Gan Jiang & Mo Ye 干将、莫邪
(Pre-Qin, Spring and Autumn period)
A swordsmith couple during the turbulent Spring and Autumn period, who forged a famous pair of swords. The “male” blade was named after Gan Jiang, and the “female” blade was named after Mo Ye.
Their stories come from a mix of history, legend, and fiction, varying wildly in different sources, with the forging of the paired swords a commonality in all.
One of the versions had Gan Jiang encountering trouble completing the forging of the swords, so Mo Ye threw herself (or her nails and hair in some of the tales) into the fire, and thus the swords were made.
Replica of the Gan Jiang and Mo Ye paired swords.
In arguably the most exciting version, Gan Jiang and Mo Ye succeeded in forging the prized sword for the king in three years, but Gan Jiang presented only the female sword and hid the male sword. Knowing he was going to be killed, he told his pregnant wife that, should the baby be a boy, tell the boy to find the sword in a rock where a pine grew on it, on the Southern mountain near their house.
Gan Jiang was indeed executed by the furious king. Mo Ye gave birth to a boy called Chi, and after the boy was grown, did as Gan Jiang said when the boy asked for his father. Chi found the sword, then started off on his journey to avenge his father.
The king dreamt that a youth of extraordinary appearances was out to kill him. Frightened, he placed a great bounty to whoever could kill this youth. Chi then hid in the mountains, and was so overwhelmed that he sang with sorrow and wept bitterly. A nameless passerby asked the reason for the youth’s deep sorrow, so Chi told him. The nameless man said, “The king put a great bounty on your head. Give me your head and sword, and I will avenge your father on your behalf.” Chi cried, “What good fortune!”, then cut his own throat.
Moved by the youth’s conviction, the nameless man kept his promise and went to the king with the head and sword. The man advised the king to cook Chi’s head, for it is a head of a courageous man. The king heeded his advice, but the head did not disintegrate even after three days of cooking. When the king went to look into the cauldron, the man cut the kings head so that it fell in with Chi’s head. The two heads battled within the cauldron. The nameless man then also cut his own head and joined the fight with the other two.
In the end, all three heads within the cauldron were impossible to separate. The three heads were thus buried together in the “Grave of the Three Kings”.
The official character song for this couple by Wang Chuan Feng Hua Lu, 《谓剑》, can be translated as "Of Swords", with one of the popular covers shown below.
The original video link: https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1xZ4y137QB
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