What funeral ceremonies were there in ancient China?

In view of the great differences in customs and habits of different nationalities and regions, the so-called "ten miles of different customs"

The old tradition of Han funeral is to pay attention to heavy burial, which is mixed with many superstitious customs. Coffin burial has been popular in Han nationality since ancient times, and the funeral is grand and divided into three stages: burial, burial and burial.

The funeral is to dress the body and put it under the coffin. Before people die, they should summon spirits and bathe the dead. Funeral is divided into two steps: small funeral and large funeral. A small undertaker is a cloth used to wrap his body, silk is for the rich and jade is for the royal family. Great-coat is to put the body in the coffin. Coffins are called "longevity materials", male coffins are engraved with the word "longevity", female coffins are engraved with the word "blessing", and some coffins are engraved with the combination of the words "Fu Lushou". When he was dying, he put rice in the mouth of the dead man. This rich family owns jade, pearls, etc. , the royal family contains jade, modern silver, are called "rice". When you die, there are often some things buried with you. Generally, people have clothes, quilts and daily necessities, and wealthy families and royalty will have many valuable items buried with them.

A funeral is to stay in the funeral palace after the funeral. The mourning period varies from 3 days to 30 days, mainly depending on the mourners. In ancient times, coffins were buried for three months, up to seven months. According to the traditional customs of the Han nationality, children should mourn when their parents die, otherwise it is unfilial. Relatives and friends will mourn and pay homage to the deceased in the future, which is called "mourning" or "condolence". All mourners should mourn. In ancient times, the mourning clothes of Han nationality were divided into five types: Wei, Cui Zi, Dagong, Hong Xiao and Zhima, which were called "five clothes". They are made of coarse linen and fine linen, and wear different mourning clothes according to the relationship between relatives and friends, which is called "Pima Dai Xiao". In modern times, white cloth is often used for mourning. Modern cities generally wear white flowers on their chests and black gauze on their arms.

Burying is burying the body of the dead, that is, burying the coffin. Before burial, the old custom often depends on geomantic omen and chooses a cemetery, which is called "choosing good luck". Funeral is also called funeral. At the funeral, the ancient Han people were generally "dutiful sons", and undertaker sang an elegy. Elegy has evolved into elegy in modern times. Relatives and friends wrote elegiac couplets or funeral elegiac couplets, which evolved into wreaths of elegiac couplets in modern times.

In ancient times, the custom of offering sacrifices to people (mainly close relatives, near ministers and near servants, which remained until the Qing Dynasty) was gradually replaced by pottery figurines, and in modern times, paper figures were buried with them.

After the funeral, there are memorial ceremonies for the seventh, seventh, centenary and anniversary, and the memorial tablet belongs to the ancestral hall, which has changed from a ceremony for people at the funeral to a ceremony for "ghosts" and "ancestors".

In addition, the Han nationality also has the custom of "returning to burial", that is, transporting the bodies that died in other places back to their original places.

During the funeral, the relatives of the deceased should wear mourning clothes and wake in the mourning hall. In the ancient etiquette system of China, filial piety was divided into five grades according to the kinship with the deceased. There is also a word "five clothes" in modern Chinese to express the distance of blood relationship. Filial piety is made of white cloth, which is quite different from the custom of westerners wearing white clothes to make dresses. In the Qing Dynasty, an Englishman came to China for the first time. When he met the funeral procession, everyone was dressed in white, but his expression was painful, sad and strange. In ancient times, people sang elegies at funerals, and Tao Yuanming, a great poet in Jin Dynasty, wrote three elegies for himself before his death. The elegy of later generations evolved from the elegy of ancient times.

The scale of the funeral ceremony is closely related to the status of the deceased. In feudal society, there were strict regulations on funeral ceremonies for people with different identities and status. Princes, nobles and rich people often show off their power with large-scale funerals. In A Dream of Red Mansions, Qin Keqing died in Ningguo Mansion with a coffin worth several thousand taels of silver. Two or three hundred monks chanted, and the procession at the funeral was "mighty and unstoppable". The poor don't even have enough food and clothing, so naturally there is no "reburial". Sometimes you can only wrap the body with a mat and bury it hastily.

After the death of the elder, children and grandchildren should stay at home for 27 months, during which time they should stop socializing and entertaining. Officials must also leave their jobs and go home to be filial to show their condolences to their relatives. This is the so-called "shouzhi".

Examples of funeral procedures

Suppose someone died at the age of 8 1, male, military background, full of children and grandchildren.

Change clothes, wear military uniforms and long-lived shoes. Covered with yellow silk and white silk towel.

All the buttons on the clothes should be cut off, and the clothes should be tied with a cloth belt, but not with a "dead knot".

Initial plastic surgery: facial features reset, with a gold ingot or a coin in his mouth. Gold ingot in the left hand (all imitations) and dog stick (convenient chopsticks) in the right hand.

The body is tied with a red line, mainly hands and feet. If there are cats and dogs to take care of at home, you can't go near the body. (to prevent the soul of the deceased from attaching to animals) transported to the funeral home.

