Is the mysterious bird a phoenix, a chicken, a swallow or an owl?

Most people who have seen Xiao, a real cultural relic of the Shang Dynasty, feel this way. Its jade is bluish yellow, and most of the jade materials are tremolite, and the selected jade materials are delicate and pure. The surface of jade is weathered and eroded because it has been buried underground for thousands of years, forming lime mud with milky white color. Most of the seepage marks are cow hair lines, with different shades and uneven thickness, naturally distributed and gradually smudged, such as ink rendering. After cutting a small window on the surface of jade, the true colors of jade will be immediately revealed. Because people in Shang Dynasty used cinnabar more in sacrificial ceremonies, most jade owls as ritual vessels would be attached with residual cinnabar on their surfaces. Because it has been hidden underground for too long, its shell is calm and dense, the light is restrained, and the original satin luster on the surface still exists.

Judging from the appearance of jade owl, its shape is owl-shaped, and its posture is flat. Businessmen hold their heads high in artistic expression, which has a silhouette artistic effect. The crown on the top of the head is very high, and the edge is cut with teeth. Each group of teeth consists of three tooth edges, which respectively represent the upturned nose, forehead tip and convex angle of the dragon. Eyes wide, eyes sharp, mouth closed, beak rolled back into the hole, wide ears spread backward, short and thick neck, full chest, gathered wings and feathers, slightly upturned tail, thick legs, round claws and short tenons. From the details of eye and mouth carving, we can see that although Shang craftsmen carved such exquisite and delicate objects, they still showed a grim and solemn style, which can be described as a masterpiece of minimalism that made the finishing point 3,000 years ago.

The earliest record about the mysterious bird comes from the Book of Songs, and it is written in the beginning of the Book of Songs, Shang Song and Mysterious Bird:

The mysterious bird of destiny,

Born in business,

The house is gloomy and earthy.

The ancient emperor ordered Wu Tang,

Positive territory is everywhere.

From the brief description of the Book of Songs to the textual research records of Sima Qian and Tai Shigong in the later period, the story of Xuanniao in Shang Dynasty is more full. There is such a record in Records of the Historian Yin Benji, which records: "The second princess of Di Ku, Judie, went out to bathe and saw the mysterious bird laying eggs. Judie took the eggs and swallowed them, so she became pregnant and gave birth to the Shang ancestor contract." (In the primitive society of China, even in the feudal society, a small and weak nation would use myths and legends to tell the origin of its own nation or family after rising to rule one side. When this kind of thing is mapped to a specific individual, it will be manifested in the theory of dreams, the theory of auspicious days, and the theory of Taoist fortune telling. So we should take this myth and legend of Shang Dynasty seriously, because it is a very common phenomenon in ancient China. Under the guidance of this mythical theory of national origin, the ancestors of Yin Shang soon took root in a somewhat mythical conclusion that their ancestors were born of mysterious birds. After the inheritance of Yin Shang ancestors from generation to generation, the mysterious bird was finally put on the altar and became the totem of Yin Shang ancestors. It is precisely because that mysterious bird became their god bird, their ancestor and their totem. Therefore, Yin Shang ancestors used jade, the most precious material, to process the image of the mysterious bird, and the jade made became the material carrier of their sacrifice and worship. However, there has been an endless debate about what is a mysterious bird.

This argument is divided into four views. First, traditional scholars believe that the mysterious bird is a swallow, based on the record of "Talking about Wenniao Department": "Yan, mysterious bird is also".

Second, scholars with archaeological experience, such as Guo Moruo and Wen Yiduo, think that the mysterious bird is a phoenix.

Third, Zheng and other philologists, according to Jin Wen and Oracle Bone Inscriptions, think that Xuanniao is a rooster from the perspective of philology and based on hieroglyphics.

Fourthly, in recent years, archaeologists such as Han Wei, Tsung i Jao and Ye Shuxian put forward the view that ostriches are owls.

Facts have proved that the fourth kind of archaeologist's viewpoint is most suitable for the mysterious bird culture of Yin Shang ancestors, because there is obvious connection between Yin Shang culture and Qijia culture. In Qijia culture, there are many ceramic owl-shaped cans similar to bronze owls and jade owls in Yin Shang culture. Perhaps because clay is easy to mold, the owl-shaped jar in Qijia culture is more realistic and vivid. Secondly, the "mysterious" person is black, and the owl happens to be dark brown, so it is very likely that the mysterious bird is an owl.

Of course, these are not conclusive. If we want to get closer to the mysterious bird culture of Yin Shang ancestors, we need to start with related jade articles. Jade, as a unique cultural symbol and an important part of material culture in Shang Dynasty, can provide reliable clues for the prototype of Xuanniao. Judging from the existing archaeological materials, Phoenix is rare in jade articles of Yin and Shang Dynasties, and only one case was found in Fu Hao's tomb, but it shows the style of the late Shijiahe culture, not the current Shang Dynasty works. Swallows and chickens appeared in Shang dynasty, but they were few in number and simple in shape, so it was difficult to compare with the sacred blackbird as a totem of Shang dynasty.

According to the jade unearthed from archaeology and the reliable data collected by museums at home and abroad, there is a kind of sacred and majestic owl-shaped strange bird with exquisite carving, beautification and exaggeration, and excellent texture, which is distinctive and eye-catching. No matter in quantity, charm or exquisiteness, it is far from being comparable to Yuyan and Yuji. In addition, similar owl images were popular in stone carvings, pottery and bronzes in Shang Dynasty. Therefore, the view that blackbirds are based on owls is the most credible.

Jade owls in Shang dynasty were generally upright or crouching, divided into slice carving and round carving, with double-line cirrus veins on their surfaces. As for the role of jade owl, it is not only ornament and display. Most jade owls with upright shapes are engraved with tenons under their feet, and some have drilled holes in the tenons. It is speculated that they were originally inserted or tied to the top of lacquer wood as tools and cultural relics to communicate with gods or ancestors in sacrificial ceremonies. Some scholars believe that the short tenon jade carving animals in Shang Dynasty were used to be embedded in the upper end of long poles in sacrificial ceremonies to summon the souls of ancestors. In the late Shang dynasty, the function and usage of the jade owl were similar to the above-mentioned jade owl. There are also some handles and other animal-shaped jade articles, all of which are engraved with short tenons at both ends for inserting lacquer wood, which is a kind of "witch jade" with religious color. It is worth noting that the tenons carved at the end of these jade articles are usually more corroded than other parts, which should be caused by contact with lacquer wood, which provides strong evidence for their use.

After such an argument, the mysterious bird revered by the Shang people as their ancestors is probably an owl!