How does a sphinx basin look like?

China's ancient civilization has a long history, formed 7,000 years ago in the Yangshao culture is the development of China's Neolithic culture of a backbone, which shows the Chinese matrilineal clan system from the boom to the decline of the social structure and cultural achievements of the period, in which the colored ceramic art has reached a fairly perfect situation, becoming an example of China's primitive art, painted human face fish pots are representative of the masterpieces, profoundly reveal the cultural phenomena of the society at that time.

Colorful pottery art has reached a high level of perfection and become an example of Chinese primitive art creation.

Painted human face with fish pattern pottery was first found in Xi'an Half-slope site, 1954-1957 Xi'an Half-slope Yangshao culture site has unearthed a number of patterned pottery, in the expression of plant and animal patterns, fish pattern is the largest number of the most representative.

Colored pottery with fish patterns, reflected in the Half-slope culture, formed the different characteristics of the early, middle and late periods.

The image of fish pattern on early painted pottery of half slope is more realistic, and it is common to see a single fish pattern, which is mostly a spreading side image, modeled in a straight line. Although the proportion is more accurate, but slightly flat.

To the middle of the half-slope culture, the fish pattern on the pottery has been rich in change, modeling to a combination of straight lines and arcs, polka dots, arcs and arcs of triangles interspersed with the use of the fish pattern appears lively and dynamic. Pattern format in addition to the spreading type, but also appeared to pirouette, jumping and other gestures. Gansu wangjia yinwa unearthed a colored pottery bottle, around the abdomen painted with four different postures of swimming fish, or stretching flat swim, or swooping down, or relative back to the ground to bend and leap. The composition is lively, can be called a masterpiece of primitive painting.

Late painted pottery on a separate fish pattern, adopted the art of exaggerated deformation. The biggest change in the head of the fish pattern, highlighting the open mouth and teeth, the fish pattern into the symmetrical pattern of the upper and lower, and the fish pattern with curved strips of unified modeling, tends to be geometric, rich in decorative.

The prosperity of colored pottery culture brought the development of primitive painting art while beautifying the dietary life. A large number of paintings and decorations in the Neolithic era were left on the walls of pottery products. Although most of the carvings here are still quite childish, the recurring and relatively concentrated patterns and motifs in them will make you chew on them with their mysterious primitive meanings. The most famous colored pottery pots with human faces and fish motifs on the inner walls of the pots are undoubtedly the most intriguing painting treasures and the most telling cultural symbols.

The colorful pottery basin with human face and fish pattern has a mysterious and evocative pattern. This black pattern is usually depicted in red earthenware pots with large mouths and rounded bottoms, with peculiar symbols around the rim of the pots. The sphinx-fish pattern, on the other hand, is in a circular composition, with the image consisting of a human head and a fish. Discovered in 1955, the Fish with Sphinx Pot is 16.5 centimeters high and 39.5 centimeters in caliber. The basin is made of fine clay red pottery with an open mouth and a curled lip, and the interior of the basin is painted with two symmetrical groups of human faces and fish motifs in black color. The human face is generalized into a round shape, with the left half of the forehead painted in black and the right half in black semi-curved, probably the custom of wenmian at that time. The eyes are thin and straight, the nose is straight, and the demeanor is peaceful, the mouth is divided into two deformed fish patterns, the head of the fish and the outer outline of the human mouth overlap, together with the two ears of the two opposite small fish, constituting the image of the peculiar human and fish merge, showing a rich imagination. The pointed angular object on the top of the human head, which may be a hair bun, together with the fin-shaped decoration of the fish, appears to be majestic and gorgeous.

The round face has a pair of smiling eyes, the nose is like an upside-down "T", the mouth is wide open with a smile, and there are two fish on both sides of the mouth. What does it mean? People feel mysterious. Fish with human face pottery pots show a combination of fish and human face of the peculiar image, the more common are: fish in the face of the composite image. The face of the mouth on both sides of the symmetry of a fish, the human mouth outlines and the fish head constitutes **** fish shape; face in the composite image of the fish. The image of the human face is filled in the round frame of the fish head. These two kinds of figure. Its ingenious composition and mysterious connotation has been the world's attention. Some people believe that this fish and human face combined image, people and fish each other allegory, and each other to borrow, means that people and fish are intermingled **** the same body, was personified fish images and various types of fish patterns may be the totem of the Semi Po tribe, with the nature of the clan's protector.

In the excavation of half slope site, *** found seven pieces of pottery painted with human face pattern, in addition to two more complete other five pieces are fragments. Fish face painted pottery pots above the figure of the face round, eyes or open or squinting, the top of the head decorated with fish-shaped decorations or semi-circular bundles of hair. The head is decorated with fish-shaped decorations or semi-circular hair bundles. The ears and cheeks are decorated with fish patterns in different directions. There are three fish-shaped high bun, black above the eyebrows, eyes narrowed into a line, the fish title to the ears, and with the human face composite, modeling is extremely vivid and friendly.

