Creation epic white epic

Genesis, the creation epic of Bai nationality, is unique. It is an ancient artistic expression that integrates poetry, song and dance, and takes Bai folk songs as the performance form and question and answer. Mainly festivals, temple fairs and weddings. Genesis is the oldest work in Bai nationality's great songs and poems, and it is also the earliest excellent long poem in the history of Bai nationality's literature. It is widely circulated in Bai areas. There are more than 400 lines in the whole poem, which is divided into three parts: the flood and famine era, the origin of heaven and earth and the origin of mankind. The main contents are:

In the past, trees and stones were the best way. Birds and beasts could talk. There were no mountains and seas, and there was no distinction between rich and poor. People can live to be hundreds of years old. The Pangu brothers, who cut wood for a living, went to the Wangs in the temple one day to tell their fortune. The king in the temple told them that cutting wood was not as good as fishing. So the two brothers went fishing in Jinsha River and caught a red fish, which turned out to be the third prince of the Dragon King. The dragon king disappeared from the three princes and looked everywhere. He happened to meet the Pangu brothers selling red fish in the street, so he bought back the three princes for 360p. The Dragon King learned that the Pangu brothers were instructed by the king in the temple to go fishing, and also asked the king in the temple for advice. He asked how it would rain this year. The king in the temple counts two points in the city and three points outside the city. The dragon king deliberately went against the rain, making it rain at three o'clock in the city and two o'clock outside the city. As a result, the flood flooded, the sky fell and everything of mankind was destroyed. Pangu Pansheng caught the Dragon King and beheaded him. After his death, the Dragon King became a rainbow. Later, Pangu became a sky, and Pansheng became a land, but the land was bigger than the sky, so it was shrunk, and the wrinkled place became a mountain. Mu Shiwei, the incarnation of Pangu Pansheng, turned his left eye into the sun, his right eye into the moon, his teeth into stars and stones, his eyebrows, hair and grass into bamboo, trees and grass, gasified into wind, turned his muscles into earth, his fingers and toes into birds and beasts, and Mu Shiwei became everything. Everything in the world needs to be planted by someone. Finally, the golden drum of Guanyin Yinzu was found in Haizi, Dali. The eagle carried the golden drum to Haizi, and the mouse took it out for a race. The species taken out are brothers and sisters born together, separated by swallows. At first, the two brothers and sisters didn't want to start a family. After burning incense, throwing the stick into the river and rolling the millstone for divination three times, they agreed to get married. Brother and sister got married and gave birth to ten sons, and ten sons each gave birth to ten sons. They each set up a place and have a hundred surnames since then.

Genesis organically links the creation myth of the ancient incarnation with the flood myth, and reflects the extremely naive understanding of nature of Bai ancestors through naive and strange fantasies; At the same time, through the description of the marriage process of brother and sister, it reflects some customs and habits of ancient Bai people. The main characters and plots in Genesis are similar to the Pangu myth of Han nationality, which shows that the cultural exchange between Bai nationality and Han nationality has a long history.

Genesis was dictated by Li Kant and Wang, recorded by Yang, included in Collection of Bai Folk Narrative Poems edited by Yang and Ethan, and published by China Folk Literature and Art Publishing House (1984 edition).