page_title: History of Chinese dance
section_title: Dragon dance and lion dance
hierarchical_section_title: History of Chinese dance / Dragon dance and lion dance
caption_attribution_description: English: MGM Macau International Lion Dance Championship 2010
context_page_description: Dance in China has a long recorded history. Depictions of dancing in China appeared over 4,000 years ago. The early dances may be folk dances or ritual dances, some of which developed into court dances. The most important of the early dances served important ritual and ceremonial roles and are known as yayue which continued to be performed at the imperial court until the Qing dynasty. A profusion of dances in popular and court entertainment as well as folk dances have been recorded in ancient texts. The art of dance in China reached a peak during the Tang dynasty when numerous dances were recorded. Dancing as an individual art form declined in the later eras when dances become incorporated into operas and female dancing also declined when footbinding became more prevalent. In more recent times dance has enjoyed a resurgence, and it is widely performed by the public and professionals alike.
  There are continuous written records of Chinese dances for over two thousands years. Some forms of dancing still performed today, for example, dancing with long sleeves has been recorded at least as early as the Zhou dynasty.
context_section_description: Among the best-known of the Chinese traditional dances are the dragon dance and lion dance, and both dances were known in earlier dynasties in various forms. A form of lion dance similar to today's lion dance was described as early as the Tang dynasty, the modern form of the dragon dance however may be a more recent development.
  In some of the earliest dances recorded in China, dancers may have dressed as animal and mythical beasts, and during the Han dynasty, some forms of the dragon dance were mentioned. The Dragon was associated with rain, and during the Han dynasty, a dance may be performed during a ritual to appeal for rain at time of drought. According to the Han dynasty text Luxuriant Dew of the Spring and Autumn Annals by Dong Zhongshu, as part of the ritual, clay figures of the dragons were made and children or adults may then perform a dance. The number of dragons, their length and colour, as well as the performers may vary according to the time of year. In the baixi variety shows, performers called "mime people" (象人) dressed up as various creatures such as a green dragon playing a flute, and acts where fish turned into a dragon were also described. Some of the performances are depicted in Han dynasty stone relief engravings, and the props used appear to be cumbersome and do not resemble modern form of the dance. Modern dragon dance uses light-weight structure manipulated by a dozen or so of men using poles at regular intervals along the length of the dragon, and some forms of the dragon can be very long and involve hundreds of performers. There are more than 700 different dragon dances in China.
  The lion dance has been suggested to have been introduced from outside China as lion is not native to China, and the Chinese word for lion itself, shi (獅), may have been derived from the Persian word šer. Detailed description of lion dances appeared during the Tang dynasty and it was then recognized as a foreign import, but the dance may have existed in China as early as the third century CE. Suggested origin of the dance include India and Persia, and during the Northern and Southern Dynasties it had association with Buddhism. In the Tang court, the lion dance was called the Great Peace Music (太平樂) or the Lion Dance of the Five Directions (五方師子舞) where five large lions of different colours, each over 3 metres tall and each had 12 "lion lads" with the lions being teased by performers holding red whisks. Another version was performed by two persons, and was described by Tang poet Bai Juyi in his poem "Western Liang Arts" (西凉伎), where the dancers wear a lion costume made of a wooden head, a silk tail and furry body, with eyes gilded with gold and teeth plated with silver, and ears that move, a form that resembles today's Lion Dance. There are two main forms of the Chinese lion dance, the Northern Lion and Southern Lion. A form of the lion dance is also found in Tibet where it is called the Snow Lion Dance.
caption: A lion dance
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