Page 287 - A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols BIG Book

A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols 280
The peach is the most usual symbol of longevity. Until very recently, peach
boughs were placed before the gates of houses at New Year, in order to drive away evil
spirits; and bows were made from peach-wood so that demons could be shot down.
Tutelary gods guarding the doors were carved from peach-wood. Later, paper models
were used instead.
The immortality associated with the peach is a favourite theme of the great lyric poets
of the Tang Dynasty. Thus in Li Bo (701–62):

Peach petals float their streams away in secret

Three peaches, five bats

To other skies and earths than those of mortals.
(Tr. Arthur Cooper, Penguin Books, 1973)

This is a reference to the celebrated short story by Tao Qian (365–428) entitled
‘The Story of the Peach-blossom Spring’. A simple fisherman follows a stream to a
spring issuing forth from a cave, through which he passes to find another world where
people lead a happy existence. This cave was often sought in the western regions of
Hunan, and has been identified as a holy place of the Zhuang, a non-Han minority in
South China. According to the Yao, another minority people in the same area, there are
twelve peach-blossom caves, and they are stations on the way from this world to another
life after death.
In popular parlance, however, ‘peach-blossom spring’ is used in more down-to-earth
fashion as a metaphor for the vagina.
Peach-blossom is compared to the fine colouring of a young girl, but the term may
also refer to a woman who is somewhat easy-going and only too ready to be seduced.
‘Green peach-blossom’ is a metaphor for a secret meeting-place of lovers. ‘Peach-
blossom eyes’ are the moist, appealing eyes of actors playing female parts. In folk-poetry,
the words ‘A drop of peach-blossom stains the azure coat’ refers to loss of virginity. ‘To