Old Nuo Character

The Yupian, a Chinese character dictionary completed in 543, records 𩙎 as an old graph of 儺. The Analects, a collection of Confucius’s sayings, describes villagers performing a year-end Nuo rite; the Classic of Poetry, an early poem anthology, preserves 儺’s sense of graceful steps with jade pendants.

From the Tang through Qing dynasties, court Nuo changed: a masked exorcist called Fangxiangshi led in Tang; in Song, performers portraying Zhong Kui, a spirit-fighting figure, took over and made the rite more theatrical. Court rites paused under Yuan and Qing, briefly returning under Ming. A cloth-strip broom from a Miao (an ethnic group in China) “Repaying a Nuo Vow” rite in western Hunan was collected in 2006; its ritual specialist swept with it to expel spirits.