One of the greatest enjoyments about this blog, besides sharing my daily findings with you, is continuously acquiring new insights about culture and history. About six month ago, I came across this cricket box. and another one. I guess I have started another collection. Whether this box comes from China or not, has been the object of a discussion over the counter of our local dairy with our Chinese friends.
More interesting is the relation of the Chinese to the crickets. To these days, it seems that Chinese nomenclature about insects, particularly crickets, is richer and more colorful than in any other languages. Our friends mentioned numerous poetic names for the various varieties of cricket species found in China. Since the Neolithic period, while most of us were mainly interested in large mammals, birds and fishes the Chinese were interested in...insects.
Their love for crickets spans a 2000 year history of both singing and fighting (referred to as “Qiuxing” or “Dou Cuzhi”)…People have kept crickets in cages such as this one, enjoying their singing since 618 A.D and cricket fighting has been a popular sport since 960 A.D. Just in Beijing, there are nearly 100, 000 fans, a thousand of which are actually registered in the Cricket Committee. If you are keen to enter the next contest, you can borrow my box ;) This year the contest will be held in Beijing at the end of October. About 400 cricket fans are expected to this contest, and as every year, the winner of the championship will become “King of Cricket”:..Think about it, it could be you ;)
Cricket fighting seems a rather gentle combat. The great entomologist Jean-Henri Fabre describes such an encounter as follows;
ReplyDeletePeace reigns in the cage until the warlike instinct of the mating per[Pg 126]iod [Pg 128][Pg 127]breaks out. These duels between rivals are frequent and lively, but not very serious. The two rivals rise up against one another, biting at one another's heads—these solid, fang-proof helmets—roll each other over, pick themselves up, and separate. The vanquished Cricket scuttles off as fast as he can; the victor insults him by a couple of triumphant and boastful chirps; then, moderating his tone, he tacks and veers about the desired one.
That sounds a bit like a domestic conflict between two people I know ;)
ReplyDelete