How many legs does a crab have?

Academic circles generally believe that the word "six" is the mistake of the word "eight". It was first seen in Li Zhi's Jing Zhai Gu Jin Qu. "Crabs have eight legs and two claws. Everyone knows everything. Xun said that the crab kneels six times and pinches twice. Yang. Kneel, foot also. Hanzi pursed her feet and knelt down. Crabs with graupel on their heads. Xu Shen's words are like floating clouds. A crab has six legs and two claws. Xun Qing Zhao Ren. Bureaucracy and three are drinking sacrifices. After the appropriate Chu for Lanling order. Both Zhao and Qi have crabs. And Chu is also the hometown of crabs. Xunzi, a great scholar, called crabs six kneels. He ye. Xu Shu revisited the different meanings of the Five Classics. At that time, numbers were natural history. Also regard crabs as hexapods. I don't know crabs? Listen to Xunzi and forget that it was a mistake. Crabs are things. The most humble and the most extensive. The mistake of Xun's statement. It's bad for people who are eight feet six inches. He is the one who knows how to move to Fuyang and Du Ruo. Not enough. "

But according to, < Compendium of Materia Medica > pharmaceutical literature, etc. It shows that there was indeed a kind of crab called "gnat" or "rat negative" in ancient times, and "crab six kneeling" was still the case in Xunzi's time.

In the past, our ancestors used arithmetic, in which "-"or "|" can be used to represent one, and "-"or "|" can also be used to represent five. Therefore, the strict eight-character can be written as "-"below three "|" or "-"below three "|"; The six characters can be represented by "Shang" or "-",or by "Shang" or "-"(where "-"can be represented by a small sum of money). Then, because China's calligraphy often has the habit of flexible writing, can we write the eight characters of ancient Chinese characters as one ",one"-"and two" | "? If there is, it is probably one of the possible reasons for the origin of the word "six" in "Encouraging Learning". We can't always ask students to say, "A crab kneels six times with one paw, and its two sharp points are so big …". Did you eat both knees, sir? Hehehe ... All the above are just jokes! (Author: Ouyang Kunlun)