"The Legend of Darkness" is expressed in a folk song version. It is known as the first creation epic of the Han nationality and has been circulated since the Ming and Qing Dynasties. "The Legend of Darkness" was discovered in 1984 by Hu Chongjun, a cultural cadre in the Shennongjia Forest District, and has received attention from domestic and foreign academic circles. The first issue of the magazine "Shennong Wenhui" sponsored and published by the Shennong Cultural Research Association published the review and edited version of "The Legend of Darkness" for the first time, which was published around 1992. As a "living fossil" of ancient culture, it is of great value to the study of ancient Chinese mythology, history, archaeology, literature, art, religion, folk customs, etc.
In 2011, "The Legend of Darkness" was approved by the State Council to be included in the third batch of national intangible cultural heritage list.
"The Legend of Darkness" was discovered in 1984 by Hu Chongjun, a cultural cadre in the Shennongjia Forest District, and has received attention from domestic and foreign academic circles. The first issue of the magazine "Shennong Wenhui" sponsored and published by the Shennong Cultural Research Association published the review and edited version of "The Legend of Darkness" for the first time, which was published around 1992.
At the beginning, the celestial body was just a ball of gas, a chaos, filled with darkness, and there was no water at first. After the efforts of countless generations of gods, a god named "Jiang Gu" appeared. , water was created. At that time, the sky sprouted and a dewdrop grew. The dewdrops were swallowed up by a god named "Prodigal". The "libertine" swallowed the dew drops and died. His body was divided into five pieces, and after that, it took on five shapes. Only then did there exist entities on the ground, the ocean, and the Kunlun Mountains. Kunlun Mountain vomited blood and water, and Pangu was born. Pangu invited the sun and moon to create the world. Finally, Pangu reincarnated on his deathbed, and his body turned into everything on the earth: the Five Sacred Mountains, the sun, the moon, stars, rivers, lakes, seas, vegetation, forests, etc. After Pangu died, the metal, stones, vegetation, and animals on the earth transformed into various gods. At this time, humans had not really appeared. The gods fought with each other, causing chaos in the sky, until the flood flooded the sky and drowned the sin. There was another fight between the Yellow Dragon and the Black Dragon in the flood. A god named Our Lady of Wu Tian came and helped the Yellow Dragon defeat the Black Dragon. Huanglong lays eggs to thank each other. Our Lady of Wutian swallowed a dragon egg and gave birth to three gods: one for heaven, one for earth, and one for Hades. Five dragons came from the flood and floated in the East China Sea holding a big gourd. The Virgin opened the gourd and saw Fuxi and Nuwa, a brother and sister inside, and persuaded them to get married. Only then did the gods of creation come into being. Only then did humans with flesh and blood come into being.
It can be seen from the content of "The Legend of Darkness" that the creation epic of the Han nation has many similarities with the creation epics of many nations in the world, especially the "flood". According to research, "The Legend of Darkness" had a woodcut version in the Ming Dynasty. Some old people in Shennongjia had seen this woodcut version, but unfortunately it has been lost. However, some old singers say that "The Legend of Darkness" began to be circulated as early as the Tang Dynasty. Although its age is not yet certain, its long history is beyond doubt.
In 1987, four units including the Hubei Provincial Department of Culture and the Provincial Federation of Literary and Art Circles awarded the "Qu Yuan Award" to Hu Chongjun, who discovered, organized and annotated "The Legend of Darkness". He was known as "China's Homer." "
For more than ten years, Hu Chongjun has been working tirelessly around Shennongjia. In terms of collecting and sorting folk stories, folk songs and ballads, the achievements have been brilliant. In addition to "The Legend of Darkness", he also collected more than ten long folk narrative poems such as "Gangjian", "The Story of Strange Fate", "Hunyuan Ji", "The Story of the Desolate Year", and "The Story of the Three Kingdoms". Taoist and Buddhist singing books include "Nuwa Zun Sutra", "Three Emperors Sutra", "Taiyang Zhen Jing", etc., and the collected folk songs include "Qin Shihuang Song", "Production History Song", "Wedding Ceremony Song", etc., which can be said to be It's so vast.
