Pig dragon

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A pig dragon or zhulong (Chinese 猪龍) is a type of jade artifact from neolithic China. Zhulong are zoomorphic forms with a piglike head and elongated limbless body coiled around to the head in the manner of an ouroboros. Early pig dragons are thick and stubby; later examples have more graceful, snakelike bodies.

Pig dragons were produced by the Hongshan culture, and often featured as grave goods.^[1] For example see [1]. Pig bones have been found interred alongside humans at Hongshan burial sites, suggesting that the animal had some ritual significance.

There is some speculation that the pig dragon is the first representation of the Chinese dragon. The character for "dragon" in the earliest Chinese writing has a similar coiled form, as do later jade dragon amulets from the Shang period.^[2]

[edit] References

^ Howard, Angela Falco, et al. (2006). Chinese Sculpture, pp. 21-22. Yale University Press. ISBN 0300100655.
^ Salviati, Filippo (2002). The Language of Adornment: Chinese Ornaments of Jade, Crystal, Amber and Glass, Fig. 17. Ten Speed Press. ISBN 1580085873.