The Japanese wedding dress, why is it so similar to the Chinese mourning clothes?

Japan is not only a neighbor of our country, historically they have a lot of exchanges with us, Japanese culture, architecture, writing and other aspects of tracing their roots are actually from China. However, some things in China and Japan are very different, for example, our ancient marriage are wearing red, the Japanese like to wear a white wedding, many Chinese people attended the traditional Japanese wedding feel that it is in the funeral, and some people even joked that this is the Japanese learned the wrong!

Unlike the Chinese bride to wear a red wedding dress, the Japanese bride will wear a white kimono at the time of marriage, and even a white hat on the head, in accordance with our Chinese customs, this is very much in the funeral ah! In fact, the Japanese bride wore white clothes from the "hanging", this thing was originally some Japanese aristocratic women in the spring and fall dress, they will wear the coat in the inner small-sleeved kimono, which played a role in keeping warm. By the Edo period, women of the upper class in Japan wore the hitokiri, which was intended to emphasize their distinctive status. At this time there were also women who would wear such a set of clothes exclusively when they got married.

The Japanese call this white dress "Shirakumoi," and it was the wedding dress of ancient Japanese women, with the bride changing into a colorful and festive kimono three days later for the yang ceremony. The bride's entire body is covered in white, symbolizing purity and innocence. On top of the white immaculate dress is a hat, which the Japanese call "Kakugakushi," meaning that it can easily be mistaken by the Chinese for mourning garments. The Japanese believe that a woman's hair is capable of attaching to the soul, so it is important to cover it with a white cap at the time of marriage to achieve the effect of driving away evil spirits.

In addition, the Japanese wear white immaculate also really have the meaning of "condolence", the ancient Japanese believe that: a daughter married like a splash of water, means that in the mother's family "death", but also marks the rebirth of the husband's family. That's why girls wear white, which is the equivalent of a funeral for their youth and their past. The bride is dressed in white and her husband is dressed in black, is this really a marriage? Chinese people who don't know look at it and think it's black and white!

Then again, different countries and nationalities have their own customs and habits, and people's western wedding dresses are also white. However, Japanese women are not only required to wear the "white unblemished" when they get married, but also to wear a similar white dress when they attend funerals! It's really similar to Chinese mourning clothes, and the Japanese believe that dressing the dead in white is a way of praying for their souls to be transcended and not be lost on earth.

It's a bit of a joke, wearing white for both funerals and weddings, and not only do Chinese people not understand it, but Westerners can't figure out why the Japanese would do it. The Japanese, after the Meiji Restoration, also found the tradition ungainly, but since the West also wears white for weddings, they used the Western explanation to try to get away with it. Of course, although Japanese wedding clothes are called "white and immaculate", they are in fact not pure white, and are usually embellished with other colors.

White nude in Japanese culture has a complex meaning, which implies discrimination against women, coupled with its meaning and perception is not good, few Japanese people nowadays will still wear white nude in the wedding.