Jingwei

Jingwei (traditional Chinese: 精衛; simplified Chinese: 精卫; pinyin: Jīngwèi; Wade–Giles: Ching-wei; lit. 'Spirit Guardian') is a bird in Chinese mythology. She started as the daughter of a powerful figure named Yandi.

After she sadly drowned while playing in the Eastern Sea, she became a bird named Jingwei.

As a bird, Jingwei has a big goal. She wants to fill the whole Eastern Sea. She flies to the shore, picks up a small pebble or twig, and drops it into the sea. This tale shows her never-ending work and her wish to change the sea forever.

Classic version

The story of Jingwei comes from an old book called the Shanhaijing. It tells of a bird named Jingwei who looks like a crow with a patterned head, a white beak, and red feet. Jingwei was once the younger daughter of a leader named Nüwa. Nüwa was swimming in the Eastern Sea when she couldn’t get back to shore. She then changed into the bird Jingwei. Now, Jingwei carries twigs and stones from the Western Mountains to try to fill up the Eastern Sea. There is also a river called the Zhang River that starts nearby and flows into the Yellow River.

A poet named Tao Qian wrote about Jingwei in his poems. He compared her to another figure, Xingtian, saying both were very determined.

In popular culture

Jingwei tells the sea that no matter how long it takes, she will keep trying to fill it so that others won’t suffer. This story gave us a famous Chinese saying, "Jingwei Tries To Fill the Sea," which means never giving up, even when something seems impossible.

In 1988, a big painting showing Jingwei’s story was shown at Tianjin railway station. She is also a character you can play as in the game Smite.

Fruit fly genetics

Professor Manyuan Long of the University of Chicago named a Drosophila gene (jgw) after Jingwei. He chose this name because the gene, like the princess in the story, changes and gets a new purpose when it comes back. Other genes were also named using ideas from Chinese mythology.