Feng (mythology)

In Chinese mythology and folklore, Fēng (封, lit. "mound; hump") was an edible monster that resembles a two-eyed lump of meat and magically grows back as fast as it is eaten. Early Chinese texts also referred to this legendary food with the names Shìròu (視肉, "look like meat"), Ròuzhī (肉芝, "meat excrescence"), and Tàisuì (太歲, "great year; Jupiter"). Ròulíngzhī (肉靈芝, "meat Lingzhi mushroom") is a modern name popularized by Chinese news media reporting on purported discoveries of Feng throughout China. Fēng (封, lit. "hump") meant "mound, tumulus, raise a mound; altar; earth up (a plant); wall, bank of field; boundary embankment, fief" in Old Chinese; and means "to seal; bank (a fire); confer (title/territory/etc.) upon, feudal; envelope" in Modern Standard Chinese. Feng occurs in other Chinese mythological names. Fengzhu (封豬, with "pig; swine") or Bifeng (伯封, with "elder brother; uncle"), the son of Kui and Xuanqi (玄妻, "Dark Consort"), was named owing to his "swinish" wickedness. Wolfram Eberhard says, Fengzhu translates "pig with a hump" because feng means "hump", although commentaries often interpret the word as "big". Shìròu (視肉, lit. "look like meat") compounds shi (視 "regard; look at/upon; inspect; watch; sight; vision") with rou (肉 "meat; flesh; pulp; 'flesh' of melons/etc."). The Kangxi Zidian dictionary entry for shi (視) quotes Guo Pu's Shanhaijing commentary to use the otherwise unattested variant jùròu (聚肉, with 聚 "gather; assemble; get together"). Tǔròu (土肉, "soil flesh") compounds tu (土 "soil; earth; clay; land; crude") with rou. Compare turougui (土肉桂, with 桂 "cinnamon; cassia-bark tree"), which is the Chinese name for "Cinnamomum osmophloeum". Ròuzhī (肉芝, "meat excrescence") uses rou with the complex word zhi (芝, "supernatural mushrooms; excrescences"). Fabrizio Pregadio explains, The term zhi, "which has no equivalent in Western languages, refers to a variety of supermundane substances often described as plants, fungi, or 'excrescences'.