What kind of mythical beast is Taotie?

The mythical beast in ancient Chinese legends

Taotie is the mythical beast in ancient Chinese legends. The Taotie is said to be one of the four ferocious beasts in ancient times. Ancient bronzes were often decorated with its head shape, which is called the Taotie pattern. Legend has it that he is the son of Jinyun family. One said it was Chi You who had his head cut off. Nowadays it is used to describe people who eat extremely well. The word "Taotie" first appeared in "Zuo Zhuan". According to records in "Zuo Zhuan: The Eighteenth Year of Wen Gong", Ji Sun Xingwen once sent someone to tell a story to Lu Wen Gong. When describing someone who was greedy for good goods and plundered and amassed money, he compared it to gluttony. It can be seen that gluttony was already connected with food at that time, and it was also deduced that it can be further compared to the greed for money.

According to "Lu's Spring and Autumn Annals", Taotie was already an evil beast in the early Zhou Dynasty that "eats people without swallowing them, causing harm to the whole body". However, it is difficult to say whether the early Zhou Dynasty was the beginning of the popularity of the Taotie story, because archeology shows that the Taotie pattern appeared as a decoration on the jade objects of the Liangzhu Culture in the Yangtze River region 5,000 years ago.

Ding and Taotie

The shape of the head is often engraved on the ancient bells, tripods and Yi vessels as decoration. "Lu's Spring and Autumn Annals·Xian Shi": "Zhou Ding's Taotie Ding has a head but no body. He cannibalizes people without swallowing them and harms his body, so he should repay them with words." Shang Xiang's Taotie Ding and Shang Kui's Dragon Taotie Ding are all made of This creation.

Volume 26 of Song Shaobo's "Records after Hearing and Seeing": "In the early days of Shaosheng, my ancestor was an official in Chang'an Mansion. He sold soup cakes in front of the Han Emperor Gaozu Temple in Xicheng, and got a white jade box with more than a foot high. It is engraved with clouds, dragons and phoenixes, the cover is a sacred mountain in the sea, and the foot is a Taotie. It is a treasure of the three generations."

With the changes of the times, the Taotie pattern on the tripods of the Shang and Zhou Dynasties, which has the meaning of governing the body and the country, was gradually adopted. People forget.

The "Wei Shu·Huan Xuan Biography" of the greedy and crippled person: "The concubine who took the concubine is almost the same as the six bodies, so he made the servant of the minister serve as the matchmaker, the chief historian to welcome the guests, the concubine was gluttonous, and he congratulated the concubine. Everlasting Autumn."

Glutious Cao Yu's "Beijing People" Act 1: "And he is particular about eating. He is a famous glutton who is good at tasting the good and evil of food." Standing on the lid of the tripod. It is also said that greedy food is called Taoist, so gourmets are commonly called "Lao Tao"; greedy money is called Tie, which represents the greed in human nature in the world.

"Taotie" is a ferocious beast in ancient Chinese legends. Its characteristic is that it can be eaten. It is an imaginary mysterious monster. This kind of monster has no body because it is so good at eating that it eats its own body. It only has a big head and a big mouth. It is very greedy and finally ate itself. It is a symbol of greed, so it is often used to describe gluttonous or greedy people.

Later generations exaggerated the gluttonous part of the image of Taotie. Su Dongpo once wrote an article called "Ode to the Taotie" which said: "I gather the beauty of things to nourish my old glutton." It adds cuteness to the Taotie, and friends who like delicious food are also called "Taotie tribe".

Tang Du Fu's "Muntuntjac" poem: "A thief in clothes and a thief, and a gluttonous beard." Li Yu in the Qing Dynasty's "Nai He Tian·Huo Jian": "In the end, the gluttonous people who come to the table will not tolerate the empty food. "Nie Gannu's "A Brief Talk about Mr. Lu Xun": "And the evil spirits of human beings are perched on these living corpses, feasting on human flesh on the dead lives."

Gluttonous Patterns<. /p>

The animal face decorations on Shang and Zhou bronzes reflected people's worship of natural gods at that time, so they had a mysterious and solemn atmosphere. However, there are still different opinions on the specific meaning of these mysterious decorations. Bronze ware embodies the consciousness of "respecting gods" among the ancestors of the Yin and Shang dynasties. In the Zhou Dynasty, it developed into "respecting heaven and ancestors", forming a symbol of the trinity of religion, political power, and clan power. Most scholars believe that the rulers of the Shang and Zhou Dynasties used the "monstrous and terrifying" bronze decorations to express the "mysterious majesty" of royal power and to express their possession of political power, status and wealth, which was daunting. The slave owners placed all their majesty, will, honor, fantasy and hope in these horrific and ferocious decorations.

Use divine power to control things. Therefore, wizards who "can communicate with gods" have a very high status, and the wizard class has become the original imperial ruling class. Sacrifice is the prerogative of wizards, and it is also the central link to communicate between humans and gods and to sanctify the order of the world. Wizards used the animals on bronze vessels to communicate with gods, so these weird animal patterns represent mystery and power.

In addition, the most primitive form of the bodyless animal mask pattern is just a pair of round bubble-shaped breast nails to represent the eyes of the animal mask. Its origin can be traced back to the Erlitou Culture. Later, the corners of the nose and mouth were gradually added. The ears and eyebrows become an animal face with complete organs.

Eyes are the main body of animal masks. Since animal masks generally only show two eyes, they should have originated from prehistoric eye worship.

There are pairs of eye patterns on prehistoric painted pottery and pairs of eye patterns on jades. In the late Neolithic Age, there were already standard animal facial patterns, as well as a simplified form of animal facial patterns, namely eye patterns. According to research by Mr. Tang Huisheng, the god of heaven in shamanism is also the sun god. The sun god is often drawn in the shape of an eye, because in many ancient myths, the sun is called the "eye of the sky." For example, the sun god of Brahmanism is also called the "Eye of the Sky" or the "Eye of the World". Scholars who hold this view believe that the Taotie pattern in the traditional sense is not just an animal mask pattern. The Taotie should be a genus of the god of heaven or the sun god. The emphasis on the eyes in the Taotie pattern is precisely because of its role as the sun god - —Description of the characteristic of light.

The Taotie pattern first appeared on jades from the Liangzhu Culture in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River 5,000 years ago. However, the Taotie pattern is more common on bronzes, especially tripods, as far back as Erlitou Xia. It appears on the bronzes of the culture.

However, the name "Taotie Pattern" did not exist in ancient times, but was named by people in the Song Dynasty when epigraphy was rising. The most perfect Taotie mask is 21.0 cm high and is now in the Seattle Library in the United States. This pattern usually takes the bridge of the nose as the midline and is arranged symmetrically on both sides.