The Story of the Gigolo Knit

A long time ago, our ancestors lived a life of sunrise and sunset. Every time after sunset, they will look up at the bright stars overhead. Over time, people found that every star and the sun and the moon have certain rules, and they have a strong interest in it. At first, our ancestors carved these astronomical knowledge on the Oracle Bone Inscriptions. They had a long and rich record of the sun, the moon, planets, comets, nova, stars, eclipses and other rare astronomical phenomena. With people's understanding of astronomy and the emergence of textile technology, there have been records about Altair and Vega. According to China's Song Dynasty masterpiece "Taiping Yulan" (Volume 3 1), it is recorded: "On the seventh day of July, the night wind swept the court, giving several seats, setting preserved wine and powder on the seats, praying that the river drum weaves a girl, saying that two stars will be there.

Here, "River Drum" and "Weaver Girl" refer to Altair and Vega. According to folklore, Altair is the god of grains, and Vega is the female silkworm god of the Emperor of Heaven. Both the God of Valley and the God of Silkworm are highly valued by the ancestors of our farming nation. At that time, people thought that there were seven stars representing the direction in the east, west, north and south, which were collectively called 28 stars. Altair and Vega are the most prominent in early autumn and July every year.

It was also found that Altair was in the east of Vega, and there was a white cloud-like thing in the middle, which crossed the sky intermittently from north to south. People call it Tianhe. There are three stars in a straight line in the southeast of Tianhe. The middle one is very bright, and the light on both sides is very weak. It looks exactly the same as the middle one. These three stars are called Libra, also called Birthday.

The biggest and brightest star in the middle is Altair, also called Altair. Its light is slightly yellow, not as bright as Vega. Therefore, out of worship of nature, people personified these two stars, and a large number of folklore about the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl appeared, which gradually became perfect.

After being demoted, Penny was born in a farmer's home and named Cowherd. Later, because his parents died early, he lived with his brother and sister-in-law. But my brother and sister-in-law are very unkind to him and want to separate from him. In the end, she only gave him an old cow and a broken car, and the rest were monopolized by her brother and sister-in-law.

From then on, the cowherd and the old cow lived together, plowing and building houses on the wasteland, and barely making ends meet. On this day, the old cow suddenly spoke and said to the cowherd, "Cowherd, today you go to Bilianchi, where some fairies are taking a bath." You hide that red fairy costume, and the fairy in the red fairy costume will become your wife. "

Cowherd was surprised and happy when he saw the old cow talking, so he asked, "Niu Ge, can you really talk?" Is it true what you said? "The old cow nodded, and the cowherd quietly hid in the reeds beside Bilianchi, waiting for the arrival of the fairies.

After a while, the fairies really floated in, took off their light clothes and jumped into the clear stream. The cowherd ran out of the reeds and took the red fairy's clothes. When fairies saw someone coming, they quickly put on their clothes and flew away like birds, leaving only fairies who could not escape without clothes. She is a weaver girl. Seeing that her fairy clothes were taken away by a young man, the Weaver Girl was ashamed and anxious, but she was helpless.

At this moment, Cowherd came up to her and said, "Promise to be my wife before I can return your clothes." The weaver girl looked intently and found that the cowherd was the cow she missed day and night, so she shyly agreed to him. In this way, the Weaver Girl became the wife of the Cowherd.

After they got married, they worked hard, loved each other and lived a very happy life. Soon, they gave birth to a son and a daughter, very cute. Cowherd and Weaver Girl thought they could be together for life and grow old together. However, when the Queen Mother learned of this incident, she flew into a rage and immediately sent a fairy to catch the Weaver Girl and make amends.

On this day, the weaver girl was cooking, and the cowherd hurried back from the fields. His eyes were red and swollen, and he told Weaver, "Niu Ge is dead. Before he died, he asked me to peel off his cowhide and put it away. One day, I can wear it and fly to the sky. "

Hearing this, the Weaver Girl understood that the old cow was the golden bull in the sky, and she was demoted to heaven just because she said a few good words for the demoted Petunia. But the Weaver Girl wondered how she suddenly died. The weaver girl asked the cowherd to peel off the cowhide and bury the old cow.

At this time, the sky is stormy, and the heavenly soldiers will fall from the sky. It is hard to say that it is escorting the Weaver Girl to the sky. At this moment, the Weaver Girl heard the voice of the Cowherd: "Weaver Girl, wait for me!" " "Looking back, the Weaver Girl saw the Cowherd coming with a pair of baskets and two cowhide children.

