I. Introduction

When they interpret popular religion, historians emphasize the structural effects created by politics, economics, and demographic change, while scholars in religious studies look at adoption and adaptation between institutional religion and popular piety. From the perspective of folklore studies, orality is one of the critical factors in molding and redirecting people’s beliefs. This essay will explore the influence of oral communication on transmission and assimilation of deities and their worship in rural North China, with a focus on the transformation of deities’ names. Written and visual communication such as stelae, murals, and statues will also be drawn on to provide historical information and supportive materials.

Hongdong 洪洞 County is located in southwestern Shanxi Province in northern China. I have conducted field work on folklore in the area. There, a particular expression, “seventy-two erlang” (qishier erlang 七十二二郎) is widely used to indicate a type of indigenous deity, categorially called “the erlang” 二郎 (literally, the second youngsters or second brothers). The number seventy-two in the expression is a figure of speech for “many.” Altogether, there are about twenty erlangs that the locals have named. Generally speaking, they have the look of young males, and their names are formed in a pattern of four characters ending in erlang. The worship of the erlangs has spread across villages and towns in Hongdong County.