Page 312 - A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols BIG Book

A-Z 305
prepare for combat in the guise of three-legged ravens, but retreat as soon as
unicorns lay on a duel, or a qi-lin tries to swallow them up.
Ravens are supposed to be very pious birds; and they raise burial mounds to those men
who are particularly distinguished for their xiao. There are also ‘divine’ ravens who live
in temple complexes and are fed by visitors. When ravens pick up food in the shadows,
they are supposed to become pregnant, and then they spit out their young.
The croaking of ravens is variously interpreted depending on the hour when it is heard.
According to one text, croaking in the evening, from eight to ten o’clock, is a good sign;
but if it is heard between ten o’clock and midnight it is a harbinger of death. In general,
the croaking of ravens is held to be unlucky.
If a woman’s hair is described as ‘raven hair’ this means that it is black and
beautifully lustrous.
The raven, as an ugly black bird, is contrasted with the auspicious magpie in the
saying ‘Better an honest raven than a deceitful magpie.’
A ‘fire raven’ (huo ya) serves Wen yuan-shuai, one of the gods of smallpox.

Red

hong

Even in prehistoric times, red seems to have been regarded as a ‘life-giving’ colour:
evidence from burial sites suggests that cinnabar or red chalk was interred along with the
corpse. Red is the colour of the summer, of the South and also of the ancient realm of
Zhou (c. 1050–256 BC). This ‘Red Age’ had red clothing, red tassels on the hats
of officials, red seal-cords, horses, flags, sacrificial animals, etc., etc.; and it all began
with the appearance of the Red raven. This ancient stratum of popular belief is not
exhausted yet – cf. the presentation of communism as the ‘rule of the Reds’ (Feng You-

lan) and of the ‘Red Guards’ as the shock-troops of revolutionary unrest.
On the Chinese stage, a red-faced man is a holy person, often the god of war
Guan-di. Of the three gods of good fortune, the one who confers high office and riches
wears a red robe; the one beside him, dressed in green, blesses a family with
children, while the third, who gives long life, is dressed in yellow or in white. Thus,
red is also held to be the colour of wealth.
Until the 19th century, concubines were not allowed to wear red skirts; only when the
concubine went for the first time to the husband, did the chief wife give her a red garment
to wear.
‘Letting red fall’ is, as one would expect, the act of deflowering a virgin, who then
loses ‘virgin red’. One still hears the proverb ‘Red face – unhappy fate’ meaning the early
demise of a husband who is sexually plagued to death by an overdemanding wife. ‘Old
Reddy’ (hong lao) was a vulgar way of referring to rank-and-file soldiers; and ‘red
contract’ was a document officially stamped in red, authenticating a legal or business
deal, e.g. the sale of a slave. In the 14th century, a ‘red register’ was drawn up, listing all