Dian Cattle Essence ~ Yunnan Museum

📍Detailed Address:
Yunnan Province, Kunming City · Yunnan Provincial Museum

🌟Highlights:
❤Recommended Reasons:

✔ The Yunnan Provincial Museum has many cultural relics featuring cattle as the subject. Tracing back to the origins, 🐄 cattle have rich and diverse historical and cultural connotations in Yunnan. Among all museums nationwide, the Yunnan Provincial Museum holds one of the largest collections of cattle-related artifacts, with no less than 100 types, including ethnic minority folk paintings like the "Miao and Yao Bullfighting Painting" and bronze cattle-and-tiger desks.

✔ Archaeological discoveries from the Neolithic period in Yunnan have uncovered a large number of animal bones, with cattle bones appearing frequently. Cattle images are also common in the rock paintings of Cangyuan. By the Bronze Age, cattle on Yunnan bronzes reached a peak, dominating the scene and holding an important place in both Chinese and world cultural history.

✔ Cattle on Yunnan bronzes first appeared during the Spring and Autumn period, reaching their peak from the Warring States to the Western Han period. They were numerous and became one of the key themes in Yunnan bronze art, continuing until the end of the Eastern Han period in Yunnan’s Bronze Age.

Five bronze hoes decorated with cattle head patterns were unearthed at Wanjia Dam in Chuxiong, dating to the late Spring and Autumn period. These are precious artworks and represent the earliest cattle images found on Yunnan bronzes to date.

The Dabo Na bronze coffin tomb in Xiangyun yielded bronze models of the six domestic animals from the Warring States period, including a three-dimensional cast sculpture of a cattle with a prominent hump on its shoulder and back, consistent with the "peak cattle" commonly seen in Western Han Yunnan. From the Warring States to the Eastern Han, cattle appeared extensively on bronzes in central Yunnan, symbolizing the wealth and status of the Dian Kingdom.

✔ The cattle images on bronzes in the Yunnan Provincial Museum roughly include the following species:

① Peak cattle, the most important meat source for the Dian Kingdom. This is also the most frequently seen cattle on Yunnan bronzes.

② Yak: The museum holds a "hunting scene stacked drum-shaped bronze shell container" unearthed from Shizhaishan in Jinning, which features a yak standing under a tree in its engraved patterns. Craftsmen meticulously depicted the yak’s dense long hair, large horns, and broom-shaped tail, making it instantly recognizable. The appearance of yaks on bronzes indicates the Dian people's knowledge and familiarity with this large livestock living in high-altitude cold areas.

③ White-limbed wild cattle: During the fifth rescue excavation at Shizhaishan in Jinning, a "gilded bronze buckle ornament of two men binding a cattle" was unearthed, providing evidence.

④ Cattle-shaped monsters: These appear only in the engraved patterns on the "hunting scene stacked drum-shaped bronze shell container" from Shizhaishan in Jinning.

✔ Cattle were symbols of wealth and status during Yunnan’s Bronze Age.

① Over two thousand years ago, the Dian people worshipped cattle highly. Cattle were sacrifices offered to the "gods" and objects of veneration. In Dian sacrificial activities, cattle traces are almost everywhere.
For example, the lid of the "curse alliance bronze shell container" depicts Dian people slaughtering cattle for sacrifice.

② Yunnan cattle totems and their connotations:

They hold multiple symbolic meanings across different cultures and historical periods, mainly including:
- Strength, resilience, and vitality.
- Power symbols in primitive worship: In primitive rock paintings and tribal cultures, cattle were seen as symbols of power due to their large size and fierce temperament.
- Agriculture and abundance.
- Religious and spiritual sustenance.
- Symbols of contradiction and harmony.
- Agricultural symbols of the Huaxia ancestors:
- The Yan Emperor tribe used cattle as a totem ("cattle-headed human" image), directly linked to Shennong’s agricultural inventions. The cattle plowing technique is considered by scholars as an important economic foundation promoting ancient Chinese unification.
- Sacred status in sacrificial activities:
Ancient sacrificial cattle had to be pure in color ("sacred, pure-colored cattle"). The "Rites of Zhou" records cattle as one of the highest-grade sacrifices, reflecting their spiritual attributes.
- Philosophical imagery of contradiction and harmony.
- Concrete representation of survival struggles.
- Cultural interpretation of yin-yang balance:
The "I Ching" associates cattle with the Kun trigram (Earth), complementing the Qian trigram (Heaven).
- Embodiment of diligence and dedication:
Cattle are regarded as benevolent animals that "stole heavenly granary seeds to save humanity," with a lifelong fate of hard work and self-sacrifice.
- Cattle as a symbol of wealth.

✔ The connotations of cattle in the production and life of various ethnic groups in Yunnan:

- For the Wa people, cattle are an important carrier of their dietary culture.
- In Miao culture, Chiyou is depicted as a cattle-horned human figure, and the cattle totem is a core symbol of ethnic identity. The ritual of cattle beating to honor ancestors expresses remembrance of their ancestors’ bravery and spirit.
- The Dian people not only used cattle for sacrifice but also combined sacrificial activities with bullfighting and cattle binding. The Dian are among the earliest peoples in the world to hold bullfighting events, which were life-and-death struggles between humans and cattle.
For example, the museum’s "rectangular bullfighting bronze buckle ornament" recreates the tense scene of Dian bullfighting.
Another example, the "six men binding cattle bronze buckle ornament" depicts the fierce struggle of bullfighting.

✔ In the southwestern borderland, south of the colorful clouds.

🐄 Cattle are indispensable in production and life, and the Yunnan Provincial Museum holds the most cattle-related artifacts.

Among them, cattle, as an important symbol of the Dian Kingdom, appear widely on farming tools, weapons, utensils, decorations, and even daily necessities.

The shell container is a unique bronze artifact of the Dian Kingdom, decorated mainly with cattle, reflecting the Dian people's yearning for a better life. The shell container, a unique bronze vessel of the Dian Kingdom, is similar to a modern "piggy bank." The sea shells stored inside, as exotic treasures, once served as currency for the Dian Kingdom under specific historical contexts. The cattle image evolved from a practical lid knob to decorative art pieces, increasing in number and combining with bronze drums to form a unique artistic style. Notably, the decorative images on the shell containers are mainly cattle, and their evolution is quite ingenious. The original standing cattle may have served only as a practical "lid knob," but over time, it gradually evolved into pure decorative art.

The cattle on Dian shell containers are not isolated images; they often coexist harmoniously with animals like tigers and deer. This design not only showcases the biodiversity of the Dian Kingdom but also artistically reflects the concept of harmonious coexistence. It demonstrates the Dian Kingdom’s diversified understanding of cattle and possibly reflects exchanges with the outside world.
Its uniquely charming content awaits further interpretation.