Tradition: Chinese Mythology
Alternative Names: Longbo Kingdom Giant, Longbo Fisherman, Longbo Guo
Category: Giant
The Myth
Longbo is a giant associated with the Longbo Kingdom in Chinese mythology. The name can refer both to an individual giant and to the people of his legendary kingdom. Longbo giants are renowned for their immense stature and extraordinary strength, particularly their ability to travel enormous distances in a few steps and catch gigantic sea creatures with a fishing line. In the Liezi, a great man from the Kingdom of Longbo is described as being able to reach five mountains in only a few steps and catch six giant turtles while fishing.
Descriptions of the Longbo people emphasize their extraordinary size and longevity. According to a commentary by Guo Pu of the Jin dynasty, a text called the Hetu Yuban describes the inhabitants of the Longbo Kingdom as thirty zhang tall and living for eighteen thousand years before dying. Their immense proportions made them figures of wonder in Chinese literature, where their fishing exploits became symbols of superhuman power. Tang dynasty poet Zhang Shuo described Longbo fishing with a single line and catching two turtles at once, while Li Bai’s Ode to the Great Hunt similarly refers to Longbo fishing for a spirit turtle.
Longbo also appears in broader literary depictions of a world filled with supernatural creatures. In Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Longbo is mentioned alongside Hai Ruo, Jiang Fei, the Water Mother, a thousand-foot whale, a nine-headed centipede, and various ghosts and monsters. Later poets continued to use Longbo as an image of enormous size and overwhelming power. Qing dynasty poet Wei Yuan, for example, evoked a man from the Dragon Kingdom whose immense presence seemed capable of overturning heaven and earth and unleashing waves.
The Longbo giant is therefore remembered chiefly through literary references to his extraordinary stature and legendary fishing abilities. The surviving accounts associate him with a kingdom of giants and with the capture of enormous turtles and fish, making him a striking example of the gigantic beings found in Chinese mythological literature.
Sources
“龍伯.” Chinese Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation. Accessed October 16, 2026. https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%BE%8D%E4%BC%AF