Zhulong (mythology)

Zhulong 'dʒuːlɒŋ or Zhuyin 'dʒuːjɪn, also known in English as the Torch Dragon, was a giant red solar dragon and god in Chinese mythology. It supposedly had a human's face and snake's body, created day and night by opening and closing its eyes, and created seasonal winds by breathing. The key word in the names "Zhuyin" and "Zhulong" is , pronounced zhú in present-day Mandarin. It describes the act of "shining" or "illuminating" something but, owing to the nature of Chinese grammar, can function as a verb ("to shine", "to illuminate"), an adjective ("shining", "bright"), or a noun ("light", "illumination", an object which illuminates) depending upon its position in a phrase. For example, the Chinese word for "candle" is (làzhú) or "wax-zhú"; an older word for "lantern" is (zhúlóng) or "zhú-basket". In the name Zhulong, the zhú modifies the noun (lóng) and thus intends a "shining", "torch-like", or "torch-bearing" Chinese dragon. and others call him "Torch Dragon", since he is described in some of the classic texts as carrying a torch. In the name Zhuyin, the zhú sits beside the noun (yīn), which describes both regular darkness and the feminine principle of the yin-yang, with an implicit conjunction between them. The zhú can also be rendered as an attributive, as in Birrell's "Torch Shade", or as an agent, as Visser's "Enlightener of the Darkness". In the Chu Ci, Zhulong is also rendered as Chuolong, which can variously mean "Distant" or "Quarrelsome Dragon", and as Zhuolong, variously "Outstanding" or "Departed Dragon". According to present reconstructions, these variant characters (now chuò) and (now zhuó) sounded closer to the pronunciation of in old Chinese, although not homophonous. The names "Zhuyin" and "Zhulong" appear in classic Chinese texts from the Han (3rd century BCE – 3rd century CE) that record the myths of the Zhou (12th–3rd century BCE). The Classic of Mountains and Seas (c. 3rd century BCE - 1st century CE) records parallel myths about Zhuyin and Zhulong.