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Tan (貪 pinyin:tān)
[audio:tan1.mp3]

In ancient times, on the walls of the [tag]Yamen[/tag] (衙門 pinyin:yá mén) or [tag]Chinese courthouses[/tag], there is a painting of a fabulous beast. This mythical beast has a head resembling a dragon, scaled body like a unicorn, hoofed feet like an ox and a long tail like that of a donkey. It bears no resemblance to any other specific animal, but a composite of several. The beast is usually depicted with his fore feet placed guardedly on eight different precious objects [tag]babao[/tag] (八宝 pinyin:bā bǎo), namely a large flaming pearl, lozenge, stone chime, pair of rhinoceros horns, coin, mirror, book and leaf. On the upper left hand corner of the picture is a large red sphere, representing a blazing sun. Although this beast had all these precious objects, he was unsatisfied and wanted to have the glowing sun as his possession, which led to his demise by drowning while attempting to get hold of its reflection in the water.

Although this depiction had been known earlier, it was not standardized until the Zhou (周 pinyin:zhōu) dynasty, 1122-221 B.C. and named formally as [tag]Tan[/tag] (貪 pinyin:tān), or avaricious. In 221 B.C. when [tag]Qinshihuangdi[/tag] (秦史皇帝 pinyin:qín shǐ huáng dì) unified the country and declared himself the first Emperor of a unified Empire, In order to govern the Empire with a centralized rule and laws, there was created a bureaucratic organization, of which were many Yamen or courthouses operating on various levels of governmental strata. In creating and dispersing the large number of magistrates and officials to various locales, it was ordered that on the wall behind each judicial bench, there was to have a large painting of which was called Tan, or ‘[tag]Avaricious[/tag]’.

Like the Wangtienhou or Admonished Animal which is a symbol of The Emperor, the Tan was a reminder and warning against avariciousness for the officials and magistrates. These were considered [tag]auspicious beasts[/tag] which admonishes of being aware of propriety and a good moral code of conduct.

– By William C. Hu and David Lei

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