The Tree of the Gods in the Sanxingdui Museum
It is said that the god of wealth is broken. The Internet has welcomed a day, everyone has seen enough of the various God of Wealth New Year posters, "I am a hutong" but to send you a different big gift - cash cow!
Everyone is looking forward to a cash cow. In traditional Chinese customs, there are many kinds of cash cows, such as old Beijing, which has a custom of praying for the New Year. According to the "Records of the Yanjing Chronicle", "The one who takes the largest pine branch is inserted in the bottle, and is decorated with ancient money, yuanbao, pomegranate flowers, etc. It is called a cash cow." ”
There are many places to burn pine and cypress branches for the New Year, one is to have a sound, the other is to have a fragrance, and the picture is auspicious. Hanging a treasure on the pine branches has become a cash cow with "good color and fragrance". The ancients hoped that money would make money, hanging like the fruit of a tree, and the slightest shake would drop money.
There is also a saying that "hanging door money", which is actually a multi-colored "paper money", similar to the paper cut hanging on the door. I guess this paper cut hangs on the lintel of the door, fluttering with the wind, and also has a kind of "cash" mood.
Paper cut from the lintel of the panjia hutong in the former Xuanwu District
Spring League in Beidaji Lane, Xuanwu District
Of course, to talk about the ancient "cash cow", the most shocking is also the variety of cash cows exhibited in the Sanxingdui Museum in Sichuan Province - now they are no longer cash cows, but they have become national treasure-level cultural relics, and they cannot be measured by money. Moreover, the meaning they imply far exceeds the superficial meaning of "getting rich and rising", and its true origin is still unclear.
When I was shooting at the Sanxingdui Museum, I couldn't remember how many cash cows there were, but each one was very shocking, and the exhibition hall gave them enough "respect", or built a separate exhibition space, or specially displayed its exquisite accessories:
Revered as a classic "cash cow"
The sacred tree in the showcase
Parts of the "branches" of the sacred tree
More rigorously, the above objects displayed in the Sanxingdui Museum can be collectively referred to as "sacred trees". I found some historical information, and some experts believe that these sacred trees are not ordinary ornaments, but symbolizing the immovable axis of "heaven and earth", but in the intercourse between upper and lower qi, that is, the so-called "heavenly hub". Therefore, it can be regarded as a "ladder to the heavens", which is not unrelated to the observation of the heavens by the ancients.
In the following museum's sacred tree, you can also see that the exhibition hall has specially created the artistic conception of "Tongtian", and I have also specially photographed the perspective of looking up at the sky:
The Sacred Tree is regarded as the "ladder to heaven"
These cash cows are made of bronze, resembling a green plant, and there are many decorations on the position of the branches, which look like copper coins, so everyone calls this "plant" full of copper coins a cash cow.
Cash cow details
However, what needs to be corrected is that the saying of "cash cow" is not the name of the ancients, and what the name of the prayer object that called this tree-like structure in ancient times is still a mystery!
In fact, the name "cash cow" was proposed by Feng Hanji in the 1940s when the Central Museum excavated the tomb of Pengshan Han in Sichuan. Because it is not clear how the ancients named it, according to the core of this shape is the tree and money, so the present people have taken an image name - the cash cow.
Some experts also believe that the "cash cow" should essentially be the product of the combination of the "ladder" function of the divine tree and the idea of "ascending immortals", and its connotation is more closely related to the "heavenly theosophy", so it is called this copper tree "divine tree", which is closer to the "authenticity" of its connotation than the "cash cow".
The Tree of Heaven
In the traceability of the name "Cash Cow", I also found an interesting story, which roughly means that there is a legend recorded in the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms": a man named Bing Yuan picked up a string of money on the road. Because he did not know who the owner was, he hung the money on a big tree. Later, when people passing by saw money hanging from this tree, they thought it was a sacred tree and a tree of wealth, so they also hung their own money on the tree in the hope that it would produce more money. Later, the money on this tree hung more and more, so that people mistakenly believed that this tree could really make money. Thus, the name "cash cow" spread.
A fragment of the Sacred Tree
The details of the sacred tree
In any case, this unearthed national treasure-level sacred tree is actually similar to the imagery of the old Beijing custom mentioned above. However, the "cash cows" of old Beijing have the flavor of new year festivals and are more folk, and these "cash cows" of Sanxingdui are mostly funerary products of han tomb magnates, and they are given a deeper connotation of "tongtian".
However, no matter what kind of "cash cow", no matter what occasion it is used for, it is actually a beautiful vision of the ancients. Happy holidays! Just as everyone knows, if you worship the god of wealth, you will not get rich because of it, in fact, the New Year is to have fun!
However, it is the real thing to learn more about traditional culture. Are you also in a posture?
A corner of the Sacred Tree Exhibition Hall of the Sanxingdui Museum