Our reporter Peng Wei
Red skirts with wide sleeves, green shirts and white coats... Have you noticed that there are more and more people wearing Hanfu in the streets and alleys today.
This ancient costume is especially popular among young people.
The beauty of clothing not only meets the needs of life and brings visual enjoyment, but its development also presents the characteristics of folk customs and culture for a period of time.
How did ancient costumes develop and evolve?
How did the ancients dye cloth and make clothes?
The name "China" is related to clothing
Hanfu enters our lives more and more.
Some colleges and communities have established Hanfu clubs; on e-commerce platforms, Hanfu has become a popular best-seller among young people; various Hanfu shows are frequently reported.
The national style that has been passed down for thousands of years has become an element of the trend of the times.
Wearing Hanfu requires an understanding of Chinese traditional culture.
In a sense, Hanfu fans assume the new role of disseminator of traditional Chinese culture at the moment they wear Hanfu.
Clothing is an important part of people's clothing, food, housing and transportation. Where did Hanfu come from?
China has been called "Hua Xia" since ancient times, and the origin of this name is related to clothing.
"Shangshu Zhengyi" Note: "Mianfu Huazhang is called Hua, and a great country is called Xia." Here, the beauty of hats and clothes is called Hua, and the country with a large population is called Xia.
"Chun Qiu Zuo Zhuan Zheng Yi" says: "China has the great etiquette, so it is called Xia; there is the beauty of uniforms, which is called Hua." It can be seen that the term Hua Xia not only refers to the geographical level, but also the value of cultural deposits.
Hanfu, as the name suggests, is the traditional costume of the Han nationality, also known as Han costume and Hua Zhuang, and is one of the oldest national costumes in the world.
According to some ancient books, Hanfu “begins with the Yellow Emperor and prepared by Yao and Shun”. It originated from the Huang Emperor's Mianfu, which was shaped in the Zhou Dynasty and formed a complete crown clothing system in the Han Dynasty.
In ancient times, clothing was not only for clothes, but a whole set of etiquette system including clothes, crowns, hair styles, and shoes.
The overall style of Han nationality's traditional costumes tends to be dignified, simple and elegant. Its basic characteristics are the collar, the right gusset, the waistband, and the tie with ropes, which often give people a free and elegant impression.
The so-called "cross-collar" means that the left and right fronts of the clothes overlap, and the two sides intersect to form a collar; "right gusset" means that the front of the shirt is long on the left and short on the right, and the front of the clothes is hidden to the right.
The birth of this costume reflects the ancient Chinese national character and state of life that are calm, gracious, and uncontested. To some extent, it also reflects the ancient people's world view of the unity of nature and man.
"Buyi" originated from Ge Ma in the mountains
As an important carrier of Chinese civilization, clothing has been expressed in poetry and poetry of the past dynasties.
In the earliest collection of poems in our country, "The Book of Songs", it is even more obvious.
According to statistics, among the more than 300 pieces of The Book of Songs, more than 60 are related to the description of costumes, from which you can also glimpse the material, color and rhyme of Hanfu in the pre-Qin period.
Hanfu fans call each other "tongpao", which is also related to the "Book of Songs".
"Qin Feng·Wuyi" has a saying: "Why is Wuyi? The same robe with the child." The "robe" mentioned here reveals the material of the Hanfu at that time, that is, the long clothes filled with flax.
Linen clothing was the mainstream of Hanfu at that time.
The "Zhou Nan Ge Tan" in "The Book of Songs" vividly records the process of garment making at that time.
At that time, Ge Ma in the mountains and plains was an inexhaustible source of clothing.
Pueraria lobata is a kind of herb, the stem can be used to make rope, and the fiber can be used to weave ge cloth.
It can be seen from the poems that the craftsmanship at that time was relatively simple. People collected kudzu grass and rattan branches from the mountains, soaked them in flowing river water, the material would not smell bad, and then used steaming, beating, rubbing and other methods to extract the fibers inside. The fiber can be woven into a thin cloth to make clothes for personal wear; the thick fiber can be woven into a coarse cloth to make a coat, which is thick and wear-resistant.
According to records, in the pre-Qin period, kudzu, fur, silk, etc. were the main clothing materials.
Godo is used by ordinary people to make clothes, and ordinary people who use linen as the main clothing material are called "commoners".
The fur and silk were mostly used by princes and nobles.
Animal fur is one of the earliest clothing materials used by mankind. The "Book of Songs·Qin Feng·Zhongnan" has a record: "The gentleman is at the end, the fox fur is in Jinyi." Other pre-Qin documents also include sheep, foxes, tigers, wolves, and black Mink and other furs are used for fur clothing or clothing.
In the Book of Songs, there are as many as forty or fifty articles related to silkworm production, mulberry and silk, which shows the status of silkworm rearing at that time.
