Why are the 'Three Wise Monkeys' Usually APES?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Wise_Monkeys

The three wise monkeys (Japanese: 三猿, san'en or sanzaru, or 三匹の猿, sanbiki no saru, literally "three monkeys"), sometimes called the three mystic apes,^[1] are a pictorial maxim. Together they embody the proverbial principle to "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil".^[2] The three monkeys are Mizaru, covering his eyes, who sees no evil; Kikazaru, covering his ears, who hears no evil; and Iwazaru, covering his mouth, who speaks no evil. Sometimes there is a fourth monkey depicted with the three others; the last one, Shizaru, symbolizes the principle of "do no evil". He may be shown crossing his arms.
There are various meanings ascribed to the monkeys and the proverb including associations with being of good mind, speech and action. In the Western world the phrase is often used to refer to those who deal with impropriety by turning a blind eye.^[3]
In English, the monkeys' names are often given as Mizaru,^[4] Mikazaru,^[5] and Mazaru,^[6] but the last two names were corrupted from the Japanese originals.^[7][8]
 ...
In Chinese, a similar phrase exists in the Analects of Confucius from 2nd to 4th century B.C.: "Look not at what is contrary to propriety; listen not to what is contrary to propriety; speak not what is contrary to propriety; make no movement which is contrary to propriety" (非禮勿視, 非禮勿聽, 非禮勿言, 非禮勿動).^[9] It may be that this phrase was shortened and simplified after it was brought into Japan.
....
Though the teaching had nothing to do with monkeys, the concept of the three monkeys originated from a simple play on words. The saying in Japanese is "mizaru, kikazaru, iwazaru" (見ざる, 聞かざる, 言わざる, literally "don't see, don't hear, don't speak". However, -zaru, an archaic negative verb conjugation, is pronounced the same as zaru, the vocalized form of saru (猿^?), "monkey", so the saying can also be interpreted as the names of three monkeys.
It is also possible that the three monkeys came from a more central root than a play on words.^{[contradiction]} The shrine at Nikko is a Shinto shrine, and the monkey is an extremely important being in the Shinto religion.^{[citation needed]} The monkey is believed to be the messenger of the Hie Shinto shrines, which also have connections with Tendai Buddhism. There are even important festivals that are celebrated during the year of the Monkey (occurring every twelve years) and a special festival is celebrated every sixteenth year of the Kōshin.
"The Three Mystic Apes" (Sambiki Saru) were described as "the attendants of Saruta Hito no Mikoto or Kōshin, the God of the Roads".^[10] The Kōshin festival was held on the 60th day of the calendar. It has been suggested that during the Kōshin festival, according to old beliefs, one’s bad deeds might be reported to heaven "unless avoidance actions were taken…." It has been theorized that the three Mystic Apes, Not Seeing, Hearing, or Speaking, may have been the "things that one has done wrong in the last 59 days."
According to other accounts, the monkeys caused the Sanshi and Ten-Tei not to see, say or hear the bad deeds of a person. The Sanshi (三尸^?) are three worms living in everyone's body. The Sanshi keep track of the good deeds and particularly the bad deeds of the person they inhabit. Every 60 days, on the night called Kōshin-Machi (庚申待^?), if the person sleeps, the Sanshi will leave the body and go to Ten-Tei (天帝^?), the Heavenly God, to report about the deeds of that person. Ten-Tei will then decide to punish bad people, making them ill, shortening their time alive, and in extreme cases putting an end to their lives. Those believers of Kōshin who have reason to fear will try to stay awake during Kōshin nights. This is the only way to prevent the Sanshi from leaving their body and reporting to Ten-Tei.
An ancient representation of the 'no see, no hear, no say, no do' can be found in four golden figurines in the Zelnik Istvan Southeast Asian Gold Museum. These golden statues date from the 6th to 8th century. The figures look like tribal human people with not very precise body carvings and strong phallic symbols.^[11] This set indicates that the philosophy comes from very ancient roots.

References

• Titelman, Gregory Y. (2000). Random House Dictionary of America's Popular Proverbs and Sayings (Second Edition ed.). New York: Random House. ISBN 0-375-70584-8.
• Archer Taylor, “Audi, Vidi, Tace” and the three monkeys
• A. W. Smith, Folklore, Vol. 104, No. ½ pp 144–150 ‘On the Ambiguity of the Three Wise Monkeys’

 External links

• Collector's picture gallery
• Information compiled by collectors
• Monkey(saru)-Kōshin on onmarkproductions.com
• More Information compiled by Collectors

At first the representations of the three monkeys were clearly recognisable Japanese macaques ("Snow monkeys") and this included the clear representation of their stumpy tails.

However, that is not the way they are most commonly known. They are most commonly represented as small APES often resembling chimpanzees but usually more ambiguously suggesting the features of both chiomps and orangutans.

