Gonggong

Gonggong is a Chinese water god who appears in many old stories and myths. He is usually described as having a copper human head with an iron forehead, red hair, and the body of a serpent. Sometimes, he is shown with a human head and torso but with the tail of a serpent. Gonggong is known for being destructive and is often blamed for causing big problems in the cosmos, like flooding rivers or shaking the earth.

In many stories, Gonggong fights with other powerful gods. One famous battle is with Zhurong, the fire god. Gonggong usually loses these fights and ends up being killed or sent away from the world of the gods.

Besides being a god in stories, Gonggong’s name is also used in science. There is a dwarf planet called 225088 Gonggong, which orbits far from the Sun. This distant world was named after the Chinese water god, showing how myths and science sometimes share the same names.

Name

In English, the name "Gonggong" uses the same two syllables, but in Mandarin Chinese, the tones are different (共工 Gònggōng). In other Chinese languages, the sounds change as well. One common way to write the name is 龔工, which sounds a bit different in Mandarin (Gōnggōng).

Gonggong’s personal name is said to be Kanghui, which can be pronounced as KANG‑hoo-ee in English or Kānghuí in Mandarin.

Legend

Gonggong is a figure from ancient Chinese stories, first mentioned around the time of the Warring States period, before 221 BC. In one famous poem called the "Heavenly Questions" (Tianwen), he is said to have hit the Earth's axis, causing it to tilt. This tilt explains why rivers in China, like the Yangzi River and the Yellow River, flow mostly to the southeast, and why the Sun, Moon, and stars appear to move toward the northwest.

Gonggong was known for causing big floods, sometimes with the help of his helper Xiangliu, a nine-headed snake. After losing a fight with Zhurong, the god of fire, Gonggong became very angry. He smashed his head against Buzhou Mountain, one of the pillars that held up the sky. This caused the sky to tilt and the Earth to shift, leading to more floods and trouble for people. The goddess Nüwa fixed the problem by using the legs of a giant turtle to support the sky again, but the tilt remained.

Main article: Nüwa