1. Proposal for marriage. In old-style marriage, "no marriage can occur without a matchmaker." The so-called matchmaker means to be a matchmaker with a man and a matchmaker with a woman. It is "matchmaking between two surnames to get married". The matchmaker sends a marriage proposal to the woman with a note. If the woman agrees, the man prepares a gift and goes to the woman's house to propose marriage, which is the "acceptance" of the six rites. There is a cumbersome marriage negotiation process from proposal to engagement.
Modern marriage, due to the open socialization of men and women, freedom of marriage and love, is basically free from the constraints of parents' orders and matchmakers' words. The cumbersome process of negotiating a marriage has gradually disappeared. However, it is quite common to make friends first after being introduced by the introducer, and then fall in love and get married. There are also public advertisements for marriage in newspapers and periodicals, and marriage agencies have appeared in society.
2. Engagement, commonly known as "engagement". There are complicated etiquette in the engagement process. The procedure is that the man and woman first exchange wedding invitations (also known as "dragon and phoenix invitations"), and then formally establish the marriage contract. When passing on the Cambodian invitation, you must also send a Cambodian pressure ceremony, commonly known as "Xia Xiaoding", which is "accepting the levy". The auspicious date for the engagement is chosen by the groom, and the groom is invited to host a banquet for the bride, her parents, brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, etc. In the old days, banquets were held at home, but now they are often held in restaurants, where engagement photos are taken, and the man also buys clothing, gold and silverware and other items for the woman.
After getting engaged, the fiancé will bring gifts to visit his parents-in-law during every Chinese New Year and holiday, especially heavy gifts during the Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival and Spring Festival.
3. The date of sending is called the "please date" in the Six Rites, that is, choosing the date of engagement. The day to be chosen must be determined by a fortune teller. After choosing an auspicious day, write down the wedding date with a red card. The groom's family will choose two days in two months to notify the bride's family. If the bride's family agrees, they will accept the groom's card and gift, write the four words "Yuntai Dengjia", and bring it to the matchmaker. He replied and said he would never reschedule. When preparing to get married, a matchmaker acts as an intermediary to discuss how to hold a banquet and determine how much money the man will give to the woman for verbal and cosmetics.
4. Welcoming the bride. Before the wedding, in order to give birth to a boy early after marriage, there is a folk custom of making and warming the bed. Generally, the bride's family invites a couple with many children to go to the groom's house to make the bed. When making the bed, the two people cannot speak and their actions cannot be sequential. This is called "simultaneous dark hair". When making the bed, spread out the mat first, then spread the mattress and quilt, and put 5 red eggs and 4 dumplings in the quilt. Hang green dragons (i.e. copper hair, copper ingots and strings of copper coins) on both sides of the bed, and hang auspicious embroidery pieces on the surface. , hanging a fat bag in the middle. Bed-warming is also called bed-pressing. On the eve of the wedding, a boy whose parents are still alive and all siblings are invited to accompany the groom to sleep on the same bed. The boy who presses the bed must eat all the chestnuts and dates on the corners of the quilt. It is commonly known as "Before marriage, children are on the bed, but after marriage, the family is full of descendants."
5. During the worship hall, the sedan chair is carried to the front door of the groom’s house. The bride gets out of the sedan chair amidst the sounds of firecrackers and gongs and drums. She is supported by the bride’s mother and moves to the living room with her feet on the sack. The meaning is "passed on from generation to generation." ". Afterwards, the wedding reaches its climax through a series of procedures such as worshiping in the hall, sitting with the rich and powerful, spreading the tent, joining the wedding ceremony, and having sex. The procedures for worshiping the church and making arrangements for a new house are different in the four towns and eight gates of Danyang. Some places are complicated, and some places are simple. In the Jinglin area of ??Danyang, after the bride and groom worship heaven and earth, a special person will pass the sacks all the way, and they will step on the sacks into the bridal chamber. This is called "passing the bag", which means "passing on the family line."
6. Wedding feast. When getting married, a wedding feast is held, which is called "drinking wedding wine". This custom has become more and more popular today. No matter where a banquet is held at home or in a restaurant, the host must stand outside the door; the bride and groom wear formal clothes to welcome the guests. Banquets usually have a dozen or even dozens of tables, ranging from eight dishes and eight bowls to shark's fin and seafood, which are becoming more and more luxurious. The bride and groom, accompanied by the best man and bridesmaid, toast table by table, and now the bride also offers cigarettes. Drinking during the toast pushed the wedding to a climax. The guests used all kinds of tricks to make things difficult for the bride and groom, and drank each other. Folks believe that it is unlucky not to make trouble, and the more trouble there is, the happier both men and women will be.
7. Returning home. The bride and groom usually return home during the third dynasty, but some may return home after six or seven days or after the full moon. When the bridegroom enters his wife's house, he must meet his parents-in-law and elders in front of the hall, and perform a greeting ceremony with relatives and friends. The groom takes the first seat at lunch. When you return home, you must return to your husband's house on the same day and do not stay at your in-law's house. This is because there was an old custom of not leaving the house empty within one month of marriage.