The Greatest Mystery of Giant Pandas: Its True Name Was Not Panda
Everyone is familiar with pandas; in people's eyes, they are a large and cute animal. Fossilized pandas dating back 10 million years were discovered in Europe, confirming the mystery of the giant panda. The mystery of the giant panda also contains the biggest puzzle: the origin of the panda's name. Let's take a look together with.
The national protected animal giant panda is probably known to no one.
We are all familiar with pandas eating bamboo; since we know it, its name has always been panda. Do you know why pandas are named 'panda'? There are many unknown things in the mystery of the giant panda, such as the fact that pandas' original name was not 'panda' but 'cat bear'.
In 1869, French Catholic missionary Armand David recognized the panda and named it 'black and white bear', belonging to the bear family. Two years later, animal scientists further examined it and determined it belongs to the cat bear family, further naming it 'cat bear'. In the mystery of the giant panda, this puzzle is the least known by people.
In the 1940s, during an animal specimen exhibition held at the Chongqing Beibei Museum, it was named 'cat bear' because its face shape was round and plump like a cat, but its overall body was like a bear. Because Chinese speakers traditionally usually are used to right to left writing, so the word 'cat bear' was written in a right to left way, the origin of the name is the least known puzzle of the giant panda's mystery.
In standard Chinese grammar, adjectives are usually placed before the nouns they modify. Since pandas are generally considered to belong to the bear family, 'cat' is an adjective and 'bear' is a noun. Therefore, the word 'cat bear' is correct in Chinese grammar. By the 1940s, many Chinese speakers had already started to get used to left to right reading, so the 'cat bear' written at the Chongqing Beibei Museum was misunderstood by everyone as 'panda'. After that, the word 'panda' gradually began to spread in Sichuan and other areas, and eventually became the habit of most people today.
The term 'panda' is the most popular term in mainland China and Malaysia and Singapore, while in Taiwan, 'cat bear' and 'panda' are both more commonly used. After 1949, due to the relocation of the Republic of China government to Taiwan, cultural exchanges between mainland China and Taiwan have also appeared. Therefore, in Taiwan, the original name 'cat bear' is still more commonly used.
The giant panda is one of China's oldest animals, and it has lived on this wonderful planet since before humans. It is hailed as a 'living fossil' by scientists and archaeologists. Like our understanding of many things, our understanding of the giant panda has gradually formed, from ancient times to modern times, from within the country to internationally, the giant panda has won the love of the people of the world in an unchanging posture, and finally won the love of the people of the world.
A former Soviet zoologist praised the giant panda: 'The giant panda is the only one of the wild animals in the world, a genuine treasure, a beautiful, innovative, and astonishing animal.' This reveals the giant panda's value and significance in biological history.
