Genshin is about to get the annual Chinese New Year event. I just want to gush a little over the history and mythology they introduce us to with this game. This time we're getting a creature called Suan Ni or 狻猊. It is one of the children of dragons but these aren't quite popular in the modern day.
We all know lions also don't look like this right? Well as it turns out Chinese lions were never really lions but Suan Ni. I think that'll come as a shock to even Chinese players because with Gaming and his Wushou Dance being Genshin's version of the lion dance I'm pretty sure miHoYo's trying to explain this history to even them.
Anyway China saw real lions through Persia and by the Han Dynasty it was accepting tributes from India. Being Buddhist India gifted the Emperor with lions which in Buddhism can symbolize the bodhisattva. This term was translated in Chinese as 师子 shizi which only means anything if you know that the modern term is 狮子 shizi. The additional strokes denote an animal and was introduced to the term in the Tang Dynasty. Because the 师子 had such a lofty meaning the old Suan Ni mythology slowly faded away and people just started calling the statues of Suan Ni 石狮 shishi or stone lions instead.
Hope that was as interesting for you guys as it was for me!
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