"The Legend of Darkness" seems to have been published quietly, but on the Internet, the news about it is almost overwhelming. Hu Chongjun, a collector and organizer who lives in seclusion in the mountains of Shennongjia, has more information online than many writers. In fact, although "The Legend of Darkness" was discovered and published in Hubei, it subsequently aroused great interest from Chinese scholars in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore and around the world. Before it was published in the past few years, readers and scholars from abroad and Taiwan and other regions sent letters to inquire about the progress of the compilation. The Han nation has finally ended its history of being known as "without its own mythical creation epic".
You can imagine the significance of this book benefiting future generations. It can be said that this book is the earliest "family tree" of our nation, and it is something that everyone and even people around the world should know. "The Legend of Darkness" is a kind of myth. This group of Han people living in the Shennongjia area have incredible imagination. Everyone may know about the story of the flood. After the flood, everyone drowned. Fuxi and Nuwa got married and became the ancestors of mankind, etc. But before the flood, "The Legend of Darkness" imagined many, many centuries and many, many distant ancestors. This ancient family tree is not only dazzling, but its unfettered magical imagination is really amazing. , I believe that everyone who reads it will be intoxicated and overwhelmed by the gorgeous and wanton scenery. Its literary talent is not inferior to Qu Yuan's "Nine Songs", or even exceeds it countless times.
Who is the first author of this strange book with multiple versions? It will definitely be an eternal mystery, saying that it is a system that is passed down through thousands of mouths and is constantly expanding and improving. , of course correct.
What is the reason why such a rich, spectacular and unparalleled libretto has been circulated and preserved in the desolate, remote and barren mountains of northwest Hubei? It seems that it is like one of those precious lone animals. , only desolation and silence are the barriers to its life.
Then, as the discoverer of this great treasure, Hu Chongjun should be respected. This collector and organizer who dressed simply, lived in poverty and enjoyed Taoism, this great scholar who lived deep in the mountains, devoted almost his entire life to this book. During my long-term contact with him, I found that he was addicted to it and could not extricate himself. His entire life was integrated with "The Legend of Darkness". His housing conditions are poor (although they have improved in recent years), the bedroom doors and windows are closed, the moldy air is suffocating, rats are running around in the cupboards without glass, and his leather shoes are never cleaned. He is usually languid, smoking a cigarette and looking very unnatural. However, as long as he talks about "The Legend of Darkness", folk songs, and folk stories, he will be in high spirits and full of witty remarks. With his talent, he could become a very good essayist and poet (I do not want to quote his wonderful prose and poetry here due to space limitations), but due to an accidental opportunity, he became obsessed with "The Legend of Darkness". And I have been preparing for a lifetime to put this book into order.
Hu was born into a family of military officers. His ancestors had been guerrilla officers in the Qing court. His ancestral home was in Zhejiang. His family fell into decline. His ancestors sold mules and horses in Sichuan, and later settled in Shennongjia. In order to collect and organize "The Legend of Darkness", he could not take care of his family, and both his wives left him. He has collected 9 manuscripts of "The Legend of Darkness", each of which has been visited countless times, including "The Legend of White Darkness", "The Legend of Red Darkness" and the related arias of the Shennong ancestors, as well as There are strange and eccentric manuscripts such as "Xuanhuang Zhuan", "Darkness Dapantou", "Darkness Outline", "Hunyuan Ji" and so on, which laid a solid foundation for enriching his collection. Now there are more than 5,000 lines in the officially published version, every line is soaked in his painstaking efforts. It should be noted that most of those librettos are incomplete, some have hundreds of lines, and some have thousands of lines. Such a messy and repetitive story cannot be sorted out even if it is sorted out. It's also tough. But the smooth epic we see now feels like it is a thousand miles away, and it is indeed an artistic family tree. We should be proud of our great nation. The history of the creation of the world by our ancestors is really soul-stirring, majestic and magnificent. In addition to being grateful to Hu Chongjun, we should also be grateful to the mountain that stands silently in the distance - Shennongjia, which has preserved the memory of our ancient bloodline with her loyalty, giving our nation the warmth of memory, and will hold us close Hold it together.
