Man's Desire to Conquer and Live in Harmony with Nature in the Early Days of History

The couple So Cong Luoi Xoi and Lup Cup, due to the heavy workload, sometimes faltered and fell... The personalities of the gods are also the realization of the personalities of each individual in the community. That's good, but it also has limitations.

Sixth: The symbol of giant gods is typical of rice-growing residents, associated with traditional fertility beliefs. Typically, in the minds of the Thai people, So Cong and Ai Lac Cac play an important role and are worshiped as agricultural gods. The same is true in the culture of the Tay people. The couple Bao Luong and Sao Cai are also considered the first people to teach farming to the ethnic group. Or we also encounter the image of giant gods in the mythology of the Vietnamese people (the most abundant), of the Muong people (Mr. Dung, Mrs. Da) who are typical rice-growing residents. It is the elevation of the role of these giant gods that is the origin of the fertility beliefs of rice-growing residents in our country.

Unlike the gods in fairy tales and legends in later periods, which often carry magical and beautiful elements, the images of gods in myths are considered copies of real life reflected in literature. There, the gods are not supernatural forces with magical miracles, but only images of society and people in the early days of history. With the desire to learn about natural phenomena to conquer them, with the awareness of the power of labor, people have attributed all things in nature to the creativity of the gods - essentially people who have been "deified". Nature has become too close to humans, becoming the object of constant human influence. The enormous, extraordinary stature of the creative gods is also the most complete and general symbol of the power.

human creativity itself, for the power to transform the world that humans have done, are doing, and will do throughout their history of existence.

2.3. Meaning of the giant symbol

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2.3.1. Expressing the desire to conquer and live in harmony with nature of humans in the early days of history

In the early stages of human history, when humans were just emerging from the animal world and began to develop their awareness, the first issues they were interested in and wanted to learn about were the natural phenomena around them. Why is there sky, earth, rain, wind? Why are there rivers, streams, lakes? Why are there animals? And why are there humans? Those questions have dominated human awareness throughout history. And even now, with much more advanced science and technology, humans continue to learn about and explain those things.

For modern people, to perceive natural phenomena happening around them is a continuous thinking process, so for primitive people, how difficult was it to explain these phenomena?

At that time, the only basis that primitive people relied on to explain the world was their own ability to work. With the continuous development of production tools, human labor productivity was increasingly improved, initially stabilizing life. It was labor that helped humans separate themselves from the animal world and helped human thinking to be increasingly improved. Primitive people every day, every hour constantly impacted nature to serve their lives, so for them, human labor had omnipotent power. And from here, to explain and perceive the world, they relied on their own labor.

Primitive people believed that all things and phenomena in nature were born from the will and labor of humans. This was clearly reflected in the myths of ethnic groups about giant gods who played a creative role. They were the God of the Sky or the Nu Oa - Tu Tuong couple of the Vietnamese (Kinh), Taman Xori of the Co or Ro Xi of the Xe Dang. And more specifically, the seven So Cong couples of the Thai (the Ai Lac Cac couple is the seventh So Cong couple) and Pao Luong - Sao Cai couple of the Tay. Through their extraordinary acts of creating nature, the giant gods were the embodiment of the ancient people's dream of conquering and transforming nature in the early days of history.

The giants in the mythology of the Thai-speaking people in particular and of other ethnic groups in general are people with extraordinary strength, so their work is also very unusual. To serve the life as well as the production work smoothly, they have to dig rivers, build soil, work in the fields, carry soil, fertilize with ash... like normal people. However, due to their unusual strength, the results of their labor are also very admirable. "Carrying ash and coal to fertilize the fields. Pouring ash down to form Tro mountain (Pu Tan in Chieng Pac - Thuan Chau). Pouring coal into Than mountain (Pu Than in Muong Phang - Dien Bien) " [46, p.10]

Through the image of giants, the ancient Tay - Thai people expressed their desire to conquer nature. They attributed all natural creations such as rivers, streams, ponds, lakes, mountains, hills, etc. to the labor of giants - the gods of the beginning of the world. It was their hard work and perseverance that helped people have the life they have today. People have fields to grow rice, rivers and streams to catch fish, forests to hunt animals, etc.

Besides the great merit of transforming nature in a beneficial direction to serve human life later, the gods also have the merit of domesticating

the first animals and plants for humans. If Sao Cai was the first god to turn wild rice into cultivated rice for the Tay people, then Ai Lac Cac and his wife were the ones who brought rice to cultivate in the four fertile valleys of the Thai people. Not only that, they also brought the animals given by Then to be kept as pets in the house, serving for transportation (winged horses). Or they went to the forest to catch buffaloes, cows, cats, and dogs to serve production. It was these gods who brought farming to the ancient Tay - Thai people.

The merits of the creative gods are truly enormous. But in the end, these giant gods are the realization, the concretization of the ancient people's desire to conquer nature, to elevate the role of human creative labor to the same level as the creativity of nature. At this time, in the period of disintegration of primitive society, the awareness of oneself, of the position and role of humans in nature is enhanced. Humans want to put themselves on the same level as nature, to conquer and transform nature in a direction that is beneficial to their lives, according to their subjective wishes. But nature is too majestic, too great compared to the small stature of humans. Therefore, in their extremely primitive and rustic imagination, they created gods of great stature to realize their dreams.

Through the myths about the gods of the Tay - Thai people in particular and other ethnic groups in general, primitive people have given a rather interesting explanation about the process of creating nature: it was the labor of the giant gods that created a new appearance for the land where humans lived in the early history. But in fact, that creativity, that merit is from the ability of human creative labor that has been sanctified, given a "sacred, mysterious" nature, just like the identity and origin of the gods!

