Yesterday's death of Pangu was also the first of the four mountains, the eye of the sun and the moon, the fat of the river and the sea, and the hair of the grass. According to the custom between Qin and Han dynasties, Pangu's head is Dongyue, the abdomen is Zhongyue, the left arm is Nanyue, and the right arm is Beiyue, and Xiyue is enough. The ancients said that Pangu cried for the river, gas for the wind, sound for thunder, and eyes for electricity. The ancients said: Pangu is happy for the purpose, and anger is yin. Wu Chu said: Pangu couple, the beginning of Yin and Yang. Today, there is an ancient tomb in the South China Sea, which stretches for 300 miles, and the soul of Pangu is also buried in the descendants of the common cloud. There is Pangu Temple in Guilin, which is enshrined by modern people. There is a kingdom of Pangu in the South China Sea, and people today take Pangu as their surname. (Ren) According to: Pangu is the ancestor of all things in the world, but life began in Pangu.
Although these records are brief, after repeating the theory of metaplasia mentioned by predecessors, the significance, spreading area and origin of southern Pangu were clearly stated: Pangu myth was spread among the people in Qin and Han dynasties, and "Wu Chu said Pangu couple" was the main spreading area at that time; There are "Pangu Tomb", "Pangu Kingdom" and "Everyone takes Pangu as their surname" in the South China Sea, pointing out that Pangu myth originated in the South China Sea (generally referring to Lingnan). "There is a Pangu Temple in Guilin, and today people are willing to worship it" further shows that Pangu Temple was first seen in Guilin (now Xiangzhou County, Laibin City, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region), and the activities of offering sacrifices to Pangu have been spread since ancient times, and incense has been flourishing. It is conceivable that if the Pangu myth first appeared in the Central Plains, it would be impossible not to mention it in all the documents from pre-Qin to Qin and Han dynasties. These are only found in the earliest records 1600 years ago, which is obviously a trace back to the source of Pangu's story.
As we all know, Nanhai, Guilin and Xiang Jun were established after Qin Shihuang unified Lingnan. According to "Atlas of Chinese History", Nanhai County in Qin Dynasty governed the central and eastern part of Guangdong, just in Panyu (now Guangzhou); Guilin County governs today's central and southeastern Guangxi to Maoming in western Guangdong. It is located in Bushan County (now Guigang City, Guangxi). After Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty leveled Nanyue, Qin divided the three counties in Lingnan into nine counties, among which Guilin County, Yulin County, was located in Xiangzhou County, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. During the Three Kingdoms period, Sun Quan established the State of Wu to rule this area. In the third year of Sun Hao Phoenix (274), it was divided into Yulin County, Guilin County, Wu 'an County and Xiangzhou County. In Sui Dynasty, Tanzhong County and Liu Zhong County were located in Guilin County. In December (592), Emperor Chengzu of Ming Dynasty established Xiangzhou, which was the beginning of Xiangzhou's name. Accordingly, Nanhai and Guilin from the Qin and Han Dynasties to the Three Kingdoms were the centers of Pangu myths and stories and the important birthplaces of Pangu culture, so they were called "Pangu Kingdom".
Analysis, Tracing and Identification of the Origin of Pangu Myth In the above-mentioned records, as early as 1930s, Contradiction (Shen Yanbing), a pioneer of China mythology research, put forward the inference that "we assume that Pangu Myth originated in the south (assuming Guangdong) and gradually went north" in ABC of China Myth, but it failed to attract due attention, and the successors did not make necessary investigations accordingly. In academic circles, the key words about the origin of Pangu myth recorded in China ancient books, such as "Pangu Kingdom in the South China Sea" and "Pangu Temple in Guilin", are mostly quoted from the original text without any analysis. Maybe they are just regarded as "anecdotes of ancient things" like general myths, and they have not seen the field investigation report. Or because of the long-standing prejudice that only the northern culture spread to the south, and the southern culture did not necessarily spread to the north, so many theorists tried to prove each other's origins by consulting relevant literature and similar legends (such as the stories of Fuxi, Nuwa and Pan Hu). ), or confused deduction, or exegetical speculation. However, the "Pangu Kingdom" recorded in the book has been ignored, and the "Pangu Temple in Guilin" is even more difficult to explore, and it seems that it is easy to avoid the importance. This is a major deficiency in the study of Pangu myth for a long time.
According to our field investigation in Xiangzhou County, Laibin City, wuxuan county and Xingbin District (formerly Binxian County) under the jurisdiction of ancient Guilin County, there are not only many Pangu temples, but also many Pangu villages, Pangu Ridges and Pangu caves, and there are indeed residents named Pan. It is precisely because the story of Pangu has been widely circulated in the local area that its people believe in and worship Pangu, and things named after Pangu can be seen everywhere. The local people are rich in Pangu and cultural heritage, which is systematic and dynamic. This shows that there is indeed a Pangu myth kingdom in South China-the Pearl River Basin in history. The "Pangu in the South China Sea" mentioned in Yi Shuoji is not a fictional anecdote, but a true record. We believe that "Pangu Kingdom" is a historical concept of a specific regional cultural system. (Press: Another monograph by Zheng, The Kingdom of Pangu in Myth and the Kingdom of Pangu in History, will be published in the next issue. Undoubtedly, Mr. Contradiction's hypothesis that Pangu was originally a local myth in southern Guangdong has been fully demonstrated.