He Xiangu is the only female fairy among the Eight Immortals. There are various stories about her life. There are local He Xiangu in Zhejiang, Fujian, Anhui and other places. However, most of the legends say that she is a woman of the He family, able to foresee misfortune and good at flying lightly. He Xiangu often holds lotus flowers.
He Xiangu is a daughter named He Tai of Zengcheng County, Guangzhou. She was born with six hairs on the top of her head. She lived in Yunmu Creek during the Empress Wu of the Tang Dynasty. When she was fourteen or fifteen years old, she met a fairy in a dream, who told her, “Consume mica powder and you can lighten your body and live forever.” When she woke up at dawn and recalled what had happened in her dream, she secretly thought to herself, “The gods would not deceive me, would they?” So she began to eat the mica powder and found that she was indeed lighter after eating it.
Since she was old enough to get married, her mother wanted to choose a son-in-law for her. She firmly refused and vowed not to marry, so her mother gave up. Later, she met Tie Kuan Li and Lan Caihe by a stream, and they taught her the secret of becoming immortal. She often traveled between the valleys, walking as fast as she could, going to and returning from the valley every day, and returning with mountain fruits to her mother. When her mother asked her why, she only said that she went to the famous mountains and immortals to talk about monasticism with the female immortals.
Later, when she grew up, she often talked about some extraordinary things. When the news reached Empress Wu, she was invited to enter the palace. When she and her envoy were on their way, He Xiangu suddenly disappeared without a trace. The ambassadors searched for her, but they could not find her.
In the year of King Jinglong of the Tang Dynasty, under the guidance of Tie Kuan Li, she ascended to immortality in the daytime. In the ninth year of Tianbao of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang, she was seen standing in the five-colored clouds at the altar of Mogu. During the Dali period of Emperor Daizong of the Tang Dynasty, she was seen in the small stone building in Guangzhou, and the assassin Gao Huang witnessed it and reported it to the court.
In the Song Dynasty, Zeng Minxing wrote in “Doksing Magazine” that when Di Qing was passing through Yongzhou in the early years of the war for Nannong, he heard that He Xiangu could foretell good fortune and went there to ask about the outcome of the war. He Xiangu said, “You don’t need to see the thieves, they are defeated and gone.” At first Di Qing did not believe it, but later the vanguard of the Song army engaged with the soldiers of South Nong Zhi Gao, and after a few rounds, Zhi Gao was defeated and fled into Dali. (Source: “Journey to the East”)
Able to foretell earthly misfortune (Wen|Shi Ke)
One day, an official suddenly received a paper of heaven, the words on it could not be read, so he came to ask He Xiangu for advice, He Xiangu said, “The heavenly book says: ‘The chief book received ten taels of gold, folded for five years’.” The official was the chief of the court, once accepting bribes from others. Hearing this from He Xiangu, he went home and quickly returned the gold intact.
He Xiangu became immortal, her hometown of Zengcheng people in order to remember her, have built temples to worship her. A family temple of He Xiangu in Xiaolou District still exists today, and a couplet is written on both sides of the gate.
Thousands of miles of footprints left Danjing
Hundreds of generations of dresses and crowns worship the ancient shrine
There is a legend hidden in this couplet. According to the legend, Mr. and Mrs. He Tai saw their daughter growing up day by day, so they found her an in-law, and chose an auspicious day, but He Xiangu refused to get married, so she quietly “asked for immortality” from the well in front of the house. When she went to wear only one shoe, the other embroidered shoes left on the well platform, so that the “footprints of the remaining Danjing”.
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