Details of walking on stilts

There is a legend among the Han people that Yan Ying, who was famous for his antics during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, once went to a neighboring country. People in the neighboring country laughed at his short stature, so he put on a Shuang Mu leg and suddenly became taller, making the monarch and ministers of this country look ridiculous. He also used this topic to make sarcastic speeches to foreign ministers, which still embarrassed them. Accordingly, stilt walking activities spread among the people.

Another legend is that walking on stilts is related to cracking down on corrupt officials. Once upon a time, there was a county called Liang Jincheng. People inside and outside the city are very friendly. Every Spring Festival, they hold a social fire together to wish each other a prosperous business and a bumper harvest. Unexpectedly, a corrupt official took this as an opportunity to get rich, saying that everyone who went in and out of the city to run a social fire had to pay San Qian money. If people don't pay, he will close the city gate and hang the suspension bridge. But it's still hard for smart people to walk on stilts. Climb over the city wall, cross the moat, continue to celebrate the Spring Festival and enjoy it. Scholars believe that the origin of stilts is related to the totem worship of primitive clans and the fishing life of coastal fishermen. According to historians' research, the Danzhu clan, which took cranes as totems in the Yao and Shun era, danced on stilts during sacrifices to imitate cranes. (See Sun Zuoyun's Talk about Dani); Archaeologists believe that there are characters in ancient Oracle Bone Inscriptions that approximate the image of walking on stilts. (Fang Qidong's Dance of Shang Dynasty in Oracle Bone Inscriptions) The two can prove each other.

There is a description of "long-share country" in the ancient document Shan Hai Jing. According to the notes of the ancients, we can know that the "long-share country" is related to walking on stilts. From the notes that "long-legged people often take long-armed people to fish in the sea", it is not difficult to imagine the image of fishing in shallow water with long wooden stakes tied to their feet and primitive fishing tools made of long wood. More interestingly, the Jing fishermen who live along the coast of Fangcheng, Guangxi today still have the habit of fishing with long stakes in shallow waters. With regard to the origin of stilts, the late historian Sun Zuoyun (A.D. 19 12 ~ 1978) put forward that stilts originated from cranes for the first time in the article "On Danzhu —— A study of ancient crane families in China ——— On the totem of stilts dancing", based on the ancient literature such as Shan Hai Jing. Guo Pu, a native of A Jin, commented: "Or there is a country of Qiao, and today a musician's Qiao built this statue." Wu Renchen commented: "When a Qiao plays, two pieces of wood continue to be sufficient, which is called stilts." Both kinds of notes think that long-legged Chinese are long-legged people tied to their feet with wooden stilts. Zhu Dan Lun holds that stilts originated from primitive totem beliefs and were used in religious sacrificial ceremonies, and evolved from acrobatic performances to dance forms that played the role of traditional operas. Danzhu in the Yao and Shun period was a clan with cranes as its totem, and stilt play directly originated from the dance of the ancient crane totem clan. Recently, some scholars believe that there is a word in Oracle bone inscriptions that can be interpreted as "dancing like a person, dancing with a stick". If it is established, this unique stilt dance form of Han nationality has already appeared in the late Shang Dynasty at the latest. This is a supplement from totem worship. Moreover, in the religious ceremony of tchokwe tribe in Zaire, Africa, there is also a performance of walking on stilts. A wizard walked slowly with long wooden stilts tied to his legs and danced slowly with his hands. This is another proof that the art of "totem worship" and "religious ceremony" originated from nature. In fact, walking on stilts is the product of the struggle between human beings and natural conditions. The origin of labor theory can be based on another note by Guo Pu: Long-arm China people have the same body as ordinary people, but their arms are three feet long. "In other words, long-legged people often carry long-armed people to go fishing in the sea." From this, it is associated with wooden stilts with long feet and long hands, and depicts the image of Jing fishermen who live in the "three islands of Jing nationality" in Fangcheng, Guangxi, stepping on wooden stilts and casting nets in shallow water to fish. According to 1930' s Art Style magazine, "Chopsticks Street and Tielong Street in Wuchang are often flooded because of their low status. Whenever they are flooded, almost all the residents there walk on stilts. This is a stilt from work and life records. Stilts originally belonged to one of the hundred ancient operas in China, which appeared as early as the Spring and Autumn Period. In China, stilts first appeared in Liezi Fu Shuo: "Those who had orchids in the Song Dynasty used their skills to dry the Song and Yuan Dynasties. Summoned in the Song and Yuan Dynasties to see their skills. There are two branches twice as long as its body, belonging to its shin, which go hand in hand, making the seven swords overlap and jump. Five swords were always in the air, and Yuan Jun was frightened and gave him gold and silk. "As can be seen from the article, stilts were popular as early as 500 BC. Performers can not only walk with long wood tied to their feet, but also jump and dance swords. Stilts are divided into three types: stilts, middle stilts and running stilts, with the highest being more than ten feet. In the Han, Wei and Six Dynasties, stilts were called "stilts" and in the Song Dynasty, they were called "stepping on a bridge". Known as "stilts" since the Qing Dynasty, it is made of 1 to 3 feet long wooden strips and wooden supports. Performers tie their feet to sticks and dress up as various figures. One or more people dance together and perform interesting actions or stories with suona. Beijing is known as the "stilt club". The Yellow River valley is called "sticking high feet", which can be divided into Wen stilts and Wu stilts. Wenqiao mainly performs walking and singing, and the dance movements are simple. Wuqiao performed handstands, high jump tables, stacked arhats and splits.

