Posted on 02/26/2004 12:30:26 PM PST by blam
'Descendants of the Dragon' confirmed at the Liaohe River Valley
In thousands of years, the Chinese people have been deeming themselves as "the descendant of the dragon" though there is no enough solid proof to support the statement. But in this year, with continually findings of dragons in archeological work at the Liaohe River Valley, the statement that the Chinese people are "the descendant of the dragon" is further confirmed.
In thousands of years, the Chinese people have been deeming themselves as "the descendant of the dragon" though there is no enough solid proof to support the statement. But in this year, with continually findings of dragons in archeological work at the Liaohe River Valley, the statement that the Chinese people are "the descendant of the dragon" is further confirmed. Dragon, in Chinese people's minds, is a symbol of luckiness and wisdom. Dragon is credited with magic power to control wind and rain, transport humans to the celestial realms and bring about auspicious signs. It is regarded as a bridge between human and heaven and gods. Dragon is introduced into areas including ancient study of celestial phenomena, study of destiny and monarch politics, which adds a bit mysterious color to itself.
Since 1983, archeologists have carried out excavations at Red Mountain remains of ancient culture, Niuheliang, the Liaohe River Valley and unearthed a great deal of valuable cultural relics. Of the items unearthed, two dragon shaped jade articles drew most attention. To discover the whole picture of the remains, the Research Institute of Archeology of Liaoning Province carried out a final excavation at the 16th site of the remains in 2003. The excavation work covered an area of 1, 575 square meters. Six tombs, 479 pieces of relics including jade articles were unearthed. In this excavation, the third piece of jade dragon was discovered in a tomb as well.
The jade dragon carving, made of soft jade in light green color by grinding, resembled the Chinese character "dragon" in ancient inscription on bones and turtle shields. It took the same shape with the other two dragons unearthed in 1984.
In the 1970s, a similar jade dragon was discovered in Sanxingtala village, Wengniute Banner of Chifeng City, Inner Mongolia. Confirmed by professor Su Bingqi, a famous archeologist and President of the Chinese Archeology Society, the jade dragon of Sanxingtala is by far the earliest Chinese traditional dragon-shaped jade article ever found.
Niuheliang Ruins is situated at the junction of Jianping country and Lingyuan county of northeast China's Liaoning Province. Covering an area of 50 square kilometers, it is the place where the famous Red Mountain culture site locates. Red mountain culture derives its name from the Red Mountain at north suburb of Chifeng city, Inner Mongolia, where the site was discovered. Red Mountain Culture was created by tribes living at west Liaohe River valley about 5,000 to 6, 000 years ago. Numerous prehistoric potteries and jade articles were discovered here. The head portrait of the "Red Mountain Goddess" and site of an ancient country consisting of temple, tombs excavated in 1984 once caused a great stir in the world.
At the Liaohe River valley, painted dragons and dragon statues were continually discovered at Zhaobaogou remains of ancient culture and Chahai remains of ancient culture, which can be traced back to 6, 000 and 8, 000 years ago respectively. Hence archeologists including Su Bingqi concluded that the Liaohe River was the cradle of the Chinese dragon.
Guo Dashun, a famous archeologist and a member of the standing committee of the Chinese Archeology Society, said the dragon of the Liaohe River featured various types and series apart from old ages. The dragon of the Liaohe Rive made in early years could be divided into eight types, namely statue, basso-relievo, woodcarving, depicted, colored pottery, clay sculpture, jade carving and color depicting chronologically. A total of 21 dragons were discovered.
Guo said the jade dragon carving unearthed at the Liaohe River vividly embodied a combination of various animals. Among the antitypes were pig, deer, bear and bird. After interaction and influence between the animals' antitypes, through continuous human processing, the dragon design was finalized. The process was tightly related to the origin and development of the Chinese civilization, the country and its people. Dragon, therefore, has been regarded as symbol of the Chinese people for thousands of years.
With a drainage area of 345, 000 square kilometers, the Liaohe River runs across northeast China's Liaoning, Jilin Provinces, eastern part of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region and northern part of Hebei Province. The Liaohe River is deemed as one of the cradles of the Chinese civilization and the Chinese people.
