Leonard W. King, who has gathered together the surviving evidence regarding the mysterious nig-gil-ma[85] points out that the name is sometimes preceded by “the determinative for ‘pot’, ‘jar’, or ‘bowl’ ”, and is identical with the Semitic word mashkhalu. In the Tell-el-Amarna letters there are references to a mashkhalu of silver and a mashkhalu of stone (a silver vessel and a stone vessel). The nig-gil-ma may be simply a “jar” or “bowl”. “But”, says Mr. L. King, “the accompanying references to the ground, to its production from the ground, and to its springing up … suggest rather some kind of plant; and this, from its employment in magical rites, may also have given its name to a bowl or vessel which held it. A very similar plant was that found and lost by Gilgamesh, after his sojourn with Ut-napishtim[86]; it too had potent magical power, and bore a title descriptive of its peculiar virtue of transforming old age to youth.” The nig-gil-ma may [[246]]therefore be a plant, a ship, a stone bowl or jar, or a vessel of silver (the moon metal). If we regard it as a symbol or avatar of the mother-goddess it was any of these things and all of these things—the Mother Pot, the inexhaustible womb of Nature, the Plant of Life containing “soul substance”, the red clay, the moon-silver, or, as in China, the jade of which the sacred vessel was made. The Great Mother’s herb-avatar was the ginseng (mandrake), as in the Egyptian Deluge story it was the red earth didi from Elephantine placed in the beer prepared for the slaughtering goddess Hathor-Sekhet as a surrogate of blood and a soporific drink; the mixture was “the giver of life”, the red aqua vitae, like the red wine and the juice of red berries in different areas.[87] The mandrake was the didi of southern Europe and of China. Dr. Rendel Harris shows that the early Greek magicians and doctors referred to the male mandrake, which was white, and the female mandrake, which was black. The black mandrake was personified as the Black Aphrodite.[88]
The Babylonian reference in a magical text to the nig-gil-ma as “two small creatures, one white and one black” is therefore highly significant. Apparently, like jade, the nig-gil-ma symbolized “the male principle”, and “the spirit” of “a beautiful woman”. Thus mandrake (ginseng), the Plant of Life, red earth, jade, the pearl and the pot or jar or bowl, and the Deluge ship, and the ship of the sun-god, were forms, avatars, or manifestations of the Great Mother who preserved the seed of mankind and the elixir of life—in the Pot it grew the Plant of Life, and from it could be drunk the dew of life, the water of life, plant and water being impregnated with the “spirit” of jade. Jade-lore is of highly complex character [[247]]because, as has been indicated, the early instructors of the Chinese attached to the mineral the Egypto-Babylonian doctrines regarding the Great Mother and her shells, pearls, precious stones, gold, silver and copper, herbs, trees, cereals, red earth, &c. The Babylonian evidence regarding the nig-gil-ma as a herb, and as a silver or stone jar, pot, or cup, in which was preserved the seed of mankind (“soul substance”) may explain why in the Chinese Deluge myth there is no ark or ship. The goddess provided jade instead of a boat and she created dragons to control the rain-supply, so that the world might not again suffer from the effects of a flood.
The virtues of jade were shared to a certain degree by rhinoceros horn, which, as we have seen, was reputed to shine by night.
Laufer has gathered together sufficient evidence to prove that the rhinoceros was one of the wild animals known in ancient China.[89] A hero of the Chou Dynasty, who subdued rebels and established peace throughout the Empire, “drove away also the tigers, leopards, rhinoceroses and elephants—and all the people were greatly delighted”.[90] A native writer says: “To travel by water and not avoid sea-serpents and dragons—this is the courage of a fisherman. To travel by land and not avoid the rhinoceros and the tiger—this is the courage of hunters.” In ancient times certain of the lords attending on the emperor had a tiger symbol on each chariot wheel, while other lords had on their wheels crouching rhinoceroses.[91] Laufer expresses the view that “the strong desire prevailing in the epoch of the Chou for the horn of the animal (rhinoceros) which was carved into ornamental cups, and for its valuable skin, [[248]]which was worked up into armour, had … contributed to its final destruction.”[92] The rhinoceros-horn cups were used, like jade cups, chiefly for religious purposes. Rice-wine was drunk from them when vows were made, and from them were poured libations to ancestors. The animal’s skin was used not only for armour, because of its toughness and durability, but because the rhinoceros was a longevity animal, and a form of the god of longevity (shou-sing). It was used, too, for the coffin of the “Son of Heaven” (the Emperor). “The innermost coffin was formed by hide of water buffalo and rhinoceros.” This case was enclosed in white poplar timber and the two outer cases were of catalpa wood.[93] The jade coffin was similarly a protecting life-giver.
