Page 91 - A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols BIG Book

A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols 84
The Chinese believe that each man is associated with a certain star, to which he should
make sacrifice at New Year. The stars therefore symbolise ‘the people’. From his
celestial journey a man brings home a star which one day flies into his wife’s mouth.
She becomes pregnant and gives birth to a son who turns out to be a reincarnation of a
friend whom the father once helped. Shooting stars foretell the death of eminent men (see
also Longevity, Planets, Spinning Damsel and Cowherd)

Copper

tong

The Chinese word tong covers also bronze and brass. The old Chinese coin with a square
hole in the middle (often rendered as ‘cash’ in English) was made of copper.
One thousand cash formed a ‘string’ – on which the coins were threaded. The real value
of the coinage varied widely over the years, so that sometimes it was advantageous to
melt the coins down to make household goods and weapons: at other times such copper
articles would be melted down to make coins. The same sort of thing happened later
when silver bars replaced the string of cash as the higher unit.
In North China it was customary to put copper bowls and shoes in the bridal
bed, because tong = copper is phonetically identical with tong = together; and ‘shoes’
(xie) are always in pairs. So this was a way of expressing the wish that the couple would
grow old together.
In the 8th hell, or rather purgatory, sinners are forced to drink molten copper, as
they used pernicious doctrines to make money. In the 6th hell the lascivious are attracted
to a dancing partner whom they embrace – only to find too late that they are embracing a
glowing hot pillar of copper. The last Emperor of the Shang Dynasty (which ended in
1050 BC), evidently a sadist, had his opponents made fast to copper pillars which were
then heated. Bronze columns played a big part as boundary markers in the South Chinese
border areas.
For articles made out of bronze, see also Bells, Drum.

Courtyard

ting

The open space surrounded by the main dwelling, the two side buildings and the main
gateway, and which is the setting for a fair amount of family life, is known as the ting. A
ting may also be a somewhat larger room used for special occasions such as festivities
(cf. the hall). Behind the main dwelling, many houses had a rear courtyard with