The tiger has always been a muse,
a creature of awe, embodied in
culture and religion. The earliest
evidence comes from 5,000 years
ago, sculpted on seals of the Indus
Valley civilization of Harappa and
Mohenjo-Daro, now in Pakistan.
Frequent references to tigers
appear in the Mahabharata and the
Ramayana, the epic poems of the
Aryan peoples who entered India
from the northwest 4,000 years ago.
The tiger appears as a symbol of
beauty, power, and ferocity.
Hinduism’s female deity, Durga, is
depicted riding on a tiger. Her
image is widely displayed and can
often be seen painted on the sides
of trucks. 

In China, people interpreted the markings on the forehead of the tiger
as the pictogram, Wang, meaning “King”, and honoured it accordingly.
In the 60-year cycle of Chinese and Tibetan calendars, the tiger is one
of the 12 animals which denote a year associated with each of the five
elements in turn – earth, iron, water, wood, and fire. Although China
has very few tigers today, the spell remains. A boy born in the Year of
the Tiger is believed to have the power to ward off evil. Children have
the character Wang painted on their foreheads in wine and mercury to
promote vigour and health. They are given tiger-head caps and shoes
embroidered with tiger heads, and sleep on tiger-shaped pillows to
make them robust. 

There may be only a few tigers in Korea, but the country is still called
the “Land of the Blue Dragon and White Tiger”. The dragon is the
guardian of the west and the tiger of the east. In 1988, the tiger was
chosen as the symbol of the Olympic Games in Seoul.