A Review of Research on the Naxi Epic "Chuangshiji" (Genesis)
This article by Yang Ting (Yunnan Minzu University, published in Baihua, 2023) reviews scholarship on the Naxi Dongba epic "Chongbandu," commonly translated as "Genesis," one of the "Three Naxi Masterpieces" alongside "The Battle of Black and White" and "Lubanlurao." It surveys literary studies (Ma Guowei, Cao Haiyan, Zhang Xuyan, Li Jinchun), philological work on Dongba character usage (Huang Sixian, Gan Lu), philosophical interpretations centered on naive materialism and primitive cosmology (Li Guowen, Yang Jiaxing, Liu Wenying, Xiaogen), and other angles including flood-myth comparison, tourism applications, and ethnological readings. The author identifies weaknesses — too few researchers, restricted access to original manuscripts, and uneven coverage across religious studies, ethnology, and philology — and proposes establishing a dedicated discipline of Naxi Dongba philology, exhaustively cataloguing pictographic variants across editions, and applying new multidisciplinary methods.
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