Changle's marriage customs? The more detailed, the better.

Changle marriage custom

Speaking of Changle folk customs, I'm afraid the wedding customs are the most colorful. A traditional marriage, from "starting a job" to "bridal chamber", is rich in content and diverse in forms, which not only embodies the characteristics of China culture everywhere, but also has distinctive local characteristics of Changle. So what are the contents and forms of Changle's traditional marriage customs? First of all, its first procedure is called "posting" and "getting married". What is "posting"? This is equivalent to the "first love" in an independent marriage. But in the past, it was different. Both men and women are arranged by their parents, which is called "parents' orders, matchmakers' words" And because the ancients believed that people's marriage was arranged by a marriage god named "the old man under the moon", but the marriage god wouldn't directly tell you who this life was destined to be? Therefore, the ancients came up with a method based on "birth" to "test" whether the marriage between men and women conforms to the marriage of "the elderly under the moon". This is nonsense, but in the past it has become a necessity for men and women to get married. In order to marry their children, parents have to ask someone to write their children's birthdays on a piece of red paper in exchange. This red paper is called "Gengtie". Parents give their children's wedding cards to each other, indicating their consent to get married. This is what Changle people call the "seven railways". Under normal circumstances, Geng Tie was given by the matchmaker. After parents receive each other's Geng posts, they will seriously ask someone to calculate whether there is a rush in the eight characters for the sake of their children's marriage. This calculation is called "marriage" Under normal circumstances, if calculated by "unmarried", if parents believe in the "marriage character", their children's marriage will "blow". So they retired from each other and found another "marriage". Of course, some parents were unwilling to break off their children's beautiful marriage, and such a thing became a "dark stage". It is worth mentioning here that although many men and women can "get married" after calculation, due to some people's "marriage luck", Geng Tie always hits a wall when he is sent out. Is it annoying? In order to "get married", there are such things as "changing the year, changing the month and changing the day". In addition, there was no clock in the past, and the time of birth was often uncertain. So strictly speaking, many people who can get married are also confused. However, in any case, parents can't easily know the truth of each other's posts. Therefore, as long as you can get married, marriage will continue. It can be seen that the "marriage theory" is just self-deception.

There is an old saying in Changle, "Choose men to look after children and women to look after mothers." It means that women are better than anything else to be "good children" and men are almost as good mothers. Of course, there are other conditions, but at least it shows that Changle people are relatives, and parents value people, not "marriage figures." Moreover, "the matchmaker talks nonsense", parents will not just rely on the matchmaker's words, see the wind and rain, ask nothing, and play with their children's lifelong events. Therefore, when a man and a woman get married, both parents will try their best to get to know each other as much as possible. This program is called "checking relatives". So what did you check in the past? Check the rural situation, such as the size of the village, the rich and the poor, and the atmosphere is good or bad. In most small villages, poor villages and "bad" villages, parents don't want to marry women to such places. Some people will "brush their heads (exclude)" when they hear the name of the village. At the same time, Changle once had a "bad atmosphere". After marriage, some women who are "big names in big villages and hard houses" often go back to their parents' homes to "help as soldiers" if their husbands bully them or are unhappy, commonly known as "leaving their parents' homes", which makes their husband's family fidgety, and many parents are afraid to marry such a daughter-in-law. Therefore, careful parents, "checking relatives" often start with "homesickness". Second, check the family, such as family status, reputation, property, structure, etc. Three of them are very important: one is "family style", because Changle is "Zou Lu on the seashore, a famous literary country", and the word "reputation" is the most important. Therefore, any family with a bad reputation will always have "official power and financial power", and it is always difficult for children to get close. Second, the "wealth" is mostly due to the consideration of "matching the family". The richer the family, the more serious it is, especially the woman's economy is better, and the woman is outstanding. Parents are most afraid of losing money in this respect. Third, "personnel", as the saying goes, "a thousand dollars and a thousand valves (official power) are not as good as Ma Le." This naturally refers to family relations, so it is good to be kind to other people's children. People who are "three or five children, four or five big" are afraid. Why? It turns out that this statement refers to polygamous or stepmarried families in the past, because many brothers are half-brothers, often "three to five children, four to five strive for greatness", and families are not harmonious, so parents naturally do not want to marry their daughters to such families. Third, check the child's female, such as age, appearance, conduct and so on. Of course, there are men's occupations. Will women be female workers? "Responsible for expenses." "Wise parents, the most important thing is this, obviously for the happiness of their children's marriage, so that the husband and wife can follow Qi Mei's example and grow old together in the future." Hearing is virtual, seeing is believing. " When parents "check relatives", they will also let their parents secretly take a look at the future "son-in-law" and "daughter-in-law" through the matchmaker without their children's knowledge, so that parents can make up their minds. This is the old "checking relatives".