 

Since there are still reports of smallish apelike creatures on Japan under the common term "Hibagon" and we have seen reporesentations of them before on this blog, it seems more likely that the common representation of the three wise monkeys actually ARE representations of three wise apes, the Japanese native apes that seem to be related to the Smaller kind of Chinese Yeren and thence to the fossil Orangutans known to have existed in China

Illustration of the Chinese Yeren as an orangutan-like creature

 as done by R. W. Benjamin on the Unknown Creatures site

Xing-Xing or similar ape, wood carving from Taiwan,

the term Xing-Xing (Shing-Shing) is in general casual use in the Orient.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sh%C5%8Dj%C5%8D

 

 

Sculpture of an obvious orangutan located at Hong Kong

 

Small "See No Evil (etc) figurines like these come from the Burmese/Thailand border country and they are referred to under the name of the local Yeti equivalent, the Tok. The bare remnants of a "Monkey" face can be made out in the gilded example below.

"King Louis" from the Disney version of The Jungle Book, a representation of the Olu-Bandar under the title "King of the Monkeys". The character was introduced by Bill Peet while he was working on the script and nobody seems to know where he came by this information: there is such a creature alleged in the Assam and Heuvelmans refers it to the "Mainland Orangutan" category. There was not such a creature mentioned in Kipling's original Jungle Book with Mowgli.

Two small votive orangutan figurines in brass from Tibet, listed for sale on Ebay.

One of the Yeti stamps from Bhutan that bears a distinct resemblance to a male (Sumatan) Orangutan. Similar orangutan like creatures are depicted in midieval Persian miniature paintings.

Above are the two types of stamp-Yetis done to the same scale. Yes, the bigger one has a tail attributed to it, but that part is never actually reported on live individuals that are supposedly sighted. Below are two depictions of the two types pasted together at the same scale.


Following is the article on Chinese Yerens from George Eberhart's Mysterious Creatures (2002) Although there are different kinds of creatures called by the same names Yeti and Yeren, Bernard Heuvelmans counts the two as equivalent and related concept and indeed the main types (discounting the local Wild Men) are the larger and smaller kinds just indicated above. The same types also continue on Southward. The general range in heights as being 4 to 10 feet tall holds for both places (discounting the even larger sizes) and I draw attention to the statement "Color varies from black in Yunnan provence to white in Tibet and reddish-brown in Hubei Provence"--That's right people, the big Yetis in Tibet ARE said to be white! {actually they are usually shades of gry or "Grizzly" and white commonly. This is the Gigantopithecus type that would be the same as the North American Sasquatch). And the smaller reddish-brown one in Nepal is the one the press has taken to calling "the Yeti": it is most likely a kind of orangutan derived from the Chinese "fossil Pongo" of the Pleistocee.

The Definitive Water Horse

While I was looking through the artwork of R. W. Benjamin at the Unknown Creatures website (Love it or hate it, it is one of the more prominent references on Cryptids that will turn up on your internet searches), and I happened to find the illustration of the Turtle Lake monster, Alberta, Canada. It happens that a description had just been posted for the Kootenay Lake monster in the yahoo group Frontiers of Zoology and the description coincided with the artwork in measurement and proportions: and that I had also previously done composites for the Lake Monsters in the Lake Winnepeg-Winnepegosis-Lake-Manitoba group, and in several lakes in Quebec, all of which tended to correspond to this Water Horse reconstruction. The illustration for the Turtle Lake Monster follows and I consider it to be an acurate depiction for what is reported:

Now please consider that actually what is ever seen is just the head, neck and upper back, or in other words the top part of the first half of the reconstruction drawing. The limbs are inferred because of their movement  in the water, and the tail is most often only assumed without any good evidence. The part of the limbs represented on the Water-Monster drawing are a fair representation of the upper parts of the limbs down to the "Knees" (which are actually the heels on the back legs)

I think we don't need to look any further than this for the identification of most "Water Horse" cases of Eurasia and North America: the Russian and even Chinese reports are much like this. The actual "PLESIOSAURIAN" shaped animals have a much smaller head, a longer neck and a much bigger body: they are seen much less often and usually closer to the sea. Out of the long list of "Lake Monster"lakes, only a few outstanding examples qualify, but they are worldwide (and uncommon)

http://www.unknown-creatures.com/gallery.html


From the Frontiers of Zoology Group submitted by Terry Colvin:
[forteana] Kootenay Lake Monster
Date: Dec 4, 2012 2:35 PM

[Vehicle engine interference is a commonly reported attribute of UFOs, but
the case below is the first instance I've come across of a boat's motor
being similarly affected in the presence of a lake monster. As I recall,
there's an account or two in the Bords' *Bigfoot Casebook* of cars that
failed to start when Bigfoot was lurking in the vicinity -- and that's the
little I know about cryptids shutting down engines and motors. Ghosts have
been known to stop cars, and witches traditionally have the power to stop
wagons, and sometimes a countercharm -- such as the one used by one of the
boat passengers -- is effective in getting the horses moving again. -- bc]

John Kirk, *In the Domain of the Lake Monsters* (Toronto: Key Porter
Books, 1998), p. 188.

