中國民間一般都將祝融視為「火」或「火災」的代名詞，根據出土文獻記載，商代祝融已被祀以南方之神，而且也證明他是楚之先祖。而今居住在古代楚地的湘西苗民，除了以「仡索」敬稱祝融為雷神，還以古詩歌加以祭誦，另以「信所」儀式祭祀他。從先秦到唐代祝融一直是民間信仰的灶神，甚至還有學者主張祝融也是農業之神。中國神話中的炎帝、閼伯、吳回（回祿），也是傳說中的火神，黃帝、炎帝則是傳說中的灶神，祝融與他們是否一神之分化？這其中錯綜複雜的關係，本文將一一加以探析。 Zhu-Rong was regarded as “fire” or “disasters of fire” among the Chinese people. Accordi ng to unearthed relics, Zhu-Rong was sacrificed the god of fire in the south. In the same time, he was the ancestor of Chu. In the west of Xian, the nationalities of Miao who lived in the area of ancient Chu, not only respected Zhu-Rong the god of thunder and called him “Qi-Suo,” but also eulogized him with the song of praise. They held the memorial ceremony for him, and called it “Zin-Suo”. From pre-Qing to Tang dynasty, people worshipped Zhu-Rong the god of cooking stove. A scholar even affirmed Zhu-Rong was the god of agriculture. In Chinese mythical legend, Yan-Di and Er-Bo, Wu-Hui(Hui-Lu)were also the gods of fire, Huang-Di and Yan-Di were the gods of cooking stove too. Were Zhu-Rong and them the same one in ancient times？Did they change into many different gods finally？There were lots of confused and multiplex connections between them. It would be discussed in this paper.
