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Kirin
Wikipedia
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A qilin, also spelled kylin and qilin (麒麟 pinyin: qi2 lin2; Cantonese: kay-lun), is a mythical horned Chinese deer-like creature that is said to appear only when a sage has appeared. It is a good omen that brings Rui4 (?? roughly translated to serenity and prosperity). It is often depicted with what looks like fire all over its body. In most drawings, its head looks like that of a Chinese dragon. The qilin is sometimes translated as unicorn in English, because it is superficially similar to the unicorn in being a hooved imaginary beast having a single horn on its head. It was also the animal of the ancient emperor Yao's minister of justice, Gao Yao. The Qilin could recognise whether a person was guilty or not.
Although it looks fearsome, the Qilin only punishes the sinners; when it walked on grass, it could not trample it. Being a peaceful creature, its diet did not include flesh.
In Japanese, the qilin is called a kirin. Japanese art tends to depict the qilin as more deerlike than in Chinese art. The word kirin has come to be used in modern Japanese for a giraffe.
This article is licensed under the
GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the
Wikipedia article "Kirin".
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Last Modified: 2004-02-23 |
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