A Study On The Special Kind Of "waterfowl Boat"of The Tang Dynasty

“Yishou”refers to a type of ancient boat with decorative bird pattern in the front.This kind of boat is a perfect combination of ancient worships and pragmatic transportation tool.For people in ancient China,the boat provided living place on the surface,and it also served as the symbol of ancient citizens’ aesthetic pursuit,and their values and feelings on life.Tian Zhaoyuan was the first scholar to conduct researches on this type of bird-shape boat.In 2015,he published his essay named”racing of bird-shape boat” on Guangming Daily.In recent years,a different type of boat—phoenix-shape boat has been noticed by some scholars participating in some boat-racing activities in the southern part of China,which triggers a series of academic researches on it.Enlightened by both those boat-racing activities and some existing academic researches,I have discovered a type of ancient boat named “Yishou” through historical documents,and this kind of boat share similarity with the “phoenix-shape boat” mentioned above.According to the historical articles from the Western Han Dynasty to Ming and Qing Dynasties,the “Yishou boat” in various dynasties generally remain the same in how and where people use it.And among all those dynasties,Tang Dynasty is blessed with the most bountiful documents on “Yishou boat”.Tang Dynasty is considered to be a boom of Chinese folk culture,which is also of great significance to the development of modern folk culture research,therefore,I conduct a general research on “Yishou boat” in Tang Dynasty.I start my research from the derivation of the noun “Yishou boat”,and pick up various descriptions of “Yishou boat” on documents,and then search for how this noun come into being.Though available documents are insufficient,I still find out that the people in Tang Dynasty are captivated by the vessels decorated with “Yishou”pattern in the front,no matter who they are,civilians or nobles.And this preference for “Yishou” pattern can be traced back to the Western Zhou Dynasty.In fact,“Yishou” is not only a terminology referring to some aquatic birds,but also a decorative pattern on boats in many occasions such as some ceremonies,war ships,race of swimming,feast on areas near lakes or rivers.Based on some basic academic researches and investigations,I find that“Yishou” is not a simple symbol,it has a variety of implicit meanings.In Tang Dynasty,people tend to be both disturbed and dauntless towards water.They had faith in “Yishou” pattern,and believed it can chant magic strength into their bodies,thus,relieving themselves from the fear on water.Hence,“Yishou” pattern became an item connected with worships on gods and ghosts.After illustrating the cultural significance of “Yishou boat”,in the last few parts of my thesis,I focus more on the status of“Yishou boat”in the boat-racing activities today.Though “Yishou boat”in Tang Dynasty and modern phoenix-shape boat belong to totally different time,they still share a lot in common.And the advancement on the cognition of “Yishou boat”in Tang Dynasty will be beneficial to improve the public’understanding of modern boat-racing activities.And we can also carry out a revitalization of traditional culture by adding more bird-shape or phoenix-shape boats in our boat-racing activities today.