The gray crane is one of the earliest cranes known to people. The ancient book "Annotations to Ancient and Modern Times" records: "He turns pale when he is a thousand years old, and turns black when he is two thousand years old. This is called Yuan He." "Sancai Tuhui" contains: "There is a Yuanhe in Leishan, who is as black as lacquer. If the person's life span is three hundred and sixty years old, it will be pure black. Fifth, there will be music festivals. In the past, Huangdi was fond of Kunhua There are Yuan cranes flying in the mountains." These records deify this bird. In Europe, gray cranes have been mentioned in the Bible; there are also images of this crane in Egyptian temples and prehistoric cave paintings. Aristotle, who lived from 384 to 322 BC, made precise records of the migration, resting, mating, and hatching of gray cranes.
The understanding of gray cranes in ancient China was also very early. Sima Qian of the Han Dynasty (145 BC or 135 BC - 87 BC) once recorded in "Historical Records·Yue Shu": When Shi Kuang aided Qin, "There are twenty-eight black cranes gathered at the corridor door." However, the ancients had misunderstandings about gray cranes. Cui Bao of the Jin Dynasty said in "Annotations on Ancient and Modern Times" that cranes turn gray at a thousand years old and turn black at a thousand years old, so they are called black cranes. Ancient Xuantong Yuan. "Erya Wings" interprets Yuanhe as "the old man of the crane", so the longevity crane is also called Yuanhe. This statement was not corrected until the Ming Dynasty by Li Shizhen, who pointed out that cranes "also have gray ones."