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In China, various customs are associated with the quality of fertility as symbolized by dragons. In Hunan and Hubei provinces, women wanting to be pregnant will let the dragon circulate their bodies and give money or gift to the dragon dance team as reward. A boy is placed on the back of the dragon and […]

The earliest Chinese writing system that has been preserved to the present day is the oracle bone inscriptions, which dates back 3,000 years to China’s Shang Dynasty (1600-1046 BC). The ancient Chinese people believed that both nature and human affairs were governed by a kind of mystical force. As a result, divination was commonly used […]

In China, there are “four famous buildings”: Yueyang Tower, Tengwang Pavilion, Yellow Crane Tower and Penglai Pavilion. Yellow Crane Tower is said to be 1,800 years old. According to legend, it was once a tavern. One day, a Taoist priest visited the tavern. The tavern’s hostess treated him to 1,000 cups of liquor. In order […]

In the past, there was once a pagoda called the Leifeng Pagoda, situated on the shore of the beautiful West Lake (in Hangzhou, Jiangsu Province). According to legend, over 700 years ago, there was once a whit snake that was transformed into a beautiful woman named Bai Niangzi (also known as Madam White Snake), who […]

Chinese characters that represent numbers also have their own special meanings. One (yi, “一”) The Chinese people believe that “one” (“一”) represents the beginning of everything. The famous ancient Chinese philosopher Laozi once said that, in the beginning of the universe, “’dao’ created one”. “One” here refers to the chaotic state that existed before anything […]

Chinese characters that represent numbers also have their own special meanings. Two (er, “two”) As we know, the Chinese people believe that everything in the universe possesses two properties: “yin” and “yang”. Laozi also said: “one created two”. This means that the primeval “one” possessed the properties of both “yin” and “yang”. Because the Chinese […]

Three (san, “三”) The Chinese people believe the number “three” is a mystical number. Laozi once said, “Two created three; three created all things”. The world thus had “yin” and “yang”. Later, changes in “yin” and “yang” produced a great many new things. Therefore, the number “three” can represent “many”. According to legend, the beginning […]

Four (si, “四”) It is interesting that the Chinese character for “four” was originally written in 4 horizontal lines, like “one two three”. Only later it was written in this way—“四”. Comparatively speaking, the number “four” is a relatively unpopular number for the Chinese people. For example, the number “four” is often avoided (and replaced […]

Five (wu, “五”) The ancient Chinese people believed that the world was composed of five basic substances: metal, wood, water, fire and earth. These five substances are known as the Five Elements (“wu xing”). The Five Elements can represent everything. For example, the Five Elements can represent the five basic directions: east, south, west, north […]

In the ancient times, the Chinese people are quite pride of their hundreds of surnames. However, recently, with the publication of “Dictionary of Chinese Surnames”, there are more than twenty thousand Chinese characters for surnames. The exact number is 23,813. The simplest surname is the surname comes from Lisu people—“一” (yi, means one) and the […]