Special Plan for the Root Nature of Civilization (3) Part 6: Wang Renxiang: How to Look at Faith and Chinese Civilization from Symbols?
China News Service, Beijing, February 26 Title: How to see faith and Chinese civilization from symbols?
——Interview with Wang Renxiang, archaeologist and researcher at the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences
Author Wen Longjie Xu Crown
The significance of symbols to civilization cannot be underestimated, and many important characteristics of civilization are embodied or hidden in prehistoric symbols. As the American scholar John Dewey put it in The Transformation of Philosophy: "Man distinguishes himself from inferior animals by preserving his past experience... Therefore, man does not live in a world of simple real things, as wild animals do, but in a world of symbols and symbols. ”
The "Four Birds Circling the Sun" gold leaf pattern, which expresses the spiritual meaning of "pursuing light, unity and progress, harmony and inclusiveness", was designated as a "Symbol of Chinese Cultural Heritage" seventeen years ago. What other symbols are there? How do these symbols present the "character" of civilization? In this regard, Wang Renxiang, a famous archaeologist and researcher at the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, recently accepted an exclusive interview with the China News Agency's "East and West Question" to talk about the era of China's prehistoric symbols and the "open" and "inclusive" civilization characteristics embodied in it.
The interview transcript is summarized below:
China News Service: It is generally believed that the most direct starting point in the history of Chinese civilization is the emergence of mature characters. What is the specific connotation of the new concept of the "Symbolic Age" that you recently proposed in "Writing and Speaking"?
Wang Renxiang: The emergence of symbols in prehistoric China is not a new discovery, nor is it a new definition. But the age of prehistoric symbols is a new concept.
Prehistoric symbols have attracted the attention of many scholars, but mostly only examine "whether they are words" or judge "how far away from the text". The many essences of symbols have not yet been clearly recognized, without realizing that they have a more important meaning than words.
Modern society is full of symbols that make information transmission fast, and human behavior and thought feel obviously beneficial. In the information society, it is impossible to imagine how "left and right" it would be without symbolic participation.
But the symbol does not belong only to modern society, it is innate to human beings. Of course, the earlier the era, the simpler and more straightforward the symbol system. Symbols are created by human beings, are the products of human thinking, and are also the knowledge system that has always accompanied human growth. There was an exclusive era of symbols in prehistory, and symbols were born at this time.
It is generally believed that the emergence of writing is an important symbol of the era of civilization. In the era of prehistoric symbols, symbols were not words, but they had quasi-literal meanings, and even played a more important role than words. Words have tangible, phonetic, and meaning, while symbols have tangible, name, and meaning, that is, there is no definite pronunciation of a agreed name. Symbols from prehistoric times are more symbolic than used to record language.
The emergence of writing and the formation of civilization are related to symbols. The Symbolic Age is the gestation stage of the Age of Civilization. After the advent of the civilized era, symbols did not die out, but flourished more vigorously.
In fact, in the era of prehistoric symbols, symbols have matured, or have exceeded the meaning of words. It can be expected that the definition of the era of civilization and the standard of writing will change, and the length of the history of civilization will be greatly extended.
One of the epigraphic artifacts of the Hongshan culture in the Chinese Neolithic era, the "Jade Pig Dragon" of Liaoning, known as the "First Dragon of China". Photo by Zhao Ying, a reporter from China News Service
China News Service: Any symbol has symbolic significance, how are the symbols of the symbol era refined? What were the main popular symbols in early China?
Wang Renxiang: When I say symbols of the symbol age, I don't mean all symbols, but those symbols that are highly recognizable and widely popular in time and space, such as those sporadic carved symbols on pottery, are not counted.
The refinement of symbols is the key to symbol creation and the result of image thinking. However, image thinking is not simply to reproduce the image of things, but to process a new image through imagination and association, that is, to perceive the shapes, images, schemas and other symbols. In this process, it is necessary to skillfully combine abstract thinking and image thinking, and "get carried away" can complete the creation of symbols.
For example, the Yangshao culture faience fish pattern is mostly formed through the dismantling of ornaments. After completing the evolution from a typical fish pattern to a simplified fish pattern, the full shape of the fish pattern has created a balanced and symmetrical diamond pattern, which belongs to the strictly structured straight-sided ornament system. After disassembling, the deformed fish lip generates the Western Yin Pattern and the Petal Pattern respectively, which are the two arc-shaped composition systems of the Faience pottery of the Miaodigou culture.
