Compared with modern times, except Four Chapters of Chen Chong, the corresponding relationship between the zodiac and earthly branches in this record is exactly the same. [ 1]
The Book of Songs Xiaoya contains "auspicious day, that is, poor horse", which reflects the relative noon horse. However, scholars pointed out that Qin bamboo slips correspond to deer rather than horse at noon, and the horse at noon is just a coincidence.
Like today, the earliest complete record of the zodiac is Wang Chong's Lun Heng in the Eastern Han Dynasty. Generally speaking, the third volume, the potential of things: [1]
Li Youjun, a zodiac animal.
"Yin wood also, its bird tiger also; It is also soil, and its birds and dogs are also; Ugliness is dirt, ugly birds and cows, no birds and sheep. Wood beats earth, so dogs, cattle and sheep are served by tigers. Hai Shui also, its bird also; Where there is fire, its birds and snakes are also; Children are water, so are their birds and mice; It is also a fire at noon, and its birds and horses are also ... horses, rats, chickens and rabbits at noon. Water is better than fire. Why don't mice chase horses? Jin Shengmu, why don't chickens peck rabbits? Hai Jian, no sheep, ugly cow. Soil is better than water, why don't cattle and sheep kill jackals? The fourth snake is also a monkey. Fire wins gold, why don't snakes eat macaques? "
With the book "poison" volume 23 has a cloud:
"Chen is a dragon, the third is a snake, in the southeast. Dragons are poisonous and snakes sting people, so snakes have good teeth and dragons have scales. Wood makes a fire, and fire is poison, so the beast of the black dragon contains Mars. "
It can be seen that at the latest, the twelve zodiac signs of the Eastern Han Dynasty have all been finalized. [1] In Qing Dynasty, Liang Zhanggang also relayed the records of Lun Heng in the series of wandering talks. [ 1]
The Biography of the Northern History of Yuwen Hu describes the letter of Yuwen Hu's mother in the State of Qi in the later Zhou Dynasty: "Your brother was born in Wuchuan Town. The eldest is a mouse, the second is a rabbit, and you are a snake. " This is an earlier record in official history, and the zodiac is related to the year of birth. [ 1]
origin
Ancient literature records have not solved the problem of the cultural origin of the zodiac, and scholars in ancient and modern times have different opinions on this. [3]
Constellation theory
Zodiac defeated Song Qian.
The ancients divided the stars near the ecliptic and equator into "28 stars". Twenty-eight nights represent an animal. In ancient times, Sunday was divided into twelve parts, represented by twelve branches. Twelve branches belonged to the zodiac, and the zodiac had a corresponding relationship with twenty-eight stars. [4] Wang Hao, a great scholar in the Ming Dynasty, believed that 28 species of animals belonged to 28 stars, and they were "unified by the seven demons" and became the pattern of "mother-soil bats, imaginary sun mice, dangerous moon swallows and sons". [4] In the Qing Dynasty, Li Changqing thought in "Panasonic Guan Yanyu" that twenty-eight lodging animals "doubled the first twelve genera" and "attached Kang Jinlong, Chen Guan and Jiao Mujiao. Jiao and Long are also ",which reflects the gathering of 28 kinds of stellar animals based on the zodiac. "[4] But there will inevitably be collateral encounters, and the records of the 28 stars will be later than the zodiac.