On May 18, 2010, the Ministry of Culture of China announced the list of the third batch of recommended projects for the National Intangible Cultural Heritage List (newly selected projects). "The Legend of Darkness" is on the list. Included in the 30th item of the folk literature project, "The Legend of Darkness" was jointly applied for by Baokang County and Shennongjia Forestry District.
In November 2019, the "List of National Intangible Cultural Heritage Representative Project Protection Units" was announced. Baokang County Cultural Center and Shennongjia Forest District Mass Art Museum were qualified as protection units for the "Legend of Darkness" project.
Babylon, Egypt, India, and China, known as the four major ancient civilizations in the world, all have their own national epics. The Babylonian creation epic "Enuma Elishem" was recorded in cuneiform on seven clay tablets, which were discovered by British archaeologists in today's Iraq in 1845. These clay tablets date back to around 1000 BC, but the content, style of writing, and stories recorded on them existed as early as 1900 BC.
Social civilization developed brilliantly in Egypt from 4000 to 3000 BC. 3500-2500 BC was the golden age of human civilization in Egypt. Egypt's politics, economy, and culture had achieved considerable development and prosperity. The great pyramids were built in that era. Regarding the god Osei who was in charge of life, death, and resurrection, The legend of Lys was also widely circulated in that era. At that time, China was far away in the period of clans and tribes. Unfortunately, it was not until around 70 AD that the Greek Plutarch wrote the long myths and legends into the book "Isis and Osiris". This ancient national legend has been circulating for 4,000 years by the time Platts recorded it! A legend can be spread for thousands of years, which is enough to prove the value and charm of the legend.
The great epic poem "Ramayana" of the Indian nation was formed approximately from 200 BC to 200 AD. At that time, China was in the period from the formation to the fall of the Han Dynasty. The whole book of "Ramayana" is divided into 7 chapters, totaling 48,000 lines. "Lua" has great influence and is regarded as a holy book by Hindu believers. It has been a compulsory course for Indian children's education for hundreds of years. It has been translated into various languages ????and widely circulated in many Asian countries.
But it is Homer’s epic that has had a huge impact on the history of world literature. The world-famous ancient Greek heroic epics "Ilion" (also translated as "Iliad") and "Odysseus" (also translated as "Odyssey") are said to be the blind poet Homer of ancient Greece, a young man. In his later years, he compiled and created it based on widely circulated myths, legends and folk stories. "The Story of Ilion" was formed around the middle of the 8th century BC, when China was in the Western Zhou Dynasty.
"E" has 15,693 lines in 24 volumes. Homer's epic is extremely rich in content. It has been regarded as the greatest epic in ancient times for thousands of years. Marx called it "a normative and unattainable model" with unique characteristics. "Permanent Charm".
The Chinese nation, which has a long history of 5,000 years and a splendid cultural tradition, has not discovered a magnificent epic of its own nation for thousands of years. This is undoubtedly the regret and regret shared by historians and literary circles all over the world. A confusing thing. More than a hundred years ago, the German philosopher Hegel once asserted: "The Chinese do not have their own epic, because their way of observation is basically prose." Since the 20th century, three major epics of Chinese ethnic minorities have been discovered one after another. : "The Biography of King Gesar" by the Tibetan people, "Janggar" by the Mongolian people, and "Manas" by the Horgiz people. However, academic circles at home and abroad are still very pessimistic: The Han nation has no epics, and which ancient nation in the world does not have glorious epics? Does the Chinese nation have no epics at all? Or have the epics been lost? Or are they buried somewhere and have not been discovered?< /p>
Finally, a shocking day came - in 1982, Hu Chongjun, a cadre of the Shennongjia Forest District Cultural Center, picked a magnificent flower of national culture - the first creation epic of the Han nation, "Darkness", in the deep mountains and old forests of Shennongjia. pass".
