Hello everyone, I am learning from history.
In the story of the Three Kingdoms, "Lü Bu among men, red rabbit among horses" can be said to be a very famous sentence, describing Lü Bu, the first warrior of the Three Kingdoms, and Ma Chi rabbit, the first of the Three Kingdoms.
So the question is, why did the ancients give a relatively weak name like "rabbit" to the incomparable horse?
In this issue, we will briefly explore several theories of the naming of the red rabbit horse.
Bole is said to be a Qin person in the Spring and Autumn Period. He was known for his proficiency in Soma and left behind a famous copy of the Soma Sutra.
In this ancient soma book, it is written to judge whether a horse is a thousand-mile horse, mainly from the following aspects:
"I want the head of the rabbit and its shoulders, the grass of the fox and its ears, the eyes and necks of the birds, the fins and ridges of the fish."
With the characteristics of the four animals of rabbit, fox, bird and fish, it is a thousand-mile horse.
Why does a Maxima have to grow a rabbit's head?
According to the shape of the horse's head, the ancients visually divided the horse into straight heads, rabbit heads, concave heads, wedge heads, half rabbit heads, etc., and horses with rabbit heads or half rabbit heads, the part above the nose slightly protruded outwards.
Modern experts through the study of the size of modern horses, the nose above the convex horse, that is, the rabbit head horse, most of them are strong heavy horses, and the body shape is also taller than other horses, which is naturally a good horse.
In traditional Chinese culture, there is a saying called "quiet as a virgin, moving like a rabbit." "Rabbit" has also become an adjective for speed.
Although the rabbit is really cute in the eyes of people today, it is really cute, slow to move, and it is not good at running long distances. But hares are very fast at short start-ups and can change direction quickly when in danger, making it impossible for either eagles or foxes to complete the hunt.
To use today's words to describe, that is, 0-100 km acceleration within 4 seconds, it can be said that the start speed is very fast, so the ancients described the rapid as "moving like a rabbit." ”
In the famous work "Lü's Spring and Autumn" in the Warring States period, it was mentioned that among the famous horses in ancient times, there was one called "flying rabbit".
"Flying rabbits, to be socked, the ancient horses are also." - "Lü's Spring and Autumn Departure"
The third theory: wū tú said
The third theory is that "red rabbit" is a misinformation of "red rabbit", which should be called red horse.
Rabbit is pronounced the same as 菟, the glyphs are close, but the meaning is completely different!
According to the ancient text "Ji Yun", "Tongdu Cut, Yin Disciple." The Chu people called the tiger Yu Suo. "During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, the ancients loved and hated the strength of tigers, and there were cultural relics about tigers unearthed everywhere, but the Chu people were particularly special to tigers.
According to records, one of the Chu state commanders, Yin Ziwen, was originally named Dougu Yuju, Dou is his surname, Gu Yushu is pronounced as ɡòu wū tú, Gu Tong "㝅", which means breastfeeding, Yu Su is a tiger; Gu Yu Su means "tiger breastfeeding".
This is also the legend of Yin Ziwen, who was an illegitimate son, who was abandoned into the wild after birth, and as a result, not only did not die but was raised by tigers, and finally became known as the famous minister of the Chu Dynasty, and later called the place where he was abandoned.
According to the "Biography of Lü Buzang Hong of the Three Kingdoms Zhi", "Bu has a good horse and a red horse. It is written here as "Akatsuki", which means tiger.
It means that Lü Bu has a good red horse called Tiger.
According to the "Yunhui" record: "Flying Horse, the name of the divine horse." "Flying dragon" here means flying tiger at first glance.
Ancient texts are mostly hand-copied, there are many similar and similar words will be wrong when copied by hand, and it will be difficult for posterity to examine it, just like the name of the red rabbit horse, it may also be a red rabbit, but it is more likely to be a red tiger.
But no matter what, because of the blessing of the fame of the god Yucheng, the red rabbit horse is the unique red rabbit horse, which has become an irreplaceable symbol of the famous horse in the minds of the Chinese people.