Một thoáng lịch sử nghệ thuật về Rồng

 một thoáng lịch sử nghệ thuật về sinh vật kỳ ảo nhất trong cung hoàng đạo Trung Quốc.

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As the only imaginary (huyễn tưởng) creature among its 12 animals, the loong, or Chinese dragon, adds a much-needed dash of the fantastical (kỳ ảo) to the Chinese zodiac.

Much of the loong’s mystery (kỳ bí) lies in its unknown origins (nguồn gốc). Loong-esque motifs have been unearthed (khai quật) at sites dating back 8,000 years, though experts (chuyên gia) generally agree that the earliest examples (mẫu vật) of a fully formed loong discovered to date are the 6,000-year-old mosaics unearthed at the Xishuipo site in what is now the central province of Henan.

In their earliest form, loong were generally depicted (mô tả) with a long snake-like body, but some had feet and dorsal fins (vây lưng), as well as other regional variations (biến thể). This has led scholars to speculate (đồn đoán) about the origins of the loong, with some pointing to the Yangtze alligator or snakes, while others argue that the image may have been derived from natural phenomena that ancient Chinese were unable to explain, such as rainbows, lightning, or tornadoes.

It would take thousands of years for their image to solidify (củng cố) into what we see today. Indeed, the complexity (phức tạp) of the loong lies in its imaginative mix of body parts accrued (tích lũy) slowly over millennia (thiên niên kỷ). By the Shang (ca. 1600–1046 B.C.) and Zhou dynasties (1046–256 B.C.), the details had become more concrete (cứng cáp), including a large mouth, upturned snout (mõm hếch), prominent (lồi) eyes and ears, and alligator-shaped body. A number of jade loong unearthed from a Shang-period tomb at Yinxu in Henan have similar eyes, rhomboid patterns along their bodies, and a raised spine, all of which were common in loong depictions from the Shang period and suggestive that representations of the beast had stabilized (ổn định).

source: Sixth Tone,