Mo (Chinese zoology)

The giant panda or panda bear (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) is a large, black and white bear native to mountainous forests in South Central China. Its habitat is mainly in Sichuan, but also in neighboring Shaanxi and Gansu. The panda's coat is mainly white with black fur on its ears, eye patches, muzzle, shoulders, and legs. Despite its taxonomic classification as a carnivoran, the giant panda's diet is primarily herbivorous, consisting almost exclusively of bamboo.

The Malayan tapir or Asian tapir (Tapirus indicus) is a black and white odd-toed ungulate, somewhat piglike in appearance, and with a long flexible proboscis. Its habitat includes southern Myanmar, southern Vietnam, southwestern Thailand, the Malay Peninsula, and Sumatra. The animal's coat has a light-colored patch that extends from its shoulders to its buttocks, and the rest of its hair is black, except for the white-rimmed tips of its ears. The Malayan tapir is exclusively herbivorous, and eats the shoots and leaves of many plant species.

Zooarchaeology reveals that fossil bones of Ailuropoda and Tapirus occurred in Pleistocene animal remains in Southern China region.^[1] The giant panda and tapir continued to occupy the lowlands and river valleys of Southern China until the Pleistocene and Holocene boundary, around 10,000 years before present.^[2] Tapir fossils have been found in an emperor's tomb Xi'an in southern China, dating from 2200 years ago.^[3]

Shang dynasty animal remains excavated at Anyang, Henan included Tapirus but not Ailuropoda. Two tapir mandibular fragments are the only instance of Pleistocene or Holocene tapirs found so far north. The paleontologists Teilhard de Chardin and Yang Zhongjian believed the tapir bones were evidence of a Shang import from the south, and they are the "last zoological evidence of human-tapir contact in China, occurring in a zoogeographic region never inhabited by the tapir".^[4]

The circa 13th to 11th centuries BCE Shang oracle bones, which constitute the earliest known corpus of ancient Chinese writing, include some Oracle bone script tentatively identified as mò < *mˁak (貘 or 獏 glyphs. According to Harper, these Shang oracle and Zhou bronze inscriptions were more likely a name for a clan or place than a wild animal.^[5]

Western zoologists first learned of both the Malayan tapir and giant panda in the 19th century. In January 1816, Major William Farquhar, the Resident of Malacca, sent the first account of the Malayan tapir to the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland with drawings of the animal and its skeleton. However, he did not assign a binomial name for the "tapir of Malacca", and Anselme Gaëtan Desmarest coined Tapirus indicus in 1819.^[6] In December 1816, G. J. Siddons discovered a young tapir in British Bencoolen, Sumatra that he shipped to The Asiatic Society in Calcutta.^[7] The French naturalist Pierre-Médard Diard, who studied under Georges Cuvier, read Farquahr's account, examined Siddons's tapir in the Governor's menagerie at Barrackpore, and sent a description to Anselme Gaëtan Desmarest in Paris, who published an account of the tapir in 1819.^[8]

In 1869, the French Lazarist priest Armand David (1826–1900) acquired a specimen that hunters in Sichuan captured alive, which was killed and shipped to Paris for study. He coined the giant panda's original binomial name Ursus melanoleucus (from Latin and Ancient Greek "black and white bear") and the corresponding French name ours blanc et noir.^[9] The first Westerner known to have seen a living giant panda is the German zoologist Hugo Weigold, who purchased a cub in 1916. Kermit and Theodore Roosevelt Jr., became the first foreigners to shoot a panda, on a 1929 expedition funded by the Field Museum of Natural History. In 1936, Ruth Harkness became the first Westerner to bring back a live giant panda, which went to live at the Brookfield Zoo.^[10]

Chinese has numerous names for the "giant panda" ranging from Old Chinese *mˁak (貘 or 獏) to Modern Standard Chinese dàxióngmāo (大熊貓). Note that Old and Middle Chinese reconstructions are from William H. Baxter and Laurent Sagart (2014).

The standard "giant panda" name mò (貘) is written with several graphic variant characters.

Mò < Middle Chinese mak < Old Chinese *mˁak (貘 or 獏, giant panda) are phono-semantic compound characters that combine the phonetic component mò < mak < *mˁak (莫, "no; nothing; not") with the semantic indicators "predatory beast" 豸 or "dog" 犭.