Yangshao culture faience fish pattern. Photo by Cheng Hao, China News Service
Schematic diagram of the evolution of fish patterns in Yangshao culture. Courtesy of respondents
The fish pattern is invisible, and the fish symbol is fishless. In this way, following the law of artistic development, many faience ornaments have been transformed into complex and simple, from "tangible and imageless" to "formless and imageless", and finally mostly presented as geometric symbols.
Yangshao cultural faience also has a "big bird pattern system", which also completes the geometric symbolization of bird patterns through simplification and deconstruction methods, and conceals the realistic bird shape.
Birds and fish, a pair of constant artistic themes, shine on faience pottery. Water and fish, the sun and birds, are also the symbols of yin and yang, water and fire in later Chinese culture.
The same is true of the white pottery ornaments of the earlier southern Gaomiao culture, and a large number of ornaments only use some graphics to refer to the object of worship.
Many white pottery motifs show a large mouth, two pairs of large teeth, and a large number of figures related to bird shapes, and some pictures show birds with fangs on their wings. These birds and bird wings refer to the mythical Sun Wu. There is a sun figure between the wings, and it is the sun that carries the sun and flies. The discovery of the white pottery of the Gaomiao culture has convinced us that the Japanese-Ukrainian myth was formed 8,000 years ago.
The fangs on the pottery of the Gaomiao culture should be the soul of the sun, which is the recognized sun symbol at that time. The radiant sun is depicted by the people of the High Temple as spitting out fangs. The fanged god flies with the bird again, or grows a pair of wings to fly. Fangs in the sun, fangs in the sun, high temple culture without fangs, you can imagine that the fangs god face is omnipresent in the high temple culture.
Schematic diagram of the types of fangs in the High Temple culture. Courtesy of respondents
It is difficult to find a direct connection between the sun and the fangs, but it seems that it is not difficult to understand that the sunlight is distilled into the shape of fangs out of the association of light.
Eight-pointed star patterns were also found on the white pottery, with full-shaped octagonal stars and half an octagonal star. The octagonal star can be seen in many prehistoric cultures, there are painted, there are also carved, as well as jade carving, widely distributed, long lasting, is a very important symbol, but also the symbol of the sun.
Octagonal pattern on Dawenkou culture clay pots. Courtesy of respondents
The "four birds around the sun" gold leaf from the ancient Shu era unearthed in Jinsha Village, Chengdu, is also related to the sun. In the pattern, four birds are flying, and the four birds meet head to tail and circle around. The sun moves from east to west in the sky, where is the driving force? The ancients naturally thought of birds, and in their line of sight only birds could soar in the air. Therefore, people imagined that there must be birds that can fly and cross the sky with the sun, and the sun must have the help of divine birds, they are sun crows.
"Four birds around the sun" gold leaf. China News Service reporter Zheng Shaochun photographed
China News Service: How did the popular symbols in early China spread? And how to reflect tolerance and openness?
Wang Renxiang: Human beings understand the universe and nature, subjectively understand and think about image information, record and depict it in specific forms, and create primordial symbols. Such symbols will be modified in subsequent transmissions and will eventually be passed on in their complete form.
Semiotics not only studies human culture, but also studies human cognitive and spiritual activities. The first symbols were related to faith, which was the driving force behind the spread of symbols. Faith gives the symbol a soul and life, and it also gives the symbol the attribute of inclusiveness and openness. Faith is the only way to bring order to a chaotic society, and symbols are powerful and appealing logos processed by brain art, and their rich diversity and wide dissemination are the embodiment of the tolerant and open characteristics of Chinese civilization.
The American semiotician Charles Sanders Peirce famously said that "only those who are understood as symbols are symbols", the essence of which is that symbols should be easy to understand and accept, acceptance is identification, and identity can be disseminated.
Pierce believes that symbols can be divided into three types: image symbols, indicative symbols, and statute symbols. Among them, the statute symbol refers to the object that has no intrinsic connection, but is conventional. The fangs on the white pottery belong to this type of symbol. Fangs have no clear connection with the sun, but they spread widely, from south to north, white pottery, faience pottery, jade carving, and stone carvings.
The depiction of the divine face on the pottery of the High Temple, the composition is complete, the form is fixed, and most of them have been quite simplified, leaving only a mouth with two pairs of fangs above and below.
Yangshao cultural faience pottery is also painted with fangs god face, which is a very vivid human face image. The micro-carved divine faces on liangzhu culture jade generally have fangs, which are also pairs of upper and lower, generally animal faces. The Jade God Face of Shijiahe Culture is characterized by long, sharp fangs, one on top and one on top of each other, and the God Face is almost all human-shaped.
