What are the characteristics and characteristics of lions?

1, the characteristics of the lion: the lion's hair is short, and its body color is light gray, yellow or brown. The male lion also has a long mane, which is light brown, dark brown and black. The long mane extends to the shoulders and chest. 2, the characteristics of the lion: large size, uniform body, long limbs, many toes. The head is big and round, the snout is short, and the vision, hearing and smell are developed.

Lions are carnivores, cats and leopards. Known as the lion, China is known as the sister-in-law. This is a big cat that lives in Africa and Asia. It is the cat with the largest average weight in existence and the only male and female cat in the world.

As an exotic species, the lion was introduced into China, and its image gradually changed in the process of blending with traditional culture. The Sui and Tang Dynasties was the peak of the development of lion culture. The lion sculpture in this period has the characteristics of realism, diversification and secularization, which reflects the open and inclusive cultural characteristics of this period to a certain extent, and also provides us with a new angle to understand the cultural characteristics of Sui and Tang Dynasties.

The introduction of lions and the evolution of stone carving modeling before Sui and Tang Dynasties

Lions, known as the six beasts, often appear in the traditional artistic images of China, but they are not native to China. In the literature of past dynasties, the earliest clear appearance of "lion" is that "giant elephants, lions, fierce dogs and big birds are eating out, and foreign bodies are everywhere" recorded in Hanshu Biography of the Western Regions. In a word.

According to the existing literature, we can basically infer that the lion was introduced into China as a "foreign body" with the opening of the Silk Road after Zhang Qian hollowed out the western regions. Due to the long distance and inconvenient transportation in Han Dynasty, lions and their artistic images were not introduced to China, and many people circulated them, but few people saw them. Therefore, most descriptions of lions lack realistic basis and the concept is vague. It was not until the end of the Han Dynasty that the true image of the lion was recorded more clearly. During the Three Kingdoms period, Meng Kang wrote in the biography of the Western Regions of Han Dynasty: "The lion is like a tiger, yellow and bearded, and its tail hair is like a bucket." The lion images in the stone carvings of tombs in this period basically conform to this pattern, but they all have a pair of wings with the color of alienation of gods. Their modeling focuses on highlighting the lion's ferocity, and they can also feel the shadow of traditional animal modeling in China. The stone lions in the Southern and Northern Dynasties had a strong religious color, and a large number of deified decorations were added to the stone lions, reflecting the rapid development of religion in this period.

The plastic arts of stone lions developed continuously, and the development of lion culture reached its peak in Sui and Tang Dynasties. The lion's modeling tends to be realistic, its posture is more diverse, its appearance tends to be barbaric, and its temperament has also changed, which bears a deep brand of the times and reflects the cultural openness and tolerance of this period.