Mò < mæk < *mˁak (貊 or 貉) was an "ancient ethnonym for non-Chinese people in northeast China" (cf. Korean Maek (貊) people), which was sometimes used as a homophonous phonetic loan character to write mò < mak < *mˁak (貘, "panda"). The graphs combine the "predatory beast" semantic indicator with bǎi < pæk < *pˁrak (百, "hundred") and gè < kak < *kˁak (各, "each") phonetic components—貉 is usually pronounced hé < xæk < *qʰˁrak meaning "racoon dog". Chinese characters for non-Chinese ("barbarian") peoples frequently used these "beast" and "dog" semantic indicators as ethnic slurs (see Graphic pejoratives in written Chinese).

These panda-name variants mo (貘; "southwestern animal") and mo (貊; "northeastern region") were easily distinguished from context. The notion of "whiteness" is a common factor among names for the black-and-white "giant panda". Mò < *mˁak (貊; "panda") has a variant mò or bò (貃), with a bái < bæk < *bˁrak (白; "white") phonetic component. The earliest dictionary definition of mo (貘; "panda") is báibào < *bˁrakpˁ‹r›u (白豹; "white leopard", see the Erya below). Chinese auspicious creatures were frequently white, such as the báihǔ (白虎; "White Tiger") and báizé (白澤) below.^[11]

Paleography confirms that early graphs for mò < *mˁak (貘 or 獏) occur in bronze script on Chinese bronze inscriptions from the Shang dynasty (c. 1600–1046 BCE) and Zhou dynasty (c. 1046–256 BCE), and in seal script standardized during the Qin dynasty (221–206 BCE). The ancient bronze and seal scripts combine an animal pictograph semantic indicator with a *mˁak phonetic component written with double 艸 or 艹 "grass" and 日 "sun" elements, but the bottom "grass" was changed to 大 "big" in the modern phonetic mò (莫).

The Old Chinese etymology of mò < *mˁak (貊, 貉, 漠, 膜) words connected with mù < *mək (牧; "pasture; herd; herding; animals").^[12] In 5th and 4th century BCE southern Chu manuscripts excavated in Hubei, mò < *mˁak (莫) was used to write "animal pelt".^[13]

The giant panda has some additional Chinese names. Ancient myths that pandas can eat iron and copper led to the appellation shítiěshòu (食鐵獸; "iron-eating beast"). The Chinese variety spoken in the main panda habitat of Sichuan has names of huāxióng (花熊; "flowery bear") and báixióng (白熊; "white bear"), (reiterating "whiteness" mentioned above), which is now the usual Chinese name for the "polar bear".^[14]

The modern Standard Chinese name Chinese: 大熊貓; pinyin: dàxióngmāo; lit. 'big bear cat'; trans. "giant panda", which was coined from the taxonomic genus Ailuropoda from Neo-Latin ailuro- "cat". The related name xiǎoxióngmāo (小熊貓; "small bear cat") refers to the lesser or red panda (Ailurus fulgens) native to the eastern Himalayas and southwestern China.

Besides the above panda-specific terms there are several related animal names.

In early Chinese zoological terminology, the mò < *mˁak (貘; "giant panda" was considered a kind of bào < *pˁ‹r›u (豹; "leopard"). The Erya below defines mò as báibào < *bˁrakpˁ‹r›u (白豹; "white leopard".

Pí < *bij (貔) or píxiū < *bijqʰu (貔貅) was a "mythical fierce grey and white tiger- or bear-like animal" that scholars have associated with the giant panda. The Erya defines pi as baihu < *bˁrakɡʷˁa (白狐; "white fox") and its young is called hù < *ɡˁaʔ (豰). Guo Pu's commentary gives an alternate name of zhiyi < *tipləj (執夷), and groups pi with tigers and leopards (虎豹之屬). The Shuowen jiezi entry links pi with the northeastern region Mo (貊 or 貉, also used for "panda"): "Belongs to the group leopard (豹屬), comes from the country Mo (貉). 'The Shijing says, "offer as a gift that pi pelt (獻其貔皮)", and the Zhoushu says, "like tiger like pi [如虎如貔]." Pi is a ferocious beast [猛獸]." Three Shuowen jiezi entries after this one, the mo (貘; "panda") is said to have come from Shu in the southwest. Thus, in pre-Han and Han texts the words mò and pi "did not denote the same animal and pi cannot be the giant panda".^[15]

