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Myths & Legends of China
By
E.T.C. Werner
H.B.M. Consul Foochow (Retired) Barrister-at-law Middle Temple Late
Member of The Chinese Government Historiographical Bureau Peking
Author of "Descriptive Sociology: Chinese" "China of the Chinese" Etc.
George G. Harrap & Co. Ltd.
London Bombay Sydney
In Memoriam
_Gladys Nina Chalmers Werner_
Preface
The chief literary sources of Chinese myths are the _Li tai shen hsien
t'ung chien_, in thirty-two volumes, the _Shen hsien lieh chuan_,
in eight volumes, the _Feng shen yen i_, in eight volumes, and the
_Sou shen chi_, in ten volumes. In writing the following pages I
have translated or paraphrased largely from these works. I have also
consulted and at times quoted from the excellent volumes on Chinese
Superstitions by Pere Henri Dore, comprised in the valuable series
_Varietes Sinologiques_, published by the Catholic Mission Press
at Shanghai. The native works contained in the Ssu K'u Ch'uean Shu,
one of the few public libraries in Peking, have proved useful for
purposes of reference. My heartiest thanks are due to my good friend
Mr Mu Hsueeh-hsuen, a scholar of wide learning and generous disposition,
for having kindly allowed me to use his very large and useful library
of Chinese books. The late Dr G.E. Morrison also, until he sold it
to a Japanese baron, was good enough to let me consult his extensive
collection of foreign works relating to China whenever I wished, but
owing to the fact that so very little work has been done in Chinese
mythology by Western writers I found it better in dealing with this
subject to go direct to the original Chinese texts. I am indebted to
Professor H.A. Giles, and to his publishers, Messrs Kelly and Walsh,
Shanghai, for permission to reprint from _Strange Stories from a
Chinese Studio_ the fox legends given in Chapter XV.
This is, so far as I know, the only monograph on Chinese mythology
in any non-Chinese language. Nor do the native works include any
scientific analysis or philosophical treatment of their myths.
My aim, after summarizing the sociology of the Chinese as a
prerequisite to the understanding of their ideas and sentiments,
and dealing as fully as possible, consistently with limitations of
space (limitations which have necessitated the presentation of a
very large and intricate topic in a highly compressed form), with
the philosophy of the subject, has been to set forth in English dress
those myths which may be regarded as the accredited representatives
of Chinese mythology--those which live in the minds of the people and
are referred to most frequently in their literature, not those which
are merely diverting without being typical or instructive--in short,
a true, not a distorted image.
_Edward Theodore Chalmers Werner_
_Peking_
_February_ 1922
Contents
Chapter
I. The Sociology of the Chinese
II. On Chinese Mythology
III. Cosmogony--P'an Ku and the Creation Myth
IV. The Gods of China
V. Myths of the Stars
VI. Myths of Thunder, Lightning, Wind, and Rain
VII. Myths of the Waters
VIII. Myths of Fire
IX. Myths of Epidemics, Medicine, Exorcism, Etc.
X. The Goddess of Mercy
XI. The Eight Immortals
XII. The Guardian of the Gate of Heaven
XIII. A Battle of the Gods
XIV. How the Monkey Became a God
XV. Fox Legends
XVI. Miscellaneous Legends
The Pronunciation of Chinese Words
_Mais cet Orient, cette Asie, quelles en sont, enfin, les frontieres
reelles?... Ces frontieres sont d'une nettete qui ne permet aucune
erreur. L'Asie est la ou cesse la vulgarite, ou nait la dignite,
et ou commence l'elegance intellectuelle. Et l'Orient est la ou sont
les sources debordantes de poesie._
_Mardrus_,
_La Reine de Saba_
CHAPTER I
The Sociology of the Chinese
Racial Origin
In spite of much research and conjecture, the origin of the Chinese
people remains undetermined. We do not know who they were nor whence
they came. Such evidence as there is points to their immigration
from elsewhere; the Chinese themselves have a tradition of a Western
origin. The first picture we have of their actual history shows us, not
a people behaving as if long settled in a land which was their home and
that of their forefathers, but an alien race fighting with wild beasts,
clearing dense forests, and driving back the aboriginal inhabitants.
Setting aside several theories (including the one that the Chinese
are autochthonous and their civilization indigenous) now regarded
by the best authorities as untenable, the researches of sinologists
seem to indicate an origin (1) in early Akkadia; or (2) in Khotan,
the Tarim valley (generally what is now known as Eastern Turkestan),
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