Page 138 - A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols BIG Book

A-Z 131
The ‘Four Friends of the Flowers’ are the swallow, the oriole, the bee and
the butterfly.
The physical appearance of a beautiful woman is described as ‘flower-like’ and she
herself is a flower reborn. The two are essentially one and the same thing, says a 19th-
century writer.
The 15th day of the 2nd month is the festival of the Goddess of the Hundred Flowers,
Bai Hua Shen. On this occasion, young girls do obeisance to the Jade Emperor (Yu-
huang-di). In pictures of the festivities, other gods are shown arriving on boats made from
banana leaves, or on clouds, and offering flowers.
A girl can be described as ‘like a yellow flower’ (huang hua mu) if she is a virgin,
while a ‘smoke-flower’ is a prostitute, whose life, like smoke, is dissipated in the brothel.
In a ‘flower-list’ (hua bang) courtesans are listed in terms of price and attractiveness, and
‘flower-boats’ are the floating brothels in the Hongkong area and off the Middle China
coast on which courtesans sing and play and entertain guests. Expressions such as ‘to
enjoy flowers and play with the moon’ or ‘to look for flowers and enquire of the willow’
or ‘to sleep among flowers and lie under willows’ or ‘to look for flowers and challenge
grass’ – all describe a man who consorts a lot with prostitutes.
In South Chinese villages, a ‘battle of flowers’ is held on the 5th day of the 5th
Chinese month. Since the date is very close to the summer solstice when manly
vigour (yang) is at its maximum and female influence (yin) is beginning its ascent, this
symbolic battle is a kind of fertility rite. ‘Flower-heart’ is a name for the vagina. A basket
of flowers carried by a young girl is the symbol of Lan Cai-he, one of the eight
Immortals.

Flute

di; xiao

Many forms of flute are known in China, both vertical and transverse. Pan-pipes
and mouth-organs are also used. The type known as di seems to have originated in Tibet
and reached China about two thousand years ago. To the Chinese ear, the di has a
melancholy sound.
The vertical flute (xiao), on the other hand, is a purely Chinese instrument played
mainly by women. There are five holes in the upper part and one in the lower; one end is
open, the other end is closed. The flute is a symbol of the Immortal Lan Cai-he (in
other versions, of Han Xiang-zi). Pictures showing a young woman playing a flute to
a man have a sexual connotation; and the expression ‘to play with jade and blow the
flute’ refers to sexual practices, especially fellatio. In Korea, as in Europe, the flute may
symbolise the penis.