{"id":5088,"date":"2017-02-27T12:37:14","date_gmt":"2017-02-27T02:37:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chinaheritage.net\/?p=5088"},"modified":"2022-01-07T07:01:52","modified_gmt":"2022-01-06T20:01:52","slug":"the-dragon-raises-its-head-%e9%be%8d%e6%8a%ac%e9%a0%ad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chinaheritage.net\/journal\/the-dragon-raises-its-head-%e9%be%8d%e6%8a%ac%e9%a0%ad\/","title":{"rendered":"The Dragon Raises its Head \u9f8d\u62ac\u982d"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Second Day of the Second Month \u4e8c\u6708\u521d\u4e8c in the Lunar Calendar was traditionally celebrated in Northern China as the day when the ‘Dragon Raises its Head’ \u9f8d\u62ac\u982d. In 2017, this\u00a0falls on the 27th of February.<\/p>\n

The day on which the Dragon Raises its Head has long been associated with water and rain. This time, which \u00a0with its astronomical associations symbolically marks the beginning of the new farming season, is when\u00a0tillers of the soil supplicate the dragon in the hope of plentiful\u00a0rains and bountiful crops.<\/p>\n

Tun Li-ch’en \u6566\u79ae\u81e3 writes in\u00a0Annual Customs and Festivals in Peking<\/em> \u71d5\u4eac\u6b72\u6642\u8a18:<\/p>\n

The second day of the second month is the ancient festival of Middle Harmony (\u4e2d\u548c, so called because it comes in the middle of spring), while the people of today call it the time when the dragon raises its head. The cakes eaten on this day are called dragon-scale cakes \u9f8d\u7bc0\u9905, and the noodles that are eaten are called dragon-whisker noodles \u9f8d\u9b1a\u9eb5. In the women’s quarters needlework is stopped for fear that they might injure the dragon’s eyes. \u4e8c\u6708\u4e8c\u65e5\uff0c\u53e4\u4e4b\u4e2d\u548c\u7bc0\u4e5f\u3002\u4eca\u4eba\u547c\u70ba\u9f8d\u62ac\u982d\u3002\u662f\u65e5\u98df\u9905\u8005\u8b02\u4e4b\u9f8d\u9c57\u9905\uff0c\u98df\u9762\u8005\u8b02\u4e4b\u9f8d\u9b1a\u9762\u3002\u95a8\u4e2d\u505c\u6b62\u91dd\u7dda\uff0c\u6050\u50b7\u9f8d\u76ee\u3002\u2014\u00a0trans.\u00a0<\/em>Derk Bodde<\/em>, Peking, 1936.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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From Nine Dragons \u4e5d\u9f8d\u5716\u5377 by Chen Rong \u9673\u5bb9 of the Southern Song (early thirteenth century). The Provenance of this work indicates that it was possibly\u00a0owned by Yixin \u5955\u8a22 (Prince Gong \u606d\u89aa\u738b<\/a>; 1833-1898), the regent forced from power by the Empress Dowager Cixi during the Tongzhi reign. During his years ‘in the wilderness’ \u5728\u91ce, the Prince spent time in a modest garden at a temple outside Beijing. There he was know as a\u00a0‘Hidden Dragon’ \u81e5\u9f8d (so called because of the ‘recumbent pine tree’ \u81e5\u9f8d\u677e growing nearby), nurturing his talents and biding his time, waiting to be recalled to\u00a0Court. Source: Boston Museum of Fine Arts.<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The Chinese calendar is cluttered with festivals, anniversaries and celebrations of various kinds. Local regions\u00a0have long marked the changing seasons and customs with holidays or feast days. In the dynastic era, different festivals would flourish in importance or fade into relative, or local, obscurity. In certain epochs\u00a0country-wide festivities were\u00a0proclaimed.<\/p>\n

Following the collapse of dynastic rule in 1911 and the rise of the Republic of China, traditional holidays jostled with new state-promulgated national days. Under the People’s Republic (1949-), holidays and celebrations have waxed and waned in tandem with the shifting fashions of revolutionary fervour.<\/p>\n

