Acknowledgement Firstly，my hearty gratitude goes to my supervisor, Yin Guoliang. Without his constant encouragement and illuminating instruction, this thesis couldn’t have been finished. He has companied me through all the stages of it.
Secondly, I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to all the teachers who have continuously enlightened me in the past two years.
Then, I’d like to express my gratitude to my beloved parents who have always been helping me out of difficulties and supporting me without any complaint.
At last, I should say: “Thank you.” to my friends and my fellow classmates who helped me face to all difficulties when composing the thesis.
Abstract
Animals play a very important role in human civilization. Human beings’ perception of animals gives rise to their complex cultural images mixed with love, compassion, disgust and fear. Therefore, words and cultures relevant to animals are abundant in cultural connotation. Aesop's Fables is full of such animal images. This thesis intends to examine the animal cultural images in Aesop's Fables by categorizing them into three categories, namely, positive, negative and neutral images. Typical examples are provided to illustrate the three categories respectively. The thesis also presents a semantic approach to some relevant animal idioms and proverbs in the English language to gain a better understanding of evolution of the animal images in the language and culture.
Key Words: animal cultural image, Aesop’s Fables, culture
摘要动物总是与人类在人类文化生存与发展的进程中紧密相连。它们在人类生活中拥有着很重要的地位。它们与人类紧密的关系混合着复杂的爱恋、同情、厌恶和敬畏，人们经常用动物形象来表达自己的情感。本文通过定性定量结合的方法分析《伊索寓言》中的动物形象，对三种动物形象（正面、负面、中性）结合具体的寓言故事进行分析，探索它们背后的文化内涵。 又从语义学角度分析英语有关动物的习语谚语中的动物形象，以了解英语语言对伊索寓言的继承和发展。8876
关键词：伊索寓言, 动物文化形象，语言，文学
CONTENTS
Acknowledgementsi
Abstractii
摘要..iii
Introduction.1

2 A Quantitative& Qualitative Approach to the Animal Images in Aesop’s Fables2
2.1 The Positive Image3
2.2 The Negative Images4
2.2.1 The Ass.4
2.2.2 The Frog5
2.2.3 The Horse6
2.3The Neutral Images.7
2.3.1 The Lion..7
2.3.2 The Dog.9
2.3.3 The Fox..10
2.3.4 The Crow12
2.3.5 The Snake..13
2.4 Summary13
3  A Semantic Approach to the Animal Images in Aesop’s Fables.15
3.1 The Wolf..15
3.2 The Dog15
3.3 The House16
3.4 The Lion..16
3.5 Others..17
3.6 Summary..17
4  Conclusion18
Bibliography.19
Aesop’s Fables is a collection of fables credited to Aesop. It is a classic collection of mini-stories that involve different animals with human characters. They always include a moral or lesson that is learned through the plot of resolution. These fables are intended to entertain, to convey a moral lesson, and to make a cautionary point. Aesop used the simple animal stories to deliver his ideas and thinking.
Although Aesop’s Fables has existed for many centuries, this book is still read and liked by people all over the world. Many of the fables have been included in textbooks of the primary and secondary schools. That indicates not only the significance of its literary value, but also the long-cherished philosophical ideas and attitudes underneath the stories, revealing good and bad human characteristics by means of different animal images.
In order to get a thorough understanding of the symbolic images of animals in Aesop’s Fables, first a quantitative approach will be adopted to group all the animals in the fables in terms of the nature of their images, into three categories, namely, a positive, negative or neutral image. These three types of images will be further analyzed and illustrated by the animal characters and their conducts in the fables.  Then a semantic approach will be conducted to examine the evolution of the animal images in the English language. In this part, the animal images will be compared with those in the English language to see whether the same connotations can be found in the language and whether there are some other symbolic meanings existing as well. Therefore, a comprehensive perspective can be gained on the evolution of the animal images in the English language. 《伊索寓言》中的动物形象:http://www.751com.cn/yingyu/lunwen_7400.html