Lion dance

The lion dance is a traditional performance found in Chinese culture and other Asian countries, where dancers in a lion costume imitate the animal’s movements. It is believed to bring good luck and fortune while warding off evil. The dance is commonly performed during the Lunar New Year, as well as at other traditional, cultural, and religious festivals. It also appears at business openings, weddings, special celebrations, and to honor important guests in Chinese communities.

Typically, two dancers perform the Chinese lion dance: one controls the head, the other the tail. This is different from the dragon dance, which involves many people holding a long, sinuous dragon body on poles. Some basic lion dance moves come from Chinese martial arts, and the performance is usually accompanied by a lively drumbeat, along with gongs and cymbals.

China has many forms of lion dance, but the two main types are the Northern Lion and the Southern Lion. The Southern Lion is more common worldwide, especially in Southeast Asia, because it was spread by Chinese diaspora communities who mostly came from southern China. Versions of lion dance related to the Chinese lion also exist in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Other forms of lion dance, not based on the Chinese version, are found in India, Indonesia, and East Africa.

**History**

In ancient China, there was a tradition of dancers wearing masks to look like animals or mythical beasts. Early texts like the *Shujing* describe performances with wild beasts and phoenixes, which may have been masked dances. During the Qin dynasty, dancers in exorcism rituals wore bearskin masks, and Han dynasty texts mention “mime people” who performed as fish, dragons, and phoenixes.

However, lions are not native to China (a species called *Panthera youngi* that lived in the northeast is long extinct). So the lion dance likely came from outside China, possibly from India or Persia, and was introduced through Central Asia. Ethnomusicologist Laurence Picken suggested that the Chinese word for lion, *shi*, might come from the Persian word *šer*. The earliest use of *shizi* for “lion” appears in Han dynasty texts and is linked to Central Asia (an older, obsolete term was *suanni*). Lions were given as gifts to the Han court by emissaries from Central Asia and the Parthian Empire.

Detailed descriptions of lion dance appear in the Tang dynasty, and writers and poets of the time already saw it as a foreign dance. But lion dance may have been recorded in China as early as the third century AD, when a Three Kingdoms scholar named Meng Kang mentioned “lion acts” in a commentary on the *Hanshu*. In early periods, the dance was tied to Buddhism: a Northern Wei text, *Description of Buddhist Temples in Luoyang*, describes a parade for a Buddha statue led by a lion to drive away evil spirits. Another idea is that the dance grew from a local Chinese tradition that borrowed Buddhist lion symbolism.

During the Tang dynasty, there were different versions of the dance. In the Tang court, it was called the “Great Peace Music” or the “Lion dance of the Five Directions,” where five large lions of different colors and moods were each led and manipulated by two people on ropes, with 140 singers. Another account says the five lions were over three meters tall, each with 12 “lion lads” who teased them with red whisks. The Tang poet Bai Juyi described another version in his poem “Western Liang Arts,” where two *hu* (non-Han Central Asian) dancers wore a lion costume with a wooden head, silk tail, furry body, gilded eyes, silver teeth, and moving ears—similar to today’s lion dance. By the eighth century, this dance had reached Japan. In the Song dynasty, lion dance was common at festivals, and during the Southern Song it was known as the Northern Lion.

The Southern Lion developed later in southern China, originating in Guangdong province. Several myths explain its origin: one says the dance began as a celebration after a village drove away a mythical monster called Nian; another claims the Qianlong Emperor dreamed of an auspicious animal while touring southern China and ordered its image to be used in festivals. But it is likely that the Southern Lion of Guangzhou adapted the Northern Lion to local myths and characteristics, perhaps during the Ming dynasty.

**Chinese Styles**

The two main types of lion dance in China are the Northern and Southern Lions. But there are also many local forms with different appearances, such as the Green or Hokkien Lion and the Taiwanese or Yutien Lion, popular among Hokkien and Taiwanese people. Other ethnic minority groups in China have their own lion dances, like the Wen Lion of the Muslim minority in Shenqiu County, Henan, and the lion dance in Yongdeng County, Gansu. There are also related dances with mask figures representing mythical beings.