Crocodile is original origin of Chinese Dragon: Ancient Taoist Origins

[voidisyinyang]

8 hours ago, Stosh said:

I just cant locate  a nice consecutively dated series of early images before appx 1000 BC , which would over time evolve from something identifiable. 

 

 

Exactly - we can agree that something later - after the Taoist crocodile dragon went extinct - was turned into your dragon.

 

But this is a thread about the Taoist crocodile dragon. Everyone knows about the common Chinese dragon chimera from all the line dancing.

 

I mean Lion dancing.

[Stosh]

I like that plan, begin where we can agree

[Stosh]

Subject to creative exploration , the dragon motif currently , is considered associated with water and good luck rather than an embodiment of evil .  Heres my versions. 

[Marblehead]

Those look more like salamanders.

 

[Stosh]

I was going for the  kindler gentler magical thing rather than the angry fire belching ,,,

though salamanders were indeed considered magical fire creatures in some cultures. 

You do some art ,  post something of it ... but not a butterfly   

[Marblehead]

13 minutes ago, Stosh said:

I was going for the  kindler gentler magical thing rather than the angry fire belching ,,,

though salamanders were indeed considered magical fire creatures in some cultures. 

You do some art ,  post something of it ... but not a butterfly   

Hehehe.  Had enough of my butterflies, did you?

 

I haven't been to my graphics recently because my time on the other computer has been with the music I want to add to my collection.

 

Maybe I'll look later for something.

 

[Starjumper]

5 hours ago, Stosh said:

Subject to creative exploration , the dragon motif currently , is considered associated with water and good luck rather than an embodiment of evil. 

 

The idea that dragons are evil is due to the church's attempt to destroy the indigenous spirituality of Europe, and they did an excellent job of that.   The church also said that black cats were evil and so there was a lot of work done to exterminate cats in general, which resulted in a population explosion among mice, which resulted in the plague.  Thank you again church, for appealing to the genocidal side of human nature.

[Stosh]

I just noticed I have no idea what the indigenous spirituality of Europe ..would have been.

I would need to know what that was to compare, I am just supposing that the nature of people is what dictates the nature of the religion, ,  more so,  than the reverse? And so the Chinese dragon is what people made of that archetype , and the European dragon is what Europeans made of it.  I refrain from comment on the plague though. 

"“Nero punished a race of men who were hated for their evil practices. These men were called Christians. He got a number of people to confess. On their evidence a number of Christians were convicted and put to death with dreadful cruelty. Some were covered with the skins of wild beasts and left to be eaten by dogs. Others were nailed to the cross. Many were burned alive and set on fire to serve as torches at night.”Tacitus

Edited July 17, 2017 by Stosh

[Nungali]

1 hour ago, Stosh said:

I just noticed I have no idea what the indigenous spirituality of Europe ..would have been.

 

 

 

 

1 hour ago, Stosh said:

I would need to know what that was to compare, I am just supposing that the nature of people is what dictates the nature of the religion, ,  more so,  than the reverse? And so the Chinese dragon is what people made of that archetype , and the European dragon is what Europeans made of it.  I refrain from comment on the plague though. 

"“Nero punished a race of men who were hated for their evil practices. These men were called Christians. He got a number of people to confess. On their evidence a number of Christians were convicted and put to death with dreadful cruelty. Some were covered with the skins of wild beasts and left to be eaten by dogs. Others were nailed to the cross. Many were burned alive and set on fire to serve as torches at night.”Tacitus

 

 

 baby water dragons ;

 

 

 

 

                 

 

 

 

 

[Stosh]

Dude, that's going way way back , with European rhinos?  Actually the subject has brought me to be considering some other things from that other thread, because ,some my folks come from , potentially , the homeland of either the Yamana or corded ware culture, and what is said of that , is ... very little ,, other than PIE culture had a sky god ,and an affinity for axes. Off the cuff , I am thinking , The Romans brought complex civilization to western Europe , ( this changes human dynamics , in both good and bad ways , ) initially pagan , by 185 AD or so, Rome and Christianity were already in France though Constantine hadn't made it his thing yet ( 325 ad) . If this is accurate , then Europeans were already adopting this new religion on their own, before Rome became its Patron  through its church , and it will be difficult to discern what the uncontaminated spiritual context was. 