According to ancient records, ancient stilts were all made of wood. Make a support point in the middle of the planed wooden stick to put your feet, and then tie it to your legs with a rope. Performers can dance swords, splits, stools, cross tables and yangko when walking on stilts. In the northern stilt yangko, there are fishermen, matchmakers, silly sons, second brothers, Taoist priests and monks. The performer's funny performance can arouse the audience's great interest. In the south, stilts play the role of traditional operas, including Guan Gong, Zhang Fei, Lv Dongbin, He Xiangu, Zhang Sheng, matchmaker, Jigong, immortal and clown. They sang while performing, making fun and entertaining themselves. It is said that this form of walking on stilts was originally developed by ancient people in order to collect wild fruits from trees for food and tie two long sticks to their legs. Nowadays, stilts used by people are mostly made of wood, and performances can be divided into double stilts and single stilts. Double stilts are often tied to the calf to show their skills; Holding the top of wooden stilts with both hands, it is convenient to go up and down, dynamic and interesting. Its performances can be divided into "Wen stilts" and "Wu stilts". Literary stilts emphasize pretending and teasing, while martial stilts emphasize personal skills and unique skills. Stilts around the country have formed a distinctive regional style and national color.

Wushu stilts in northern Henan, which originated in Ming and Qing Dynasties, is a unique dance art of Han nationality in China.

The height of stilts varies from a few inches to seven or eight feet in Shanxi. In Ruicheng County and Xinjiang County of Shanxi Province, the height of stilts reaches 15 feet or even 18 feet. Usually, the height of stilts is about four feet. Stilts have a long history in Shanxi, and pictures of stilts and acrobatics can also be seen on the sarcophagus of the Northern Wei Dynasty unearthed in Yushe County, Jinzhong area. Although stilts are not recorded in writing, they should have started in the Northern Wei Dynasty at the latest. There are two kinds of stilts in Shanxi: Wen stilts and Wu stilts. Literary stilts are more important than twisting steps, while martial stilts mainly perform stunts.

In Fushan County, the first stilt is the conductor, the second stilt is the leader, the opera characters are in the middle, and finally the ugly ones are behind. The performance begins with twisting various field maps, and then performs various difficult movements such as "crossing the fairy bridge", "jumping on the table", "jumping on the double stool" and "splitting".

In Hucun, Yuanqu County, stilts mainly perform stunts. The stilt performances here not only have tricks such as twisting waist, bumping, backflip, falling fork, jumping table and somersaulting, but also have difficult lifting methods such as lifting two knots, three knots, sitting lifting, standing lifting and combination lifting, and can form the shape of "horse-drawn cart" and "crossing the overpass". Walking on stilts in this county, the most difficult thing is to "climb the tiger ladder".

"Butterfly" in Bai Bi Village, Xinjiang County and Shuangchi Town, Jiaokou County are stilt programs, which have both storylines and many difficult movements. This program is performed by three people. The young woman plays the role of an angel, carrying a butterfly on her back, the young man plays the role of a niche, holding a butterfly fan, and the clown plays and chases with a rattle. It is very vivid, lively and interesting. In the performance, these three people have some skills, such as squatting, jumping on the table, kite flipping, jumping over the head, rolling backwards and jumping on one leg.

The "animal stilts" in Jishan County and Youyu County are conjoined stilts performed by two people. Stilts performers have wooden stilts tied to their feet, animal skins tied to their waists and animal heads tied to their foreheads. Their upper body plays the corresponding numbers to form a group of shapes, dancing forward in the music and gongs and drums.

It is very difficult for three people to step on four stilts in Xiaxian and other places, and four people * * * tie five stilts, so the performance needs tacit cooperation.

The stilts in Yuanping, Pingding and Dingxiang counties are called "stilt yangko", which is called "stilt yangko" by twisting yangko steps and changing formation, and then commenting and singing. In Ganjiazhuang, Xixian County, there is also a performance mode of "singing stilts", in which a small bell is tied at the joints of stilts.

In Shanxi province, stilt performances are varied and eclectic. The performance time of these stilts is generally in the "golden age" activities around the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, and stilts are a form of performance in the whole activity. This kind of activity is flexible in content and relatively free in action. You can perform in a big venue or walk around the street.

It is the Lantern Festival, and the countryside in Cangzhou, Hebei Province is full of joy. Dancing yangko, walking on stilts, dancing long dragons and running dry boats, the farmers spent the Lantern Festival happily. The picture shows the stilt team performing stilts in Nanxiaoying Village, Cang County. Stilts are popular in Northeast China, and the most famous is "Southern Liaoning Stilts". Its form is complete and its performance is standardized. At first, I wanted to "build an elephant" (in the shape of a two-story building) to sing yangko, which means "there is an elephant living in peace", and then I ran to the big field to change the formation, and then performed duets, "butterflies flapping" and "fishermen fishing", and performed folk operas in groups.

On the stilts of ethnic minorities, actors all wear their own clothes and perform in a unique way. For example, Buyi people have both double stilts and single stilts (also known as single stilts), which are easy to make by holding both ends of stilts with both hands, and their single stilts are especially popular with children; Bai people's "stilts play with horses", in which actors also step on wooden stilts and perform with horse-shaped props; The "double stilts" of Uighurs integrate folk dance into it, which is refreshing.

Walking on stilts is also called "crutches" in the five-guarantee area.