As there were black and white nig-gil-ma, and black and white deities, so were there black and white rhinoceroses and black and white elephants. Gautama Buddha entered his mother’s right side “in the form of a superb white elephant”.[94]
The water-rhinoceros had “pearl-like armour” (a significant comparison when it is remembered that pearl-lore and jade-lore are so similar), but not the mountain rhinoceros. It was the horn of the male animal that had special virtues. The markings on it included a red line, which was a result of his habit of gazing at the moon; the spots were stars. As the animal was connected with the “material sky”, the horn was impregnated with the Yang principle. A horn that “communicated with the sky” was of the “first quality”. Laufer quotes the statement: “If the horn of the rhinoceros ‘communicating with the sky’ emits light, so that it can be seen by night, [[249]]it is called ‘horn shining at night’ (ye ming si): hence it can communicate with the spirits and open a way through the water”. A man who carried in his mouth a piece of rhinoceros horn found, it was alleged, on diving into the sea, that the water gave way so as to allow a space for breathing.[95] The pearl-fishers may therefore have used the magic horn, believing that it protected and assisted them.
It is recorded of a horn presented to an emperor of the Tʼang Dynasty that “at night it emitted light so that a space of a hundred paces was illuminated. Manifold silk wrappers laid around it could not hide its luminous power. The emperor ordered it to be cut into slices and worked up into a girdle; and whenever he went out on a hunting expedition, he saved candle light at night.” With the aid of the horn it was possible “to see supernatural monsters in water”.[96]
There was warm rhinoceros horn and cold rhinoceros horn, as there was warm jade and cold jade. A Chinese work of the eighth century mentions “cold-dispelling rhinoceros horn (pi han si), whose colour is golden.[97]… During the winter months it spreads warmth which imparts a genial feeling to man.” Another work speaks of “heat-dispelling rhinoceros horn (pi shu si).… During the summer months it can cool off the hot temperature.” Girdles of “wrath-dispelling” horn caused men “to abandon their anger”; hair-pins, combs, &c., were made from “dust dispelling” horn. Rhinoceros horn had, like jade, healing properties. A fourth-century Chinese writer tells that “the horn can neutralize poison because the animal devours all sorts of vegetable poisons with its food”. Chinese drug stores still stock shavings of the horn to [[250]]cure fever, smallpox, ophthalmia, &c.[98] According to S. W. Williams[99] “a decoction of the horn shavings is given to women just before parturition and also to frighten children”. A medicine is prepared from rhinoceros skin, too. Laufer states that “the skin, as well as the horn, the blood, and the teeth, were medicinally employed in Cambodja, notably against heart diseases.… In Japan rhinoceros horn is powdered and used as a specific in fever cases of all kind.” Dragon bones were used in like manner in China. It is of importance to note that the rhinoceros horn derived its healing qualities because the animal fed on plants and trees provided with thorns.[100] Like the dragon, the rhinoceros had an intimate connection with certain plants; like the ginseng-devouring goat, it carried in its blood the virtue of the plants and herbs it devoured. In Tibet and China the rhinoceros became confused with the stag, antelope, and goat with one horn. It was the prototype of the unicorn. In India and Iran it was confused with the horse. There is in Chinese lore a “spiritual rhinoceros (ling si)” with the body of an ox, the hump of a zebu, cloven feet, the snout of a pig, and a horn in front.[101] It may be that in ancient times the lore connected with the hippopotamus was transferred by the searchers for pearls, precious stones, and metals to the Chinese “water-rhinoceros”. Like the composite wonder-beast in the Osirian hall of judgment, which tore the unworthy soul to pieces, the rhinoceros had its place in judicial proceedings in China. In its goat form it solved a difficult case when Kas Yas administered justice by butting the guilty party and sparing the innocent.[102] [[251]]
The importance attached to jade in prehistoric Europe raises an interesting problem. Jade artifacts have been found associated with the Swiss lake-dwellings, and at “Neolithic sites” in Brittany and Ireland, as well as in Malta and Sicily, and other parts of Europe. Schliemann found votive axes of green and white jade (nephrite) in the stratum of the first city of Troy. It was believed at the time that the European jade artifacts had been imported from the borders of China, and Professor Fischer expressed the wish “that before the end of his life the fortune might be allotted to him of finding out what people brought them to Europe”.[103] Professor Max Muller believed that the Aryans were the carriers of jade. “If”, he wrote, “the Aryan settlers could carry with them into Europe so ponderous a tool as their language, without chipping a single facet, there is nothing so very surprising in their having carried along and carefully preserved from generation to generation so handy and so valuable an instrument as a scraper or a knife, made of a substance which is Aere perennuis”.[104]
After a prolonged search, European scientists have located nephrite (jade proper) or jadeite in situ in Silesia, Austria, North Germany, Italy, and among the Alps. “A sort of nephrite workshop was discovered in the vicinity of Maurach (Switzerland), where hatchets chiselled from the mineral and one hundred and fifty-four pieces of cuttings were found.”[105]