Chinese mythology

This article treats origins of Chinese mythology; for the later elements, to see: : Category: Chinese mythology

Presentation

The Chinese mythology is known thanks to texts dating primarily from the Dynastie Han. The most important source is the Shanhaijing “Book of the Mounts and the Seas”. Having hardly more than 2000 years of age, these writings can be regarded as recent. Moreover, they were written by well-read men who sometimes reinterpreted the Mythologie in accordance with their philosophical designs. They thus transformed the most important gods into virtuous or bad sovereigns having reigned at one very old time.

One can however have a rather precise idea of what was Chinese mythology “original” by comparing it with those of the other people of the Far East. By extending the comparison to all Eurasia, one realizes that most of this mythology is of Indo-European origin . It thus has resemblances completely striking to the Germanic Mythologie, Greek or that of the people Slaves and Scandinavians. That is due on arrival with the accesses of China of Indo-European people, the Tokhariens, there is more than 3000 years. The Chinese of Antiquity called them the Rong-Dogs (Quan-Rong), the term “Rong” being applied to all the Western barbarians.

Properly Chinese myths

In all the the Far East and the Oceania, there was a cosmological dualism opposing two principles, on the one hand the light, the sun and fire, on the other hand the darkness, the moon and water. The first principle was generally represented by a bird. In China, it was about a corbel. The solar bird is one of the privileged topics of the Dynastie Shang, the first dynasty Chinese whose existence is attested by archeology. The second principle was represented by a snake or an aquatic animal. The mother of Shun, one of the mythical sovereigns of China, was of the clan of the snake, and his/her father was of the clan of the bird. Shun resulted thus from the union of the two principles. This myth also illustrates the Totémisme of the old Chinese company, according to which each clan had an animal ancestor, as well as the Exogamie, which required that the husbands come different clans.

Xie was the ancestor of Shang and his/her mother was called Jiandi. One day, it went to bathe with her sisters in the river of the Obscure hill. A black bird (swallow or corbel) passed while holding a multicoloured egg in its nozzle. It dropped it. Jiandi took it and put it in its mouth, but it swallowed it inadvertently. Following that, it conceived Xie. It is about a particular form of union of the two cosmic principles, since this myth utilizes on the one hand water and the darkness, on the other hand a bird.

The sun resided on a tree, called Fusang or Kongsang. It also rose this tree, in the morning, to lie down on another tree located at the west. Formerly, there were ten suns. One day, they rose all at the same time, inflicting to the men an intolerable heat. Yao cut down nine with arrows of them, so that there remained nothing any more but one about it. According to the majority of the texts, Yao required of the Archer Yi to cut down the suns instead of doing it itself, but it is the result of the crossing of mythologies Chinese and Indo-European, because Yi is an Indo-European hero. This myth of the supernumerary suns exists at other people of the Far East, Siberia and even at some Amerindian, proof of its seniority.

One can also mention the myth of the separation of the sky and the ground, which were formerly very close.

It is important to announce that none of these myths has the least equivalent in Indo-European mythology.

Myths of Indo-European origin

The creation of the world

The creation of the world results from dead from a giant, Pangu. Its breath became the wind and the clouds, its left eye the sun, its right eye the moon, its four members the four “ends” of the world, its blood and its moods the Yellow Fleuve and the Yangzi Jiang, etc Pangu are obviously related to the giant Ymir of the Scandinavian Mythologie or with the Purusha of the Indian mythology. This myth tardily would have arrived to China, come from India throughout the world Tibetan, which was itself in contact with the world tokharien.

Sky

Among various designs of the Sky, one finds of them one which has an analogy at the Serbes: there are nine separate skies one of the other by a door which keep of the tigers and the panthers and which is ordered by one of the gatekeepers of the Lord of In-High, Shangdi. The Serb design of the sky is known in a christianized form: God provided each of the seven skies of a door and placed in front of it an guardian angel.

The Three Majestic ones

At the beginning of their history, the Chinese place the Three Majestic (see Sanhuangwudi): Fuxi, Nüwa and Shennong. Fuxi is still called Taihao, the Supreme Glare. It passes to have taught hunting and fishing with the men, and it raised animals for the kitchen. It also had a role of intermediary. His/her sister and marries, Nüwa, was a goddess of fruitfulness: she governed the marriages, like Fuxi, and she gave children. Shennong was a god farmer who also played a part in the trade. He invented the first plow and he created the markets. One allots also the discovery to him of the medicinal plants.

The most beautiful illustrations of Fuxi and Nüwa come from tombs of the area of Tourfan, in the west of China. They are dated from the fourth at the eighth century of the Christian era, time when this area was tokharienne. These two divinities have tails of snake. Fuxi holds a square, symbol of the square and male sky, and Nüwa holds a compass, symbol of the round and female ground. At old the Indo-Europeans, the sky was square and the ground was round, whereas for the Chinese, the round sky was posed on the square ground. Moreover, Fuxi and Nüwa are accompanied by two suns. In tombs of the Hittites going back approximately 4000 years, one finds representations similar of two twins, boy and girl, accompanied by two suns. These twins would be what the texts hittites call the god Sun of the Sky and the goddess Sun of the Earth.

A thorough comparison of the Nüwa goddesses and Athéna show that they are almost identical. Thus, one allots to them the invention of musical instruments with wind. A legend little known makes of Athéna donneuse children and allots the epithet of " to him; Mère". It was thus a goddess of fruitfulness like Nüwa. The latter was qualified " of empress divine" and, according to certain Chinese commentators, it was the wife of Yu Large the, founder of the Dynastie Xia. Athéna was closely related to the royalty, which explains its complicity with sovereigns such as Cadmos, founder of the city of Thèbes, or Ulysses. Nüwa was also described as " large sage" whereas Athéna was known for its wisdom. Nüwa would have created the men with mud at the edge of a pond. Athéna would not have done anything of such, but a similar myth exists all the same in Greek mythology: the creation of the men with clay by Prométhée.

