Pets And Social Life In The Tang Dynasty

Pets come from domestic animals.The history of keeping pets can be traced back to the primitive hunting period.The Tang Dynasty's economic and cultural exchanges of domestic and foreign rapidly developed,especially in species exchanges.As the wind of keeping pets become flourish,the pet culture has been further developed,too.There are many types of pets in the period.From the biological point of view,they can be divided into mammal pets,bird pets,insects and fish pets.Affected by the martial and recreation atmosphere,these pets are given priority to with larger beasts and birds of prey,while small birds and insects secondary.From the breeding subject,pets can be divided into two kinds of court and folk.The former mainly from local,private or foreign tribute,and the latter mainly through the purchase,gift and capture,etc.The rulers of the Tang established the pet raising,management and protection system.The beasts,birds of prey pets,like eagles,hounds,elephants,rhinoceros,lions were feed in the palace imperial gardens.The Tang government set up other specialized agencies,like wufang,jifang,mafang and idle stables.There are many full-time workers,like veterinarians and handymen and other staffs responsible for domestication and health care of these palace pets.Parrot,dog,cat,crane and other small pets are relatively simple and easy to operate,so most of them are fed by individuals or families.There are some potential hazards in pet feeding,such as pet wounding,destroying farmland and crops.Therefore,these rulers promulgated the decree and the edict to regulate the pet's harmful behavior and compensation limit for breeders.There are many related laws and regulations in Tang's Law.Accordingly,the animal protection concept has been developed in Tang Dynasty.Influenced by the Confucian benevolent thought,Taoist and Buddhist idea of advocating natural or protecting animals,the successive rulers had issued some edicts to ban on killing and released animals.Bai Juyi,Xue Tao,Wang Wei,Li Shen,Xu Hun and other scholars,even monks Qi Ji also have writing poetry to encourage the cage pet back to nature.In the period of history before the Tang dynasty,the pet is still keep in the upper nobility.Up to the Tang Dynasty,the pets feeding atmosphere is extended to the scholar bureaucrat,even ordinary people's homes.Pets have important value in their secular life and religious life.In the secular life,pets have many values,such as companionship,entertainment,emotional comfort and value of life.Playing with pets is an important leisure activity.Pet has become the common image in the poetry,or a symbol of love,loyally,or to express their interests.The development of animal fighting and dance performances was very prosperous,respectively as the representative of cockfighting and horse dance performances.There also appeared to imitate the attitude of animals and birds intended to play drama.In the religious culture,the elephant,lion,parrot,crane and peacock are the incarnation of Buddha and bodhisattva.The elephant represents the birth,the lion metaphor mana.The parrot and crane have the virtue of loyalty and benevolence.Their Buddha's wisdom is very high.Blue dragon,white tiger,turtle snake,phoenix is Taoist "four" Dragon and Phoenix have many fetures of other animals.Tortoise and snake has a long and unpredictable fate of the divine.The white tiger is the God of war,and it is a symbol of power and dignity.Lions,elephants,cranes,parrots,insects,fish,turtle and other animal are given many auspicious meaning,such as,harmony,wealth.Religious teachings influence peoplei's understanding of animals.The religious image and the secular image of pet animals blend together.Pets are practical and accompanying,they can meet material and spiritual needs of people.Influenced by the concept of human settlements,the induction of literati chant description and the stimulation of religious factors,the demand for pet continues to expand,the pet value continues to soar,which promote the development of pet economy.The prosperity of pets feeding activities led to the emergence of a large number of good experts who can tame animals well.People's understanding of pets has been more indepth and comprehensive.Many animal monographs appeared,which undoubtedly promote the development animal culture research.After the mid-Tang,with a sudden turn for the worse,the brave spirit was no longer exists.Many scholars have talent,but were not taken seriously.They often borrow pets to express their grief and anger.As a result,the purpose of keeping pets is gradually from the functional level of entertainment,rise to the psychological level of spiritual comfort.Pet feeding promoted the development of social economy and culture.This life-style also enriched the Tang people's material life and spiritual life.However,a large number pet of no practical use,consumed enormous wealth,which undoubtedly contributed to the luxury enjoyment atmosphere.At the same time,because the people who are good at raising pets can get the attention of the rulers,more and more people begin to move away from agricultural production,in order to have a pet for a living.This ultimately restricts the benign development of agricultural economy and social culture.