The sun appeared before the birth of mankind. As anthropologist edward tylor said, "Where there is light, there will be sun worship". In the initial era of primitive gathering and hunting, there was no sun worship in the thinking consciousness of the ancestors who were half man and half beast.
In the Neolithic Age, when people struggled with nature, they found that solar energy brought them warmth and food and promoted the development of agriculture and animal husbandry. The sun has a direct relationship with the life of our ancestors.
Of course, people's scientific ability is limited and their cognitive level is insufficient, so they can't understand the natural phenomenon that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, emitting light and heat. They think that the sun has joys and sorrows like God, and their reward seems to depend on their mood.
So primitive ancestors began to worship sacrifices to ensure that the sun appeared on time. In the Oracle Bone Inscriptions unearthed from Yin Ruins in China, it is recorded that both sunrise and sunset were worshipped at that time. When there was a solar eclipse in the Zhou Dynasty, only the Emperor of Zhou could "play drums in the DPRK and offer sacrifices to the country".
It is precisely because people are very concerned about the sun that when people see a black spot on the sun, they will think that it is a black bird flying to the sun to convey people's sincere belief in the sun. Crows are all black, as if they had experienced a harsh experience. They go out like the sun at dusk and fly freely in the sky, making our ancestors think that blackbirds are crows, so there is a saying that "Wu Yang carries the sun".
The Image of Filial Piety Birds in Qin and Han Dynasties
With the improvement of people's productivity in Qin and Han dynasties, people's understanding of natural phenomena and laws deepened, and ancient myths and legends were not enough to convince people. The worship of the sun weakened, and the crow carrying the meaning of the sun no longer had mysterious colors.
The status of crow god bird is gradually replaced by filial bird. The swarthy raven flew to the palace of the ruler, and with the status of a god bird in primitive society, it flew into the lives of ordinary people with a little combination with the ruler.
It has been recorded in the Compendium of Materia Medica, Birds and Ciwu: "This bird is born with filial piety, and its mother eats for 60 days, and when it grows, it eats for 60 days." It's a comment that crows are feeding back. Young crows are fed to grow up. When the old crow is too old to eat, the crow will look around for food and make it delicious to repay his parents. In Xu Shen's Shuo Wen Jie Zi in the Eastern Han Dynasty, it is said that "martial arts and filial piety are also birds".
In the eyes of the rulers, the filial piety of crows is infinitely magnified, and princes and ministers all give Sanzu House as a gift to show the benevolence and filial piety of the rulers and serve as a model for ordinary people. "High-impedance Taihe seven years in June, Qingzhou offer three feet, filial piety to heaven and earth. In May of the first year of Sejong Jingming, Xuzhou presented three ancestors and five, in April of the first year of Su Zongxiping, Ji Jun presented three ancestors and five.
Too often in the early Yuan Dynasty, in May 2008, Qi presented the prince of Wu with three feet and five feet, and in April of the second year of filial piety, the capital received three feet and five feet. "? The rulers instilled the concept of filial piety into ordinary people, and the position of crows in filial piety was constantly consolidated.