For instance, those\u00a0of a certain generation may well recall the decade when families\u00a0were forced to enjoy (in moderation) a Revolutionised Spring Festival \u9769\u547d\u5316\u6625\u7bc0 or Chairman Mao’s Birthday (conveniently falling on the day after Christmas). Then there was the plethora of commemorations of Party meetings, announcements, rhetorical victories,\u00a0heroes and martyrs. These were often marked with fireworks, clamorous processions with drums and slogans, as well as song-and-dance performances. For later generations, the mix of old (and many revived) festivities (and extended holidays) with the days on which the Party congratulates itself and its favoured causes (May First; May Fourth; Children’s Day (1 June); August First; October First, etc) is welcome for it means less work and more shopping.<\/p>\n

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Chinese New Year’s fireworks. Photograph by Lois Conner.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Since the Lunar New Year, China Heritage<\/em> has marked a number of traditional festive days (see here<\/a>, here<\/a> and here<\/a>), adding to our calendar today’s\u00a0celebration when\u00a0the Dragon Raises its Head.\u00a0We will return to the topic of annual festivals\u00a0in China First: Heritage Engineered<\/strong>. At that time\u00a0we will focus on\u00a0the significance of\u00a0‘An Opinion Concerning Preserving\u00a0and Enhancing\u00a0Exemplary Chinese\u00a0Cultural Heritage<\/a>‘ \u95dc\u65bc\u5be6\u65bd\u4e2d\u83ef\u512a\u79c0\u50b3\u7d71\u6587\u5316\u50b3\u627f\u767c\u5c55\u5de5\u7a0b\u7684\u610f\u898b<\/a>, a lugubrious\u00a0document\u00a0issued jointly by the Chinese party-state (that is the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and the State Council of the People’s Republic) on 25 January 2017. (In the document-driven world of bureaucracy ‘Opinions’ \u610f\u898b originate at the highest level of party-state management; they offer direct guidance and practical suggestions for the implementation of the ‘Spirit of the Centre’ \u4e2d\u592e\u7cbe\u795e when subordinate organs set about realising the vision of\u00a0the Opinion in question.)<\/p>\n

As noted in the above, the Second Day of the Second Month is predominantly celebrated\u00a0in the drier climes of the north, where beseeching rain from the heavens was long practiced. It also marks the birthday of the legendary Sage King Yao \u582f.\u00a0For the moment, we would point out that in the list of approved annual festivities and celebrations contained in the January 2017 \u2018Opinion on Chinese Cultural Heritage\u2019, The Dragon Raises its Head does not rate a mention. Indeed, the era of Chairman of Everything Xi Jinping (2012-) began with the banning in China<\/a> of a satirical image published on the cover of 4 May 2013 issue of\u00a0The Economist\u00a0<\/em>of the party-state-army leader dressed in a imperial dragon robe \u9f8d\u888d celebrating his defeat of factional enemies with a glass of champagne and a party whistle. The cover caption read: Let’s party like its 1793: Xi Jinping, the ‘Chinese Dream’ and a return to greatness<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, in China Heritage<\/em>, with the help of the work of the photographer Lois Conner,\u00a0we pause to consider the Dragon.<\/p>\n

\u2014\u00a0The Editor<\/em>, China Heritage
\nThe Second\u00a0Day of the Second\u00a0Month of the
\nDingyou Year\u00a0\u4e01\u9149\u5e74\u4e8c\u6708\u521d\u4e8c
\n27 February 2017<\/p>\n

\n

\u4e7e<\/h3>\n

Qian<\/em><\/h3>\n

Heaven<\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The importance of this moment in the cycle of being\u00a0can be\u00a0found in\u00a0Hexagram I of the Book of Change <\/em>\u6613\u7d93. This hexagram, Heaven \u4e7e\u5366, contains Six Dragons: Hidden Dragon, Dragon Seen, Flying Dragon, Dragon Leaping, Overreaching Dragon and Headless Dragon. Each is taken to represent\u00a0the natural progression of events (agriculture, political or social), phases in the unfolding of an enterprise or, in later times, the \u00a0stages of personal enlightenment. The Dragon Raises its Head is signified by the solid or Yang Line in the Second Place in the Hexagram, the Dragon is seen in the fields\u00a0\u898b\u9f8d\u5728\u7530:<\/p>\n

Yang in the Second Place<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Dragon<\/p>\n