Slowly, the distance between them is getting closer and closer, and the weaver girl can also see the lovely faces of her children. The children all shouted "Mom" with open arms.

Seeing that the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl are about to meet, but at this moment, the Queen Mother arrived in Xiangyun. She took off the golden hairpin on her head and rowed it among them. At the moment, a billowing Tianhe lies between the Weaver Girl and the Weaver Girl, which cannot be crossed.

The Weaver Girl looked at the Cowherd and his children across the Tianhe River and cried herself hoarse. Cowherd and children also cried their eyes out. Their crying is so heart-wrenching and tearful that even the gods who are watching feel sad and sad.

When the Queen Mother saw this scene, she was also moved by the loyal love of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl, so she agreed to let the Cowherd and the children stay in the sky, and let the magpies bridge the Tianhe River on July 7 every year, and the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl met once. From then on, the Cowherd and his children lived in the sky, separated from the Weaver Girl by a Tianhe River.

The beautiful legend of the meeting between the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl on the Magpie Bridge has entrusted the ancients with their beautiful yearning and longing for the lovers to be well.

In fact, in the ancient literature of China, the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl first appeared as the names of two stars. These two star names were first seen in Dadong in The Book of Songs Xiaoya, and the cowherd in the poem was called Petunia.

The reason why the ancients paid attention to the stars in the sky is that the change of the position of the stars in the night sky can be used to mark the farming season and punctuality, while the morning glory and the weaver girl were noticed by the ancients as the signs of autumn.

This is clearly stated in Summer Zheng Xiao, the first calendar in Chinese history: "In July ... at dawn, the Weaver Girl left for the east." The phrase "Weaver Girl Goes East" contains all the secrets of the story of the Cowherd and Weaver Girl on Tanabata Tianhe.

In the Eastern Han Dynasty, among the Nineteen Ancient Poems written by Anonymous, there was a poem "All the Way to the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl", which described the beautiful love story of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl. The poem wrote:

Distant Altair, Jiao Jiao Hehan girl. Skillful hands, make a loom. There is no chapter all day, and tears are pouring down.

What's the difference between a clear river and a shallow one? Between water and water, there are no words.

As can be seen from this poem, Penny and Weaver Girl are lovers who admire each other.

In written records, the earliest description of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl as husband and wife should be the Selected Works compiled by Liang Xiaotong in the Southern and Northern Dynasties. At this time, the story of Cowherd and Weaver Girl and the plot of Tanabata meeting have begun to take shape, from two stars in the sky to husband and wife.

However, in the imagination of the ancients, couples in heaven and couples on earth are basically the same, so there is no tragic color in the story. In the Eastern Han Dynasty, there was a record in Ying Shao's Custom Yi Tong:

Weaver crossing the river on Tanabata, Queqiao Club. It is said that on the seventh day, the magpie's head rose for no reason, because Liang Yidu crossed the Weaver Girl.

This shows that at that time, not only the theory that the cow and the weaver girl are husband and wife has been generally recognized, but also the story that they meet on Qixi with magpies as a bridge every year has been widely circulated among the people and integrated into the customs.

As time goes on, the story continues to enrich and develop. There is such a record in Jingchu Sui History Collection:

To the east of Tianhe, there is a weaver girl, the son of the Emperor of Heaven, who weaves hard work and brocade clothes every year. Sad for his loneliness, the Emperor of Heaven betrothed him to Hexi to lead the cowherd and gave up weaving after marriage. The Emperor of Heaven was furious and ordered him to go back to Hedong, only for a period of time on July 7th every year.

The story of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl has changed a lot from here to now. Because the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl were greedy for pleasure after marriage, they "abandoned weaving", which angered the Emperor of Heaven and was punished. This brings a tragic atmosphere to the story.

Then, why add the role of the old cow to the later legends and let it play a huge role in the story? Because cattle are the treasure of the farm, farmers love breeding cattle and even pin their life ideals on them.

When the ideal of life is hindered, farmers often have the illusion of helping cows, hoping that cows will exert their magical power to help them tide over the difficulties. At the same time, anthropomorphizing animals is also one of the artistic techniques often used in various folklore.

The story of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl reflects the ancient people's good wishes to oppose feudal ethics and pursue a happy life, their yearning for good love, and their unswerving pursuit and advocacy of love. Let people believe that love is hard-won, and let people cherish the value of love more.