Houji

Houji, Lord of Millet, (Chinese: 后稷; pinyin: Hòu​jì; literally "Lord (or Empress) Millet") also variant (Chinese: 後稷; pinyin: Hòu​jì), or Qi (棄; personal name Zhou Qi (周棄) or Ji Qi (姬棄),[1] is credited either with original or exemplary cultivation of millet and wheat,[2] or with the original provision of millet to humanity, obtained from heaven. Houji is particularly remembered as Minister of Agriculture, in connection with the Great Flood.

Contents

Name

As a child, before receiving the name of Houji, he was originally given the name Qi, meaning "the Abandoned One". After growing up and becoming famous, he became known as Ji, having been awarded a surname, which then had not yet become a usual possession: thus, his Chinese name was Ji Qi. Posthumously, he was better known as Houji, from hou, "prince/deity/spirit" and ji meaning "agriculture".[3]

Ancestry

The ancestry of Houji is sometimes given that he was one of the Four Sons of Di Ku, each of whom founded a dynasty; thus being a Great-great grandson of the Yellow Emperor.[4] Another version is that his was a virgin birth, after his mother Jiang Yuan,[5] one of Di Ku's wives, stepped in a divine footprint.[6] He was posthumously elevated to Prince of Millet (houji) by King Chen Tang of Shang, founder of the Shang dynasty,.[2]

Ancestor of Zhou dynasty

Ji Qi, or Houji, is considered to be the founding ancestor of the royal house of the Zhou dynasty,[1] whose surname was Ji. The Zhou were successors to the Shang dynasty.

In mythology and religion

Houji is only one of several culture heroes alternatively or accumulatively credited with originating or first cultivating crops among the Five Cereals (China).[7]As Houji, Ji Qi was worshipped as one of the patron gods of abundant harvests,[6] like Lai Cho.[8]

An ode in commemoration of Houji appears in The Book of Poetry.[9] Besides its interest as one of the poems/odes of this classic foundational to Classical Chinese poetry; as one of the Confucian Classics, it is also a primary historical source on Houji (whether as a mythical or historical character). The ode begins, in the translation of James Legge, with his miraculous birth (note that "our people" refers to the House of Zhou):

The first birth of [our] people,
Was from Jiang Yuan.
How did she give birth to [our] people ?
She had presented a pure offering and sacrificed,
That her childlessness might be taken away.
She then trod on a toe-print made by God, and was moved,
In the large place where she rested.
She became pregnant....[10]

After a miraculously easy birth, Houji came out "like a lamb[11] ". For some reason, perhaps shame, Houji's mother then abandoned him, thus he is also known as the "Abandoned One". After his abandonment,the miracles continued:

He was placed in a narrow lane,
But the sheep and oxen protected him with loving care.
He was placed in a wide forest,
Where he was met with by the wood-cutters.
He was placed on the cold ice,
And a bird screened and supported him with its wings.
When the bird went away,
Hou-ji began to wail....[12]

When Houji grew older he became famous for (in Legge's translation) his luxuriant crops of beans, rice, hemp, wheat, and gourds.[13]

Then he specialized in grain, in particular being credited with the introduction of several types of millet.[14] Houji is then praised for introducing the annual spring sacrifice in which millet is converted to an alcoholic beverage and served with a roasted sacrificial sheep and the herb southernwood:

And how as to our sacrifices [to him] ?
Some hull [the grain] ; some take it from the mortar ;
Some sift it ; some tread it.
It is rattling in the dishes ;
It is distilled, and the steam floats about.
We consult ; we observe the rites of purification ;
We take southernwood and offer it with the fat ;
We sacrifice a ram to the Spirit of the path ;
We offer roast flesh and broiled : –
And thus introduce the coming year.
We load the stands with the offerings,
The stands both of wood and of earthenware.
As soon as the fragrance ascends,
God, well pleased, smells the sweet savour.
Fragrant is it, and in its due season !
Hou-ji founded the sacrifice,
And no one, we presume, has given occasion for blame or regret in regret to it,
Down to the present day.[15]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b CHINAKNOWLEDGE – a universal guide for China studies, article on Zhou Kings and rulers, [1]
  2. ^ a b Chinaculture.org article on Hou Ji
  3. ^ Wu, 234
  4. ^ http://www.chinaknowledge.de/History/Myth/mythology.html#diku
  5. ^ Shijing, Shi 245
  6. ^ a b Encyclopædia Britannica, article on Hou Ji
  7. ^ Sarah Milledge Nelson, Origins of Food Production In China – Rice, Millet Cultivation, Other Domesticated Plants, Domesticated Animals, Oryza sativa, Children of the Yellow Earth, mian. With bibliography. http://www.jrank.org/history/pages/5913/Origins-Food-Production-In-China.html
  8. ^ Roberts, Chinese Mythology A to Z, 2nd Ed, Revised, 2009 CE, p. 70
  9. ^ Wu, 233-4 and footnote 2 (page 276), citing daya, shengmin
  10. ^ Shijing III. 2. (245), verse 1
  11. ^ Shijing III. 2. (245), verse 2
  12. ^ Shijing III. 2. (245), verse 3
  13. ^ Shijing III. 2. (245), verse 4, Legge translation
  14. ^ Shijing III. 2. (245), verses 5 and 6
  15. ^ Shijing III. 2. (245), verses 7 and 8

External links