The Chinese consider the Dragon to be the strongest of mythological creatures and the most prominent member of their array of auspicious beasts. Most people are familiar with its form, but no one has seen a real dragon in the flesh.
The Dragon is an important component of Chinese culture and, down the ages, has served to symbolise the pursuit of fine items and prayerful yearning for them. From the earliest times, it was absorbed into the conventions of daily life and formed an “auspicious culture”. Its material manifestation was as the “dragon” totem, reflected in vernacular customs and different genres of artistic creation, for example, painting, utensils, architecture, and clothing.
Carpet with nine five-taloned imperial dragons
Qing dynasty (1644-1911)
A brightly-coloured red tufted carpet depicting nine five-taloned imperial dragons, which should be used in palace or palace during imperial visits. Five-taloned dragons of this type is noble and symbolize imperial power, while the Chinese character for the numeral ‘‘nine’’ (pronounced ‘‘jiu’’) connotes ‘‘everlasting’’ (pronounced ‘‘chang-chang-jiu-jiu’’).
In Chinese mythology, the phoenix is the most beautiful auspicious bird, and in its earliest form, it was also a clan totem of distant antiquity that possessed mysterious qualities. Legend has it that when the phoenix appeared, the myriad varieties of birds would flock together, and the fortunes of the empire would greatly prosper. With the world under Heaven (China) at peace, it was as if the phoenix and Dragon, of equal status, were situated at opposite ends of a hall, offering salutations to one other.
In another legend, the feng phoenix is the male, while the huang phoenix is the female. Taken together, the “feng-huang“ phoenix causes happiness. Every five hundred years, bearing the burden of the accumulated karma of humankind, it plunges into a fiery furnace and so ends its life in exchange for rejuvenating Auspiciousness and happiness in the human sphere. Finally, by bathing in fire, it obtains rebirth, and this is called “the nirvana of feng-huang“, which symbolises an unyielding and unflinching resilience of spirit. For this reason, feng-huang is also employed as a metaphor for the sage.
Tray with contrasting colours (doucai) depicting the characters in the story “Playing flute to attract phoenixes”
Kangxi period, Qing dynasty
This tray has a white glaze as its ground. The central portion of the tray uses the doucai technique of painting in contrasting colours to depict the characters in the story”Playing flute to attract phoenixes”. This tale comes from the chapter ‘‘Xiaoshi’’ (a person’s name) in Liu Xiang’s Lie xian zhuan (Biographies of assembled celestial beings). The central portion of this tray depicts just this very story of Xiaoshi and Nongyu attracting phoenixes.
This tray has a regular form and a general shape. Its roughcast is thin, and its glaze is lustrous jade-like white. Decorative patterns are crisp and clear, their style loftily elegant, and the contrast between red and blue is marked. The overall connotation of the depiction is one of happy celebration and the auspiciousness of wealth and rank.
Legend has it that in the epoch of Duke Mu of Qin (705 B.C. – 621 B.C.) in the Spring and Autumn period, there lived an individual called Xiaoshi who was adept at playing the vertical xiao bamboo flute. Whenever he played, birds such as peacocks and white cranes were attracted by its sound. Duke Mu had a daughter named Nongyu, who also loved music, so Duke Mu gave her hand in marriage to Xiaoshi. After the wedding, husband and wife accompanied one another, playing music. Xiaoshi taught Nongyu to play the xiao, which attracted phoenixes to stop on top of their house. Duke Mu had a phoenix terrace built especially for them, and after husband and wife had lived there for several years, one day, they flew away with the phoenixes and became celestial beings.
Confucius said: “When the Son of Heaven (the emperor) promulgates virtuous morality, this will cause peacefulness to prevail, and the unicorn, phoenix, tortoise, and dragon will be the first to present their auspiciousness for its sake’’, the meaning expounded here is that when four kinds of auspicious creatures appear—the unicorn, phoenix, tortoise, and dragon—they represent that the world under Heaven is at peace. This sentence is recorded in the ancient book Kong congzi (Collected essays of Confucian philosophers), from which the phrase “the dragon and phoenix present auspiciousness’’ was extracted and written more than two thousand years ago.
Wine pot with famille rose dragon and phoenix
Daoguang period, Qing dynasty
The entire teapot has a white glaze as its ground. In blue and white with other colours added, it imitates the style of wine flasks furnished with semicircular handles opposite the spout in the Wanli era of the Ming dynasty. The tip of the spout itself is moulded with a chicken’s head in red glaze as the mouth of the vessel and is thus a combination of form and spirit. The handle is embellished with a brushstroke of red glaze, which matches the spout and adds a further layer of inventive craftsmanship. One face of the body uses blue, green, and red glazes to depict a huge dragon with fangs opened and claws brandished and coiled in the air. Surrounding this on all sides are cloud patterns, gorgeously dense in colour. The other face depicts, in many hues, a brightly-coloured phoenix, lovely in form and gaudy in colour, soaring and wheeling in the sky. The phoenix body is in a yellow glaze, while its head and wings are blue, and its tail is richly multicoloured.
The dragon and phoenix are both auspicious spirits. A matching combination of dragon and phoenix is called in the vernacular: “the dragon and phoenix present auspiciousness”. The auspiciousness is for what one mainly desires: the country security, the people at peace, happiness and health, and a joyful marriage for a hundred years.