Liangzhu Yu chun and fangs god face pattern. Photo by Du Yang, a reporter from China News Service
The engraving of white pottery, the carving of jade, and the depiction of faience pottery, these three waves of art have left similar divine forms, which is not only a continuation of the artistic level, but the identity of the belief system.
Looking at the prehistoric fangs god face symbols, we can get the following impressions: the epidemic age is about 8000-4000 years ago, which was widely popular in the north and south regions; the composition of the fangs is basically similar, with a pair of upper and lower teeth, the upper teeth are inside and the lower teeth are outside, and the style is in the same line. In this way, the fangs god has been recognized in prehistory on a wide scale and for a long time, which can be determined to be related to worship and belief, reflecting the spirit of openness and tolerance.
The personification of flora and fauna was a fixed way of prehistoric artificial gods. After an animal image is placed on a human face, it has a divine personality. The prehistoric fangs god face was created by adding animal fangs to the human face. As a symbol of faith, as well as the aforementioned eight-pointed star pattern, the fangs god face can spread across various cultures in a long time and space range, reflecting the openness and tolerance of Chinese culture.
It is also worth mentioning the fish symbol on the pottery of the Shuangdun culture in Anhui, which is crossed by two simple arcs to indicate the outline of a fish. Such symbols also appear on Yangshao faience pottery in central and western Henan, and it is thanks to openness and tolerance that its vitality is counted in the millennium.
A collection of fish patterns of the Shuangdun culture. Courtesy of respondents
Fish patterns on the pottery of the Miaodigou culture. Courtesy of respondents
Symbols convey the human mind, the faith, and also the art in the process of communication. The reference and absorption that appears in the process of symbol dissemination is a portrayal of cultural openness and tolerance.
Civilization and prehistory are the division of two major periods of human beings. Although symbols were also widely used in civilizational times, their role and meaning in prehistory are obviously different. On the basis of openness and inclusion, cultural preparation for pluralism may begin with symbolic identification. Identified by symbols, we can see the spread of faith and the development of artistic thinking.
China News Service: What other paths do you think are to explore the origin of Chinese civilization?
Wang Renxiang: Archaeological discoveries have taught us that there was an exclusive era of symbols in prehistory, and before the advent of writing, symbols began to dominate people in some specific areas. Symbols influence the way people think and behave, and also allow people to understand each other, uphold openness and tolerance, and achieve mutual recognition.
Early symbols are more of a religious nature, open and inclusive, thanks to which they attract more attention in the spread, and they are getting bigger and bigger like snowballs.
The early beliefs of mankind were embodied in the knowledge of the universe and all things. Before the advent of words, schema symbols had become an important expression of faith. Prehistoric symbols are not yet words, but they record the thinking of the human soul.
Prehistoric symbols are generally geometric figures distilled from the connotations of faith, emphasizing symbolic significance. The Fangyuan symbols with the concept of yin and yang as the core, and the fangs and sun-Wu symbols with the sun worship as the core, record the history identified by ancient beliefs, which is the root of Chinese culture. Decoding the meaning of these symbols helps to understand the essence and roots of Chinese culture.
Since the era of prehistoric symbols, Chinese culture has begun to exchange and integrate in time and space, and gradually formed a unique character of cultural integration. The mode of interpretation formed by Chinese civilization, thinking and spirit has always been absent. Notice those ancient symbols, those that are related to faith, those flags that guide the direction of thinking, and there will surely be more new discoveries. (End)
Respondent Profiles:
Wang Renxiang is an archaeologist, cultural scholar, and researcher at the Institute of Archaeology, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. He is a professor at the Graduate School of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and has been appointed as a distinguished professor of Nanjing Normal University and Capital Normal University, and a distinguished researcher of the School of Humanities of Shanghai Jiaotong University. He is the chief author and editor-in-chief of more than 100 kinds of books, mainly including "The Art Wave of Prehistoric China", "Collection of Chinese Prehistoric Archaeology", "Half-Window Imagery", "Mortal World and The Divine Realm", "Tomb of the Tibetan King", "The Beginning of Chaos", "Diet and Chinese Culture", "Taste of The Past", "Good Self-Restraint - Ancient Hooks and Buckles", "Fangyuan Unity - Yu chun research", "Great Yangshao", "Nan Fan Hai Xiahou" and so on. In recent years, the focus has been on the study of the connotation of faith in early Chinese art, and related works will be published one after another.
(China News Network)