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The Origin of Physiognomy and <Phrenology(骨相)> of Wang Chong

joo mi kang 1 KIM GYESEONG 2

1동방문화대학원대학교
2동방문화대학원대학교 동양학연구소

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ABSTRACT

Physiognomy(相學) in the pre-Qin period(先秦時期) was settled as a sociocultural phenomenon after it had gone through a transitional process for thousands of years. In the era of drastic changes of Chun qiu zhan guo period(春秋戰國時期), god-centered independence began to change gradually to human-centered one, and as shamanism(巫) and historians(史) spread into common people, the tendency of conjury(術數) sprang up among people. Under the influence of the theory of heaven and humans response(天人感應說) of Han dynasty(漢代) and so on, conjury study(術數學) couldn’t but be developed in Han dynasty when philosophy shifted from human-centeredness to the connection with gods. Wang Chung(王充) made ‘phrenological(骨相)’ as the proof of human independence and established physiognomy(相學) for the first time from the perspective of determinism(命定論), and it was meaningful in that phrenology(骨相學) was connected to personality or the Five Elements(五行) even though it was elementary.

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