Only one interview has ever been obtained from a living witness of a
Kootenay Lake monster and it was due to the diligent detective work of the
late Jim Clark who managed to track down Naomi Miller, a resident of the
small lakeside community of Wasa in 1937. Miller's story is a fascinating
one and here is her own account of what took place:

_Our family always used a boat to go to Kaslo from our home at Shutty
Beach, four miles north on the shore of Kootenay Lake. Many of our
neighbours were forced, in those depression years, to walk to town to do
their errands and to walk home again. The Williams family, who lived less
than half-a-mile from us, were among those who had no boat, no horse and
no car. One day Mr. Williams came to our door, explaining that he had an
urgent errand in Kaslo. Could he please have a ride to town? My father
willingly let him use one of our boats with a small outboard motor. It was
also agreed that my brother and I (aged six and ten) would accompany him
to do a few errands.

_Errands accomplished, we enjoyed a sunny July day and a crystal clear
lake as the motor purred driving us homeward. We rounded the "Big Point"
and were barely out of sight of Kaslo when the motor coughed and stopped.
Moments later we were aware of a ripple just ahead of the boat. A black
head reared followed by at least one hump above the water some eight feet
behind us. This weird creature swam between our boat and the shore to a
position behind us. We sat hypnotized until the "Ogopogo" dived with a
gurgling sound into the calm water. Mr. Williams made the sign of the
cross [...], twice, to protect himself from evil. He then pulled the
starting cord and the outboard motor responded as if nothing had happened.
We do not know what we saw, but agree that it was longer than our 16 foot
boat, and three of us in it that July day in 1937._
[Once again assuming the tail which is not seen, and in a size range
 which is probably the smaller end of Lake Monster reports in general-DD]

Terry W. Colvin
Ladphrao (Bangkok), Thailand
Pran Buri (Hua Hin), Thailand
http://terrycolvin.freewebsites.com/
[Terry's Fortean & "Work" itty-bitty site]

Dale Drinnon <daledrinnon@gmail.com>	Dec 4 (2 days ago)
to frontiers-of-zoology. A very good description of a swimming moose! As to the boat's motor, I assume it could have gone out at any time and therefore [had the mysterious stopping and starting] gotten accidentally attached to any number of unrelated things by the witnesses just as well. Best Wishes, Dale D.

Yeti Vs. Sasquatch

"We has met the enemy and we is bot' da same". Pogo, sorta.

 

The Tibetan Big Yeti is evidently a harvester of winter-kill carcasses and stores them above the permanent snowline, and so is a nearly complete carnivore: the more widespread Sasquatches (Shan Giants, etc) live down in pine forests and happily take deer but are buoyed through the year by pine needles and stashes of pine nuts, as far as reports go to indicate. Which is marvelously well conveyed in this panel cartoon, I wonder where the artist got such precise information? Unless it was just a brilliant insight based on their different environments.

Thanks to Burt Smith for the heads up on this cartoon. [Posted to Facebook]

 

 

[Second item]

 

While I was searching the Unknown Creatures websites of the Nandi Bear artwork (curiously the site does not even have a listing for Nandi Bear any more), I did happen to find the page for the Nyalmo, the Big Yeti:

http://www.unknown-creatures.com/nyalmo.html

And I know you are not supposed to mess with another artist's work without permission, but I made a little fixup of his illustration:

Now it happens that Mr Benjamin did NOT do an illustration of the Big Yeti, what he did was a perfectly accurate illustration of the typical or common-garden-variety Yeti which is rather less than the height of a man on average (And compared to a chimpanzee in size and looks by educated Tibetans) The animal should be coloured in a reddish-brown shade and it is thought to be related to the Orangutan by most experts. It is probably identical to the (Smaller) Yeren, Da-Nhan, Mawas, Xing-Xing, Mahalangur (Big Monkey), Olo-Bandar and so ond Southeast Asia, and a survival of the fossil "Mainland Pongo" (Orangutan) of the Ice Ages. more work needs to be done to determine how closely related to the orangutans it really is. Below is  R.W. Benjamin's original artwork, unaltered and unharmed, and no harm was meant by this comparison which was done to make a scientific point and not to defraud anybody:

 

 

And, once again, this illustration does not actually go with the Nyalmo, which should be more like the common Sasquatch or Gin-Sung of Ivan Sanderson.