After the "red line ties the feet" between men and women, it is usually the man who puts forward the marriage plan first and lets the matchmaker tell the woman. Once the woman's parents agree to the man's marriage, the next procedure is for the man to send a "daily list", which is the auspicious day chosen by the man, to inform the woman. However, in the past, when men chose to get married, there was a rule: it must be in the second half of autumn. The reason is that in the former farming society, the second half of autumn was the slack season, which was not only beneficial for both parties to arrange marriage, but also to take care of relatives and friends to relax and hold a wedding reception. Second, the weather was cold in the second half of the year, and there was no refrigeration equipment before, which was conducive to food preservation. Third, good furnishings on the bed can add luster to the new house in cold weather. Therefore, in the past, Changle urban and rural areas basically did not get married in the first half of the year. Because of the poor economic and material conditions in the past, getting married is an earth-shattering event. In order to have enough time to make preparations, the man must send the "daily list" together with the "gifts for the second half of life", gold and silver jewelry, "ten colors" gifts (mainly pork) and some wedding cakes that the man gave to the woman before May of the following year. At the same time, the "daily list" must be written in good red paper. When the woman receives the "daily list" and all kinds of articles, she also carries out a ceremony of offering sacrifices to her ancestors, and then takes out a small number of articles in the "Ten Colors" as "good omen". After that, parents distributed wedding cakes and pork to relatives and elders. All close relatives who eat wedding cakes and pork should "add boxes" when the woman gets married, that is, give gold, silver or clothes, which is also an important etiquette in Changle traditional wedding customs. In the next few months, the man will be busy repairing the house and adding furniture, and will generally start a new stove for the bride to "try the tripod" in the future; At the same time, wedding invitations should be sent to relatives and friends one or two months before the wedding date. The woman naturally has to prepare a dowry. If it is a peasant woman, parents will let her daughter go out in public or take part in labor, which is called "housekeeping"; At the same time, the girl's family will learn some "wedding songs" to prepare for the "embroidered shoes" night. These songs should be sung by parents, elders and others.

Traditional wedding arrangements are extremely grand, but mainly concentrated in the married man's home. Before the wedding, the most important thing for a married party is to paste couplets, also called wedding couplets. Married people should not only paste red wedding couplets in ancestral halls, living rooms and kitchens, but also paste red wedding couplets in places with pillars, gates, small doors and windows to decorate the environment and render a festive atmosphere. At the same time, wedding couplets will also be affixed to the clan in-laws who "cook and drink together" (the whole family will attend) to unite the affinity of the family, so that those who help with the wedding can come uninvited and show the atmosphere of "helping the heat" (unity) of the clan. Writing wedding couplets is different from writing Spring Festival couplets. First, the paper is different. The Spring Festival couplets only use red paper, but the wedding couplets must use a kind of "white-headed red paper". Why use "white-headed red paper"? In a word, because "grow old together" means "grow old together", which is the best wish of marriage. Second, the content is richer. The meaning of Spring Festival couplets is basically the same. They all say "Celebrate the Spring Festival and pray for good luck", but the connotation of Spring Festival couplets is endless. For example, the ancestral hall must praise the ancestral industry and the ancestral virtue, and show the family's "hall number", so that the ancestral halls with different surnames and branches will have their own advantages. In the new house, it is necessary to write something like "harmony between husband and wife, laurel blue, and a full house of children and grandchildren", while in the kitchen, it will be written around "harmony between three, six and five flavors". In this way, the cheap traditional culture and taste will be high. At the same time, Changle people have two characteristics in writing wedding couplets: first, they must write a picture of "Jia Guanlian" in class and stick it on the wall. The content is roughly: what is the name of the long man or the two men, and what is the order of the word Jia Guan? Let people know at a glance whose son is getting married. Second, we must write a picture of "Jiang Taigong is here, all free from sin" in the new house and stick it on the latch of the window or other places, so it is called "liberation couplet" to ward off evil spirits. Put up wedding couplets, and then decorate the ancestral temple and new house. Let's talk about the layout of the ancestral hall first. It is inevitable to tidy up and clean up clutter for weddings and banquets. On the wedding day, we will decorate the front hall with lanterns, and hang a pair of "high photos" (a kind of big lanterns) and a piece of red silk on the beam to show "the happy event of our family". If you have a portrait of your ancestors, you should hang it in the "nave". Fan Zutang is an old house with a threshold in the Ming Dynasty. It is necessary to remove the threshold in order to "get rich and become an official" through celebration. But women can't get off the threshold when they get off the sedan chair. Let's talk about the layout of the new house. Attention should be paid to the arrangement of beds, tables, cabinets and bedding. When the room is noisy, we must set aside more space to entertain guests. So everyone in the village knows who is happy.