Taijitu during the Qing period for their possible connection with Zhou Dunyi's "taijitu". Ming period author Lai Zhide (1525–1604) simplified the "taijitu" to a design of two interlocking spirals. In the Ming era, the combination of the two interlocking spirals of the "taijitu" with two black-and-white dots superimposed on them became identified with the "He tu" or "Yellow River diagram" (河圖). This version was reported in Western literature of the late 19th century as the "Great Monad", and has been widely popularised in Western popular culture as the "yin-yang symbol" since the 1960s. The contemporary Chinese term for the modern symbol
Yin and yang creative energy divides and whose fusion in physical matter brings the phenomenal world into being. Also "attrib." or as "adj." Cf. yin. b. "Comb.": yang-yin = "yin-yang" s.v. yin b. For the earliest recorded "yin and yang" usages, the "OED" cites 1671 for "yin" and "yang", 1850 for "yin-yang", and 1959 for "yang-yin". In English, "yang-yin" (like "ying-yang") occasionally occurs as a mistake or typographical error for the Chinese loanword "yin-yang"— yet they are not equivalents. Chinese does have some "yangyin" collocations, such as 洋銀 (lit. "foreign silver") "silver coin/dollar", but not even the most comprehensive dictionaries (e.g., the "Hanyu