Page 37 - J. P Morgan Collection of Chinese Art and Porcelain

HISTORICAL INTRODUCTION

emblem of the masonic craft. This last is Nii Wa, who

is variously represented as either the consort, or sister
of Fu-hsi; their bodies terminating in the forms of
dragons or serpents, are intertwined below, and so are

those of the attendant sprites supported by rolled
clouds ending in birds' heads. Fu-hsi first traced the

—eight trigram symbols of Chinese divination, and he also

invented knotted cords records like the Peruvian

quippus, which are said to have preceded Chinese hier-
oglyphics. The third of the San-huang was Shen-nung,

the Divine Husbandman, who first fashioned timber into

ploughs, and taught his people the art of husbandry.

He discovered the curative value of herbs, and founded

the first markets for the exchange of commodities.
WuThe
Ti, or Five Rulers, who succeeded the above,

are depicted in the same series of bas-reliefs. They

wear the long official robes and the square-topped hats

hung with pendants of jade, which were adopted by the
first of their number, the famous Huang-ti, a promi-

nent personage at the dawn of Chinese history. He

was the founder of the first hereditary line, whose capital
was near the modern Hsi-an Fu, in the province of

Shensi. Many of the industrial arts, including that of

welding clay, are traced back to his time, and his prin-

cipal consort, Hsi-ling Shih, who first taught the people

to rear silkworms, is still worshipped as a deity on that
account. The Taoist mystics have transformed Huang-

ti, the "Yellow Emperor," into a miraculous being who

invented alchemy, and was the first to gain immortality.

He is identified by Terrien de Lacouperie with Nak-
hunte, and made the leader of his so-called Bak tribes,

which are supposed to have traversed Asia from Elam
to China, and to have started a new civilization in the

valley of the Yellow River; while his predecessor, Shen

Nung, is identified with Sargon, who is supposed to

have ruled in Chaldaea about 3800 B. C. But such

speculations are difficult to follow, although there

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