One might start thinking about the Celts and the Druid thing, but my ancestors largely displaced the Celts in antiquity in North Eastern Europe.

So I would be wanting to be informed about the beliefs of the Yamana or the Corded ware folks , or the Vikings.

 

Sorry thats all jumbled , I am not clear on much here.. but 

The Vikings weren't above killing Dragons, so I am thinking that the Roman Church would not be the instigator of demonizing the dragon, nor was it the civilizer of western Europe, and even pagans are fine with institutional crucifixion or defining good vs evil.  

 

"In Norse mythology, Níðhöggr (Malice Striker, traditionally also spelled Níðhǫggr, often anglicized Nidhogg^[1]) is a dragon/serpent who gnaws at a root of the world tree, Yggdrasil. In historical Viking society, níð was a term for a social stigma implying the loss of honor and the status of a villain. Thus, its name might refer to its role as a horrific monster or in its action of chewing the corpses of the inhabitants of Náströnd: those guilty of murder, adultery, and oath-breaking, which Norse society considered among the worst possible crimes."

Edited July 17, 2017 by Stosh

[voidisyinyang]

Berndt, Andreas. "The Cult of the Longwang: Their Origin, Spread, and Regional Significance." In Chinese and European Perspectives on the Study of Chinese Popular Religions, edited by Philip Clart. Taipei: Boyang Publishing, 2012. Pp.61-94.

Abstract: This essay discusses the cult of the Chinese water deities called longwang (Dragon Kings or Dragon Princes). Deriving mainly from two sources - one the ancient Chinese belief in dragons itself, the other Indian snake deities called nagas or nagarajas that came to China along with Buddhism beginning in the first millennium - the cult became increasingly popular during the Tang and Song dynasties and can be found throughout the empire of the Ming and Qing dynasties. The essay focuses on how the expansion of the longwang cult can be explained. It argues that, despite historical developments, its expansion was mainly influenced by geographical factors like climate and topography. But these influences also modified the cult of the longwang: in late imperial China, instead of a homogeneous cult, a great variety of different forms of longwang worship existed. Local case studies from Qing dynasty Xuanhua (former Chaha’er), Changting (Fujian), Taigu (Shanxi), and Suzhou (Jiangsu) are introduced to illustrate these developments. (Source: book)

https://home.uni-leipzig.de/clartp/CPR_%26_Other_Religions.html

[Stosh]

Wikipedia, describes longwang ,, like a subject ,considering the four cardinal directions as dragons. It doesnt mention snakes. First millenium being hundreds of years after Lao , and many more since the origin of all Taoist lore, again snakes arent indicated as being dragons origin either. 

So I dont know what you are getting at. 

[voidisyinyang]

3 hours ago, Stosh said:

Wikipedia, describes longwang ,, like a subject ,considering the four cardinal directions as dragons. It doesnt mention snakes. First millenium being hundreds of years after Lao , and many more since the origin of all Taoist lore, again snakes arent indicated as being dragons origin either. 

So I dont know what you are getting at. 

 

Andreas Berndt did his Ph.D. thesis on dragons in China.

 

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwixpILG0KTVAhVpsFQKHXYmDfkQFggsMAI&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.qucosa.de%2Ffileadmin%2Fdata%2Fqucosa%2Fdocuments%2F20915%2FBerndt_Der%20Kult%20der%20Drachenk%C3%B6nige%20(longwang)%20im%20China%20der%20sp%C3%A4ten%20Kaiserzeit.pdf&usg=AFQjCNEy1t5nNke47fh7yBLBSObI8Ki0WQ

 

pdf link - it's in German but I snagged this quote:

 

Quote

Wang Fu says, "The people paint the dragon's shape with a horse's head and a snake's tail....his neck that of a snake...."

