Talk:Green Dragon Crescent Blade

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[edit] Green or Blue?

User 69.231.246.224 changed the text "Green Dragon Crescent Blade" to "Blue Moon Dragon". I posted the following on their talk page:

Hi there. :-) I note that you've replaced all references to "Green Dragon Crescent Blade" with "Blue Dragon" (specifically on pages Guan Yu, Green Dragon Crescent Blade, and Guan dao). I wondered what your motivation is for this? I ask this in particular since the page Green Dragon Crescent Blade does reference the alternative name in the second paragraph: "It is also sometimes referred to as Blue Dragon...". Further the Chinese characters "青龍偃月刀" mentioned in the Guan dao article (in the first paragraph of the History section) do actually mean "Green Dragon Crescent Blade". Finally, in replacing the name with "Blue Dragon" you have removed all of the links to the page Green Dragon Crescent Blade. I thought I'd ask you first rather than undoing your changes without talking to you.

Stelio 23:12, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Having not heard anything from them, I have now restored the text to "Green Dragon Crescent Blade". Stelio 19:11, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

The chinese character is Green, not blue. The proper name should be "Green Dragon Crescent Blade"
David
The name's definitely Green Dragon Crescent Blade. "Blue Dragon" originated from the Dynasty Warriors series, and I recall Guan Yu calling it "Black Dragon" in the video game Kessen 2. Both games are made by KOEI, which suggests to me they aren't exactly bent on promoting a universal name for it.80.4.201.125 17:37, 31 March 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, it's definitely green, not blue. The Chinese character 青 qing is usually translated as "green". —Lowellian (reply) 06:32, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] What color is it?

  • I thought I would provide some background info for those who are confused about the color. The problem stems from the first character in the Chinese word: 青. Depending on the context, 青 can be translated as green, blue or black.[1][2] So which one is it here? I would go with green dragon (think about it, does a blue or black dragon make any logical sense? Lizards tend to be green, not blue or azure!).
Why green? 青 was originally a compound character made up of two separate characters: 生 (to give birth to) + 丹 (red). In other words, 青 (green the color of trees 木, and spring) is that which begets red (火 - fire, summer). Confused? Read the Wu Xing article, and all will become clear (I hope).
Why blue? In Xun Zi (s:荀子/勸學篇) It says 青、取之於藍，而青於藍；冰、水為之，而寒於水。 (blue is taken from the knotweed plant, but is even bluer than knotweed. Ice is made by water, but is colder than water.) Xun Zi's point was that a good student should surpass the achievements of his teacher. This passage gave birth to the Chinese idiom: 青出於藍.[3]
Why black? The leaves of the knotweed plant contain liquid which can be used to make dye. According to the Kangxi Dictionary entry for 藍, the color of the dye can range from green to blue or darker (resembling black?).[4] -- A-cai 00:43, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Dragon origin story

The story of the blade was that there was a blacksmith forging the blade when suddenly a green dragon passed by, The dragon was cut up and the body became part of the pieces therefore making the dao a magical weapon.
Where did this story came from? never heard of it. The weapon itself is 82 pounds (not british pounds, the unit they used during that period), not 100. Freescoring 09:12, 27 April 2007 (UTC)