The Year of the Tiger says that the Tiger | "Little Red Riding Hood" and "Tiger Grandmother"

Cloth tiger Qing Dynasty Collection of the Palace Museum in Beijing

Once upon a time, there was a little girl who was loved by everyone and liked to wear a red hat given to her by her grandmother, so everyone called her Little Red Riding Hood. One day, her mother asked her to bring food to her grandmother, who lived in the forest. Little Red Riding Hood meets the wolf in the forest, and she tells the wolf that she is going to visit her grandmother in the forest. When the wolf found out, he tricked Little Red Riding Hood into picking wildflowers, and he ate Little Red Riding Hood's grandmother one step ahead of him. Later, he disguised himself as his grandmother, and when Little Red Riding Hood came to see her grandmother, the wolf ate her in one bite. Fortunately, a brave hunter later rescued Little Red Riding Hood and Grandma from the wolf's belly.

This is one of the versions of the fairy tale "Little Red Riding Hood" that we are familiar with. Little Red Riding Hood Story, there are more than a hundred different versions in Europe. "Grandma Wolf", which has the same core of the story, also has hundreds of different versions in China. It is now unclear when and where this story originated.

Tiger head pillow Song Dynasty Collection of the Palace Museum in Beijing

But in China, there is also a story of "Tiger Grandmother", which is also widely circulated:

In Shexian County, Anhui Province, wanshan mountain stands tall, and there are many tigers in the mountains, among which there are female tigers, who often transform into human forms and harm people. An old mother asked her daughter and son to take a basket of dates and visit their grandmother six miles away. In the evening, the sisters and brothers got lost. Meet an elderly woman who says she is their grandmother. The two children said: "I heard that my grandmother had seven moles and melanomas on her face. The old woman said, "Just now the dustpan was covered with dust, so I washed it." "Then go to the stream to pick up the snail seven, Fu Yu noodles."

The two children saw it, believed it, and followed the old woman to a chamber. At rest in the evening, the old woman said, "Which of you two is a little fatter, and the fat one I will sleep with my arms around me." The brother said, "I'm fat." He slept with the woman's arm on his back, and the girl slept at her feet.

When the girl lay down, she noticed that the woman's body was hairy, and the woman explained, "It is cold, and you use a mattress made of sheep fur outside." In the middle of the night, the girl heard the sound of eating, and the woman explained: "Eat the jujube you gave me, the night is cold and eternal, and the old man eats a little to resist hunger." The girl said, "I'm hungry too." "When a woman gives a date, she coldly points to it." Horrified, the girl got up and said, "I'm going to the bathroom." The woman said, "There are many tigers in the mountains, and if you are afraid of being attacked by a tiger, don't go." The girl said, "Grandma tied a rope around my feet and neck and dragged me back when the situation happened." ”

After the girl got up, she looked down at the moon, and the rope was also an intestine. Hurry up and climb the trees to escape. The woman found out and threatened her: "There are tigers in the trees." The girl said, "You are a real tiger, and you actually ate my brother!" The woman was furious, but helpless, and before long, at dawn, a burden-bearer came, and the bearer rescued the girl, put her coat still on the tree, and carried her away. After a while, the woman came with two tigers, pointed to the tree, and said, "Man also." "The second tiger broke the tree and pushed it down, and it turned out to be clothes, thinking that the woman had deceived them, and became angry, ate the woman, and fled.

This story was originally a folk tale circulating in Anhui, compiled by Huang Zhijun, a Shanghai literati during the Ming and Qing dynasties. Some researchers believe that the story of Grandma Tiger and The story of Grandma Wolf were popular at the same time. But folklorist Wang Jiuling believes that the story of The Tiger Grandmother should have become popular earlier.

Tiger brick Tang Dynasty Collection of the Palace Museum in Beijing

The origin of Chinese tiger culture is very early, and the mussel sculpture dragon and tiger pattern found in the original tomb of Xishuipo in Puyang, Henan in 1975 is 60000 or 7000 years old. In tiger culture, the tiger, as a spiritual totem, is active in both military activities and daily life, and tiger head hats, tiger head shoes, cloth tigers, and New Year paintings are indispensable to tiger elements. But at the same time, in real life, people have paid attention to the ferocious and cunning side of tigers. The record of tigers eating people goes on in the history books. This is also the social basis for the popularity of the story of "Tiger Grandma". With the change of the times, there are fewer and fewer tigers, and the tiger cannibalism has gradually become less, and people's understanding of the cunning and ferocity of wolves has become a consensus, and the protagonist of this story has changed from "Tiger Grandma" to "Wolf Grandma", which is also reasonable.

Yangzi Evening News/Purple Cow News reporter Zang Lei

Proofread by Li Haihui