Xuánmò < *ɢʷˁinmˁak (玄獏; "dark mo") was a regional product that the northeastern Yi people of Lingzhi (present day Hebei) submitted to the Zhou court, according to the pre-Han Yi Zhou shu. The 3rd century commentator Kong Chao (孔晁) referred to the Erya definition of mo as baibao ("white leopard") or baihu (白狐; "white fox") in a variant text reading, and defined xuanmo as heibao (黑豹; "black leopard") or heihu (黑狐; "black fox"). However, since xuanmo came from northeast of China it is unlikely that the referent was the giant panda from the southwest.^[16]

Chéng < *C.lreŋ (程; "amount; rule; journey") is an obscure animal name that could be related to the mo. The Zhuangzi and Liezi have the phrase "qingning generates chéng, chéng generates horse, horse generates humankind" (青寧生程 程生馬 馬生人) in a passage on cyclical processes. A medieval quotation from the lost book Shizi said cheng (程) was equivalent with the standard Chinese name bao (豹; "leopard") and the Yue (southeast coastal region) regional name mo (貘). The commentator Shen Gua (1031–1095) said the ancient meaning might be the same as the contemporary usage in Yanzhou (in present-day Shaanxi), where cheng was the local word for chong (蟲; "tiger; leopard"). Harper concludes that even if we assume the Shizi quotation is authentic, the information that cheng, bao, and mò were ancient synonyms in regional languages is not evidence that any of them referred to the giant panda.^[17]

Jiǎotù < *k-rˁiwʔ l̥ˁa-s (狡兔; "cunning hare") is an iron-eating animal related to the mò. It is recorded in the Shiyi ji (拾遺記; "Record of Gleanings"), compiled by the Daoist Wang Jia (d. 390 CE) from apocryphal histories. "The cunning hare found on Kunwu Mountain is shaped like rabbit, the male is yellow and the female white, and it eats cinnabar, copper, and iron. Anciently, when all the weapons in the King of Wu's armory went missing, they dug into the ground and discovered two hares, one white and one yellow, and their stomachs were full of iron, which when cast into weapons would cut jade like mud. The cunning hare is in the mò panda category." (昆吾山狡兔形如兔雄黃雌白食丹石銅鐵 昔吳王武庫兵器悉盡掘地得二兔一白一黃腹內皆鐵取鑄爲劒切玉如泥皆貘類也).

Chinese texts have described the mò "giant panda" for over two millennia.

The circa 4th or 3rd century BCE Erya lexicon section shòu (獸; "beasts") defines mo (貘; "giant panda") as a baibao (白豹; "white leopard"). The snow leopard (Panthera uncia) is an alternate identification of this "white leopard".^[18] The Erya commentary by Guo Pu (276–324) says the mò,

"Resembles a bear, with a small head, short legs, mixed black and white; able to lick and consume iron, copper, and bamboo joints; its bones are strong and solid within, having little marrow; and its pelt can repel dampness. Some say that a white-colored leopard has the separate name mò." (似熊頭庳腳黑白駁能舐食銅鐵及竹骨骨節強直中實少髓皮辟濕或曰豹白色者別名貘)^[19]

The next two Erya definitions of animal names are parallel with mo: hán < *ɡˁam (甝) is a báihǔ < *bˁrakqʰˁraʔ (白虎; "white tiger"); shù < *Cə.liwk (虪) is a hēihǔ < *m̥ˁəkqʰˁraʔ (黑虎; "black tiger"). Guo's commentary says the names referred to white-colored and black-colored tigers, not zoologically different animals. Unlike the mò giant panda's familiar cultural identity and history, neither han nor shu occurs in any early texts besides the Erya.^[20]

The c. 3rd or 2nd century BCE Shanhai Jing (Classic of Mountains and Seas) mytho-geography does not directly mention mo (貘), but says one mountain has panda-like měngbào (猛豹; "ferocious leopards"), and Guo Pu's 4th century CE commentary to another mountain says it was the habitat of mo (㹮) pandas.

The description of Nanshan (南山; "South Mountain") says, "On its summit are quantities of granular cinnabar [丹粟]. The River Cinnabar rises here and flows north to empty into the River Rapids. Among the animals on this mountain are numerous wild leopards [猛豹]. Its birds are mostly cuckoos [尸鳩]."^[21] Guo Pu says, "The ferocious leopard resembles the bear but is smaller. Its fur is thin and brightly glossy; it can eat snakes and eat copper and iron; it comes from Shu. Alternatively, the graph bao (豹) is written hu (虎) [tiger]." (猛豹似熊而小毛淺有光澤能食蛇食銅鐵出蜀中豹或作虎).^[22] The sub-commentary of Hao Yixing (郝懿行) identifies mengbao < *mˁrəŋʔpˁ‹r›u (猛豹; "ferocious leopard") or menghu < *mˁrəŋʔqʰˁraʔ (猛虎; "ferocious tiger") as the similarly pronounced mobao < *mˁakpˁ‹r›u (貘豹; "panda leopard").

