The Benevolence and Filial Piety Culture of the Dragon Mother

Elderly residents in Shanglin County, Xincheng County and Xingbin District of Laibin City, Heshan City, as well as parts of Mashan County bordering Shanglin, have all heard the legend of Tejue. They all know that this story originated in Shimen Village of Shanglin County.

In the late primitive society, there lived a childless lonely woman in Shimen Village of Tanghong Township. Out of kindness, she adopted a baby snake. When she was cutting fodder for pigs, she accidentally chopped off the snake’s tail. Hence she named it Tejue, a Zhuang word meaning short-tailed dragon, and raised it as her own son.

As Tejue grew up, he possessed immense supernatural power. He took good care of his adoptive mother and the local villagers. After his mother passed away, Tejue summoned a strong wind and carried her body to a cave behind Shimen Mountain for burial. Every year on the third day of the third lunar month, Tejue would come back to sweep her tomb.

Later, people named the lake where Tejue had lived the South Stone Sea. His adoptive mother was honoured as the Dragon Mother, and the burial cave was named Ganxian Cave.

According to folklore, the Dragon Mother died on the second day of the third lunar month and was buried on the third day. Therefore, grand sacrificial rituals are held by the South Stone Sea on the third day of the third lunar month every year to worship the Dragon Mother. This date eventually evolved into a shared festival of the ancient Nanyue ethnic group, the ancestors of the Zhuang and Dong peoples, and became the origin of the traditional Zhuang festival of the Third Day of the Third Lunar Month.

Professor Lan Duomin from Minzu University of China specially elaborated on the legend of Tejue and the Dragon Mother Cave (Ganxian Cave) in his paper Snake Totem, the Third Day of the Third Lunar Month and Cliff Coffin Burial, published in Guangxi Ethnic Studies (Issue 4, 1996).

The story of Tejue has been recorded in every edition of Shanglin County Annals starting from the Guangxu reign version. From the late Qing Dynasty to the 1950s, numerous poets and literati in Shimen and Shanglin created a large number of poems themed on the Dragon Mother and Tejue. In the 1950s and 1960s, the Shanglin County Song and Dance Troupe adapted the story of Tejue into many Zhuang musicals and staged performances both inside and outside the county