Читать книгу The Element Encyclopedia of Magical Creatures: The Ultimate A–Z of Fantastic Beings from Myth and Magic - John Matthews - Страница 282

The buffalo is a bovine species most commonly found in warmer latitudes. What people call ‘buffalo’ in North America are really bison. Buffalo, in common with other cows and bulls, share qualities of life-sustaining fertility and gentleness as well as of virile power and wildness. Among the Zulus of Southern Africa, the buffalo is believed to be able to possess the soul of a human. The young men who tend the buffalo herds frequently draw blood from the vein of a living creature in order to partake of the animal’s strength and endurance. In many parts of Africa, it is only the male buffalo that is sacrificed and eaten, and sometimes only once a year. Among the Baule people of the Ivory Coast, Goli is name of the water buffalo, the protector of the village. Among the Senufo of the Ivory Coast, the buffalo Nasolo is an initiator. In Asia, black buffalo were sacrificed to the god of the chase, while the buffalo was one of the forms in which the Buddha chose to appear. In Hindu iconography, the god of the dead, Vana, rides upon a buffalo; in Hindu tradition, the great goddess, Durgha, slays the mighty buffalo, Mahisha. In Chinese lore, the buffalo is seen as a symbol of man’s unregenerate nature, which is why the sage Confucius is shown riding a buffalo, symbolizing his triumph over his animal nature. Taoist tales speak of how the buffalo is green in colour, or changes from black through to white as the spirit increasingly learns how to spurn base desires.