According to legend, the technology of sericulture was invented by the Yellow Emperor's concubine Lei Zu, and the findings of archaeologists also support this claim.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, archaeologists discovered silk pieces thousands of years ago at the Qianshanyang site in Zhejiang; at the Qingtai site in Xingyang, Henan, they found urn coffins with traces of silk.
These findings all show that the ancestors of China used silk to weave ropes and weave cloth.
"Green clothes and yellow clothes" all rely on dyeing
In the Spring and Autumn Period, there were "green clothes and yellow dresses" in ancient costumes, the clothes had colors, and the dyeing process had reached a higher level.
In the "Book of Songs", "green youth, leisurely my heart", talked about the collar and blue top; "缟衣綦綦 towel," "缟衣 Rufilter" and other verses can also see the multi-color clothes.
The silk is white silk, and the scarf refers to a light green skirt.
Filter is a hemp plant, which can be turned red by dyeing.
At that time, the costumes had appeared in red, yellow, blue, green, white and other colors. Among them, nobles especially admired vermilion.
Many poems in "The Book of Songs" mention dye plants, including zhe, blue, green, and so on.
For example, the "Zhe" mentioned in "Daya·Huangjin" refers to yellow mulberry, which can be used as a yellow dye to dye yellow clothes.
"Xiaoya·Green Picking" says: "Choose green in the end, but not full of a scorpion... Always pick blue, not full of a scorpion..." Here, "green" and "green" are synonymous, and they are a kind of herbaceous plant. , Can be used to make yellow dyes.
"Blue" is also a herbaceous plant, referring to Polygonum blue, etc., which can be used as a blue dye.
"Under the conditions of ancient technology, blue is easy to dye." said Jun Shi, a member of the Science Squirrel Society and a Ph.D. in botany. There are also many raw materials for blue, including Isatis indica and Polygonum blue.
There is a description in "Shu Wen Jie Zi": "Blue, dyed with grass." This refers to the clothing dye at the time.
Isatis is a general term for cabbage vegetables in the old saying. Both Chinese cabbage and Chinese cabbage are within the scope of "Isatis". Isatis is more suitable for growing in the north, so it is also called "Beibanlangen".
The flowers of Polygonum vulgare are like small flowers that are tied into a bunch of "Setaria". The number of cultivation is much lower than that of Isatis indigotica, and there are not many opportunities to appear on the field.
China is known as the "old country of clothing". As early as the Zhou Dynasty, clothes were not only used to protect against cold and warmth, but were also endowed with special political and etiquette functions, from which we can see the "image of thought" of our ancestors.
The ancestors had special requirements for clothing on special occasions.
For example, in formal occasions, nobles wear clothing that corresponds to their status and status to show their status while expressing respect for each other.
In the "Book of Songs·Xiaoya·Caishu", the scene of the emperor's reward to the princes is described-"What about it? Xuan Dang and Yu." "Xuan Dang" refers to the dress embroidered with black dragon patterns, "Xuan" It is a dress with black and white patterns.
At that time, "skin dress" was also the earliest court dress in ancient times. This kind of dress was generally made of animal skins and decorated with animal bones and jade.
"Yiyi" is also a kind of court clothes made of black silk in ancient times.
Inheriting clothing culture is not just retro
Before the Qin Dynasty, costumes formed the "shenyi" Hanfu system.
After that, each dynasty formed its own style of clothing according to the characteristics of the times and society.
During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, Hanfu was innovated on the basis of not departing from the original characteristics.
Many bright flower patterns can be seen in women's clothing, with a strong artistic style and more gorgeous clothing.
In the Song Dynasty, conciseness, freshness and simplicity were even more advocated.
The Yuan Dynasty did not enforce the Yifu system, and the folks still mainly used Hanfu, but both Mongolian clothing and Hanfu showed a trend of influence.
During the period of Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang, the edict ordered the world to "be as old as the Tang and Song dynasties", restoring the traditions of Hanfu and changing styles of clothing.
The Qing Dynasty implemented the policy of shaved hair and easy clothing, and the tradition of Han clothing was forced to end.
In the period of the Republic of China, the government promulgated the decree to cut pigtails and make clothes easier, and the costume culture of all ethnic groups gradually recovered.
Affected by the international trends at the time, Chinese people put on Western-style clothing, and the cheongsam and tunic suits that combined Chinese and Western styles were all the rage.
In recent years, my country's economy and culture have developed rapidly, and its international status has gradually improved. Chinese style has become the leading fashion trend. Hanfu has entered ordinary life and even went abroad.
Many experts pointed out that wearing Hanfu is not to inherit Chinese traditional culture. Our understanding of Hanfu and related culture cannot be superficial and become a retro style.
As a "Hanfu lover", on the basis of appreciating the elegant and flexible aesthetics of Hanfu, we should also dig deeper into its cultural connotation, explore the traditional oriental thoughts and virtues such as the unity of nature and man and the tolerance of all things.
While spreading the culture of Hanfu, it can also promote the spirit of ancient craftsmanship and combine the characteristics of the new era to give new connotations to Hanfu.