The Shanhai jing description of Laishan (崍山; "Lai Mountain") says, "On the mountain's south face are quantities of yellow gold, and on its north face are numerous elk and great deer [麋麈]. Its trees are mostly sandalwood and dye mulberry [檀柘]. Its plants are mostly shallot and garlic [薤韭], and many iris [葯]. There are sloughed-off snakeskins [空奪] on this mountain.".^[23] Guo identifies Lai Mountain with Qionglai Mountain (in ancient Shu, present day Sichuan), notes it was the habitat of the mò (㹮), and says, "Mò resembles a bear or a black and white bo, and also eats copper and iron" [㹮似熊而黒白駮亦食銅鐵也].^[24] Bo (駁; "contradict") names "a mythical beast like a saw-toothed piebald horse that eats tigers and leopards".

Despite the similarities between how Guo Pu's Erya commentary above describes the mo (貘; "panda"), and his descriptions of the mo (㹮; "panda") on Lai Mountain and mengbao (猛豹; "ferocious leopard") on South Mountain; he plainly does not identify the thin-furred mengbao or menghu as the black and white panda, but rather as another metal-eating animal from Shu that resembled the bear.^[25]

Xu Shen's c. 121 Shuowen jiezi Chinese character dictionary definition of mo (貘) says, "resembles the bear, yellow and black in color, comes from Shu" (the region of present-day Sichuan). Duan Yucai's 1815 commentary to the Shuowen jiezi identifies mò as the "iron-eating beast" (鐵之獸) or Shanhai jing's "ferocious leopard" (猛豹). He says "the animals still inhabited the eastern part of Sichuan, and were a nuisance to locals who gathered firewood in the mountains and who needed to take iron to feed the metal-hungry pandas. Dishonest people sell panda teeth as fake Buddhist Śarīra relics.".^[26] The cultural motif of metal-eating animals was neither unique to the panda nor to China, and by the 3rd or 4th century this folklore occurred from the Mediterranean to China and often in connection with the forge and metalworking.^[27]

The evidence of the Erya and Shuowen jiezi indicates that pre-Han and Han readers knew the giant panda by the name mò, which they understood to be both bear-like and belong to the leopard category.^[28]

Shanglin Park, Scrollable handscroll illustrating Sima Xiangru's famous Rhapsody on Shanglin Park attributed to Qiu Ying (c. 1494-1552)

Beginning with the Han dynasty, the giant panda was a popular trope in Classical Chinese poetry. Mò first appeared in Sima Xiangru's c. 138 BCE Shanglin fu (上林賦; "Rhapsody on Shanglin Park"). Emperor Wu of Han's Shanglin (Supreme Grove) hunting park west of the capital Chang'an that contained wildlife from all of China, organized by habitat. The twelve Beasts of the South, where "In deepest winter there are germination and growth, bubbling waters, and surging waves," included the mò giant panda,^[29] zebu, yak, sambar, elephant, and rhinoceros. Archeological excavations confirmed the giant panda as object of spectacle in the same century. The tomb menagerie of Empress Dowager Bo (d. 155 BCE) included a giant panda, rhinoceros, horse, sheep, and dog; implying that in addition to animal performances and hunting, "we may imagine the elite observing the giant panda and other wildlife at close range in enclosures".^[30]

The giant panda next appeared in Yang Xiong's (53 BCE-18 CE) rhapsody on the Shu capital (present day Chengu) that lists mò among the wildlife of Min Mountain north of the city. Both Sima Xiangru and Yang Xiong were natives of Shu, and likely knew the giant panda from personal experience.^[31]

Zuo Si (c. 250-c. 305) mentioned the mò in hunting passages from his rhapsodies on the southern capitals of Shu and Wu. In the Wu capital (Wuxi in Jiangsu) the hunters "trampled jackals and tapirs"^[32] or "kicked dhole and giant panda,^[33] and in the Shu capital hunt "They impale the iron-eating beast" (戟食鐵之獸) and "Shoot the poison-swallowing deer" (射噬毒之鹿豺).^[34] The commentary by Liu Kui says mò pandas were found in Jianning (建寧), present-day Chengjiang County, Yunnan, and glosses "iron-eating beast" by repeating the common belief that the giant panda could rapidly consume large amounts of iron simply by licking with its tongue.^[35]