In August 1982, when Hu Chongjun was collecting folk songs, he got a 3,000-line manuscript of "The Legend of Darkness" from Zhang Zhongchen, a nursing home in Songbai Town, Shennongjia Forest District. The form of folk songs narrates major historical events from prehistory to the Ming Dynasty, divided into four parts: the origin of heaven and earth, the creation of Pangu, the raging flood and the rebirth of mankind, and the emergence of the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors. Hu Chongjun immediately believed that the manuscript was of great value. Then, he visited nearly 200 folk singers and old storytellers in the mountains of Shennongjia, and actually collected eight kinds of texts of "The Legend of Darkness", totaling more than 30,000 lines. He published the fragments of collected information in the "Collection of Shennongjia Folk Songs". The first person to discover the true value of "The Legend of Darkness" was Liu Shouhua, an associate professor at Central China Normal University. In January 1984, he wrote "New Discovery of Ancient Mythology in Northwest Hubei - A Preliminary Review of the Shennongjia Myth Narrative Folk Song "The Legend of Darkness"". The article believes that the discovery of "The Legend of Darkness" proves that the Han nation has works such as mythological epics that are spread orally among the people.
Soon after Mr. Yuan Ke, the president of the Chinese Mythology Society and a famous scholar, read Liu Shouhua's paper and the fragments of "The Legend of Darkness", he excitedly said: "The discovery of "The Legend of Darkness" is a new breakthrough. The Han nation also has its own epic. "Yuan Ke pointed out: ""The Legend of Darkness" is extremely precious. Hundreds of years ago, someone combined myths and legends with history and made a preliminary integration."
In July 1984, at the National Academic Symposium on Ethnic Minority Myths, Liu Shouhua introduced this important achievement of folk literature to the national academic community. Li Erzhong, deputy director of the Hubei Provincial Advisory Committee of the Communist Party of China and vice chairman of the Chinese Folk Literature and Art Association, wrote: "The narrative and imagination capabilities of "The Legend of Darkness" are many times higher than those of "Li Sao"... Its content is The richness and brilliance of literary talent can make works such as "Selected Works of Zhaoming" and "Wenyuan Yinghua" inferior. "Liu Shouhua said in an interview with a reporter from "China Culture News": "The Legend of Darkness, the first creation epic of the Han nationality, is It is of great value to the study of traditional Chinese folk culture and has attracted the attention of experts at home and abroad. "
Most of the myths and epics of various nationalities in the world are interested in the creation of the entire universe, and most of them talk about the creation of the universe. There is the universe - a chaotic and invisible mass, from which one or a pair of gods are separated. The number of gods continues to increase, and each god plays a role in the cosmic system. The Creator God brought life to the earth in the form of plants, animals, and humans. Many myths and epics have written about "floods"--human beings were once destroyed by floods. This theme can be seen in epics and myths around the world. Including "Genesis" in the Bible, there are many narratives in the myths of Indians, ancient Greeks, Central American Mayan Indians and American Yoruba people. The most detailed myth about the great flood belongs to the Babylonian creation epic "Enuma Elishem".
The book "The Legend of Darkness" is preceded and followed by the appendix of common people's professions, and the main text of the book is the record of the ancient Yong Kingdom and its survivors (today's Tujia people). "The Legend of Darkness" is not the only epic. The Miao and other ethnic groups with a long history also have similar epics. Some of the Miao epics have also been published. Many major events are consistent with "The Legend of Darkness", but the names of the people are different.