Zao Jun the Kitchen God to whom Wǔgǔ offerings are made in some traditions.
The Five Grains or Cereals (traditional Chinese: 五穀; simplified Chinese: 五谷; pinyin: Wǔ Gǔ) are a grouping (or set of groupings) of five farmedcrops that were all important in ancient China. Sometimes the crops themselves were regarded as sacred; other times, their cultivation was regarded as a sacred boon from a mythological or supernatural source. More generally, wǔgǔ can be employed in Chinese as a synecdoche referring to all grains or staple crops of which the end produce is of a granular nature. The identity of the five grains has varied over time, with different authors identifying different grains or even categories of grains.
Holiness
The sense of holiness or sacredness regarding the Five Grains proceeds from their traditional ascription to the saintly rulers credited with creating China's civilization. They were seen not merely as five crops chosen from many options but as the source permitting agrarian society and civilization itself. "Squandering the Five Grains" was seen as a sin worthy of torment in Diyu, the Chinese hell.[citation needed]
As the position of emperor was seen as an embodiment of this society, one's behavior towards the Five Grains could take on political meaning: as a protest against the overthrow of the Shang dynasty by the Zhou, Boyi and Shuqi ostentatiously refused to eat the Five Grains. Such rejections of the grains for political reasons underwent a complex development into the concept of bigu, the esoteric Taoist practice of achieving immortality by avoiding certain foods.[citation needed]
By the time of written records, the development of agriculture in China had become greatly mythologized. There were various traditions regarding which of the early Chinese leaders introduced the Five Grains:
Shennong (神農) (lit. "Divine Farmer") was a Chinese culture hero credited with the development of agriculture. He was often conflated with Yandi (the "Flaming Emperor") and is also sometimes described as the Wugu Xiandi or "Divine Emperor of the Five Grains". Sima Qian's chronology placed him around 2737–2699 BC.[citation needed]
In the Shennongjia ("Shennong's Ladder") area of Hubei, an oral epic poem titled the Hei'anzhuan ("Story of Chaos") describes Shennong finding the seeds of the Five Grains:
Shennong climbed onto Mount Yangtou,
He looked carefully, he examined carefully,
Then he found a seed of millet.
He left it with the Chinese date tree,
And he went to open up a wasteland.
He planted the seed eight times,
Then it produced fruit.
And from then on humans were able to eat millet.
He sought for the rice seed on Mount Daliang,
The seed was hiding in grasses.
He left it with the willow tree,
And he went to open up a paddy field.
He planted the seed seven times,
Then it produced fruit.
And from then on humans were able to eat rice.
He sought for the adzuki bean seed,
And left it with the plum tree.
He planted it one time.
The adzuki bean was so easy to plant and was able to grow in infertile fields.
The soybean was produced on Mount Weishi,
So it was difficult for Shennong to get its seeds.
He left one seed of it with a peach tree,
He planted it five times,
Then it produced fruit,
And later tofu was able to be made south of the Huai River.
Barley and wheat were produced on Mount Zhushi,
Shennong was pleased that he got two seeds of them.
He left them with a peach tree,
And he planted them twelve times,
Then later people were able to eat pastry food.
He sought the sesame seed on Mount Wuzhi,
He left the seed with brambles.
He planted it one time.
Then later people were able to fry dishes in sesame oil.
Shennong planted the five grains and they all survived,
Because they were helped by the six species of trees.[1]
Huangdi (lit. "Yellow Emperor"), placed 2699–2588 BC by Sima Qian, was also credited in ancient texts as the first teacher of cultivation to his subjects.[2]
Houji (lit. "Lord Millet") is sometimes credited with the original provision of millet from heaven to mankind[citation needed] and sometimes credited with its exemplary cultivation.[3] Lord Millet was a title bestowed upon this figure by King Tang, founder of the Shang dynasty, and may have been an early position in the Chinese government.[3] He was later worshipped as one of the patron gods of abundant harvests, like Lai Cho.[4]
In southern China, the Pengtoushan culture on the Yangtze River (c. 7500–6100 BC) has left rice farming tools at some locations, though not at the type site. The Hemudu culture around Hangzhou Bay south of the Yangtze (c. 5000–4500 BC) certainly cultivated rice. The various people (such as hundred viet tribal union) who succeeded in these areas were later conquered and culturally assimilated by the northern Chinese dynasties during the historical period.[citation needed]
Lists
There are various versions of which five crops (or even broad categories of crops) are meant by this list.
The Tang-era Buddhist master Daoxuan's Ritual of Measuring and Handling Light and Heavy Property (量處輕重儀, Liangchu Qingzhong Yi) instead lists five categories: "house" grain (房穀), "loose" grain (散穀), "horn" grain (角穀), "beard" grain (芒穀), and "cart" grain (輿穀).[clarification needed][5] Huilin (慧琳)'s Pronunciation and Meaning of All Scriptures (一切經音義, Yiqiejing Yinyi (Huilin)) cites Yang Chengtian (陽承天)'s Assembly of Characters (字統, Zitong) as describing similar categories: suigu, sangu, jiaogu, qigu, and shugu.[clarification needed][5]
One modern Chinese dictionary notes other candidates including sesame, barley, oats, and peas.
Modern ritual and culinary usage
Assortments of five grains continue to be used in ritual contexts, as in the Southern Min custom of creating a Taoist stove to cook Chui Zhao Fan, a meal for the Kitchen God in which five dry seeds are placed into a slot in the chimney of the stove.[6] Casual worshippers may simply use any five beans (e.g., of different colors) instead of any particular set of grains.[citation needed]
