China’s Five Sacred Creatures and What They Actually Meant
The dragon: lord of transformation, emblem of imperial power The Shuowen Jiezi, the Han dynasty’s great etymological dictionary compiled around 100 CE, describes the dragon as “the lord of scaly creatures,” able to be dark or luminous, minute or vast, short or long, ascending to the heavens at the spring equinox and submerging into the […]
5/22/2026 10:48:01 AM