By People's Daily Online
Also, it is my opinion that the people living in Northeast China at that time (or close to that time) were Caucasian tribes with names like Saka, Xiongnu, Yuezhi. Comments?
There are numerous Chinese poems written about the green eyes of the Han Emperors.
The Curse Of The Red-Headed Mummy
Victor Mair and company found jade mining in the area where these mummies were found.
Both Pottery and Jade images from 2500 BCE to 4,700 BCE show Asian facial features. However both "slanted" and "round" eyes are found in the Liangzhu Culture (3,200 to 2,000 BCE), outside the Yellow River Valley (and frustrating the CCP). There were multiple culture centers in China -- North near Present day Korea, South along the Coastand Pearl Rover, from Beijing to the Yellow River and strung out along what was to become the silk route, and Southeast to Southwest along the Yangzi. The more recent day Caucasians were, of course near and North of the Silk Route. The Tibet Plateau and rainforests south of it were difficulties to Indic cultures until 200 /300 BCE. Any Caucasian groups would have been most likely to have come through the Yellow River.
Sorry for the disconected thoughts. Do you recall any Dragon immages in Scythian art or Scytho-Dravidian?
I know there's an important Scythian myth involving serpents, and I'm pretty sure there's examples of art that go with it, though I haven't seen them myself yet. Here's some information:
According to a Scythian myth (The History of Herodotus: Book IV), the first man Targitaos begat three sons. Another myth reports (the same source) that the Scythian equivalent of the Greek god Heracles met a woman with features of a serpent instead of the legs. So this semi-serpent bore him three sons. On these grounds, I think that Targitaos is equal to Heracles (Raevsky 1994: 206), and his name reads Tar gita 'The giving (god)' (cf. Russian dar 'gift', god 'year', Lithuanian guodas 'honour, glory, entertaining'), it is the Russian pagan god Dazh'bog 'The giving god' (Rybakov 1987: 76) and the Proto-Slavonic god Dar 'The giving (god)' of the Phaistos disk.
[SNIP]
Let us examine the names of Targitaos' children, and then we shall search for the name of the semi-serpent goddess.
[SNIP]
Now one can find the name of the semi-serpent goddess. This character is represented on a Scythian gold horse frontlet (Galanina, Domansky and Smirnova 1981: 67, 68, photo). The goddess stands on the border of two worlds; the World Tree with 12 branches or petals (they are 12 months, i.e. a whole year) is depicted above her head. Her legs are replaced by two serpents. According to Y.A. Shilov's (1995: 189-90) investigation of the archaeological cultures of the Indo-Aryans, the team of a bull was presented together with the two snakes and symbol of fertility in a burial. On the other hand, the Indo-Aryan bull god Rudra 'Howling' was associated with snakes (Shilov 1995: 192). On these grounds I conclude that Argimpasa [Ar gim pasa] is this semi-serpent goddess. There is a good probability that an image of the goddess is a cow, too. Some features of this goddess are reflected in the Russian pagan gods Yarila and Veles.
Circassian g''ethe 'spring-time' is comparable with Russian gad 'reptile (snake)', gadyuka 'snake species', Serbo-Croat gad 'dirtiness, mud', and Old Indian gad 'to crawl'.
Just off the top of my head, Beouwolf..Merlin. King Arthur's dad was named Pendragon. Notice how dragons frequently have fire coming out their mouths? (comet imagery?)
Mair believes the pre-Tocharians were the 'red-headed mummies' in my post #6.
Yup. I read about a dwelling in England that has been continuously lived in for 1200 years. Amazing when we think about American housing, huh?
What I was trying to figure out was the Sichuan art (4,800 - 1,100 BCE) that is so very different from other Chinese art.
Yup. How do you know so much about this region. Very few people do.
Did you read The Tarim Mummies by JP Malloy and Victor Mair? I've read that book three times and still cannot absorb it all. Another good one on the same subject is The Mummies Of Urumchi by Elizabeth Barber.
My mind is gone too. lol
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