The ancient Dian civilization is a magical existence, which has existed in history for a short time (278 BC - 109 BC), and there is no exact written record of itself, but it has left a large number of unique bronze artifacts in the Golden Seal of the Dian King, and a large number of animal shapes and activity scenes are included in many excavated artifacts. How to understand and interpret its direction, and what was the meaning at that time? These most primitive patterns also constitute the lowest genetic part of the ancient cultural information in Yunnan, and the interpretation of these mysterious artifacts is the decoding of the culture of its own ancient Dian kingdom, and can analyze the traces of exchanges with the surrounding regions.
Ancient Dianguo Niuhu Copper Case
The cow and the tiger are the animal shapes that often appear in the ancient Dian bronzes, and as far as the most famous cow and tiger bronze case is concerned, the usual interpretation is that the cattle and animals are the first of the "three animals" of the sacrifice, and are the most important sacrifices in the ancient sacrifices. The tiger has a lofty position in the Dian culture, and often stands at the top of the bronze pillar of the Dian people's sacrifice, which is the object of worship. But what do they mean together? And the calf in the middle? Or some call them "one tiger eats two cows", but on this artifact, they look at each other peacefully, and there is no fighting or panic. How to understand the interpretation?
In ancient times, the cow and the tiger were both symbols of bravery and objects of worship, and the cow was not the shape of the docile and prostrate plough in our impression now.
The worship system of cattle
Yunnan is close to Tibet, and now the Tibetan language also calls wild yaks "ben", corresponding to the word "ben".
During the Shang Zhou Dynasty, King Wu of Zhou called his army that had come from afar "Tiger Ben", and this "Ben" (bēn) referred to the wild yak. The so-called "tiger ben" is a ranger cavalry that is as fierce as a tiger and as powerful as a wild yak. The bull and tiger are juxtaposed, a symbol of bravery. The yak's close cousin, the tumor cow, is also very tall and powerful, and can weigh more than a ton. One thing that cannot be ignored is that the nomadic peoples in the ancient Dian kingdom were a very important part, and their migration and communication methods also brought myths and legends from other regions, or ways of creating understanding. The Southwest Silk Road, the connection between Yunnan and the Ganqing region of Sichuan. And central Asia, ancient Persia, ancient India, cross-regional and cross-cultural totems also have influences?
"Copper Drum Dian Niu" by Lin Guocheng
Tibetan wild yak
Ancient Dian Wuniu Copper Case - Collection of the National Museum
The cow is described in the "Zhou Yi Saying Gua" in the foundation of Chinese culture: "Qian is heaven, father, and yin; Kun is the earth, mother, and kettle... For the sub-cow, the Zhou people's "Kun for the cow" and the Qinghai Tibetan people have the symbol of the white yak as the mother of the main god of the land.
It is also recorded in the ancient Tibetan question and answer song "Sparzai Cow Song": "When Spar (meaning the universe and the world) was first formed, the heavens and the earth were mixed together, and when Spar slaughtered the cow, he cut off the bull's head and threw it on the ground, and there was a high mountain; when the cow's tail was cut off, there was a curved road; when the cow's skin was peeled off, there was a flat field."
In the "Othemiah", which originates from the legend of the creation of the Hani region of Yunnan province where the ancient Qiang migrated, there is such an account: the Hani people killed a dragon cow and used the various parts of the dragon cow to create the heavens, the earth, the sun, the moon and all things. They made heaven and earth out of dragon cattle, they made the sky out of cow skin, beef made the land, cow legs made pillars of the land, the cow's left eye made the sun, the right eye made the moon, the ribs made terraces, and the teeth made the stars.......
In ancient Persian mythology, the Persians regarded cattle as their ancestors. In the book Avestan, it is said that Arura Mazda, who represents the light, created primitive people and primitive cattle in the world. The status of the ox as the first creation object was incomparably high in the minds of the Persians. In this Persian mythology, another character, Mithra, appeared, born of the goddess of the earth, who rode a primitive cow to sacrifice according to his mother's orders, and after the primitive cow died, its torso became the moon, its fur became a star in the sky, its tail became the grain of the world, the blood became a delicious grape, and the bodily fluids flowing out of the body made everything in the world grow. The ox is the mother of all things and is closely related to the earth. The "birth" of the crop goes hand in hand with the "death" of the bull. The cycle of life, the resurrection of the dead, is the object of sacrifice for sacrificing life. This legend is also similar to the Tibetan "Sparzai Cow Song", and Mithra, as we will describe in detail later, is also the embodiment of the persian sun god, the god of war, and the beast lion.
The white bull worship of Indian civilization.
Persian little white cow faience 11th-12th century cow pattern faience bowl Private collection
With the foreshadowing of the worship legend of Qiangzang and the ancient Persian cattle, then return to a scene of ancient Dian culture itself. Judging from the excavated artifacts of the ancient Dian Kingdom, many of them have a strong nomadic atmosphere, and we assume that one of the ancient nomadic peoples moved south along the edge of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, and they brought the customary atmosphere of northwest China, and even brought the aesthetic worship taste of Central Asia. It finally landed on the vast open space of the two major lakes of Dianchi Lake and Fuxian Lake. So what is the connection between the ancient Dian culture in northwest China and Central Asia, which is closely related to the nomadic peoples, from the perspective of artifacts?