Is seen in the fields.<\/p>\n

Draco in campis<\/em>.<\/p>\n

It profits<\/p>\n

To see a Great Man.<\/p>\n

Magnum virum<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Yang line in Yin Place. Centered. The fields lie upon the Earth, writes Cheng Yi. Now the Dragon emerges, visible above the Earth, manifesting Inner Strength, influencing\u00a0others in a \u00a0process of universal\u00a0extension. The Sage Shun cultivated the Earth and caught fish. It Profited him to see a Man of Inner Power, the Sage Yao, in order to implement the Tao.<\/p>\n

\u2014 John Minford<\/a>, The Book of Change<\/em><\/a>, 2014,\u00a0p.17ff.<\/p>\n

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Dragon \u9f8d in the hand of the Tang-era calligrapher Zhang Xu \u5f35\u65ed, from ‘Four Ancient Poems’ \u53e4\u8a69\u56db\u8cbc<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Chinese dragon, l\u00f3ng<\/em>\u00a0\u9f8d, is a\u00a0zoological miscegenation. It has the head of a camel, horns of a stag, eyes of a rabbit (or devil) and the ears of cow (or ox). These are joined by the neck of a snake to the belly of a sea-monster. It is covered with the scales of a carp, has the claws of an eagle and the pads of a tiger. Along its back are eighty-one scales. It has whiskers on either side of the mouth, and a beard on its chin, and it carries in its mouth a pearl, the symbol of wisdom. Furthermore, the dragon can change size at will, and in an instant can shrink as small as a silkworm or become so gargantuan that its form fills the skies.<\/p>\n

Although the dragon has a venerable history in China \u2014 dragon-like creatures, the ku\u00ed<\/em>\u00a0\u5914, festooned ancient bronzes \u2014 its rise to the status of imperial emblem was gradual. From the time of the Tang dynasty in the seventh century it was employed by the dynastic\u00a0house and in the following dynasty (the Song, tenth to thirteenth centuries) it became the crest of the imperial family:\u00a0a five-clawed dragon was\u00a0reserved for the use of the emperor and his immediate relatives, a four-clawed creature being a common decoration on the robes of lesser officials.<\/p>\n

In the middle of the nineteenth-century, in need of an identifying national symbol as it reluctantly entered the world of international politics, the Manchu-Qing government chose the Dragon Banner. This Yellow Dragon Flag of the Great Qing Empire \u5927\u6e05\u9ec3\u9f8d\u65d7, as it was called (the background of the flag was imperial yellow, the dragon was an Azure Dragon \u9752\u9f8d\/\u84bc\u9f8d), was first hoisted by Chinese diplomatic missions in the West from early 1862, at the start of the Tongzhi reign period.<\/p>\n

Thus, something that had been the mark of imperial power became, in the age of the nation-state when the invention of individual national identities were de rigueur<\/em>, emblematic of China as a country. As the rule of the Qing Dynasty faltered revolutionary patriots set on the overthrow of the imperial house rejected the dragon and its symbolism; it was regarded as being symptomatic of a dated and reactionary tradition.<\/p>\n

Remains of dragon-headed water spouts at the ruins of the Marvellous Realm of the Square Gourd\u00a0\u65b9\u58fa\u52dd\u5883, Garden of Perfect Brightness \u5713\u660e\u5712, Beijing. Photograph by Lois Conner.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After the Revolution of 1911, the dragon was abrogated by nationalists as they formulated a new sense of self-identity. Yet, as the century progressed, this ancient icon was gradually reclaimed as a symbol of the nascent nation-building temper of the country. Eschewed as a remnant of the feudal past on Mainland China during the height of Maoism, it has only been since the 1980s\u00a0that the dragon has been embraced once more as being emblematic of the Chinese-Han people, as well as a commercial icon with a high-recognition factor for tourists. It flourished during the first Year of Tourism of 1988, and while it was promoted by the authorities, some intellectuals criticised it as a symbol of malevolence, violence and backwardness (at the time, the published dialogue between the journalist Dai Qing \u6234\u6674 and the social scientist Yan Jiaqi \u56b4\u5bb6\u5176 on the subject of the dragon was supposed to have offended the party-state elder\u00a0Deng Xiaoping, whose Zodiac Sign was the Dragon, that it helped seal the fate of\u00a0The\u00a0<\/em>World Economic Herald<\/em> \u4e16\u754c\u7d93\u6fdf\u5c0e\u5831, the popular newspaper that ran\u00a0the conversation).<\/p>\n