 

So Berndt is citing a paper called:

 

"The Dragon in Early Imperial China"

 

Actually it's a  Ph.D. thesis.

 

The Dragon in Early Imperial China [microform] - Raymond Anthony ...

https://books.google.com/books/.../The_Dragon_in_Early_Imperial_China_micro.html?i...

The Dragon in Early Imperial China [microform]. Front Cover. Raymond Anthony Dragan. Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Toronto, 1993 - Dragons - 368 pages.

 

Then he cites Creel stating the early dragons were snake-like or some aquatic animal but "unmistakably reptilian."

 

No hits for crocodile or alligator.

 

29 hits for snake in German.

 

Animal and the Daemon in Early China, The

Roel Sterckx

SUNY Press, 2012

 

yeah that dude argues what you are stating - that the dragon is fundamentally a transformational creature - between various species.

 

But he has two quotes of stating the dragon turns into a snake and vice versa.

 

So I don't know - maybe Wiki just isn't up to snuff yet on this subject.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[voidisyinyang]

Andreas Berndt

Friedrich-Alexander-University... , Erlangen · Department of Classical World and Asian Cultures

History of Religion, Other Religions

Doctor of Philosophy

 

 

So - he's a professor now based on his Snake Dragon ph.d. thesis.

 

must have been a decent argument if it scored him a well-paying career.

 

Wiki? The volunteers probably haven't noticed this German Ph.D. thesis yet.

 

Andrea Beck, Andreas Berndt (eds.), Sacred and Sacred. Perspectives of the Holy, Stuttgart (Franz Steiner Verlag) 2013, 210 pp., 22, T. farb. Fig., Kart. (Contributions to hagiography, 13), ISBN 978-3-515-10624-5, EUR 44,00.
 

[voidisyinyang]

http://www.academia.edu/6181163/The_Double-Headed_Dragon_and_the_Sky_A_Pervasive_Cosmological_Symbol

 

The Double-Headed Dragon and the Sky - Wiley Online Library

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1749-6632.1982.tb34263.x/pdf

by JB CARLSON - ‎1982 - ‎Cited by 10 - ‎Related articles

Double-headed serpents or dragons form a rather specific subclass in the bestiary ... interpreted as related cosmological images representing the sky, the rain-.

 

So he is arguing a global meaning - in China - the rainbow.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_(rainbow-dragon)

[Stosh]

While I put no stock whatever in Phds , they need to defend their conclusions like everyone else,,

There's an eternal problem with any kind of rational conclusions, ,,

one starts with unbiased factual data ,

and then,

extrapolates something they consider equally factual and un-spun, but ,

 people can put whatever meaning they want to on something ambiguous.

Horses heads don't have antlers , and snakes don't have legs. Rainbows don't have scales , and the Cardinal directions don't need animals to defend them.   

Heres my hoghead model . It has a forehead , like starjumper envisioned, a long snout , formidable teeth , and theyre actually pretty intelligent , while being both dangerous and fortuitous, and creatures of mud. 

 

Edited July 25, 2017 by Stosh

[Marblehead]

Are you suggesting that dragons may have evolved from pigs?

 

[Stosh]

21 hours ago, Marblehead said:

Are you suggesting that dragons may have evolved from pigs?

 

No, the idea was already propounded by others ,  that the head of a dragon was depicting a hog's head , sometimes with the nose of a dog , antlers of a deer , even the barbels of a catfish, or carp. I like the fish ones I've seen. I'm just showing that the muzzle of a wild river hog is quite long enough to explain dragon portraits without requiring crocs to supply the long face. 

Edited July 26, 2017 by Stosh

[KuroShiro]

Huang Di is said to have ascended to Heaven on a Dragon.

 

 

The Dragon was a spaceship.

It is known!

[Stosh]

... according to ancient astronaut theorists, who are obviously on LSD.

