Oxen in Chinese mythology
In some cases, Chinese myths focus on oxen-related subjects, such as plowing and agriculture or ox-powered carriage.
It can refer to a male, castrate or not, or to a female, young or old, of various species of the bovine family which have been domesticated for use as draft animals, with their strength being harnessed for various purposes, especially carting loads and various types of farm work, such as plowing.
However, male cattle used for hard labor are often castrated in order to make them more tractable, as well as providing better quality meat when finally consumed.
In the study of historical Chinese culture and other ethnic cultures in the area of what is now China, many of the stories that have been or are told regarding various characters and events have a double tradition: one of which traditions presents a more historicized version and a more rationalized account, and, another version which presents a more mythological and perhaps fantastic account (Yang 2005:12–13).
The family Bovidae includes almost 140 species of cloven-hoofed, ruminant mammals with characteristic unbranching horns covered in a permanent sheath of keratin in at least the males, but in terms of domestic cattle in China, this widespread family tends to be represented by the genus Bos in the north, similar to the familiar European and American domestic cattle; the Bubalus ("water buffalo"), generally in the warmer and wetter areas of the south, such as the Yangzi River valley; and, the yak (also in the genus Bos), in the higher and colder elevations of the more westward regions.
Various types of oxen have been domesticated in the area of what is now modern China for thousands of years, used for agriculture, transportation, for food, and other purposes.
These generally powerful creatures have had a significant roles in turning and tilling the soil with the plow, hauling loads by pulling an oxcart, turning millstones and waterwheels, and in the case of the yak, being saddled and ridden by humans or carrying loads mounted on their backs.
One of the myths involving the interaction of humans or divine beings and oxen is related to a popular holiday held on the 7th day of the 7th lunar month.
In Chinese mythology, there is a love story of Qi Xi (七夕 literally, "the Seventh Night"), in which Niulang (the Cow-Herd) (牛郎, Altair) and his two children (β and γ Aquilae) are separated from their mother Zhinü (the Weaver-Girl) (織女, lit.
The Oxen got the message mixed-up, and instead told the people that the Emperor of Heaven promised them that if they worked hard, that they would be able to eat three times a day.
Shujun is specially credited with inventing the agricultural practice of using a draft animal of the bovine family to pull a plow to cultivate the soil prior to planting, loosening and turning it, thus greatly enhancing agricultural productivity, and then teaching this skill to others (Yang, 2005: p. 201).
Lihui Yang describes Chiyou as having a six-handed human body, horned, four-eyed head with swords and spears for ears and temples, and ox hooves (2005: p. 92).
They worship oxen, which they consider to be lucky and heroic, and protective bringers of prosperity, and they wear ox horn motifs embroidered on their clothes or decorated on silver ornaments (Yang, 2005: p. 93).
According to their mythology, as recorded in Chinese sources, the Kyrgyz people[note 2] who were red-haired and had white faces claimed to be the descendants of a mating in a mountain cave between a cow and a god (Schafer, 1963: p. 73).
The last, together with its spirit driver Mangshen 芒神, was made of clay and consequentially whipped and smashed to pieces, as a symbol of instigation of the spring agricultural growth.
According to a widespread Gansu province myth, earthquakes have their origin in the annoyed shrugging of the ox which bears the earth on its back (Yang, 2005: 178).
Ox herdboys riding oxen have been used as a motif in painting and graphic arts to symbolize the ability of the mind to control the body.
