Door gods Shen Tu and Yu Lei

Door gods are one of the most ubiquitous of auspicious themes seen in popular prints created for the redecoration of houses as part of traditional New Year festivities. Prints of door gods come in pairs, to be pasted on the two doors of the main entrance of a traditional Chinese home. Such a public positioning is meant to keep out evil and atrract prosperity. The figures face each other in order to better observe everything that passes through the door.

In the popular lore of the Western Han dynasty (206 bce–9 ce), Shen Tu and Yu Lei stood watch over the Gate of Ghosts, a spirit portal located among the branches of a giant peach tree along the Eastern Sea. The two guards would capture evil spirits and feed them to tigers. They enhanced their power by wearing auspicious elements—the wish-granting wand (ruyi), the fungus of immortality (lingzhi), the happy bat (fu), and the long-life tortoiseshell pattern (gui).