The Moon was said to rise between the horns of the Spring Dragon. An eclipse of the moon or sun was believed to be caused by a dragon eating the celestial body. In ancient times lightning was considered to be ‘dragon fire’. Originally people pleaded with the dragons to bring rain for a good harvest at this mid-summer festival as a drought was just as ruinous as a flood. Death by drowning was considered a sacrifice to the dragon king and this is tied to the origin of the Dragon Boat festival which at a later date came to commemorate the drowning of Qu Yuan. The Dragon King, ruler of water, traditionally lies out in the sun to dry his scales on the sixth day of the sixth lunar month. If a dragon king takes to the air it brings a great storm and rain - a typhoon ( 台 风 tái fēng in Chinese). The seas are ruled by dragon kings ( 龙 王 lóng wáng), one for each of the traditional four seas that surround China. Mourners for Song Wen who traveled great distances to show their gratitude (source Weibo). A great many of these grateful students have played their part in mourning his loss by traveling from all over China. It was only when he recently died aged 48 that it was discovered that he had been helping students in financial difficulties over many years. Song Wenwu was a teacher in one of the poorer parts of Anhui province. The film title Crouching tiger, Hidden dragon ➚ comes from a place of hidden strength, and a most auspicious Feng Shui location. Ideally this should be to the east of the location as in the case of the city of Nanjing. There are many other joyful festivals spread throughout the year.įeng shui favors sites with a ‘hidden dragon’, which is found where the form of the surrounding hills look like a huge protecting dragon. Imperial dragon at the Forbidden City Next Festival This was the day Lóng tái tóu 龙 抬 头 when the dragons by tradition stirred from their winter slumber.Ī representation of a 贪 龙 Tān lóng ‘ greedy dragon’ was often put at the entrance to the administrator's house (the yamen) so that the administrator and all the supplicants were encouraged to keep themselves on good behavior by this savage and hungry representation of a dragon. The Blue Dragon festival takes place on the 2nd day of the 2nd lunar month each year. Buddhists brought with them into China a rather different view of dragons more akin to the europeans, Buddhist dragons are more cantankerous and prone to malice. The river forming a long stretch of China's north-eastern border is the 黑 龙 江 hēi lóng jiāng ‘Black Dragon River’ which in turn gives its name to the whole province. The blue-green dragon ( ) represents east and spring and is one of the four divisions of the traditional month. Dragons belong to various categories: heaven dragons ( 天 龙 tiān lóng) ruling the sky spirit dragons ( 神 龙 shén lóng) ruling the rain earth dragons ( 地 龙 dì lóng) ruling springs and streams, and treasure dragons ( 伏 藏 龙 fú cáng lóng) which guard buried riches. Dragons are lords of nature, commanding the mountains, sky, sea and land. Dragon shape decorations have been found on Yangzhou pottery dating back 6,000 years and there are hints that the original inspiration for a dragon was the alligator ➚ of Southern China. Its face has whiskers and a beard.ĭragons were well established in the Chinese mind as far back as the Shang dynasty. There are traditionally 81 (9x9) scales running along its spine.
It is said to be a composite of nine different creatures: camel’s head, deer’s horns, rabbit’s eyes, cow’s ears, snake’s neck, frog’s belly, carp’s scales, hawk’s claws and tiger’s palm. It has a sinuous body covered in scales, with four legs and two horns. It is second only to humans in the hierarchy of animals. There is an impressive imperial Nine Dragon Wall of glazed tiles at both the Summer Palace and the Forbidden City at Beijing.Īccording to an ancient classification the dragon is considered the chief of all scaled creatures, while birds are represented by the phoenix animals by the unicorn and all shelled creatures by the tortoise. Kowloon, part of Hong Kong means ‘nine dragons’ in Cantonese. As such it associated with the number nine (as 3 is yang, 3x3 is extremely yang) and so Nine Dragons 九 龙 jiǔ lóng are extremely propitious. It is a strong ‘ yang’ animal (male, sun and active). People need to seek the favor of dragons and keep them on their side. The Chinese dragon is imperious, powerful but good-natured. Maybe a different word should have been used to distinguish the Chinese version of these mythological creatures. Dragons in China are not the fire-breathing, evil monsters that they are portrayed elsewhere in the world.
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