Fu (also called Fu Xing) is the god of happiness and good fortune plus a part of a group called San-Xing. Fu is also symbolized by the bat and his name means “Lucky Star”. Fu can be told apart by his usually blue or green clothes of a civil servant, a ’winged’ hat and in the company of children.
Fu is said to have been a sixth century government official called Yang Cheng from a village known as Dao Zhou. People of Dao Zhou were notably short and every year the emperor would summon a large number of these people to his court as the emperor loved to be around such short people.
The short people never went back to their town of Dao Zhou and the emperor summoned more and more of these people to his court, in turn the population of Dao Zhou was reduced greatly over time. Fu eventually requested the emperor to show consideration for the people of his hometown, moving the emperor so much with the request that he never again summoned the short people of Dao Zhou.
Fu’s name is a common symbol in Chinese literature where it represents happiness and good fortune to which it is common to find it in Chinese households and businesses.
Fu is also commonly mistaken for another god, Tian Guan, who is also a god of good fortune.
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