W220xL300mm, China
There are many door gods, the most famous and the original ones are Qin Qiong and Wei Chi Gong. The two generals have been keeping the ghosts away from the imperial court. the Tang Emperor felt sorry for their long shifts and ordered portraits to be put up on the doors to give them a well deserved break. Click here for the full story. Traditional Chinese doors comes in pairs and a print of the individual door god would be posted on both doors. This particular prints has two door gods, the one with the white face on the left is Qin Qiong (門丞) and Wei Chi Gong (戶尉) is on the right, this print is made for single door.
The four words on the print “門丞戶尉” refers to the two door gods, but funny enough with the four words mixed up as “門尉戶丞” it became a Taoist spell for healing the sick. The procedure apparently goes like this (please don’t try this at home);
take a rooster with lush feathers,
hold a knife with your right hand and the rooster on the left,
go to the house of the sick,
inside of the house take 3 steps and on each step say the spell,
“門尉戶丞，某甲病蠱，當令速出，急急如律令”
(門尉戶丞, so and so’s sickness, expel at once, promptly take the order)
then put the head of the rooster in the mouth of the patient 3 times,
take the knife and draw blood from the rooster’s comb,
mixed the blood with 100ml of white spirit for the patient to drink.
… if the patient was not very sick before … he probably would be now …
Mountain Folkcraft 