Origins of China: Pangu, Nüwa, and Fuxi 

In an endless expanse of nothingness, when there only existed a cosmic void, chaos (Hundun) reigned supreme. However, with the flow of time, the celestial energies of Yin, the passive and cold force, and Yang, the active and hot force, began to stir as they yearned for balance. As a result, they coalesced into an egg, and from their congealment Pangu, a colossal hairy, giant, with two horns and two tusks, was birthed.

18000 years passed before Pangu, in his egg, realized that he was surrounded by nothingness. It was then he hatched, fully formed, holding an axe (a symbol only visible in Chinese Mythology since the Ming dynasty). With this axe, he hacked apart the Yin and Yang. The Yin, the dark and murky energy settled to form the earth whereas the Yang, the light and clear energy, rose to form the vast skies.

To prevent Yin and Yang from merging, Pangu stood between them and pushed them apart with his own bare hands, with his head touching the sky and his feet planted in the earth, for another 18000 years. As he kept growing in height and stature, the heavens and earth stretched 90,000 leagues ( roughly 30,000 miles) apart.

Soon after, exhaustion got to Pangu and he passed away. Upon his death, his skull became the top of the sky, his breath transformed into the winds and clouds, and his voice echoed the rolling thunder. His left eye gave rise to the Sun while his right eye formed the Moon. His limbs extended to form North, South, East, and West and his flesh turned to soil. His sweat formed the rain and the dew, and his blood flowed as the rivers and seas. His veins transversed to form roads, whereas his body formed the rugged mountains. His body hair sprang into plants and trees, whereas his teeth converted to precious metals. While his bones became hard stones, his marrow gave rise to the ever-so-important precious stone of jade. Finally, the fleas in his fur gave rise to animals.

While the earth had assumed its divine form, humans were yet to walk on the face of it. Even though there exist multiple versions in Chinese mythology regarding the advent of humans, most of them are traced back to the legend of one of the most venerated goddesses, Nüwa.

Nüwa (Nǚwā), or Nu Gua, was considered to be the Mother goddess and creator of all humankind in Chinese folk. She represents nature, fertility, and order on the earth. In ancient mythology, she has been depicted as part woman and part serpent.

After, Pan Gu’s body had formed the Earth, the goddess Nüwa walked among the mountains, rivers, and trees. On her wanderings, she was overcome with loneliness. While she had the sylvan beauty of earth to bask in, she found no one to keep her company. As she sat, crouched near the Yellow River, she realized what was missing. Using the yellow mud or clay around the banks of the river, she started to create figures with hands, legs, and arms and breathed life into them. This became the first human.

Excitedly, Nüwa went on to sculpt more and more humans from the mud but eventually tired herself out. Therefore, she took a vine, dipped it in mud, and began swinging it around. Each splatter of the clay is said to have given rise to a new human.

It is further believed that the people Nüwa sculpted from her own hands formed the royalty and the nobles, whereas the “cord-made” people became the commoners and the working class.

Other sources also credit goddess Nüwa with the creation of animals, stating that on the first day, she used clay to create chickens. On the second day, she created dogs; on the third day, she created sheep; On the fourth day, she created pigs; on the fifth day, she created cows; on the sixth day she created horses; and finally on the seventh day, she created humans.

At the same time, Nüwa is also closely associated with a deluge myth, where she saved mankind from terrible flooding and destruction.

As time flew by, a long time after the creation of humanity, a quarrel between Gonggong, the God of Water, and Zhu Rong, the God of fire brewed into a war that wreaked havoc and caused despair all over the world.

As the God of water Gonggong found himself on the brink of defeat after one particular battle, he smashed his head against the Buzhou Mountain with fury. The Buzhou mountain refers to a mythical peak located in Northwest China which represented the pillar that held apart the heavens and the land.

As Gonggong repeatedly hit his head on the mountain, it collapsed and a part of the sky fell inside crevices that fissured in the earth. A massive fire engorged the forests and rain poured through the hole in the sky. At the same time, flood waters rose from beneath the earth. In this reign of chaos, fierce creatures emerged from the deepest pits of the earth and began terrorizing and devouring humans.

Seeing the Mankind she had created suffer, Nüwa was anguished; she resolved to mend the sky and restore balance to the earth. Thus, Nüwa collected Five colored stones from the world’s majestic rivers and melted them to create a molten iridescent mixture that she then used to mend the hole in the sky. She then killed a mammoth-sized turtle and used its 4 legs as pillars to support the sky. To preserve humanity, she caught and slayed a black dragon who had been terrorizing the central plains, scaring away all the other beasts from the land of Qi. Then, she burnt reeds and used the resulting ashes to barricade the floodwaters so people could live happily again.

Thus, peace was restored to the land. However, since the turtle legs were less tall than the mountain, they caused the sky to slant to the northwest and the earth to the southeast. This gave rise to the Day-night cycles and caused the rivers of China to run southeast.

Some scholars suggested that Nüwa was the first creative Chinese deity as ancient China is considered strongly matriarchial. At the time, many believed childbirth was a miraculous occurrence and children only belonged to their mothers. However, during the Song dynasty, as the reproductive cycles came to be understood, society started moving towards a more patriarchal system.

Hence, there exists another alternate version of the copulation myth that relies more on Nüwa’s male counterpart, Fuxi. Fuxi, the first mythical emperor in China, was both Nüwa’s brother and husband. He was a great leader, revered for discovering the eight Chinese trigrams (which further helped develop the Chinese writing system), the yin-yang, and the 5 elements that explained the natural course of the world. He domesticated animals, created fishing nets taught people how to use them, and instituted marriage.

In an alternative myth, it is said that a catastrophic flood consumed the entirety of mankind except twins Nüwa and Fuxi, who managed to escape into a boat. As the floodwaters calmed down, they sought refuge in the Kunlun mountains. It was then that they realized they were the last humans left on Earth.

While they both believed that they should procreate to save humanity from dying out, they knew it was a contentious issue since they were siblings. Thus, they turned to heaven’s guidance, praying for divination. After praying, they decided that they needed to go through divination tests that would reveal whether they were destined with one another.

In the first test, they rolled a boulder down the mountains, postulating that if both the boulders were to land together, it meant that the heavens approved of their matrimonies. As the two boulders landed together, Fuxi and Nüwa seemed to have passed the first test of divination.

In their second test, Fuxi and Nüwa ascended two different mountains and lit separate fires. If the plumes from the two fires intertwined with one another, it was a sign that they had been blessed to continue the human race. As the smoke from the fires intertwined with each other, Fuxi and Nüwa got married and repopulated Earth.

As stated before, many believe that as the matriarchial system started collapsing, many members of the royalty and Confucionists tried to diminish the role of Nüwa as a goddess and delegitimize her role as a female ruler. This would also explain why the ‘Heaven-Piercing’ festival (celebrated on the 23rd day of the first month during which people would prepare flatbreads and place them on their ceilings to imitate the mending of the sky) faded away after the arrival of the Song dynasty.

Although China’s traditional and religious beliefs on the various deities underwent massive changes throughout the years, Nüwa still holds a position as one of the most important figures and idols in Chinese culture.

To conclude, her role in molding Chinese culture and practices remains undeniable, despite the decades of attempts to erase her importance.


*Emperor in China referred to anyone (predominantly man) who rules alone and legitimately with their dynasty.