2.3.2. Promoting the role of creative labor

In the early days of history, when human perception was still limited, they were aware of the role of labor in transforming the world and transforming humans. Through their own labor and creativity, humans gradually asserted themselves in the natural world, not only as a part of nature but also moving towards conquering it and transforming it in a direction that was beneficial to them. It can be said that "labor created humans".

With the continuous development of creative labor activities through the invention of a series of increasingly effective tools, the lives of primitive people began to stabilize. Accordingly, their awareness was also enhanced. However, the awareness of nature, people as well as the social community in which people lived was still very vague. Moreover, people at this time were still just a part of nature, having an organic relationship with nature because their lives were still completely dependent on nature. Therefore, changes in the surrounding environment had a direct impact on their lives that they could not explain. And labor - that is, human creativity - was the salvation for them to learn, explain and move towards conquering nature.

Through the system of myths about giant gods in the dawn of ethnic history, the Tay - Thai people in particular and other ethnic groups in general all expressed their desire to conquer nature through labor. The creative gods are the deification of human labor capacity.

Primitive man was so small before the majestic and great nature. Sometimes that nature was gentle, but sometimes it was fierce. To suppress nature, the weak strength of man could not do it. They had to resort to some supernatural force that was on par with nature.

And they generalized that desire into the image of “giant” gods.

The gods in the mythology of the ethnic groups also do the same jobs as normal people. They also get married, have to work to have food, and have good and bad qualities like humans, the only difference is in their stature. For example, Ai Lac Cac. The couple Ai Lac Cac cooked sticky rice in Muong Then. The handful of sticky rice Ai threw to the buffalo fell down and became Xoi Nuong mountain ( Pú Khẩu chỉ ), the stone thrown became Da Roi mountain ( Pú Hinh Kình ), the foot stepped on the flint stone that fell into the Nam Rom river, making the middle of the river without rocks. Or accidentally dropped a load of coal or ash, creating Than mountain, Tro mountain... As for the couple Bao Luong - Sao Cai, in order to have enough food to feed their children, they also had to work hard to find and cultivate wet rice plants, take care of and cherish it to get good results. We see here the image of a farmer with muddy hands and feet - a typical image of the Vietnamese people.

There is no magical or supernatural element here, but it is a realization of the image of human labor. It reflects very truthfully the life of primitive people at that time. The absurd element here only stops at the fact that the things the gods do are so grand, so extraordinary, but also so ordinary. That action, that work can be done by ordinary people, but here, because the object of influence is so majestic nature, it must be raised to a new height, to a new level that only gods with enormous stature can undertake.

“ It is labor that creates man for man, creates a human nature. Through labor, the essential forces of man are materialized in objects, nature becomes human for man, and thus the relationship between man and nature becomes human, and human feelings are humanized ” (Marx).

Therefore, between nature and man there is a friendly relationship like that of blood relatives. Nature and man are faithful companions forever. Looking at nature, man sees his own shadow.

Thus, in general, the giant gods in the mythology of the Thai-speaking peoples are the embodiment of human labor in the early history. With the desire to learn and explain nature, in addition to the pride in the fruits of their own labor, the ancient Thai people attributed the creative ability of nature to human labor. A very special phenomenon of personification shows the pride of the ancients in themselves, in the ability to create and transform the objective world of humans, taking humans as the center of the universe. Human power has been "deified", "sacred" through the image of the gods, but it is still very close to humans. The ancients could easily recognize their own shadow through the image of the creative gods, or in other words, the gods of the beginning of the world were the "inflated" and "magnified" ability of human creative labor. Through the images of these gods, the role of humans is elevated to be on par with nature.

Not only a part of nature, the ancient Tay - Thai people expressed their desire to learn and conquer nature, even considering all things and phenomena in nature to originate from human labor. With the birth of mythology, humans have further affirmed their position in nature, completely separated from the animal world and proactive in their life activities. Because humans have labor - the ability to create with a purpose that is unique to humans.

2.3.3. Affirming the strength of rice-growing residents

The image of people and society reflected in the myths of the Thai-speaking people is the image of a wet rice agricultural culture. That is the discovery of a type of " grass that grows lushly green, has hard, sharp, rough seeds, but when buried in the fire, it pops and blooms white buds, delicious to eat ". Sao Cai decided to bring that plant back to grow as a regular food for his family. Or when Then sent him to govern Muong Then, Ai Lac Cac and his wife brought rice plants down to grow in four fertile valleys on earth: Muong Then, Muong Tac, Muong Lo, Muong Than, which were later considered the ethnic territory of the Thai people.

Right from the beginning of human history, when they were just born from the animal world, with a very vague and childish perception of nature, originating from the natural conditions where the people lived, the ancient Thai-speaking people decided to choose wet rice as the main food crop of their people. From here, a wet rice civilization typical of the valley - the main habitat of the people - was formed, blending with the plain rice civilization of the Kinh (Vietnamese) people. It can be said that the Thai-speaking people in the valley blended with the Viet-Muong people in the plains to create the brilliant Red River civilization in the ancient history of Vietnam.

Since the formation of the ethnic group, the ancient Thai people have chosen wet rice farming as their main economic occupation. This has been clearly shown in the ethnic group's mythology - the earliest form of folk literature in the history of human literature.

The giant gods not only brought rice to the people but also taught them how to care for it to get the best results. If the couple Bao Luong and Sao Cai had to " build embankments for shallow areas, dig up low areas to lower the water level, and saw that they had to prune and pruning"

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