The Study Of Myths And Legends Of Huangdi

The development process of the myths and legends of Huangdi runs through the evolution history of the entire Chinese civilization.In the historical records of the past dynasties,Huangdi is said to be a model of a holy king who represents martial arts,inventions,and virtuous virtues.In Han stone reliefs,Huangdi was sometimes a majestic god,and sometimes an immortal being envied by mortals.In Taoist literature,Huangdi is held up as a religious idol who devoted himself to cultivating the Tao,possessed Taoist magic,and ascended to heaven.In the literary works,Huangdi is described as an immortal,skillful and virtuous monarch,who governs the world with his clothes hanging down.It can be said that in the development of the past dynasties,the myths and legends of Huangdi have shown the characteristics of diversified images,enriched events,multiple meanings,and diversified genres.The connotations of the myths and legends of Huangdi actually reflect the contents of different cultures in different times,such as the national thinking mode,the political intentions of the ruling class,and the belief needs of the people.Based on the above background,this paper focuses on the image of Huangdi,which exists in written documents such as history and literature,folk oral documents and unearthed cultural relics,but does not make textual research on its historical authenticity or false discrimination of a certain aspect.Instead of making a breakthrough in the ancient history of Huangdi's mythology,this paper intends to present the important stages in the formation and evolution of Huangdi's mythologies and legends in a more comprehensive and objective manner under the background of the development of Chinese traditional culture.In this process,the author fully absorbed the results of previous studies.Based on the abundant texts of Huangdi's myths and legends,this paper focuses on the cross-utilization of multidisciplinary knowledge to show the appearance of Huangdi's myths and legends in different times,and the narrative activities under the relationships between important figures.The research of the myths and legends of Huangdi,which originated from the awakening of the nation and the research of ancient history,is not only closely related to the development background of national politics and culture,but also closely related to the development trend of various related subjects-History,ancient literature,ethnology,archaeology,anthropology,folklore,mythology,religion and other disciplines had not only injected new vitality to the study of Huangdi's mythologies and legends,provided valuable research resources,but also interpreted the significance of myths and legends of Huangdi to the ancient history construction,the Chinese civilization exploration,the pattern of pluralistic integration of the Chinese nation,and national spirit formation.The full text is roughly divided into two parts.The first part is from chapter one to chapter four,which mainly elaborates the formation and evolution of the myths and legends of Huangdi.The first chapter focuses on the formation of the myths and legends of Huangdi in the pre-Qin period.The texts of the Huangdi myths represented by The Classic of Mountains and Seas showed the primitive form of the myths of Huangdi in the early stage,and then in the subsequent historical books such as Zuo Zhuan,the texts presented the Characteristics of ancient history and legends.During the Warring States period,there has been a grand occasion for discussing Huangdi by all classes of authors.The myths and legends of Huangdi carried by the scholars reflected the cultural features of the Warring States period.On the basis of recording myths and legends,they showed the initiative of “mythmaking”.During this period,the typical construction of Huangdi's identity was ancestors and saint kings.The myths and legends of Huangdi in the pre-Qin period laid the foundation for the development of Huangdi's myths and legends in the Han Dynasty and later.The second chapter focuses on the prosperity and development of the myth of Huangdi in the Han Dynasty.There are three different forms of development of the myths and legends of Huangdi in the Han Dynasty.First one appeared in the form of the official history of the “Five Emperors”,the second is in the popular oracle myths in the Han Dynasty,and the third is the myths preserved in the Han stone reliefs.The Han Dynasty was the peak period for the development of ancient myths.The development of the myths and legends of Huangdi was deeply influenced by the political culture and social beliefs in the Han Dynasty.Huangdi was not only the head of the five ancient emperors,but also the inducing saint king,as well as the prominent god and celestial being.The polymorphic development of the myths and legends of Huangdi in the Han Dynasty greatly enriched the cultural connotations of the myths and legends of Huangdi.It provided an opportunity for Huangdi to finally become the representative of two national cultural,the ancestor of the