Hung Mung

Hong Meng, Hung Meng, or Hung Mung (simplified Chinese: 鸿蒙; traditional Chinese: 鴻蒙; pinyin: Hóng Méng; Wade–Giles: Hung Meng) is a character in the Daoist text Zhuangzi and a metaphor for the "primordial world, primeval chaos" in Chinese creation myths. Like many Zhuangist names, Hong Meng is a word play, translated as "Mists-of-Chaos", "Vast Obscurity", "Big Concealment", "Vital Principle", and "Natural Energy".

Hong Meng compounds hong "wild goose, swan; vast, great" and meng "covered; ignorant (esp. in childhood), untutored; encounter, receive; (Yijing) Hexagram 4". The (ca. 111 CE) Hanshu biography of the Daoist author Yang Xiong writes Hong Meng as 鴻濛, with the variant Chinese character meng "mist, drizzling rain" (sharing the 氵 "water radical in hong 鴻). In Modern Standard Chinese usage, hongmeng 鴻蒙 is a literary metonym meaning "primordial world; primeval atmosphere of nature" before Pangu created the world.

Hong Meng first appears in the (ca. 3rd century BCE) "Outer Chapters" of Zhuangzi (chapter 11, Zài Yòu 在宥) paired with Yun Jiang (simplified Chinese: 云将; traditional Chinese: 雲將; pinyin: Yún Jiàng; Wade–Giles: Yün Chiang). This character name combines yun "cloud, clouds" and jiang "military commander, general officer; (Chinese chess) general corresponding to (chess) king". English translators of the Zhuangzi have rendered Yun Jiang and Hong Meng as:

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