Without exception, in the cultural remains of the Jiangzhai site in Lintong, also found almost the same human face fish pattern painted pottery pots, in addition to the face of the eyes painted outlines, two ears next to the ornaments into the upward turn of the plume, the other parts, including the bottom of the single painting of the whole fish, can be seen, do not look closely, would think that they are the same piece of work it.

Based on the fact that the Yangshao people lived next to the water, and that fishing and hunting were still an important source of livelihood, it is easy to assume that this is a reflection of the life of fishing and eating fish at that time. However, upon closer scrutiny, one will find that things are not so simple. Throughout the pattern, it seems that fish occupy more of the picture, or that fish surround the human face.

The fish shape or the distortion of the fish is on the top of the face, by the eyes and by the cheeks, not in the mouth of the face; the fish is the whole body, but the face has only the patterned circle marking the outline of the head, showing that it is the human being who adorns himself with the fish, and it can be said that it is even more of a figurative display of the fish's spirit.

Fish motifs on the human face were not painted on ordinary pottery, either on the half-slope or in Jiangzhai. They are only found on a kind of colored pottery pots with holes in the shallow bottom. And these pots have only one special use, which is as a lid on the urns for burying children. Urn burial was commonly practiced in the Yangshao culture of a burial, that is, special urns as a burial to bury children who died young, and its most prominent feature is that in the bottom of each urn lid are left a small hole, which experts have basically agreed that this is as the soul of the deceased set up the entrance and exit. The idea of the soul conveyed by the hematite powder of the caveman has received a distant response here.

From the lines of the pots' paintings and the uniformity of their form, it seems that they are more patterned and symbolic. The ancestors must have wanted to express some kind of wish or idea with their drawings.

The human face pattern is also a unique pattern on the colored pottery of half slope type culture. In Zhengning County, Gansu Province, Gongjiachuan unearthed a gourd-shaped bottle with images of human faces painted all over the belly of the bottle. The human face with fangs protruding, eyes wide open, mighty and fierce, showing superhuman courage.

At present, the academic world for the study of the human face fish pattern has appeared nearly thirty kinds of statements. Some believe that it reflects the ancient totem worship, some believe that it is a sorcerer's mask, and some believe that it is water plants, fish and insects or baby birth chart. Summarized the following four main conjectures:

One is the totem said. Totem worship is the ancient ancestors of spiritual life and primitive belief in the symbol, they usually will be totem emblem engraved or painted on certain objects. Half-slope people living in the water, this fish and human face combined with the image of people and fish each other, and each other to borrow, meaning that people and fish are intertwined **** the same body, was personified fish images and various types of fish patterns may be half-slope tribal totem, with the nature of the clan's protector. Ancient half-slope people in many pots are painted with fish and net pattern, which should be related to the totem worship and economic life, half-slope people in the river valley terrace camping settlements, living a sedentary life based on agricultural production, building camp collection and fishing and hunting, this fish pattern decoration is a reflection of their lives. The peculiar attire on the human head is probably a masquerade image of some religious activity, and the slightly deformed fish pattern is probably a representation of the personified independent deity - the fish god, expressing the theme of people worshiping fish as a totem.

The second is the mask said. Ancient times, people can not make a reasonable explanation of natural phenomena, the ancestors need to beg the gods blessing, to drive away the fear of the heart, so the sorcerer this communication between man and God of the ancient profession came into being, "the human face fish basin" is the sorcerer needs to wear a kind of mask when the magic.

Third, the image of ancestors. Primitive man could not understand where he came from, half slope people living in the water, see the fish living in the water, they believe that their ancestors were originally the image of the fish.

Fourth, the power symbol said. Some experts believe that the face of the fish is in a certain range of authoritative image of a specific reference. To a large extent, it is a symbol of power, and whoever holds this image in the clan tribe has the absolute power to dominate others.

In addition, in the pre-Qin canon "Poetry", "Zhouyi" in the fish has a metaphor for "male and female" meaning, and this inference, the face of the fish tattoos should also be the meaning of praying for reproductive reproduction and prosperity of the clan. No matter what ideology the Hanpo people used it to express, they were able to cohesion of such a rich social content in the art of painting this creative motive, are amazing. This is also the greatness of primitive art. At the beginning of its creation, it may only have a specific meaning, but its form contains one of the most precious characteristics of human beings - the freedom of creation in practice. This makes it, without exception, a mark of beauty.

Whether the symbols carved on the rim of the sphinx basin belong to the script. Although the academic community is still debating, but from the archaeological data found in Guanzhong region, more than ten prehistoric sites unearthed with the same half-slope engraved symbols, and are engraved in the black broadband along the mouth of the pottery bowl, this phenomenon does not tell us, half-slope type of engraved symbols, even if it is not a text, at least in a specific range of common symbols with a certain meaning? A glance at the drawings and articles is commonplace, but the mystery of the Hanpo pottery is unforgettable, the sphinx pattern pottery pot decoration is even more puzzling. And this sphinx in other cultures of colored pottery did not appear.