A Study And Collation Of Manuscripts Of Divination By Five-signs In Dunhuang

"Five-signs", a phrase referring to divination by tortoise-shell or that related with it, occursfrequently in traditional literatures. The existing literatures noting explicitly divination by five- signssourced from Tang dynasty, which show that the divination practice was already prevailing at thebeginning of the Tang dynasty and was listed by the authority of Tang dynasty as four legaldivination practices together with divination by tortoise-shell, divination by Zhouyi and Shipan. Itshigh place among the armomancy is self-evident. However, we have no way to know the details onthe armomancy due to the loss and lack of the literature about it. It is not until the emergence ofDunhuang literatures of divination by five-signs that the scholars began to focus on and thereby,have knowledge of the legal divination practice gradually. The author of this dissertation sortsthrough and studies the Dunhuang literature of divination by five-signs on the basis of the existingstudies over it.Divination by five-signs became very popular during the Tang dynasty, and lasted till the Songdynasty. Yet, it experienced such a process of development and change since its occurrence that italtered at the end of the Tang dynasty, was greatly simplified in the Song dynasty, and withered awaygradually in the South-Song dynasty. Fortunately, it was spread and put to us around Dunhuang areawhere its primitiveness was well reserved on account of the relatively enclosed surroundings causedby the special political background. The phrase "five-signs" was originally used in Divination bytortoise-shell, which refers to the crackle in the burnt tortoise-shell, namely, "sign". These signs arecalled gold, wood, water, fire and soil according to their feature, which are the signs in the divinationby five-signs. In this sense, the word originated from divination by tortoise-shell. Later, with theevolution of five elements theory and divining culture, the former became connected with Divinationby tortoise-shell and Divination by Zhouyi and applied widely. Thus, the five-element doctrinesfunctions as a bridge that connects the divination by tortoise-shell and five-element theory ofYi-ology closely together with its main embodiment on lines partitions about sign of divination bytortoise-shell and palace-partition practice of divination by tortoise-shell. In this bachground, afterthe late West-Han dynasty, divination by tortoise-shell gradually evolved towards the way offive-element theory of Yi-ology. In this process, divination by five-signs split apart from that bytortoise-shell and Zhouyi in the Northern Dynasties, and became into being as a new divinationpractice. This accounts why Divination practice by five-signs kept a close relation with that bytortoise-shell and Zhouyi. The divinatory practice of divination by five-signs resembles that ofdivination by Zhouyi and adopts the contents of eight trigrams Doctrine. The literatures aboutdivination by five-signs, Qianxu, and Divination Practice by five-element are all the representativeworks of divination practice that take five-element theory as their theoretical basis, take numbers offive elements as a way of forming its own structure system, and accordingly imitate divinationpractice of Zhouyi.At the same time, the terms and content of divinatory practice of divination by five-signs areinfluenced by divination by tortoise-shell, and the relict species could be traced in some cases, andsome contents are accord with the documents about divination by tortoise-shell. It was nature thatwith the growth of the geomancy culture, different armomancies borrowed from and even emergedwith each other. Therefore, the divination by five-element kept a close relationship with that bytortoise-shell and by Zhouyi. In addition, armomanies of other genre, such as divination by Shipan and astrology also exerted their influence upon it. Thanks to its practicability, divination by five-signinvolved numbers of divining matters. Yet, the fact that the theory of divination by five-signs wasbased on that of five-element doctrines results in the divination principles of such major diviningmatters of Divination by five-signs as theft foretelling, foretelling for passerby and illness foretellingare constructed mainly thorough five-element doctrines. These divination matters, on the one hand,exemplified the power of influence of five-element doctrines upon the traditional culture, and on theother hand, reflected the social condition and the spirit world of the people at that time, such as theirideology and belief.