to the concept of di as the base of a fruit, which falls and produces other fruits. This analogy is attested in the Shuowen jiezi explaining "deity" as "what faces the base of a melon fruit". The latter term xiān unambiguously means a man who has reached immortality, similarly to the Western idea of "hero". Many classical books have lists and hierarchies of gods and immortals, among which the "Completed Record of Deities and Immortals" ( Shénxiān tōngjiàn) of the Ming dynasty, and the "Biographies of Deities and Immortals" ( Shénxiān zhuán) by Ge Hong (284–343). There's also the older Liexian zhuan ( "Collected Biographies of Immortals"). There are the great cosmic gods representing the first principle in its unmanifested state or its creative order—Yudi ( "Jade Deity") and Doumu ( "Mother of the Meaning" or "Great Chariot"), Pangu (, the macranthropic metaphor of the cosmos), Xiwangmu ( "Queen Mother of the West") and Dongwanggong ( "King Duke of the East") who personificate respectively the yin and the yang, as well as the dimensional Three Patrons and the Five Deities; then there are the sky and weather gods, the scenery gods, the vegetal and animal gods, and gods of human virtues and crafts. These are interpreted in different ways in Taoism and folk sects, the former conferring them long kataphatic names. Below the great deities, there is the unquantifiable number of gods of nature, as every phenomena have or are gods. The Three Patrons ( Sānhuáng)—Fuxi, Nüwa and Shennong—are the "vertical" manifestation of the primordial God corresponding to the Three Realms ( Sānjiè), representing the yin and yang and the medium between them, that is the human being. The Five Deities ( Wǔdì) or "Five Forms of the Highest Deity" ( Wǔfāng Shàngdì)—the Yellow, Green or Blue, Black, Red and White Deities—are the five "horizontal" manifestations of the primordial God and according with the Three Realms they have a celestial, a terrestrial and a chthonic form. They correspond to the five phases of creation, the five constellations rotating around the celestial pole, the five sacred mountains and the five directions of space (the four cardinal directions and the centre), and the five Dragon Gods ( Lóngshén) which represent their mounts, that is to say the chthonic forces they preside over. The Yellow God ( Huángshén) or "Yellow God of the Northern Dipper" ( Huángshén Běidǒu) is of peculiar importance, as