In ancient Chinese myths and legends, the marriage of Fuxi and Nuwa's siblings is the two most well-known stories, and it is also an important example of the existence of blood marriage in China.
Nuwa appears repeatedly in ancient documents, such as in "Chu Ci Tianwen": "Nuwa has a body, who is the craftsman?" Wang Yi of the Eastern Han Dynasty mentioned in his commentary: "According to legend, Nuwa's human head and snake body can change seventy times a day. ”
Nuwa, a goddess known as the "Divine Woman" in ancient times, is good at cultivating all things; Fuxi, revered as a "strange god", is listed as one of the Three Emperors in ancient literature.
Fuxi has a strange image of a serpent body and a human head, and is considered to be holy. He invented gossip and writing, and pioneered the system of marriage, with lipi as a ritual.
In some legends, Nuwa and Fuxi are considered to be siblings. For example, "Spring and Autumn Genealogy" and "Customs and Customs" both mention that Nuwa is Fuxi's younger sister. There are even ancient texts such as Li Kang's "Duyi Zhi" in the Tang Dynasty, which records the legend of Fuxi and Nuwa's brother and sister getting married.
In these ancient legends, the images and deeds of Nuwa and Fuxi are full of mystery and magic.
At the beginning of the ancient universe, only two people, Fuxi and Nuwa, lived at the foot of Kunlun Mountain, and there were no other human beings in the world at that time. So, they discussed whether they should become husband and wife and have offspring, but because they were brother and sister, they were very ashamed of it.
When they hesitated, they climbed to the top of Kunlun Mountain and swore to heaven: "If God makes us husband and wife, then give us a revelation and let the clouds and smoke on the horizon gather; If we don't become husband and wife, let all the smoke disperse. ”
As soon as the words fell, I saw that all the clouds and smoke had gathered. So, they eventually got married and gave birth to the entire human race. However, when they intersected, Nuwa was still so ashamed that she covered her face with a fan woven from straw.
This is the origin of the use of fans by women in later generations. In fact, according to archaeological excavations in recent decades, paintings and carvings on the theme of Nuwa and Fuxi are very common.
For example, the portrait stones and portrait bricks of the Han Dynasty found in Shandong, Jiangsu and other places, the stone carvings of the Han tomb in Dahuting in Mi County, Henan, and the silk paintings of the ** soil of the Astana tomb in Turpan, Xinjiang, all have the images of Nuwa and Fuxi with snake heads and snakes and tails intertwined with each other.
Some of the portrait stones and portrait bricks also depict the images of Pangu, Nuwa, and Fuxi at the same time, forming a complete mythological picture of the Chinese ancestors who opened the world and created mankind.
It is worth noting that, according to the records of Du Guangting of the Fifth Dynasty, in the Central Plains, including Henan and Shaanxi, there were many Fuxi Nuwa temples, Fuxi tombs and Nuwa tombs in the Central Plains at that time.
Later generations recorded that Fuxi was called "the first system of marriage", and that Nuwa "prayed to the god of the shrine, prayed for the female matchmaker, and was married because of the faint marriage" ("Customs and Customs"), and worshiped her as the god of marriage, all of which are related to the myths and legends of their brother and sister getting married.
The myths and legends of Nuwa and Fuxi are also very popular in ethnic minority areas. When discussing the ancient history of China, the modern scholar Xu Xusheng said: "In the early Qing Dynasty, Lu Ciyun's "Dongxi Fiber Chronicles" once said: 'The Miao people sacrifice to report grass.
Sacrifice witches, set up Nuwa and Fuxi seats. Modern anthropologists have investigated the field and obtained some Miao legends. According to their legends, the Miao people are all from Fuxi and Nuwa.
They were originally brother and sister (or sisters), but they were the only ones left when the flood cut them off. They are worthy to be husband and wife, and they are human beings. ”
1.Research in recent years has shown that the myths and legends of many ethnic minorities, especially the Yao, Zhuang, Yi, Bai, Hani, Lisu, Lahu, Wa, etc., similar or similar to the Miao in southwest China, have been further confirmed.
2.In ancient China, there are many legends of brother and sister marriages, such as the descendants of the children of the Gao Yang clan who reproduced after they got married, and the Pan Gu and the daughter of the Gao Xin clan went to the deserted Nanshan Mountain and got married in the stone room.