An animal named nietie (齧鐵; "iron-chewer") is mentioned in the Shenyi jing (神異經; "Classic on Divine Marvels"), a collection of regional information on marvelous creatures, which is traditionally attributed to Dongfang Shuo (c. 160 BCE – c. 93 BCE) but more likely dates from the 2nd century CE. "In the south quarter there is a beast with horns and hoofs whose size is like the water buffalo. Its coat is black like lacquer. It eats iron and drinks water. Its feces can be used to make weapons whose sharpness is like steel. Its name is "iron-chewer." (南方有獸毛黑如漆食鐵飮水名齧鐵).^[36] A 10th century quotation not found in the transmitted Baopuzi text referred to the Shenyi jing "iron-chewer", "Master Dongfang recognized the iron-swallowing beast" (東方生識啖鐵之獸).

Although the origins of the Chinese metal eating motif are uncertain, it remained an identifying characteristic of mò through the 19th century when Duan Yucai noted it. Harper proposes that the nietie "iron-chewer" embodied this motif, and although the mo panda was already associated with whiteness and metal, the marvelous "iron-chewer" added to its cultural identity.^[37]

Li Shizhen's 1596 Bencao Gangmu (Compendium of Materia Medica) section on animal drugs enters mo (貘) between leopard and elephant entries.

The skins are used as rugs and mattresses. It is a good absorbent of body vapours. It is like a bear, head small, feet short, with a black and white striped skin. The hair is short and glossy. It enjoys eating copper and iron things, bamboo, bones, and venomous snakes. Local people lose their axes and cooking utensils. The urine can dissolve iron. Its joints are very straight and strong, the bones are solid without marrow. In the Tang dynasty it was a favorite motif for screens. It occurs in Omei Mts., Szechuan, and Yunnan. It has a nose like an elephant, eyes like a rhinoceros, tail like a cow, and feet like a tiger. The teeth and bones are so hard that the blades of axes are broken by them. Firing does not effect the bones. It is said that antelope horn can break a diamond, so can the bones of a tapir.^[38]

Li Shizhen lists three associated animals: Nietie (齧鐵), "A southern species. The size of water buffalo, black and shiny. The feces are as hard as iron. One animal was recorded 7 feet high which could travel 300 li a day." An (豻), "A monstrous terrific beast producing one horn. [Giles dictionary], the tapir. Some accounts ally it with the Mongolian mastiff [胡狗; Hugou]. It is like a black fox, 7 feet long, in its old age it has scales. It can eat tigers, leopards, crocodiles, and metals. Hunters are afraid of it." Jiaotu (狡兔), "In the K'un-Wu mountains there is a rabbit-like animal which is iron eating. The male is yellow and the female white."^[39] Li also gives three medicinal uses for the mò: Pi (皮; "skin"), "Slept on it will remove heat boils, and it keeps off damp and bad infections." Gao (膏; "fat"), "For carbuncles. It is well absorbed." Shi (屎; "feces"), "Taken to dissolve copper or iron objects which have been accidentally swallowed.".^[40]

From the Han through the Tang dynasty (618–907), the giant panda name mò consistently referred to an exotic black and white bear-like animal found in southern China, with a pelt that repelled dampness, and legends about its solid bones, hard teeth, and metal eating. Giant panda pelts were luxury items and Emperor Taizong of Tang (r. 626–649) presented mò pelts as banquet gifts to a select group of officials.^[41]

Then in the 9th century, the renowned Tang poet and government official Bai/Bo Juyi (772–846) popularized the name mò denoting a fantastic mythological chimera with elephant trunk–rhinoceros eyes–cow tail–tiger paws components, drawings of which were supposedly able to repel contagion and evil. Chinese mythology has a long chimeral tradition of composite or hybrid beasts with parts from different animals.^[42] Some examples are the denglong, kui, fenghuang, and qilin. In comparative mythology, many cultures have four-animal part hybrids combining four kinds of animal parts, comparable to the Chinese "quadripartite mò".