Chinese nation and the founder of Taoism.The third chapter focuses on the evolution of the myths and legends of Huangdi under the influence of Taoist culture and the analysis of the types of mythological texts derived therefrom.After the Han Dynasty,the most prominent characteristic of the development of Huangdi's myths and legends was Taoismization.Taoism rose in the late Han Dynasty and became the state religion in the Tang Dynasty,and was highly respected by the rulers in the Song Dynasty.Therefore,the influence of Taoist culture on Huangdi's myths and legends became the main background for the development of Huangdi's narrative in the Tang and Song Dynasties.Under the influence of Taoist beliefs,the image of Huangdi evolved from the original “Huangshen” to “Taozong”.He was not only an important inheritor of various Taoist spells,but also a religious idol created to fight against Buddhism at that time.The Taoist mythologies formed around Huangdi contain rich narrative types.On the basis of traditional story types,it is more vivid because of immersing in religious meaning.The analysis of the Taoist Huangdi mythological text is helpful to further understand the Taoist cultural beliefs in China.The fourth chapter focuses on the Huangdi's mythologies which were developed from elegant to popular.Judging from the recording rules of Chinese classical myths,the“elegance” of the nature of the literature to a certain extent dispels the“vulgarization” of Huangdi's myths and legends as folk literature.During the full development of popular literature in the Song Dynasty and Ming and Qing Dynasties,the myths and legends of Huangdi experienced a large-scale popularization development.The background of the reorganization of ancient history and the prevalence of folk history-telling in the new changes in Song historiography provided an opportunity for it.The myths and legends of Huangdi were interpreted in different degrees in popular literary types such as historical storytelling,early literati simulations,and Chinese traditional serial novel.This “vulgarization”movement not only enriched the narratives of Huangdi's mythologies and legends in the process of preserving the old plots and compiling and innovating plots,but also completed the task of popularizing ancient history and inheriting mythological resources among folk society.The second part is Chapter 5 to Chapter 7.The discussion is mainly based on the relationship and deeds of the three groups of characters closely related to Huangdi in the myths and legends of Huangdi.Objectively speaking,characters exist only in relationships and behaviors.Exploring their significance to the development of the narrative of myths and legends is helpful to grasp the developing process of the image and deeds of Huangdi.The fifth chapter focuses the stories of Yandi and Huangdi,which represent the mainstream narrative in the myths and legends of Huangdi.The generation of the mainstream meaning of Yandi and Huangdi mythology comes from the objective need of tracing the origin of the Chinese nation.The writing of the Yandi and Huangdi mythologies during the pre-Qin,Qin and Han dynasties is the basis for the generation of its mainstream meaning,so the myths and legends of the Yandi and Huangdi mythology in this period are the focus of this chapter.It focuses on the analysis of the origin of the relationship between the two emperors of Yandi and Huangdi,the occurrence and significance of the war between different virtues,and shows the two images tending to the ancestors of the nation.The sixth chapter discusses the legends of the ministers of Huangdi.The myths and legends of the emperor and his ministers-who built times of peace of prosperity originated here.The legends reflect the culture of the ancient Chinese feudal regime.At the same time,the “narrative motif” formed by the images of the ministers was an important driving factor for the development of the narrative of Huangdi myths and legends.The concentrated discussion on the images and deeds of the ministers can effectively reveal the political significance in the myths and legends of Huangdi.Chapter Seven analyzes the development of Huangdi's mythologies from the female perspective.The rise of feminist mythology in the mid-20 th century makes researchers turn their attention to the female issues in ancient myths.In the mythology of ancient emperors,women stay on the verge of discourse.The images of imperial concubines and imperial daughters existing as subsidiary roles in the emperor mythologies,reflect the cultural history of the patriarchal society.The contribution of women to the development of the Huangdi tribe can be proved by the contributions of Lei Zu in raising silkworms,the responsibility of Momu Wizard,and the deeds of the three daughters to the father.At the same time,the legends of the Three daughters of Huangdi is a local narrative,and the attention to its evolution process can form a dialogue space between classics and folk narratives,and further explore the evolution law of folk myths and legends.