一切經音義 31.12

31.12

Guimao 龜毛 (pronounced with the fanqie 愧逵. The Zitong says: "The tortoise is an aquatic shelled creature; its bones are outside and its flesh is inside. It is formed with 它 [snake]; the head of a tortoise is the same as the head of a snake, being of heaven-and-earth's nature. Generally among shelled creatures there are no males, and creatures like tortoises and turtles take snakes as their mates. The left side depicts its legs, the right side depicts the pattern on its shell, and the head and tail are pictographic").