The myth of the Korean tiger

There is often a tiger in myth, and people think it is grateful.

Koreans call the coming Year of the Tiger the Year of the White Tiger. In South Korea, fortune tellers have begun to interpret this 60-year-old White Tiger Year. According to Korean legend, a tiger that has lived for more than 500 years can become a white tiger, which is the most effective among tigers. Koreans believe that the Year of the White Tiger is second only to the Year of the Golden Pig. Suitable for life events such as getting married and having children. The fortune teller predicted that there would be many children this year. It is said that the birth rate in the Year of the Tiger will never be lower than that in the Year of the Golden Pig. Fortune-tellers say that men born in the Year of the Tiger will be very successful in the future and suitable for joining the army and politics, while women will make achievements in education and law.

Some Korean friends said that there were many mountains in South Korea, and there were many tigers in those days, and they were even called the country of tigers. Unfortunately, Japanese colonists wiped out tigers that year. Although there are no tigers in Korea today, Koreans are still obsessed with tigers. Speaking of tigers, many people can say a few proverbs, tell fairy tales about tigers and find out some calligraphy and painting with tigers as the theme. Some painters even describe the shape of the Korean peninsula as a tiger lying on its side.

Korea University, a century-old famous school in South Korea, directly uses Tiger Head as its school emblem. The school explained that the tiger is the god of the Korean nation and has the characteristics of courage, decisiveness, agility and majesty.

Tiger is one of the favorite animals of Koreans, and it is almost equivalent to the incarnation of god or man. Some scholars say that if China is a dragon, India is an elephant and Egypt is a lion, then the sacred animal symbol of South Korea is the tiger first. Historically, South Korea was once called "tiger talking about the country" because in all kinds of myths and legends, the proportion of tigers appeared is very high. In the myth of the founding of the Republic of Korea, the tiger and the bear appeared together. They both wanted to be human at the same time, but the tiger failed because of impatience, and the bear eventually became human and became the ancestor of Koreans. Some people explain that this may mean that the tiger tribe lost to the bear tribe.

In the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the tiger appeared many times as the messenger of God or the identity of God, and saved a king. The tiger in Three Drafts of Yan Wen's Long Bamboo Slips in Wuzhou, also known as the Mountain King, is a combination of tiger worship and mountain worship, and the tiger becomes a mountain god or an envoy of the mountain god.

Koreans also regard the tiger's bravery as a symbol of the army. Tigers also have the power to exorcise ghosts, so hanging a tiger painting at home or wearing a tiger symbol can play this role. In the past, at the beginning of each year, from the palace to the homes of ordinary people, pictures of tigers were posted on the doors of South Korea to ward off evil spirits.