The Evolution of Chinese Dragon Motifs

The following is an excerpt from the last chapter of Wolf Totem, I think it is quite right, you take a good look at it, maybe it will help you The image of the dragon actually appeared 5,000 years ago.In 1971, in Inner Mongolia, Samsung Tara unearthed a jade dragon, known as the first Chinese dragon, belonging to the Neolithic period of the Hongshan culture. At that time, the Chinese ancestors had not yet become a farming nation, but were still in the state of hunting, gathering, nomadic or half-farming and half-pastoralism. The dragon totem was first the totem of the primitive ancestors of Huaxia, and later evolved into the totem of the farming nation. I have carefully read and studied the Wengniu Te three-star Tara jade dragon, but to my surprise, the primitive jade dragon, not at all the later Chinese people are familiar with the dragon, but the wolf head and body image of the dragon, the jade dragon's body has no scales, there is no claw, the head and the back of the neck is a wolf's head and neck, simply like according to the wolf's head and neck copied down the same: a long face, a long nose, a long kiss, a long warped corners of the mouth. Especially the eyes, it is definitely wolf eyes, exactly the same as our coyote's eyes, round eyes, eyes hanging, the corner of the eye hanging extremely long and oblique, this key feature of the wolf, by the Neolithic ancestors with artistic techniques to exaggerate perfectly. This is not enough, the wolf's neck above the wolf's mane is also carved extremely like, from the top of the head to the back of a long sliver of the wolf's mane high up, very powerful and beautiful. The towering wolf's mane is the distinctive feature of the ferocious Mongolian steppe wolf. I am too familiar with the wolf, I can imagine, if there is no long and careful observation of the wolf, our ancestors are absolutely not carved such a godly artistic image of the wolf. This Jade Dragon is actually a Jade Wolf, especially the head is definitely a wolf's head. However, some scholars say that the head of this jade dragon is a pig's head. However, I think that, in terms of nomadic character, neither the domestic pig nor the wild boar will become the totem of worship for the nomads in the north, because the nomads in the northwest and north of China will never worship the animals that are tamed by themselves or can be tamed. Only people who do not understand the character of the Chinese nomadic people will think that the Chinese steppe people will worship domestic animals; from the image, the pig's eyes are not hanging eyes, the mouth of the pig's arching mouth is not open in the forefront of the mouth, the whole pig's head is not a long shape. Moreover, short and fat only stick-shaped small tail pig, whether it is a domestic pig or wild boar, to evolve into a long dragon that would be too far-fetched, while the long wolf body plus the long furry wolf tail, evolved into a dragon body is possible. Think about the long wolf skin tube plus long wolf tail hanging on the top of a tall birch pole, when blown up by the wind, is not particularly like a wolf head dragon body? I guess, the Chinese flying dragon is likely to be the Chinese grassland ancestors imagined the prairie wolf soul ascension after the flying wolf image, is the image of the wolf's embellishment and deification. That year I watched the little wolf ascension, really feel that the little wolf is not only like a flying wolf, but also like a flying dragon flying in the clouds, just did not follow the feeling to dig down.

Later, after returning to Beijing, I saw the picture of the Jade Dragon, and I was really excited, as if I had seen the Coyote. In the primitive conditions of the time, the jade carved out of the beautiful jade with such a beautiful wolf head and dragon body jade, it can be inferred that our ancestors are familiar with the wolf and worship to what extent. And "Jade Dragon" unearthed in Inner Mongolia, is the Mongolian steppe wolf's hometown, is the land of China's fierce wolf giant wolf most places, is later countless worship of the wolf totem nomadic people have been living in the place, but also the "flying wolf" legend of the most places. This makes me naturally think of the relationship between Wolf Totem and Dragon Totem, and I started to study the relationship between the two.

According to my research, I think the wolf totem and dragon totem have at least the following seven common characteristics:

First, the earliest wolf totem and dragon totem appeared in the Inner Mongolia grassland or close to the Mongolian grassland. Here is precisely the home of the world's largest and most ferocious Mongolian steppe wolves, and the steppe wolves and the nomadic people of the same country, people and wolves fight each other, interdependent, and *** with living in this vast grassland. Therefore, the wolf's spirit and character of the steppe people have the greatest impact, unlike the Arctic Circle and the Russian forest wolves away from the crowd to prey on wild animals for a living, the impact on people is not great, so it is also difficult to produce wolf totem worship there.

Secondly, the primitive wolf totem and dragon totem have the same head and neck and the same long cylindrical body. The primitive jade dragon of Samsung Thala in Inner Mongolia is a wolf head and dragon body, that is to say, in the Neolithic period, the primitive wolf totem and dragon totem have the same head and neck, and the same body, both without scales. This suggests that the dragon totem did not evolve from a fish or snake. At that time, it is very likely that the wolf totem is the dragon totem, the dragon totem is the wolf totem, the two totems have not been separated, and their homes are still in the grassland.

Third, the wolf totem and dragon totem are using the body up and down arching posture flight. In the legend, whether in the Mongolian steppe or the Chinese land, these two national totems are flying totems. In the steppe, the wolf totem could fly and carry the souls of men up to Tengri, while the Chinese dragon totem could soar through the clouds and call down the wind. But the totems of many peoples in the world and in China do not fly, such as those who worship the bear, the tiger, the ox, the monkey and so on. It is no accidental coincidence that the totems of the steppe peoples of the Chinese land and the farming peoples of China are characterized by flight.

