2024 is the Year of Dragon in China. The sign itself is the utmost symbol of auspiciousness and mightiness.
Unlike any dinosaur-like figure, the Chinese dragon resembles a snake with legs or - some might argue - a crocodile, a turtle or a fish. However, none of those animals live up to the mythical being’s capabilities to control winds and rains and to soar to the sky.
The character 龍/龙 (lung as pronounced in Cantonese, or lóng in Mandarin Pinyin), translated as dragon or preferably loong, was first seen in I Ching 易经, an ancient Chinese divination text. We can find it in such simple phrases as潜龙勿用 (No action when the loong is hidden) and 飞龙在天 (loong flying in the sky), which are elusive when interpreted literally. Shuowen Jiezi 说文解字, the first Chinese dictionary - compiled by Xu Shen 许慎 (c. 58 – c. 148 CE) - to analyse the structure of Chinese characters and to give the rationale behind them, describes that: the “loong”, resembling a worm, can be visible or invisible; thin or huge; short or long; soars to the sky during the Spring Equinox and hides deep in water during the Autumnal Equinox.
Does it seem like lightning? Its dazzling appearance is often followed by roaring or even a deafening (somewhat scary) clap of thunder. When it is “invisible”, it is still on the spot to produce the sound. It mostly shows up in spring and summer, usually with rains (under its control, as the ancients may gather), and “hides” during autumn and winter. As such, some of those phrases in I Ching were supposed to guide the ancients through farming – if you replace “loong” with “lightning” as you make of them. The Chinese character for loong is probably the onomatopoeia of lightning.
In some of the earliest civilisations, agriculture was a matter of survival or extinction. When astronomical knowledge was insufficient, lightning (together with thunder) naturally became a deity, signalling the start of a yearly farming cycle, blessing crops with rains, yet sometimes elusive that also fit to the imagination of a divine spirit. In the oracle bone script, the character申, in the shape of a lightning bolt (and originally meaning lightning), connotes to a deity in some cases as per Shuowen Jiezi.
The worship of the loong also evolved to that of the ancestors. The Yellow Emperor (c. 2698–2598 BC), Emperor Yao (c. 2356 – 2255 BC) and Yu the Great were all said to have been born in connection with the loong. Most notably, the character 禹 – the name of Yu the Great, who established the Xia dynasty circa 2070 BC - appears in the bronze script as three intersected flashes of lightning. During the latter many dynasties for dozens of centuries, emperors, boasted as the “sons of the sky”, adopted loong as their exclusive symbol.
Nearly all of the Chinese four-character idioms related to “loong” are positive, such as 望子成龙 (hoping one’s child will become a loong). People even put the character in their names, such as Bruce Lee 李小龙 (lit. Lee little loong) and Jackie Chan 成龙 (lit. becoming a loong). Sylvester Stallone, for the valiant and powerful role he often plays in films, is admirably called Shi Tai Loong 史泰龙 in Chinese (史: a typical Chinese family name; 泰: name of Mount Tai; 龙: loong), a transliteration of his last name.
Nowadays, with the legendary and imperial contexts of loong having vanished, Chinese people are still pleased to be called the “descendants of the loong”, probably referring to the symbol’s aesthetic and auspicious connotations that are often intertwined with wisdom, power and excellence.
