Bronze dragon, from Shi Siming's tomb near Beijing, a Turko-Sogdian general who proclaimed himself an emperor in the rebellion against Tang dynasty in 8th c. His Sogdian name -suat-kan- is a Manichaean term for "flame"...
Snake = Sun's heat. Dragon = Old Snake = destructive Sun's heat of the late summer early autumn, which causes drought...
This is true in Mesopotamia (I talked about it in my post "Seven headed dragon")
In Bactria (I talked about this in my post "Bactrian snakes and dragons")
In Europe (I talked about this in my posts "Enemy of the sun" and "Dragon that stole rain")
But not in China...Chinese dragon is a rain deity that fosters harmony...Why? Because of Chinese climate...
Dragons appeared in China for the first time during Neolithic...These artifacts, called "jade dragon rings" from the Xinglongwa culture (6200–5400BC) are interpreted as the oldest dragon depictions in China...
The Hongshan_culture (4700-2900BC) succeeded Xinglongwa culture. And they loved dragon rings...So much they became obsessed with them and made pile and pile and pile of them...
Looks familiar? This is the earliest example of Ouroboros: Serpent biting its tail. Remember Dragon is an old snake, which represents sun's heat. Dragons's head is the hottest part of the year, and his tail is the coldest part of the year...And the dragon/serpent biting its tail represents never ending spinning of the solar year and the change of seasons...
I talked about this in my post "Yormungandr"...
Before I saw these Neolithic Chinese Ouroboroses I thought that they appeared for the first time in Ancient Egypt.
So if dragon is the symbol of the destructive heat of the late summer, why is the Chinese dragon "a rain deity that fosters harmony"?
Because this is what the climatic year looks like in North Eastern China: The maximum heat corresponds to maximum precipitation...
The dragon (the hottest sun of the late summer early autumn) really does bring rain...Shit loads of it actually...
Yin (water, down, rain) and Yang (fire, up, sun) in balance and harmony...
I talked about Yin and Yang as a symbolic description of the interplay between sun and earth and the climate they create in my post "Yin and Yang"...
By the way, did I mention that the dragon mad Hongshan culture guys belonged to the paternal haplogroup N-M231??? It is estimated that this was the predominant haplogroup in the region in the Neolithic period at 89%, its share gradually declining over time!!!
Today this haplogroup is most common in Finland, the Baltic states and among northern Siberian ethnicities, such as the Yakuts.
Any Fins here today? What the fuck were you guys doing in China 7000 years ago and what's the story with the "dragon thingy"?
Well the story is all about the beginning of agriculture and the domestication of millet...But more about it in another post soon....
Thanx a lot, now I can't wait :/
ReplyDelete