More the same is the wolf totem and dragon totem flying posture, the wolf in the grassland running posture is up and down, the wolf skin tube is hung on the top of a high wooden pole by the wind blowing is also up and down, the body arching "flying"; and the Chinese dragon in a variety of ancient murals and carvings are molded into bowing, up and down, arching "flying"; and the Chinese dragon in various ancient murals and carvings were portrayed as bowing, up and down, arching "flying"; and the Chinese dragon in various ancient murals and carvings were molded into bowing, up and down, arching "flying". The Chinese dragon is portrayed in various ancient murals and carvings as bowing, undulating up and down and arching to "fly". This flying posture and the wolf totem running and "flying" action, but with the water fish, snakes and crocodiles, as well as land snakes and pythons swimming action is completely different. Fish, snakes and crocodiles all move by swinging their bodies and tails from side to side. One action is "arching up and down" and the other is "swinging from side to side". These two different actions and postures clearly show that the wolf is a higher animal than the fish, snake and crocodile, and that the Dragon Totem did not evolve from the oviparous, lower-ranking animals like the fish, snake and crocodile, but from the steppe land mammals, and that it was not the first to evolve from the fish, snake and crocodile. The dragon totem did not evolve from fish, snake, python and crocodile, which are oviparous and inferior animals. Most Chinese, however, believe that the dragon was transformed from fish and snakes in the water, and some still believe that the prototype of the dragon is the crocodile. These views do not see the essential difference between the dragon and the fish, snake, python and crocodile in the category, and do not see the fundamental difference between "arching up and down" and "swinging from side to side". Thus, the original face of the dragon totem spirit to cover up more and more obscure.

Fourth, although the wolf totem and the dragon totem can fly, but they do not have wings. In the Chinese legend, there are "flying tiger", "flying horse" and other mythological images, other ethnic groups also have "feather snake" and other totem images, but those flying animals have wings, the 50's Pegasus cigarettes. In the 1950s, there was the image of Pegasus with huge wings on the cigarette box of Pegasus brand cigarettes. So why doesn't the dragon totem have wings? I think it's because the Wolf Totem has no wings, so the Dragon Totem, which evolved from the Wolf Totem, also has no wings. And the reason why the wolf totem does not have wings is because the primitive grassland people believe that the gods and goddesses of the wolf will fly, without wings can fly.

Fifth, wolf totem and dragon totem are both closely related to the highest worship of the two peoples of China - the worship of the sky. In the grasslands, grassland people believe that the wolf is Tengri sent to the grasslands to protect the grasslands, but also worship Tengri's soul on the Tengri; and in China, the farming community believes that the dragon is the embodiment of the sky, and the emperor is the "true dragon son of heaven", sacrosanct. Since the Han's worship of the sky is the nomadic ancestors from the nomadic area to the Chinese farming land, so they also brought the Wolf Totem together.

Sixth, the wolf totem and dragon totem are fierce and terrible beast image. The totems of the peoples of the world are fierce beasts and gentle herbivores, and many peoples take the cow as their national totem. But why did the Chinese people take the dragon with such a ferocious and hideous face as their national totem? This is because, at that time, the ancestors of the Huaxia people were still hunter-gatherer nomadic tribes, not the gentle farming people, and the vast majority of nomadic people in China took the wolf as their totem. Because the image of the wolf is fierce and terrible, so the wolf totem evolved into a dragon totem of the image of the dragon is also exceptionally fierce and terrible.

Seventh, wolves and dragons are untamable. The totems of many peoples in the world are animals that can be tamed, and even take domestic animals as totems. However, the totems of the two major ethnic groups in China, the wolf and the dragon, are both of an untamable character. The wolf is the most stubborn of all beasts, never yielding, bears, tigers, lions, eagles, elephants can be tamed, but the Mongolian steppe wolf can not be tamed. As the wolf is untamable, the dragon totem evolved from the wolf totem is also untamable. The dragon is the inheritor and reinforcer of the wolf spirit, which is not only untamable by people, but also will tame all its subjects. The wolf's untamable spirit was later exploited and deified by the Confucian spirit of imperial supremacy.

Based on these key similarities between the Wolf Totem and the Dragon Totem mentioned above, I hypothesize that the Chinese Dragon Totem most likely evolved from the Steppe Wolf Totem, just as the Chinese farming peoples evolved from the Steppe Nomads. Since the nomadic people on the grassland have never left the grassland, the wolf totem of the grassland people has never been deformed, and the grassland people have always worshipped the wolf totem from ancient times to the present day; and in the ancient times, a part of the nomadic people left the grassland and entered into the farming area of Huaxia, which also brought the Tenggeri worship and the wolf totem worship into the farming life of Huaxia. Because, in ancient times, no matter the pastoralism and agriculture are relying on the sky to eat, therefore, the sky worship transferred to the farming area is also retained, but the nomadic tribes into farming after the gradual softening of the character, slowly become afraid of wolves and hate wolves, then from the grassland to bring the wolf totem worship does not adapt to the farming life and the spirit, so the original wolf totem was slowly transformed by the farming life, and changed into the function of cultivation clouds and rain sowing The new image of the dragon totem