Bringing artifacts to life
Let the culture pass on
The use of ancient domestic pigs
The history exhibition hall of Cangzhou Museum displays a Han Dynasty green glazed pottery pig, which is 38.5 cm long and 24.2 cm high, clay red pottery, and green glaze is applied throughout. The pig has both ears protruding forward, a long nose and fangs, short and thick limbs, a mane on the neck, and a short tail coiled above the buttocks. From the physical point of view, this pig's mane is sharp and the fangs are turned outward, and it still retains the characteristics of a wild boar, but its head-to-body ratio is significantly smaller than that of a wild boar and larger than that of a modern domestic pig, and it is in the process of domestication of wild boar to domestic pig.
Han Dynasty green glazed pottery pig
Pigs are closely related to the lives of Chinese, compared with other domestic livestock, pigs have the characteristics of eating miscellaneous, strong fertility, fast growth rate, and high feed conversion efficiency, which also makes pork the main edible meat. Mencius said: Chickens and dogs are beasts, and there is no time to lose, and seventy people can eat meat. "Mulan Poem": The younger brother smells the sister and sharpens the knife to the pig and sheep. These accounts illustrate the important role of pigs in ancient human life.
In China's long agricultural history, domestic pigs also have a fatty effect on agricultural production. The Ming Dynasty's "Shen's Book of Agriculture" records: Yang Yong is suitable for the ground, and pig Yong is suitable for the field... Raise six pigs, raise them for six months... 90 quintals per litter. The "Zhou Li Di Guan" records: The method of the grass man's palm soil is to plant the land of things, and it is suitable for planting, and all dung seeds ... 埴垆用豕. In the history exhibition hall of the Cangzhou Museum, a han Dynasty green glazed pottery circle is on display. The upper part is a toilet, and the lower part is a pigsty, which is a building where the toilet and the pigsty are combined into one, which was called "溷" in the Han Dynasty and "Even Thatched Toilet" in modern times. Man and pig manure are piled up in the pigsty to facilitate fattening.
The whole body of the pig is a treasure. Pigs can be medicated, the "Compendium of Materia Medica" lists pigs as the first of the 26 species of livestock that can be medicated, and fully explains the medicinal value of pigs, such as pork can supplement kidney failure, pig blood can treat stroke dizziness, pig milk can cure pediatric eclampsia, etc. Pig fur and teeth can be used as clothes and weapons. "Zuo Chuan Yin Gong Five Years" records: leather, teeth and teeth. Yang Bojun notes that the skin is yin, the leather is armor, and the bone is decorated with two ends of the bow.
In ancient times, another important use of pigs was sacrifice. In the Dawenkou culture, people were buried with pig heads; during the Yin Shang period, the combination of pigs, cattle and sheep began to appear, and there are records in the oracle bones: Ding Weibu, and burned in the father Ding Hundred Dogs, Hundred Pigs (Boars), and 卯百牛"; the Zhou Dynasty's "Book of Rites and The Royal System" records: Tianzi Sheji is too imprisoned, and the princes are all imprisoned. Cattle, sheep and pigs three animals for the tai prison, sheep and pigs two for the less prison; qin and Han until the Southern and Northern Dynasties period, pork is the preferred meat for folk sacrifices, in the literature after the Qin and Han Dynasties, if not specifically specified, "meat" generally refers to pork. During the Tang and Song dynasties, the "Miscellaneous Five Elements Book" said: "The stove king died on the day of the nongzi, and did not use this day to rule the stove, often on the day of May, the pig's head sacrifice stove, so that people can cure life ten thousand times", and the pork sacrifice ritual can be continued to be passed on. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, the people at the end of the year had the custom of "killing pigs". In the Qing Dynasty, there was a custom of "eating sacrificial meat". "Qing Barnyard Banknotes and Diets" records that the meat is boiled in white, without salt sauce, and it is very tender and beautiful.
Domestic pigs have always been accompanied by the development of Chinese civilization, in addition to their widespread use in materials, they also have an important impact in the field of spiritual culture, please pay attention to follow-up articles.
Author Lu Qingyuan