[gatito]

On 7/11/2017 at 2:48 PM, Starjumper said:

Ok, we're in luck.  I decided to dust off an old mask I made and take some pictures of it this morning in order to make it a little easier to draw a sketch.  This is quite an accurate rendition of the size and shape of the head of the dragon that came to see me.  I had put a frill on it in a hurry for a halloween party but that was all wrong so I took it off to make a new one.  You can see markings across the top of the head where the spines of the frill are supposed to attach.  The difficulty with the frill is finding some kind of narrow tapered rod that is a bit flexible and then finding the right kind of fabric to drape over it.  I think I'll try cutting some small bamboo we have growing here and see if that can work.

 

I took it to the halloween party and that night when I walked into the kitchen a little boy there, who was sitting on his dad's lap, burst out crying.  It looked much more impressive when the big frill was on it even though that wasn't that accurate.

 

 

 

 

So this will give some artists something to start with.

 

 

Bump...

 

[gendao]

On 7/25/2017 at 1:26 PM, Stosh said:

While I put no stock whatever in Phds , they need to defend their conclusions like everyone else,,

There's an eternal problem with any kind of rational conclusions, ,,

one starts with unbiased factual data ,

and then,

extrapolates something they consider equally factual and un-spun, but ,

 people can put whatever meaning they want to on something ambiguous.

Horses heads don't have antlers , and snakes don't have legs. Rainbows don't have scales , and the Cardinal directions don't need animals to defend them.   

Heres my hoghead model . It has a forehead , like starjumper envisioned, a long snout , formidable teeth , and theyre actually pretty intelligent , while being both dangerous and fortuitous, and creatures of mud. 

 

You might actually be right.  NY lecturer Dennis Ryan supports the theory that modern Chinese dragons originated from Hongshan boars...which were the first livestock domesticated in China...and thus probably gained significant cultural importance.

Quote

The image of the dragon as an ideological phenomenon emerged during the first phase of the Jade Age around 3500-2300 BC in the Hongshan cultural period.

the so-called “pig-dragon” (Figure A), as archaeologists have labeled it. The name derives from the features of its face, which is similar to a pig or a boar, and its curling body that reminds us of a snakelike dragon. This pig-dragon has a pair of earflaps on its head, circular eye sockets above tear-shaped nostrils and jaws with opposing upward and downward pointing tusks; it has a hole in the middle so that it can be suspended from the neck, its tail and head remain connected by a narrow slice of jade, and it seems to be coiled in fetal form.

The basic traits of this dragon reappear in the C-shaped jades of the Lower Xiajiadian culture (2600-1600 BC), as exemplified by the Sanxingtala dragon jade (Figure B).


It is interesting to note that, despite its unique traits, this dragon-pig also shared certain similarities with its early Mesopotamian counterparts: both were associated with water, fertility and power, both embody part of the mythical symbolism of the snake, and both were first represented in art in almost the same time frame (3500-2000 BC). However, we cannot yet determine whether this was just a fascinating happenstance or a possible byproduct of cross-cultural exchange between merchants or travelers who might have reached distant trade routes.

Quote

A pig dragon or zhūlóng (simplified Chinese: 玉猪龙; traditional Chinese: 玉豬龍) is a type of jade artifact from the Hongshan culture of neolithic China. Pig dragons are zoomorphic forms with a pig-like head and elongated limbless body coiled around to the head and described as "suggestively fetal".  Early pig dragons are thick and stubby, and later examples have more graceful, snakelike bodies.

Pig dragons were produced by the Hongshan culture. Along with the same culture's jade eagles (玉鷹), they often featured as grave goods.  Pig bones have been found interred alongside humans at Hongshan burial sites, suggesting that the animal had some ritual significance.

There is some speculation that the pig dragon is the first representation of the Chinese dragon. The character for "dragon" in the earliest Chinese writing has a similar coiled form, as do later jade dragon amulets from the Shang period.

 

[alchemystical]

Its also very interesting you find lots of dragon lore in the UK as well as south America and the Native Americans also had their share of flying serpent motifs.

 

Velikovsy hypothesized that they all had their common origin in the birth of Venus which was originally a comment that created a very strange and unique show in the skies for our ancestors around 1500BC who recorded it in the various myths that came down to us through time without context.