According to a famous Chinese myth, a girl of Shennong of the name of Nüwa (where the syllable wa is " orthographiée" in a different way) drowned in the sea Orientale whereas she walked at the edge of the shore. It changed into a bird, the jingwei , which resembled a corbel. According to the Shuyi ji , work of the Dynasty Tang, it would have rather drowned in a river, but one knows certain Fufei, whose name means " Marry of Fuxi" and which is thus identifiable in Nüwa, which drowned in a river. One can thus consider that these two Nüwa are identical. However according to a Greek legend told by Ovide, a girl of king walked on a shore when the god of the Sea tried to violate it. She changed into a crow, bird close to the corbels. This girl of king was associated with Athéna, which was victim of an assault with intent to commit rape made by Héphaïstos, god in maritime matter. One sees kind the relationship of the Chinese and Greek myths.

One could object that Athéna is by no means the sister-wife of a god similar to Fuxi, which does not have no equivalent in Greek mythology. That is explained by the fact that it was sacerdotal (the Chinese texts allot to him the invention of the method of divination exposed in the Yi King) and that at the Greeks, it did not exist more class of priests.

Huangdi

The well-read men of old China remembered that Huangdi , the Yellow Empereur, was the mythical ancestor of the Rong-Dogs. The Chinese adopted it and made of him the successor of the Three Majestic ones. They regard it as the founder of their civilization. Master of the Thunder, it had a residence at the top of the Kunlun, a supposed mountain to be located at the center of the world where four rivers took their source. One allots sometimes four heads to him, with which it could supervise the four cardinal points at the same time. He moved in the tank and its true name, Xuanyuan, meant “stretcher”. About a very great intelligence, it could speak a few days after its birth, and he was magician and soothsayer. One of its ministers would have invented the writing. He was a warrior, who learned “the handling from the shield and the lance”, according to the historian Sima Qian. He could also overcome the wild beasts. The Chinese associated to him two brothers, Shentu and Yulei, which killed the demons.

Huangdi carried out a very hard fight against Chiyou, presented like a son, a grandson or a minister of Shennong. It was a blacksmith and an expert in the manufacture of the weapons, which he would have invented besides. He was venerated like a god of the War. Huangdi used against Chiyou an army of wild beasts. The most famous episode of the battle is that during which Chiyou created a thick fog. The Prince of the Wind, often associated with Huangdi, manufactured a statue assembled on a tank which always indicated the south with its right-hand man; it made it possible the troops of Huangdi to be directed in this fog. Then, Chiyou caused a hurricane, with strong winds and torrential rains. Huangdi made come his/her daughter Ba, who brought the dryness. The hurricane was destroyed, but Ba which cannot go back to the sky, his/her father exiled it on the territories of the North, which it transformed into a desert. The Chinese texts frequently locate this battle in a place called Panquan, the " Source of Talus".

According to Guizang, a work of the high Antiquity known only by quotations, Chiyou attacked Kongsang in order to prevent the sun rising and from plunging the ground in an eternal darkness. The myth of the combat between Huangdi and Chiyou thus finds its equivalent at the Slaves of the Balkans. The latter told that the god of the Thunder was to face each morning a creature in the shape of dragon or snake, which wanted to capture the sun and to plunge the world in darkness. This creature created thick fogs and destroying bad weather. It is surely about the most important myth of Tokhariens, which was related to their veneration of the rising sun. The mention of Kongsang is explained by a sinicization of this myth, because for the Indo-Europeans, the sun rose starting from the sea which surrounded the ground, and not starting from a tree. In the Indian mythology, Indra is the winner of a dragon which seeks to retain water or the sun and which creates wind or a thick fog.

As the combat between Huangdi and Chiyou is often located close to a source, it can be close to the murder by Apollon of the Python snake, which kept a source on the site of Delphes. Precisely, a thorough analysis of the characteristics of Huangdi and Apollo shows that these two divinities were similar. One can also compare Huangdi to the god Lug Celtes or to the god Wotan of the German . Lug fought against Balor and its army of Fomoire, the creatures having only one eye, an arm and a single twisted leg. Chiyou was the chief of the chimei , of the demons of the marshes of mountain. Among the latter, were chui , creatures with single arms and leg. In the Shanhaijing, it is question of creatures to an eye or an arm and a twisted leg. Lug, Apollo, Wotan or Indra are the heirs to a single proto-indo-European divinity.

Xiwangmu

Another divinity, Xiwangmu, the Queen-Mother of Occident , were always associated with the Western territories, where lived Tokhariens. It was a goddess of fruitfulness, with the intense sexual activity. It was the guardian of fishings of immortality. It also reigned on the human destinies and the west, which was the ground of deaths, and it could start epidemics. One can compare it with the German goddess Frija or the Scandinavian goddess Freyja. All were probably hypostases of the Earth. It also seems that it was a form of Nüwa, another goddess of the fruitfulness, which corresponded to the goddess Sun of the Earth of Hittites. Both had bonds with the snakes; Xiwangmu as Nüwa had a relationship with the musical instruments with wind.

The Yi archer

The resemblance of the archer Yi and the Greek hero Héraclès was noticed for a long time. They are both of the solitary heroes and killers of monsters. Like Héraclès, Yi carried out a certain number of “work”. Like Yi, Héraclès was an archer.

See detailed article Houyi

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