Such legends are especially prevalent among ethnic minorities. According to a legend of the Nu people in Yunnan, the brother and sister hid in a big gourd and drifted with the water to survive.
When the flood waters receded, the crow persuaded them to marry, but both were ashamed to marry their brother and sister, and finally the elder brother passed the archery test and married his sister, giving birth to nine boys and nine girls.
Since there were still no other men and women in the world, the nine siblings intermarried with each other and gradually produced many offspring.
The myths in the Bousangai Yasangai and the Dongba Sutra, the Chongyitu and the oral literature of the Book of Genesis are all stories of sibling marriages. The first man, Bousangai, married the woman, Yesangai, and had children.
Later, however, the siblings also married, intermarried, and had many children and grandchildren. In Naxi legend, the intermarriage between the Lien brothers and sisters angered the gods, and the gods decided to send a flood to wipe out the human race, which also indicates that the Naxi people have evolved to a higher form of marriage and can no longer tolerate the existence of blood marriage.
These myths and legends are not only circulated among the Dai people in Xishuangbanna and the Naxi people in Lijiang, Yunnan, but also in other cultures. For example, the Inca kings of Peru had made it mandatory for the king's heir to marry the eldest daughter of his parents, and the pharaohs of ancient Egypt and the kings of the Ptolemaic dynasty also married their sisters or half-sisters.
In ancient Roman times, it was also common to see brothers marrying sisters or half-sisters in the families of land cultivators or craftsmen. These myths and legends all reflect the continuous evolution and change of human beings in the form of marriage, from the initial blood marriage, to the later marriage between brothers and sisters, and then to the final freedom of choice of spouses, reflecting the progress of human civilization.
Brothers, daughters, aunts, and sisters were all hired as wives. This phenomenon, recorded in ancient Chinese literature, is regarded by many scholars as a "remnant" of primitive blood marriage.
However, we can also see this phenomenon in many myths and legends about sibling marriages. For example, when Wei Shu's "Book of Wei: The Biography of the Western Regions" records the customs and customs of Persia, it also says: "Most of them take their sisters as wives and concubines. ”
However, we should note that in these myths and legends, sibling marriages usually occur when no one else can marry at the beginning of the world, or when the population is extinct due to a severe natural disaster.
Moreover, the parties are ashamed of their brother-sister relationship, and often have to go through some torture or obtain the consent of the gods before they can get married. In addition, sometimes sibling marriages require a change of face so that they do not know each other.
In addition, brothers and sisters who intermarry with each other are basically one-on-one, rather than group marriages of multiple pairs of brothers and sisters. These episodes show that the people who wrote and told such myths were not themselves at the stage of blood marriage, but had evolved to a higher stage of marriage, and that in their time there were clearly social prohibitions and ethics against brother and sister intermarriage.
This is evidenced, for example, by the Naxi mythology in which the gods of heaven become angry when they see a brother and sister marrying. Well, this brings up some problems. How much of the case that has been preserved in myths and legends as an ancient memory is true and how much is fictional?
Even if we admit that brother and sister marriages did occur in ancient times, is this an individual exception, or is it a general rule in society? According to Morgan's research, after a long period of chaotic **, the earliest form of marriage formed by human beings is blood marriage, and then in chronological order, through Punalua marriage, couple marriage, and finally transition to monogamous marriage, that is, monogamous marriage.
Blood marriage, also known as "equal generation marriage", "class marriage", "generation marriage", it is a special form of marriage, limited to collective intermarriage between brothers, sisters or (cousin) brothers and sisters, and the marriage group is divided according to the "generation", men and women of the same generation can freely intermarry, and the ** relationship between different generations is prohibited.
This marriage system represents the first important evolution of human relations between the sexes, and it is also an important symbol of the evolution of human society from primitive groups to the earliest form of family, the "blood family".
Although blood marriage has become extinct in modern times, many examples can still be found in literature and myths and legends, which is different from the purely speculative jumble** assertions.
In the history of human marriage, whether blood marriage has ever existed is still an unresolved issue, and there is continuous controversy in the academic community. Even the widely circulated legend of intermarriage between brothers and sisters in China cannot be determined that blood marriage really exists, and it can only be considered that its possibility is greater than that of the chaotic **.
Therefore, we need more evidence and research to get closer to the truth of history.