Set up a simple mourning hall at home

Portrait: I prepared an enlarged photo in advance and bought a special photo frame. Set the black ribbon.

Offering sacrifices: a bowl of whole grains, a censer, some incense, a bowl of seasonal fruit cakes and rice, a pair of big steamed bread chopsticks, etc.

Lamps: buy funeral supplies: black gauze, white flowers, white cloth, red cloth, burning paper, pottery pots (with holes at the bottom),

Paper: rooster, white flag, paper horse (paper cow for women), villa, gold and silver vault. On the night of death, family members burn paper in clay pots, and relatives and friends also burn it when they visit. The next day, I went to the police station to cancel my account. On the third day, the funeral.

Family clothes

Direct descendants are white blood relatives, and peers wear black gauze. Other relatives wear black veil. Grandchildren sewed a small piece of red cloth on a small white belt and black gauze. Other guests wear white flowers.

Items to be prepared: seven small bags or seven coins, two one-inch photos wrapped in paper ashes burned a few days ago.

Items to bring: offerings from the mourning hall, death certificate of the police station, clothes of the deceased, and a bottle of white wine.

Before the funeral, the portrait was placed in front of the car. The eldest son led all the younger generations to kneel in front of the car, raised the earthen pot over his head and said, "Dad, have a good trip", so he smashed the earthen pot as hard as possible, but not twice. Putting the paper cock in front of the car means that the eldest son (or grandson) gets on the bus and raises the flag.

Every car in the convoy has a sign. For the age of the deceased. The deceased was 8 1 year old, plus one year old. Then the car number is 83. If the deceased is a male, stick it on the left rear side of the car, and if it is a female, stick it on the right rear side of the car.

There is also the custom of throwing paper money in some places. Scattered all the way, meaning "buying money for the road", some places put paper money on the bridge and hold it down with stones when crossing the bridge. After the hearse starts, it usually doesn't stop. Before the red light, the driver counts the time, moves slowly, waits in the distance, and accelerates when the green light is green.

Throw the paper cock out of the car before it reaches the funeral home. (Some places use live cocks)

After entering the funeral home:

Collect the body and go through cremation procedures.

Before cremation, choose urn and small tablet. Wordpad can be written by staff. Pay attention to the writing of men and women: take the exam first and take the first step. After the body was taken out, an "opening ceremony" was held. When the body was taken out of the freezer, the eldest son held his head and the others held the body and put it in the car in the morgue. If you need to move, the eldest son is still on the body. Cut the red line on the corpse before opening the light, and put the burnt paper ash into the paper coffin, or put it into the pocket of the deceased, and then put the corpse into the paper coffin. It means money for children to travel.

The undertaker guides the filial son (eldest son or grandson) to open the light. The dutiful son holds a cotton swab, dips it in white wine or alcohol, and rubs it on the deceased, which is called opening the light. It means to restore various functions of its body. The lighting sequence is from head to toe, followed by head, eyes, nose, mouth, ears, chest, right hand, left hand and feet. The undertaker said that the dutiful son repeated it and then wiped it on the part. For example: open your nose and smell the flowers; ..... Open your right hand and write an article; Open your left hand and catch money and food; Open your feet and step on the lotus to open the hall. The opening remarks are slightly different for men and women.

When the light is turned on, family members can't cry, let alone shed tears on the body. After turning on the light, the body was handed over to the staff for makeup.

Hold a mourning ceremony or farewell ceremony. Before the ceremony, explain the life of the deceased to the master of ceremonies (prepare at home in advance), and give the list of major guests to the staff in the form of one-inch or two-inch photos. After the ceremony, the body was cremated. At the same time, under the leadership of the eldest son, a memorial ceremony and burning things were held.

Sacrifice portraits and memorial tablets, put grains, fruits and cakes (four in some places), and put flowers, liquor and cigarettes. The eldest son first incense, and then incense in the order of generations. According to the order of long before young, near before far.

Burn things. Burn some paper first, then burn the clothes of the victim, and then burn all the offerings. If there is a wreath, pick seven flowers and save them for burning at seven o'clock.

When cooking, sprinkle white wine on clothes to help burn. Burn things, finish the funeral, remove white flowers and filial piety. Immediate family changed to black veil.

Except for a few people, everyone else went to the funeral party. Prepare a few pots of water, liquor and candy outside the funeral hall. Anyone who comes back from the funeral home should wash his hands, sip with wine or contain a piece of sugar before entering the banquet hall.

Before the funeral, the family members lined up and the undertaker presided over it. The host announced that the family members thanked their relatives and friends for coming to the funeral, bowed to them, and then the family representatives spoke. The main content is thanks, and a thin wine is prepared for everyone to enjoy.

During the funeral, the main blood relatives of the younger generation will toast each table.

Get the ashes. In the urn, put seven coins in the shape of the big dipper. Then choose a large piece of ashes and put it in the urn. The last one should be the skull.

Stick a photo of the deceased on the front of the urn.

Ashes repository, over.