Bai Juyi wrote about suffering from headaches—tóufēng (頭風; 'head wind') that according to traditional medical theory were caused by the feng (風; 'wind') "wind-ailments" (cf. Western miasma theory)—and he used a folding screen known as a píngfēng (屏風; "wind screen/wall") to prevent drafts. The poet commissioned an artist to paint a fabulous mò on his wind screen, which Bai enjoyed so much that he composed his famed Moping zan (貘屏贊; "Mo folding-screen paean") in 823. The preface explains:

The mò has elephant trunk, rhinoceros eyes, cow tail, and tiger paws [貘者象鼻犀目牛尾虎足]. It inhabits the mountains and valleys of the south. To sleep on its pelt repels contagion [寢其皮辟瘟]. To draw its form repels evil [圖其形辟邪]. In the past I suffered from wind-ailment of the head [病頭風], and whenever I slept I always protected my head with a small screen. By chance I met a painter and had him draw (the mò). I note that in the Shanhai jing this beast eats iron and copper, and eats nothing else. This stirred me and now I have composed a paean for it.^[43]

Bai used two Chinese medicinal terms for what a mò image specifically repelled: wēn (瘟; "epidemic; infection") and xié (邪,; "evil; unhealthy influences that cause disease"). Earlier Chinese sources about mò did not mention drawing one in order to repel evil through apotropaic magic, and artists were free to shape the hybrid beast without reference to the giant panda.^[44] The Japanese baku (獏) changed the Chinese myth about the mò image preventing illness to dream-devouring in order to prevent nightmares.

Bai's "eats iron and copper, and eats nothing else" reference comes from Guo Pu's 4th century commentary to the Shanhai jing and not the pre-Han classic text. The Shanhai jing proper mentions the mengbao "ferocious leopard" on South Mountain, which Guo notes as a metal-eating beast similar to the mò, and mentions Lai Mountain, which he glosses as a mò habitat. Bai Juyi's reading of the Shanhai jing with Guo's commentary, conflated the "ferocious leopard" and mò "panda" as same metal-eating animal.^[45]

Duan Chengshi's 863 Youyang zazu (Assorted Morsels from Youyang) is a miscellany of legends and stories, including the giant panda under the name moze (貘澤; 'panda marsh'). "The moze (貘澤) is as large as the dog. Its fat has the quality of dispersing and smoothing. When placed in the hands or when stored in copper, iron, or pottery vessels it entirely permeates them. When contained in bone it does not leak."^[46] This Youyang zazu context is the only extant early record of the word moze < Middle Chinese mækdræk, which Harper explains as a Tang pun with the marvelous baize < bækdræk (白澤; "White Marsh") creature. Its omniscience of the world's supernatural creatures was supposedly written down as the lost Baize tu (白澤圖; "White Marsh diagrams"), which were popular iconographic drawings used to protect the home from harm. Harper suggests an origin for the mò's elephant trunk. In the 8th and 9th centuries the Indian elephant-headed deity Ganesha was the Buddhist counterpart to the popular Chinese spirit-protector Baize.^[47]

In the centuries after the Tang, Chinese people's ideas and impressions of the mò were mostly obtained from old textual accounts and illustrations in woodblock printed books, not from nature. The woodblock illustrations are variations on Bo Juyi' s elephant trunk–rhinoceros eyes–cow tail–tiger paws components mò, regularly with the elephant trunk but not consistently. Details were sometimes selectively combined, as when bear-like features were mixed with elephant trunk.^[48] For instance, the Piya dictionary, compiled by Lu Dian (陸佃) (1042–1102), described the mò as: "resembling the bear with elephant trunk, rhinoceros eyes, lion head, dhole fur. Its feces can be made into armaments that will cut jade, its urine can dissolve iron into water." (貘似熊獅首豺髲鋭鬐卑脚糞可爲兵切玉尿能消鐵爲水).

The oldest mò illustration dates from the Song dynasty (960–1279) or Yuan dynasty (1271–1368). It is found in the Erya yintu, the extant 1801 facsimile woodblock edition of the Yuan facsimile manuscript copy of an illustrated Song edition of theErya.^[49] The head with ears and trunk appears more like an elephant than the later Chinese and Japanese illustrations in which Abel-Rémusat recognized the tapir. The main difference is the coat, which is depicted with white midsection, and is the one detail that connected the quadripartite mò to the giant panda in nature, whose coat has black shoulders and legs with white in the middle. The Erya yintu illustration is the only early example of this black and white mò depiction.^[50]