The ancient Goguryeo people believed that their ancestor King Fuyu was born from a golden frog. Both Zhejiang and Fujian have frog temples. Zhejiang is called Jinhua General and Fujian is called Frog General. The Zhuang people have the habit of prohibiting the killing of frogs. Some infertile Zhuang women also believe that swallowing toads can give birth to children (for more information about Zhuang paper-cutting, please refer to: Introduction to Zhuang folk paper-cutting). Obviously, ancient peoples feelings for frogs were a kind of worship of animal spirits.
The northwest Loess Plateau is the birthplace of the Xuanyuan Huangdi Clan Group recorded in ancient history. According to ancient historical legends, the totems of the Huangdi Fishing and Hunting Clan during the totem worship period include frogs. In addition, the totems of the legendary ancestor Nuwa are also " frog". In ancient China, "Wa" had synonyms with "wa" and "frog", and all came from "黾". "This naturally organically links the oldest frog totem with the oldest Nuwa clan group. The 'frog' totem is the symbol of the Nuwa clan group." (More Nuwa-related content: The inheritance of collective consciousness in Chinese folk paper-cut art) This is confirmed by the "frog pattern" painted pottery from the early Neolithic site in Banpo, Shaanxi, about six or seven thousand years ago. Regarding "Wa", Xu Shen of the Eastern Han Dynasty explained it in "Shuowen Jiezi" as "the ancient sacred goddess who transforms all things"; "Shuowen Jiezi" records that "when the world first opened, Nuwa rolled loess to make people, and she had great power in drama. If he had no time to offer, he would lead the rope across the mud and lift him up as a human being." In addition, the word "pregnancy" is the ancient work of "女?", which is the image of a toad and a frog plus the word "女", which vividly illustrates that "女" and "frog" combined into the word "pregnancy", this is probably the creation of human beings by Nuwa. Let the legend appear in words. in addition,In Chinese traditional medicine, the female "human gate" (reproductive organs) is called "toad mouth" or "frog mouth". "The word 'frog mouth' is where man comes from, and naturally it also means that Nuwa created man." It can be seen from this that "Nuwa" is the ancestor of all things, the ancestor of human beings, and the god of life and reproduction in Chinese peoples thinking. "Wa" is the same as "frog", and "frog" has many children. It seems reasonable for the common people who advocate life and reproduction to regard "frog" as their totem worship object. From this point on, we can be sure that the appearance of the "frog" image in the collection of folk paper-cut patterns is a relic of primitive human totem worship and a schema representation of the consciousness of life reproduction.
As a female image, frogs not only appear in the paper-cut program "Golden Toad Spews", which highlights fertility, but also in combination programs that reflect the love between the sexes, such as "Chicken Playing with Toad" and "Bangs Playing with Golden Toad". Keep applying.