日志

泰国的生肖画

热度 10已有 1789 次阅读2016-5-3 10:31 |个人分类:古今收藏| 泰国, 生肖

2016-5-2

在友谊商店见到一组泰国的生肖画，看起来很残破的样子，是两幅拼在一起的，左边那一幅是一年四季的四只老虎，右边那一幅讲的是如何才能够在虎年把握时机逢凶化吉美好姻缘的巫术。

网上狗一狗，说是大英图书馆有类似的一个册页，是十九世纪末的作品：

The British Library holds a magnificent manuscript from Thailand dated 1885. It contains a series of drawings based on the Chinese Zodiac and its animals. A male or female avatar, a plant and a number are associated to every zodiacal sign.

In the upper left corner the female avatar for the year is riding a tiger. Only a ritual specialist (หมอดู) would have been able to interpret these omens and to give advice on how to avoid unfortunate or dangerous events。

要说上面这两幅，有一点神似的话，下面这一组，简直就更像了：

Each zodiac-related folio is followed by one folio of paintings, which symbolise the fate of a person under certain circumstances. The paintings are accompanied by numbers and one would have to trust the interpreting skills of the divination specialist to find out about the future.

One outstanding phrommachat manuscript was acquired for the Library by Henry Ginsburg in 1975 (Or. 4830) and has been digitised recently. Although the manuscript has no colophon and is not dated, we know from the style of writing and orthography that it was produced during the second half of the 19th century. However, it may be a revised copy of an older manuscript that was in a deteriorating state due to frequent use. The manuscript has 59 folios of text written on mulberry bark paper, accompanied by coloured illustrations on 32 folios and one ink drawing of entwined naga serpents. The text mainly explains how to interpret the illustrations, which include drawings based on the Chinese zodiac that relates each lunar month to the animals of the 12-year-cycle and their reputed attributes (earth, wood, fire, iron, water) as well as a male or female avatar (representing yin and yang), and a symbolic plant. A small number diagram used to work out periods in a person’s life which are particularly dangerous or unlucky is also usually present.