bird totem of the Yin people in the East. It is mentioned in Shan Hai Jing and Xi Jing that there is a colorful bird with three names, namely, imperial bird, warbler bird and phoenix bird.

Shan Hai Jing Nan Ci San Jing records a kind of bird, which is shaped like a chicken and has colorful patterns. It's called Phoenix. It shows that the image of Phoenix is very beautiful from the beginning. In the future, just like the image of a dragon, the more complicated it is, the more it has a head, a hip, a snake neck, a fish tail, a dragon pattern, a turtle body, a swallow chin and a chicken mouth. (See "Huainan Zilanming") Indus does not live, unless it is bamboo, it will not be eaten. (See Poetry, Elegance and Volume) It sings and dances, which means that the world is at peace. As the head of the flock, it has tens of thousands of followers. Phoenix died on the mountain. Every July and August, birds come here to mourn it, and it will take seventeen or eighteen days to disperse. Therefore, this mountain is called "Mourning Mountain". (See Notes on Shui Jing: Birds Hanging) Phoenix is a combination and sublimation of the elegant demeanor of hundreds of birds, and its prototype is nothing more than four types: Yang bird, eagle, peacock and chicken. The northern nationalities in China worship the eagle, the king of birds.

After Liao, Jin and Yuan Dynasties, great changes have taken place in the phoenix, which is basically a chicken and a sparrow, especially the strong wings and the prominent posture of the eagle. The common phoenix in our current artworks is actually the image after the Qing Dynasty, which is composed of pheasant tail, chicken body, comb, eagle eye, eagle claw, eagle neck, peacock feather and mandarin duck feather. Its tone is not as persistent and stable as that of a dragon. Suzaku is the southern star, ghost, well, willow, wing, bird and Zhang in Seven Nights.

Xuanwu: Xuanwu is a spiritual thing composed of turtles and snakes. Xuanwu originally meant Xuanming, and the ancient sounds of Wu and Ming are interlinked. Wu means black; Ghost means yin. At first, Xuan Ming described the turtle divination as follows: the turtle's back is black, and the turtle divination first invited the turtle to ask questions in the underworld, brought back the answers and showed them to the world in the form of divination. Therefore, the earliest Xuanwu is the tortoise. Since then, the meaning of Xuanming has been expanding. Turtles live in rivers, lakes and seas (including turtles), so Xuan Ming became a water god; The tortoise lives long, and Xuan Ming has become a symbol of immortality; The first underworld was in the north. In the Yin and Shang Dynasties, Oracle Bone Inscriptions divined that "divination will point to the north", so Xuan Ming became a northern god again.

Xuanwu, like other three spirits, is also derived from the 28 stars on earth: bucket, ox, female, air, danger, house and wall.

However, people after ancient times have the following explanations for Xuanwu. Xuanwu is a tortoise. "Book of Rites. Quli Shang says: "OK, there are Zhu birds in front, then Xuanwu ..." Xuanwu is a tortoise and snake. Supplement to Hong Xingzu's Songs of Chu: "Xuanwu is called tortoise and snake. Located in the north, it is called Xuan. With a scale, it is called martial arts. " Xuanwu is a combination of snakes, turtles and snakes.

However, Xuanwu was upgraded by later Taoist priests to the Northern Emperor-Emperor Zhenwu. Different from the other three spirits. Other green dragons and white tigers only became the gatekeepers of the mountain temple, and Zhu Bird became the Xuan Nv of another day.