253 To portray abstract knowledge of the physical world requires picturing processes not readily visible to the human eye. To translate the fndings of natural science into pictorial schema is to render nature intelligible and accessible. Empirical inquiry and image making are not antagonists, but complements, both analyzing and classifying natural phenomena in pictorial form. By mobilizing knowledge that mediates the relation of picture maker and his environment, scientifc illustrations and zoomorphic representations are, moreover, ecological images. 1 During the Song dynasties (960 – 1279), when dual explanatory frameworks for rain— namely, empirical accounts of the water cycle and zoomorphic representations of dragons— coexisted, paintings of dragons mediated the relation of humans and their environment by summoning rain. 2 Neither such paintings, nor the tension between alternative epistemologies of rain, were new. In his Lun heng (Balanced discourses) of ca.83 ce, the philosopher Wang Chong (29 – 97 ce) recorded the popular notion that supernatural dragons bring thunder and lightning, and thus rain, 3 debunking it with an empirically accu- rate explanation of the water cycle. 4 The Song polymaths Shen Gua (1031 – 1091) and Ye Mengde (1077 – 1148) sustained and elaborated Wang’s ideas: 5 based on his own observation, Ye described rain and water circu- lation accurately; 6 Shen studied lightning, authoring an exceptionally limpid account of it. 7 Shen, however, used the terms of supernatural explanation to serve an empirical, analytical understanding of rain, thus revealing the coexistence and interdependence of these conceptual chapter 7 The Pictorial Form of a Zoomorphic Ecology: Dragons and Their Painters in Song and SouthernSongChina Jennifer Purtle -H/*D ?00.0P1*H% 6.#)H/#5H0/ H/ 2*H/DQD 1P5 #/C 2SJ5SPD-H/ DCH5DC A9 7DP0.D :HJADP)DJC #/C 4S)D/D > =#/) </HTDPQH59 0E 5#U#HH 8PDQQ 8P09SDQ5 4A00I 2D/5P#J *551,DA00I%D/5P#J1P02SDQ5%0.JHAS50P0/50CD5#HJ#%5H0/0C0%6. 2PD#5DC EP0. S50P0/50 0/ ,, 2019PH)*5 W </HTDPQH59 0E 5#U#HH 8PDQQ 1JJ PH)*5Q PDQDPTDC