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Ancient Chinese ritual of 'elephant washing' for good fortune discontinued

By PulseAugur Editorial · [1 sources] ·

In ancient China, the ritual of 'elephant washing' was performed by royal families to invoke good fortune. The word for elephant, 'xiang', sounded similar to the word for auspiciousness. This tradition, which dates back to at least the Han dynasty, was eventually discontinued in the late Qing dynasty after an incident where a parade elephant caused a fatal accident. AI

RANK_REASON The article discusses a historical cultural practice with no direct relevance to current AI news or industry trends.

Read on SCMP — Tech →

AI-generated summary · Google Gemini · from 1 sources. How we write summaries →

Ancient Chinese ritual of 'elephant washing' for good fortune discontinued

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COVERAGE [1]

  1. SCMP — Tech TIER_1 English(EN) · Fran Lu ·

    Sacred splashes: ancient Chinese ritual of ‘elephant washing’ for good fortune

    In ancient China, royal families washed elephants to pray for good fortune – until one elephant went rogue and brought the tradition to an end. Elephants had been spotted and documented in China as early as 4000 BC. They are believed to have once been familiar animals in the Cent…

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