Historical Changes Of Consciousness Of Mountains And Rivers Of Tang Dynasty

The beauty of mountains and rivers has been appreciated since ancient times. The culture of mountains and rivers is an important part of Chinese traditional culture. The consciousness of mountains and rivers has developed from the worship of mountains and rivers'gods before Qin Dynasty to some philosophical ideas such as Confucius'idea of comparing the characteristics of mountains and rivers with the quality of gentlemen, and Zhuangzi's idea of returning back to the nature, building a bridge between mountains and rivers and the spiritual world of human beings. When it came to Wei and Jin Dynasties, with the influence of the above-mentioned ideas and the ideology of "Xuan Xue", people began to have the real consciousness of mountains and rivers, which abandons the utilitarian purpose and the judgment of practical value while viewing the mountains and rivers. However, due to the limitation of background characteristics of times, the consciousness of mountains and rivers at that time remained in the superficial and vague level. The distance between mountains and rivers and human beings was narrowed, but people still had no clear and harmonious conception towards mountains and rivers until Tang Dynasty. There are some backgrounds that help the consciousness of mountains and rivers of people in Tang Dynasty present a remarkable feature of times, such as the prosperity of Tang Dynasty; the religious culture, as a social trend of thought, coming into the ideology of literati of Tang Dynasty; the two kinds of life styles, imperial examination and reclusion, having been commonly accepted by the literati; and Tang people's special outlook of space-time, region, and ocean. The famous mountains and great rivers in Tang people's view are not only those identified by national authority, but also those related to religion, culture, transportation, and economy. Those mountains and rivers came into the view of common literati, and with the description of scholars, their image had a qualitative change in the ancient history. Tang people give the mountains and rivers a clear conception, that is to say, each mountain and river has its own unique characteristics, and Tang people view mountains and rivers without any utilitarian purpose of Han Dynasty and without any philosophy about mountains and rivers presented by the Song Dynasty5. The relation between mountains and rivers and human beings becomes harmonious and congruous in Tang Dynasty. The dissertation uses six chapters to explain the above-mentioned ideas. The introduction part makes a brief survey of the development of consciousness of mountains and rivers before Tang Dynasty, and talks about the author's opinion of the traditional outlook of mountains and rivers. Chapter one expounds the overall understanding of natural mountains and rivers in the society of Tang Dynasty, from the aspects of buildings, palaces, mausoleum, religion, literature, drawings,and the five great mountains and four great rivers authorized by the Tang government and some other famous mountains and rivers. Chapter two talks about the famous mountains in the view of people in Tang Dynasty, which are put into the following three categories: the five great mountains concerned with sacrificial rites, famous mountains related to religion, and great mountains associated with literature. This chapter also makes a comparison of the differences of the understandings of mountains of Tang people and those of the people in previous dynasties. Chapter three is concerned with the great rivers in the view of people in Tang Dynasty. The emphasis is placed on the consciousness of rivers, lakes and oceans in the eyes of Tang people. We also make a comparison of the differences of the consciousness of water of Tang people and that of the people in previous dynasties.In addition, we emphasize that the consciousness of ocean plays an important role in promoting Tang people's consciousness of water. Chapter four summarizes the remarkable characteristics of Tang people's consciousness of famous mountains and great rivers. Moreover, we compare the differences and association between the mountains and rivers authorized by the national government and those attracting the common literati. We also analyze Tang people's psychological feature that they do not like climb high mountains, and the attraction of the mountains along the middle and lower reaches of Changjiang river to Tang people's consciousness of mountains and rivers. Chapter five conducts an analysis of the historical reasons of the formation of Tang people's consciousness of mountains and rivers, such as the following items: the permeation of religious culture; Tang people's unique outlook of space-time, region, and ocean; the influence of land and water transportation and the center of economic development of Tang Dynasty on the consciousness of mountains and rivers; the imperial examination, the trend of reclusion, and the government officials'system of Tang Dynasty. Chapter six makes a summary of the consciousness of mountains and rivers of Tang Dynasty, and states its influence on the consciousness of mountains and rivers of the following dynasties. Diachronically, we compare its relationship and differences with that of Wei and Jin Dynasties and its influence on that of Song Dynasty. Synchronically, we sum up the remarkable features of the consciousness of mountains and rivers of Tang Dynasty in that background of times. The last part is a summary that concludes the whole dissertation. It is inevitable that people's consciousness of mountains and rivers has not undergone a remarkable change and formed a distinctive consciousness of mountains and rivers until Tang Dynasty.