In Taiwan, by contrast, the Dragon had resurfaced in the unlikely context of the US government’s recognition of the People’s Republic of China in 1979 and the abandonment of three decades of diplomatic support for the Republic of China. At the time, the campus song-writer\u00a0Hou Dejian \u4faf\u5fb7\u5065 composed\u00a0‘Heirs of the Dragon’ \u9f8d\u7684\u50b3\u4eba to express the melancholy mood of the island and a profound frustration with China’s autocratic\u00a0traditions; then and subsequently the song has generally been misinterpreted as being a paean for the outsized scaly creature and its descendants, the Chinese People.<\/p>\n

Hou’s lyrics describe a sense that many people\u00a0have had of growing up not secure in the reassuring embrace of the dragon, but rather constricted by this snake-like totem and oppressed by its mighty claws:<\/p>\n

\n
\n

In the ancient East there is a dragon;
\nChina is its name.
\nIn the ancient East there lives a people,
\nThe dragon’s heirs every one.
\nUnder the mighty claws of this might dragon I grew up
\nAnd its heir I have become.
\nLike it or not \u2014
\nOnce and forever, an heir of the dragon.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

\u00a0\u53e4\u8001\u7684\u6771\u65b9\u6709\u4e00\u689d\u9f8d
\n\u5b83\u7684\u540d\u5b57\u5c31\u53eb\u4e2d\u570b
\n\u53e4\u8001\u7684\u6771\u65b9\u6709\u4e00\u7fa4\u4eba
\n\u4ed6\u5011\u5168\u90fd\u662f\u9f8d\u7684\u50b3\u4eba
\n\u5de8\u9f8d\u8173\u5e95\u4e0b\u6211\u6210\u9577
\n\u9577\u6210\u4ee5\u5f8c\u662f\u9f8d\u7684\u50b3\u4eba<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Hou Dejian’s fellow Taiwanese writer, the acerbic essayist and historian Bo Yang \u67cf\u694a, was even more direct:<\/p>\n

I really don’t know why the Chinese people have chosen this grim, hideous figure of the dragon to symbolise our nation!\u00a0 In fact, the dragon can only symbolise the hardships of our people!\u00a0 Whenever anyone mentions ‘Heirs of the Dragon’, my hair stands on end.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It was a sentiment repeated by the mainland writers of the controversial tele-series\u00a0River Elegy <\/em>\u6cb3\u6ba4 broadcast on CCTV at the height of late-1980s openness\u00a0which excoriated China’s inward-looking, landlocked culture:<\/p>\n

\n
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In the garden of the Republican-era Presidential Palace \u7e3d\u7d71\u5e9c, Nanjing. Photograph by Lois Conner.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Some say there is an element in Chinese culture that tolerates evil; others say the fatal weaknesses of the Chinese national character are worldly wisdom, fatalism and a docile acceptance of suffering. This in no accident… . Water is the lifeblood of agriculture, and it is the dragon king who rules over water. For this reason, this nation both loves and hates the dragon, worships him and curses him.\u00a0 It is a complex combination of emotions, as twisted as the form of the dragon itself…<\/p>\n

You could say that [the dragon] is the symbol of our nation. But has anyone ever considered why the Chinese adore this terrifying monster?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

After defecting to the mainland in the early 1980s, Hou Dejian, now cast not as a forlorn Taiwanese Chinese betrayed by American dreaming but as a patriot, was for a time a darling of the authorities. ‘Heirs of the Dragon’ became something of an unofficial anthem, uniting at least superficially the Mainland, Taiwan and Hong Kong. For the Communist authorities it\u00a0lost some of\u00a0its lustre when Hou joined the protesters in Tiananmen Square in April-June 1989, and revised the song for the occasion.<\/p>\n

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Sources<\/strong><\/p>\n

The description of the dragon, and the potted history of the dragon as a symbol in China is from my In the Red: on contemporary Chinese culture<\/em>, New York: Columbia University Press, 1999.\u00a0The\u00a0quoted material from\u00a0Hou Dejian, Bo Yang and River Elegy<\/em> first appeared\u00a0in\u00a0Geremie Barm\u00e9 and Linda Jaivin, eds, New Ghosts, Old Dreams:\u00a0Chinese Rebel Voices<\/em>, New York: Times Books, 1992, pp.153-155.<\/p>\n

Also<\/strong><\/p>\n