Research On The Image And Belief Of The Sacred Bird In Ancient Sichuan

The ancient Shu civilization is an important branch of Chinese civilization,but the cultural interpretation of the cultural relics unearthed from the Sanxingdui and Jinsha sites is not yet sufficient.In recent years,benefiting from the new progress in archaeological excavation work at the Sanxingdui Site,there has been a new opportunity for the study of ancient Shu civilization,with the possibility of in-depth interpretation of related cultural relics and their decorations(including bird elements of artifacts and images).This study investigates the artifacts and images containing bird elements unearthed from the Sanxingdui and Jinsha sites from three dimensions: archaeology,art,and religion.By restoring the original images of bird patterns and imitation tools,the artistic expression characteristics are analyzed,and the cultural functions of the divine bird images in the ancient Shu state,as well as the creation concepts and cultural beliefs of the ancient Shu ancestors,are explored.The main body of the article consists of five parts.The first part is the introduction,which mainly explains the spatiotemporal scope and related concepts of this study.It also briefly reviews and comments on the current status of research on the image and belief of divine birds in the ancient Shu region,and clarifies the research ideas and methods,academic value and significance of this article.The second part provides a comprehensive review and analysis of the records of ancient Shu divine birds in passed down literature.The research results indicate that the names,life experiences,and geographical location of the ancient Shu kings are closely related to "birds",which indirectly proves that the worship of divine birds occupies an important position in the primitive religious beliefs of the ancient Shu ancestors.The third part,based on archaeological culture,comprehensively collected and organized bird patterns and imitations unearthed from the Sanxingdui and Jinsha sites,and combined with relevant artifacts and images unearthed from early civilization sites,conducted a research-based restoration of some incomplete and unknown divine bird images unearthed in the ancient Shu region.On this basis,the types of bird image materials are classified based on the shape,pattern characteristics,and combination methods of the objects,which also involves the cultural sources of the objects and patterns.The fourth part,based on the formal analysis of the divine bird image,places the bird image remains unearthed in the ancient Shu region in a specific archaeological and cultural background.By utilizing some artifacts and images unearthed from the same site and related sites of the same era,the material environment of the ancient Shu country’s sacrificial ceremony and the cultural environment of the ancient Shu civilization are constructed,and the theories and methods of anthropology,philology,mythology,and other disciplines are combined,The focus is on examining the functions and significance of divine bird patterns and figurative instruments in ancient Shu art,as well as the beliefs and etiquette systems of ancient Shu ancestors.The last part of the article is a summary of the entire text.Firstly,it pointed out the important position of the worship of divine birds in the primitive religious beliefs of the ancient Shu ancestors,and secondly,it summarized the cultural functions of different types of bird images left in the sacrificial activities of the ancient Shu state.The article aims to promote the overall process of ancient Shu civilization research by studying the image and belief of divine birds in ancient Shu,and deepen the understanding and understanding of the worship of divine birds in early Chinese civilization.