炎帝神农氏
Xu Jetian – Scanned by Szilas from the book Kínai költészet (Chinese poetry，ISBN 963 9283 06 1)
In ancient times, people did not know how to cultivate crops. They survived by hunting, fishing, and gathering wild fruits. At that time, there was a clever man who, feeling hungry, wanted to go out to hunt deer, pigs, rabbits, and other animals. However, a heavy rainstorm prevented him from leaving. The clever man was extremely hungry, so he gathered some grass seeds from the weeds outside his cave and cooked them to eat. After eating several handfuls, he was no longer hungry. He shared this discovery with everyone, and they also gathered wild grass seeds to eat, which proved to be effective. Later, people called these few kinds of tasty wild grass seeds “grains.” The clever man was honored and called “Shennong.”
One day, Shennong ate too much grain and his stomach became bloated like a drum. He wondered: “If these wild grasses can cure hunger, can they(other grasses) also cure bloating?” So he went to find wild grasses and fruits to eat to cure his bloating. After trying many different things, he finally found hawthorn berries and radish seeds, which cured his bloating. On another occasion, he had a headache and couldn’t sleep. He went out to find wild fruits to eat and saw that the leaves of the mimosa tree (also known as the night-closing tree) were open during the day and closed at night. He thought, “If only my eyes could be like these leaves, opening to see things during the day and closing to sleep at night, how wonderful that would be!” He took some mimosa bark, boiled it in water, and drank it. Surprisingly, he fell asleep!
Later, whenever Shennong felt unwell, he would taste herbs to cure his ailments and share the medicinal herbs with others. He tasted hundreds of herbs and cured many diseases for himself and others. Legend has it that Shennong had two divine horns on his head. If he tasted a poisonous herb and felt unwell, he would lower his head and insert the horn into the ground, which would immediately detoxify him. From then on, the legend of Shennong tasting hundreds of herbs spread far and wide.
Additional Notes
- The legend of Shennong is an important part of Chinese mythology and cultural history, symbolizing the origin of agriculture and medicine.
Leave a Reply