Brick carvings unearthed in Afghanistan, Central Asia – private collection
Catalogue of ancient Dian bronze buckles
Central Asian artifacts and ancient Dian bronze artifacts have a very similar visual similarity, and perhaps some inspiration can be obtained from the worship of each other's totems to help us understand the ancient Dian artifacts. Let's look at the next set of pictures.
Ancient Dian bronze - cattle and tiger buckle ornament
Lions attack cows
Ancient Dianguo Niuhu Copper Case
Mithra the Cattle Slayer Roman Sculpture (100-200 AD) – Collection of the British Museum
Lion and sun god one tattoo
The aforementioned Persian myths and legends, Mithras sacrificed bulls, and Mithras is the embodiment of the sun god worshipped by the Persians, and also the god of light, the god of war, and incarnated as a lion totem, symbolizing the light and combat power of the sun. The image of Mithra killing cattle was also replaced by the Persians as a sculpture of a lion attacking a bull, and the palace of the Achaemenid dynasty of the First Persian Empire was built in the Persianpolis Palace in 518 BC during the reign of Darius I, and it is on the wall of the ancient city of Persepolis in present-day Iran that the famous bas-relief lion attacks the bull can be seen.
The famous bas-relief on the wall of the ancient city of Persepolis, Iran - lion attacking bull
In the historic Zoroastrianism (Zoroastrianism), the lion is a symbol of the sun. In our popular Jin Yong novel "The Book of the Dragon Slaying in the Heavens", the Ming Sect Leader is called Yangding Tian, and the Heir of the Sect Leader, the Golden Retriever King, expounds the relationship between the sun and the lion.
Niuhu Bronze Case - Jiangchuan Museum
The cow and the lion, as their respective symbols, represent sacrifices, and after the death of the cow, all things are divided, and the land is conceived by the interaction of the sun. And there are also cows representing winter, lions representing the scorching sun summer, seasonal transformation, cold and warm alternating taste.
Lion and tiger picture
Ancient Rome 4th century Tiger hunting white bull Mosaic Capitoline Museum
When we use the above interpretation, lions and tigers are juxtaposed beasts of prey, because there is no lion species in Middle-earth, and we have basically never seen lions, here we put forward a hypothesis: the tiger that is also the king of the beasts may have a close symbolic meaning to the lion in the early days, the strongest of the beasts, and continues to bring this understanding to various places with the migration of nomadic groups. Also placed in the ancient Dian culture with strong traces of nomads, the image of cattle and tigers appears frequently in bronze. From the ancient Roman mosaic paintings, you can see the scene of the tiger attacking the cow, in some areas the tiger coexists with the lion, in some places there is only one species, and there is basically no lion in the Chinese region. So in ancient times, tigers replaced some of the symbolism of lions.
Ancient Dian bronze part (278 BC – 109 BC)
Ancient Rome 4th century Tiger hunting white bull Mosaic Capitoline Museum
Niu Hu Copper Case
At this time, let's interpret the Niuhu copper case, which is a representative of the ancient Dian culture.
The tiger is lying on the cow, the tiger has the sun, the meaning of summer, and the main pattern of the cow symbolizes the land, winter, and has the smell of being sacrificed. The illumination of the earth by daylight, winter and summer, warm and cold seasons transform. The calf in the middle of the pattern is the output of these two effects. The calf represents the new order of life. The cow corresponds to the land and winter, the tiger corresponds to the sun and the summer, the heavens and the earth change, and the seasons change. The order of heaven and earth rotates and lives endlessly.
Bull-tiger fighting bronze buckle
With this interpretation, we will have a question at this time, where is that person? Where is the value and meaning of human beings? Let's get down and answer that question.
From wild to domesticated
Niuhu copper case part - ear cut flowers
Bronze bull's head with cut flower ear, Jiangchuan Museum collection
What is easy to overlook is that the ears of the cow are traced by pruning, which represents the taming of the bison by man, which indicates that man has played some subjective role in the natural order.
Four-ox gilded knight bronze shell vessel Collection of Yunnan Provincial Museum
"Ancient Dian Kingdom in the Intersection of Time and Space" Lin Guocheng's work Pen ink on paper pastel.
The details of this four-ox gilded knight copper shell vessel and the ear cutting of the front cow tiger copper case solve the ancient Dian people's relationship with nature, and through these artifacts, the view of nature in the ancient Dian culture is skillfully displayed.
The combination of the former cow and the tiger is the process of the regeneration of the heaven and earth cycle, the combination of the tiger symbolizing the sun and the cow symbolizing the land gives birth to the calf, which is a new life, a new output of the land cycle, and the trimmed ears represent the artificial taming effect in this process. The cow's ear trimming hinted at some of the role that the strong men of the tribe played in this order.
The gilded knight bronze shell vessel, in the middle is the golden knight, the golden king, replacing the sun god of war symbolized by the tiger, while the bull stands in all directions represents the land, symbolizing the sun's tiger crouching below the horizon, the central position is replaced by the knight, the golden king represents the new maintenance of order, the establishment of a tribal worship system, and the establishment of a meaning association between the artifact and the totemic nature.
What the ancient Dian bronze artifacts express is their understanding of the natural order: cattle and tigers interact with each other, people stand in between, heaven and earth circulate, and life goes on and on. This is an initially simple view of nature, which has long and continuously been deeply imprinted on the land of Yunnan. (Author Lin Guocheng)